A Blue View

GOP Politicians "are going out there, they are unknowing of the facts, and they are making charges and allegations that are not anchored in reality”

NY Times:

The White House pushed back Sunday against Republican criticism of its approach to terrorism, calling it “not anchored in reality” as a national security debate that was largely muted in recent years roared back to center stage with an angry intensity.

After a week of sustained attacks led by former Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska and a host of Congressional Republicans, President Obama and his aides argued that they were handling terror suspects much as the previous administration did, dismissing Republican complaints as politically motivated.

“The most important thing for the public to understand is we’re not handling any of these cases any different than the Bush administration handled them all through 9/11,” Mr. Obama told CBS News on Sunday. “They prosecuted 190 folks in these Article Three courts,” he added, referring to civilian courts. “Got convictions. And those folks are in maximum security prisons right now. And there have been no escapes.”

Mr. Obama’s counterterrorism adviser, John O. Brennan, was more scathing about the Republican criticism. “Quite frankly, I am tiring of politicians using national security issues such as terrorism as a political football,” Mr. Brennan, a longtime Central Intelligence Agency officer, who also worked under President George W. Bush, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “They are going out there, they are unknowing of the facts, and they are making charges and allegations that are not anchored in reality.”

The White House rebuttal came a day after Ms. Palin drew rousing applause at a convention of Tea Party activists by declaring that “we need a commander in chief, not a professor of law.” Appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” Ms. Palin followed up her critique of Mr. Obama by attacking what she called “this perceived lackadaisical approach that he has to dealing with the terrorists.”

The exchanges reflected a stark escalation in rhetoric in recent weeks as the uneasy truce on terrorism that existed at the beginning of the Obama presidency evaporated. The Republican critique of Mr. Obama as a Miranda-reading, soft-on-terror president attempts to tap into an historic vulnerability for Democrats, with midterm elections on the horizon and the president already on the defensive on a health care bill and the economy.

Strategists in both parties said the argument had gained new traction with the attempted Christmas Day bombing of an airliner, the missed deadline for closing the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and the collapse of the plan for a trial in New York of the self-described mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks. Some Democrats worried that Mr. Obama was losing control of the issue politically.

“Terrorism has really become an issue again,” said Leslie H. Gelb, a former president of the Council on Foreign Relations. “It’s jumped to a much higher level because of the Christmas bomber that scared the willies out of people.” And, he added, “for the most part, the narrative has been taken out of the White House’s hands.”

Republicans said they were seeing growing alarm after a year of Mr. Obama’s policies. “People suspended judgment and wanted to let him play his hand,” Karl Rove, the former adviser to Mr. Bush, said of the president. But the Christmas Day bombing attempt “has caused doubts about how he is handling this to bubble to the surface.” ...

The Woman Who Doesn't Know What Her Priorities Would Be Is Running For President

Andrew Sullivan I:

Of Course She's Running For President

It's her divine mission, as she sees it. And it would be a function of "divine intervention" as she explicitly said last night.

Ambers, previously a skeptic, comes around. Given the complete lack of talent among GOP ranks and their universal fear of taking on Palin supporters, it seems obvious to me she will likely be the next GOP nominee. My hope, of course, is that this a) forces what was once a serious governing party to nominate a responsible fiscal conservative in the primaries and fight back against the madness; or b) drives every last sane conservative to realize they have no choice but to back Obama; or c) that Palin so alienates the GOP elites by primary challenges that they somehow manage to quash her and she runs as a "rogue" third party George Wallace style candidate, and helps re-elect Obama by an electoral college landslide.

This is so far into the future, of course, that it's pure speculation.

She may also implode as more scrutiny exposes who she  and her dangerous, radical and clearly controlling husband really are. But I'm beginning to wonder if there's anything in her past, any lie or scandal, that could at this point deter her supporters. If she were found guilty of a Watergate-level iniquity, they'd see it as a frame-up by the liberal elites (as many, remember, did Nixon). And those elites, out of cowardice and fear, never nipped this in the bud when they could have; and that bitter old cynic, McCain, gave her the platform she needed. 

So we have here a truly Coughlinite movement, headed by an Eva Peron figure, eager to use the Dolchstoss card to bring out the kind of voters Rove always believed could eventually crush even the most mobilized democratic GOTV operation.

Know fear.

Andrew Sullivan II:

Palin's Cheat Sheet

Having mocked president Obama for using a TelePrompter - not long after he made mincemeat of Republicans with no such TelePrompter at their retreat - she had to scribble down her priorities as president on her palm for the truly tough-as-nails Q and A she had to endure for ten minutes or so last night.

Written on her hand:

"Energy"

"Budget [crossed out] (Cuts)"

"Tax"

"Lift American spirits"

My favorite detail is "[Budget] Cuts". Which just about sums up the real Tea Party agenda on spending. But it also suggests that she was told in advance of the questions she would be asked, one of which was what would be you priorities if you were elected president? Now think about this: she had to write on her hand her priorities as president.

 

Everything You Need To Know About President Obama, The deficit & The Right

Jonathan Chait:

Pretty much everything you need to know about President Obama and the budget deficit is contained within this chart:

The chart, which is based on Congressional Budget Office figures, shows something which is both incontrovertible yet known by very few people:Obama's budget does not increase the long-term, or even the medium-term, budget deficit. It reduces it slightly.Most of the commentary castigating Obama for the deficit is an attempt to imply, usually without quite saying so, that Obama's policies have caused the red ink. This editorial from National Review is typical:

federal fiscal policy has now run completely off the rails... what had been a chronic problem that all involved knew needed corrective action has now become, in the Obama years, a full-fledged disaster in the making.... If the Obama budget is adopted in full, federal borrowing will top $18 trillion by 2020. Over the period 2011 to 2020, the president’s plan is to run deficits totaling an astounding $8.5 trillion.

Based on the writing of this editorial, NR's editors know full well that Obama's budget does not cause the fiscal disaster. They are blaming him for failing to clean up the mess he inherited. That's a fair thing to blame him for, but it's not a serious enough crime to sustain the rhetorical fury. So the NR has written the editorial in such a way as to lead its readers to the erroneous conclusion that Obama has caused the deficit. It's true that "If the Obama budget is adopted in full, federal borrowing will top $18 trillion by 2020." What the editorial fails to say is what will happen to federal borrowing if Obama's budget is not adopted. We are supposed to think that the debt will be lower, but it won't. It would be higher.

I'm singling out National Review, as I said, not because it's egregious, but because its rhetorical trick is completely typical of the argument coming out of the Republican Party and the conservative movement. Just about every argument you'll hear from the right about the budget will be some version of this rhetorical maneuver.

More Haiti Cartoons On The Media & Right-Wing

A Double Agent? (cartoon)

 

Cheney Cartoons

Cheney Utters More Nonesense From His Lair (cartoon)

Hypocrite Cheney Does It Again; White House Hits Back

Wash Post:

The political war over the failed Christmas Day bombing of a U.S. airliner showed no signs of abating Wednesday as leaders of both parties escalated their attacks, employing fiery rhetoric in assessing blame for the Detroit incident.

Former vice president Richard B. Cheney led a GOP offensive to assail President Obama's leadership on national security, charging that the American people are less safe because, Cheney believes, Obama is "pretending" that the United States is not at war with terrorists.

"We are at war and when President Obama pretends we aren't, it makes us less safe," Cheney, one of Obama's strongest critics, said in a statement to Politico. "Why doesn't he want to admit we're at war? It doesn't fit with the view of the world he brought with him to the Oval Office. It doesn't fit with what seems to be the goal of his presidency -- social transformation -- the restructuring of American society."

Top aides to Obama and Democratic leaders pushed back aggressively, accusing Cheney and other Republicans of politicizing the incident in ways they say Democrats did not during previous terrorist acts.

"Cheney was out there today saying that the president doesn't recognize that we have a war on terror," White House senior adviser David Axelrod said in an interview. "This is the president who has made a very tough decision to refocus our efforts in Afghanistan after seven years of drift."

Democrats said the Bush administration -- chiefly Cheney -- failed to keep its focus on the fight against al-Qaeda as it pursued war in Iraq.

"This president is not interested in bellicose rhetoric, he is focused on action," White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer wrote on a blog. "Seven years of bellicose rhetoric failed to reduce the threat from al Qaeda and succeeded in dividing this country. And it seems strangely off-key now, at a time when our country is under attack, for the architect of those policies to be attacking the president."

For days, a chorus of GOP leaders has sought to portray Obama as weak on national security because of his administration's response to the incident as well as the intelligence and security failures that allowed Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board a Northwest Airlines flight carrying an explosive.

Republicans said Obama should have interrupted his Hawaiian vacation before Monday to address last Friday's attack. But Democrats called this a double standard, saying they did not attack then-President George W. Bush when he said nothing during his vacation in Crawford, Tex., for nearly a week after shoe bomber Richard C. Reid's failed attack in 2001.

"Republicans are simply hypocrites," Democratic National Committee spokesman Brad Woodhouse said. "There is nothing -- no bounds whatsoever -- to what they will politicize for their own political gain."

House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) on Wednesday said the Detroit incident is evidence that Obama should reconsider his decision to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. "It's time for the president to halt terrorist transfers to other countries, including Yemen."

The detainees who ended up in the al-Qaeda leadership in Yemen were released not by Obama but by Bush two years ago.

"Obama is a Communist"

Bet you didn't know that.  Luckily Commieblaster informed us all when he commented on yesterday's post, Bill Ayers dumps Obama:

Bill Ayers is a Communist and has ties to 8 people in the White House. See facts here: http://www.commieblaster.com/bill_ayers/index.html. Obama is a Communist. See facts here: http://www.commieblaster.com/obama/index.htm. 80+ in Congress are Communists. See facts here: http://www.commieblaster.com/progressives/index.html

His site, btw, is quite a paranoid, historically-ignorant trip.

Commieblaster's comment reminded me of the anonymous note I received while campaigning for Obama during the election:

  

and the subsequent comment A Blue View reader left about it:

I have been pretty active in campaigning for Barack Obama. A lot of folks where I live know this about me. I strive to do this, both in the community and on the canvassing trail as politely and respectfully as possible. However, not everyone wants to behave in a like manner. Yesterday I was verbally accosted at our local school bus stop. Out of the blue - I did not bring up the subject of politics - I was told that if Obama was elected, that I would be the one to blame. I was told that "We will come knocking on your (my) door to blame you (me) for having to live in a socialist society".

At the time these events occurred, EJ Dione asked:

Are we witnessing the reemergence of the far right as a power in American politics? Has John McCain, inadvertently perhaps, become the midwife of a new movement built around fear, xenophobia, racism and anger? ...  We are in the midst of what could become -- and here's hoping it doesn't -- the worst economic downturn in decades. The last thing we need is a campaign that strengthens fanaticism, tarnishes the authority of the next president and whips up the worst kinds of prejudice. 

Thanks to Commieblaster, the birthers & Tea Baggers, I think it is both sad and clear that we have witnessed the rebirth of the far right fringe over the last year. The unanswered question, is how powerful are they? Will they effect enough elections to have impact?

Your thoughts?

"We should have a muslim-only check in line at our airports" (animated cartoon)

 

The Apocalypse The Right-Wing Fears With Stupifying Consistency Has Not Come To Pass

The New Republic:

Conservatives have lined up in near-unanimous opposition to any progressive legislation introduced during President Obama’s first year in office. Whether they’ve been railing against health care reform, a climate bill, or financial regulation, their ire has stemmed less from legislative specifics than from a generalized prophecy of doom: Obama’s proposals will move the country toward socialism, bankrupt entire industries and small businesses, and deny Americans their basic freedoms.

These arguments, however, aren’t new. Conservatives—not just Republicans, but various politicians and groups who’ve resisted major social changes—recycled them throughout the twentieth century. They used them to oppose numerous progressive measures that Americans now take for granted, from women’s suffrage to child-labor laws to Medicare. [See "The Republican Party ... [has not and] cannot come to grips with the very nature of the problems of modern American politics"]. Here we’ve collected a few choice predictions about disaster that never came. Conservatives today might prefer they be forgotten.

“It may be impracticable that our distinctively American experiment of individual freedom should go on.”

—Senator David Hill (D-NY), in 1894, bemoaning the creation of a federal income tax

“Woman suffrage would give to the wives and daughters of the poor a new opportunity to gratify their envy and mistrust of the rich. Meantime these new voters would become either the purchased or cajoled victims of plausible political manipulators, or the intimidated and helpless voting vassals of imperious employers.”

—Former President Grover Cleveland, in 1905, on why women shouldn’t be able to vote

“[T]he child will become a very dominant factor in the household and might refuse perhaps to do chores before six a.m. or after seven p.m. or to perform any labor.”

—Senator Weldon Heyburn (R-ID), in 1908, on why child labor should remain unregulated

“I fear it may end the progress of a great country and bring its people to the level of the average European. It will furnish delicious food and add great strength to the political demagogue. It will assist in driving worthy and courageous men from public life. It will discourage and defeat the American trait of thrift. It will go a long way toward destroying American initiative and courage.”

—Senator Daniel O. Hastings (R-DE), in 1935, listing the evils of Social Security

“[I]t would make it practically impossible for any publisher in the United States to accept any food, drug, or cosmetic advertising without facing squarely into the doors of a jail.”

—Federal Trade Commission Chair Ewin L. Davis, in 1935, on the dangers of empowering the Food and Drug Administration to regulate the food, drug, and cosmetic industries ...

“[The Act represents] a step in the direction of Communism, bolshevism, fascism, and Nazism.”

—The National Association of Manufacturers, in 1938, condemning a national minimum wage and guaranteed overtime pay

“It is destroying the amicable relations between the white and Negro races that have been created through 90 years of patient effort by the good people of both races. It has planted hatred and suspicion where there has been heretofore friendship and understanding.”

—Senator Strom Thurmond (D-SC), Senator Richard Russell (D-GA), and other Southern legislators, in 1956, describing the perils of integrating public schools

“It is socialism. It moves the country in a direction which is not good for anyone, whether they be young or old. It charts a course from which there will be no turning back.”

—Senator Carl Curtis (R-NE), in 1965, opposing Medicare

“[T]his bill could prevent continued production of automobiles . . . [and] is a threat to the entire American economy and to every person in America.”

—Lee Iacocca, executive vice president of Ford Motor Company, in 1970, on why the government shouldn’t regulate airborne contaminants that are hazardous to human health

“The effects include serious long-term losses in domestic output and employment, heavy cost burdens on manufacturing industries, and a resultant gradual contraction of the entire industrial base. The irony of this bleak scenario is that these economic hardships are borne with no real assurance they would be balanced by a cleaner, healthier environment.”

—The National Association of Manufacturers, in 1987, on the perils of an emissions reduction program to combat acid rain

“The doctor begins to lose freedoms; it’s like telling a lie, and one leads to another. First you decide that the doctor can have so many patients. They are equally divided among the various doctors by the government. But then the doctors aren’t equally divided geographically, so a doctor decides he wants to practice in one town and the government has to say to him you can’t live in that town, they already have enough doctors. You have to go someplace else. And from here it is only a short step to dictating where he will go.”

—Ronald Reagan, in 1961, arguing against the creation of Medicare

It's Time For You To Go (cartoon)

 

"Oh come all ye tea baggers"

At Home With The Denial Family (cartoon)

 

Tea Party Activists Continue Pushing The GOP Over The Cliff

Wash Post:

The energized "tea party" movement, which upended this year's political debate with noisy anti-government protests, is preparing to shake up the 2010 elections by channeling money and supporters to conservative candidates set to challenge both Democrats and Republicans.

Buoyed by their success in capsizing a moderate Republican candidate this fall in Upstate New York, tea party activists and affiliated groups are unveiling new political action committees and tactics aimed at capitalizing on conservative opposition to health-care reform, financial bailouts and other Obama administration policies. The goal is to harness the anger that led to hundreds of protests around the country from spring to fall, including a gathering of tens of thousands of protesters on the Mall in September.

The strategy poses both an opportunity and a risk for the beleaguered Republican Party, which is seeking to take advantage of conservative discontent while still fielding candidates who appeal to independent voters. Fundraising efforts are just beginning, but tea party activists have already inspired serious challenges to establishment GOP Senate candidates Carly Fiorina in California and Charlie Crist in Florida; a similar insurgency in last month's House race in New York splintered local Republicans, leading to a Democratic victory.

"It's time to take control," conservative activist Eric Odom declares on the Web site of his new political action committee, Liberty First PAC, which will "support fellow patriots looking [to] defend our liberty." Odom, who played a central role in organizing the first tea party protests this spring, says the PAC will not support incumbents of either party.

Smart Girl Politics, a conservative women's group active in getting people to tea party protests, is considering forming a PAC to steer its 23,000 members to help conservative candidates.

Another influential activist, Erick Erickson of RedState.com, plans to encourage donations to conservative challengers such as GOP Senate candidate Pat Toomey, who hopes to win the Pennsylvania seat held by Republican-turned-Democrat Arlen Specter.

And in Washington, FreedomWorks, an advocacy group that helped organize many major tea party protests, is set to announce plans this month to raise millions of dollars through a reorganized PAC targeting its 500,000 registered members, said Matt Kibbe, the group's president. Chaired by former House majority leader Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.), the group says its fundraising effort will be modeled on the Internet financing juggernaut created by Barack Obama in 2008.

"We're looking at the potential of raising small checks from a vast number of donors, just as Obama did," Kibbe said. "We've been studying everything about the Obama primary strategy, and I happen to think the tea party movement could make even the Obama grass-roots machine look obsolete."

But Kibbe and others acknowledge that they are not near that point yet, and political experts in both parties say it is unclear if the movement can become the kind of unified force that can win, and not just disrupt, elections.

The tea party movement is splintered into hundreds of local and state-level groups that have differing rules and goals and for the most part have not participated in big-money politics. Many of the groups have been torn apart by personal feuds in recent months; one major umbrella organization, the Tea Party Patriots, has filed a lawsuit against a founding board member who signed on with a rival, the Tea Party Express.

Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said during a speech last week that the "tea party movement is savaging the GOP" and has sparked a "corrosive and consistent fight" over the party's direction.

Today's Opposition Cartoons

Jon Stewart To Lou Dobbs: Why Does The Right Wing Equate Losing An Election With Tyranny?

Jon Stewart is a very smart guy. He gets across his progressive perspective in such a disarming yet devastating way. Watch his interview with Lou Dobbs as they discuss why he left CNN and why the right-wing acts like expanding health care access to lower middle class people is the end of American democracy.

Watch both parts to enjoy one of the best, most succinct ways I've seen of puncturing the right-wing's rationalizations of their Obama hysteria ... in the audacious form of a conversation with one of its worst offenders.

Part I (which was aired):

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Exclusive - Lou Dobbs Extended Interview Pt. 1
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Part II (available only online):

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Exclusive - Lou Dobbs Extended Interview Pt. 2
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

The Anti-Defamation League Singles Out Glenn Beck As Anti-Government Conspiracist

NY Times:

The Anti-Defamation League, in a report released this week, has asserted that “a current of anti-government hostility has swept across the United States” since President Obama was elected just over a year ago.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the study cites the Tea Party movement and the at times rowdy health care town halls that occurred over the summer as examples of the increasingly anti-government climate. But it also takes aim at one prominent media figure: Glenn Beck.

In general, the report said that those more hostile toward government believe the Obama administration poses a threat to the long-term well-being of the country, with some believing the president wants to import socialism or fascism to America.

“Some of these assertions are motivated by prejudice, but more common is an intense strain of anti-government distrust and anger, colored by a streak of paranoia and belief in conspiracies,” the study found.

And Mr. Beck, the report found, has helped fan that hostility by invoking conspiracy theories and “demonizing” the administration on both his radio program and Fox News television show. In contrast, the A.D.L., a prominent Jewish organization whose mission is to fight anti-Semitism, reported that commentators like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity have sharply criticized Mr. Obama on partisan grounds while dismissing extremists and conspiracy theorists.

Mr. Beck’s broadcasts “play an important role in drawing people further out of the mainstream, making them more receptive to the more extreme notions and conspiracy theories.”

Christopher Balfe, the president of Mr. Beck’s production company, Mercury Radio Arts, said Mr. Beck had no comment on the report at this time.

The Right's Reign Of Terror Begins: Now, The Tea Parties & Birthers Are Purging Themselves, Not Just The GOP

Jon Stewart Does Glenn Beck

He's got Beck down!

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The 11/3 Project
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

The Partisan Divide

First, a relatively innocent play on the Berlin Wall:

Then two cartoons, which because they're so far removed from the truth yet professional cartoonists felt they were ok to publish, really illustrate how conservatives & progressives have a Mars / Venus thing going with a vengeance right now.

The Ft Hood Handoff (cartoon)

 

In Reaction To Ft Hood, Right Wing Begins Ginning Up Anit-Muslim Sentiment

Quinn suggests we "broom the Muslims out of the military," says internment "worked" during WWII:

Satirical Skinheads From Maine

How do you think these two guys voted on Tuesday?

Dana Carvey Show - Skinheads From Maine
by PigLips

The State Of The GOP Cartoons

Hysteria In America (cartoon)

 

Eh, He's So Scary (cartoon)

 

The GOP Will Say Anything To Kill Health Reform No Matter How Gallingly Hypocritical

It started two days ago with Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, posted by Prescriptions:

In a speech on the Senate floor on Tuesday morning, Mr. Corker lashed out at Democrats and their plan to permanently adjust a Medicare doctor payment formula at a 10-year cost of nearly $250 billion that will simply be added to the federal deficit. Democrats are expected to try to take up the bill on Tuesday.

Then, the NY Times reported this morning on the GOP's success:

In the face of solid Republican opposition, Senate Democrats on Tuesday backed down from their effort to increase Medicare payments to doctors without offsetting any of the cost over the next 10 years.

Jonathan Chait gets to the galling heart of the matter:

 ... What's going on is a perfect metaphor for how Obama and the republicans are treating fiscal policy.

More than a decade ago, Congress tried to control Medicare costs by restricting payments to doctors. But the reimbursement cut has proven unpopular. So every year, Congress appropriates more money to fill the hole and keep the doctors happy. Yet the pay cut remains on the books. So, admitting the obvious fact that the reimbursement cuts will never happen would, officially speaking, cost $247 billion over ten years.

Everybody agrees that it's a sham. Since the Democrats are trying to reform, and trim, how much Medicare spends, they planned to wipe the slate clean and just admit the obvious reality that the $247 billion is going to get spent.

Conservatives are attacking this as proof that health care reform is based on fraudulent accounting. See -- they're spending money they don't pay for! National Review calls this "offloading $247 billion in Obamacare costs onto a separate, standalone, unfinanced piece of legislation." But it's not "Obamacare costs." It's money that would get spent whether or not health reform happens. It would be fair to make this charge if Obama were using these illusury savings to cover the cost of the new spending in his health care reform, but he isn't.

So why is Obama getting attacked so bitterly over this? Because he's acknowledging it. It's the same thing that's happened to fiscal policy since he took office. The Bush administration hid the true iscal picture with a plethora of accounting gimmicks -- keeping all war costs out of the budget, pretending the middle-class tax cuts would expire, and on and on. Obama has tried to make the budget reflect reality. Alas, reality is a bummer. (And yes, the long-term deficit is entirely the fault of policies Obama inherited.) So Obama gets attacked for a "shell game" when all he's really doing is admitting the shell game that's been going on for years.

People have made this point before, but the conservative attacks on health care reform's fiscal responsibility are beyond hypocritical. George W. Bush and the Republicans created a new health care entitlement in 2003 that was completely unfinanced. Not a dime was paid for. The Democrats have decided to completely finance every cent of health care reform, and they're taking a hundred times more flack for fiscal irresponsibility than the Republicans ever did. There's a lesson here, and "fiscal responsibility pays" isn't it.

Irrational Obama Opposition Cartoon

 

Generals: Dick Cheney, Liz Cheney Are Fearmongering

From Politico:

About a dozen retired generals and admirals, trying to add momentum to President Barack Obama’s effort to close the Guantanamo Bay military prison, are accusing former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz of scaremongering about the dangers of closing it.

“It’s up to all of us to say these arguments advanced by Cheney and his acolytes are nonsense and that really what they’re doing is undermining our national security by delaying the date at which Guantanamo is closed,” retired Brig. Gen. James Cullen, a former chief judge of the Army’s Court of Criminal Appeals, told POLITICO Tuesday.

“Some of the fear issues that are being raised in this are really unfortunate. It gets people excited about things they shouldn’t be excited about and impedes doing what is critical to this country. Get that damn symbol off the table,” said retired Gen. David Maddox, a former Army commander-in-chief for Europe. “We take a setback every time somebody, whether it’s the vice president or his daughter comes out and says the things that they say….We have to get out there again and just keep pounding.”

The former vice president and his daughter declined comment on the criticism.

The former military officers, whose Washington visit was organized by Human Rights First, argued rather bitterly that the Cheneys have exaggerated the risks of bringing Guantanamo prisoners from Cuba to the United States.

“Can you imagine getting a terrorist from Guantanamo convicted and put in a federal penitentiary in your town?” Maddox asked. “Have you ever checked who the hell’s in there already? Have any of them gotten out? The person who we’re putting in is probably a heck of lot less dangerous than most of them who are already in there.”

Administration officials recently acknowledged that Guantanamo may not be closed by Obama’s deadline of Jan. 22. But retired Army Maj. Gen. Tony Taguba, who investigated the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq, said the president was smart to set a mark.

“It forces us to have an end state,” Taguba said. “It cannot be open in perpetuity because we’re having this so called long war against terrorism.”

Bernie Sanders: In Wash DC, Where Hypocrisy Levels Are Pretty High, The GOP As Medicare Champion "Bounces off the charts"

Damn those video tape libraries! They make it so easy to catch our lying hypocrisy:

Right-Wing Census Paranoia: Bachmann, Beck, Fox News, and More

This Week's Mediscare From The GOP

From Jonathan Cohn:

The Republican grandstanding on Medicare during Finance Committee hearings this week hasn't been surprising, I suppose. But the audacity is still pretty breathtaking.

As you may have heard or read by now, the Republicans are angry over proposed cuts to Medicare Advantage, the private insurance alternative to traditional Medicare. The insurers who offer Medicare Advantage plans receive a flat fee for every senior that signs up. But virtually every independent expert who has studied the program has concluded that those fees are way too high--that, in effect, the government is getting a lousy deal. So when Democrats, including those drawing up the Finance bill, were looking for revenue to finance expansions of health insurance coverage, they figured that getting rid of those subsidies was a smart idea, particularly since it would generate more than $100 billion over ten years.

The danger of these cuts is that, without the promise of those fat subsidies, some private insurers may decide to pull out of the business altogether. It happened once before, back in the late 1990s, when the Clinton Administration pushed through reductions to Medicare-plus-choice, the predecessor to Medicare Advantage. (It was basically the same program under a different name.)

Today, about ten million seniors are enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans, which tend to offer things like vision care, gym club memberships, and lower cost-sharing. Some of these people might have to give up those plans. And Republicans think this is a travesty. "Medicare shouldn't be the piggy bank," Senator Jon Kyl said on Wednesday. "The reduced costs fund a new entitlement. They don't help seniors who rely on Medicare."

Actually, that's not clear at all.

Seniors who lost their Medicare Advantage wouldn't be left uninsured--or even without the opportunity to get the extra benefits they now enjoy. They would still have the traditional Medicare program, which covers pretty much every essential medical service, as well as the chance to buy supplemental coverage to fill in the financial gaps. They might have to pay a bit more for it, but the only reason they pay less now is that the government has been over-paying insurance companies. This simply puts them on the same footing as other Medicare beneficiaries, while eliminating a source of inefficiency in the program. You could make a case--in fact, I would make a case--that the net effect is to make Medicare stronger, particularly if you believe that comprehensive reform will eventually help make the entire American health care system more efficient (thus easing cost pressures on Medicare).

But put that aside and consider what sort of standing Republicans have to make this argument. Remember, this is the same party that promoted much larger, less targeted cuts to Medicare in the 1990s--and did so not to shore up the program or expand health insurance for working-age Americans, but to create room for tax cuts that primarily benefited the wealthy.

So, just to review:

Modest Medicare cuts to make the program more efficient and help working-age people get insurance...bad.

Much larger Medicare cuts to give rich people get tax cuts...good.

And to think Americans still don't trust the GOP on health care.

The GOP's Ministry Of Information

August Madness Has Facilitated Democrats Use Of Reconciliation

An interesting, plausible-to-me theory from Jonathan Chait:

I think that a couple months ago, Democrats would have paid a fairly high price for passing a health care bill with zero or one Republican votes. This is because the major theme of the news coverage revolved around whether Democrats would find a bipartisan solution (wonderful!) or go it alone (boo!)

August, as I have argued, may have actually helped Democrats. Before, Republicans were making earnest-sounding pleas for negotiation and bipartisanship while slowly bleeding out the calendar. The recess furor exposed (and helped create) the GOP's total unwillingness to compromise. The result, I suspect, is that Democrats will now pay a far lower price for passing a bill without substantial GOP buy-in.

Lessons Learned, & Not Learned, By The Right (cartoons)

A Glenn Beck Fan

More Wing-Nut & GOP Cartoons

The Next Thing For The Right To Fear-Monger: Patriot Act Changes

From the NY Times:

As Congress prepares to consider extending crucial provisions of the USA Patriot Act, civil liberties groups and some Democratic lawmakers are gearing up to press for sweeping changes to surveillance laws.

Both the House and the Senate are set to hold their first committee hearings this week on whether to reauthorize three sections of the Patriot Act that expire at the end of this year. The provisions expanded the power of the F.B.I. to seize records and to eavesdrop on phone calls in the course of a counterterrorism investigation.

Laying down a marker ahead of those hearings, a group of senators who support greater privacy protections filed a bill on Thursday that would impose new safeguards on the Patriot Act while tightening restrictions on other surveillance policies. The measure is co-sponsored by nine Democrats and an independent.

Days before, the Obama administration called on Congress to reauthorize the three expiring Patriot Act provisions in a letter from Ronald Weich, assistant attorney general for legislative affairs. At the same time, he expressed a cautious open mind about imposing new surveillance restrictions as part of the legislative package ...

One of the witnesses Democrats have invited to testify at both hearings is Suzanne E. Spaulding, who has worked for lawmakers of both parties as a former top staffer on the House and Senate Intelligence committees. Mrs. Spaulding said she would urge Congress to tighten restrictions on when the F.B.I. could use the Patriot Act powers.

The rapid build-up of domestic intelligence authorities after the Sept. 11 attacks, she said, had overlooked “important safeguards,” which has resulted “in a greater likelihood at a minimum of the government mistakenly intruding into the privacy of innocent Americans, and at worst having a greater capability of abusing these authorities.”

Still, she acknowledged, the public record contains scant evidence that the F.B.I. has abused its powers under the three expiring Patriot Act sections. And it remains to be seen whether a majority in Congress will welcome undertaking a potentially heated debate over national security in the midst of already wrenching efforts to overhaul the nation’s health insurance system.

<Continue reading to learn about the 3 specific provisions up for renewal.>

President Obama: The Biggest Motivator Isn't Race But Size & Role Of Governement

I wholeheartedly agree with the President's view below that while some of his opponents are motivated by race, the bigger issue for most is the role of government. I also believe, and suspect the President agrees though he didn't say, that the GOP is nonetheless trying to capitalize on the racist fear--no matter how large or small--that's out there.

From the NY Times:

President Obama said Friday that he did not believe his race was the cause of fierce criticism aimed at his administration in the contentious national debate over health care, but rather that the cause was a sense of suspicion and distrust many Americans have in their government.

“Are there people out there who don’t like me because of race? I’m sure there are,” Mr. Obama told CNN. “That’s not the overriding issue here.”

In five separate television interviews at the White House, Mr. Obama said he did not agree with former President Jimmy Carter’s assertion that racism was fueling the opposition to his administration. He described himself as just the latest in a line of presidents whose motives had been questioned because they were trying to enact major change.

Mr. Obama will appear on five Sunday talk shows — an unprecedented step for a president — to promote his health care plan. The television networks broadcast brief parts of their interviews on Friday evening, all of which focused on a question the White House has sought to avoid all week: Has race played a role in the debate?

Mr. Obama, the nation’s first black president, said “race is such a volatile issue in this society” that he conceded it had become difficult for people to tell whether it was simply a backdrop of the current political discussion or “a predominant factor.”

“Now there are some who are, setting aside the issue of race, actually I think are more passionate about the idea of whether government can do anything right,” he told ABC News. “And I think that that’s probably the biggest driver of some of the vitriol.” ...

He conceded that many people were skeptical of the health care legislation making its way through Congress ... But even as the White House sought to push it aside, the issue of race persisted through the week, with some critics saying it was the reason a Republican lawmaker was disrespectful to the president last week, calling him a liar as Mr. Obama addressed a joint session of Congress. The television interviews on Friday were the first time Mr. Obama had weighed in.

“Look, I said during the campaign there’s some people who still think through a prism of race when it comes to evaluating me and my candidacy. Absolutely,” Mr. Obama told NBC News. “Sometimes they vote for me for that reason; sometimes they vote against me for that reason.”

But he said that the matter was really “an argument that’s gone on for the history of this republic. And that is, what’s the right role of government?”

The president said the contentious health care debate, which came on the heels of extraordinary government involvement in bailing out banks and automobile companies, had led to a broader discussion about the role of government in society.

“I think that what’s driving passions right now is that health care has become a proxy for a broader set of issues about how much government should be involved in our economy,” Mr. Obama told CBS News. “Even though we’re having a passionate disagreement here, we can be civil to each other, and we can try to express ourselves acknowledging that we’re all patriots, we’re all Americans and not assume the absolute worst in people’s motives.”

The president used the media blitz to add his own commentary about the news media.

He said he blamed cable television and blogs, which he said “focus on the most extreme element on both sides,” for much of the inflamed rhetoric.

“The easiest way to get 15 minutes of fame,” Mr. Obama said, “is to be rude to someone.”

Juan Williams Tells Hannity Acorn Story Is "Minuscule." Asks "Why don't you go after Blackwater, the Defense Industry & Wall St?"

Exactly

More Wing-Nut, Obama Hating Cartoons

   

For Those Who Were On Vacation The Last 3 Weeks

Jon Stewart provides a nice summary--from health care to You Lie--of what's been happening while he was on vacation:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Apothecary Now
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Healthcare Protests

"Tea Party" Leader Shows His True Stripes On CNN

This guy does a great job discrediting himself and his "movement" as he spews hate out of both sides of his mouth at once. And David Gergen's face while he speaks is priceless ...

Jimmy Carter Believes "race is at the core of much of the opposition to President Obama"

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

The Wash Post's report:

Former president Jimmy Carter told NBC's Brian Williams in an interview Tuesday that he believes race is at the core of much of the opposition to President Obama.

"I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African American," Carter said. "I live in the South, and I've seen the South come a long way, and I've seen the rest of the country that shared the South's attitude toward minority groups at that time, particularly African Americans"

Continued Carter, who is famously from Georgia: "And that racism inclination still exists. And I think it's bubbled up to the surface because of the belief among many white people, not just in the South but around the country, that African-Americans are not qualified to lead this great country. It's an abominable circumstance, and it grieves me and concerns me very deeply." ...

The 39th president also predicted that Obama will be able to "triumph over the racist attitude that is the basis for the negative environment that we see so vividly demonstrated in public affairs in recent days."

Obama Hating Cartoons

 

As The Right's Attacks Continue, White House Debates The Way To Respond

From the Wash Post:

Facing a near-daily barrage of attacks from conservative opponents, White House officials are engaged in an internal debate over how hard to hit back, even as they have grown increasingly aggressive in countering allegations they deem to be absurd.

After brushing aside criticism during the presidential campaign that they tried to keep candidate Barack Obama too far above the fray -- and with memories of the abundance of media coverage during the Clinton years -- administration officials are accelerating their efforts to anticipate and respond to the most sharp-edged charges.

The White House officials are eager to avoid the perception that the president is directly engaging critics who appear to speak only for a vocal minority, and part of their strategy involves pushing material to liberal and progressive media outlets to steer the coverage in their direction, senior advisers said.

When critics lashed out at President Obama for scheduling a speech to public school students this month, accusing him of wanting to indoctrinate children to his politics, his advisers quickly scrubbed his planned comments for potentially problematic wording. They then reached out to progressive Web sites such as the Huffington Post, liberal bloggers and Democratic pundits to make their case to a friendly audience.

The controversy escalated, but by the time it was over, White House advisers thought they had emerged with the upper hand. The speech, they said, was the most-viewed live video on any government Web site in history, and they were pleased with the media coverage of the event. 

In private, Obama has developed what his advisers say is becoming a familiar response to new allegations, rolling his eyes in disbelief and asking how his staff plans to counter them. Several senior advisers said in interviews that they are more focused on getting legislation passed than trying to manage the "right-wing noise machine," convinced that voters will react most positively to measurable improvements in their lives.

But at a tactical level, administration officials are taking seriously the potential for damage and are attempting to respond forcefully. 

Ignorance Is Bliss--And Drives The GOP-- But It's Stupidly Self-Defeating (cartoons)

Their Rallying Cry, I Want MY Country Back, Says It All

A very astute observation from a Daily Dish reader:

It's really much less complicated, and the answer is tucked neatly in the phrase, "I want my country back."  What that means is, the country that recognizes me  and people like me as the cultural core of the nation, deserving of disproportionate influence and income.  Race is the dominant theme -- but running through the same current are appeals to religion and cultural values, including education, or lack of it.  While it might seem radical, even crazy, that a certain segment of the population strongly devalues education and educated people, it's part of the American experience.  That's why many hyper well-educated elected officials, including presidents, try to pretend that they are "just folks." 

Wilson's Unspoken Word: You lie, boy!

From Maureen Dowd:

The normally nonchalant Barack Obama looked nonplussed, as Nancy Pelosi glowered behind.

Surrounded by middle-aged white guys — a sepia snapshot of the days when such pols ran Washington like their own men’s club — Joe Wilson yelled “You lie!” at a president who didn’t.

But, fair or not, what I heard was an unspoken word in the air: You lie, boy!

The outburst was unexpected from a milquetoast Republican backbencher from South Carolina who had attracted little media attention. Now it has made him an overnight right-wing hero, inspiring “You lie!” bumper stickers and T-shirts.

The congressman, we learned, belonged to the Sons of Confederate Veterans, led a 2000 campaign to keep the Confederate flag waving above South Carolina’s state Capitol and denounced as a “smear” the true claim of a black woman that she was the daughter of Strom Thurmond, the ’48 segregationist candidate for president. Wilson clearly did not like being lectured and even rebuked by the brainy black president presiding over the majestic chamber.

I’ve been loath to admit that the shrieking lunacy of the summer — the frantic efforts to paint our first black president as the Other, a foreigner, socialist, fascist, Marxist, racist, Commie, Nazi; a cad who would snuff old people; a snake who would indoctrinate kids — had much to do with race.

I tended to agree with some Obama advisers that Democratic presidents typically have provoked a frothing response from paranoids — from Father Coughlin against F.D.R. to Joe McCarthy against Truman to the John Birchers against J.F.K. and the vast right-wing conspiracy against Bill Clinton.

But Wilson’s shocking disrespect for the office of the president — no Democrat ever shouted “liar” at W. when he was hawking a fake case for war in Iraq — convinced me: Some people just can’t believe a black man is president and will never accept it.

“A lot of these outbursts have to do with delegitimizing him as a president,” said Congressman Jim Clyburn, a senior member of the South Carolina delegation. Clyburn, the man who called out Bill Clinton on his racially tinged attacks on Obama in the primary, pushed Pelosi to pursue a formal resolution chastising Wilson.

“In South Carolina politics, I learned that the olive branch works very seldom,” he said. “You have to come at these things from a position of strength. My father used to say, ‘Son, always remember that silence gives consent.’ ”

Barry Obama of the post-’60s Hawaiian ’hood did not live through the major racial struggles in American history. Maybe he had a problem relating to his white basketball coach or catching a cab in New York, but he never got beaten up for being black.

Now he’s at the center of a period of racial turbulence sparked by his ascension. Even if he and the coterie of white male advisers around him don’t choose to openly acknowledge it, this president is the ultimate civil rights figure — a black man whose legitimacy is constantly challenged by a loco fringe.

For two centuries, the South has feared a takeover by blacks or the feds. In Obama, they have both.