The Commentariat -- Feb. 23, 2014
** ... Mike Lofgren, a former GOP Congressional aide, has a long piece in Bill Moyers' Journal on what he calls the "Deep State" -- the vast, entrenched labyrinth of insiders who actually pull the strings in Washington. There are also some interesting-looking sidebars on some of the issues Lofgren raises. ...
... A follow-up piece by Moyers (which seems to have disappeared!) on Trans-Pacific Partnership is based on reporting by Lee Fang. Lee's Republic Report piece is here.
** Simon Head in Salon: "Worse than Wal-Mart: Amazon's sick brutality and secret history of ruthlessly intimidating workers."
Gregory Clarkson in the New York Times: "To a striking extent, your overall life chances can be predicted not just from your parents' status but also from your great-great-great-grandparents'." CW: I found Clarkson's thesis -- and the methodology he used to arrive at it -- pretty fascinating.
Do-Nothing Republicans Finally Do Something: Invent a Constitutional Crisis. Tim Devaney of the Hill: "House Republicans will push the Obama administration to roll back regulations over the next few weeks as they combat an 'imperial presidency.' In an email to House Republicans, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) accused President Obama of 'effectively rewriting the laws' and called on the GOP to fight to 'restore the balance of power created by our Founders. President Obama has provided new clarity as to what constitutes an imperial presidency,' Cantor wrote Friday in the email obtained by The Hill. 'Declaring that he has a "pen and a phone," he has acted to effectively rewrite the laws of the United States.'"
Perception Skews Right. New York Times Editors: "Republicans were successful in discrediting the very idea that federal spending can boost the economy and raise employment. They made the argument that the stimulus was a failure not just to ensure that Mr. Obama would get no credit for the recovery that did occur but to justify their obstruction of all further attempts at stimulus."
Christi Parsons & Melissa Harris of the Los Angeles Times: "President Obama plans to announce on Tuesday the opening of two new manufacturing institutes in the Chicago and Detroit areas as part of a larger plan to use public-private partnerships to advance his agenda despite opposition from Republicans in Congress. Several federal agencies will join forces with companies and universities to run the institutes, which will be devoted to bridging the gap between applied research and product development...."
Coral Davenport of the New York Times: "President Obama's annual budget request to Congress will propose a significant change in how the government pays to fight wildfires, administration officials said, a move that they say reflects the ways in which climate change is increasing the risk for and cost of those fires. The wildfire funding shift is one in a series of recent White House actions related to climate change as Mr. Obama tries to highlight the issue and build political support for his administration's more muscular policies...."
Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "President Obama is stepping up his efforts to coalesce and energize the Democratic base for the 2014 elections, backing off on issues where his positions might alienate the left, and more aggressively singling out Republicans as being responsible for the country's problems."
Everything Is Obama's Fault -- Including Chris Christie. Maureen Dowd: "The governor was a beneficiary of America's desperate hunger for genuine leadership. You can blame Obama for the Christie tulip craze. The president has been so wan, he confused people into thinking that bluster was clarity. In a climate with no leadership, the bully looks like a man. If you've only been drinking water, Red Bull tastes like whiskey. Obama's ethereal insipidity made Christie's meaty pugilism attractive; Obama's insistence on the cerebral made voters long for the visceral, even the gracelessly visceral." ...
... CW: Dowd borrows liberally from Alec MacGillis's excellent reporting for the New Republic on Chris Christie's modus operandi, a piece I recommended several days ago. MoDo isn't kind enough to link to MacGillis's piece, so I here it is. ...
... Steve M.: "Maureen Dowd thinks America joined Cult of Christie because Barack SpockBambi was too much of a metrosexual girlyman.... Was America ever actually attracted to 'Christie's meaty pugilism'? ... Back when he was known primarily as a big lug with anger management issues, in 2011..., the public had decidedly mixed feelings about Christie. His favorable ratings got into the 40s and 50s much later, after he stopped being known primarily for being an angry lout and started being known for his response to Sandy -- Obama outreach included."
Chris Christie, Still Beloved by the Rich
... Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney will fundraise alongside New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) on Thursday in Boston. The joint appearance is a signal by Romney to the Republican establishment that he remains an ally of the embattled Garden State governor...." CW: Too bad. Looks like Mitt is not going to be releasing his Chrisco oppo file anytime soon. ...
... Paul Steinhauser of CNN: "As Christie convenes two days of Republican Governors Association meetings ... in the nation's capital Friday and Saturday, an RGA official tells CNN that the group has raised $18 million since Christie took over as RGA chairman in late November. That's a new fundraising record for the first three months of a new RGA chairman's tenure."
Local News
A Savvy Businesswoman. Huffington Post: "In perhaps the greatest display of entrepreneurial spirit in modern history, a California Girl Scout has been selling cookies outside of a San Francisco marijuana dispensary. Danielle Lei, 13, set up shop in front of The Green Cross on Monday, selling a whopping 117 boxes in just two hours, according to Mashable. That's about one box per minute." ...
... Heather Burke of CBS Denver: "Although pot shops are becoming a big market in the state, it's one the Girl Scouts of Colorado don't want to dip into. They issued a statement that reads, 'We recognize these are legitimate businesses, but we don't feel they are an appropriate place for girls to be selling cookies in Colorado.'"
News Lede
New York Times: "A day after President Viktor F. Yanukovych fled the Ukrainian capital and was removed from power by a unanimous vote in Parliament, lawmakers moved swiftly on Sunday to dismantle the remaining vestiges of his government by firing top cabinet members, including the foreign minister. With Parliament, led by the speaker, Oleksandr V. Turchynov, firmly in control of the federal government -- if not yet the country as a whole -- lawmakers began an emergency session on Sunday by adopting a law restoring state ownership of Mr. Yanukovych's opulent presidential palace, which he had privatized."
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Reader Comments (11)
Zeus! I hate to say this but I agree, essentially, with MoDo.
There's cheering in the streets because the social security "reform" of screwing around with the indexing to the CPI is not included in this year's budget, even though BHO's staff (and presumably BHO) still favor it.
Two more years. Maybe then we can elect a Democrat.
Where Dowd sees insipidity in Obama, I see thoughtfulness and compassion. Where she sees inaction, I see a leader responsible more than any other individual for the passage of a landmark piece of legislation, health reform, which has eluded other politicians for decades.
But then, I never confused Christie's boorishness for leadership, nor his policies such as refusing to set up a health insurance exchange or to participate in a building a much needed tunnel for good judgment.
Speaking of " insipid" : that is how I would describe Dowd's column.
The weak leadership of President Obama while the Democrats had a majority of votes is causing the near failure of needed health care reform. Obama sat quietly while Democratic Senators took turns playing the role of the needed vote and demanding concessions.
As each element of the Affordable Care Act was agreed upon it should have been sold by prominent members of the Congress and the Administration running to the Sunday shows and to the press heralding and explaining the benefits. Instead, the Senate squabbled and the President made no effort to sell the deal. The opposition, on the other hand, was quick to misrepresent the ACA and took strong positions that were mainly unanswered.
Today, all Democrats should be embarrassed for letting the Republicans define the Act and by Presidents failure to gain America's support that really was due.
It appears that MoDo's Mojo only starts percolating when she can link Obama (read blame) for anything and everything. Her premise here is that "The governor [Christi] was a beneficiary of America's desperate hunger for genuine leadership." Wow. In other words, we Americans are lost at sea here longing for a thug-like bluster buster like Christi to lead this country on the path to...??? What exactly does she mean by "genuine leadership?" Apparently she thinks Obama has not only NOT been a leader, but is also NOT genuine. This I find ironic since her piece was about Christi who as Alec points out in his masterful article built his whole political career on a rotten foundation. I would argue that a hell of a lot of Americans want leadership from Congress which is what has prevented Obama from implementing many of his plans. I would also add that many Americans cotton to politicians like Christi because they confuse the performance with the results and are taken in just as they were with Reagan whose reign was the role of a lifetime.
Christi, as Alec points out, was teethed on controversy.Arguments flourished in his household and being the oldest sibling he picked up the reins and maybe the toy guns and always played the sheriff. What child in third grade is speaking at PTA meetings? This early on taste of POWER was like a transitional object that he has carried throughout his career. And as Alec says, "he wasn't attacking the corrupt machine he was merely mastering it and now this scandal has "laid bare the skill and audacity Christi constructed for his public image."
I suggest that Ms. Dowd have some of that Red Bull and settle down and reflect on those that have truly made a difference in our country for the better and did it with the kind of strength that comes from persistence, tenacity, and courage––or, do an article on Norcross, the real Boss of New Jersey, and see if you can sneak Obama in there somehow.
What a surfeit of thoughts after reading the Deep State and then linking to Danielle Brian and Sheila Krumholz on Moyers. Out in the fly-over states, if you go after and point a light at the entrenched political interests, you better be prepared to be pushed down really hard. The politicians and business owners control both the media and the police and none of the above like being embarrassed and called out as crooked. I don't want the levers of government to steal my house and my assets because I take a locally unpopular position. Try as I might I can't find much information about how I can do-it-myself asset protection trust. First they take your money; then they despoil your beggarly reputation; and finally they dismiss you as a crazy gadfly. One person's Breitbart is another's Snowden is another's Daniel Ellsberg. Who do I think I am if I start calling out people who benefit from the Deep State? They are the government or at least they have the people with the keys, guns and handcuffs on speed dial. And if the government litigates against you, they will re-allocate all of your money to the lawyer you have to hire to fight your way into insolvency. And you'll probably lose because too many of the adjudicators are chummy with each other and you are the bait that pays their country club bills. As Brian says, "we need to empower people". And bad press matters. In small localities, the press is platitudinous and as unalienating as Jello because everyone is only one person removed from a potential advertiser. Very often there are little to no choices for media exposure to be used to shine a light on the rats. Hence the word entrenched. The Deep State and their corporate minders against the full-employment desiring population is really trench warfare World War lll.
Just finished reading the "Deep State" piece. Couldn't help thinking how this huge behemoth is like something not controlling us from above, but more like, say, carp (fishy) swimming below the surface waters, always there, just behind the facade, sometimes very nearly exposed, so that you can dimly see the shape of it just like you can see sometimes through the surface of an ornamental pond on a still day, the dark, gross inhuman outline of a carp gliding slowly past and you suddenly realize that the carp were always there below the surface, even while the water sparkled in the sunshine and you went about your business never noticing, not really caring as long as things were going your way.
This was a depressing piece of journalistic muscle. I need time to chew on it. I also need a nap.
Lest we all crawl under our beds, Juan Cole has some extenuating perspective on the Deep State:
http://www.juancole.com/2014/02/vulnerable-people-power.html
Marie probably posted this a couple of weeks ago, but in case not, I am linking it here. (Note: I am off the grid for 3 months in the CA desert--more than slightly brain dead. It is a good feeling!) The story was in the New York Observer by new Kingpin, former Giuliani aide, Ken Kurson--called "The Op-Ed Dead." It is worth the read if you have extreme distaste for Tommy Freedom and Our Miss Brooks, and love reading shit about them!
http://gawker.com/new-york-times-staffers-finally-admit-how-dumb-tom-frie-1516151755
Good column by Gary Younge in today's Guardian:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/23/what-is-barack-obama-presidency-for
"If the Deep State is not monolithic but divided over policy, and if it is in fact much more responsive to the exercise of public political power than the author admits, then it is vulnerable to a vigilant public."–––Juan Cole
Thanks W.O.––wouldn't have liked it under that bed.
Deep State:
Would only add that the author is a failed republican savant--a person whose genes, by definition, include paranoia and fear mongering.
Salt, please, on the rim of my tequila, bartender.