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Tuesday
Feb142012
The Commentariat -- February 15, 2012
My column in today's New York Times eXaminer is on a New York Times post regarding President Obama's revision of the contraceptive mandate. The NYTX front page is here. You can contribute here. ...
... CW Update: I see Elizabeth Warren agrees with me. And she knows how to clobber Sen. Scott Brown with it. Which was the point of my column.
Suzy Khimm of the Washington Post on Obama's budget proposal: "Obama’s budget provides a plan under which sequestration — that is, the cuts triggered by the supercommittee’s failure to pass a $1.2 trillion deficit reduction plan — won’t actually happen. Obama’s budget would cut the deficit by nearly $2 trillion in 2021 through higher taxes, thus allowing the government to avoid the spending cuts by going well beyond the $1.2 trillion requirement."
Jim Rutenberg & Alison Kopicki of the New York Times: "’s political standing is rising along with voters’ optimism that the economy is getting better, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, a shift that coincides with continued Republican disquiet over the field of candidates seeking to replace him." ...
... Nate Silver reassesses Obama's chances in a New York Times Magazine piece headlined "Why Obama Will Embrace the 99 Percent."
Laurie Goodstein of the New York Times: "The near-unified front led by the nation’s Roman Catholic bishops to oppose a mandate for employers to cover birth control has now crumbled amid the compromise plan that the Obama administration offered last week to accommodate religious institutions."
Peter Hart: contrary to the assertion of New York Times tech writer David Pogue, Apple products do not have to be made in Chinese sweatshops to be affordable. It might help Pogue, Hart writes, to read his own newspaper, which covered this very subject in an important expose' of Apple's Chinese ops.
David Kirkpatrick of the New York Times on Fayza Abul Naga, the Egyptian prosecutor who is investigating 16 American aid workers for organizing opposition to the Egyptian government. Abul Naga, a holdover from the Mubarak regime reportedly has even the ruling generals afraid to cross her. CW: we're missing a piece of the puzzle here.
Right Wing World
"Zombie Politics." John Sides of the Monkey Cage: tho Southern whites without college degrees have trended Republican over the past 50 years, "The white working class has not, as a whole, become more Republican."
Adam Serwer of Mother Jones: Republicans find another way to gut the Affordable Care Act. The act "requires all health care plans to offer certain services and benefits, including birth control. Last week, Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) offered a 'conscience amendment,' to the law, pitching it as a way to allay religious employers' qualms about providing birth control to their employees. But Blunt's proposal doesn't just apply to religious employers and birth control. Instead, it would allow any insurer or employer, religiously affiliated or otherwise, to opt out of providing any health care services required by federal law—everything from maternity care to screening for diabetes. Employers wouldn't have to cite religious reasons for their decision; they could just say the treatment goes against their moral convictions." Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has signed onto the bill; Senate Democrats intend to call Republicans' bluff & will schedule a vote.
Santorum Meets Occupy: 'I think it’s really important for you to understand what this radical element represents, because what they represent is true intolerance,' Santorum said, after two protesters were taken to the ground and placed in handcuffs by police. The protesters, Santorum suggested, 'instead of standing here unemployed, yelling at somebody' should instead 'go out and get a job.' -- Juana Summers, Politico ...
... Nothing says tolerance like calling people presently being handcuffed for yelling at you 'intolerant.' -- Charles Pierce, Esquire
... Seriously? Santorum? Steve Kornacki of Salon: "Rick Santorum has won four of the first nine Republican nominating contests, leads in three of the four most recent national polls, and has even pulled ahead of Mitt Romney in Michigan, Romney’s native state." But the conventional wisdom is that he doesn't have a shot at the nomination. Kornacki outlines four reasons why, but he concludes, "... there’s one key difference between Santorum and the others who’ve vied with Romney for the lead this year: He’s a genuinely competent candidate.... This is more than can be said for Gingrich, Rick Perry and Herman Cain."
Here's a pretty funny Santorum ad whacking Romney for his attack ads:
This week, President Obama will release a budget that won't take any meaningful steps toward solving our entitlement crisis. The president has failed to offer a single serious idea to save Social Security and is the only president in modern history to cut Medicare benefits for seniors. -- Mitt Romney Campaign
... Um, that reads, Obama failed to cut "entitlements" at the same time he cut them. Steve Benen: "Taken together..., Romney contradicted his own talking points, lied about the Affordable Care Act, and engaged in some remarkable hypocrisy, accusing Obama of doing what Romney himself intends to do. That's pretty impressive for one paragraph."
"Bailout Politics." Chris Bury of ABC News: "As Republicans Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich scramble to overtake native son Mitt Romney in the Michigan primary, scheduled for Feb. 24, the state's economy appears to be climbing out of a deep, dark hole." ...
... Michael Shear of the New York Times: Mitt Romney pens an op-ed in the Detroit News trying to explain why he was right all along about the auto bailout. CW: Though this is a straight news story, Shear sort of lets you know Romney's claims are one lie atop another. You can read his op-ed here. ...
... Todd Spangler of the Detroit Free Press: Three top Michigan Democrats -- former Gov. Jennifer Granholm, & Reps. Sander Levin & John Dingall challenged Romney's op-ed. “I’d say he stabbed us in the back in our darkest hour,” Granholm said. ...
... Rep. Gary Peters (D-Michigan) gives a point-by-point on why Romney was wrong then and he's wrong now. ...
... Jonathan Cohn of The New Republic cites several places Romney misstated the facts; then he takes on Romney for calling the deal with the UAW "crony capitalism." "Prioritizing workers over investors may seem strange to the co-founder of Bain Capital. That doesn’t mean it’s wrong." ...
... Travis Waldron of Think Progress has another good post here. Funny how Romney thinks it's great when Bain Capital gets a government bailout but not when the auto companies do.
Rachel Maddow reported last week that every GOP state presidential election/caucus has been flawed in one way or another. The Maine caucuses held Saturday, subsequent to Maddow's report, are no different. They're still counting & arguing. ...
... Eric Russell of the Bangor (Maine) Daily News: "Pressure is mounting on the Maine Republican Party to reconsider its weekend declaration that Mitt Romney won the state’s caucuses, at least until all votes have been counted. The Maine GOP announced Saturday that Romney narrowly edged Ron Paul, 39 percent to 36 percent, in a nonbinding presidential preference poll taken during the caucuses. The margin was fewer than 200 votes. A number of communities were not included in that poll because they had not held their caucuses by the deadline spelled out by the state party."
Igor Volsky of Think Progress: on contraception exemption, Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) flip-flops on former State Rep. Scott Brown. He was against it before he was for it before he was against it before he was for it. Something like that.
News Ledes
President Obama was in Wisconsin to speak about insourcing jobs:
Yahoo! News: "While touring a factory owned by Master Lock on Wednesday, President Obama urged manufacturers to bring jobs back to the U.S. "Right now we have an excellent opportunity to bring manufacturing back -- but we have to seize it," Obama said. Obama praised Master Lock during his State of the Union Address for re-shoring about 100 jobs from China to its Milwaukee plant."
The Hill: "Lawmakers raced against the clock Wednesday to put the final touches on a payroll tax cut package before day’s end so the House could hold a Friday vote on the measure."
That Went Well. Washington Post: "Chinese officials denied a visa to a top State Department envoy and refused to meet with her to discuss issues of religious freedom days before this week’s high-profile visit to Washington by China’s vice president, according to rights advocates and others. Suzan Johnson Cook, the U.S. ambassador at large for international religious freedom, was scheduled to travel to China on Feb. 8, according to several rights advocates who were invited to brief her ahead of the visit."
New York Times: "Iran struck back against a European oil embargo by cutting supplies to six European countries Wednesday as state media in Tehran said that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was being briefed “on new nuclear achievements” expected to be announced later in the day. The oil cutoff affects the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, France, Greece and Portugal."
AP: "Trapped inmates screamed from their cells as a fire swept through a Honduran prison, killing at least 300 inmates, authorities said Wednesday. Lucy Marder, chief of forensic medicine for the prosecutor's office, said early Wednesday some 356 people on the prison roster are unaccounted for among 852 prisoners."
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Reader Comments (10)
Me, I'm a 67 year old male to whom it doesn't really matter. But I thought I might point out that United States women are 1 President, 3 Senators and, perhaps, 1 Supreme Court Justice away from the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the outlawing of freedom of choice, a direct assault on Griswold v. Connecticut and the death of reproductive rights.
@David,
Point out to whom? Are you for or against the issues you cited, and why or why not?
And why does it not matter to you? You have no wife? Mother? Daughter(s)? Sister(s)?
@cakers. I'll see you & raise you. We all have a stake in women's reproductive rights. (I'm 67, too, and absent a biblical-type miracle, I won't be getting pregnant again.) Kristof touched on this in his Sunday column (linked in Sunday's Commentariat) when he mentioned the Medicaid & insurance premium savings associated with birth control. Then add this: about 2/3rds of unplanned pregnancies turn into unplanned children, children who end up receiving a disproportionate amount of government aid. There are other costs of unplanned pregnancies, too, though these costs cannot easily be measured in dollar figures: the tensions, disruptions, and sometimes legal battles that result from the unplanned pregnancies/children which distract those involved during their working hours, and of course all of the child care issues that those who plan pregnancies are more likely to have worked out. If we haven't been there, done that ourselves, we all know people who have.
Over and above that is the women's equality issue. Women should have the same rights to preventive medicine as men do. The bishops have tried to counter that position by saying that "pregnancy is not a disease." That's just a stupid, stupid argument: contraception prevents pregnancy; that's why it's called "contraception": contra + conception. Jerks. I think there are still insurance policies that cover Viagra but not the pill.
Finally, there's the general moral issue. Unlike our ancestors, we are privileged to live in a time when it is possible to plan pregnancies without giving up half our sex lives and worrying every month about whether or not we "accidentally" got pregnant. In a country as rich as ours, there is no reason that this privilege should be limited to those who can afford contraception. With that privilege, of course, comes responsibility: the responsibility to have children when it is economically and emotionally feasible to do so. Not everyone will be that responsible, of course, but as long as we make it difficult for women to obtain contraception, or if necessary abortions, we can hardly have responsible childbearing as a universal goal. The conservatives who tell people to act responsibly but won't give them means to do so are reprehensible.
Contraceptives prevent abortions. Absent an edict from President Rick Santorum, contraceptive means will still be available to the middle class & wealthy. As Marvin Schwalb pointed out a few weeks ago, even if Roe v. Wade is overturned, women of means will still be able to get abortions. It will be the poor who suffer. Tell that to the good followers of Jesus.
"...[Barack Obama] won't take any meaningful steps toward solving our entitlement crisis.... [has no] serious idea to save Social Security and ... is only president ... to cut Medicare ..." -- Mitt Romney Campaign
Yes, it sure sounds contradictory, until you remember that most old conservatives currently receiving both SS and Medicare don't consider these to be entitlements. These are things they've earned, that they've paid for... little facts like their contributions probably don't come close to paying for current benefits do not intrude. Or that the amount of the annual budget going to the "real" entitlements aka gov't give-aways (food stamps, rent help, UI, etc) is a small fraction compared to their "earned" retirement benefits likewise do not pertain to the discussion at hand. Romney, who has clearly honed his skills as panderer par excellence, knows this. So his statement makes perfect sense in "right-wing world."
@ Trish Ramey. Excellent point. As long as seniors think they're "entitled" to the "entitlement" payments they've "paid for," those "entitlement programs" are not "entitlement programs," but all the programs to help poor people, students, etc., are "entitlement programs" to which the recipients are not "entitled." Whoosh. Romney got it; I didn't. Sometimes the double-speak is hard for an old librul to keep up with. Thanks for the translation.
Cakers: I have both a wife and a daughter.
Marie: Is my assessment of the situation correct or not? Perhaps you can point out to me who is going to stop this assault on women. While you (the collective thousands of you) are making good arguments, good points and good sense, the "good followers of Jesus" are electing legislators at every level: school board, city, county, state and federal. Those elected officials are introducing and passing nuisance regulations and laws restricting voting rights, reproductive rights, limiting access to health clinics, revising school curriculums, and a whole host of measures designed to implement their very focused dual objectives: the elimination of the separation of church and state and the ultimate supremacy of their religious and social ideology.
Last week hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of us, myself included, signed petitions protesting Komen's politicalization of the struggle against cancer and supporting Planned Parenthood. Komen, at least temporarily, seems to have backed off. But this week the "good people of Jesus" counter-attacked the contraceptive mandate. They are even upping the ante with the Blount Amendment. They've retaken the initiative and the momentum. (Irony: most of these antis couldn't be bothered to piss on President Obama if he were to catch fire. Yet more than 28,000 of them went to whitehouse.gov to sign the Rescind Petition. Only 22,000+ bothered to sign the petition in support of women's health, reproductive rights and the mandate at whitehouse.gov.)
Where were you, ladies?
This morning I received four different petitions about three different issues from four different liberal organizations in my email box. Nothing like a unified response in the face of imminent danger.
I could go on but it would just be furthering the cause of the well-funded, well organized, highly focused, disciplined, fanatical, even rabid forces arrayed against Women's Rights. So long as you can attack the messenger you don't have to look over the wall and see the enemy at the gates.
Let me take the contraception issue one step further. While pissing on women has been a basic part of religion from day one, what I think we are seeing here is something more than that. Religion and the religious are scared. Scared of science, scared of the fact that a huge chunk of Europe no longer believes and yet manages to live perfectly normal lives, scared because the modern world has made the premise of hiding from reality much more difficult. Look at Maureen Dowd's column today (Black Magic). Santorum is not taking us back to the 12th century, many Americans have never left the Medieval life.
So after losing all of their credibility the Bishops try to assert their authority again. Mitt can lie over and over because no one has the nerve to Google anything. Fox news has never created one conservative. They just listen because it is what they already decided they want to hear. So yes, the economy has practically disappeared from the debate and contraception has become more important, but the basic premise is fear. Fear creates ignorance and ignorance creates fear. So religion has become the basic issue of the Republican position. Now America is going to have to decide whether or not to be the America our founders created or a new America which uses the Bible instead of the Constitution. The big advantage of the latter is that you can pick and choose almost any position you like. In an article by religious leaders in a local paper, in defense of gay marriage pointed out that the Bible requires no interest on loans and gives permission to stone disobedient children. Wouldn't that give a new version of the Supreme Court lots of fun!
Blunt is a bluff. The Republicans that run things will be quietly running from this proposed legislation. They will never let it come to a vote. I am sure they have counted and are aware that support would cause a disaster for their party.
@ Carlyle. We'll see what happens. Majority Leader Reid has called for a vote on the Blunt bill next week.
@ David Feldman. Not sure how to answer your question. Ultimately, the Court will decide whether laws that restrict or negate Roe v. Wade are constitutional. My understanding is that some potential litigants are holding back on challenging state laws that clearly conflict with Roe, & to a lesser extent, Planned Parenthood v. Casey because they don't want to give the Roberts Court a chance to decide & are hoping Obama will be able to replace one of the conservative Supremes.
I'm kind of off-put by your asking where I was on the White House petition. I have yet to sign a White House petition, though I regularly sign petitions that come from outfits like MoveOn.org, because they make the news, get higher numbers & get to the White House. I haven't seen much evidence the WH takes its petitions seriously. Anyway, where was I? I was right here.
As to how to stop the assaults on laws that help the poor, women, schoolchildren, etc., I don't know. There will always be right-wing nuts, and they are in a particular lather now as white people are about to become the minority. As Marvin Schwalb says, they're scared. These people and their forebears have been using their muscle on minorities and women since before they wrote the Constitution, so I'm not surprised they're worried about turnabout. They should be. People are people, and people in power will behave badly.
So there are no easy answers. The best thing to do is to protest bad legislative or administrative moves, to take other offensive action like Occupy, talk to any neighbors who aren't foaming at the mouth, encourage good people to run for public office, support them in their efforts and, come election day, vote for least crazy candidate wherever you live. Too often that's a hold-your-nose proposition.
And bear in mind that even the best of circumstances will be far short of perfect.