The Commentariat -- Oct. 28, 2014

Internal links, graphic removed.

NEW. Gov. Rush Limbaugh. Marc Santora & Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: New Jersey Gov. Chris "Christie continued to defend his state's mandatory quarantine program on Tuesday morning, even as a growing number of scientists and public health experts condemned the restrictions as overly broad and possibly harmful in the fight against Ebola in West Africa. The New England Journal of Medicine, in an editorial published on its website, said the approach taken by New Jersey, New York and several other states 'is not scientifically based, is unfair and unwise, and will impede essential efforts to stop these awful outbreaks of Ebola disease at their source, which is the only satisfactory goal.'"

Ron Nixon of the New York Times: "In a rare public accounting of its mass surveillance program, the United States Postal Service reported that it approved nearly 50,000 requests last year from law enforcement agencies and its own internal inspection unit to secretly monitor the mail of Americans for use in criminal and national security investigations. The number of requests, contained in a little-noticed 2014 audit of the surveillance program by the Postal Service's inspector general, shows that the surveillance program is more extensive than previously disclosed and that oversight protecting Americans from potential abuses is lax.... The audit found that in many cases the Postal Service approved requests to monitor an individual’s mail without adequately describing the reason or having proper written authorization." ...

... Eric Tucker of the AP: "While Congress mulls how to curtail the NSA's collection of Americans' telephone records, impatient civil liberties groups are looking to legal challenges already underway in the courts to limit government surveillance powers. Three appeals courts are hearing lawsuits against the bulk phone records program, creating the potential for an eventual Supreme Court review." ...

... Katrina Vanden Heuvel of the Nation, in the Washington Post: "It is time for President Obama to offer clemency to Edward Snowden, the courageous U.S. citizen who revealed the Orwellian reach of the National Security Agency's sweeping surveillance of Americans. His actions may have broken the law, but his act, as the New York Times editorialized, did the nation 'a great service.'"

Michael Shear & Sabrina Tavernise of the New York Times: "The federal government on Monday announced a new set of monitoring guidelines for people arriving from West Africa that stopped short of the tough measures instituted in New York and New Jersey last week, an effort to bring uniformity to a messy patchwork of responses by states. The new policy, which federal health officials said was an effort ... to strike a balance between safety and civil liberties, would require returning heath care workers, or people who had been near Ebola patients, to submit to an in-person checkup and a phone call from a local public health authority." ...

... Jon Swaine & Dan Roberts of the Guardian: "Federal health officials attempted on Monday to bring some order to a chaotic response to the latest Ebola diagnosis in the United States, after the United Nations criticised earlier restrictions placed on healthcare workers returning from west Africa.". ...

... Margaret Hartmann of New York: "Since each state sets its own quarantine rules, governors can keep imprisoning health-care workers if they want. The army immediately undermined the federal government's new guidelines by announcing that soldiers returning from West Africa are being quarantined for 21 days, though they show no signs of illness and had no direct contact with Ebola patients." ...

... The Most Misunderstood Man in New Jersey Is Misunderstood Again. Matt Arco of NJ Advance Media: " Gov. Chris Christie insisted during a campaign stop today he hasn't reversed his decision on mandatory quarantines for people traveling to the U.S. from West Africa, even as a nurse who had been held at University hospital was released earlier this afternoon. The governor, speaking to reporters in Florida, said his policy hasn't changed. The statement came just hours after the administration announced the nurse under quarantine at University Hospital in Newark after treating Ebola patients in Africa will be discharged. 'I didn't reverse any decision, why are you saying I reversed my decision?' Christie responded to a question today about the nurse, Kaci Hickox." ...

... Susan Livio of NJ Advance Media: Hickox "will be expected to quarantine herself at home, according to the Maine Health Department, which pledged to 'work collaboratively' with her and coordinate any food or medicine she might need if she begins to show symptoms." ...

... Liz Robbins, et al., of the New York Times: "Even as New Jersey officials on Monday released a nurse they had kept quarantined in a tent since her return from treating Ebola patients in Sierra Leone, an unapologetic Gov. Chris Christie dismissed those who questioned his handling of the case and denied that he had reversed himself.... Mr. Christie said he had no reason to talk to [nurse Kaci] Hickox. 'My job is not to represent her,' he said. 'My job is to represent the people of New Jersey.'" ...

... CW: Yesterday, Steve M. asked "Is Chris Christie being mean enough to Kari Hickox to win the Republican nomination in 2016?" Yeah, I think, "Fuck you, International Hero Nurse," is just mean enough. (It would have been better if Hickox had been both a nurse AND a nun who dedicated herself at great risk to helping the helpless, but you can't have everything.) ...

     ... Oh, sorry, I was wrong. Lucy McCalmont of Politico: "Rush Limbaugh slammed New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie on Monday over his Ebola response, saying it's the Republican governor who should be quarantined for siding with President Barack Obama ahead of the elections. 'So one week before the election, once again, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has caved. We need to quarantine Chris Christie is what needs to happen here, folks. This is the second election in a row,' Limbaugh said on his radio program.... Comparing Christie's Ebola response to his Hurricane Sandy hug with the president ahead of the 2012 elections, Limbaugh said Christie is 'responding to Obama's demands.'" ...

... Steve M. explains Christie's mistake: "If he were whining now that he was forced to [release Hickox] by jackbooted Obama administration thugs, or possibly by evil trial lawyers (... Hickox was threatening a federal lawsuit), he might be looking good right now in the eyes of Limbaugh and his crowd.... You leave her in the tent, or you say you were forced to free her by the fascist political correctness police. Christie had an enemy -- as Mark noted in my comments, the right was already mounting a hate campaign against Hickox, noting that she's (gasp!) a registered Democrat, and has worked for (horrors!) the CDC." ...

... Abby Ohlheiser & Cecilia Kang of the Washington Post: Hickox "was specifically critical of Christie, who had told reporters Saturday that Hickox was 'obviously ill.' 'First of all, I don't think he's a doctor,' Hickox told CNN on Sunday, in an interview from her isolation tent.... That same day, she hired civil rights attorney Norman Siegel, who told NBC News that Hickox planned to sue for her release." ...

... Andy Borowitz: "Saying that he was 'sick and tired of having my medical credentials questioned,' Governor Chris Christie (R-N.J.) had himself sworn in as a medical doctor on Sunday night. Dr. Christie acknowledged that becoming a doctor generally requires pre-med classes, four years of medical school, plus additional years of residency, but he said that the Ebola epidemic compelled him to take 'extraordinary measures, as we say in the medical profession.'" ...

... Benjamin Wallace-Wells of New York: "Christie's own politics, his instinctive pugilistic communitarianism, may seem a little anachronistic in a country less inclined to see outsiders as enemies.... Already there is something that feels characteristic about Christie in this episode, in which he rushed to the barricades to fight an enemy that no one else could see."

Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "The office of Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, said on Monday that [New York C]ity's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and the contractor, Computer Sciences Corporation, created schemes that would trigger [fraudulent Medicaid] reimbursements on tens of thousands of false claims.... [The] reimbursements ... amount to tens of millions of dollars.... The lawsuit, which follows a whistle-blower's complaint, was filed under the False Claims Act. The lawsuit demands triple damages and penalties, but does not specify how much it is seeking.... '... we strongly disagree with the allegations, which we believe involve technical billing issues, not fraud,' the [city's] Law Department said."

A Kindlier, Gentler ISIS Media Campaign? Adam Taylor of the Washington Post: "In a remarkable new video released by the Islamic State militants, British hostage John Cantlie gives a tour of the Syrian city of Kobane and denounces Western coverage of the fighting in the city."

Kate Cox of the Nation: "All across the United States, prison populations are graying, growing old and infirm behind bars.... This is a man-made crisis that tracks back to the nation's long obsession with retribution, which peaked in the 1980s and 1990s. That's when the 'tough on crime' and 'war on drugs' ideologies reigned supreme, spawning mandatory minimum sentences and 'three strikes' laws, among other things.... Spending on inmates ages 50 and older tops $16 billion annually.... Perpetrators and victims -- and the public at large -- could benefit from a system that recognizes retribution must be paired with earlier release and more support for re-entry, as well as repealing mandatory minimum sentencing laws and refocusing our energies on diversion, community supervision and community-based sanctions and services."

November Elections

Dan Balz & Peyton Craighill of the Washington Post: "Republicans enter the final week of the midterm campaign holding higher ground than the Democrats, [link fixed] aided by public dissatisfaction with President Obama's leadership, with the overall direction of the country and with the federal government's ability to deal with major problems, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll." ...

... John Cassidy of the New Yorker: "... it is perfectly possible that neither side will emerge from next Tuesday with victory sealed. Runoffs are likely in Georgia and Louisiana. We could have to wait until early January to find out who controls the upper chamber."

John Dickerson of Slate: "This year's contest is a no-mandate election, in which the winning side will succeed with no great animating idea other than the fear (or avoidance) of the Obama nightmare. Republican debates, speeches, and advertisements have been so thoroughly concerned with the president and how much the Democrat on the ballot agrees with him, there is no other message that competes. That's a smart political strategy, but it's not a governing strategy. Republicans may take control of Congress, but it will have been by clobbering a president they'll then have to work with...."

Coming Soon -- the Ebola Senate Majority. Margaret Talev of Bloomberg Politics: "Last week marked a spike in TV ad buys in Senate and House races featuring either the word 'Ebola' or images of emergency workers in protective suits and masks, according to data from Kantar Media's CMAG, a tracking firm. The uptick coincided with polling showing worsening prospects for Democrats in some of the same states where the ads are running, including Georgia." ...

... David Espo of the AP: "Senate Democrats unleashed a late-campaign round of attack ads Monday accusing Republicans in key races of harboring plans to cut Social Security and Medicare. The commercials in Iowa, New Hampshire, Louisiana and elsewhere appear aimed at older voters, who cast ballots in relatively large numbers in midterm elections and have tended to support Republicans in recent years."

Georgia. Laura Bassett of the Huffington Post: "David Perdue, Georgia's Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, defended himself Sunday night against charges that he paid female managers less than male ones when he was CEO of Dollar General, saying 'it was less than 2,000 people' who brought the lawsuit against the company.... We had upwards of 70,000 employees at that company.'" ... Paul Waldman suggests, "Maybe he should turn this into a slogan: 'David Purdue: The majority of people who worked for me didn't sue for discrimination.'" ...

     ... CW: If you read the underlying Mother Jones story, you'll see that more than 4,000 employees sued Dollar General during Perdue's tenure as CEO: 2,100+ in the gender discrimination suit & another 2,000 in a suit claiming "that the company had made them managers in name only so it could deny them overtime they would have earned as store clerks." In mediation, Dollar General paid off the employees & former employees in both class action suits.

Kentucky. The Louisville Courier Journal Editors in endorsing Alison Grimes. notes that Mitch McConnell has refused to speak to the board: McConnell "now is identified largely as the master of obstruction and gridlock in Washington. Kentucky needs a U.S. senator who sees a higher calling than personal ambition and a greater goal than self-aggrandizement." ...

Lexington Herald Leader Editors, endorses Alison Grimes for U.S. Senate: "The Senate may never recover from the bitter paralysis [Mitch] McConnell has inflicted through record filibusters that allow his minority to rule by obstruction. Even before Barack Obama was sworn in, McConnell told his fellow Republicans that their strategy was to deny the new president any big wins. The country was in two wars and at deep risk of sliding into a depression, but making an adversary look bad was McConnell's main mission. His signature cause - flooding elections with ever more money - corrupts. He poses as a champion of the right to criticize the government, but it's really his rich buddies' right to buy the government that he champions." ...

... Sam Stein of the Huffington Post: After asking McConnell's various offices a dozen times, a spokesman finally confirmed that Mitch McConnell "wants to repeal the full health care law, including not just the federal subsidies for people purchasing on exchanges like Kynect, but also the mandates and taxes on high-cost plans and other features of the legislation." CW: Say adios to affordable health insurance, 500,000 Kentuckians & millions of Americans. ...

... CW: Despite his despicable character & Dickensian policies, Mitch makes a humanizing campaign ad, proving, if nothing else, that Mad men are awesome. If you can make the Turtle seem like a good-natured human being, you can make even that dead guy in New Hampshire (see below) come to life:

Louisiana. Phil Mattingly of Bloomberg Politics: "Senator Mary Landrieu [C-La.] used the absence of her top opponent in her re-election race at Monday's debate to highlight her differences with President Barack Obama and her efforts to work across the aisle during her time in office.... The no-show, Rep. Bill Cassidy "has consistently led Landrieu in head-to-head polling."

Maine. Matt Byrne of the Portland Press Herald: "Two Portland-area lawmakers will roll out a referendum petition drive this week to enact ranked-choice voting in Maine gubernatorial elections. Rep. Diane Russell, D-Portland, who is running for re-election, and Sen. Richard Woodbury, an independent from Yarmouth who is not running again, said Monday that ranked-choice voting offers a fairer way for Mainers to choose their governor." CW: Good for Russell & Woodbury, but this system should be used for other races, too.

Massachusetts. Charles Pierce stands up for Martha Coakley & rips the Boston Globe for its endorsement of Charlie Baker which "doesn't make a very compelling case for Baker over Coakley on any grounds save for the fact that he's not her."

New Hampshire -- where a dead politicians weighs in on today's U.S. Senate campaign. He didn't like Jeanne Shaheen when he was alive, & he doesn't like her now that he's dead, apparently. Anyway, the GOP thought what was good in 2008 is good for 2014. Whatever. Dave Weigel, via Margaret Hartmann.

Wisconsin. "Scott Walker to Chris Christie: Thanks for Nothing." Alexander Burns of Politico: "Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker says he needs more help from the national GOP in his reelection fight -- and an upcoming visit from New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie isn't going to cut it.... '[Christie] is coming because he asked if he could come and we weren't going to say no,' Walker said. 'But we're not looking for surrogates.'" CW Note to Scottie: Maybe your likely 2016 presidential rival doesn't want you to win this one.

Presidential Election

Sean Sullivan of the Washington Post: "As [Chris] Christie considers a run for president, the question of how his image as a no-nonsense, shoot-from-the-hip executive will play in the far-flung precincts of Iowa and South Carolina, where politics tends to be less in-your-face than in New Jersey, is increasingly relevant. His Ebola decision thrust both his persona and his policy-making style back into the spotlight."

Surprise! Hillary Business, After All. Ruby Cramer of BuzzFeed. At a rally for Martha Coakley Friday, where she & Elizabeth Warren both spoke, Hillary Clinton said, "Don't let anybody tell you that corporations and businesses create jobs." Speaking Monday at a rally for Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney" (D-N.Y.), Clinton corrected herself: "The Republican alternative is a discredited economic theory that will hurt middle class families. So-called trickle-down economics has failed. I short-handed this point the other day, so let me be absolutely clear about what I've been saying for a couple of decades. Our economy grows when businesses and entrepreneurs create good-paying jobs here in America and workers and families are empowered to build from the bottom up and the middle out -- not when we hand out tax breaks for corporations that outsource jobs or stash their profits overseas." CW Translation: "Send more cash, my Little Wall Street Angels." ...

... Jonathan Chait adds some context in a post titled, "In gaffe, Hillary Clinton endorses communism."

Jason Horowitz of the New York Times profiles Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who is gearing up to run for president.

Beyond the Beltway

Michael Schwirtz & Michael Winerip of the New York Times: "The New York City Correction Department’s top uniformed officer, facing criticism over underreporting of violence at Rikers Island, will step down, a department spokesman said Tuesday. The officer, William Clemons, a 29-year veteran correction official in New York, was appointed chief of department just five months ago by Mayor Bill de Blasio's reform-minded correction commissioner, who described him at the time as a 'superb corrections professional.'... The move is a blow to the commissioner, Joseph Ponte, who has stalwartly defended his decision to promote Mr. Clemons in the face of unsettling revelations about his competence in recent weeks." ...

     ... UPDATE. New Lede: "In a major shake-up at the New York City Correction Department, three high-ranking officials, including the top uniformed officer, are stepping down amid mounting criticism over the handling of violence and corruption at Rikers Island.... Mayor Bill de Blasio's handpicked correction commissioner, Joseph Ponte, had promoted all three within the last five months."

News Ledes

AP: "An unmanned commercial supply rocket bound for the International Space Station exploded moments after liftoff Tuesday evening, with debris falling in flames over the launch site in eastern Virginia. No injuries were reported following the first catastrophic launch in NASA's commercial spaceflight effort. The accident at Orbital Sciences Corp.'s launch complex at Wallops Island was sure to draw criticism over the space agency's growing reliance on private U.S. companies in this post-shuttle effort."

USA Today: "Amber Vinson, one of two Texas nurses who tested positive for Ebola after treating an infected patient, is free of the virus and will be discharged Tuesday from Atlanta's Emory University Hospital, according to the hospital."

Atlantic: "Darren Wilson, the police officer accused of shooting Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, this summer..., has not been seen since August 9.... It's now being reported that a total of six criminal cases have been dismissed, because Wilson, as the arresting officer, isn't showing up to court to testify."

CNN: "South African prosecutors will appeal the verdict and the sentence in the Oscar Pistorius case, a spokesman for the country's National Prosecuting Authority told CNN on Monday."

Comments

[Victoria D.]

The NY Times has a fascinating piece on fast food wages/benefits in Denmark, comparing it to the situation in the U.S. I was prepared to learn of a difference but was utterly shocked to read what an enormous gap actually exists. One thing that really stood out was the comment by a Dane that high wages were an agreed cost to insure against too radical wage disparity, hence too great inequality. He seemed shocked that people might have to live on the streets. Americans used to feel that way, too. I don't know what went wrong with us. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/28/business/international/living-wages-served-in-denmark-fast-food-restaurants.html?smid=nytcore-ipad-share&smprod=nytcore-ipad

[Akhilleus]

Victoria,

What went wrong in this country was and is an entire political party operating in the thrall of money and power and against the well being of 95% of it's citizens. What went wrong was and is a solipsostic media echo chamber that exists solely to support the misanthropic efforts of that party. What went wrong was and is a supreme court not only not dedicated to justice but one without an attachment to the rule of law; a court that has arrayed its implacable enmity against any it deems its ideological and political foes. What went wrong is a radical, unforgiving ideology that has churned a fetid soup of racism, fear, greed, paranoia, religious intolerance, and violence into a venomous toxin mainlined on a daily basis by millons who have rejected humanity for the warm infected pus of tribal hegemony. What went wrong in this country was and is individuals who see nothing wrong with pain and suffering for others as long as they can keep their own humanity and decency locked away long enough to enjoy either monetary gain or some fleeting sense of victory over their imagined enemies.

What went wrong was and is the worst of our species concentrated in the Republican Party.

[safari]

A convenient loophole in Kansas finance law doesn't consider the state Supreme Court justices as "state officials", so if you wanted to mount a highly political campaign to sway public opinion using a slush fund of untraceable dark money you could do so free from any form of disclosure laws. I don't think the Kochs were leading this charge into unknown territory, but now that it's known I'm sure they'll be "investing" heavily soon.

In the article I particularly like the 'shocked' responses of the omission of the state judges as ´state officials', mentioning the loophole as if it wrote itself into the law and now it´s written in stone; fatalism wins. And how convenient for Brownback as he's campaigned on purging the liberal justices from the Court.

http://www.propublica.org/article/a-kansas-groups-push-to-oust-judges-reveals-a-gap-in-campaign-finance-rules

So Brownback wins an unprecedented majority throughout the state, nearly sweeping the executive and legislative powers, then systematically purges the 'moderates' from his own party aided by his oligarch puppetmasters to join more rightwing ideologues to his machine. An army of 'yes' men to give a democratic veil to his extremist policies. And to complete the cycle, he still feels the fervent desire to purge the last branch of any unpure thoughts, bringing the judiciary under his right wing. I wonder if he walks around in gold slippers and a King's crown when he paces in his living room reading the SparkNote's version of the Prince?

That's a cute little democracy we've got going in Kansas

[Nancy]

Oh, please. The NYMag article is overthinking Chris Christie. Wagon circler? Communitarian? How about an arrogant bully who smells and misses no opportunity to look like he's in charge (which translates to presidential). He thought he and his equally arrogant buddy Cuomo were going to ride in and show the whole country what leadership is. He's the guy in your office, neighborhood, family who has an unsolicited solution to every problem, whether a problem exists or not. And by god you're going to listen to him. Fatass showboat.

[Citizen625]

"The proposed order would effectively give a government agency unfettered power to freeze all assets of its choosing held by any of over 40 innocent children, spouses of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of all ages." Re: the Charles Whyly bankruptcy http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-27/wyly-widow-says-she-was-insolvent-after-billionaire-s-car-death.html?cmpid=yhoo.
The way the right wing world view works is that you can steal $500+ million, give it to your family and politicians and screw the society that made your "largess" possible. Wow! Life without shame is really more convenient than hindsight encumbered with conscience. The GOP thinks the Whylys have dignity along with their "philanthropy". How many Democrats think this crowd of crooks has dignity? Our bar representing acceptable behavior has been adjusted so low than Cheney, Bush and Kardashian are all thought acceptable.

[Citizen625]

"... Katrina Vanden Heuvel of the Nation, in the Washington Post: "It is time for President Obama to offer clemency to Edward Snowden". Is this before or after wrecking the election results for the Democrats? Some days I think the tactical skills of the Dems and Progressives are just fucking lame. Losers don't write the history.

[MAG]

@Citizen625 Want to read about more billionaire benefits?

"Steve Ballmer stands to gain as much as $1bn in tax benefits as a result of his $2bn purchase of the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team, helping to explain why the Microsoft billionaire paid a record price for the club."

http://www.cnbc.com/id/102123997

You see there's this: "Under an exception in US law, buyers of sports franchises can use an accounting treatment known as goodwill against their other taxable income."

Like to get me some of that good will!

[Akhilleus]

Safari,

Nicely said.

I was struck by your reference to Machiavelli. It raises an intriguing point when considering the conservative worldview as instantiated and perpetuated by the Republican Party.

One of Machiavelli's most important but little understood points in parsing the workings of power politics can be found at the intersection of politics and religion, a locus populated today almost solely by Republicans, unbelievers and adherents of "dirty" religions having been rudely escorted to the town limits and told to start walking.

Here I must defer to old friend Isaiah Berlin for whom Machiavelli represents a very early proponent (whether he knew it or not) of a nascent form of pluralism. That door will remain closed for the present since the room behind it is packed too full for even a long comment. But Berlin's point about Machiavelli's jaundiced view of religion mixed with affairs of the world (the realms of morals and politics, in Berlin's words) is that this is a very bad and ultimately unworkable idea.

Machiavelli believed that whatever a person's private moral codes, ie, religion, ethics, etc, were, they should remain that: private. He believed that if a prince bought into Christianity, lock, stock, and barrel, that he could not then rule effectively. Religion would demand something other than the pragmatic approach Machiavelli believed necessary in political desmesnes.

This does, in a way, point out one of the central and most glaring internal inconsistencies for wingers, the fact that they hold their Bibles high and thump their chests for Jesus and talk about living a virtuous life but in their daily dealings with other humans and the type of politics they support, often act monstrously.

It's also representative of the unholy (literally) alliance made during the Reagan years between Republican politicians and fundamentalist Christians. At that time, they needed each other, one for support, the other for power. But fealty to religious extremists has in many ways bound the hands of politicians who might like to go another way, many of whom (then), likely wished they had never made that deal. This is exactly what Machiavelli was talking about.

But now here's the really interesting thing. A generation after Ronald Reagan screwed this country up, but good, his legacy continues to fuck us up, but may, in fact, eventually doom his party (unless, of course, they go the Brownback route and install themselves as the only game in town). Today, those initial inconsistencies, although they've never really gone away, have been buried into the admixture of noxious ingredients that have become the essence of modern movement conservatism, combining the worst of religious intolerance and hatred, a demand for ideological purity, and sense of victimization, with the worst of political hypocrisy, untraceable dark money, election rigging, voter disenfranchisement, character assassination, and enslavement to Wall St. and vested interests like the NRA.

The internal contradictions have become subsumed by the all-consuming need to win, no matter what. You see the problem? How is it that so-called Christians can abide the nasty, illegal, immoral, anti-democratic and anti-American schemes necessary for their political arm to succeed despite a continuing decrease in Party membership? And how is it that professional politicians can abide the oppressive restrictions placed on them by fundamentalist religious nutjobs?

The answer is, I think, that both sides have ceased trying to reconcile those problems; they've all morphed into some brutish new kind of political/religious abomination.

The underlying contradictions remain, but like untreated neuroses, they will continue to eat away at the rotting superstructures thrown together by the Reagan era schemers.

The center cannot hold.

But, in order to stave off collapse as long as possible, we have the disgraceful goings on in places like Kansas and in the US Supreme Court where harsh reality--a party whose ideology is more and more frequently rejected by Americans--is being held at bay by increasingly slick "legal" maneuverings, unlimited cash, and a Supreme Court eager to press its thumb on the scales.

At some point what's wrong with Kansas will cease to matter. It probably already has. As John Prine might say, they're runnin' just to be on the run.

The problem is, they're running over everyone else.

[Citizen625]

AK:"Machiavelli believed that whatever a person's private moral codes, ie, religion, ethics, etc, were, they should remain that: private. He believed that if a prince bought into Christianity, lock, stock, and barrel, that he could not then rule effectively. Religion would demand something other than the pragmatic approach Machiavelli believed necessary in political demesnes." Wow! You've got a full-throated roar this a.m. If I may focus on this paragraph: by extension the Dem/Progressive are similarly 'burdened' like Christians with their notions of niceness and fair play and acting in the interests of the less well-off among us. And thus they lose power in contemporary political struggles. The self perpetuating cynicism of Machievellism is in essence a race to the bottom in terms of behavior to advance political goals.

I read some place that now is one of the most interesting times in history to be alive in terms of the important subjects under political review. Now, we have new instantaneous ways to keep up to date on dozens of subject that too often sub-divide us instead of unite us. For example: I had a Greenpeace organizer look at my coat which has a fishing boat on it and stop talking to me because he figured I was a lost cause. Really, people who fish have an even greater interest in environmental protections than your average person because the wholesomeness of their environment is not only their personal health but also that of their economic health. Directly. We sub-divide our political affiliations with a narrowness that befits the narrow-minded. So, while we remain politically pure of thought, we lose allies and elections. If the SCLC used kids in demonstrations to gain support for their cause, was it wrong? Dems/Progessives need to win.

[Akhilleus]

Citizen,

You're not wrong about how divided we've become, nor about the need to win elections.

Those, like your Greenpeace friend, who allow their passions to petrify into absolutism, are looking for love in all the wrong places. If they wanna win, they can't only be preaching to the choir. They gotta convince those on the fence and maybe some on the other side of it. They can't worry about apostates, and they shouldn't be rejecting someone, such as people like yourself, because their ability to interpret hopeful signs is kneecapped by a desire for shibboleths in the place of allies.

I think there is a difference, however, between a political worldview being circumscribed and curtailed by an implacable religion, and one informed by a sense of ethical treatment of others, even though in some ways it seems that progressives who adhere to those beliefs do seem to lack the wherewithal to mount effective political challenges.

Liberals/progressives certainly have a baseline ideology, but have been nowhere near as adamant about strict adherence to the cause. Prior to the teabaggers, for instance, during the late 80s and 90s, conservatives marched in lock-step and mowed down much of the poorly organized opposition. Only recently have the cracks begun to cause serious problems for them.

I think it's possible to construct a popular and potent political movement based on a sense of fairness and concern for others, which I see as being in marked contrast to a political scheme that has to rely on obdurate religious zealots. The GOP has been successful for many reasons, but less so for that. They've been running a shell game with the aid of the media and wealthy backers so they haven't been forced to come clean with the public about what it is they're actually selling.

A sense of responsibility to other human beings isn't the same as a forced obeisance to inflexible dogma. The fact that Democrats haven't been able to adequately put that sense into a form they can sell to voters is more a failure of imagination than one of being weighted down with an ideology inconsistent with winning elections.

At least, in my opinion.

I think Machiavelli has useful things to say besides "do whatever it takes". There are many reasons Democrats are in the political doldrums, but a commitment to humanity isn't one of them.

[Kate Madison]

WELL, WE ARE NOT GOING TO WIN ELECTIONS THIS WAY!
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Kate -- We have a MAJOR problem. And only a few hours left to find a solution.

PLEASE READ THIS IMMEDIATELY:

It’s now official that Boehner’s allies will spend $25 MILLION this week against Democrats -- the most of the entire election. They’re going all out to crush us in the final days of the election -- and it’s working.

Polls all around the country show that Republicans’ Obama-bashing TV ads are taking their toll on our Democratic candidates. We’ll be blunt: Today is our last chance to turn things around.

The final week ad buy deadline is tonight at MIDNIGHT. If you’re reading this email right now, we need your help.

Kate -- Please step up before the FINAL ad buy deadline tonight.
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This is pathetic and at least the 25th plea I have received today--all after unsubscribing from everything political. I gave a nice donation to Bold Progressives early in the campaign, and said that would be IT for me--retired, not wealthy, etc. etc. I am getting very
pissed off at the DCCC for continually hitting up poor little old ladies like me instead of stepping up to the plate! They should take it to FatAss Christie--his Ebolalies and terrible manners--and the rest of the Putrid Puffs the Repubs are $hoving into office now.

[James Singer]

Housekeeping. Got an invite this AM from the Pew Research Center to take an audience survey. Maybe some of you have also received an invitation. Somewhere near the middle of the survey I was asked to list my three main sources of news. I wrote: 1 RealityChex, 2 Daily Kos, 3 NY Times/LA Times. I felt kinda bad about leaving out The Guardian, Salon, Slate, Charlie, and all the other really good compilers, but they only wanted three.

[Akhilleus]

Kate,

I know just how you feel. The begging deluges my inbox daily.

But don't you wonder if Republicans make the same kind of play, albeit not like Democratic candidates do, to people like us, but to, shall we say, their FIO--friends in oligarchy?

Dear Charlie and Dave,

Hey guys, you dudes have been wicked awesome. And I want you to know right up front that I've always been a huge fan of Koch Industries, no matter how many laws you've broken and how much money you've been fined. What's a few little multi-million dollar fines now and then? Fucking govament.

Anyway, I think you should know that I think Nancy Pelosi has been trying to steal that stash of dirty tricks notebooks I have hidden in my garage. I mean, WTF! You boys KNOW I can't win without dirty tricks! A B+ sophomore at UW-Madison could clean my clock in a zoning board election. I NEED dirty tricks. You boys know what I mean, right? I mean, your family made your money by sucking off Stalin while pretending to long for Joe McCarthy's tiny dick up your asses.

I mean, listen to this. Last week, I was having a little cookout in the backyard of my taxpayer supported mansion, where I slipped a thick packet (no, Charlie, not that kind of packet) to my uncle, Rudy Randa--you know, our bud in the 7th circuit appeals court--to make sure all those stoopid corruption charges against me were deep-sixed (asshole good government groups!), and lo and behold (like they say in the Bible...I mean I think they say shit like that; I've never read it) I see an unmanned drone flying over us taking pictures of me and Uncle Rudy trading spit, and I'm pretty sure it was painted in the colors of the Kenyan flag which means it was sent by you-know-who....fucking black bastard.

Anyway, I reawey, reaway, reaway, need your help. Public employees, teachers, blah people, and demycraps are all saying bad things about me. But you boys know, sometimes, you just have to kick some moocher ass, am I right? Fucking parasites. They don't know that it's people like you--and me, of course--who give them everything. Those bastards OWE US. I mean, now they're complaining that they even have the right to vote, like the Constitution applies to them. Where do these fucking people think they live? The United States?

So this is why I need to ask you to, please, please, please, pretty please, with the deed to the state of Wisconsin on top, help me tell Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy and Franklin fucking Roosevelt (he must be really old by now) and Al Franken and Harry Reid and Elizabeth Warren and Chris Rock (who is he, again?) and all those other people who think that Our America includes them, that they are gonna get their liberal, namby-pamby, bleeding heart, who cares if poor people die, asses kicked from here to election day.

Honestly, bros, 10, 20, maybe 50 mill tops. TOPS! Dirty tricks and attack ads run up the bills.

Yours in Grateful Servitude,

Little Scotty Walker

[Akhilleus]

James,

You da man.