A Crappy Deal

I'm too bummed to go into it now...but we got our five-year-old back (the economy). He may have been molested and possibly raped (drastic cuts as he's very sick), but he wasn't murdered which he would have been if the hostage takers didn't get everything they wanted, so unfortunately Obama paid the full ransom (the same thing with the bankers & TARP 1 [Bush] and 2 [Obama]).

Yet at least, the crazy liberal, George W. Bush's chief speechwriter, David Frum agrees with me.

Sigh.

For the crazies...

Soundtrack for this post required click here.

His Mom's first name is legally Stanley. It's sort of when I learned that Tina Fey's real name was Elizabeth Stamatina Fey. This won't put any crazy birthers to bed, as Dave Weigel notes on his blog on Slate.com, they'll likely want to see a baby footprint (even though Hawaii never did that).

Now where was the 2008 Republican Presidential nominee born? Oh that's right, I forgot, in PANAMA! But it's OK because he's white and that feels more American. And it's also OK because he was born on a U.S. naval base which makes it diplomatically and legally a teeny, teeeeny, tiny slice of America, but don't tell conservative Republicans to hold the same view about Guantanamo Bay,  because they can't have both a naval base that IS America and another base that is most definitely NOT America, because then they would have to follow U.S. federal law and no one in Congress likes doing that.

The Obam-"duh" Doctrine, Ctd...

All the way back in December of 2009, President Obama received the Nobel Peace prize and I noted that conservatives were stunned that the President would advocate for the use of force in defense of this country and in limited times when the humanitarian call for action was too great. And I said way back then, that this was unveiling of the Obama doctrine. And I was right.

President Obama proved last night that he's a man of his word. He does not oppose the use of military force but he understands that military force alone cannot, and we as a country cannot, force political change. We can create conditions where mass violence is minimized, but we cannot through our military might form a brand new government for a country out of whole cloth. And for god sakes, we don't need to save the whole world by ourselves! It's OK to ask friends for some help. One of my favorite quotes during the 2004 Presidential campaign, John Kerry mused regarding Iraq, "Mr. President, it's not leadership if no one is following."

Some conservatives and liberals argue that by imposing the "no-fly zone" implicitly calls for regime change. I disagree. We are not taking part in a civil war. We are merely making it a fair fight. We have removed Gaddaffi's ability to attack from the air (which is imprecise and kills more civilians) and limited his ability to use mass artillery.  The Obama Doctrine is essentially limited strategic force with a cooperative massive effort on the diplomatic end to ensure foreign policy goals. Last night, the President essentially said "Gaddaffi must go, but we don't have to kill him for that to happen." After the sobering lesson of Iraq, we've learned that the U.S. Armed Forces are really good at blowing stuff up. They are not good at making a government for a foreign country.

Meanwhile, France and the U.K. are taking the reins, because this is in their backyard and the conflict is a more vital interest to them. We are also supplying our high tech know-how with radar jamming and other advanced rescue capability.

I think it's a pretty sensible policy. We will stop mass murder where and when we can. We are in the business of stopping things from happening not making things happening. The military is responsible for destructive capability and constructive capability will be the purview of our state department and diplomatic efforts in the region, which by definition, includes partners willing to help and help pay for those shared goals.

The era of the superpower died in 1990 and really died on September 11, 2001. With actual threats that are so defuse and varied, no one nation will be able to fight it all by itself. The new era requires cooperation with friends and allies, which happens to be the best for security and fiscally. And if working with our friends is called weakness by some conservatives, than so be it. I'd rather have a stronger America that looks weak than a weak America that pretends to be strong.

President Obama, Pragmatist

I've long told my conservative friends that Obama was never, nor will ever be, an ideological leftist.  He is a liberal in his beliefs and values, but he is operationally a conservative (which I believe is similar to the American character i.e. black emancipation and suffrage, women's sexual and economic freedom, DADT, etc - "Let's do this major social change but let's just do it very slowly so we can make sure it works out all right").  He is willing to deal and compromise to help move the country slowly, methodically forward in--his own estimation--the right direction. When we look back on his presidency, the story will outline progressive ideas and policies legislated, enacted and executed in a conservative manner.

GOP leadership approves $900B worth of new stimulus-wait...what?

This stimulus is actually the deal on the extension of the Bush tax cuts announced earlier today (technically yesterday) by President Obama.  Key quote from the New York Times article (emphasis mine):

"The package would cost about $900 billion over the next two years, to be financed entirely by adding to the national debt, at a time when both parties are professing a desire to begin addressing long-term fiscal imbalances."

Oh, that's right.  I forgot that it's not deficit spending if you spend it on the crap you want to buy. I get it now Republicans! See, if Democrats want to use the country's credit card to buy some construction workers to fix a bridge, that's deficit spending. But if Republicans want to give more money to millionaires with the country's credit card, money that in all likelihood those millionaires will save.  That money comes from a special magic Republican fund that doesn't come from borrowing!

Remember folks, you only have to find a way to pay for a program if it affects someone who might actually need the money, like unemployment insurance extensions for those laid off during the great recession (those lazy bums) and food stamps (if more poor kids are starving, they might be more motivated to find work, right!?).

Now that I'm done with my little rant, I actually think the deal President Obama got on the "Bush tax cuts" is probably the best he could get considering the circumstances. And if you remember, this deal between the President and Republican leadership, I advocated for earlier on this blog (it's actually former OMB director Peter Orzsag's - but I'll take the credit). And if this deal helps pave the way for the ratification of START and the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, then overall I think it was the right thing to do. Losing some important chess pieces in order to control the rest of the game is worth it.

A Class Act

President Obama making his contribution to (famed sex columnist) Dan Savage's noble It Gets Better project, to help bullied gay youth, on Youtube.

Although he's cautiously stepping towards a real gay rights agenda on Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT) and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) to the consternation of some on the left, I think his ninja moves behind the scenes will provide for a more lasting change as I stated here (rather obscenely) in a previous post. (Meaning Grandmas should not read the aforementioned post!)

Nerd in Chief

Peter Baker's must read interview with President Obama.  This interview was used for his NY Times Magazine piece, "Education of a President"

On what he would tell the Barack Obama of December 2008:

"Now in retrospect, I could have told Barack Obama in December of 2009 that if you already have a third of the [stimulus] package as tax cuts, then the Republicans, who traditionally are more comfortable with tax cuts, may just pocket that and attack the other components of the program. And it might have been better for us not to include tax cuts in the original package, let the Republicans insist on the tax cuts, and then say, O.K., you know, we’ll compromise and give you your tax cuts, even though we had already proposed them.

And if you recall, when we initially unveiled what the Recovery Act would look like — in fact, that a third of it was tax cuts — Mitch McConnell actually was, as he phrased it, pleasantly surprised that sort of traditional Republican idea had been included. But very quickly that pleasant surprise turned into attacks on the infrastructure or the aid to the states or what have you.

I would have told Barack Obama back in 2009 that just be warned, structuring the tax cut the way we did, where people basically got a small bump in their paycheck every two weeks, was the right thing to do economically, but politically it meant that nobody knew that they were getting a tax cut. And in fact what ended up happening was six months into it or nine months into it, people had thought we had raised their taxes instead of cutting their taxes."

On whether he has a communication problem or a policy problem:

I think that, when I reflect back on the last two years, I do think that given how much stuff was coming at us, we probably spent much more time trying to get the policy right than trying to get the politics right.

There is probably a perverse pride in my administration — and I take responsibility for this; this was blowing from the top — that we were going to do the right thing, even if short-term it was unpopular.

And I think anybody who’s occupied this office has to remember that success is determined by an intersection in policy and politics, and that you can’t be neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion. And so there are probably areas where we could have been more effective than we’ve been.

NEWSFLASH: The Bailout Worked

A new release by the Treasury Department shows that TARP - commonly known as "the bailout" - will not cost taxpayers as much as originally anticipated.  Estimates show that the program, signed into law by President Bush in late 2008 and re-authorized by President Obama in 2009, will cost approximately $50 billion but has the potential to turn a profit for taxpayers.

Although President Obama should have leveraged the use of TARP more over Wall Street banks and hedge funds for stronger financial regulation reform, the program did its job in stabilizing the financial sector at a relatively small cost. (It's important to remember that estimates of the cost of the crisis range from $1.3-1.6 trillion.)

Interesting fact: Although roughly $700 billion was authorized, the program only disbursed roughly $380 billion.

The bailout is a perfect example of why it's sometimes OK to have BIG GOVERNMENT.  I would have liked to stem the financial crisis but unfortunately I don't have $700 billion at my disposal.  The big banks were the ones who didn't have any money anymore, so they couldn't get together and come with a private solution.  Once at the turn of the century, the U.S. went into a recession and J.P. Morgan, not the bank, but the man, bailed out the U.S. government - those were the days!

There are some things that big government shouldn't do. Big government shouldn't set local school curriculum, or set local zoning laws, tell you you can't eat certain foods or smoke, or tell a girl what to do with her body if she gets raped or knocked up by her 15 year old boyfriend.  That stuff is too small for big government to do and it's really not its job.

Anyway, this is a case of big government working.  We don't want big government all the time but we want big government to do big things like this, fighting wars, making sure every state is treating U.S. citizens equally and protecting our food, air and water to make sure its clean.  All of this big stuff we can't do by ourselves and we need big government to do. And when we agree that there are certain big things that we need to do like build more federal highways, reform our outdated healthcare system, update our energy grid, or send our troops to war, it's fair that big government asks us to pay for those things, because those things cost a lot of money.

What I wrote to OFA today

Obama's campaign arm "Organizing for America" asked people to fill out a survey to gauge voter feelings before the midterm.  Here's what I wrote them:

I am a big supporter of President Obama. I think he has been a pragmatic reformer who is moving the country in the right direction. What he needs to do however, is reclaim his transformational presidency. 

I am thankful for his Clintonian successes and Joe Biden was correct when he said healthcare reform was a "BFD" but I want him to be the transformational figure I still believe HE IS. I want him and his staff on the phone with moderate Republicans all the time. I want him to use his personal emotional talent behind the scenes. Americans want the sense that Congress can work together for the benefit of the country. 

Republicans have been absolute a-holes in this regard, but we knew that would be the case going in. I still want the President to work toward a Capitol Hill that at least seems like it's functioning. He can do it. That's why I voted for him. He needs to reclaim that mantle. Otherwise OFA is just an extension of the Democratic Party, and that's great (and it fights for the things I believe in), but I think we all know the change we sought is something much, MUCH deeper. Let's GO do it!

On the Cordoba House Muslim Community Center

First of all, let's make clear that the "Ground Zero mosque" is not just a mosque and is not at ground zero.  The planned Muslim community center is going to replace the supposed "hallowed ground" of the old Burlington Coat Factory on Park Place (take a look at the site here).

www.national911memorial.com - South Memorial Pool Vista

Other commentators have aptly pointed out that probably one of the reasons why this particular development of the Muslim cultural center irks so many in New York City and around the country is due to the fact that construction of the new World Trade Center and corresponding 9/11 memorial has been painfully and depressingly slow.

Second, kudos to the President for his brave speech on religious freedom during the White House Iftar Dinner for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan (full text) proudly proclaiming our American values of freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

Third, shame on the President for then walking back his comments on the following Saturday while on vacation in Florida (video here).

"In this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion," Mr. Obama said at the Coast Guard station. "I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding. That's what our country is about."

Arrggh.  The whole point of electing Obama as the Democratic nominee was so we wouldn't get another Clinton, and we got one anyway!

I digress. This is not hard to understand. If we allow al-Qaeda to scare us into giving up our constitutional values then the terrorists have won.  We don't need to fight them in Iraq or Afghanistan. We can call it quits and come home because our values and ideas are only worth fighting for abroad if we can UPHOLD THEM AT HOME.

The United States Constitution is not the guarantor of anyone's personal moral beliefs; it is instead designed to protect LIBERTY and FREEDOM. Sometimes the Constitution protects rights that we often disagree on in normal discourse, such as the right to have a handgun in dangerous urban neighborhoods or the right to have an abortion without telling one's parents.

However, sometimes the Constitution protects rights that most of us personally disagree with.  Such as the right of a crazy super right-wing minister to protest during military funerals because our culture "tolerates homosexuality." Many conservatives and Republicans are upset with the community center, calling the building location "offensive."

On June 14, 1977, the Supreme Court in National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie held that Neo-Nazis could march through the town of Skokie, Illinois, a town with the largest number of Holocaust survivors per capita at the time.  Now that is offensive.  If the Constitution protects Neo-Nazis who are trying to purposefully give the community they harmed the middle finger, it definitely protects moderate Muslims who are just trying to build a community center, yes with a mosque, in an old worn out building that used to be a Burlington Coat Factory, near the site of a horrible tragedy.

Of all the freedoms in this country we are blessed with, the most important is our freedom of - and freedom from - religion. It is our core principle, it is why we are here, and it is why our young Republic was founded.  If we fail to uphold the principles that led to our founding, the United States of America that we seek so dearly to protect, ceases to exist.

Graph of the Obama tax proposal vs. original Bush tax cuts

So here's a handy little graph from Ezra Klein's blog to help sort out the difference between the Obama budget proposal for only letting the tax cuts for the richest 1-2% expire and the Republican proposal of extending the "Bush" tax cuts as is.  This graph lays out pretty clearly that the Bush tax cuts did largely go to the richest Americans, and not like medium rich, but like really REALLY rich.  As you'll see, between the two tax proposals most of the tax cut amounts are essentially the same for most income brackets.

Also ask yourself, if you really care about cutting the deficit (letting the tax cuts expire in full would cut the deficit by roughly 30%) would you be willing to part with the amount in either proposal?

Full disclosure, I stand to gain an increase in my tax cut of $2 to $7 from the Obama proposal.  My bias is so easily purchased!

Read the full article about the Joint Committee on Taxation's analysis of the two tax proposals here at the Washington Post.

Why Obama should keep McChrystal on as Commander of the War In Afghanistan

Since the Rolling Stone article profiling General McChrystal came out, many Washington pundits have been calling for President Obama to fire him for insubordination. Throughout the profile, McChrystal's quotes have shown a man who expressed all too willingly that he felt he lacked support from top administration officials who disagreed with him about the Counter Insurgency strategy (also known as COIN) and the corresponding surge in Afghanistan. Now the ill-timed comments threaten to weaken his status as Commander-In-Chief, and more importantly, weaken the unified resolve to see the mission through.

McChrystal openly mocked officials such as Vice President "Bite Me" Biden and Ambassador Richard Holbrooke for advocating a purer counter-terrorism strategy with more drones and a lighter military footprint.

This is not good.  We have civilian leadership of the Armed Forces for a reason.  Sometimes in the midst of battle the good general thinks that the battle in front of him can always be won whereas the President must ask the question of whether the battle was worth fighting at all.

This flap is surely going to cause hurt feelings between the President and the General and many other Presidents such as President Truman could and did fire their generals for open disagreement.  I would not blame President Obama if he fired General McChrystal, but I think it is the wrong move.  After the lengthy review on Afghanistan's conflict, the President determined that it was a conflict worth fighting and that Counter Insurgency of "Clear, Build, and Hold" with extremely restrictive rules of engagement was the way forward.  General Stanley McChrystal literally wrote the manual.

Here's a chance for President Obama to illustrate that he's a different kind of President, that hurt feelings won't get in the way of seeing the strategy through.  The strategy might still fail, but at least we tried.  And in this era of foreign policy where the opaque goal is to not get 17 year old men with little to no employment prospects mad at you, unfortunately trying is all you can ask.

Story of the Day

Now, a whole host of people, including same-sex partners, can designate visitation rights and power of attorney to their partners in case they get sick thanks to an executive order from President Obama.  Read the full story here. Key excerpt below [emphasis mine]:

"Every day, all across America, patients are denied the kindnesses and caring of a loved one at their sides whether in a sudden medical emergency or a prolonged hospital stay," [Obama] wrote.


Affected, he said, are "gay and lesbian Americans who are often barred from the bedsides of the partners with whom they may have spent decades of their lives -- unable to be there for the person they love, and unable to act as a legal surrogate if their partner is incapacitated."


Officials said Obama had been moved by the story of a lesbian couple in Florida, Janice Langbehn and Lisa Pond, who were kept apart when Pond collapsed of a cerebral aneurysm in February 2007, dying hours later at a hospital without her partner and children by her side.


Obama called Langbehn on Thursday evening from Air Force One as he flew to Miami, White House officials said. In an interview, Langbehn praised the president for his actions.


"I kept saying it's not a gay right to hold someone's hand when they die, its a human right," she said, noting that she and Pond had been partners for almost 18 years. "Now to have the president call up and say he agrees with me, it's pretty amazing, and very humbling."


The new rules will not apply only to gays. They also will affect widows and widowers who have been unable to receive visits from a friend or companion. And they would allow members of some religious orders to designate someone other than a family member to make medical decisions.

Hat tip to Dan Savage at the Savage Love Blog or Slog.

He's trying

Again and again, I keep on trying to hammer out there that it's not what the president accomplishes it's how.  People keep on forgetting that the founders intended for Congress to handle what the country accomplishes (or doesn't accomplish for that matter).

Here's President Obama's letter to Congress concerning healthcare reform and on his openness to key Republican ideas in crafting and shaping the bill.


obamaletter -

This is why Obama's President

During the campaign McCain proposed a British parliamentary style "question time" for the President in front of Congress.  This isn't exactly it, but it's damn close.  We have to work together if we're going to solve America's big problems.

Below Obama takes questions from the GOP House caucus for 60 minutes.  Enjoy.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The Obam - "duh" Doctrine

So apparently conservatives are all surprised and a flutter that our Democratic President, or as they would say "Democrat" President stated in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech that he believes that war is necessary some times.

Wow. I know this is really controversial and I can't believe that a Democrat would ever believe that sometimes war is justified to meet threats and human rights violations. That we must do our best to negotiate and use other means of persuasion first, but that force can and must be used when the time calls for it against leaders like Hitler and Milosevic and whoever the bad guys are in Darfur.

Duh. This is not crazy political science or theory here. The Bush Doctrine on the other hand, while admirably liberal in policy was not realistic. To be fair, the doctrine was really half crazy conservative and half crazy liberal.

The Bush Doctrine essentially is a mix of two primary concepts preemption and freedom in the form of Democratic government for everybody on the earth. The first principle was preemption; we must attack possible threats first before they become real threats. Unfortunately, that concept isn't legal nor is it a smart use of our limited military power, as we have learned recently troops cost money (money we don't have). How can you guess the right country to attack? Iran may attack Israel, at what point are we justified in bombing their nuclear facilities. The mere chance of an attack is not reason enough to start a war.

The second concept is freedom should be everywhere and we should use military force and diplomatic isolationism to press countries to move towards democratic governments. Sometimes a military dictatorship can be our friend. For example, when Gen. Pervez Musharraf was President of Pakistan he did a much better job than the current president in fighting Pakistani Taliban and Al-Qaida even though the current President has created a more democratic government.

The Obama Doctrine basically states that we're going to go after and kill some bad guys who aren't interested in negotiating or peace. We're going to negotiate with the weirdos who may or may not have bad intentions, people like Kim Jong-Il and Ahmedinejad. And we'll only use force if it's for our absolute security or if it's a real crime against humanity such as sectarian violence in Darfur, but Europe needs to step up to the plate and help. Because unlike other doctrines of past presidents we don't want to be the only policeman in the world, it costs a ton and it's not worth the problems. We've got problems here that we need to fix. As Obama correctly stated in his Afghanistan speech, "the nation I'm most interested in building is our own."

Tip to the world. We're back to the time when America won't attack unless you've demonstrated a history of being an evil-doer. So that's yes to Al-Qaida and no to Iran, because Iran's people are more pro-American than their government, so isolating that country further pushes those fans away, get it?

Just remember this bad guys, "Nobody makes me bleed my own blood."

Why Obama's Afghanistan decision is the right call

Much like the Iraq surge the success of the continuation of our conflict in Afghanistan will not depend on how many troops we send to the region. What success does occur will happen largely as a result of the change of strategy.

Unlike some of my liberal colleagues, I supported the Iraq surge under President Bush, but I did so not because I believed that more troops would necessarily be the answer. My support was conditional upon a complete change of strategy. When Bush decided to make General David Petraeus, the man who helped develop counter insurgency strategy, the primary commander of the Iraq operation, I had the sense that a more sizable troop presence might help provide that security while providing our soldiers the added benefit of needed reinforcements.

The "surge" time line should be short and sweet. Personally, I only have the stomach to be militarily engaged there for 2-3 more years. I'm glad that President Obama did not adopt the McChrystal strategy wholesale as some of the area's extremely mountainous regions will never be able to be "held" by military forces. Afghanistan is the kind of terrain that is designed for extremely light special forces in the hills and a more traditional army presence in the major population centers. (Thank you Vice-President Biden for that policy movement)

We owe this to Afghanistan. We totally messed them up in the 80's when we used them to fight a proxy war with the Soviet Union, and our Central Intelligence Agency trained a promising young upstart in guerilla warfare named Osama bin Laden to do so. Anyone ever heard of him? I thought so. I would much rather have a communist Soviet Union than Islamic terrorism be the primary enemy of the United States, you can at least negotiate with a COUNTRY. However, I digress.

We again messed Afghanistan up in 2002-2005 when we actually did some good to start by ousting a terribly repressive regime. But then we sent a large majority of our forces there to fight a completely unnecessary war in Iraq. Now you can see why the war in Iraq was doubly stupid. Anyway, we are there now, and we owe the people of Afghanistan a good faith attempt at helping them create a civil society, one where women and girls go to school, one where literacy rates are higher, one where there's more subsistence farming and less poppy farming (perhaps more on that later), and where they have a government that can respond to their needs.

Again, I believe we owe them this shot at a workable stable country. They don't get a free police force for eternity as some would like. The Afghanistan Government gets 2-3 years to shape up, with substantial help. If they can't do that hopefully Afghans will remember the time that America tried to help rather than refer to the time "The Americans left again."

Let's hope.

Please look to my fellow blogger PaleThunder for an articulate argument of his concerns.