Deliver us from the rubber stamp

The idea of a national primary keeps getting floated as a solution to all our electoral woes. MyDD's Jerome Armstrong is on this today.

Despite my confirmed irritation with Iowa and New Hampshire voters getting first crack at those who would be president, I'm not sure a national primary is the answer.

It's a cliché, but if the nomination goes to the candidate who wins the most popular votes in a single, national primary – all campaigns for president must be national. Period.

No campaign will ever start small and grow into a national candidate – they must have the bucks and logistics to cover all the states (or enough of the population centers) to win.

This election has shown us candidates who do not have national legs (Ron Paul, Mike Huckabee, John Edwards) and while they have clearly been given short shrift by the media – were this a national primary, they'd have never gotten into the race at all.

Armstrong links to an article from Democracy Journal where Kenneth Bauer asserts that a national primary will not endanger "retail politics" (something I'd concede) and rebuts my particular objection with :

It’s at this point that someone pulls the Jimmy Carter card, arguing that the current system enables a relative unknown to emerge. This idea is as dated as a can of "Billy Beer." Carter is, in fact, the only candidate to have made such a journey, and even he made important moves to build support during the Invisible Primary, winning, for instance, the Iowa State straw poll in 1975. And Carter benefited immensely from being the first candidate to exploit fully the dynamics of the new nominating system.

Assuming he's right about Carter (a fair assumption) Armstrong's argument gets boiled down to: "The door's practically shut on emerging candidates now, why not slam it?"

I don’t agree. While the political establishment would never go for it- the idea that the nomination begin in a few states before going to a wider set of states I think has merit. My chief objection is that the order is fixed in stone – Iowa and New Hampshire always get the Pole Position. The established powers always know what ground they will be battling on.

You set up a system where the order changes from time to time, and I think you afford the outsider a (slim) chance to get in – and you add some variables to the mix.

I mean, look at the primary we have now – the states were all jostling for position in the primary season and we've ended up with primaries after Super Tuesday that actually matter. (Yes, I understand that Super Delegates can F that up, but stay with me…)

Candidates may break under the relentless strain of campaigning – but we're seeing states voting with enthusiasm – people are just so happy to be asked their opinion (as opposed to being informed who their party's candidate will be, and won't-you-please-pull-the-only-lever-you-have?).

Making it a national primary will ensure that my vote is counted, but it will also ensure that my choices of candidates will be limited in a process I have absolutely no say in.

Piss in my pond and tell me it's raining

Do you know what's in the water that you drink?
Well I do, and it's a-maz-ing...
--Randy Newman's It's a Jungle Out There

If you live near the Great Lakes, the Center for Disease Control is sounding a lot like Monk's theme song: they know about some horrible things in your drinking water, but they're not going to tell you.

(h/t to Emptywheel)

The draft executive summary (PDF), which is helpfully stamped with 'Do Not Cite or Quote," has a few items you might want to be aware of (italics in original, bold emphasis added):

...Of the 108 hazardous waste sites included in the 25 [Areas of Concern], 71 sites were identified as having a potential human health impact. Of this number, 2 are classified as urgent public health hazards, 29 are identified as public health hazards, and 40 are listed as indeterminate public health hazards as defined by the [Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry] Public Health Assessment Manual.

Vulnerable populations (i.e. children less than 6 years of age, reproductive age women, and older adults) living within a one-mile radius from the AOC hazardous waste sites included approximately 5,000 residents for the Lake Superior AOCs, over 200,000 persons for Lake Michigan AOCs, approximately 9,000[?] persons in the Lake Ontario AOCs, and over 7,000 residents for the Lakes Erie and Huron AOCs, respectively. These figures indicate that the total number of individuals within one mile of AOC hazardous waste sites totals an estimated 230,000. According to analysis of ATSDR's HazDat database for 2003, there were over 15,000 instances where contaminants of concern were found at levels above health-based screening values in a variety of media (i.e., water, air, and soil).

This report indicates that there are 25 AOCs which have not been remediated and that over 9 million residents are living within these AOC counties. The AOC county health measures (health status indicators) that compare unfavorably with the median of the peer counties and also with the U.S. population data merit further attention. Differences between the peer counties, the U.S. population data, and the U.S. AOC counties indicate elevated rates of disease beyond the norm (norm being the peer counties and the U.S. population data).

While no causal inferences or associations are made in this report, of the 26 AOCs, elevated rates were observed for infant mortality in 21 AOCs, low birth weight in 6 AOCs, and premature births in 4 AOCs. Elevated cancer mortality was also seen for breast cancer in 17 AOCs, colon cancer in 16 AOCs, and lung cancer in 12 AOCS...

They finished the report late last year, and the wheels of bureaucracy turn slowly - but this is yet another report that was intended for public release - and hasn't been.

People think I'm crazy, 'cause I worry all the time
If you paid attention, you'd be worried too
You better pay attention
Or this world we love so much might just kill you


I could be wrong now, but I don't think so

Ice storms: love them, hate them

Sure they almost kill you, but in exchange you get some lovely scenery.

Ready on day one. Day two? not so much

(h/t to Zell and TPM)

You have to wonder about the Clinton campaign at this point.

Pre-Super Tuesday, they were content with the air of inevitability.
Post Super Tuesday they were minimizing the significance of losing caucuses (and small states, and states with large numbers of African-Americans) and stressing the importance of primaries in states they had advantages in (like Ohio and Texas).

We've all heard the firewall soundbite over and over.

Now, WaPo is reporting that the rules of the Texas primary could dilute the payoff for Clinton's popularity there. Further, WaPo is suggesting that these rules came a surprise to "[s]everal top Clinton strategists and fundraisers."

Now, two things I would say about this:

1) the obvious thing - If this surprise is truly representative of her campaign staff's preparedness - Sen. Clinton is being very poorly advised. Being caught flat footed after Super Tuesday is one thing, a lot in play and the polls were not helping. But it was weeks ago. We've been hearing the 'Texas firewall' talking point ever since that night - and their campaign hasn't bothered to see if their firewall is actually a viable strategy?

2) Why are the rest of us hearing about this two weeks later? I missed it, but I'm nobody. The national news folks have bucks and time. Surely one of them could have read the state primary rules.

They couldn't be bothered project the current polling into the primary rules to see what the delegate breakdown would be?

Sheesh, people. I mean, I know they're busy crafting the next installment of 'Person of the Week' but how's about doing something that matters. Don't take the campaign's word for it - look it up. It's called reporting (you can look that up, too).

Late Edit:
MyDD's Glenn Smith breaks down the Texas rules for those who are interested.

They are pretty interesting, actually.

Delegates are awarded to districts based on the turnout from the past two election cycles. Since Hispanic districts have had pretty low turnout in the last few elections - Sen. Clinton's popularity with Latino voters will not get the same payoff as it would in a traditional primary.

Glenn gives just the what-if scenario I was looking for in this post:

This is a very, very optimistic scenario from a Clinton point of view:

Clinton wins the large Hispanic districts with 4 delegates each by 62 percent or more. This unlikely outcome would give her a 3-to-1 delegate split in those districts. Award her majority wins in Hispanic districts with 3 delegates, splitting 2-1. Award Obama an edge in two African American districts, one in Houston, the other in Dallas. Split the Austin (Travis County) delegates evenly, even though Obama will win Austin comfortably). Split all the other districts, awarding Obama 1 extra delegate to make up for all the African Americans in East Texas and independent and moderate voters in the 20 GOP Senate districts we're just going to split evenly.
How's this turn out? Clinton, 64 delegates, Obama, 62 delegates.

And that's the optimistic scenario. Not much of a firewall, eh?

You cannot help but respect the history of John McCain

Really. You have his harrowing brush with death on the Forrestal, then his shootdown and torture, and a refusal to jump ahead of more deserving prisoners costing him over five years of his life.

-but the John McCain of the present sounds nothing like the young naval officer he used to be:

(h/t to MyDD)

John McCain: [Lays out what he sees as signs of progress on the ground in Iraq to refute statements by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton that the surge is not working.]

George Stephanopoulos: But if Iraq is meeting those marks, then why not withdraw our troops step-by-step as Senator Obama and Senator Clinton call for?

McCain: Because it has to be dictated by events on the ground, not by an arbitrary date...

Stephanopoulos: But if we are making progress today?

McCain: We are making significant progress today.

Mitt Romney got booted by his own party for talking this kind of crap - also for being seen to reverse long-held positions for political reasons.

I used to be a fan of the man - and I give him plenty of credit for McCain-Feingold - but it's hard to see him as a maverick when he's parroting the same kind of head-in-the-sand garbage the White House has been pitching for seven years.

Regular as clockwork

(h/t to Sadly, No!)

It's as if school shootings are a magnet for chest-thumping idiots:

In a recent post about the campus shooting at Northern Illinois University one reader, who lives near the campus, posted this:

I am discouraged that no one took their books, laptops, anything and just threw it at the guy, no one fought back. It’s that passivity that troubles me.

That’s a great point. It seems that far too often modern Americans have an instinct to cower or run away when threatened instead of fighting back. Especially younger Americans, and based on my personal experience I’d have to say that it’s being learned in our schools.

No, actually that is not a good point - it's just another poser telling you what they would have done [in their dreams] had they been there.

Yeah, hero - you'd have gone down swinging. Your cat-like reflexes have been honed from years of...talking about what you'd do in a crisis.

Va Tech drew out the same flavor of fool, as well.

This poster was small potatoes, but I predict we will not have long to wait before Michael Savage or someone like him rises out of the slime to make a similar comment.

Should be a bumper sticker...

(h/t to Group News Blog via MyDD)

As if

Danger Room scoffs at the transparently false rationale for the US shooting down one of it's own satellites: (quoting an unnamed space security expert)

"Having the US government spend millions of dollars to destroy a billion-dollar failure to save zero lives is comedic gold"

(h/t to TPM)

Going theories are: We're posing to make others tremble at our ability to destroy satellites; we're trying to keep our secret space stuff from falling into the wrong hands; or we're just idiots.

Hard to pick a favorite, there.

Nice work

CJR comments on an article in the Atlantic by Joshua Green.

CJR hits the high points - but it's an interesting article. Green recounts the ups and downs of Team Hillary leading up to the departure of her campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle.

Worth a look.

Late edit: removed the repetitive language. Geez - I must be tired to put the word 'interesting' twice in the same sentence.

He's calling it crap, only because the FCC works for the President

Democrats pay attention - This is how you take control of this issue.

Keith Olbermann, addressing the President, discussing his characterization of the FISA extension (from A veto of the FISA bill endangers Americans):

“This Saturday at midnight,” you said Thursday, “legislation authorizing intelligence professionals to quickly and effectively monitor terrorist communications will expire. If Congress does not act by that time, our ability to find out who the terrorists are talking to, what they are saying and what they are planning will be compromised.” You said that “the lives of countless Americans depend” on your getting your way.

This is crap. And you sling it with an audacity and a speed unrivaled by even the greatest political felons of our history.

He then rebuts this with Richard Clarke's statement and goes for the throat.

And your minions like John Boehner, your Republican congressional crash dummies who just happen to decide to walk out of Congress when a podium-full of microphones await them, they should just keep walking, out of Congress and, if possible, out of the country.

For they and you, sir, have no place in a government of the people, by the people, for the people.

The lot of you are the symbolic descendants of the despotic middle managers of some banana republic to whom “freedom” is an ironic brand name, a word you reach for when you want to get away with its opposite.

Thus, Mr. Bush, your panoramic invasion of privacy is dressed up as “protecting America.”

Thus, Mr. Bush, your indiscriminate domestic spying becomes the focused monitoring only of “terrorist communications.”

Thus, Mr. Bush, what you and the telecom giants have done isn’t unlawful; it’s just the kind of perfectly legal, passionately patriotic thing for which you happen to need immunity!

[...]

We will not fear any longer. We will not fear the international terrorists, and we will thwart them. We will not fear the recognition of the manipulation of our yearning for safety, and we will call it what it is: terrorism. We will not fear identifying the vulgar hypocrites in our government, and we will name them. And we will not fear George W. Bush.

Kick crazy ass.

What's that thing in the middle of your back? Is it... a bone?

A Texas House Chairman aims some smack at the White House (h/t to Emptywheel):

You have also suggested that Congress must grant retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies. As someone who has been briefed on our most sensitive intelligence programs, I can see no argument why the future security of our country depends on whether past actions of telecommunications companies are immunized.
The issue of telecom liability should be carefully considered based on a full review of the documents that your Administration withheld from Congress for eight months. However, it is an insult to the intelligence of the American people to say that we will be vulnerable unless we grant immunity for actions that happened years ago.

Emptywheel also lists a statement from Sen. Harry Reid that sounds nice. But at this point - if I'm looking for words of inspiration - I listen to Sen. Reid seconds before I hit up the President for an ideological pep talk.

It remains to be seen if there is anything more than kabuki going on - but if more statements like these can fight past the filter - perhaps there is a chance an honest public debate can take place.

And that debate - I could be hopeful about.

Hardly worth mentioning, really

Today the House republicans walked out of the US Capitol to protest the house not extending the Protect America Act.

If you watch NBC News - this is the only part of the story worth mentioning.

What follows is what the Feb 14, 2008 broadcast of the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams said about this subject:

With all of the hubhub surrounding this presidential election season, it's important to remember the business of Congress goes on - at least it's supposed to. Republicans, though in the House stopped all work for a time today and staged a walkout. They left the House chamber to protest the Democrat's refusal to renew the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Law which expires this week.

That's it. No context - no reason why this dispute is taking place. No mention of retroactive immunity or the fact that (oh, by the way) even with the act lapsing, the wiretapping it authorized is permitted to continue until at least August.

It's just that those goofy Democrats are letting a law expire.

Almost like the GOP walkout achieved it's primary goal of framing the debate in a way most favorable to the administration.

If only there were some organization of lawmakers, people in power, who could hold a press conference and challenge this simplistic characterization of the issue.

Oh, wait - there is. And Speaker Pelosi had just such a press conference.

I'm sure there's a good reason NBC ignored it completely.

Too good to be true

Imad Mughniyeh dead.

The way the news broke, it seemed like this wasn't genuine. Hezbollah says so, he was killed in Syria.

But if it is true - there are CIA officers and Mossad agents high-fiving each other.

Now if we could only get the Mossad to go after Bin Laden, maybe we could see some progress on that front.

I haven't the slightest idea what the hell is going on

In a little less than nine hours, I will take more money than I have ever had and give it to someone else.

In exchange, they will give me the keys to a home that I will be allowed to live in provided I pay several times that amount over the next three decades.

I'm not clear on how I feel about this - but a good clue would be the fact that I am writing this in the wee hours of the morning instead of getting the sleep I spend most of my days pining for.

There is a certain insanity to what I am doing - never mind the everyday nature of the transaction. Something I cannot afford, I will buy anyway. I will pay for it many times over and think of it as an investment.

Many years from now, I hope to sell it to someone who is similarly deluded. After the transaction we will shake hands and both feel fortunate.

But I still can't get over how crazy this seems.

In two days we move our stuff into the house - and we're not ready. It'll go okay, since our stored items will arrive and be unloaded by other people. Still, somehow this just isn't happening.

Not again, seems to be my brain's attitude about the whole thing. Surely not so soon.

I have changed no addresses, switched no utilities, or done any of the things on the lengthy punchlist I followed just over two months ago. I doubt I still have it.

I think we can get up to speed. I mean, we never really moved in to this apartment - but cripes, we're tired.

Brazen Careerist

I don't have much use for Penelope Trunk's career advice. Her blog, Brazen Careerist, is chock full of observations that I find vague enough to qualify as horoscopes.

But I subscribe to her RSS feed. Why? Because she also writes stuff like this:

Then, one night, the baby was screaming and our three-year-old wouldn’t go to bed and my husband was telling me that I needed to get the three-year-old some milk and I was saying that he should and I’ll get the baby and he rolled his eyes, and then I took a knife out of the dirty dishes and stabbed my head.

I don’t actually remember doing it. I remember my husband saying, “Oh my god. There’s blood everywhere.”

Here’s how crazy I was: I just put the knife back in the sink and went to get the baby.

Whatever her shortcomings are as a career adviser, it's pretty clear this woman can write.

I'd argue it's also pretty clear that she needs to write.

Her story detailing her 9/11 experience at Ground Zero is one hell of a narrative. She describes being engulfed in the cloud of the collapsing towers, then:

There was complete quiet. No one could talk because no one could breathe. Then I heard cracked glass. I moved toward the noise until I saw a glow coming from a broken window. Somehow, I lifted myself into a broken window that was above my shoulders. I found air. And then I thought only of water. I found my way to a bathroom in that building and inside there were debris-covered men in ties drinking out of a toilet. I drank, too.

It's clear that she's pretty messed up - and I'm sure the causes of that go deeper than any blog post would tell you. You read some of the posts that flirt with those causes - and you want to root for her.

At a minimum, you want her to write more. Pour some demons out onto a page until she's done with them.

At least I do.

So, I keep checking the feed.

Call me a misery hound if you want - but there's a little inspiration there, too.

OMG - Just read the transcript...

Roger Clemens sh!ts himself in front of Congress.

Dear Congresswoman

Now that the Senate has voted to give retroactive immunity to the telecommunications industry for past wiretapping activities, it's up to the House of Representatives to stop this from becoming law.

More astute observers than I have pointed out a disturbing pattern of government behavior: The Executive asserts powers that are questionable. Congressmembers raise questions. Congressional leadership acts to make the actions of the Executive retroactively legal.

The Democratic Party was handed the reins of power to stop this –and yet it continues. Sen. Harry Reid pushed an immunity bill to the Senate floor and 19 Democratic Senators voted with the entire GOP to pass it.

I ask you, how could this happen?

With telecom immunity, the White House would close the only viable avenue the public has for holding people accountable for wiretapping abuses. It does not appear that the Senate has the stomach to rein in the White House, nor does it seem likely that Congressional requests for information on wiretapping activities will produce anything in the foreseeable future.

Incredibly, early reports are that the House leadership is considering some kind of accommodation.

Again, I ask: how could this happen?

On this one item, this ONE time - surely the House can stand up and say "No" to this President. He is staggeringly unpopular – and opposing him would place the house on the side of the masses.

Sen. Feingold did his duty and he lost. My other senator sold my privacy out. I'm asking you as my representative to *do something.*

I am sure you know (but I will say it anyway) the virtues and values that define this nation can go away if all we do is comfort ourselves with the fact that they are written down somewhere. In order to matter - to exist in any meaningful way - they must be defended *in public* whenever they are challenged.

Force your opponents to public debate on this issue. Expose their blatant mischaracterizations of what immunity is and is not.

Most of all do not let the House leadership sell us out like Sen. Reid.

In that case, maybe we don't want you to level with us

CJR nabbed a nice quote from the Financial Times about the subprime mortgage mess:

Hank Paulson, US Treasury secretary, yesterday said "the worst is just beginning" for a wave of subprime mortgage resets as he unveiled an initiative with six private sector banks to delay home foreclosures.

Ewww.

Just so you know who sold you out...

...on the FISA bill.

The full vote is here.

Voting for it were 48 Republican senators (Lindsey Graham did not vote) as well as their surrogate member Joe Liebermann.

Joining them were 19 Democratic Senators:

• Baucus (D-MT)
• Bayh (D-IN)
• Carper (D-DE)
• Casey (D-PA)
• Conrad (D-ND)
• Inouye (D-HI)
• Johnson (D-SD)
• Kohl (D-WI)
• Landrieu (D-LA)
• Lincoln (D-AR)
• McCaskill (D-MO)
• Mikulski (D-MD)
• Nelson (D-FL)
• Nelson (D-NE)
• Pryor (D-AR)
• Rockefeller (D-WV)
• Salazar (D-CO)
• Webb (D-VA)
• Whitehouse (D-RI)

The two Democratic Senators running for president did not vote on this issue

Sen. Baucus (D-MT), Johnson (D-SD), Landrieu (D-LA), Pryor (D-AR), and Rockefeller (D-WV) are the only Dems up for re-election from that list.

Turncoats

(Via TPM)

The Senate vote on the Dodd-Feingold amendment to strip telecom immunity from the new FISA bill wasn't even close: 31-67.

TPM also lists the Democratic sell-outs on this bill:

• Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)
• Evan Bayh (D-IA)
• Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
• Tim Johnson (D-SD)
• Herb Kohl (D-WI)
• Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
• Claire McCaskill (D-MO)
• Mark Pryor (D-AR)
• Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)
• Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)
• Ken Salazar (D-CO)
• Tom Carper (D-DE)
• Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)
• Jim Webb (D-VA)
• Ben Nelson (D-NE)
• Bill Nelson (D-FL)
• Kent Conrad (D-ND)
• Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)

I have to say, Jim Webb and Herb Kohl... I'm just shocked.

Sen. Dodd is saying he'll filibuster the full bill when it goes to the floor - but thanks to this vote -the bill that does will include immunity.