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The DCCC wants my money and will lie to get it

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Well, maybe “lie” is too strong a word. Maybe “mislead” would be better. The type of misleading that, were it anything but political fundraising, would be considered fraud.

The immediate cause of my (rekindled) ire: an email I received today from the DCCC fundraising off of Bernie Sanders “passionate speech about income inequality in front of thousands of fired up progressives in Maine.” “It was” the DCCC avows, “AMAZING”.

It probably was.

Except the last thing the folks who run the DCCC want to see in Congress is more Congresspeople like Bernie Sanders. They call me constantly, and I always tell them the same thing: I won’t give my money to a Democratic organization that seeks out the most conservative candidates it can find. You can read one indictment here, the money quote being:

The real tragedy is that the DCCC and the DSCC– for all their mealy-mouthed protestations of “neutrality” in primaries– continue recruiting fiscally conservative candidates, in the image of Blue Dog Steve Israel and New Dem Joe Crowley (both crooked Wall Street-backed politicians being high up in House Democratic Party leadership). The DCCC gets into trouble by recruiting these awful conservative candidates– some actual opportunistic Republicans– and either lose outright or win and then lose the seat soon after when Democratic voters realize they’ve been sold a bill of goods. Yesterday, reporting for Roll Call, Emily Cahn, wrote that the DCCC, still smarting from the disasters of their past recruitment “strategy,” is reassessing– or at least cultivating an image of reassessing the failed recruitment agenda.

And here’s what we get:

Horrible New Dem-type candidates pushed by Steve Israel who led the Democrats into jaw-dropping defeats– some in heavily blue districts– included Jennifer Garrison (OH), Sean Eldridge (NY), Domenic Recchia (NY), Ann Callis (IL), Jerry Cannon (MI), Erin Billbray (NV), Andrew Romanoff (CO), Kevin Strouse (PA), Marjorie Margolies (PA), John Lewis (MT), Pam Byrnes (MI), James Lee Witt (AR), Emily Cain (ME), Bobby McKenzie (MI), Aaron Woolf (NY), Martha Robertson (NY), Suzanne Patrick (VA), Manan Trivedi (PA) and Nick Casey (WV).

Fiscally conservative Democratic incumbents who followed lame DCCC messaging and were defeated– primarily by Democratic voters’ decision to boycott the elections– included Blue Dogs and New Dems like Ron Barber (AZ), Nick Rahall (WV), Pete Gallego (TX), Dan Maffei (NY), John Barrow (GA), Joe Garcia (FL), and Brad Schneider (IL). Several other putrid conservaDem incumbents managed to hold onto their seats by the skin of their teeth, like Jim Costa (Blue Dog-CA), Scott Peters (New Dem-CA), Ami Bera (New Dem-CA), and Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY).

We don’t win by being Republican-lite, and what good would it do us if we did. The linked article notes that the DCCC is trying to change the image of what it is doing, but the substance remains. The DSCC is, of course, no better. Right now they are pushing an ex-Republican, whose stripes are mostly unchanged, over Alan Grayson for the Senate in Florida. The sad fact is that winning is secondary; winning with Wall Street friendly types is the objective, and if that means losing a few seats you could have won with good candidates, well, that’s the price you have to pay.

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Let’s parse this

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Politico has obtained a draft of the TPP treaty section governing intellectual property. While it’s devastating all around. it’s provisions on pharmaceuticals are particularly bad. Drug prices would rise everywhere, and in many poorer countries generics would no longer be available, meaning that (even more) people will die so drug companies can make obscene profits. The provisions in question are those proposed by the United States, so keep that in mind as we go further.

What struck me was this:

U.S. officials said the key point to remember about trade deals is that no provision is ever final until the entire deal is final—and that major compromises tend to happen at the very end of the negotiations. They expect the real horse-trading to begin now that Obama has signed “fast-track” legislation requiring Congress to pass or reject TPP without amendments.

via Politico

So, let’s parse this. The Obama administration is telling us that there is no need to worry about the terrible effects of its own proposals, because there is always the chance that it will compromise and the final product will be better than what it has clearly signaled it wants, by proposing it in the first place.

The Obama folks have always had rather strange ways of approaching negotiations. When it came to the health care and stimulus bills, Obama’s approach was to make his opening offer what he felt he would probably get after protracted negotiations. Shockingly, Republicans demanded more concessions, which he proceeded to give them, even though it bought him nary a vote. And let’s not even get into the negotiating strategy he employed to avert government shutdowns, by offering to eviscerate Social Security. Only the refusal of Republicans to agree to anything Obama proposed saved us then. But let Tom Tomorrow tell the story:

  
Back to the “trade” pact. Based on past practice, there is no good way to look at these “trade” proposals. First, if this is an indication of what Obama thinks he would get after protracted negotiations ( see: cartoon above), one must be truly frightened to contemplate what Obama would really want if given his druthers. But I suspect that this is not a replay of his health care negotiating style; he reserves that for Republicans, or did until recently, as there are some indications he may have learned a lesson most of us never needed. No, his administration will be playing hard ball on this, so what you see in the draft is what we’re likely to get when the dust settles.

So we are left to ponder some semantic distinctions. Is his administration merely being disingenuous, or would it be more accurate to say that they are lying?

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Credit where due

Wednesday, July 1, 2015

I have been known to be somewhat critical of Obama on occasion, such as when he sells out the 99.9% by pushing rotten “trade” deals designed to make the comfortable far more comfortable. So, it’s only fair that I give credit when due, and his step today giving full diplomatic recognition to Cuba deserves a lot of credit. This comes about 50 years late, but that’s not Obama’s fault. Any objective observer would be mystified by the intransigence of the U.S. with regard to Cuba, particularly considering our fairly relaxed attitude toward certain “allies” with, let us say, less than stellar human rights records.

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Republicans say the darndest things

Wednesday, July 1, 2015

Federal Communications Commission member Michael O’Rielly, a Republican, had this to say recently:

[P]eople do a disservice by overstating [the internet’s] relevancy or stature in people’s lives. People can and do live without Internet access, and many lead very successful lives.

via Daily Kos

This is coming from a man who shares responsibility for regulating the internet. This surely proves that you don’t have to run for president to participate in the “I’m stupider than you” Republican sweepstakes. But I’m sure this type of thinking is not new. Most likely back in the 30s there were Republicans wondering why anyone needed the TVA, since many people lived without electricity, not to mention indoor plumbing.

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Back from the shadows

Wednesday, July 1, 2015

It’s been a while since I posted, thereby letting down the legions who read this blog. As Thomas Jefferson said in an entirely different context, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that I should declare the causes which impelled me to put aside my keyboard. I have of late been occupied with the premath (new word, and hereby copyrighted) and aftermath of the nuptials of my only begotten younger son (my only begotten older son being in attendance as well).

The happy couple wrote their own wedding vows and chose the accompanying readings. I never thought I’d be proud to say that my son chose the words of a Republican for his wedding ceremony, but the world is a strange place. At the last minute they chose to read a portion of Kennedy’s gay rights decision, which has an eloquent paean to marriage. It was spot on, and a big hit.

The nuptials took place in our back yard, so we were pretty busy, both before and after the big event, but things have slowly returned to normal, and I am now in a position to inflict my views on the world, unencumbered by other responsibilities.

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Justice Roberts (and Kennedy too) gives the Republicans a gift

Thursday, June 25, 2015

Today’s Supreme Court decision upholding Obamacare subsidies was precisely what most Congressional Republicans wanted, except for the precious few true believers among them. They now have the best of both worlds. They can complain bitterly about the decision, thus pleasing their base, without any risk of electoral fallout at the hands of those who would have lost their insurance had the court ruled the way they say they wanted it to rule. Had the court struck down the law, the Republicans might have been forced to act responsibly, something they’re adverse to doing, and, in fact, something of which they are constitutionally incapable. The relief must be palpable, especially among those such as Paul Ryan who would have been responsible for coming up with a Republican alternative. The sad fact is that the Obamacare system is about as right wing as you can get and still deliver something approaching universal health care; any workable alternative would have to veer toward socialism.

Pity poor John Roberts, who has saved his party, but is now the target of its hypocritical scorn. Well, wasn’t it Harry Truman who said that if you want a friend in Washington, you should get a dog. Roberts is probably at the pet store now.

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Bowdoin man makes good

Tuesday, June 23, 2015

The folks at the National Review, who specialize in giving racism a (very thin) veneer of intellectual respectability, have set their sights on DeRay McKesson. Here’s the intro:

Meet DeRay McKesson: Bowdoin ’07, a former Minneapolis-area school administrator — and now the public face of “Black Lives Matter.” Imagine Al Sharpton, circa the Crown Heights riot, with access to Twitter. That’s DeRay.

via National Review

Now, I come not to praise or defend Mr. McKesson, who can take care of himself. I merely point out the prominence accorded his alma mater, which, I flatter myself into believing, the National Review considers self evidently a bastion of liberal perfidy, just as it considers Al Sharpton self evidently representative of all that is evil. After all, Bowdoin has been certified the worst school in the nation by a group of right wing professors, so, I feel comfortable in asserting that the folks at the white shoe racist rag are sending a message by the reference to Bowdoin.

To paraphrase a Dartmouth man, which pains this Bowdoin alum a bit, Bowdoin is a small college. And yet there are those who love it!  I love it all the more knowing that it produced DeRay McKesson, and that he has disturbed the folks at the National Review. They wouldn’t bother attacking him if they weren’t afraid of him. A few more like him and we might finally live down the shame of Franklin Pierce.

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A corollary

Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Upton Sinclair once said: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”

Self evidently true.

I believe I have discovered an equally obvious corollary to Sinclair’s observation:

It is easy to get a man to believe something, when his salary depends on his believing it.

This is the most charitable explanation for the fact that there are people in New Hampshire (all, apparently, members of Trump’s staff) who claim that they actually want Donald Trump to not only run for president, but to win.

Speaking of Trump, I was briefly puzzled by the fact that he became an announced candidate. He surely does not expect to win, and unlike the Carsons and Santorums, he has no need to keep his name out there to get speaking fees from the yahoos. But, as I said, I was puzzled only briefly. The Donald may be the first person to run for president simply because he needs people to pay attention to him. It is surely a sign of the decline of our empire that not a single one of the announced Republican candidates is remotely qualified to be president. It will be a certain sign of our decline if one of them gets elected, which is not as unlikely as many people seem to think.

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History rhymes

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

Read this article before proceeding. If you find it a bit complicated or opaque, I think I can help by defining a few terms and giving a simple explanation of what’s going on here.

“Regulatory Capital Relief” refers to a method currently utilized by banks to skirt the Dodd-Frank requirement that they keep enough real assets to cover their losses if they make bad loans. The riskier the loan, the more cash they are supposed to keep in reserve.

“Credit default swaps” are insurance policies issued by hedge finds and other criminal enterprises that promise to pay a creditor if a borrower defaults on an insured loan. Banks buy credit default swaps instead of putting cash aside in case risky loans go bad. They do it because the cost for the insurance is less than the cost of putting the money aside, just as it’s cheaper for you to buy auto insurance than to put money in the bank to cover your liability should you cause a horrible accident. The difference between you and the banks is that you honestly expect your insurance company to make good if you cause an accident, while the banks have no such expectations about the crooks that issue credit default swaps. Also, the likelihood of you causing an accident pales in comparison to the likelihood that the banks will crash the economy.

Anyone can issue a credit default swap. I could do it if I wanted to, and the banks were willing to pay me a premium. Banks are well aware that credit default swap issuers will most likely not be able to pay up if the insured loans go bad, just like AIG wasn’t able to pay up in 2008. However, the banks don’t care because 1) pretending that the swaps are on the up and up frees up more money for them to play with, and 2) they know that if the loans go South the government will step in again and save their bacon.

It’s nice to know that the SEC has been aware of this issue for years; not so nice to know they have no intention of doing anything about it.

The more time passes after 2008, the more admiration I have for FDR and the folks who dealt with the fallout from the Depression. They made some mistakes for sure, but they at least learned from history. As soon as we could, we took steps to make sure that if history didn’t repeat itself, it would certainly rhyme.

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The rich are different than you and me

Monday, June 15, 2015

Polling proves it, just check out this article on Kos.

Now, what is interesting about this is that on almost every question, the rich truly are different from you and me (considering you and me collectively). It would not be a stretch to say that they are more selfish and self-centered, with all that leavened by a smidgen of entitlement. Putting the causation question aside, there is something else about this poll that is quite striking. Public policy in this country closely tracks the opinion of the very rich, and where it doesn’t presently precisely align, the general drift is toward their preferences. Funny, that, as it seems inexplicable that in the world’s greatest democracy (we are, aren’t we?) the public policy preferences of the few should consistently trump the preferences of the many. After all, as Justice Kennedy has told us, there is absolutely no evidence that money is a corrupting influence in politics. One can only conclude that the policy preferences of the rich have been adopted because they are so self evidently the right positions, even if so many of them don’t work in practice.

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