Joe Lieberman is becoming a parody of himself.
The full story is here at the Washington Monthly. Here’s the synopsis.
Every time Congress passes a law providing funds for school construction (including universities and colleges) it includes language that is probably constitutionally required: that none of the funds go toward constructing anything that is primarily meant for religious purposes, such as a chapel. The language has never been controversial. Until now, when Republicans eager to torpedo the stimulus package seized on the language and portrayed it as an assault on the right of college students to practice their religion. Of course, it’s no such thing, and an amendment to strip the language went down to defeat. Alarmingly it got 43 votes. Or, as Steven Benen at the Washington Monthly put it: “There are 43 senators who tried to change the stimulus bill because a TV preacher’s lawyer got confused and lied about what’s in the bill.”
Yes, you already guessed it. Our sorry excuse for a Senator was among the 43.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Remember how Joe Lieberman told us all that he wanted to help Barack Obama succeed? Take a look at how “our” Senator has been voting on the stimulus amendments. (from Nate Silver):
It’s probably best to click on the image and see it full size in another window.
A silver lining: Nate says that the Democrats are holding together better than the Republicans.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
It was cold out tonight, and it was cold at our Drinking Liberally haunt, but we few, we happy few, we band of brothers (and sisters) had a great time. We got a first hand account from one of our brothers about the inauguration. Here he is, a proud bearer of a purple ticket. He never made it to his assigned place, but looking at the bright side, he wasn’t trapped in the Purple Tunnel of Doom. Moreover, he helped stimulate the economy, for as he pointed out, he paid a couple of thousand dollars to spend 6 hours in the cold.
While we were there our very thoughtful waitress came in and let us know that the president was on the TV, giving a speech, so we all adjourned and watched Obama pummel the Republicans. A great speech. Per usual after our monthly meeting, I’m not really in great shape for deep thought, so I’ll close with the observation that Obama seems to be hitting his stride. Now, if only Harry Reid would learn how to control the Senate we’d be in decent shape.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
This post is written 90% because I like what Obama did today, and 10% to get back into the good graces of my spouse, who doesn’t like it when I criticize Obama. (See yesterday) I only do it because I want him to succeed, unlike his predecessor, who I freely admit I wanted to fail. After all, he wanted to lead us to a constitutional dictatorship and a military Empire.
Anyway, back to the point, today Obama gave a speech and took the fight right to the Republicans
Some excerpts:
Now, I read the other day that critics of this plan ridiculed our notion that we should use part of the money to modernize the entire fleet of federal vehicles to take advantage of state of the art fuel efficiency. This is what they call pork. You know the truth. It will not only save the government significant money over time, it will not only create manufacturing jobs for folks who are making these cars, it will set a standard for private industry to match. And so when you hear these attacks deriding something of such obvious importance as this, you have to ask yourself — are these folks serious? Is it any wonder that we haven’t had a real energy policy in this country?
…
In the last few days, we’ve seen proposals arise from some in Congress that you may not have read but you’d be very familiar with because you’ve been hearing them for the last 10 years, maybe longer. They’re rooted in the idea that tax cuts alone can solve all our problems; that government doesn’t have a role to play; that half-measures and tinkering are somehow enough; that we can afford to ignore our most fundamental economic challenges — the crushing cost of health care, the inadequate state of so many of our schools, our dangerous dependence on foreign oil.
So let me be clear: Those ideas have been tested, and they have failed. They’ve taken us from surpluses to an annual deficit of over a trillion dollars, and they’ve brought our economy to a halt. And that’s precisely what the election we just had was all about. The American people have rendered their judgment. And now is the time to move forward, not back. Now is the time for action.
These guys have to be put on the defensive. If they filibuster, they have to really do it, so the whole country can see what’s going on and who is holding things up. This, I suppose, is where Obama’s highly visible effort to make nice with the Republicans comes into play. Except with their fringe base, they won’t be able to make the argument that he hasn’t listened to them.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Grimm learns a lesson from our former president.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Yet another reminder. Tomorrow at 6:30 PM, at the Bulkeley House on Bank Street in New London, we’ll have our first Post-Obama Drinking Liberally. We’re looking forward to a first hand report on the inauguration from one of our regulars, who was a holder of one of those infamous purple tickets.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
It is helpful, in these days of Obama stumbles, to remember that it took Bill Clinton quite a while to get his sea legs. On the other hand, Clinton never promised, and never attempted, to deliver fundamental change. Nor did he have the opportunity to change the national conversation the way that Obama does. We are in a world of hurt, and a clear and forceful president could take control of the national conversation. As I’ve said before, it’s always possible that Obama is thinking several moves ahead, but recent developments are certainly not encouraging. It is unclear precisely what Obama gets from the Judd Gregg nomination. We know what we get: another Republican Senator and a cabinet official who has undercut his new boss before even being confirmed. And, no question he’ll sail through, while Hilda Solis dangles at the whim of the Republican rump.
In the end, though, it’s the economy that will make or break Obama. It’s pretty clear that the Republicans are perfectly happy to wreck the economy if they can bring Obama down in the process. What’s more depressing is that Obama has hired a crew of “experts” who seem determined to do the Republican’s dirty work. Read this, (via Atrios). The upshot of the article is that, other than some cosmetics, such as the executive compensation limits (which are so riddled with holes they will prove meaningless) the Obama approach, as envisioned by his Wall Street retread appointees, is eerily similar to the Bush approach. If we’ve learned anything in the past eight years it’s that the Bush approach to anything is presumptively the wrong approach.
The Democrats are a timid lot, who haven’t quite come to terms with the fact that they are in the majority. They are afraid of words like “socialism” and “nationalize”. They are about to bail out these banks, enrich the stockholders, fleece the taxpayers, and prolong this recession, all to avoid taking effective steps that would leave them open to hearing those words. The fact is that they will hear them anyway. If the Republicans have proved anything in the last two weeks (as if we didn’t know this already) it’s that they are quite willing to lie, in unison, about things great and small (one example here). It’s pretty clear that a response similar to Sweden’s (nationalize, then privatize when things are stable) to their banking crisis would be both fair and effective. Swedish taxpayers got their money back. We never will. We are going to end up buying crap at inflated prices. We will never get our money back, and the bankers and their stockholders will be sitting pretty. To paraphrase Woody Allen: This plan is a travesty. It’s a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham.
Obama will rue the day that he put these foxes in charge of the henhouse.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Sometimes things move too fast. A friend of mine tipped me off to this story this afternoon, and I put it aside to rail against yet another example of corporate greed.
Well, it still is, and was, despite Wells Fargo’s decision to back down. It’s also yet another example of the collective blindness under which our betters labor. Don’t they realize that they should keep the excess within the confines of their gated communities for awhile? Meanwhile, which of the following are you going to believe:
This, from Wells Fargo?
“The event is not a ‘junket’ for executives but a four-day business meeting and recognition event for hard-working team members who made homeownership achievable and sustainable for borrowers across the nation.”
Or this?
The conference is a Wells Fargo tradition. Previous years have included all-expense-paid helicopter rides, wine tasting, horseback riding in Puerto Rico and a private Jimmy Buffett concert in the Bahamas for more than 1,000 employees and guests.
“I was amazed with just how lavish it was,” said Debra Rickard, a former Wells Fargo mortgage employee from Colorado who attended the events regularly until she left the company in 2004. “We stayed in top hotels, the entertainment was just unbelievable, and there were awards — you got plaques or trophies.”
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
I actually think this is something worth exploring, from the New York Times’ Andrew Sorkin:
Maybe someone deserves a bonus.
Like someone who sniffs out the next Bernie Madoff. Or jousts with tomorrow’s gonzo bankers. Or defuses the Next Big Crisis in whatever Next Big Thing is dreamed up by Wall Street.
Someone, in short, who regulates.
Why not reward a regulator, or group of regulators, who bring down some big corporate game? A little incentive never hurt anyone, and if the bonus consisted of a portion of fines actually collected it could never be criticized as being based on the illusory profits on which so many Wall Street bonuses are based.
But the very next paragraph in the story gives one pause:
It is clear that the nation’s financial regulators were no match for Wall Street last time. The financiers were always one step ahead. But maybe that isn’t surprising. The financiers, after all, have a big incentive to outsmart the financial police. It is called a bonus. Wall Street lures a lot of bright minds with money. How can federal agencies compete? They can’t.
Actually, it ain’t necessarily so. Not everyone is motivated solely by money. There are plenty of people out there, and many at government agencies that are smart and dedicated to doing a good job. Lots of people believe they ought to work in a field where they can make a decent living and do some good, or at least do no harm. Government work fits that description, unlike Wall Street. Nowhere in this article does Sorkin mention that the people in charge of those regulators for the past eight years have reined them in at every turn, taking a chainsaw to those regulations, and refusing to allow them to get subpoenas to enforce the law (and then blasting them for not getting them when things go wrong). Regulation didn’t save us from this disaster because the political appointees charged with enforcing those regulations were ideologically averse to doing so, and each was looking forward to making big bucks in those regulated industries after doing their bit to destroy good government. No amount of bonuses to the underlings is going to correct that. If the American people insist on electing people who brazenly proclaim their intentions to serve the interests of the plutocrats they will continue to get regulatory misfeasance.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Headline from this morning’s New London Day:
Rell stands firm in her opposition to tax hike.
Let’s speak tautologically. How about, Rell refuses to make hard choices, or Rell tries to maneuver Democrats into taking political heat, or Rell stands firm in her support for local property tax increases.
