Just for my own amusement, I'm going to post a brief summary of the Birther conspiracy theory positing that President Obama is not a natural-born citizen of the United States. There are ample records showing that Obama's parents were both students at the University of Hawaii during the year before their marriage and his birth, that a birth certificate was issued in Hawaii for his birth, and that the Department of Health made birth announcements for the future president in two local Honolulu newspapers.
As I understand it, the story goes like this: A young Kenyan student named Barack Hussein Obama decided in the late 1950s that he wanted to destroy the United States from within. His plan was as follows: Earn a scholarship to study in the United States, go to the University of Hawaii and enroll as the first black student there. Set up contacts in the state's Department of Health in order to fabricate documents, then marry a white woman and have a child. Shortly before the child's birth, fly away to Kenya and deliver the baby there. Then get your contacts with the Department of Health to produce not only a false birth certificate, to establish your son (or daughter) as a natural born citizen and therefore elligible to be president, but also to publish a number false birth announcements in local papers. Pay off airline officials so that they ignore regulations barring newborns from flying on international flights, and return to the United States. Continue your studies at the university, but eventually abandon the child and rely on him or her to become the first African American president, and possibly also the first female president. Also rely on him or her, through no influence of your own, to become a radical Marxist who shares your goal of destroying the United States from within.
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Friday, July 24, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
Mexico City on the Supreme Court?
In the discussion of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Barack Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, commentators have pointed out that there is no strong evidence on her stance on abortion, which is generally speaking the litmus test issue for Supreme Court nominees. People who are concerned about the ideological composition of the Court are primarily worried about the possibility that a change in the Court's lineup will result in the overturn of 1973's Roe v. Wade decision, which struck down abortion bans across the country.
Many people on the far left, people who are not fans of the Democratic Party, pointed out last year that Barack Obama would be likely to appoint very different Supreme Court justices than his opponent, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). McCain pledged to appoint judges in the mold of Chief Justice John Roberts or Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, President George Bush's two appointees to the Court. It was clear at that time that this president would make at least two nominations to the Court, and the left wanted those justices to be pro-choice as much as the Republican base wanted additional pro-life justices sitting on the Court.
There is an unspoken premise here that the Court will treat abortion the same way the executive branch does. The model here is the Mexico City Policy, which was enunciated by Ronald Reagan in 1984. It has been upheld by Republican presidents and revoked by Democrats since that time. The policy barred federal agencies from giving funding to foreign organizations that advocate or fund abortions. Court-watchers usually assume that justices will treat abortion in the same way politicians do. As Justice Antonin Scalia pointed out in his dissenting opinion to the 1992 abortion case Planned Parenthood v. Casey (and no doubt on countless other occasions), the Supreme Court is not supposed to be motivated by policy preferences. The Court deals with matters of law, and is tasked with making rulings based on what the Constitution does or does not say.
We usually assume not only that presidents will enforce their preferences on abortion through their Supreme Court nominations, but that that is a desirable way for politics to operate. I find that troubling, and I won't endorse that as I make my point about Sotomayor and the effect she'll have on the issue.
The Court directly addressed the precedent of Roe in the aforementioned Casey decision. There have been four changes in the composition of the Court since that time.
Since Obama is considered a strong supporter of abortion rights, and since conservatives decried Sotomayor as an activist even before it was known whom Obama would support, one would expect Sotomayor to be a stauch supporter of the Roe decision, but we have no evidence to support that as yet. There are a handful of cases dealing tangentially with abortion that have come before her on the 2nd Circuit Court, but none have dealt with the fundamental issues involved in Roe.
In a 2002 case, Center for Reproductive Law and Policy vs. Bush, the 2nd Circuit upheld the Mexico City Policy against a challenge from a pro-abortion right group. The group claimed the policy violated their rights to free speech, due process and equal protection. Sotomayor and the 2nd Circuit denied all three claims on various grounds and in keeping with a nearly identical case before the same court some years earlier.
When Sotomayor comes before the Senate for confirmation, no doubt this question will be watched carefully.
Many people on the far left, people who are not fans of the Democratic Party, pointed out last year that Barack Obama would be likely to appoint very different Supreme Court justices than his opponent, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). McCain pledged to appoint judges in the mold of Chief Justice John Roberts or Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, President George Bush's two appointees to the Court. It was clear at that time that this president would make at least two nominations to the Court, and the left wanted those justices to be pro-choice as much as the Republican base wanted additional pro-life justices sitting on the Court.
There is an unspoken premise here that the Court will treat abortion the same way the executive branch does. The model here is the Mexico City Policy, which was enunciated by Ronald Reagan in 1984. It has been upheld by Republican presidents and revoked by Democrats since that time. The policy barred federal agencies from giving funding to foreign organizations that advocate or fund abortions. Court-watchers usually assume that justices will treat abortion in the same way politicians do. As Justice Antonin Scalia pointed out in his dissenting opinion to the 1992 abortion case Planned Parenthood v. Casey (and no doubt on countless other occasions), the Supreme Court is not supposed to be motivated by policy preferences. The Court deals with matters of law, and is tasked with making rulings based on what the Constitution does or does not say.
We usually assume not only that presidents will enforce their preferences on abortion through their Supreme Court nominations, but that that is a desirable way for politics to operate. I find that troubling, and I won't endorse that as I make my point about Sotomayor and the effect she'll have on the issue.
The Court directly addressed the precedent of Roe in the aforementioned Casey decision. There have been four changes in the composition of the Court since that time.
- Byron White, who voted to overturn Roe in 1992, was shortly replaced by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a supporter of abortion rights and presumably a justice who would vote to uphold Roe if it was challenged. Ginsburg voted to strike down laws against partial-birth abortion in 2000's Stenberg v. Carhart.
- Harry Blackmun, the author of the Roe decision, was replaced by Steven Breyer. Breyer is consistently liberal and wrote for the majority in Carhart. This is presumably not a change in the Court's ideological composition.
- The late Chief Justice William Rehnquist was replaced by John G. Roberts in 2005. Rehnquist voted to overturn Roe, and Roberts would likely do the same.
- Sandra Day O'Connor, the author of the Casey decision, retired in 2005 and was replaced by Samuel A. Alito, who was promoted from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Alito had been the dissenting vote on Casey at the appellate level, meaning that he voted to uphold the abortion restrictions eventually struck down by the Supreme Court. Alito would most likely vote to strike down Roe.
- Scalia and Clarence Thomas, both of whom voted to overturn Roe, remain on the Court, as do Anthony Kennedy, John Paul Stevens and David Souter, who voted to uphold it.
Since Obama is considered a strong supporter of abortion rights, and since conservatives decried Sotomayor as an activist even before it was known whom Obama would support, one would expect Sotomayor to be a stauch supporter of the Roe decision, but we have no evidence to support that as yet. There are a handful of cases dealing tangentially with abortion that have come before her on the 2nd Circuit Court, but none have dealt with the fundamental issues involved in Roe.
In a 2002 case, Center for Reproductive Law and Policy vs. Bush, the 2nd Circuit upheld the Mexico City Policy against a challenge from a pro-abortion right group. The group claimed the policy violated their rights to free speech, due process and equal protection. Sotomayor and the 2nd Circuit denied all three claims on various grounds and in keeping with a nearly identical case before the same court some years earlier.
When Sotomayor comes before the Senate for confirmation, no doubt this question will be watched carefully.
Friday, October 17, 2008
A few weeks ago I read a Rolling Stone article penned by Matt Taibbi explaining why Sarah Palin represents everything that is wrong with America. I agreed with most of what he said, and I always enjoy anyone taking shots at Palin, who is just about the worst thing that could possibly have happened to American politics. The most striking thing Taibbi said, though, was that he supports Barack Obama because of what he says about America.
It's more than just the fact that he would be the first black president. His various shortcomings notwithstanding, Obama is a thoughtful, intelligent, compassionate and open-minded person. He is no radical; we can't expect from him to bring about the socialist revolution the right keeps shouting about. There is no prospect of Obama overturning the political power structure in America; if Wall Street thought he was going to put the lid back on their honey pot, they would not have contributed so much to his early campaign during the early part of the primaries. But I think he is the best that we can expect that system to produce.
The divisive rhetoric of the right is only fully coherent if Obama is a dangerous outsider, so that is the narrative his opponents have constructed around him. It is a nebulous construct indeed; we have the word 'terrorists' thrown around without much attention to historical accuracy or grammatical number. The McCain campaign's official line is that Obama has a close friendship with '60s-era radical and domestic terrorist (singular) William Ayers. Never mind that their association was strictly professional, involved only charitable efforts with other leading Chicago citizens and a single fundraiser for Obama, and ended over three years ago. What matters is that voters hear the word 'terrorist'.
That word plays into two other (sometimes subliminal) memes pushed by the right. If Obama is a '60s-style leftist radical, is he also socialist or communist? Maybe he's a Muslim terrorist. Or maybe he's with the Nation of Islam- a violent black separatist and a different form of '60s radical.
Once these ideas get inside the soggy heads of so-called low-information voters, it all intermixes into a hazy, anti-American caricature. Both McCain and Sarah Palin are calling Obama a socialist; Palin and McCain adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer have made comments about certain areas being "not real" America and some being more patriotic and pro-America. It's clear from the remarks made by McCain surrogates that, contrary to what Taibbi's argument, they think of conservatives as the best Americans, the ones who embody what America really stands for.
The game here is in-group identification. It has been no secret that the Republicans' best chance to overcome Obama in a very Democratic year is to paint him as alien. Most of the bad things about Obama stem from the degree to which he has sold himself out, ingratiating himself to the political establishment in order to become a player in the presidential race. Hitting Obama on that count doesn't play well with thinking voters, since their major alternative is a 26-year Senator who has assiduously followed the incumbent president during his second term in office. The other reality-based criticism of Obama is his lack of experience, which also doesn't carry a lot of water with anyone lucid enough to understand the danger in putting Sarah Palin within a heart attack or metastatic melanoma of the presidency.
With the legitimate criticisms blunted by their own candidates' shortcomings, the right has had to resort to turning Obama into a scary, angry, communist black man. The people who respond to those kinds of tactics are not the ones I would put forward as exemplars of what is great about America. One of the major reasons why I support Obama's candidacy is that statement that his election would make about America. He would not merely be the first black president; he would be a president who won despite prolonged appeals to ignorance and bigotry by his opponents.
It's more than just the fact that he would be the first black president. His various shortcomings notwithstanding, Obama is a thoughtful, intelligent, compassionate and open-minded person. He is no radical; we can't expect from him to bring about the socialist revolution the right keeps shouting about. There is no prospect of Obama overturning the political power structure in America; if Wall Street thought he was going to put the lid back on their honey pot, they would not have contributed so much to his early campaign during the early part of the primaries. But I think he is the best that we can expect that system to produce.
The divisive rhetoric of the right is only fully coherent if Obama is a dangerous outsider, so that is the narrative his opponents have constructed around him. It is a nebulous construct indeed; we have the word 'terrorists' thrown around without much attention to historical accuracy or grammatical number. The McCain campaign's official line is that Obama has a close friendship with '60s-era radical and domestic terrorist (singular) William Ayers. Never mind that their association was strictly professional, involved only charitable efforts with other leading Chicago citizens and a single fundraiser for Obama, and ended over three years ago. What matters is that voters hear the word 'terrorist'.
That word plays into two other (sometimes subliminal) memes pushed by the right. If Obama is a '60s-style leftist radical, is he also socialist or communist? Maybe he's a Muslim terrorist. Or maybe he's with the Nation of Islam- a violent black separatist and a different form of '60s radical.
Once these ideas get inside the soggy heads of so-called low-information voters, it all intermixes into a hazy, anti-American caricature. Both McCain and Sarah Palin are calling Obama a socialist; Palin and McCain adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer have made comments about certain areas being "not real" America and some being more patriotic and pro-America. It's clear from the remarks made by McCain surrogates that, contrary to what Taibbi's argument, they think of conservatives as the best Americans, the ones who embody what America really stands for.
The game here is in-group identification. It has been no secret that the Republicans' best chance to overcome Obama in a very Democratic year is to paint him as alien. Most of the bad things about Obama stem from the degree to which he has sold himself out, ingratiating himself to the political establishment in order to become a player in the presidential race. Hitting Obama on that count doesn't play well with thinking voters, since their major alternative is a 26-year Senator who has assiduously followed the incumbent president during his second term in office. The other reality-based criticism of Obama is his lack of experience, which also doesn't carry a lot of water with anyone lucid enough to understand the danger in putting Sarah Palin within a heart attack or metastatic melanoma of the presidency.
With the legitimate criticisms blunted by their own candidates' shortcomings, the right has had to resort to turning Obama into a scary, angry, communist black man. The people who respond to those kinds of tactics are not the ones I would put forward as exemplars of what is great about America. One of the major reasons why I support Obama's candidacy is that statement that his election would make about America. He would not merely be the first black president; he would be a president who won despite prolonged appeals to ignorance and bigotry by his opponents.
Monday, September 1, 2008
More on Palin
Sarah Palin is a major gambit. The ubiquitous sports metaphor among pundits has it that she is a Hail Mary pass, a last-ditch effort to bolster a desperate Republican campaign. The Alaska governor was a dark horse when Sen. John McCain announced her as his running mate Aug. 29. Her nomination seems carefully tailored to appeal to the electoral blocs in which Sen. Barack Obama is perceived as weak. Palin should play very well with the voters supposedly alienated by Obama's infamous gaffe two weeks before the Pennsylvania primary in April. Obama was speaking at a private fundraiser in San Francisco when he said that, in reaction to the indifference of the Powers That Be, rural voters in Pennsylvania "cling" to the Second Amendment, religion, and xenophobia. Apparently dwelling on Obama's five-month-old comment, McCain and his people chose the evangelical governor of a state with an even stronger gun culture than we have in Pennsylvania.
During her acceptance speech, Palin brought up Obama's comment, saying that Obama addresses working class voters with respect when he speaks in Scranton, Penn., but mocks them behind their backs in San Francisco. The problem with Obama's comment in April was not that it betrayed a lack of understanding of the working class; indeed, there is a great deal of bitterness among the working class in this state. Gun ownership and church attendance are high in rural areas of Pennsylvania. These are cultural pillars which remain constant in the lives of blue-collar voters buffeted by the sort of things Obama and Biden talk about in stump speeches. Obama was obnoxious in his delivery, but his observation was sound. In the days since the Republican Convention, he and his running mate have pointed out that Republicans said much about God and guns but nothing about the issues which face the working class. This response is smart. Palin can field-dress a moose. Fine, but what are she and McCain going to do to lower gas prices, expand access to health care, create jobs for the middle class?
We have heard from the Republicans for months that Obama is naught but a carefully contrived spectacle, devoid of substance. He has been derided as a celebrity and accused of relying on identity politics. All of these memes have been irrevocably undermined by McCain's choice of running mate. The only requirement imposed on the vice president by the Constitution is that he or she must be fit to assume the Presidency; it is for this duty that Republicans have endorsed Palin. It's laughable for them to continue to disparage Obama's thin resume.
So many of the issues raised by McCain and his surrogates regarding Obama's fitness to take up the staggering responsibility of the presidency apply equally to Palin. How can it be said that he is too green to serve as commander-in-chief, but she is not? The pinnacle of Palin's executive experience is the governorship of a state no larger than the Harrisburg metropolitan area. Has her short time in that post prepared her to manage the vast executive departments of the federal government? If Democrats are wrong to treat their candidate like a celebrity, should Republicans refer to Palin as a "rock star"?
On the day that McCain introduced her to the nation, Palin parroted Sen. Hillary Clinton's remark about the 18 million cracks the senator's supporters had made in the glass ceiling that is the American presidency. Attaching a female to the bottom of the ticket in hopes that women will vote their gender is as sexist as any remark made by Democrats about Palin neglecting her children to run for office. It is obvious that the Republicans think women voters are stupid and that they condone identity voting when it is to their benefit.
The forfeiture of so many prominent talking points is the price McCain has paid to energize the Republican base. The Religious Right and social conservatives adore the governor and don't care much about the contradictions her presence forces on the campaign.
During her acceptance speech, Palin brought up Obama's comment, saying that Obama addresses working class voters with respect when he speaks in Scranton, Penn., but mocks them behind their backs in San Francisco. The problem with Obama's comment in April was not that it betrayed a lack of understanding of the working class; indeed, there is a great deal of bitterness among the working class in this state. Gun ownership and church attendance are high in rural areas of Pennsylvania. These are cultural pillars which remain constant in the lives of blue-collar voters buffeted by the sort of things Obama and Biden talk about in stump speeches. Obama was obnoxious in his delivery, but his observation was sound. In the days since the Republican Convention, he and his running mate have pointed out that Republicans said much about God and guns but nothing about the issues which face the working class. This response is smart. Palin can field-dress a moose. Fine, but what are she and McCain going to do to lower gas prices, expand access to health care, create jobs for the middle class?
We have heard from the Republicans for months that Obama is naught but a carefully contrived spectacle, devoid of substance. He has been derided as a celebrity and accused of relying on identity politics. All of these memes have been irrevocably undermined by McCain's choice of running mate. The only requirement imposed on the vice president by the Constitution is that he or she must be fit to assume the Presidency; it is for this duty that Republicans have endorsed Palin. It's laughable for them to continue to disparage Obama's thin resume.
So many of the issues raised by McCain and his surrogates regarding Obama's fitness to take up the staggering responsibility of the presidency apply equally to Palin. How can it be said that he is too green to serve as commander-in-chief, but she is not? The pinnacle of Palin's executive experience is the governorship of a state no larger than the Harrisburg metropolitan area. Has her short time in that post prepared her to manage the vast executive departments of the federal government? If Democrats are wrong to treat their candidate like a celebrity, should Republicans refer to Palin as a "rock star"?
On the day that McCain introduced her to the nation, Palin parroted Sen. Hillary Clinton's remark about the 18 million cracks the senator's supporters had made in the glass ceiling that is the American presidency. Attaching a female to the bottom of the ticket in hopes that women will vote their gender is as sexist as any remark made by Democrats about Palin neglecting her children to run for office. It is obvious that the Republicans think women voters are stupid and that they condone identity voting when it is to their benefit.
The forfeiture of so many prominent talking points is the price McCain has paid to energize the Republican base. The Religious Right and social conservatives adore the governor and don't care much about the contradictions her presence forces on the campaign.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
No historical understanding necessary
I like this cartoon by Pulitzer Prize winner Mike Ramirez. In particular, I like the way it casually eviscerates its own point. The bust of Lincoln is included to demonstrate that far more qualified presidents would be baffled that someone so inexperienced as Barack Obama could hold the highest office in the land.While Lincoln is indubitably one of the greatest presidents in American history, his example is inapt because he had about as much government experience when he was elected president as Obama does today. Lincoln served eight years as a member of the state legislature in Illinois, equal to Obama's time there. Lincoln taught himself law during his early years in the legislature and eventually became a distinguished attorney. He was elected to a single term in the House of Representatives, where he was a vocal advocate against the Mexican War, but was not a prominent or successful legislator. In 1858 he ran unsuccessfully against Stephen A. Douglas for the Senate seat now held by Richard Durbin. Douglas and Lincoln ran for president two years later; the Electoral College was split among them and two other candidates, but Lincoln had a commanding plurality in the popular vote and a solid bloc of victories in Northern states.
Anyone who follows presidential politics is familiar with Obama's résumé. He graduated from Columbia University, worked briefly for a publishing company, then moved to Chicago to become a community organizer. After graduating from Harvard Law school in 1991, he worked as an attorney in Chicago and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago. He served eight years as a legislator before defeating carpetbagger and all-around embarrassment Alan Keyes in what was essentially a bye election for the Senate in 2004. He has served for three years and, while not a star legislator, I submit that he has been more successful than Lincoln.
Obama's is far from the most impressive curriculum vitae to show up in this year's crop of presidential candidates, but the parallels between him and Lincoln should be enough to demolish the "lack of experience" meme. While there is little to indicate that an Obama presidency would be as historic and Lincoln's, a lack of executive experience should not automatically disqualify a presidential candidate.
It is surprising that Ramirez chose Lincoln as the president who, presumably, would be most offended by an Obama presidency. He might have chosen Ronald Reagan, who remains a conservative icon to this day and had served two terms as governor of California before ascending to the Oval Office. That might neuter the right's criticism of Obama's fanatical supporters, who are no less enthusiastic than the Cult of the Deified Ronald. At least a Reagan bust would have allowed the cartoonist to avoid decapitating his own argument, though. Critiquing the Obama brand could be the work of other cartoons, so the contradiction would be less obvious.
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Clinton claims effervescent victory
As things stand right now, Hillary Clinton has claimed victory in the Indiana primary, though the New York Times considers the race too close to call. Her lead is less than 2% with 91% of the precincts reporting their results.
I expressed hope in my last post that Clinton would give up and go home after tonight, but her untimely declaration of victory seems to preclude that possibility. I could dig through some amateur number-crunching right now if I wanted to, but I'd rather wait until the professionals make their rounds in the morning. Suffice it to say that Clinton has very little chance of pulling off this nomination. As long as Obama's name is on the ballot in the remaining primaries, he's virtually guaranteed 15% of the pledged delegates. That puts him within striking distance of the 2,025 he needs to lock up the nod; it looks to me that Clinton can only win if the infamous superdelegates decide she deserves to be the Democrats' horse in the 2008 race. And even that seems less likely by the day.
BBC Radio is putting an interesting spin on tonight's primaries. Barack Obama has "claimed victory" in North Carolina, they say, while Hillary Clinton "says she won" Indiana. That really doesn't convey the difference between Obama's 14-point lead in the final results in NC and Clinton's 1.8-percent lead in IN, which is not yet final. I guess she has the power of suggestion working for her.
I expressed hope in my last post that Clinton would give up and go home after tonight, but her untimely declaration of victory seems to preclude that possibility. I could dig through some amateur number-crunching right now if I wanted to, but I'd rather wait until the professionals make their rounds in the morning. Suffice it to say that Clinton has very little chance of pulling off this nomination. As long as Obama's name is on the ballot in the remaining primaries, he's virtually guaranteed 15% of the pledged delegates. That puts him within striking distance of the 2,025 he needs to lock up the nod; it looks to me that Clinton can only win if the infamous superdelegates decide she deserves to be the Democrats' horse in the 2008 race. And even that seems less likely by the day.
BBC Radio is putting an interesting spin on tonight's primaries. Barack Obama has "claimed victory" in North Carolina, they say, while Hillary Clinton "says she won" Indiana. That really doesn't convey the difference between Obama's 14-point lead in the final results in NC and Clinton's 1.8-percent lead in IN, which is not yet final. I guess she has the power of suggestion working for her.
Monday, May 5, 2008
Clinton disses economists
In an interview yesterday with George Stephanopoulos, Sen. Hillary Clinton defended her proposal to suspend the federal gas tax this summer by dismissing the opinions of economists, who universally agree that the idea is bogus. You can see the video here- she says at 3:55, "I'm not going to throw my lot in with economists,"as though they were some cult that would ruin her electability if she were associated with them. She insists that her policy will work if we just do it right. Barack Obama knows better; he voted for a gas tax holiday when he was in the Illinois State Senate. It was a dumb idea then as now; it didn't work and, like an adult, Obama admits his mistake.
Obama derides the tax holiday as a measure which will save the average consumer $30, or the price of half a tank of gas. Even that is generous. The price of gasoline is at a national average of $3.60 a gallon because that is what the market will bear right now. If we lifted the 18.4-cent federal gas tax, companies could sell the same volume at the same price and pocket the extra $9 billion which the tax is projected to collect this summer. If Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) knows what he's talking about, oil refineries in America are operating at 85% capacity right now. To me, that says that oil companies have projected what amount of gasoline is going to maximize their profits, and that's the amount they're going to put on the market. Lifting the federal tax is no incentive for them to lower prices and forgo a larger potential profit.
So far as I have heard, the unanimous opinion of economists is that there is no chance the tax holiday will work. Faced with the opposition of people who know what they are talking about, Clinton went into full-blown W-style denial. In her interview with Stephanopoulos, Clinton justified her flat-earthism by complaining about the Bush administration's pro-corporate elitism. She is disturbed by their disdain for the average person, but she embraces their disdain for facts. She contends that our government has relied on "elite opinion" which cares nothing about the little guy. I have to wonder whether or not the elites she is talking about include the economists who have long agreed that "trickle-down economics" does nothing to help the poor or the scientists who have warned with increasing urgency about the danger global warming poses for the world's poor. She can talk all she wants about helping the less fortunate, but if she plans on continuing the White House aversion to facts, she's not going to do anyone any good.
What really surprised my about this whole episode was how quickly Clinton threw Paul Krugman under the bus. Krugman, a New York Times columnist, Clinton supporter, and economist, argued last week that the tax holiday is a ludicrous proposal, though he focused more on Sen. John McCain's support for it and soft-pedaled his criticism of Clinton. When Stephanopoulos pointed out Krugman's dissent, it elicited a wickedly supercilious dismissal.
Clinton's no-facts-necessary style is most disappointing in view of the larger themes of her campaign, which bear a stultifying resemblance to the imagery and tactics employed by Republicans in recent years. It's dangerous for Clinton to cast Obama as an elitist who is out of touch with working-class voters and as weak on national security. Along with the lack-of-experience argument, these are the lines McCain would advance against her in the general election if she won the nomination. As things stand, she's making his case for him. Obama may not be great, but at least he will be somewhat different from the disaster we have now. And at least he has some grounding in reality.
Obama derides the tax holiday as a measure which will save the average consumer $30, or the price of half a tank of gas. Even that is generous. The price of gasoline is at a national average of $3.60 a gallon because that is what the market will bear right now. If we lifted the 18.4-cent federal gas tax, companies could sell the same volume at the same price and pocket the extra $9 billion which the tax is projected to collect this summer. If Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) knows what he's talking about, oil refineries in America are operating at 85% capacity right now. To me, that says that oil companies have projected what amount of gasoline is going to maximize their profits, and that's the amount they're going to put on the market. Lifting the federal tax is no incentive for them to lower prices and forgo a larger potential profit.
So far as I have heard, the unanimous opinion of economists is that there is no chance the tax holiday will work. Faced with the opposition of people who know what they are talking about, Clinton went into full-blown W-style denial. In her interview with Stephanopoulos, Clinton justified her flat-earthism by complaining about the Bush administration's pro-corporate elitism. She is disturbed by their disdain for the average person, but she embraces their disdain for facts. She contends that our government has relied on "elite opinion" which cares nothing about the little guy. I have to wonder whether or not the elites she is talking about include the economists who have long agreed that "trickle-down economics" does nothing to help the poor or the scientists who have warned with increasing urgency about the danger global warming poses for the world's poor. She can talk all she wants about helping the less fortunate, but if she plans on continuing the White House aversion to facts, she's not going to do anyone any good.
What really surprised my about this whole episode was how quickly Clinton threw Paul Krugman under the bus. Krugman, a New York Times columnist, Clinton supporter, and economist, argued last week that the tax holiday is a ludicrous proposal, though he focused more on Sen. John McCain's support for it and soft-pedaled his criticism of Clinton. When Stephanopoulos pointed out Krugman's dissent, it elicited a wickedly supercilious dismissal.
Clinton's no-facts-necessary style is most disappointing in view of the larger themes of her campaign, which bear a stultifying resemblance to the imagery and tactics employed by Republicans in recent years. It's dangerous for Clinton to cast Obama as an elitist who is out of touch with working-class voters and as weak on national security. Along with the lack-of-experience argument, these are the lines McCain would advance against her in the general election if she won the nomination. As things stand, she's making his case for him. Obama may not be great, but at least he will be somewhat different from the disaster we have now. And at least he has some grounding in reality.
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