Category Archives: Democrats

DeMint stars in Moyers report on how Dems killed earmark reform

Here's something that will jar a few of your preconceived notions (at least, among those who were so dismissive of Bill Moyers a while back as a liberal shill): It's a Bill Moyers report on PBS that calls Democratic leaders to task for double-crossing Jim DeMint and deep-sixing earmark reform.

Remember when everyone was so impressed that Nancy Pelosi was working with Sen. DeMint on this issue? Well, this report tells the rest of the story, of how the promise was undone.

An excerpt from the transcript:

SYLVIA CHASE: But what Senator Reid wasn't saying was that the reform measure contained a caveat. Senators wouldn't have to disclose any earmarks that went to federal entities.
But in the Defense Bill, almost all the earmarks first go to federal entities before being passed along to private contractors. In effect, senators would be able to hide almost every earmark. And that prompted a challenge from Senator Jim DeMint — a champion of earmark transparency. The South Carolina Republican made a startling admission.
JIM DEMINT: Many in this Chamber know I don't often agree with Speaker Pelosi, but Speaker Pelosi has the right idea.
SYLVIA CHASE: And a stunning proposal.As an amendment to the Ethics Bill, the staunchly conservative Republican DeMint proposed that the Senate adopt word-for-word the House version of earmark reform marshaled through by the liberal Democrat Nancy Pelosi
JIM DEMINT: We proposed the DeMint-Pelosi Amendment. And I presented it on the floor. And the place was quiet.
JIM DEMINT: This is the language which the new Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, has put in this lobbying reform bill in order to make it more honest and transparent.
SYLVIA CHASE: It was a brilliant tactical move. If the Democratic majority was to reject DeMint's amendment it would mean rejecting the much stronger earmark disclosure rules crafted under their own party's high profile Speaker of the House.
JIM DEMINT: Harry Reid did not want this to come for a vote. He made a motion to table it, which gives the members some cover because you're not really voting against the amendment. You're just voting to table it.
SYLVIA CHASE: "Tabling" the so-called DeMint-Pelosi Amendment would mean removing it from consideration — effectively, killing it.
HARRY REID: I would appeal to my friend from South Carolina. I repeat: I know you are doing this because you think it is the right thing to do. But take the opportunity to look at what is here. It is better than the House version – so much better.
JIM DEMINT: And Senator Reid assumed as most people did including me that he would get fifty-one votes to table it. And we had a few heroes on the Democrat side that joined us, Barack Obama, relatively new senator, bucked his party and voted with us.
SENATE PRESIDING OFFICER: On this vote the ayes are 46, the nays are 51. The motion to table is not agreed to.
JIM DEMINT: And we defeated the tabling motion. Well once the tabling motion failed by a vote or two, everyone knew they were going to have to vote on the real thing and it was like 98 to nothing. I mean this is the kind of thing that if, if senators know America can see what they're voting on, they were afraid not to vote for it.
SYLVIA CHASE: Indeed, with all eyes watching — 98 senators voted in favor of the artfully crafted DeMint-Pelosi Amendment; not one opposed it.
The junior senator from South Carolina had taken on the powerful Senate Majority Leader and won. Or so it appeared. Remember: this was an amendment to a wide-ranging ethics bill. And before a bill becomes a law, its final language must be worked out between both houses of Congress. Steve Ellis, a leading earmark reform advocate in Washington, explains how the game works.
STEVE ELLIS: So rather than doing what the House did which was simply change their rules. You're done the next day. Everything is changed and you have to abide by earmark reform, people could still modify it before it actually ended up becoming the rules of the Senate.
SYLVIA CHASE: Which is precisely what happened.

You can watch the video here (sorry, I couldn't find imbed code).

By the way, Barack Obama — whom DeMint had occasion to praise back at the start of this tale ("And we had a few heroes on the Democrat side that joined us, Barack Obama, relatively new senator, bucked his party and voted with us.") — does not escape Moyers' skepticism. Near the top, he notes:

BILL MOYERS: No earmarks will be allowed and if you thought you hadn't heard him correctly, he repeated it in his big speech on Thursday. None of those hidden pet projects with multi-million dollar price tags that individual members of Congress sneak into bills for special interests or campaign contributors. Can it be true? Have we really crossed the bridge to nowhere for the last time?
Don't hold your breath. As a senator, Barack Obama himself was no slouch when it came to passing out earmarks. And many of the people in his incoming administration are accomplished practitioners…

Looks like Blago’s pick WILL be seated now

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It appears that now the Senate leadership is bending over backwards to seat Roland Burris. What a mess. There is, of course, no good and honorable way out of this for any of us, given the following absurd facts:

The ridiculous person who is STILL governor of Illinois is utterly devoid of anything remotely resembling shame, or honor. There was a time (I think — or am I just romanticizing?) when anyone caught in a wringer this way would bow his head and disappear (in ancient Rome, he'd have sliced himself open in a hot tub — which I am NOT advocating here, I'm just noting the contrast). Not now. Not Blago.
The fact that Mr. Burris had no more pride than to stand up and accept the appointment. That was my first reaction when I heard about this over my vacation: Who would accept this under these circumstances? The answer: Mr. Burris would. This guy has no particular big strikes against him, they say. But this is a pretty big strike all by its lonesome. What's in the water up there?
The fact that this jerk is still the governor, and hasn't even been indicted, and we've got this "innocent until proven guilty" shtick in this country. Situations like this can make you hanker after the Napoleonic Code.

I figure that's enough to get y'all started on the subject. Fire away.

Another view on Nikki and the Speaker

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We’ve heard from different sides of the divide — or one of the divides — that split S.C. Republicans on the subject of Speaker Harrell’s heavy-handed treatment of Nikki Haley and Nathan Ballentine. Now I see that Tim Kelly, who is no kind of Republican, has also weighed in on Nikki’s behalf:

There are probably about six things in life that I agree with Mark
Sanford on – and it would still take me about a day-and-a-half to
figure out what they are – but his efforts to introduce more
transparency and accountability into South Carolina government is
definitely at the top of that list. About the only argument I have
against his efforts to restructure government to give the governor
actual control over the executive branch is that we could end up with
Mark Sanford exercising that control….

So far, not a lot of votes out here in the real world for the Speaker on this…

The imperial presidency-elect?

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This letter on today’s page got me to thinking:

New administration may be full of itself

For the past few weeks, I have witnessed our newly elected commander-in-chief and his subordinates on national and local news.

On the podium is a seal that denotes “the office of the president-elect.” Believing I had forgotten much of my ninth-grade civics class, I reread our U.S. Constitution. Described therein were the offices of, requirements for and duties of the president, senators, representatives, et al. Nowhere could I find a definition of the “office of the president-elect.”

How pompous and presumptuous of those so headily and gleefully poised to assume the reins of power. Could be a sign; I don’t know.

JOHN R. CLARK
Hartsville

Obamaseal1
What it got me to thinking was this: This keeps cropping up, and I keep wondering why, because Barack Obama doesn’t strike me as this kind of guy. He is, after all, The Tieless One. These overdone trappings of gonnabe power just don’t seem like him.

Remember how everyone talked about the "Imperial Presidency" during the Nixon administration? Well, who is it on Obama’s team who is so tone-deaf as to want to project an image of an "imperial presidency-elect," or earlier, an imperial candidacy (at right)?

I had noticed the seal, too, and I thought it was pretty weird. But what I don’t know is, whose idea is this? Why does this keep happening? And why doesn’t Obama put a stop to it?

Obama and the old white guys

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Several times in the last couple of weeks, various commenters have noted — either with approval or dismay — that Barack Obama is opting for experience in his choice of advisers.

For a sample of what I mean, note this piece from the front of The New York Times‘ Week In Review section Sunday, "Change is Landing in Old Hands:"

AS he sought the presidency for the last two years, Barack Obama liked to say that “change doesn’t come from Washington — change comes to Washington.”

Nearly three weeks after his election, he is testing voters’ understanding of that assertion as he assembles a government whose early selections lean heavily on veterans of the political era he ran to supplant. He showed that in breathtaking fashion by turning to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, his bitter primary rival and the wife of the last Democratic president, for the post of secretary of state.

Mr. Obama will bring pieces of Chicago to the White House in the form of longtime advisers like Valerie Jarrett and David Axelrod. But even after vowing to turn the page on the polarized politics of the baby boom generation, he’s made clear that service in the Beltway wars of the last 20 years is not only acceptable, but in some cases necessary for his purposes.

Of course, y’all know what I think — experience is a valuable asset. I may object to the Hillary Clinton appointment, but less because she doesn’t represent "change" than the fact that the particular job seems a bad match. I applaud his turning to other Clinton veterans, such as Rahm Emanuel and Larry Summers.

Anyway, this discussion reminds me of something. Way back last year, I had lunch with someone from the John Edwards campaign after my "Edwards is a phony" column. She was a strikingly attractive young woman of apparently multiethnic background. At some point in our discussion I asked, "Why Edwards?" (Meaning, "…out of all the Democrats running for president?," not "…since he’s such a phony?")

I was really struck by her answer. She said she had thought about working for Obama, but took a look at all the old white guys around him, and thought she wouldn’t feel at home on that team. Yes, the observation seemed ridiculous in light of all the young folks of multiple backgrounds who had flocked to the Obama banner by that time, but I didn’t say so. Maybe at the start of the campaign, his staff had really looked that way to a young political professional. After all, Ted Sorenson was one of his more prominent early supporters, and surely HE is an Old White Guy? Or maybe she was just rationalizing.

Anyway, I knew Obama was smart, and he’s proving it by choosing smart, experienced people for his team. And not all of them are old, white guys.

Colombian FTA editorial

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Our Colombia Free Trade Agreement editorial today (which, as with the Joe Lieberman piece, you should be able to tell I wrote) was based in so many sources that I thought it would be nice to give you a version with links here. So here you go:

Congress should
pass Colombian
Free Trade pact

WHAT DO The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times all have in common? They all agree with The State: All say Congress should pass the Colombian Free Trade Agreement.
“Pass the Pact,” says The Post. “Seal the deal,” says the L.A. Times. The Journal says the pact offers President-elect Barack Obama a “Lame Duck Opportunity” — tell Congress to agree to a deal with President Bush to link a Detroit bailout to passage of this and other free trade agreements before the end of the year: “U.S. business and the rest of the world would applaud…. President Bush could do the heavy lifting.”
Perhaps most impressive of all — it’s certainly caused some buzz in the blogosphere — is this opening sentence of the New York Times piece: “We don’t say it all that often, but President Bush is right: Congress should pass the Colombian free-trade agreement now.”
That puts The Times, uncharacteristically as it notes, on the opposite side of liberal Democrats in Congress — and in disagreement with Mr. Obama’s stated position. But as the broad consensus among editorial boards indicates, pretty much any one who looks at this issue who was not recently elected with the help of Big Labor sees the need to pass the pact.
Why? It’s common sense. Most Colombian goods already flow into the United States duty-free. This agreement would open Colombia to U.S. products, made by U.S. workers.
It also would, perhaps most importantly, solidify our relationship with a loyal ally in a region where we have too few friends. Not passing it would give the back of our hand to a country roughly surrounded by nations ruled by people who mean the United States ill.
It’s ironic that Democrats would oppose this agreement while Mr. Bush supports it. As The New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof wrote in a column that ran on our op-ed page in April: “For seven years, Democrats have rightfully complained that President Bush has gratuitously antagonized the world, exasperating our allies and eroding America’s standing and influence.
“But now the Democrats are doing the same thing on trade.”
So what’s the argument against the pact? Opponents say the Colombian government has been complicit in violence against union leaders in that country. Some point to recent indictments of top officials for colluding with right-wing paramilitaries who have terrorized unionists. But such indictments actually argue for the agreement, demonstrating how President Alvaro Uribe’s government has cracked down on such violence. Last year, violence against union members dropped below the rate for the general public.
Some, ironically echoing an argument used by John McCain in a different context, say the agreement should not pass this year because Sen. Obama was elected while opposing it and “elections have consequences.” But as we noted in endorsing Sen. McCain, “Few will cast their ballots on the basis of the Colombian Free Trade Agreement,” and indeed, some who disagreed with our endorsement took us to task for even bringing up a topic so irrelevant to their preference for Sen. Obama.
The president-elect, and congressional Democrats, are perfectly free to re-examine their positions on this issue. They should do so, and listen to the many independent voices that say they should pass this pact now.

Yesterday was a good day, ’cause I got to write about Joe

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What with my department being down from four editorial writers (we call ’em "associate editors") to two, I’m having to write more editorials myself these days.

That means more editorials on national and international subjects. It’s best for metro subjects to be handled by Warren Bolton, and state topics by Cindi Scoppe. Those are their areas of expertise. That just leaves the rest of the world to me.

It also means you’ll read more editorials with UnParty themes, because that’s what I’m interested in. Hey, you want editorials from me, I’m going to write them whenever possible on stuff that interests me, Al Franken. Or whoever I am.

Hence today’s piece about Joe Lieberman. John McCain robbed me of the chance to write lots about my man Joe during the election when he picked You Know Who from the frozen tundra. Think what a fine time I would have had.

But this week’s events gave me the chance to write about Joe anyway. And that’s a good thing.

Lieberman lets Democrats keep his vote

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That’s all I had to say. I just thought I’d offer the alternative interpretation to the standard headline, such as this one on the NYT site, which was "Democrats Let Lieberman Keep Senate Chairmanship."

I wonder if this development had anything to do with the president-elect’s meeting yesterday with the other two of the Three Amigos? I don’t know, but it’s another positive development. I always like to see Joe get what he wants; he deserves it.

Apparently, Pure Evil never sleeps

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Here I though all the tomfoolery was behind us, but apparently the Axis of Evil is still at work. I speak here of the Axis of Evil that the Democrats are always going on about: the G, the O, and the P. This came in this morning:

Dear Brad,

Sadly, the power of well-funded lies can be hard to overcome with the
underfunded truth.

Six years ago, Saxby Chambliss won his Senate seat
by running a TV commercial pairing my picture with Osama bin Laden’s.

But with Chambliss now in a runoff against Democrat Jim Martin
scheduled for December 2 in Georgia, we are closer than ever to Martin
winning. It’s all part of finishing the job started with Barack Obama’s
historic election.

Beyond Georgia, there are still two other
outstanding Senate races – in Alaska and Minnesota. President-elect Obama will
need every last legislative vote to change this country.

The DSCC
never takes a day off and will keep right on working to make certain the makeup
of the Senate fully reflects the will of the people. But keeping pace with
the GOP will take all of us doing our part to raise $100,000 before midnight
Friday. We’re all so committed to winning these extra seats that a group of
our Democratic senators will triple every gift made before the deadline….

This note is "signed" by Max Cleland, a guy I don’t really know much about other than the fact that he is one of the Foremost Victims of the GOP’s mean, nasty ugliness, according to these releases I receive all the time. To partisan Democrats, he’s sort of what St. Stephen is to Christians.

Not that I think Mr. Cleland wrote the message. There’s a sameness in these DSCC releases that suggest the hand of a common ghostwriter. Although the recent Kerry one did seem to top the others in vehemence, so maybe the putative authors DO have some say over the messages. But even if they do, they try their best to speak as though they had but One Mind, which of course is what political parties are all about — surrendering one’s thought processes to the Party. They all certainly seem to be universally aggrieved, at the very least. And only one thing can assuage their pain: Your money.

Energy Party’s worst nightmare: gas at $1.87

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You may think it’s the Republicans who were the big losers last week, but you’d be wrong. It was the Energy Party.

I realized how awful things were last night as I passed the gas stations on the way home. Hess was at $1.879.

Folks, that’s the same as less than 30 cents a gallon back when I started driving in 1968. Which is less than we were paying then. And when I think of the 1968 Buick LeSabre I used to drive (before I bought my Vega, which was really a mistake), and the mileage it got, it sends a chill to the heart.

Even I, Energy Party stalwart that I am, thought about stopping to buy some of that cheap gas, even though I had plenty in my tank.

So now everybody’s going to start buying SUVs again (which of course will create upward pressure on the gas price, but we never learn), and Obama’s going to make sure we don’t drill in Utah or wherever, and Congress wants to bail out Detroit (or perhaps we should say, it wants to bail out the UAW), whether it gets its act together or not.

As The New York Times noted on Election Day,

Just a few weeks ago, the Big Three American automakers convinced
Congress to give them $25 billion in cheap loans to retool their plants
to make fuel-efficient cars. Then, with nary a blush, the Ford Motor
Company introduced the new star in its line: the 2009, 3-ton,
16-miles-per-gallon, F-150 pickup.

Lord help us, because we won’t help ourselves.

Just to review, here’s what we should do, and are not going to do:

Impose a tax increase to get the pump price of gasoline back closer to $4, so the money stays in this country, and demand is curtailed, thereby driving down world prices, thereby putting more money in our national coffers for hydrogen research, developing electric cars, paying for the War on Terror, credit bailouts, a National Health Plan, and all the other stuff we can’t actually afford now.
Produce more of our oil domestically, whether it’s off-shore, in Utah, in Alaska, wherever — for as long as we continue to need the stuff, which will be for quite a while.
Put all the resources we can muster into an Apollo/Manhattan Project to make our need for oil a thing of the past ASAP. How will we pay for it? I just told you.
Use "stimulus" funds to build mass transit, nuclear plants and other critical energy infrastructure, rather than throwing the money to the winds the way we did with the earlier stimulus program.
Do all the other stuff in the Energy Party Manifesto.

There. I said my piece. Nobody’s listening, but at least somebody said it.

Since when do stem cells top the agenda?

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So Obama’s hitting the ground running — jawboning Bush about Detroit, and so on — and that’s a good thing. Actually, he’s running BEFORE he hits the ground, which doesn’t happen until Jan. 20, but that’s good too. The nation needs leadership in a time of economic trouble, and it hasn’t had any lately.

Team Obama is also turning to some other priorities, such as shutting down Guantanamo (which, if and when it happens, will likely be cheered by John McCain as well — even if he may quibble over what happens with regard to trying the prisoners), and signaling that it is NOT going to dismantle our intelligence apparatus (much to the consternation of Obama’s base). All to the good, and all appropriate.

But one thing that the new team is signaling as a priority puzzles me. I first ran across it in the WSJ‘s weekend interview piece with Rahm Emanuel. Headlined with the quote, "Do What You Got Elected to Do," it looked at first as though it would make eminent good sense, invoking such themes as, "Barack Obama’s message of change and Bush and the Republicans’ record of incompetence." Fine. But then I got to this:

Asked what Barack Obama was elected to do, and what legislation he’s
likely to find on his Oval Office desk soonest, Mr. Emanuel didn’t
hesitate. "Bucket one would have children’s health care, Schip," he
said. "It has bipartisan agreement in the House and Senate. It’s
something President-elect Obama expects to see. Second would be [ending
current restrictions on federally funded] stem-cell research. And third
would be an economic recovery package focused on the two principles of
job creation and tax relief for middle-class families."

At this point, I got whiplash. Say what? Hey, I’m all for Schip and all that — for starters (it doesn’t get us to a National Health Plan, but it’s something). But I don’t recall it being, specifically, a main topic in the election. But let it pass; it fits under the umbrella of a topic Obama DID talk a lot about.

But stem-cell research? You’re kidding me, right? An issue from the very heart of the Culture Wars, the second priority of the new president? In what universe, other than that occupied by the NARALs on one side and the Right to Life lobby on the other?

Why would this supposedly pragmatic, triangulating new chief of staff choose such a pointlessly divisive cultural issue as Priority Two for a president who so famously wants to end divisiveness in the country? Does he want to make the biggest mistake since Bill Clinton, after winning as a Third Way Democrat, both lifted regulatory restrictions on abortion and tried to eliminate the barrier to gays in the military in his first days in office?

Obama making stem cells a top priority would be like … I don’t know… like a Republican getting elected and announcing that one of the first things he’ll do is intervene in something like the Terri Schiavo case. One can quibble all day about the efficacy of different approaches to research in this field — but lifting the very narrow restriction that exists on federal funding of this activity (not on whether the research will take place, but on whether we the taxpayers will pay for it) is all about bragging rights in the Culture War. It’s a big deal to the left to lift the restrictions and a big deal to the right to keep them in place, but it doesn’t bear much on the price of fish for the rest of us. In fact, the technology may be on the way to making the political argument moot.

At first I attributed this to some sort of misunderstanding. After all, this interview was conducted on the fly, in an airport, before Mr. Emanuel had even been officially offered the post of chief of staff. And it WAS couched in terms of what Obama’s "likely to find on his … desk soonest" from Congress, which is different from what his own priorities might be.

But then I started seeing other references to this Kulturkampf issue, references that indicated this would be a priority for the new administration. And I had to wonder why. Is this a sop Obama would throw to his base so they get off his back on intelligence matters? Maybe. And maybe it’s just some partisans on his transition team getting carried away with themselves.

But it gave me pause.

Obamarun2

Biggest disappointment of the night: Mike Montgomery’s loss

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Looking at both our endorsements AND my predictions I made yesterday, you might have already figured out that my biggest disappointment in last night’s results was Mike Montgomery’s apparent loss of his seat on Richland County Council.

Actually, last night was a bad one all around for you folks who live in Richland County, whether you know it yet or not. In the only other contested race, Gwen Kennedy — remembered mainly for her Hawaiian junket at taxpayer expense (and for almost nothing else because she basically accomplished nothing in office that I can recall) when she was on the Council before — won. But we expected that — there was no way a Republican was going to win that seat against a Democrat with name recognition, even BAD name recognition.

But Montgomery was arguably the best, brightest, hardest-working member of council, a guy who truly had the interest of everyone in the county, regardless of party or anything else like that, at heart. On a council that had lost its way recently — putting $30 million for parks ahead of transportation and other critical needs — he was one guy who was right on those and other issues, an extremely level-headed pragmatist with his priorities straight. This is a deep loss for anyone who cares about the future of the county.

And he lost to a guy who — and I kid you not — had exactly two reasons for running:

He didn’t think Decker Boulevard was getting redeveloped quickly enough.
He thought there should be a Democrat on the ticket to take advantage of the Obama Effect. Really. That was his reason. When his wife, who lost to Montgomery in the last election, wouldn’t run again, he put his own name on the ballot. That’s pretty much his story.

So basically, we have here a monument to party line voting over merit, the most stark that I saw in this election. And it’s a real shame.

Oh, and I would have given you some pictures of these two guys on this post, BUT MY LAPTOP GOT STOLEN LAST NIGHT. But perhaps I already mentioned that.

Our 2008 endorsements favor GOP; overall record still tilts to Dems

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This is an all-things-to-all-people post.

Those of you who think we’re just another bunch of wild-eyed liberals who only back Democrats, just read this paragraph! I’ve done the count on this year’s endorsements (which you can go read here), and here’s the final count: We endorsed 8 Republicans (John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Joe Wilson, Nikki Haley, Michael Koska, Mike Montgomery, Celestine White Parker and Harry Harmon), 5 Democrats (John Spratt, Jim Clyburn, Nikki Setzler, Anton Gunn and Jim Nelson). And one independent (Elise Partin, in a nonpartisan election for Cayce mayor).

Now, those of you who think we’re that right-wing rag that only endorses Republicans, just read this paragraph! As you may recall, I started keeping score a couple of election cycles ago, and our running total in general elections, from 1994 through 2008, is 60 Democrats, and 54 Republicans, so we’ve endorsed Democrats 53 percent of the time.

As I’ve explained about a gazillion times, party is not a consideration for us. The only reason I know the numbers above is that I got tired of people constantly accusing us of being one or the other, so I went back through all of the general elections since I had joined the editorial board in 1994 (and everyone else currently on the board joined later than that).

Since then, I have kept the count up-to-date. But I only total up the numbers for the current year after we’ve decided all our endorsements. That makes for some pretty lopsided years in which someone might think we were pushing mainly for one party or the other. For instance, in 2006 we endorsed 12 Democrats and only five Republicans.

Here’s the year-by-year breakdown (and here it is on a spreadsheet):

Year    Democrats Republicans Independents
1994       10                4             1
1996          2                5
1998          8                11
2000          7                10
2002          9                4
2004          7                7
2006          12                5
2008          5                8          1
TOTALS    60             54          2

Looking back at this, I wonder about the low number of independents, and then I remember that most of our opportunities to endorse nonaligned (or at least NOMINALLY unaligned) candidates have come in Columbia city elections, and these are not counted. I’m just looking at the November elections here. I think that one independent in 1994 was Bubba Cromer.

Have fun trying to find patterns, if you’re so inclined. I notice that, except for 1998, we have a tendency to go for Democrats in years when we elected statewide officials to S.C. government, and Republicans in presidential election years — except for 2004, which was a tie. I’m no statistician, but I sort of doubt that someone who IS a statistician would think a trend that involves only 8 elections and has two exceptions is much of a trend.

You could also compare the time BEFORE I became the editor (when the makeup of the board was quite different) to AFTER (I became editor in 1997), but you don’t get a dramatic difference. In the two elections before I was promoted we went for 12 Democrats and 9 Republicans, since then it’s been 48 Democrats and 45 Republicans — indicating that I have kept it closer to even than previous leadership did! Which of course is also statistically meaningless.

If we were trying to create a trend, it would be to aim for a 50-50 breakdown, so neither party could claim we were biased against them. But we’re not trying, so the results are imperfect.

You know what’s most startling to me? That in all those years, we’ve endorsed only 116 fall candidates. Seems like a lot more. But then, the primaries are always busier than the general.

The Post and ‘liberal bias,’ then and now

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Cal Thomas cries AHA! upon reading the Sunday column of The Washington Post‘s ombudsman, in which Deborah Howell writes:

Neither the hard-core right nor left will ever be satisfied by Post coverage — and that’s as it should be. But it’s true that The Post, as well as much of the national news media, has written more stories and more favorable stories about Barack Obama than John McCain. Editors have their reasons for this, but conservatives are right that they often don’t see their views reflected enough in the news pages.

For Mr. Thomas, this is an occasion for pontificating (in a column he wrote for tomorrow) about "what’s wrong with modern media." For me, I’m reminded of "All the President’s Men," which I watched again over the weekend.

There’s a great scene in which Hugh Sloan is trying to explain himself to a fidgety Woodward and Bernstein. "I’m a Republican…" he begins, to which Redford’s Woodward, eager to keep this critical source talking, says, "So am I."

In response, Dustin Hoffman’s Bernstein gives Woodward this look. As focused as he is on the goal of getting Sloan to talk, he registers surprise, for just an instant. His look seems to say, "What did you just say? Going a bit far to ingratiate ourselves with this guy, aren’t we?" The look combines incredulity with a touch of acknowledgment that maybe it IS true, and if so, this Woodward guy is really a different animal.

I really don’t know what newsrooms are like these days because I haven’t worked in one in a while, but in my day it was extremely unusual for anyone to declare a party preference, but a far greater rarity to say, "I’m a Republican." I can think of one reporter I had over the years — one out of dozens — who made a point of saying that, and it was sort of the running gag — he was the "office Republican." He left the paper in 1982 to go to work for a newly elected GOP congressman — Don Sundquist. Now he’s a lobbyist for the insurance industry. I’ve mentioned him here before: Joel Wood.

There have been reporters who, if you forced me to guess, I would guess leaned Republican, and plenty of them who leaned — some very heavily — to the Democrats. But Joel’s the only I remember who made a point of it. Come to think of it, I can only think of one reporter who made a big point about being a Democrat, and he did it to an embarrassing degree. He wasn’t nearly as cool about it as Joel. And why do I just say "leaned" when I speak of the others? Because it’s nothing I would quiz people about, not back in my news days, anyway.

So yeah, Woodward was a different sort of critter, certainly back in Ben Bradlee’s day, and probably today. In another column, Ombudsman Howell says the following:

While it’s hard to get some readers to believe this, I have found no hint of collusion between the editorial and news pages in my three years here. The editorial board’s decisions have nothing to do with news coverage. In fact, Len Downie, who just retired as executive editor, famously didn’t read editorials, and the computer system has a firewall that prevents the newsroom from seeing the editorial staff’s work.

Republican-leaning readers — along with some who say they are Democrats — have overflowed my e-mail inbox saying that The Post is biased in favor of Obama. As I’ve noted before and will again, Obama has gotten more news and photo coverage than McCain.

Of course, readers who tilt to the right will say that with news people being instinctively, reflexively liberal, you don’t need any collusion. (The Post, by the way, endorsed Obama — even after years of agreeing more with McCain on Iraq.)

I’ll close this post with a quote from yet another Howell piece, and this is an experience that everyone in the business can identify with, whatever their biases or lack thereof:

When I came to this job in October 2005, I heard more from Democrats who thought The Post was in George W. Bush’s back pocket. The Post was "Bush’s stenographer." Now I hear mainly from Republicans who think The Post is trying to elect Barack Obama president.

Yup. Been there, heard that.

You, too, can use irony — no experience required

39 Replies

Wow. As cool as Barack Obama is — and he IS cool, all the time — some of his supporters are VERY emotional.

Two of them — Jennifer and Pam — got so worked up by my very mild use of irony on this previous post (referring to their guy as "The One") that they mistook me for a Republican. To wit:

I don’t understand why Republicans continue to call Senator Obama
"The One" – none of his supporters has ever used that term. Why do you
rely on mocking the man and spreading lies about him? Is it maybe
because you are obviously wrong on the issues? Crawl back into your
caves, please, and let us get to work cleaning up another one of your
messes.

Posted by: Jennifer Mullen | Oct 29, 2008 9:13:15 PM

_____________________________________

When a party has no good ideas or solutions you slander your
opponent. Just like Brad , you know " the one " comment. The consistent
theme from the RNC and the McCain campaign is fear and hate . And ,
this paper’s editorial board enforces that theme. Sad to think that
some in this state are unable to look to the future .

Posted by: pam,greenwood | Oct 30, 2008 9:58:27 AM

Talk about letting emotion override the higher faculties…

p.m., thanks for pointing out the painfully obvious:

Jennifer, Oprah Winfrey introduced Obama as "The One" years ago. I
have seen the videotape. If you would Google it, you could probably
find it….

Posted by: p.m. | Oct 29, 2008 10:43:00 PM

Yes, I got the thing about "The One" from that font of Republican bile, Oprah… We "Republicans" always go to her for our marching orders, talking points, swastika armbands, etc.

Folks, where are we when we can’t even use the smallest bits of irony in our public discourse without somebody getting all offended?

Come on, folks — Phillip gets it. He’s for Obama, and he can josh about the cheesiness:

Naturally, my biggest complaint was the syrupy Saving-Private-Ryan-ish background music.

Posted by: Phillip | Oct 30, 2008 4:40:54 AM

And I didn’t even notice the music — leave it to Phillip; he’s our music guy. I just noticed the cheesy set, which someone was careful to make ALMOST exactly like the Oval Office, but enough unlike it to allow for plausible deniability. I mean, LOOK at it, people. Now that’s artistry.

Folks, cheesy is cheesy. Joe the Plumber — cheesy. Pandering with a gas tax cut — cheesy. Picking Sarah Palin — cheesy (although, to quote from the movie Phillip cites, I find myself "strangely attracted…"). Maverick this, maverick that — cheesy.

Now, you Obama supporters — make some ironic comments about your guy. Come on, you can do it. Look, this guy’s going to be the president, and I just won’t be able to stand four years of y’all being so deadly earnest. Loosen up.

Hey, don’t blame Kerry

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This is just to make sure that no one thinks John Kerry is some sort of anomaly out there with the overheated rhetoric.

This companion piece came to me this morning, from Paul Begala, under the headline "Voter Intimidation":

Dear Brad,

Everywhere I go, people ask me: "Are the Republicans going to steal another election?"

They’re right to worry. With the Mississippi governor challenging new voters and angry crowds intimidating early voters in North Carolina, they’re trying to do what they’ve done before.

It doesn’t have to be like this. If you give the DSCC the resources they need, they know exactly how to fight the dirty tricks over the last four days and make sure every vote counts.

We have a team of experienced lawyers and trained poll watchers, ready to jump at any sign of trouble. And we’re getting every last voter to the polls to win these Senate races by so many votes that this election can’t be stolen….

You know what really cracks me up about this? That it is an article of faith among Democrats that Republicans are "fear-mongers," while Democrats just make up stuff to be afraid of, all in the cause of raising money.

Let me ask you something, however you plan to vote: Do you feel intimidated? Do you know anyone who feels intimidated, as a voter? One more: To quote Ferris Bueller’s garage attendant, "What country do you think this is?" Haiti? Russia? Get a life.

John McCain and Russ Feingold were exactly right to try to limit the impact of money on our politics, and George Will is full of baloney on the subject, with his "money equals speech" spiel.

Kerry calls GOP ‘depraved’ and ‘sickening;’ I call Kerry ‘overexcited’

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Folks, Barack Obama is the most flush candidate in the history of the world. Surely, he can lend some to his party’s senatorial campaign, so they can stop it with the hysterical, slavering begging. Such as this e-mail I just got from our ol’ buddy John Kerry:

Dear Brad,
It is sickening. But not surprising.

Today’s Republican Party is so depraved that they’re running ads in Florida trying to connect a Democratic candidate to 9/11 attacker Mohammed Atta. They’re in North Carolina attacking Democratic Senate candidate Kay Hagan’s faith and character. And in Colorado, Democratic Senate candidate Mark Udall is the target of a GOP robocall campaign making the insane accusation that he supports human cloning.

It’s the same political strategy of fear and resentment we’ve seen for 30 years.

But this year they will fail miserably. Because our side has the answers America is looking for. And no two-bit attack ads will change that reality.

Our job in the hours and days ahead is to make sure our Senate candidates have every resource they need to rise above the attacks. We need more ads, more phone calls, and more voter-to-voter contact….

Yadda, yadda, you know the drill. The Republicans are evil incarnate, so we must do absolutely anything and everything we can to crush them, drive them before us, hear the lamentations of their women, etc.

These people would probably do this stuff even if they had the kind of cash on hand that Barack Obama has. This is what political parties do — they demonize the opposition, without let-up, on and on and on. I have a mental picture of the kind of donor who actually responds positively to this sort of appeal: He’s wild-eyed, half his hair is torn out, and he’s muttering like the proverbial deranged street person as he writes his check, "Those rassenfratzin’, mother-grabbing @*&^%!!! … THIS’ll show ’em!"

This is one of the main reasons I hate political parties. Equally.

I gotta say, though, that lately the Democrats — except Barack Obama, who is always cool — have seemed more hysterical than the opposition. Maybe that’s what it takes to win in this insane system.

It use to not be that way. Back in Lee Atwater’s day, the Republicans actually WERE as bad as Kerry’s e-mail implies. Well, I take that back — nobody’s THAT bad. But just discount the keening hyperbole a bit, and you’ve got an accurate picture. Not necessarily "depraved." Just very bad. And the Democrats just sort of took the punishment, seeming dazed and confused.

But along about 1998, the Democrats caught up with them. Something just sort of snapped along about the time of the Clinton impeachment. Democrats started screaming, and once W. was elected, they turned up the volume to 11, and if Obama were to lose next week’s vote, they’d turn it up even higher — so it’s probably a good thing that he’s going to win, right? For our ears, if nothing else.

Meanwhile, the Republicans are pretty quiet, by comparison. If anybody’s getting mainstream, official-party e-mails from the GOP as crazy as this one from Kerry, I’d like to see ’em. Well, I wouldn’t LIKE to see ’em, but I probably should in the line of duty. But I think the GOPpers aren’t nearly this pumped up this year. These "atrocities" that Kerry cite may very well be real. But the national GOP’s not sending me stuff like this, and the Dems are.

Anyway, whoever’s doing it — Democrats, Republicans, Federalists — it’s really, really off-putting. I would say let’s get next week over with, but I know that won’t end it. I’ll keep getting e-mails like this one. They never stop coming, because for these people, the campaign is forever.

Disregard previous: ACORN is in S.C.

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You know how I passed on the word that ACORN had essentially been chased out of S.C. by SLED? Well, now the same source — the Charleston paper — says the group IS doing something in our state, just not the kind of voter registration shtick that it’s become recently infamous for. Here’s the story:

By Robert Behre (Contact)
The Post and Courier
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, also known as ACORN, is still operating in South Carolina but is focusing more on tax assistance and foreclosure assistance than on voter registration.

Head organizer Jean Busby said what voter registration work the group is doing is under the umbrella of the S.C. Progressive Network….

The Post and Courier reported earlier this month that the group was no longer in the state after repeated calls to its Columbia office were met with a busy signal, after an operator said there was no Columbia listing for the group and after a worker in its national office in Washington said the group had no presence here….

Oh, and FYI — the S.C. Progressive Network? That’s Brett Bursey’s outfit. I’m sure all of those of you who were concerned about ACORN feel much better now, knowing that. (Do I have a dry wit, or what?)

Rob Miller’s new TV ads

1 Reply

Still catching up on e-mail, I ran across this from this afternoon:

Miller Begins TV Advertisement Blitz

Democratic Congressional Candidate and Iraq War Veteran Rob Miller began his TV advertisement blitz today. The campaign is running two introductory commercials that feature Miller’s service in the US Marine Corps and outline his platform of reducing wasteful spending, balancing the budget and protecting American jobs.

Miller Campaign Manager Lachlan McIntosh said the ads are designed to introduce Miller to voters and emphasize the change he represents. "Voters understand that to get out of the mess we are in, we’ve got to change Washington. Rob represents the new ideas and new leadership we need," McIntosh said.

He promises to "fight for us" in Washington. Arrrghhh. You know how I hate it when that happens.

Which was stupider — Pelosi’s speech, or the Republican reaction to it?

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Reading through various accounts of the breakdown in Washington yesterday, I kept running across the fact that some Republicans blamed a speech by Nancy Pelosi at the outset of the voting for so many Republicans voting against the bailout plan. And sure enough, it was pretty awful:

$700 billion. A staggering number. But only a part of the cost of the failed Bush economic policies to our country. Policies that were built on budget recklessness. When President Bush took office, he inherited President Clinton’s surpluses — four years in a row, budget surpluses, on a trajectory of $5.6 trillion in surplus. And with his reckless economic policies, within two years, he had turned that around.

And now eight years later, the foundation of that fiscal irresponsibility, combined with an anything goes economic policy, has taken us to where we are today. They claim to be free market advocates, when it’s really an anything goes mentality. No regulation, no supervision, no discipline. And if you fail, you will have a golden parachute, and the taxpayer will bail you out.

Those days are over. The party is over in that respect. Democrats believe in a free market. We know that it can create jobs, it can create wealth, it can create many good things in our economy. But in this case, in its unbridled form, as encouraged, supported, by the Republicans — some in the Republican Party, not all — it has created not jobs, not capital, it has created chaos.

One has to ask, what the hell was the woman thinking? After days of leaders of both parties struggling to come up with a deal that could pass the House, she talks like that as the voting starts? Was she trying to make it fail? Did she think the only problem at that point was that she needed to get the more angry, partisan Democrats to vote for it, and they needed to be whipped up? What?

Or was it just the usual — that people who live by partisanship just don’t even notice themselves when they say stuff like this; it just comes out?

I don’t know, but I do know this — that’s a lousy excuse for Republicans to use to vote against it, because, as Barney Frank put it, their feelings were hurt. No, the Speaker should not have said those things. But if this was the plan that Republican negotiators had agreed was the thing to do, you don’t just throw that out because somebody on the other side spouts a bunch of foolishness. The economic health of this nation is not a tool for you to express your displeasure with your opponents’ rhetoric.

Just disgusting all around. Every time I look at this situation, I just get more and more disgusted. I realize that’s not a particularly constructive reaction, but that’s the one I have.

Gop_leaders

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