Categories: government regulation, campaign finance, John McCain
Who’s Counting? And Who Counts?
![[mail]](img/envelope.gif){kind=small}
| Categories: General Motors, ACT NOW, Abortion, campaign finance, 2012 Election What can I tell you about the Iowa Republican Primary that you don’t know already? That Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum were neck and neck for most of the evening? That Romney “won” by only eight votes? That libertarian Ron Paul was close on their heels? That Newt Gingrich seemed dead in the water, having missed the deadline for the South Carolina primary, but announced he was headed for New Hampshire? That Michelle Bachman dropped out today after her poor showing and that Rick Perry probably should? That Jon Huntsman got a whopping one percent of the vote?
Corporate Supreme
| Categories: Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, John McCain, CBS, President Reagan, cabletelevison, Politics, Obama Administration, healthcare policy, government regulation, Hillary Clinton, Supreme court, Roberts court, Samuel Alito, Warren Court, Citizens United v. FEC, campaign finance Years ago, when I was in a quandary about the direction of my career, I got some sound advice: Never fall in love with a corporation, because it’s constitutionally unable to reciprocate.
This week, the Supreme Court created a limited redress to that issue in Citizens United v the Federal Elections Commission, giving corporations unfettered permission to spend their general funds on the campaigns of politicians they favor, and turning them into “a real live boy” as Slate put it. Who says money can’t buy you love? If the Rehnquist court handed Republicans the presidency in 2000, it’s hard to believe the Roberts court hasn’t handed them the Congress in 2010.
Beyond Slogans
| Categories: Bill Clinton, John McCain, Al Gore, Economics, Pennsylvania, Obama Administration, Education Funding It’s not the New Deal. Or the New Frontier. Or the Great Society. Or, heaven help us, the Reagan Revolution. But I’m hoping after last night’s news conference, the passage of a stimulus package in the Senate and today’s rollout of a new TARP bailout that this is the Real Deal—a viable plan to restore some rationality to our economic life together as a nation.
Perhaps after the debacle of the last presidency it’s too easy to give President Obama high marks for engaging in a fruitful discussion of economics, foreign policy and, yes, even A-Rod’s steroid use. (He’s concerned about the message it sends to children.) For showing his understanding of the dynamics of Congressional politics, for using one of his vice president’s gaffes to make a point that no program’s perfect. This give and take went on for a full hour before he thanked the media and a heavy foot could be heard coming down from the podium as he strode off.
Some Modest Proposals
| Categories: News, environment, issues, network television, Obama Administration, Education Funding, Scientific research, science education, media policy, healthcare policy, George Lakoff, government regulation The California cognitive scientist George Lakoff http://berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2004/08/25_lakoff.shtml has urged Democrats to resist Republican attempts to influence policy by “framing” it in language that obscures its true nature—death tax rather than inheritance tax, entitlement programs rather than veterans’ benefits and social security, and, of course, “pro-life” to cover a whole lot of issues that are less than life-enhancing to many sentient beings.
Democrats attempted this with some success, but most of the time, the Democratic problem has been a lack of imagination and courage. As Team Obama gears up for a new beginning, here are some of my ideas for them:
Awe and Relief
| Categories: Barack Obama, John McCain, CBS, Abuse of Power, Sarah Palin, George McGovern, fascism, Pennsylvania, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Unitary Executive Tuesday’s election still fills me with awe, and not just for Barack Obama. The American electorate is wiser than I dared hope. Even John McCain, who ran a shoddy campaign, delivered a concession speech that was generous and inspiring. Sarah Palin has flown back to Alaska with new respect, I would hope, for the power of community organizing.
I spent the week prior to the election in a place I’d never known existed—Northeast Philadelphia—with a marvelous group of people, most of whom were volunteers.
XML Feeds