Thanks to the Wall Street Journal for pointing out what appear to some very good truth-in-politics websites. These websites, both nonpartisan, have undertaken the monumental task (along with us) of calling our politicians on their statements, speeches, and ads when things don't appear to add up. These may be worthy of a link on our main page, depending on what y'all think:
CJR Campaign Desk
FactCheck.org
Just one example from Campaign Desk:
Williams [NPR correspondent] responded, "There's just no history of anyone losing both the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary and then going on to win the nomination."
Well, actually there is, Juan. A politician named Bill Clinton lost both Iowa and New Hampshire just 12 years ago, roared back to take the Democratic nomination and, thence, the White House.
Saturday, January 31, 2004
Re: The CBO: Obscuring the Problem
Some astounding numbers from the CBO. From the Wall Street Journal, Sen. Kent Conrad, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee:
"These aren't short-term deficits. CBO's estimates show that if we continue with our current policies, and factor in the cost of extending recent tax cuts and reforming the Alternative Minimum Tax, the deficit over the next 10 years for the period 2005-2014 will soar to $4.8 trillion, or $7.1 trillion if Social Security is excluded. That represents an astounding reversal from the $5.6 trillion 10-year surplus for the period 2002-2011 that was projected when President Bush took office," Conrad said.
The CBO report can be found here.
"These aren't short-term deficits. CBO's estimates show that if we continue with our current policies, and factor in the cost of extending recent tax cuts and reforming the Alternative Minimum Tax, the deficit over the next 10 years for the period 2005-2014 will soar to $4.8 trillion, or $7.1 trillion if Social Security is excluded. That represents an astounding reversal from the $5.6 trillion 10-year surplus for the period 2002-2011 that was projected when President Bush took office," Conrad said.
The CBO report can be found here.
Friday, January 30, 2004
Dean Bets Farm On Wisconsin
Joe Trippi out, Roy Neel in. Today Roy Neel posted a lengthy message on the Dean blog highlighting the new strategy to get Dean back in the race. It's a hell of a last-ditch gamble, and I'm not sure I approve, but I found it to be very interesting that the focal point has now become Wisconsin. They are making a fairly weak effort for Feb 3, with Neel claiming 3rd place finishes will be enough. Then they are putting significant resources into a strong showing in the Feb 7-8 Michigan, Washington, Maine contests. But the main focus is to get Wisconsin, in order to have momentum going into Super Tuesday, where the campaign still feels they have a strong following in New York and California. It's good to see Wisconsin have some influence. So, Ryan, we're counting on you.
ps. Here's the footage on ABC's mea culpa for their part in the Dean Scream debacle.
ps. Here's the footage on ABC's mea culpa for their part in the Dean Scream debacle.
Thursday, January 29, 2004
More Promises...
AP reports here that the "U.S. Military 'Sure' to Catch Bin Laden." The timing sure makes me wonder...
Dean Goes Nuts
I thought this was a neat story from the campaign world, my human interest story for the month... So after Iowa, Dean goes and makes the speech heard round the world. By the next morning various people (including Rush Limbaugh, IIRC) were circulating all sorts of remixes of the speech. An enterprising 21 year-old Deanie decided to register www.deangoesnuts.com and start collecting remixes. In addition to hosting 30-40 different remixes of the speech, he posted his own personal story of why he is supporting Howard Dean. He's been interviewed by the press 30 times, has raised $800 for Dean, and has received numerous emails from folks who were won over by his site. I'm awed by his creativity in subverting an embarrassing situation into a positive resource. The internet is cool. My favorite is the Howard Dean Unchained remix. He's also got an awesome and inspiring non-scream Howard Dean remix that I think the campaign ought to make use of. I challenge any person to listen to that track or to listen to Dean's speech after the New Hampshire primary (available here) and tell me that man is not electable. What crap...
BTW, it's been reported that ABC actually ran the speech on the news today with the crowd noise added back in, noting that the scream can barely be heard over the cheering. Now they just need to run it 686 more times to even the score (the Dean campaign was keeping track).
BTW, it's been reported that ABC actually ran the speech on the news today with the crowd noise added back in, noting that the scream can barely be heard over the cheering. Now they just need to run it 686 more times to even the score (the Dean campaign was keeping track).
Wednesday, January 28, 2004
Just the Thing to Read...
...while I'm eating my lunch. Fricken exploding whales. Just wait 'til Al Qaeda gets their hands on a few of those..
Tuesday, January 27, 2004
Presidential Futures Market
PBS's Frontline and Marketplace are sponsoring this interesting experiment, where you can buy and sell futures of candidates (with play money--damn securities regulations). It will be interesting to watch the price fluctuations tomorrow.
The CBO: Obscuring the Problem
The Washington Post is running an editorial today clarifying some of the CBO's recently released deficit numbers. Due, they say, to legal requirements on their projections, the CBO ignores significant costs and calculates the Social Security surplus as part of revenues. The actual numbers for the next 10 years are far more grim. The deficit is likely to reach $1 trillion per year by 2014, and the increase on the US national debt (the present level of which the CBO also grossly misrepresents) would increase multiple times what the CBO has estimated. They also point out that both Bush and the Democratic candidates don't appear poised to do much about this situation. Great editorial, wish people were paying attention.
Monday, January 26, 2004
How to Tell When the Democratic Party Has Gone Awry
Bush advisors say they don't care who emerges from the primary, whoever it is will be crushed by their accusations that he is a liberal. Um, unless I'm mistaken, that is supposed to be the core identity of the Democratic party, just as the core identity of Republicans is to be conservative. Something has gone wrong when the basic value of your party has become an insult, meanwhile the opposition goes parading around about what compassionate conservatives they are...
Questioning the Justification (Round 2)
So, by now we all know that we didn't go to war over weapons of mass destruction, we went to war to stop that Evil Saddam from abusing his people. Well now it seems Human Rights Watch has a few questions about this theory. In their annual report they wrote: "Brutal as Saddam Hussein's reign had been, the scope of the Iraq Government's killing in March 2003, was not of the exceptional and dire magnitude that would justify humanitarian intervention. The Bush administration cannot justify the war in Iraq as a humanitarian intervention, and neither can Tony Blair." Uh oh, time to go back to the list of war excuses...
John Kerry Has A Howard Dean Moment
In a distinctly un-Kerry-like performance, the Senator said he didn't think the Southern states were that important for a Democratic candidate. This seems very much like a play out of the Howard Dean playbook, because a) I think he's right, b) I think he'll get crucified for it. Ah well, welcome to our world, Senator.
Remembering MLK
Just came across this fairly well put-together multimedia presentation of an MLK speech for peace updated with some current events appropriate images...
Sunday, January 25, 2004
A Little Different Perspective
Check out this video for (literally) a different perpective on the now infamous Dean Iowa speech. Looks a little different when the camera is not zoomed in on Howard and the sound not feeding directly from his mic. Watching that, I suspect Dean and his staff walked off that stage thinking it was a pretty good performance...
Latest New Hampshire Poll
It looks like the New Hampshire primary will be interesting as Dean tries to lick his wounds (including the self-inflicted) from Iowa. The latest Zogby poll shows Kerry leading Dean by 7 percentage points, 30 to 23%. I believe this is an average of the last 3 days. Of note, the latest poll, for Saturday, shows Kerry leading Dean by only 28 to 25%. It remains to be seen whether this is just a statistical anomaly or perhaps a combination of Kerry's momentum fading a bit, with some recovery by Dean.
Friday, January 23, 2004
Kay Throws In the Towel
In the immortal words of Cartman: "Screw you guys. I'm going home." Chief US weapons inspector in Iraq, David Kay has resigned from his role as head of the Iraq Survey Group. Reuters quotes him saying of the WMD's, "I don't think they ever existed." He is to be replaced by former UN inspector Charles Duelfer, who is quoted as saying that his chances of finding anything are "close to nil." Ouch. That's got to hurt. As I was saying about stark differences between reality and the State of the Union address...
Credibility Gap
I'm not going to rehash the campaign funding issue. I said what I have to say and stand by those comments. I just wanted to point out an editorial the Washingon Post is running today questioning Edwards's credibility on campaign finance.
Please With Sugar On Top
I've already fired off a one-liner on this issue, and I'm not planning to go into any depth this time either. But what a difference there is between the reality of our desperate need for UN help in Iraq and the strident "we don't need a permission slip" rhetoric of Bush's State of the Union. It amazes me that Kofi Annan still has the patience to deal in good faith with this administration.
Don't Drink and... Stampede?
Maybe they can run a public service announcement about this during the Super Bowl..
Thursday, January 22, 2004
Re: Worth Fighting For (or Pulling a Bush or Money Talks)
First, a housekeeping matter--let's try and keep a consistent headline to our discussions so that it is easier to respond.
I think some of the tension that is created among the candidates (or among the supporters of different candidates) arises because any person who hopes to mount a viable campaign must recognize that money is sadly necessary to run a successful campaign, and recent statistics suggest that money can often be the most controlling factor. So I don't fault anyone for taking contributions from any individual who offers them and for any lawful amount. While it might be a noble stand if a candidate were to refuse any amount more than what every American could afford to give, they would simply not last. Even the "$100 Revolution" is out of reach for many. As Edwards frequently stumps, there are millions of Americans in poverty--yet they deserve a voice in the campaign as much as everyone else. We must work to change our crappy system that equates money with (democratic) power and yet begrudgingly recognize that is the system within which we presently operate.
That being said, I think it's fair when evaluating candidates to factor in who their base of support is. Ideally, every candidate wants to represent the "common person," but the reality is that we are a diverse people and sometimes candidates are forced to pick sides. But on that score donations do not give the entire picture. Regional loyalty, historical affiliations, family ties are equally important when trying to decipher exactly who a candidate works for. It seems fair to predict that someone who has spent a great deal of their career as a plaintiffs' lawyer will approach issues differently than someone who was born into a wealthy New England family (or married into one).
The decision always comes down to affection and trust. I don't think that our electoral process gives me the kind of information I really desire to make that choice as effectively as I would like, but again we must take what we got for now. And at least the choice right now does not require that we choose the "least repulsive" candidate--not yet, anyway (November is still a long way off). Let's be glad that we have a few candidates who are raising some good issues and would likely make some good changes.
I think some of the tension that is created among the candidates (or among the supporters of different candidates) arises because any person who hopes to mount a viable campaign must recognize that money is sadly necessary to run a successful campaign, and recent statistics suggest that money can often be the most controlling factor. So I don't fault anyone for taking contributions from any individual who offers them and for any lawful amount. While it might be a noble stand if a candidate were to refuse any amount more than what every American could afford to give, they would simply not last. Even the "$100 Revolution" is out of reach for many. As Edwards frequently stumps, there are millions of Americans in poverty--yet they deserve a voice in the campaign as much as everyone else. We must work to change our crappy system that equates money with (democratic) power and yet begrudgingly recognize that is the system within which we presently operate.
That being said, I think it's fair when evaluating candidates to factor in who their base of support is. Ideally, every candidate wants to represent the "common person," but the reality is that we are a diverse people and sometimes candidates are forced to pick sides. But on that score donations do not give the entire picture. Regional loyalty, historical affiliations, family ties are equally important when trying to decipher exactly who a candidate works for. It seems fair to predict that someone who has spent a great deal of their career as a plaintiffs' lawyer will approach issues differently than someone who was born into a wealthy New England family (or married into one).
The decision always comes down to affection and trust. I don't think that our electoral process gives me the kind of information I really desire to make that choice as effectively as I would like, but again we must take what we got for now. And at least the choice right now does not require that we choose the "least repulsive" candidate--not yet, anyway (November is still a long way off). Let's be glad that we have a few candidates who are raising some good issues and would likely make some good changes.
A Lesson In Logic
This was written by someone (don't know his real name) on a forum I frequent. It's a far more concise review of the State of the Union speech than I had...
What a sad state we're in. Here's what I took from the Bush address:
* We can only achieve peace by pursuing unending war
* We can only save our freedom by giving up our liberties
* We can only fix our half a trillion dollar budget deficit by collecting less revenue and spending more money
* We can only grow our devastated economy by renewing our commitment to the principles that crashed it in the first place
* The three million jobs lost since 2000 pale in importance to the 1000 created last month
* We can only preserve the sanctity of marriage by amending the Constitution to deny rights to homosexuals
* We can only insure good medical care by limiting malpractice lawsuits
* We can only show our commitment to America's schoolchildren by denying schools funding while promoting sexual abstinence and mandatory drugs testing
War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength.
What a sad state we're in. Here's what I took from the Bush address:
* We can only achieve peace by pursuing unending war
* We can only save our freedom by giving up our liberties
* We can only fix our half a trillion dollar budget deficit by collecting less revenue and spending more money
* We can only grow our devastated economy by renewing our commitment to the principles that crashed it in the first place
* The three million jobs lost since 2000 pale in importance to the 1000 created last month
* We can only preserve the sanctity of marriage by amending the Constitution to deny rights to homosexuals
* We can only insure good medical care by limiting malpractice lawsuits
* We can only show our commitment to America's schoolchildren by denying schools funding while promoting sexual abstinence and mandatory drugs testing
War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength.
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