"To what purpose are powers limited, and to what purpose is that limitation committed to writing,
if these limits may, at any time, be passed by those intended to be restrained?"
-- Chief Justice John Marshall, Marbury v. Madison, 1803

Monday, October 06, 2008

It’s Monday.  And in looking for a straw man to bash, I ran across this:

Every time I think of William Ayers, I also think of John McCain, because they are of the same era, and they both believed in the efficacy of violence. According to an article in Friday’s New York Times, McCain once said of Ayers, “How can you countenance someone who was engaged in bombings that could have or did kill innocent people?” He had to use that “could have or did” because no one knows if bombs Ayers built actually killed anyone—let’s say that the odds are against it. Likewise, no one knows whether the bombs John McCain dropped on North Vietnam ever killed anyone. According to McCain’s biography, “With the outbreak of the Vietnam War, McCain volunteered for combat duty and began flying carrier-based attack planes on low-altitude bombing runs against the North Vietnamese. ...On October 26, 1967, during his 23rd air mission, McCain´s plane was shot down during a bombing run over the North Vietnamese capital of Hanoi.” Let’s say, given those twenty-three bombing runs, the odds are for McCain having killed some innocents. How can you countenance someone who was engaged in bombings that could have or did kill innocent people, John?

But, of course, John McCain’s defense is that he was performing his patriotic duty, and that’s what William Ayers would have said, too. I remember the Vietnam War. It was not a war of self-defense that the U.S. had to wage or had to win. It was a war of aggression, a waste of resources, lives, manpower, global good will, and national spirit. And, many would say, it was a war crime. Those who were against it viewed their protests as essential patriotism, a way of correcting terrible choices and profound injustices.

...

In the meantime, what about the case against John McCain? The next time he goes abroad, might some enterprising human rights activist step up to him and put him under a citizens’ arrest for war crimes and get him hauled off to the The Hague?

I don’t think Barack Obama would like that. As snarky and contemptuous as McCain acts toward Obama, I think President Obama would defend McCain. In fact, I think he would feel about him as he does about Ayers—he’s an old man, and the wars he once fought are over and done with. Time to get past fighting old battles. Sometimes I agree with him. But then McCain brings up Williams Ayers again, and I can’t help thinking of those bombing runs, and those dead innocents.

How stupid is this?  Well, so stupid the readers at HuffPo are all over it.  It’s almost refreshing to see that this article goes too far even for liberals.

Look, I think the Ayers thing is garbage too.  But this is just silly.  The soldier, in most countries, tries to achieve his purpose with the minimum amount of destruction and bloodshed.  He fights under rules that all civilized nations have agreed to. The terrorist tries to achieve his purpose by targeting random people while maximizing destruction and bloodshed. There are no rules. They deliberately kill innocent people and children.

Yes, the boundaries get blurred at times.  But when they do, we charge people with war crimes.  Bombing an enemy with which you are engaged in open war doesn’t even come close.

Sunday, October 05, 2008

I am Hal’s complete lack of surprise:

Congress was front and center in the national news last week and the American people were far from impressed. If they could vote to keep or replace the entire Congress, 59% of voters would like to throw them all out and start over again. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that just 17% would vote to keep the current legislators in office.

Today, just 23% have even a little confidence in the ability of Congress to deal with the nation’s economic problems and only 24% believe most Members of Congress understand legislation before they vote on it.

...

Only half (49%) believe that the current Congress is better than individuals selected at random from the phone book. Thirty-three percent (33%) believe a randomly selected group of Americans could do a better job and 19% are not sure (see crosstabs).

A separate survey found that just 11% of voters say Congress is doing a good or an excellent job. (see crosstabs and recent trends).

So why don’t we do anything about it?

Despite these reviews, more than 90% of Congress is likely to be elected this November due to an electoral system designed to benefit incumbents. The biggest advantage offered those in the House of Representatives is a process known as Gerrymandering where Congressional Districts are loaded with friendly voters from Representative’s own party. In effect, Members of Congress—working through their state legislature--get to choose their voters rather than letting voters choose their Congressman.

Also aiding incumbents is high name recognition from news coverage, large staffs funded by taxpayers, and other perks. While the staff positions are technically excluded from politics, the constituent services they provide in a Congressman’s name are among the most effective of all campaign techniques.

...

When the Constitution was written, the nation’s founders expected that there would be a 50% turnover in the House of Representatives every election cycle. That was the experience they witnessed in state legislatures at the time (and most of the state legislatures offered just one-year terms). For well over 100 years after the Constitution was adopted, the turnover averaged in the 50% range as expected.

In the twentieth century, turnover began to decline. As power and prestige flowed to Washington during the New Deal era, fewer and fewer Members of Congress wanted to leave. In 1968, Congressional turnover fell to single digits for the first time ever and it has remained very low ever since.

It’s the old problem—people hate Congress but love their Congressman.  People refuse to believe that their bum is part of the problem.

I sometimes wonder whether term limits would be a good idea.  We’ve had them in San Antonio for a while and they’ve proven effective—and united all the special interests against them.  “Experience” doesn’t much to me when it’s experience in larding up bills with pork and accreting power.

But that would require a Constitutional Amendment.  In the meantime, something like Schwarzenegger’s plan to have districts drawn by judges instead of legislatures is much more doable and could help relieve the pressure.

I get that it’s a joke, but this won’t help Maverick’s already troubled campaign.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s brother made an apparent joke at a campaign rally this weekend that might not play well in parts of newly competitive Virginia.

Joe McCain, speaking at an event in support of his brother, called two Democratic-leaning areas in Northern Virginia “communist country,” according to a report on The Washington Post’s Web site.

“I’ve lived here for at least 10 years and before that about every third duty I was in either Arlington or Alexandria, up in communist country,” Joe McCain said at an event in Loudon County, Va.

Joe McCain then apologized, but the remark drew laughter at the event, according to the report.

Now, I don’t know enough about the area in question to say whether he’s technically right or not, but when you’re trying to hold onto a once-reliably Red state with a month to go, I’d think you’d want to be more careful in where and when you shoot your mouth off. Straight talk might be one thing; stupid talk that could cost your brother votes is another.

I don’t often agree with Bill Maher, but here he makes sense.

I don’t use the word “atheist” about myself, because I think it mirrors the certitude I’m so opposed to in religion. What I say in the film is that I don’t know. I don’t know what happens when you die, and all the religious people who claim they do know are being ridiculous. I know that they don’t know any more than I do. They do not have special powers that I don’t possess. When they speak about the afterlife with such certainty and so many specifics, it just makes me laugh.
....

People can tell you, “Oh yes, when you get to Paradise there are 72 virgins, not 70, not 75.” Or they say, “Jesus will be there sitting at the right hand of the Father, wearing a white robe with red piping. There will be three angels playing trumpets.” Well, how do you know this? It’s just so preposterous. So, yes, I would like to say to the atheists and agnostics, the people who I call rationalists, let’s stop ceding the moral high ground to the people who believe in the talking snake. Let’s have our voices heard and be in the debate. Let’s stand up and say we’re not ready to let the country be given over to the Sarah Palins of the world.

I’m with Sullivan on this one-I think Maher’s tendency to lump all believers together with the fundamentalist wingnuts of the world is unfair. Where he’s right is in our right to be skeptical. But there’s another side to this. After all, faith was a large part of the civil rights movement, it has helped people cope and overcome in the most difficult of circumstances, and inspired some of the world’s great thinkers, writers, artists, leaders, etc. I’m still just as skeptical of organized religion and literal interpretations as ever, but I don’t believe in knocking personal faith if it does some good. The problem with faith and politicians is, they use it to turn people against one another and to advance their own pet agendas. That’s where I draw the line.

Among the many many unrelated revision crammed into the bailout bill was Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity Act.  Really, the name alone should tell you this was a bad idea:

The law doesn’t require health insurers to cover mental health care. But if they do, they’ll have to treat psychological and addictive disorders just as they do other medical conditions.

Put another way, insurers will no longer be able to limit the number of visits or charge higher deductibles and co-payments for mental health and substance abuse services.

“If you have insurance, then your mental health care must be equal to the benefits you get for any other disease,” said Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), quoted in a Reuters article. His daughter has schizophrenia.

President Bush signed the bill into law after it was tacked onto the $700 billion financial bailout bill the House of Representatives passed 263-171 on Friday.

The Associated Press notes that the law applies to health plans covering more than 50 employees, “potentially reaching 113 million people nationwide.”

The cost is estimated at $3.4 billion over 10 years. Insurance companies and businesses had argued for years that the change would make medical coverage more expensive, but came on board a compromise was reached earlier this year.

In short, you can have however many yack sessions you need with your therapist until you feel whole again.  Two predictions:

First, this will cause many insurers to drop mental health coverage completely, which lead to screams for a mental health coverage mandate (as many state already have).

Second, this will make health insurance more expensive, causing employers to drop it and people to be unable to afford it, increasing the calls for government insurance.  As a man who never met a health care mandate he didn’t like, I’m sure Obama know this.  You have to wonder if that’s the intention of the law.

Update: Allow me to state that as a man with obsessive/compulsive disorder (OCD), who has spent maybe $5,000 a year of his own money out of pocket on medical therapy sessions for the past three years or so, I think this is a fucking stupid idea.  I can see expanding coverage to include more concrete, diagnosable medical conditions, but making sure that every bored housewife can go and piss and moan to her therapist for a few hours a week is going to do exactly what Hal said, cause plans to drop mental health care altogether and deny people like me, with life-long mental health conditions, the care that we rightly deserve.

Saturday, October 04, 2008

Barack Obama is fighting back.

Branding his opponent as “erratic in a crisis,” Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) is preempting plans by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) to portray him as having sinister connections to controversial Chicagoans.

Obama officials call it political jujitsu – turning the attacks back on the attacker.

McCain officials had said early in the weekend that they plan to begin advertising after Tuesday’s debate that will tie Obama to convicted money launderer Tony Rezko and former Weathermen radical William Ayers.

But Obama isn’t waiting to respond. His campaign is going up Monday on national cable stations with a scathing ad saying: “Three quarters of a million jobs lost this year. Our financial system in turmoil. And John McCain? Erratic in a crisis. Out of touch on the economy. No wonder his campaign wants to change the subject.

“Turn the page on the financial crisis by launching dishonorable, dishonest ‘assaults’ against Barack Obama. Struggling families can’t turn the page on this economy, and we can’t afford another president who is this out of touch.”

Then Obama says: “I’m Barack Obama and I approved this message.”
....

“We think the McCain campaign made a huge error by telling the press that their strategy was to distract from the most important issue facing voters,” a senior Obama official said. “Every attack going forward will be easy to characterize for what it is – an attempt to distract from the Bush-McCain economic record.”

McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds hinted at the tough new line Saturday on “Fox & Friends.”

“There are associations that are important to who Barack Obama is as a candidate, who he’d be as president,” Bounds said.

Obama-Biden communications director Dan Pfeiffer said about the new ads: “If John McCain thinks he can ‘turn the page’ on the economic crisis facing American families, he is even more out of touch than we imagined. Now there may be no good answers for John McCain due to his erratic response to the financial crisis, but his desire to avoid discussing the economy is something we will remind voters of everyday for the next month.”

I agree with Hal-I think McCain is making a big mistake by dredging up Ayers again. It smacks of desperation from a campaign that should be able to debate the issues far more effectively than they have. Meanwhile, Obama can go after McCain on his weakest point-the economy.

McCain says he’s battle-tested. But Obama may be showing that he’s battle-ready.

I guess this will put Sarah over the top, then:

Dolly Parton, our favorite Sevier County songbird, tells entertainment news program “Extra” that she can identify with GOP vice presidental candidate Tina Fey Sarah Palin! “I always say we’re very much alike,” says the normally bipartisan Parton.

Parton goes on to tell “Extra”: “(We’re) both small town girls, both a Pentecostalism and we both carry an AK-47.”

Look at it this way: You get three boobs for the price of one.

Let’s see-we’ve had Chuck Norris and Rick Flair both come out for the Republicans this year. Are there any more has-beens who haven’t made up their minds yet?

Oh, this is going to work out real well.

The bailout bill also gives the Internal Revenue Service new authority to conduct undercover operations. It would immunize the IRS from a passel of federal laws, including permitting IRS agents to run businesses for an extended sting operation, to open their own personal bank accounts with U.S. tax dollars, and so on. (Think IRS agents posing as accountants or tax preparers and saying, “I’m not sure if that deduction is entirely legal, but it’ll save you $1,000. Want to take it?") That section had expired as of January 1, 2008, and would now be renewed.

Starting with the so-called Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1988, the IRS has possessed this authority temporarily, with occasional multiple-year lapses. A 1999 internal report said the IRS had 126 “trained undercover agents” working in field offices at the time. This is the first time that such undercover authority would be made permanent.

Sens. Max Baucus (D) and Chuck Grassley (R) have been pushing to make it permanent for a while, claiming (PDF) in April that: “Undercover operations are an integral part of IRS efforts to detect and prove noncompliance. The temporary status of this provision creates uncertainty, as the IRS plans its undercover efforts from year to year.”

There’s another section of the bailout bill worth noting. It lets the IRS give information from individual tax returns to any federal law enforcement agency investigating suspected “terrorist” activity, which can, in turn, share it with local and state police. Intelligence agencies such as the CIA and the National Security Agency can also receive that information.

The information that can be shared includes “a taxpayer’s identity, the nature, source, or amount of his income, payments, receipts, deductions, exemptions, credits, assets, liabilities, net worth, tax liability, tax withheld, deficiencies, overassessments, or tax payments, whether the taxpayer’s return was, is being, or will be examined or subject to other investigation or processing, or any other data received by, recorded by, prepared by, furnished to, or collected by the Secretary with respect to a return.”

That giant sucking sound you hear is what’s left of your privacy going out the window. But I’m sure we can rest easy. After all, the IRS wouldn’t misuse this power, would it?

David Weigel has a review of the new David Zucker epic, An American Carol.

The goals here are as partisan, zealous, and transparent as Warren Beatty’s when he made Reds, or John Travolta’s when he made Battlefield Earth. Zucker has promoted the film across conservative media, at the Republican convention (where screening attendees like Rick Santorum got liberal paper dolls for their kids), and on Fox News. “Laugh like your country depends on it!” bellows the movie’s ad copy. This is not a joke. If a Scary Movie bombs, some people lose money. If An American Carol bombs, Zucker’s quest to make Hollywood safe for conservatives is dealt a Dunkirk.
....

Zucker doesn’t try too hard to understand the left beyond Moore/Malone. Late in the film, we learn that Malone was only ever unpatriotic because, as a portly teen, he had a crush on a girl who hated America, too. When she ran off with a soldier, he doubled down as a political activist. Malone’s motivation is the only one that Zucker explains: The rest of the liberals and left-wingers in the movie are psychopaths who willfully make things up, chant slogans mindlessly, and beat up people who upset them. This is the first Hannity and Colmes comedy, birthed in an echo chamber, with references that only make sense to people who are already die-hard conservatives.

I understand Zucker’s POV. Conservatives in Hollywood are few and far between, and if there was anyone who deserved the Zucker treatment it’s Mikey Moron. But as much as I can’t stand Moore, I think a more balanced approach might have worked better. The conservative movement is running on fumes, and if Obama wins (as now seems likely) this will look like an artifact from the nasty Bush years. I haven’t seen the movie, so I can’t comment on how truly funny it is or isn’t, but it seems to me that Zucker can do better. (I still think Airplane! is one of the best comedies ever made).

So much for the high road:

The McCain campaign is delivering on its announcement to step up attacks on Sen. Barack Obama with little more than a month until Election Day.

Referring to Obama’s relationship with William Ayers, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin accused Obama of associating “with terrorists who targeted their own country.”

Speaking at a fund-raising event in Colorado Saturday, Palin said: “This is not a man who sees America as you and I do – as the greatest force for good in the world,” Palin said, according to a statement released by the McCain-Palin campaign. “This is someone who sees American as imperfect enough to pal around with terrorists who targeted their own country.”

Palin was reacting to a New York Times article published Friday about the Democratic nominee’s association with Ayers, a member of the 1960’s radical group the Weathermen. The group was involved in bombings of the Pentagon and the Capitol but federal criminal charges against Ayers were eventually dropped. Ayers hosted an event in 1995 where Illinois State Senator Alice Palmer introduced Obama as the person she had chosen to succeed her because she was running for Congress. The two men were members of the same charitable board in Chicago. According to a campaign spokesman quoted in the Times story, Obama and Ayres have not spoken by phone or exchanged e-mail messages since Obama became a U.S. Senator in 2005. The newspaper says the two last met more than a year ago when they bumped into each other on the street in Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood where they both live.

They are getting desperate.  Wright will be next.  And if they get really scared, they’ll start talking about Michelle Obama.

This is like watching the Clinton campaign all over again.  They are going through the same stages—Denial, Anger, Fear and Bargaining.  In the end stages, like the first week of November, I expect the McCain campaign to be citing “internal polls” that show that they are really going to win the election and claiming that CNN/Gallup/USA Today/Rasmussen/Zogby are all “in the tank” for Obama.

How sad.  They could have won this thing and acted as a bulwark against a Democratic Congress.

What a surprise:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin made considerably less money than rival Sen. Joe Biden, but the Palin family gave more to charity in the last two years than Biden has in the last eight combined, according to Palin’s tax records released Friday afternoon.

Palin, the running mate of presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), and her husband Todd reported meager earnings from 2006 and 2007, at least by presidential-politics standards.

In 2006, the Palins paid $11,944 in taxes on $127,869 in income. In 2007, they paid $24,738 on $166,080.

But in 2006, they donated $4,880 to charity, and in 2007, they donated $3,325.

By contrast, Biden (D-Del.), Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s running mate, has donated a total of $3,690 since 1998 despite his higher Senate salary, according to an analysis posted by National Review.

You mean that a conservative walks the walk of charity better than a liberal?  I’m shocked!

Some people still remember what it was like when there was an actual conservative in office.

In his first inaugural address, President Ronald Reagan delivered a line succinctly capturing the sentiment that elected him: “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”

A generation later, that attitude still resonates with a solid majority of Americans. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 59% of voters agree with Reagan, and just 28% disagree.

Support is found across a wide range of political and demographic groups. Sixty-seven percent (67%) of men agree with Reagan, as do 52% of women. A majority of voters in all age and income groups agree.

The only demographic group to disagree with Reagan’s statement are those who identify themselves as politically liberal. Just 35% of liberals agree that government is the problem, but 46% disagree. Moderates embrace the Reagan view by a 61% to 25% margin, and conservatives are even more enthusiastic.

Republicans overwhelming embrace Reagan’s view, and 55% of unaffiliated voters agree as well. Democrats are a bit less enthusiastic, but 49% agree with Reagan while 34% disagree.

Of course, one of Reagan’s great gifts was his ability to communicate conservative ideas effectively to a wide audience, something Bush and many current Republicans have sorely lacked. Also, he was able to walk the walk. What many have come to realize is just how far the current Republican Party has strayed from his ideals. That’s why they’re most likely headed for another thumpin’ in a few weeks.

Guess what else was put into the bailout bill?

SEC. 117. CARBON AUDIT OF THE TAX CODE.

(a) Study- The Secretary of the Treasury shall enter into an agreement with the National Academy of Sciences to undertake a comprehensive review of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to identify the types of and specific tax provisions that have the largest effects on carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions and to estimate the magnitude of those effects.
(b) Report- Not later than 2 years after the date of enactment of this Act, the National Academy of Sciences shall submit to Congress a report containing the results of study authorized under this section.
(c) Authorization of Appropriations- There is authorized to be appropriated to carry out this section $1,500,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 and 2010.

Remember when Senator McCain accused Obama of bringing back European-style ideas from his whirlwind tour? Didn’t McCain help to get this passed? To put it more succinctly:

This appears to be an attempt by global warming fanatics to lay the foundation for an economy-killing carbon tax just like the “cap-and-tax” system that is now destroying European industry.

What do you want to bet that the Democrats would love to use this as an excuse for eliminating subsidies for “Bad businesses” over “Good” green ones? I’m sure that some Dems would use the excuse that they’re being both environmentally and fiscally responsible. But given the history of liberal efforts to influence business, they’d most likely wind up being niether in the end.

What hath Bush wrought? Norquist finally admits what most of us have known for years:

Perhaps Mr. Bush has, on behalf of the modern Republican party, raised the white flag in surrender to bigger government.

Gee, ya think? And it’s starting to look worse for the GOP with a month to go.

“If you turn the clock back two or two and half weeks, you could make a plausible argument that if a couple of things go our way we will lose three to four Senate races,” said one Republican strategist. “Now we will lose six to eight.” Polling in most Senate races over the past 14 days has shown a five-point decline for the Republican candidate, the strategist said.
The picture in the House is similar.

Maybe they can recover from this in time for the 2010 midterms. Divided government is the best thing that could happen under an Obama administration. But while some Republicans seem to have suddenly rediscovered fiscal repsonibility, others are still clinging to faded dreams of repeating the heady days of Bush’s first term. Those days are over, however. To borrow a phrase from a certain group of left-wing nutjobs, it’s time to move on.

Friday, October 03, 2008

O.J.’s going to jail, O.J.’s going to jail.

LAS VEGAS (AP) - O.J. Simpson, who went from American sports idol to celebrity-in-exile after he was acquitted of murder in 1995, was found guilty Friday of robbing two sports-memorabilia dealers at gunpoint in a Las Vegas hotel room.

Simpson, 61, could spend the rest of his life in prison. Sentenced was set for Dec. 5.

A weary and somber Simpson released a heavy sigh as the charges were read by the clerk in Clark County District Court. He was immediately taken into custody.

The Hall of Fame football star was convicted of kidnapping, armed robbery and 10 other charges for gathering up five men a year ago and storming into a room at a hotel-casino, where the group seized several game balls, plaques and photos. Prosecutors said two of the men with him were armed; one of them said Simpson asked him to bring a gun.

The verdict came 13 years to the day after Simpson was cleared of murdering his ex-wife and a friend of hers in Los Angeles in one of the most sensational trials of the 20th century.

Better late than never. I hope he gets the max. In the meantime, I think we can all take some satisfaction in that this piece of excrement is finally going away. Justice is served.