Push Polling And Its Pernicious Politics

It takes a lot more than money, believe it or not, to keep up a plutocracy. One of those things is fake public opinion perceptions. The days of buying that appear to be numbered, if Rachel Maddow's performance is any indication. Her treatment is worthy of any college course on statistics or social science.

The progressive community has railed for many many years about the pernicious effect of "push polling" -- a poll designed to influence the results that the pollers want to see. But only Rachel can boil it down and slice and dice it like this (with the help of the inestimable and uncompromising Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com):

I have nothing more to say:

Oh my god: Katie Couric Does It Again

This is chilling. Just chilling. Glenn Beck rants about "white culture" and then can't explain it in an unedited interview. Katie can show some brass when she wants to.

Blackwashing: by Stephen Colbert

This just cannot be seen enough:
The Word - Blackwashing

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Generational Theft? It Already Happened. Under Republicans.

I just love charts like this one. The same chart was dramatic when I first started studying economics in the early 90's, but boy howdy has it ever gotten... well, beyond dramatic. I think theatrically this gets to the tragic.

Deficits during Republican and Democratic administrations (labeled on the chart). This one shows the deficit under George H.W. Bush (Reagan's record was bad too, but not as bad as Daddy Bush), then Clinton when America achieved surpluses, and then the W. Bush years...

NPR & PBS: Who Are We Fooling?

NPR and PBS both have turned themselves into corporate ad channels -- locally and nationally every hour of programming contains probably 6 to 10 minutes of corporate and foundation promos -- we're not stupid, we know it's advertising.

So let's not pretend that PBS is the BBC.

If someone will point to Fox News and the corporate media bias and stand up for public broadcasting, then there should be NO corporate sponsorship in exchange for public grants for PBS and NPR. I know, I know... but this is what we could have if we elected BETTER and more Democrats, hell just plain more liberals.

With the Republican party imploding, lets face it, what will be left is "Conservative Democrats" and "Liberal Democrats." Oh, and a Republican fringe along with the Greens, LaRouche, Libertarians, etc.

Clinton-Bush: The Next Reagan-Bush

Frank Rich writes tonight in The New York Times a scathing cultural critique of our times. In it, he uses a moniker that jumped out at me: "Clinton-Bush."

When one analyzes the roots of our current fiscal calamity, the roots of the crisis quickly come to bear at the feet of Republican congressmen (yes, men) and the Clinton presidency which signed the seeds of destruction into law: namely, the repeal of the Depression era reforms of the Glass Steagall Act (known as the Gramm Leach Bliley Act) and the horrifically disastrous "Commodities Futures Modernization Act" of 2000.

So here's a minor paragraph from tomorrow's Sunday edition of The Times' Frank Rich column:

United States District Court judge in New York, Jed S. Rakoff, scathingly condemned the Obama Securities and Exchange Commission for letting Bank of America skate away with what Rakoff called an immoral and unjust wrist tap to settle charges that it covered up $3.6 billion paid out in bonuses when it purchased Merrill Lynch. How is this S.E.C. a change from the Clinton-Bush S.E.C. that ignored all the red flags on Bernie Madoff?

There's a reason Frank Rich earned his way into the Sunday Times column.

Another Family Values Republican Bites the... Dust

Why can Republicans still trumpet their "traditional values" bona fides? It's unbelievable that "sexual conquests" and "loose morals" are lobbed at Democrats from the likes of: Mark Foley, Newt Gingrich, David Vitter, Rush Limbaugh, Bill "loofa" O'Reilly, John Ensign, Mark Sanford, Larry Craig -- just to name a few.... Witness this creepy 100%-rated family values California Republican rep bragging near an open microphone about his sexual exploits with 2 women years younger, spanking them, how much sex he's had with them recently... oh, and these ladies are reported to be LOBBYISTS. Nice...

The atrocity:

Michael Moore: The Most Feared Film-Maker in America Strikes Again

Michael Moore, the most feared film-maker in America. The trailer for his latest film:

Hoyer Now Supports Public Option: "With or Without Republicans"

Brett Zongker at the AP (I know, the "Against Progressives" AP!), has an article today featured by Huffington Post stating that at a town hall (can we retire that silly term already people...) that he now supports the Public Option, "with or without Republican support." This is progress we can believe in... for now. To wit:

"If the question is do I plan to vote for a public option with or without Republican support, the answer is yes," Hoyer said.

A public option would lower insurance premiums for everyone through competition with private insurers, he said. The House, he said, would not pass an alternative calling for nonprofit cooperatives, which has been floated in the Senate.

And then, in a "tell" or a "wink" at his enlightened readers, Zongker goes on to -- gasp, almost "report" -- by including a short episode reflective of the deep insights and awareness that these persistent town-hallers (tea-baggers/deathers/birthers/seceders) bring to the table. HILARIOUS. Like someone on Medicare decrying gov'mnt run health care, this time it's her state that has it covered, so why do we need the government? Sheesh. We are not even having the same conversation in this country. Not even in the same room:

The first questioner who challenged Hoyer directly, April Burke of Mechanicsville, Md., said her son and daughter in law both had lost their jobs and health insurance but were covered by the state.

"So why should I want to have the government get into my business?" she asked Hoyer.

The congressman said Burke's family would benefit from the health care overhaul being proposed. But she shouted back: "We want government out of our business now."

I presume this means she wants everyone to pay out of pocket for their children to go to private-run schools (why should single people subsidize parents who made an individual choice to have children)? Right lady? And we should all pay out of pocket for private protection services - let them compete - and get rid of municipal police and fire departments, right lady? Surely the private sector can be more efficient and provide better teachers, fire fighters, ambulances, police. Oh, and while we're "getting government out of our business," we should get rid of the Defense Department, right lady? Just replace it with Blackwater and Halliburton, right lady? Then it will all go better and cheaper. Hell we already had as many contractors (mercenaries, ahem...) in Iraq as we had patriotic enlisted troops, so we're almost there.

Oh, and no more NASA, no more spy satellites, and no more satellite TV or GPS. No more control over epidemics -- no more annual flu shots, right lady? It's all government in our business.

And why not have 3 of the same road everywhere you go - we should make road builders compete and only the people who drive on them should pay tolls for those roads. That won't hurt quality much, will it?

A Libertarian - er, Anarchist - paradise.

Because that's what these people really are: anarchists. You want government out of our business? It means there's no government. That's anarchy. That's destruction of the nation. Lady, meet the secessionist klan. You want your country back? No lady you want your country gone.

Hang On To Health Care: Obama's Fall Offensive?

This from comments under Ezra Klein’s Enzi article at WashingtonPost.com (not my comment):

“The Senate Finance Committee should just pass the HELP bill on September 15th on a party line vote. ALL of their work has been worse than useless to this point. Somebody introduce Max Baucus to the concept of sunk costs. He's failed on the biggest stage he'll ever hold. It's better to just start getting over it rather than keep on making the FAIL bigger.”

This would be brilliant. And feasible. The Senate Finance Committee is the most powerful committee on the Hill. Everyone “knows” that all a bill requires is the president and the Senate Finance Committee for success. So everyone “knew” the bright lights would be on that committee. That’s the committee with the “gang of six” from the no-population states where 2 of the 3 Republicans including the ranking member (Grassley & Enzi) have said they’re against any reforms at all now - after negotiating supposedly in good faith into the recess. Really?! That’s what Gibbs was reacting to. Plus now the fundraising letter from Grassley stating he has always opposed reform and calling it “Obamacare.”

This is all today.

Somehow, and this would have been stunningly brilliant strategy if Kennedy was doing this all along, they might have planned to put these stooges at a table and shine the light on them while the other 2 Senate Committees crafting a bill (HELP is one, which Kennedy chaired and Dodd has been assisting, the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions) do their work under less scrutiny. The non Finance committees are the ones with the Senators like Dodd, Kennedy, Boxer - you know, from states with PEOPLE…

(Make no mistake, real reforms will prove as popular as the New Deal once they start going in place - it could be the REPUBLICAN’S Waterloo - THEY could lose their party for a decade, and they know it.)

Then, as the Finance Committee implodes as they have done, the commenter is suggesting that by simple majority (on the committee) the Senate Finance Committee should vote to throw out their version and instead adopt the HELP Committee version as their own, and vote that straight out of committee to the floor. (This would mean the same bill comes out of two committees.)

Sure the filibuster is still there, but who in the public is going to be able to follow that jujitsu before it even hits the floor. It would have almost no impact on the public debate but would get the best bill onto the floor. Hell right now the public doesn’t even know there are multiple versions of a bill in the Senate plus the House versions. So it would be a way to throw out the trash of Baucus’s committee (Finance) and put forth the strongest bill possible in terms of reform, then push it through with a 51+ vote majority while exposing Republicans to all moderates and Dems as clear crazy obstructionists (who haven’t put a single idea on the table and are openly “out to get the president”). We saw a flash of this tactic from The White House today in Gibbs’ conference (if I’m describing their tactic).

This could be the great hope in the end. I have to believe that Obama has had plenty of time to campaign on this and plan this, and I have to believe he knows he simply cannot fail and he must get a big win here - and as he’s shown before, it’s only the end result that really matters (as with November 2008). These are really really great signs we’re seeing today. The “offensive” may be under way. I also received an email from a progressive group about to do a big national ad buy to support the Public Option.

Hang on. These ain’t the Clintons we’re dealing with. I hope.

Gulp…

Maddow: The Republican Miniverse

NBC actually did a poll exposing their competitor Fox News for materially misinforming its viewers (or just plain attracting a fringe who cling to false assumptions about "the facts") and the results are striking. Among self-identified Republicans (albeit that's a dwindling base), 60% get their news from Fox News. Fox News viewers are most likely to think that the President wasn't born in Hawaii, they think in surprising numbers that health care reform is about killing off citizens, and they are most likely to think flat false facts about what is (and is actually not) in the health care reform drafts circulating in Congress, such as whether the bill will cover illegal aliens (emergency care subsidized by taxpayers already covers illegals, by the way, by default), that it will fund abortions with taxpayer dollars, and other just flat insane ideas that would and could never be a part of health reform legislation at this point in our history.

But the most fascinating part of it all is something I myself have been grappling with for about a year now: how do you have an honest debate with people who just flat can't get reality correct? Forget precise. Forget honest disagreements. Forget even a bizarre debate about an issue and the facts of that issue. Increasingly this nation is trying to have a debate between people who know the facts (even if only a general set) and others who fall hook-line-and-sinker for special interest lies. This is a conversation from last night definitely worth watching - and feeling good that it happened on national news cable on an increasingly popular and influential program.



And my favorite congress person, and easily the smartest politician in congress (even if a bit gruff), Rep. Barney Frank slices and dices a woman who - to the Jewish Barney Frank - accuses health care reform of being a Nazi effort to exterminate American citizens. This is an answer to Rachel Maddow's brilliant discussion above. Choice quote from Frank: "Arguing with you is like arguing with a dining room table. I just don't want to do it." It's worth remembering in these bizarro political times. Just because someone has an opinion doesn't make it based in fact or worthy of an honest and fact-based response. Sometimes you just have to walk away from, as Frank describes, "the table."