Obama's Merit Badge
Barack Obama took a stand today that probably won't move the polls in his favor, and could possibly hurt him down the line. Speaking to the National Education Association, Obama announced that he supports merit pay for teachers--a step sort of comparable to walking into a Boston sportsbar wearing full Yankee regalia.

Obama's endorsement of merit pay for teachers was the first note deviating from the promise-anything tenor of visits by several presidential candidates to the union this week.

Obama said that improving public education was vital to the U.S. ability to compete in a global economy, pointing out that students here score well below their counterparts in other industrialized nations, particularly in science and mathematics.

"In the 21st century, countries that out-educate us now will out-compete us tomorrow," Obama said. "The work you do and the difference you make has never been more important to the future of this country."

He promised more pay "across the board" for teachers and extra incentives for those willing to work in lower-performing schools in urban and rural areas, though he noted that he would release the details of those goals and other education policies at a later date.

Obama did evidently hit several of the expected (and valid) Democratic notes as well, blasting the implementation of the federal No Child Left Behind policy with a clever one-liner--"Don't pass a law called No Child Left Behind and leave the money behind"--as well as its overreliance on standardized testing. But by supporting merit pay as well as differential bonuses for working in higher-need areas, Obama began to put some substance where his sentiments have been: if his campaign really is to transcend tired zero-sum partisan battles, he needs to acknowledge that arguments on both sides of those battles have some merit.

Resistance to merit compensation is one of two deeply dug-in positions of the teachers' unions that most everyone else hates. (Unwillingness to empower principals to fire crappy educators is the other.) It gives the sense, and understandably so, that the unions are more concerned with protecting the job security and earning power of bad teachers rather than rewarding great ones as a means to improve educational outcomes and ensure qualified teachers in shortage areas (math, science, special education, et al). While the devil certainly resides in the details of how to define and reward "merit"--one reason why he's right to seek a methodology in partnership "with" the NEA rather than doing it "to" them--the concept has to go forward.

I don't have the mental toughness to go track down Hillary Clinton's remarks to the NEA... but then again, do I really have to? You know and I know what she served up: a long list of platitudes about the importance of the profession, a few subtle or overt references to the role of the educator in the "village" she believes it takes to raise a child; an anecdote or two about a Very Special Teacher who helped shape her emerging personhood as a young woman; a promise that her administration will stand shoulder to shoulder with the teachers rather than just placing ever-heavier burdens on them as the Bushistas have done through the imposition of NCLB.

That's all fine. But it neither addresses the real problems within the teaching profession--which I believe should be thoroughly professionalized, with salaries comparable to lawyers and doctors and performance expectations similarly elevated from the current dismal level--nor moves the discussion of education issues forward in a way that's meaningful to anyone who wasn't in the room.

Obama's taking a whack at this particular sacred cow won't do much for him in the short term; most obviously, I can't imagine he'll get the union's endorsement now. But it does suggest that some of those traits liberals were unsure he possessed--a measure of courage, a willingness to take stands--might be there after all, underlaying the lofty rhetoric with a real vision of leadership.

The Twisted World of the WSJ
For awhile now, I've been meaning to start writing more about my own work and experiences here on AIS, at least until football season starts. But I didn't want to get quite this personally involved; yesterday morning I received an e-mail that a policy brief I recently wrote for the Center for an Urban Future, about the importance of New York City's Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP), was featured in a Wall Street Journal editorial.

Now, it's always nice to see one's work get attention, and indirectly the editorial endorsed our view that the program, which puts upwards of 40,000 New Yorkers ages 14 to 21 into subsidized employment for seven weeks every summer, is beneficial. But... well, read it for yourself and see if you can spot the problem:

...[A] sobering new report from the New York City-based Center for an Urban Future shows how minimum-wage laws are already hurting the unskilled and inexperienced.

The "Summer Help" study assesses New York City's publicly funded Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP), which each year matches tens of thousands of young people between the ages of 14 and 21 with employers ranging from the local library to investment banks.
...
Today, however, the New York program serves 20% fewer young adults than it did in 1999, and last year it turned away 30,000 mostly black and Latino applicants. The report cites minimum wage-increases in the Empire State --one of 30 states that mandates a minimum higher than the federal floor -- as a factor in the program's decline.

"The higher state minimum wage that went into effect in 2005," writes author David Jason Fischer, "added to the challenge of funding SYEP by increasing the cost per participant, making it difficult to keep SYEP enrollment levels the same without year-over-year budget increases or additional administrative cuts." New York's minimum wage increased once again this year
to $7.15 from $6.75, adding another $3.5 million in costs.

The harm from minimum-wage laws is well-documented, and even government job programs aren't immune. ...

Did I write that sentence? Yes.

Do I "cite minimum wage increasees... as a factor in the program's decline"? HELL NO.

Entirely unmentioned in the editorial are either of the two biggest reasons we suggest for why enrollment is down from 1999: the calamitous decline in federal funding for SYEP--from $42.5 million in '99 to $5.4 million in 2006--and, to a considerably lesser extent, the lack of awareness or interest on the part of the private sector in NYC in supporting seasonal employment for young people. What they did, of course, was take one point we made, in the interest of intellectual honesty--the fact that the higher minimum wage raises the cost per SYEP participant--and stretch it beyond wafer-thin to resume their usual ideological battle against the minimum wage.

I don't suppose I need mention that I wasn't contacted before this editorial was published, nor that I vehemently disagree with its conclusion. The only time I've ever taken on the question of the minimum wage in a professional capacity was in late 2004, when we endorsed the move then current in the New York state legislature to pass the three-stage increase that has brought the wage to $7.15 per hour in our report "Between Hope and Hard Times." Before doing so, we examined a lot of research for and against minimum wage increases, and we reached an informed conclusion that such measures did considerably more good than harm. In New York, this manifestly has proven to be the case, as the Fiscal Policy Institute found six months ago in this short report.

To my knowledge, this is the first time my work has been misappropriated in this dishonest way. I wrote a letter in response to the WSJ, but have not yet heard whether or not they plan to publish it. Here's the gist:

Your July 3 editorial, “Minimum Wage, Jobless Kids,” twists the findings of the Center for an Urban Future’s report “Summer Help,” which I authored, almost beyond recognition. Notwithstanding your focus on the minimum wage, our primary finding was that the biggest reason enrollment for New York City’s Summer Youth Employment Program has decreased by 20 percent was the precipitous decline of federal dollars to support the program—from $42.5 million in 1999 to $5.4 million last summer. It is irresponsible, to say the least, to hijack this point in order to argue against the minimum wage—a premise with which we strongly disagree, and that much research has refuted.

Despite its clearly mischievous intent, the editorial has the germ of a point: if any situation justifies a sub-minimum wage, it is publicly subsidized employment for part-time workers who are not their families’ primary wage earners. Given the proven value of summer youth employment, it might well be a better public investment to employ a larger number of teens at a slightly lower hourly wage. To stretch this point into a blanket condemnation of the minimum wage, however, is a dishonest distortion of our work.

Happy 4th of July.

McCain: The End
I'm tempted to put a question mark in the title, but I won't: I think Arizona Senator John McCain is finished as a presidential contender, and maybe as any kind of presence in national politics. As the campaign finance reporting quarter is about to close, McCain is expected to fare no better than third, behind Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani; given his reportedly anemic fund-raising, and with Fred "TV's Fred Thompson" Thompson set to enter the race next week and already polling well ahead of McCain, and the immigration bill he'd publicly supported now dead and buried, and the widely reviled war he still supports in its bloodiest stretch yet, it's impossible for me to see how McCain gets back in the race.

It's simultaneously sad and satisfying. Sad, because I was one of those people in the late 1990s who genuinely liked and admired McCain despite not sharing his views. Primarily I respected his view that getting the thumb of big money off the scale of policymaking represented a quantum leap forward for democracy; and his willingness to take on the established power centers of Washington not just in campaign finance but in military spending and other areas signaled to me that he was a guy who put prinicple ahead of career. And of course, during the 2000 campaign he seemed to be changing before our eyes, speaking truth to power (and to the powerless) and, not incidentally, having a great freakin' time.

Satisfying, of course, because he renounced all that to suck up to George W. Bush, the man whose campaign smeared McCain in the 2000 race, and the Republican establishment. McCain's embrace of Bush became really conspicuous around 2003, but he'd started down that road within weeks of leaving the race in 2000; I remember him getting booed off the stage at Arianna Huffington's "Shadow Convention" in Philadelphia that summer after suggesting to an incredulous crowd that Bush was "the real reformer" in that year's race. It was hard to tell whether McCain, who was transparently enraged, was more upset at the rude crowd or at what he was saying that so provoked them.

Two men could have denied Bush a second term on their own in 2004: Colin Powell and McCain. Given his support for closing the Guantanamo prison and his counseling Barack Obama, Powell seems to regret his complicity in the perpetuation of Bush's misrule; McCain, though, seems to be permanently afflicted with Stockholm Syndrome. He's reaping the whirlwind twice over: the Republican base still detests him for his 2000-era deviations from Supreme Orthodoxy, and now everyone else mistrusts him precisely because he's so assiduously embraced the twisted principles of New Mutant Republicanism.

It's also satisfying when one sees dumbassed eulogies from the group that was McCain's truest constituency back in the day: the punditocracy. Here's Stuart Rothenberg:

Here’s a bit of unsolicited advice for Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign (which has plenty of smart people and doesn’t need my advice): Try to get back to McCain’s story.

It isn’t news that McCain’s campaign is staggering under the weight of weaker-than- expected fundraising and poll numbers, criticism from conservatives who don’t trust him, the Senator’s immigration and Iraq positions, and the perception that he’s just another politician.
...
... I was reminded the other day about the one thing that’s missing from the national coverage of the 2008 McCain campaign that was so prevalent during the coverage of his 2000 White House bid: His life.

As I watched McCain in Iowa and New Hampshire eight years ago, I was struck by how many veterans were in his audiences, and how real people talked and related to him. They saw him as a true hero. Given the recent media coverage of Paris Hilton and the late Anna Nicole Smith, plenty of Americans might well like to hear about a true hero.
...
McCain continues to talk about many of the things that he did in 2000, including ethics, wasteful spending and national security. And his Web site includes his bio and photographs from the Vietnam era. But things have changed for McCain, in part because the coverage of him is so unlike what it was and in part because the GOP field is different.

McCain has tried to be the conservative candidate, while Giuliani challenges him for party moderates, as well as those wanting a candidate who projects strong leadership on the war against terror. The mayor and Romney (add to them Thompson soon) are fresher faces, at least in a presidential race, than is McCain, and voters always seem smitten with the new guy, at least for a while.
...
McCain may not be able to reinject his personal story of heroism and service into the national media coverage of his campaign or excite people the way he once did. His military record may be old news to too many people. But his campaign needs to find a way to make John McCain more than just a Washington, D.C., insider and Senator, and his personal story and heroism should be more of an asset now than it is.

I'm not saying Rothenberg is an idiot, but I'm surely saying this is one of the more idiotic articles I've read in a long, long time. He's casting about, really thinking out loud/on the page, for how his boy McCain can save his doomed presidential run, and the best he can come up with is "more biography"?

This makes no sense. McCain probably has higher name recognition than anyone else in the race not named "Hillary Clinton," and more people probably have opinions pro or con about him than any other non-Clinton candidate. You can't reintroduce yourself to people who know you (or think they do). And, as might not be the case with Rudy, the Mittster or TV's Fred, people probably have a fairly accurate sense of who McCain is and what he's about.

McCain probably could have won the presidency in 2004, had he run as an independent (or Democrat, for that matter). He always looked best compared to Bush. But he chose the route of syncophancy, and lost everything. It's all over for him now.

Seeking the Stealth Lefty
His candidacy was sunk before I began this blog, but in the 2004 presidential primary season, my Democrat of choice was Wes Clark. I believed then (and believe now) that Clark was the most accomplished candidate in the race, that he had the combination of experience, temperament and leadership skills to thrive in the job, and that his resume was such that he would be impervious to many of the typical attacks leveled against Democrats--the sort that ultimately helped fell John Kerry. Those four metaphorical stars on Clark's shoulders as a retired general both protected him from liberal attacks... and helped obscure just how much of a big old liberal he was. The campaign website had the most detailed policy proposals on issues important to me--human capital, urban policy, that stuff--of any Dem in the race... and he was solidly progressive down to the last word.

Clark's own significant flaws as a candidate--the inability to speak in soundbites, and even stupider shit like the fact that he didn't blink, pretty much ever--did him in. But the notion of a Stealth Lefty still appeals to me, and I think that's a large part of why I could get behind a Bloomberg presidential candidacy.

In this recent New Republic article, Jonathan Chait--a generally solid pundit--recognizes that Bloomberg is essentially a liberal Democrat in independent's clothing, but fails to see the value in the disguise of both Bloomberg and the Unity '08 effort that eventually could evolve into his campaign organization:

in the age of George W. Bush, the substance of the partisanship scold ideology is no longer, by any reasonable definition, centrist. They are moderate Democrats who don't want to admit it. Unity '08 proposes to address the following issues: "Global terrorism, our national debt, our dependence on foreign oil, the emergence of India and China as strategic competitors and/or allies, nuclear proliferation, global climate change, the corruption of Washington's lobbying system, the education of our young, the health care of all, and the disappearance of the American Dream for so many of our people."

Most Democrats wouldn't disagree with anything on this list. Most Republicans, on the other hand, are happy to raise the national debt in order to cut taxes, either don't believe in global climate change or don't want to do anything serious to stop it, oppose any plan that could provide health care for all Americans, and think the American Dream is thriving. Unity '08 further insists that gun control, abortion, and gay marriage should not "dominate or even crowd our national agenda." Which party has been putting those issues at the center of the agenda? Not the Democrats.

Bloomberg's politics are even further to the left. He's an out-and-out social liberal, banning smoking in public places and going to war against the National Rifle Association. He emphasizes programs to help the poor, has worked closely with unions, and has denounced rising inequality as a threat to democracy. But for Bloomberg and his admirers to admit that their views do have a home in a major party would destroy the basis of their self-image. Thus they must maintain at all costs the pretense of transcending ideology.

Chait's correct that this is dishonest; he's wrong that it's about the "self-image" of Bloomberg, the Unity '08 backers, and the millions of Americans who might rally to the cause.

So what is it about? I would submit that the problem is the recent history of the Democratic Party, its continuing internal balkanization, and its ongoing perception problems.

The atrocious failures of Bush/Cheney/DeLay/Norquist/Dobson Republicanism have helped obscure the negative associations many Americans--including not a few Democrats themselves/ourselves--had, or have, about the party: its fractiousness, the tendency of its leaders to waffle and triangulate, the ongoing sense that the Democrats aren't for things so much as against what the Republicans are for. Not that these perceptions are accurate, but they're real, and I think they persist. It also doesn't help that in three straight close elections, from 2000 to 2004, the Democrats face-planted at the finish line; last year, polls indicated a blowout from the spring onward, and never really shifted. Everybody loves a winner, and the Democrats were the Philadelphia Phillies of American politics.

(My soul died a little writing that last sentence, by the way.)

What Bloomberg would shed by running as an independent isn't the platform; it's the ancillary bullshit. All that baggage. The need to genuflect before interest groups. The guilt by association of sharing a party label with Michael-Dukakis-looking-silly-in-the-tank, Al-Gore-Serial-Exaggerator, Bll-Clinton-getting-blown-by-the-intern, John-Kerry-Flip-Flopper, and the rest. Yes, it's media-inflicted damage, vastly more reptile-brain association than substance, but that doesn't matter. Just as the fact that Republican governance has been demonstrably worse, that these people should be disqualified just for their failure to realize what a fuckup their fratboy-in-chief has been, doesn't matter. The fact is that for many, the Democratic Party label is sufficient grounds not to vote for an individual. (Of course this is also true for the Republicans. Bloomberg is the only one I can remember voting for, and he's no longer one--which isn't a coincidence.)

That Bloomberg is a billionaire, a guy who succeeded in two cutthroat fields and then again running the biggest, baddest city in the land, is his armor against ideological attacks just as Clark's stars and scars might have had had he gotten the nomination in 2004. Not sharing the Democratic label might give that armor an extra inch of thickness. If his Democratic opponent is Hillary Clinton, who (fairly or not) brings a vast amount of personal baggage to the generic-Dem pile, that could look awfully attractive to a wide swath of the electorate.

Rudy 'n' Dick
Move over, or at least enough to resume AIS. Meaning that the desk is built and everything's plugged in.

One probably wouldn't expect Dick Cheney to hold much brief for Rudy Giuliani's presidential aspirations; it just doesn't feel right that secretive and relentlessly right-wing Dick would support flamboyant Rudy, whose perceived "social liberalism" distinguishes him in the Republican presidential field. But given two significant traits the two seem to have in common, I'm starting to wonder.

One is the total conflation of force with foreign policy. Cheney, of course, is well-known for his hyper-militaristic, extra-paranoid foreign policy worldview. He's rumored as aggressively pushing for a confrontation with Iran, he's against closing Guantanamo Bay, he lobbied against anti-torture legislation. Giuliani is attempting to make up for his total lack of national security knowledge or credentials--and, as always, wring every tiny drop of support from the bloody shirt of September 11--by constantly referring to the need for "action" and "leadership" in our dealings abroad. Given his audience of Republican primary primates, it's dubious that this will be heard as "forcefully engage in diplomatic processes and leverage our 'soft power' to achieve consensus foreign policy goals."

The second is an evidently absolute sense of entitlement, an unwillingness to acknowledge any limits or external standards. (One might call it a totalitarian mindset; another word could be "sociopathic.")

As you've probably read, Cheney this week resorted to yet another dodge in his eternal battle against oversight and accountability: after years of claiming executive privilege on issues of secrecy, Cheney now claims that the Office of the Vice-President is exempt from obligations to the National Archives because it's not part of the executive branch. Maureen Dowd, whom I've ripped for her pseudo-sophisticated focus on trivia, turns her same bitchy talents to better use on Cheney:

I guess a man who can wait 14 hours before he lets it dribble out that he shot his friend in the face has no limit on what he thinks he can keep secret. Still, it’s quite a leap to go from hiding in a secure, undisclosed location in the capital to hiding in a secure, undisclosed location in the Constitution.

Dr. No used to just blow off the public and Congress as he cooked up his shady schemes. Now, in a breathtaking act of arrant arrogance, he’s blowing off his own administration.
...
On Thursday, Mr. Waxman revealed that after four years of refusing to cooperate with the government unit that oversees classified documents, the vice president tried to shut down the unit rather than comply with the law ensuring that sensitive data is protected. The National Archives appealed to the Justice Department, but who knows how much justice there is at Justice, now that the White House has so blatantly politicized it?

Cheney’s office denied doing anything wrong, but Cheney’s office is also denying it’s an office. Tricky Dick Deuce declared himself exempt from a rule that applies to everyone else in the executive branch, instructing the National Archives that the Office of the Vice President is not an “entity within the executive branch” and therefore is not subject to presidential executive orders.
...
Cheney and Cheney’s Cheney, David Addington, his equally belligerent, ideological and shadowy lawyer and chief of staff, have no shame. After claiming executive privilege to withhold the energy task force names and protect Scooter Libby, they now act outraged that Vice should be seen as part of the executive branch.

Cheney, they argue, is the president of the Senate, so he’s also part of the legislative branch. Vice is casting himself as a constitutional chimera, an extralegal creature with the body of a snake and the head of a sea monster. It’s a new level of gall, to avoid accountability by saying you’re part of a legislative branch that you’ve spent six years trying to weaken.

That's chutzpah. But perhaps no more so than Giuliani's unwillingness to part ways with a supporter who abused children:

Anyone who has followed the career of Republican presidential contender Rudy Giuliani knows the value he places on personal loyalty. Loyalty is what inspired the former mayor of New York to make Bernard Kerik, once his personal driver, the commissioner of the New York Police Department, and then a partner in his consulting firm, and then to suggest him to President Bush as a potential head of the Department of Homeland Security.

After revelations about Kerik's personal history derailed his bid for the federal post, Giuliani demonstrated that there were limits to loyalty. He has distanced himself from Kerik, who resigned from Giuliani's firm and later pleaded guilty to corruption charges. Giuliani has not, however, sought to distance himself from another, much closer friend whose personal baggage is also inconvenient, and would send most would-be presidents running.

Giuliani employs his childhood friend Monsignor Alan Placa as a consultant at Giuliani Partners despite a 2003 Suffolk County, N.Y., grand jury report that accuses Placa of sexually abusing children, as well as helping cover up the sexual abuse of children by other priests. Placa, who was part of a three-person team that handled allegations of abuse by clergy for the Diocese of Rockville Centre, is referred to as Priest F in the grand jury report. The report summarizes the testimony of multiple alleged victims of Priest F, and then notes, "Ironically, Priest F would later become instrumental in the development of Diocesan policy in response to allegations of sexual abuse of children by priests."

Five years after he was suspended from his duties because of the abuse allegations, Placa is currently listed as "priest in residence" at St. Aloysius Church in Great Neck, N.Y., where close friend Brendan Riordan serves as pastor, and officially lives at the rectory there with Riordan. In addition, Placa co-owns a penthouse apartment in Manhattan with Riordan, the latest in a half-dozen properties the two men have owned in common at various times since the late 1980s.

Placa has worked for Giuliani Partners since 2002. As of June 2007, he remains on the payroll. "He is currently employed here," Giuliani spokeswoman Sunny Mindel confirmed to Salon, adding that Giuliani "believes Alan has been unjustly accused." Mindel declined to discuss what role Placa plays with the consulting firm, or how much he is paid.

The full piece details the case against Placa; read it for yourself, but it sounds pretty strong to me. It also describes their lifelong friendship, and I suppose that one could credit Giuliani for personal loyalty. But I think the question is more one of judgment. The allegations against Kerik didn't show up all at once at the end of 2004; they were old, old news to Rudy. Similarly, the allegations against Russell Harding, the son of a political crony whom Giuliani appointed to head a New York City agency and turned out to be a fan of child porn who ran up hundreds of thousands of dollars on the city's dime, were known during Giuliani's mayoralty. In both cases, he did nothing, and with Kerik he only cut ties after Bernie's crimes came to light.

It's as if he's giving Cheney a run for the brass ring in the balls department. Maybe that shows a kindred spirt. It's also probably worth noting in passing that Giuliani's "liberal" positions--on abortion and gay rights--are non-issues for Cheney. While he's anti-choice, it hasn't been an issue he's pursued through his career. And Dick's most (maybe only) humanizing trait is his uninterest in even condemning, much less cutting off, his lesbian daughter just to placate the Christatollah Right. They disagree on guns, but that's likely far overshadowed by Giuilani's burgeoning anti-tax, anti-regulation platform--something Cheney shares and that helps bind both to the Norquist wing of the party.

Even if Cheney did favor Giuliani, though, I'm not sure what he could do to help him. He wouldn't endorse Rudy, and I doubt he could use his evil powers, which seem to be governmental in nature, very easily for political purposes. What's scary is the thought of a nut like Giuliani in the presidency, armed with the wildly expanded powers Cheney has tried to seize for the job. At least for now, the sociopath tries to stay behind the scenes.

I'm Just Sayin'...
A new poll from LA Times/Bloomberg offers a number of interesting findings about the 2008 presidential race:

In a generic presidential general election, the Democrats beat the Republicans by eight points among registered voters (49%-41%). But when the match-ups are among different candidates, the story is slightly different.

Clinton vs. three top Republican candidates: McCain narrowly leads Clinton by 45% to 41%, although within the poll’s margin of error. The gender gap that has been seen in many election polls is no exception in this poll. Among men, 34% support the NY Senator, 52% support the Arizona Senator, while the reverse is true of women – 47% for Clinton and 38% for McCain. A large majority of minorities are supporting the Democrat over McCain, as well as the other top two candidates – Giuliani and Romney. Independents support Clinton by 40% to 34%.

Romney narrowly leads Clinton by 43% to 41%, but well within the poll’s margin of error. Again, there is a gender gap, with men supporting Romney, while Clinton receives the support of the women. White voters would give Romney a 14 point advantage over his Democratic rival.

Giuliani beats Clinton by 10 points (49%-39%). Slightly more than half of white voters support the Republican
candidate (an 18 point lead over Clinton). Women who usually are strong supporters of the only female candidate for president, barely supports Clinton over Giuliani (45%-41%), while men solidly endorse the former mayor of NY (57%-32%).

Edwards vs. three top Republican candidates: McCain narrowly leads Edwards by five points, but within the poll’s margin of error --45% to 40%. Edwards, too, sees a gender gap – with men supporting McCain (54%-31%) and women giving the Democrat a 12 point advantage.

Edwards beats Romney by 14 points (46%-32%). White voters are virtually split between the two. Independents give Edwards a 41%-27% lead over his opponent.

Edwards marginally is ahead of Giuliani by 46% to 43%, although within the poll’s margin of error. Once again, men are supporting the Republican candidate over the Democratic opponent. Women are supporting Edwards (48%) over Giuliani (38%). Nearly half of white voters support Giuliani.

Obama vs. three top Republican candidates: This poll shows that Obama, among the top three Democratic candidates, appears to be the more electable candidate. Obama takes a 12 point advantage over McCain (47%-35%), has a 16 point lead over Romney (50%-34%) and a small five point lead over Giuliani within the poll’s margin or error. More minorities support Obama against each of the three Republican matchups than the other two Democratic candidates. White voters split their votes among Obama and McCain and Obama and Romney. But, Giuliani gets a nine point advantage with this racial group over his Democratic rival (49% for Giuliani, 40% for Obama). The Democratic Senator from Illinois maintains a leads in each of the three paired match-ups among women voters. Independents are also supporting the Democratic candidate over the three Republican candidates.

All emphases mine. The same poll gives Clinton a 33 percent to 22 percent lead over Obama among Democrats for the nomination. Of course, national polls are somewhat less meaningful, and the state races still show Edwards well ahead in Iowa, Clinton ahead by various margins in New Hampshire, and a total mess in South Carolina.

But what's weird to me is the "internals" of this poll, which show Sen. Clinton winning 40 percent of "liberal Democrats" to Obama's 21, with 18 for Al Gore and 10 for Edwards. As we've discussed here and elsewhere, again and again and again, Hillary Clinton is not a liberal Democrat, despite the media portrayal. I wonder if Obama and Edwards need to start pushing this message a little harder.

What they can't do much about, I think, is the overwhelming female support for the first really viable female presidential candidate. Clinton doubles Obama's support among women who are likely to vote in the Democratic primaries. But a caveat noted at PoliticalWire from a different poll is that "In the general election, 43% of female independents said they 'definitely will not vote for her if she is the Democratic nominee.'"

That's not female Republicans; that's female independents. And remember that Hillary Clinton consistently polls more strongly among women than men; so it's possible, maybe likely, that a majority of independent men won't support her. Given that the Republicans start with a larger "base" than Democrats in terms of ideology (though not party identification), writing off such a big chunk of the contested middle--especially against a perceived moderate like Giuliani, if he somehow makes it to the general--probably would doom the ticket.

For all the useful insights of this poll, however, it still fails to ask the question I'm most curious about: how badly Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee would hurt Democrats further down the ticket.

I very strongly believe that nominating Sen. Clinton will absolutely doom the party's majority in the House of Representatives, and possibly endanger the Senate as well. Freshman Democrats in "red" states like Indiana and Kansas, and even "purple" states like New Hampshire and Iowa and Ohio, likely would have to disavow their own presidential candidate; their Republican challengers would start with the enormous advantage of 16 years of anti-Hillary stereotyping in the minds of the local electorate.

I'm not saying she wouldn't win. As noted a couple posts down, I think she probably would, especially if it's Romney; her team is better at the blocking and tackling of politics, and a Mormon candidate could have some of the same categorical opposition as Clinton herself. But the larger point is that the 2008 election is the Democrats' to lose--and the best chance they have to lose it is by nominating Hillary Clinton for the presidency.

"Get a Life"
For decades after the American Civil War, presidential candidates from the Republican Party won elections by "waving the bloody shirt"--making emotional appeals hearkening back to the Civil War and, if applicable, their own participation in the struggle, to burnish their own credentials and run down their opponents'. Something similar is happening in the 2008 presidential campaign, as candidates from New York--or "from" New York--are using the trauma of September 11, and the lingering fear that America will again suffer terror attacks, in their efforts to win votes.

The candidate who's most guilty of this shameful ploy, of course, is Rudy Giuliani. On September 10th, Giuliani was the widely loathed and increasingly irrelevant New York City mayor best known for publicly dumping his high-profile wife and picking fights with everyone from squeegee men to edgy artists to (really) ferret lovers. But his public performance on the day of the attacks transformed Rudy from a slimy, possibly unbalanced political has-been to something like a Churchillian symbol of American resolve. He used the afterglow to make untold millions speaking and lobbying, and to launch a presidential campaign on the premise that his gut-level understanding of terrorism makes him the best choice to lead the nation.

To a much lesser extent, Hillary Clinton also has tried to leverage 9/11 for political gain. She's mixed it up with Democratic rivals Barack Obama and John Edwards on the question of whether Americans are "safer" now than before the attack, and cited 9/11 as a factor that contributed to her endlessly controversial vote to authorize military force in Iraq. Most political analysis has held that Senator Clinton isn't using 9/11 so much to win the nomination, but to position herself better for a general election showdown with an unapologetically belligerent and fearmongering Republican.

Both candidates, though, are selling a version of the 9/11 experience that I think most New Yorkers would find preposterous. Much closer to our own sense of how that day remains with us was the reaction of Mayor Mike Bloomberg to the recent news of a plot to blow up JFK Airport in Queens. Speaking two days after the announcement of the plot, Bloomberg said, "There are lots of threats to you in the world. There's the threat of a heart attack for genetic reasons. You can't sit there and worry about everything. Get a life."

None of us who were in Lower Manhattan that morning will ever forget it, and it's rare that more than a few days go by when I don't think about the chaos and panic on Wall Street, the surreal walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, wandering along Court Street listening to the news from car radios, the panic over the whereabouts of a housemate who worked in the Towers. (She was fine, thank goodness.) And I tend to notice things like an unattended bag probably more than I used to. But as the lamented Tony Soprano might have said: "Whattaya gonna do?" I worked on Wall Street for more than four years after that, and I'm still at that office a couple days a week. I ride the subway, I go out in town. I never considered moving away. (At least not for that reason; singly and after getting married, I certainly wondered whether this town was really affordable in the long term.) And I think literally every person I know here had more or less the same reaction.

In much of the rest of the country, though, the fear seems to be greater. I'll also never forget canvassing in Ohio on the day of the 2004 election, talking to a young woman who was considering voting for Bush because he'd made her feel safe after the attacks. It would have been rude, but not illogical, to ask just why the terrorists were going after her Cleveland suburb anyway.

A piece in Sunday's New York Times nicely captures how differently 9/11 plays in NYC, and everywhere else:

New York is survivor and victim and — in this campaign year — political touchstone. Two wars are being fought in its name, although polls show a decided majority of New Yorkers oppose the larger of those conflicts. Even for a place that can harbor an insufferable sense of its own uniqueness, the “America’s city” stuff might be getting to be a bit much.

Few New Yorkers have shaken their awareness of hideous possibility. We may chuckle at the perfunctory-to-the-point-of-ridiculousness security pat-downs at Shea Stadium. They are more likely to uncover a covert brew than a covert something nasty. Same goes for the drone of warnings to watch, look, listen for suspicious packages and/or odd people on the subway. Sort us out like that and who will be left to ride?

And yet. A beefy bouncer confesses he really doesn’t care for subway tunnels anymore. A handyman tends to notice who pulls what kind of valise onto the bus. A mother pushing a baby carriage says she stays away from landmark buildings.

But what do you do with this knowledge that it could all get a lot worse very fast?

“Mayor Bloomberg is my man,” says Michael Liburd, a cleaning man born in Nevis and raised in Flatbush, Brooklyn, where he was found loading mops into his car. “You have to be concerned because this city has many, many lunatics. But you can’t lock yourself inside.”
...
For New York’s flock of presidential candidates, the calculus is more complicated. The “war on terror” becomes their claim to special expertise. Mr. Giuliani, as ever, is most muscular in asserting his proprietary claim. “When I lived through Sept. 11, and I don’t just mean the day, I mean a period of time, I was at the center of it,” he said the other day.

Mr. Giuliani does not add that he accrued additional experience watching his multimillion-dollar emergency management office collapse into rubble. Turns out he placed it too close to the trade center towers.

As for Mrs. Clinton, she wasn’t dusted by the rubble of the towers, and her accent owes more to Chicago than Flatbush. But she fought for money to rebuild, and to protect those with respiratory ills, and no politician goes wrong for long by wielding 9/11 as a deflector shield.

I don't want to go looking for it right now, but I think Bloomberg added that the statistical chance of getting struck by lightning is much higher than getting killed by a terrorist. He could have made similar statements about gun violence, or health complications stemming from obesity, or lung cancer from second-hand smoke--all of which are issues he's tried to take on, with varying degrees of success, during his mayoralty, and might be the sort of things he would talk about were he to run for president as an independent.

I'm certainly not saying that foreign policy isn't important, or that the experience of 9/11 shouldn't be handled with seriousness and sensitivity. But the Giuliani campaign in particular is predicated upon an assumption, unspoken and probably unconscious, that a Strong Man can make us safe and solve our problems. I much prefer the Bloomberg approach, which is that government can and should do everything in its power to ensure citizens' safety (from tainted food or random gun violence as well as spectacular terror strike), but that seeking total control is a fool's errand that does far more harm, in every realm from the psychological to the budgetary, than good.

A Semi-Random 2008 Presidential Prediction I Might Totally Repudiate
This came to me while watching chunks of the Republican debate Tuesday night: Mitt Romney will win the Republican nomination next winter, and Hillary Clinton will win the Democratic nomination, and she will defeat Romney in the November 2008 general election. Sen. Clinton will win something like 51.8 percent of the popular vote, with a slightly larger electoral college margin on the strength of her field operation tipping a few tossup states and the lack of grass-roots Republican enthusiasm for supporting a Mormon.

I said something like this to Annie while the debate was still on, adding that the question then would be whether Jeb Bush would defeat Hillary Clinton in 2012. I think she was cleaning the cat litter box at the time, and called back something about the considerable volume of cat shit in the box. I suggested this was the perfect metaphor for a second Clinton/Bush election five years hence, and she responded that this was why she'd made the remark.

Maybe I'm just pessimistic these days. But a 2008 general election matchup pitting the hyper-controlled, hyper-cautious Mrs. Clinton against the supremely packaged and almost endlessly slick Mittster would really showcase the miserable worst of our politics. It's extremely slight consolation that she'd very probably win such a miserable contest, presumably repopulating the executive branch with progressives and thus doing some good while her presidency foundered.

"The Timidity of Hope"
A few weeks ago I asked one of my friends, who also works in policy, what she thought about the Democratic presidential race in general, and Barack Obama in particular. She kind of made a face and said, "I'm a wonk. You're a wonk. We need specifics, details, programs."

It was a fair criticism, though I'm not totally sure I share it. Democracy is a mass exercise, even (or especially) in as flawed and imperfect a version as we have in the United States, and almost by definition the mass public isn't going to wonk out with me and my friend and our colleagues. This might the corollary to the best line John Edwards got off in last night's debate, which I wrote about earlier today: "Being president isn't about legislating--it's about leadership." (The irony, of course, is that Edwards has issued the most detailed plans of any major candidate on either side, and is pretty clearly trying to position himself as "the candidate of ideas" in response to the greater star power of Obama and Hillary Clinton.)

This brings me to Paul Krugman's column today about Obama's health care plan. He issued it somewhat in response both to the detailed proposal Edwards made earlier this year, and Obama's own widely perceived flop at a candidates' forum on health care a couple months ago.

I'll admit up front, and not even with a great deal of shame, that I haven't read either plan. I've read a fair amount about both, for whatever that's worth, and I grasp how they're different in concept and ambition. But aside from impressing super-wonks like Krugman, or lesser wonks like me--a feat that has some value, but not a ton, as I'll explain below--I'm not sure I totally get the point. Here's Krugman:

The Obama plan is smart and serious, put together by people who know what they’re doing.

It also passes one basic test of courage. You can’t be serious about health care without proposing an injection of federal funds to help lower-income families pay for insurance, and that means advocating some kind of tax increase. Well, Mr. Obama is now on record calling for a partial rollback of the Bush tax cuts.

Also, in the Obama plan, insurance companies won’t be allowed to deny people coverage or charge them higher premiums based on their medical history. Again, points for toughness.

Best of all, the Obama plan contains the same feature that makes the Edwards plan superior to, say, the Schwarzenegger proposal in California: it lets people choose between private plans and buying into a Medicare-type plan offered by the government.

Since Medicare has much lower overhead costs than private insurers, this competition would force the insurance industry to cut costs — making our health-care system more efficient. And if private insurers couldn’t or wouldn’t cut costs enough, the system would evolve into Medicare for all, which is actually the best solution.

So there’s a lot to commend the Obama plan. In fact, it would have been considered daring if it had been announced last year.

Now for the bad news. Although Mr. Obama says he has a plan for universal health care, he actually doesn’t — a point Mr. Edwards made in last night’s debate. The Obama plan doesn’t mandate insurance for adults. So some people would take their chances — and then end up receiving treatment at other people’s expense when they ended up in emergency rooms. In that regard it’s actually weaker than the Schwarzenegger plan.

I asked David Cutler, a Harvard economist who helped put together the Obama plan, about this omission. His answer was that Mr. Obama is reluctant to impose a mandate that might not be enforceable, and that he hopes — based, to be fair, on some estimates by Mr. Cutler and others — that a combination of subsidies and outreach can get all but a tiny fraction of the population insured without a mandate. Call it the timidity of hope.
...
[Obama's plan] doesn’t quell my worries that Mr. Obama’s dislike of “bitter and partisan” politics makes him too cautious.

Two points here. First of all--and this is something so obvious and uncontestable that I think it's kind of negligent for Krugman not to mention it--there's next to no chance that anything proposed by any candidate on something as big and important and contentious as health care gets enacted as drawn up by the David Cutlers of the world. (He's a brilliant guy, by the way--this isn't a slap at Cutler. It's just that academics aren't generally successful, ever, in writing legislation.) The details--the substance that Krugman and my friend were both waiting for--are, in that sense, totally irrelevant. Whatever legislation the 111th Congress passes, assuming a Democratic president and Democratic majorities and other favorable circumstances for major health care legislation, will be written by anonymous staff (perhaps, hopefully, with input from people like Cutler), chewed over in countless private meetings with colleagues, officials, lobbyists and advocates, torn up and rewritten, marked up in committees, argued in public, salted with goodies, revised and amended a hundred times, and perhaps finally enacted. Or not. It's a slight exaggeration to claim that any resemblance would be coincidental, but that's almost the case.

Two, since this is the case, one can look at Obama's approach, which I think can be characterized as "do what can be done," in one of two ways. The partisan will suggest that the inevitability of compromise means that an advocate should set his or her position at the far end of what they want, giving as little ground as possible before settling on an agreement or walking away if the proposal is too diluted. The consensus-seeker will counter that it's better to minimize the level of conflict up front, improving the chances for some kind of accord, and going back later if need be to fix what's wrong.

I've written here before that I believe the essence of executive leadership is threefold: to know where you want to take the public on an issue, to know where they are, and to have an idea of how to get them from Point B to Point A. It's an exercise in finding consensus, then shifting the consensus, accomplished through exhortation and patience. My sense is that Obama grasps this, which is why I'm planning to support him next year. Just because my version, or Krugman's, of where Point A should be, is different from his, doesn't in my opinion trump the sense that he knows how to carry out the journey.

The Democrats' Debate
The second Democratic presidential debate, held Sunday night in New Hampshire, was surprisingly substantial despite the best efforts of Wolf Blitzer to keep the proceedings on the usual rotten level. A transcript is up if you want to take a look; here are my quick thoughts.

1) Nobody could accuse Hillary Clinton of not knowing her stuff, and she proved it again Sunday night. But it drives me nuts every time she goes down the road of 9/11 fearmongering, demagoguing the “war on terror.” John Edwards got some attention last week for pointing out that the "war on terror" is a bumper-sticker, not a strategy–and that its purpose was entirely Republican political advantage. I find this almost uncontestable--but Sen. Clinton evidently does not, perhaps just because she's "from New York." FWIW, that was her only moment in the debate that got me angry, and I did like that she smacked Blitzer down a little later on. I wish she'd gotten a chance to expand upon remarks she made last week comparing the current economy to the Robber Baron era--but the questions just didn't fall that way.

2) Barack Obama was miles, miles better last night than in the first debate. He just seemed sharper, and he more than held his own in an early exchange with Edwards over the Iraq war. He’s the best “on TV” candidate, I think because he just seems calmer than the rest of them–all that Marshall McLuhan stuff about television as a "cool medium" describes Obama’s edge there. His response on a later tax question from the audience was terrific, taking a typically idiotic query about specifics (”what number is ‘rich’?”) and drilling down to something more fundamental–the premise on which he’d base taxing and spending decisions.

3) Edwards was disadvantaged last night because the substance never got around to his big area of strength: domestic economic issues. But I thought he held his own on Iran and other questions.

4) I really like Chris Dodd. Hard to imagine how he emerges, but I’d like to see it happen. His response to the last question of the night--"What would your first action be as president?"--was perfect: restore respect for the Constitution. This was, alas, as close any candidate got to what I consider the big unasked query; see below.

5) Bill Richardson IMO was better last night than he was in the first debate, or on Meet the Press, but still not great. His line about being a “pro-growth Democrat” annoyed me; in general, Richardson seems too ready to accept right-wing frames. On foreign policy, though, his substance comes across.

6) Angry Little Elf Dennis Kucinich really should just STFU. I might have to kick some money to his Dem primary opponent for Congress next year…

I guess this is far too much to expect from fundamentally unserious people like Wolf Blitzer, but the question I really would like to hear answered goes something like this:

"In six and a half years since taking office, the Bush administration has embraced a governance philosophy that allocates greater powers to the executive branch than any previous president has enjoyed. The 'unitary executive theory' posits virtually no limits on what presidents can do, striking a different balance between the president's powers and those of Congress than most officials and observers had previously believed. Do you share this expansive view of executive power or not, and how would you approach the question of checks and balances as president?"

Even a "raise your hands if you think the president should have godlike powers" would be a start...

Too Little, or Too Much
I'm certain that I'm not the first person to whom this has occurred, but consider how differently the Bush administration and its congressional rubber stamp responded to two major problems of the current period.

When it came to Iraq and the threat of Saddam Hussein acquiring "the world's deadliest weapons," policymakers decided upon a proactive response. Some soundbites are so good you can't forget them even when you desperately want to: such is the case with then-National Security Advisor Condeleezza Rice somberly telling us, "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." More broadly, the administration has embraced the so-called "One Percent Doctrine": if there's even a very slight possibility of a terrorist threat, the United States should act as if it's absolutely certain. In the words of the vice-president, "It's not about our analysis ... It's about our response."

Contrast this with the administration's actions, or lack thereof, in the face of a threat that could and, many believe, will do damage on a scale that al Qaeda couldn't imagine: global warming.

Now, six and a half years into his disaster of a presidency, Bush evidently is moving closer to acknowledging the reality of climate change. Maybe the president who insists that history will vindicate his Splendid Little War is thinking uneasily about its verdict on a potentially much bigger question. But there remains a chasm between acknowledging a problem and working toward a solution, and Bush's approach here is still nothing more than wishing, hoping, and punting. And while the now-majority Democrats in Congress talk a better game than did their predecessors--the switch in attitude and aptitude from James Inhofe to Barbara Boxer is pretty dramatic--they can't really do anything substantial without presidential support, and with a very winnable presidential election fast approaching, they're probably too scared to try.

Had the administration taken the One Percenter approach on climate change, we'd presumably be investing countless billions in a Manhattan Project level effort to develop lower-emitting fuels. Had they taken the climate change approach to post-9/11 foreign policy, we would have left Saddam alone and hoped that he'd just die quietly, and maybe reached out to the rest of the Arab world with persuasion rather than coercion. It's hard not to suspect we'd be vastly better off on both counts.

Bush is Our Fault
This hasn't been a good week for my political peace of mind. The Democrats took an ownership share of the war and somewhat backed off their promsies of ethics reform, the US Attorneys purge reached new depths of tragicomedy, a bad immigration bill is going down to defeat largely because it isn't even worse, and the astonishing idiocy of George W. Bush was again on full display. This is a man who evidently fails to grasp concepts that a reasonably attentive 12 year-old would understand, and he's the most powerful man in the world.

If there's any grounds for hope, it would be that the public seems far ahead of its ostensible leaders. They (we) want out of the war, and they want the Democrats to lead on that and other questions. Of course, this only makes it even more baffling that the Democrats refuse to do so.

I've written here and elsewhere that the whole country, minus maybe 20-25 percent of the willfully ignorant or hopelessly detached, simply want the Bush Era to end and the Duhciderer to go home to Rancho Plastico and read boxscores, clear brush, and drink himself to death. But impeachment, the legal only way to make this happen before my dad's 66th birthday (1/20/09), is "off the table." Gary Kamiya, writing in Salon, explains why, in one of the most brilliant pieces I've read in a very long time. Kamiya makes the point that pundits, liberals, and just about everyone else either has missed or is afraid to say: Bush is our creation, and in an imperfect but very real sense, we enabled his disaster. It's worth quoting at length:

[T]here's a deeper reason why the popular impeachment movement has never taken off -- and it has to do not with Bush but with the American people. Bush's warmongering spoke to something deep in our national psyche. The emotional force behind America's support for the Iraq war, the molten core of an angry, resentful patriotism, is still too hot for Congress, the media and even many Americans who oppose the war, to confront directly. It's a national myth. It's John Wayne. To impeach Bush would force us to directly confront our national core of violent self-righteousness -- come to terms with it, understand it and reject it. And we're not ready to do that.

The truth is that Bush's high crimes and misdemeanors, far from being too small, are too great. What has saved Bush is the fact that his lies were, literally, a matter of life and death. They were about war. And they were sanctified by 9/11. Bush tapped into a deep American strain of fearful, reflexive bellicosity, which Congress and the media went along with for a long time and which has remained largely unexamined to this day. Congress, the media and most of the American people have yet to turn decisively against Bush because to do so would be to turn against some part of themselves. This doesn't mean we support Bush, simply that at some dim, half-conscious level we're too confused -- not least by our own complicity -- to work up the cold, final anger we'd need to go through impeachment. We haven't done the necessary work to separate ourselves from our abusive spouse. We need therapy -- not to save this disastrous marriage, but to end it.

At first glance it seems odd that Bush's fraudulent case for war has saved him. War is the most serious action a nation can undertake, and lying to Congress and the American people about the need for war is arguably the most serious offense a public official can commit, short of treason. But the unique gravity of war surrounds it with a kind of patriotic force field. There is an ancient human deference to The Strong Man Who Will Defend Us, an atavistic surrender to authority that goes back through Milosevic, to Henry V, to Beowulf and the ring givers, and ultimately to Cro-Magnon tribesmen huddled around the campfire at the feet of the biggest, strongest warrior. Even when it is unequivocally shown that a leader lied about war, as is the case with Bush, he or she is still protected by this aura. Going to war is the best thing a rogue president can do. It's like taking refuge in a church: No one can come and get you there. There's a reason Bush kept repeating, "I'm a war president. I'm a war president." It worked, literally, like a charm.

And many of the American people shared Bush's views. A large percentage of the American people, and their elected representatives, accepted Bush's unlimited authority to do whatever he wanted in the name of "national security." And they reaffirmed this acceptance when, long after his fraudulent case for war had been exposed as such, they reelected him. Lindorff and Olshansky quote former Republican Sen. Lowell Weicker, who justifies his opposition to impeachment by saying, "Bush obviously lied to the country and the Congress about the war, but we have a system of elections in this country. Everyone knew about the lying before the 2004 elections, and they didn't do anything about it ... Bush got elected. The horse is out of the barn now."

To be sure, the war card works better under some circumstances than others. It is arguable that if there had been no 9/11, Bush's fraudulent case for war really would have resulted in his impeachment -- though this is far from certain. But 9/11 did happen, and as a result, large numbers of Americans did not just give Bush carte blanche but actively wanted him to attack someone. They were driven not by policy concerns but by primordial retribution, reflexive and self-righteous rage. And it wasn't just the masses who were calling for the United States to reach out and smash someone. Pundits like Henry Kissinger and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman also called for America to attack the Arab world. Kissinger, according to Bob Woodward's "State of Denial," said that "we need to humiliate them"; Friedman said we needed to "go right into the heart of the Arab world and smash something." As Friedman's statement indicates, who we smashed was basically unimportant. Friedman and Kissinger argued that attacking the Arab world would serve as a deterrent, but that was a detail. For many Americans, who Bush attacked or the reasons he gave, didn't matter -- what mattered was that we were fighting back.
...
The unpleasant truth is that Bush did what a lot of Americans wanted him to. And when it became clear after the fact that Bush had lied about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein, it made no sense for those Americans to turn on him. Truth was never their major concern anyway -- revenge was. And if we took revenge on the wrong person, well, better a misplaced revenge than none at all.
...
The problem is that the American people are not judging Bush by the standards of law. The Bush years have further weakened America's once-proud status as a nation of laws, not of men. The law, for Bush, is like language for Humpty Dumpty: it means just what he chooses it to mean, neither more nor less. This attitude has become disturbingly widespread -- which may explain why Bush's illegal wiretapping, his approval of torture, and his administration's partisan purge of U.S. district attorneys have not resulted in wider outrage.

This society-wide diminution of respect for law has helped Bush immeasurably. It is not just the law that America has turned away from, but what the law stands for -- accountability, memory, history and logic itself. That anonymous senior Bush advisor who spoke with surreal condescension of "the reality-based community" may have summed up our cultural moment more acutely than anyone else in years. A society without memory, driven by ephemeral emotions, which demands no consistency from its leaders but only gusty patriotism, is a society that is not about to engage in the painful self-examination that impeachment would mean.

Emphasis mine. Bush is simply the most egregious symptom of a disease that's been around in American history at least since Nixon, and probably further back that that. This is a wasting affliction; what it erodes is our shared commitment, regardless of personal politics or beliefs, to play by one set of rules that we agreed upon at the Founding and have periodically revised since then. The Law should not be seen as an obstacle course to navigate en route to some extra-legal goal, whether it's to launch a war of choice and vengeance or to politicize the institutions of government. It should be seen as a barrier that keeps us all from harm, an unscalable fence that separates safe ground from the minefields.

What Bush, Cheney, Rove, and their congressional enablers did was to cut a thousand holes through that fence, so much that the whole structure is now unsound, and it's no longer clear where the barrier is drawn, what's safe and what's not. But they couldn't have done this if we hadn't let them. And we let them because the unthinking, unreasoning desire for revenge--regardless of whether that revenge was justified or even rational--trumped the commitment we made. Under cover of war lust, an unprecedentedly political administration did the bulk of its grim work. We gave them that cover.

Prolonging a Nightmare
By now you've heard that the Democrats folded like the proverbial cheap suit on the "showdown" over the next round of funding for George W. Bush's Excellent Iraq Adventure. There are justifications for this--the votes weren't there, this will prove to be a pyrrhic victory for the Republicans, and so on--but those change neither the public perception ("President Wins Showdown") or, much worse, the underlying reality that we're committed to further deepening the hole in Iraq.

What bothers me most is that the vote in some sense validates and perpetuates the tragedy of Iraq, which itself exemplifies everything that's gone hideously wrong with our "democracy," so-called: the erosion of checks and balances, the disappearance of a constructively critical press, the terrifying indifference to the suffering of other peoples, how quick we are to toss away our own supposedly central values.

I read this piece on the way home tonight; I wish I could dismiss it as overblown, wild-eyed lefty ravings, but the diagnosis on Iraq seems to me almost inarguable:

Without question, the administration's catastrophic war in Iraq is the single overarching issue that has convinced a large majority of Americans that the country is "heading in the wrong direction." But the war itself is the outcome of an imperial presidency and the abject failure of Congress to perform its Constitutional duty of oversight. Had the government been working as the authors of the Constitution intended, the war could not have occurred. ...

Instead of uncovering administration lies and manipulations, the media actively promoted them. Yet the first amendment to the Constitution protects the press precisely so it can penetrate the secrecy that is the bureaucrat's most powerful, self-protective weapon. As a result of this failure, democratic oversight of the government by an actively engaged citizenry did not— and could not— occur. The people of the United States became mere spectators as an array of ideological extremists, vested interests, and foreign operatives— including domestic neoconservatives, Ahmed Chalabi and his Iraqi exiles, the Israeli Lobby, the petroleum and automobile industries, warmongers and profiteers allied with the military-industrial complex, and the entrenched interests of the professional military establishment— essentially hijacked the government.

Some respected professional journalists do not see these failings as the mere result of personal turpitude but rather as deep structural and cultural problems within the American system as it exists today. In an interview with Matt Taibbi , Seymour Hersh, for forty years one of America's leading investigative reporters, put the matter this way:

"All of the institutions we thought would protect us— particularly the press, but also the military, the bureaucracy, the Congress— they have failed… So all the things that we expect would normally carry us through didn't. The biggest failure, I would argue, is the press, because that's the most glaring…. What can be done to fix the situation? [long pause] You'd have to fire or execute ninety percent of the editors and executives."

Veteran analyst of the press (and former presidential press secretary), Bill Moyers, considering a classic moment of media failure, concluded : "The disgraceful press reaction to Colin Powell's presentation at the United Nations [on February 5, 2003] seems like something out of Monty Python, with one key British report cited by Powell being nothing more than a student's thesis, downloaded from the Web— with the student later threatening to charge U.S. officials with 'plagiarism.'"

As a result of such multiple failures (still ongoing), the executive branch easily misled the American public.

Iraq is a nightmare in every sense, from how we got there to how it’s unfolded and, worst of all, what it’s shown us about ourselves. When you’re stuck in a nightmare, all you want to do is wake up. The Democrats’ caving on the spending measure, tactically justifiable though it might be, is at bottom a guarantee that the nightmare will continue for at least a little longer.

An Even Less Convenient Truth
Check out this book excerpt from Al Gore's The Assault on Reason.

This is an insightful but profoundly depressing read. Gore grasps a point that should be obvious--modern American culture is defined by the passive experience of watching television, and that passivity has drained the vitality of the public sphere. He doesn't say, but could, that the fracturing of the culture was coincident with and reinforcing of the fracturing of the "vital center" postwar consensus. As we've stepped back into our little pursuits and niches, we've left the playing field of politics to those who have the most resources and interest in grabbing a piece, from interest groups at all points of the political compass to millionaire campaign bundlers.

Gore paints a dire picture of American democracy "in danger of being hollowed out." That at least he's got right. Unless and until there's a Great Depression-level economic crash (and I'm starting to think we know too much about the economy for that to be very likely) or a series of terror attacks that make everyone feel personally endangered, we are very unlikely to succumb to an overtly authoritarian form of governance. There will still be campaigns and elections and different levels and branches of government, all contested by different political parties. It just won't matter. The barriers to enactment of the popular will--from gerrymandering to unlimited corporate money to institutionalized trivialization of the news--will become ever stronger, while the popular will itself is thinned to nothing.

But he's not dire enough, or has a mistaken sense of the timeline. One can plausibly argue that this all has happened already, it's gone, and what remains is entertainment and ritual. It's not primarily corporate pervidy or trash TV or the rise of the political consultants that killed it; "we the people" just lost interest, because we don't collectively do great things anymore. We can't even really win wars, be they military or market-based. We're still coasting on what we were 60 years ago, the fluky comparative advantage we ended World War II with and then somewhat reinforced when the Cold War concluded. That ride will end, and then we'll start to become as fractured economically as we are in the other ways. In fact, that's already well underway too ("The Shrinking Middle Class").

Thus, the fights of the late Bush years, for those who care about the Constitution and think the system as enacted in 1789 and refined through the Civil Rights era was worthwhile and effective, are really just about trying to preserve the tools and framework of American democratic governance. For today, people are doing this to push back against individuals or factions that seek to abuse power--but for the longer term, the hope is that if the public ever feels like taking a real interest at some future point, they'll still have the capacity.

Just When I Thought He Was Out...
Maybe Mike Bloomberg really will run for president. I'm always loath to credit the Washington Moonie Times, but per Political Wire, that paper reports that he's set aside $1 billion and "lowered the bar" to potentially jump into the race. Charlie Cook's weekly political e-mail (unlinkable, alas, as it's not on a website so far as I can tell) speculates as well, specifically focusing on the possibility of a Bloomberg/Chuck Hagel ticket. (Hagel's certainly into it, though he might want to reverse the names. No way that happens, by the way--Bloomberg is nobody's #2. More likely, Hagel would be a de facto co-president, more or less running foreign policy, perhaps in tandem with a Democratic Secretary of State like Bob Kerrey, who represents for both Nebraska and NYC.) And the New York Times speculated again yesterday about a Bloomberg campaign, noting that he's reactivated his old campaign website.

I realize that it makes as much sense to complain about a partisan rag slanting its coverage as about a rabid dog biting passers-by, but I'm a little miffed that the Moonie piece evidently characterizes Bloomberg as "a social liberal and fiscal conservative." The first part is true, but the second is absurd. Bloomberg isn't a budgetary tightwad by any means: he's pledged $150 million of city money to the most ambitious anti-poverty campaign NYC has seen in at least 35 years, and potentially wants to obligate billions toward his "PlaNYC" campaign to manage the city's growth over the next 20 years or so. He did dig New York out of the $6 billion budget hole he inherited from Rudy Giuliani, but that's not "conservative" so much as "responsible"--especially considering that the biggest means by which he did this was a record tax hike on home owners. That assessment is actually the example par excellence of Bloomberg's pragmatism: it was steep and came in for understandable but brutal criticism--and as soon as the books were balanced, he started making good to those he'd dunned with big rebates and other goodies. You can't have a 73 percent approval rating with home owners still mad at you.

A Bloomberg/Giuliani race would be fascinating, considering that New Yorkers themselves (ourselves) overwhelmingly prefer the current mayor both in that job and the presidency. I could see Rudy running against New York even as he presents himself as its, and the nation's, defender against the turr'ists. But I don't think Rudy's getting to the general election, which would obviate the awkwardness of Bloomberg running against the guy who (like it or not, and I don't) basically gave him the mayoralty in late 2001.

But the real intrigue would be Bloomberg versus Hillary Clinton.

For thinking Democrats, particularly the more progressive activists who disdain (or detest) Hillary and are currently supporting Barack Obama or John Edwards, this will be a conundrum. Bloomberg's a better manager, he would have vastly more ability to get legislation passed, and in some respects he could run to Sen. Clinton's left--he's simply a much stronger social liberal, with a demonstrated commitment to economic justice. But he's not a Democrat (anymore). The unions probably would back Hillary... though the NYC unions don't hate Bloomberg, and Clinton's top advisor, Mark Penn, has some pretty ugly anti-labor credentials that Bloomberg's team would be quick to exploit. She'd have African-Americans, probably, though Bloomberg is sufficiently popular with black leaders in the city that he could send out a bunch of plausible surrogates and probably do at least as well as Bush did in '04.

I've almost convinced myself that this could happen. If ever the country were ready for a "short, divorced Jewish billionaire" who doesn't pander or dumb it down, it would be after the disastrous years of Bush, who is Bloomberg's polar opposite. If the Democrats really do nominate Hillary, that will block off millions of independents and moderate Republicans who would be open to some Democrats but not to That Woman. None of the Republicans really look credible in a general election; Fred Thompson has huge flaws that will come into focus if and when he gets in, McCain is too tied to the war and carries the baggage of his past good deeds; and Romney is just sort of pathetic.

It still feels like a stretch that the country would recognize Bloomberg for the excellent president he could be. But not nearly as much as it did a few months ago.

Al Gore and the Buyer's Remorse Primary
Josh Marshall's blog reports that a collection of onetime Al Gore staffers met for dinner last night in Washington, and the sense was strong that Gore isn't running in 2008 after all. While Democrats looking at their presidential selection pool haven't expressed the same level of dissatisfaction bordering on despair that Republicans seem to be suffering, there's no question that Gore's absence from the race leaves many partisans a bit sad and unfulfilled.

As someone who disdained Gore in 2000 but has come to admire him very much since then, I somewhat share this sentiment. HIs being denied the presidency through cheating, lying and strong-arm tactics set the tone for the disastrous years since then, with the worst administration in American history; if only they'd been as incompetent at winning political fights as they've proven to be at everything else. That Gore has grown in stature, figuratively as well as literally, since then, just adds salt to the wound of the Bush years.

I still maintain that his not entering the race shouldn't surprise anyone: fat people can't win in America, and Gore is big as a house. But there's time to drop the weight, and I don't think the "news" from this dinner really changes a thing.

Gore won't "jump into" the race in that he'll run in the primaries; he doesn't want to come down from the clouds, and after what the press did to him in 2000, it's hard to blame him. Not to mention that this was a guy who, unlike the president he served from 1993-2001, never seemed happy or even comfortable engaging in the theatrical aspects of politics. But he will keep his powder dry and stand ready to come to the rescue if/when the party needs him next year.

The scenario is that there's either a deadlocked convention--not very likely IMO--or, far more likely, a massive case of buyer's remorse after Hillary Clinton wins the nomination with 35-45 percent in every primary and polls show her losing to McGuliomney by 5-10 percent, despite the 20 percent advantage a generic Democrat has over a generic Republican.

Right now, about 50 percent of those polled from the general electorate claim they won't support Hillary no matter what. A year from now, that number could go even higher: I believe that for Hillary to win the nomination she'll have to throw the patented Clinton sharp elbows--and, in doing so, will alienate supporters of Obama and Edwards to the point that they'll be open to a third-party candidate who broadly shares their values and worldview. My man Mike Bloomberg still could be that guy, though the polls don't show much potential support for the short, divorced Jewish mayor who's enjoyed drugs and talked some smack over the years. But if it's not Bloomberg, it'll be someone else--Oprah, Jim Webb, a former general or two. Polls will bear out this hunger for a third option, and they'll also show that as HRC sinks, Al Gore rises. The pressure will build for him to get in.

Would he do it? Who knows. But if you're determined to hope for a Gore '08 candidacy, that's your scenario: he wins the Buyer's Remorse Primary.

Baseball-Related Despair
The Philadelphia Phillies cause me a lot of misery and countless (well, uncounted) wasted hours every year, but I'm not sure I've ever gotten to the moment of bleak resignation that, yes, they're going to fall short again, as quickly as I have this spring. Barely five weeks into it, I'm waiting for the end. After the usual hope-inducing winter and spring, the team staggered out of the gate to their annual 1-6 start; they rallied to within two games of the .500 mark, then went out on a ten-game road trip that mercifully concludes tomorrow night and fell on their collective face again. Now five games under the break-even point and 6.5 behind both the Mets and Braves--two well-run organizations that aren't going to collapse--the season *feels* over, whether or not it actually is.

Readers of The Good Phight probably have picked up on my despair, but if a man can't fully wallow in the sadomachistic psychological mire of his obsession on his own blog, then where to do it? Here's what's wrong with the Phillies, as I commented on another Phils site Tuesday afternoon:

1) The fish rots from the head, and bad process leads to bad outcomes. The poison unquestionably starts with principal owner Bill Giles, who should be put in jail for what he's done to a great franchise (while making unfathomable money!) since making the purchase in 1981, and team president David Montgomery, who seems sufficiently dumb it's a wonder he can dress himself. Regardless of what you think of Charlie Manuel as a manager (myself, I think he's about average--his positives and negatives more or less cancel out, though right now the negatives are on display given how little margin for idiocy the bench and bullpen give him), he was hired because the team's best player at the time loved him. That's no way to do business. And GM Pat Gillick, though nominally an outsider, seems to be the epitome of the 1970s/early '80s mindset that has suffused the organization ever since.

2. The roster is unbearably top-heavy. I'm working on something for TGP to more fully tell this story, but it's hardly an original observation that this team has about 5-7 really valuable players (Utley, Rollins, Hamels, et al), a similar number who are fine for now (e.g. Geary, Moyer)... and another dozen guys who are stealing money. Incredibly, this has been the case for three years now: an island of excellence in a big lake of stinkola.

3. None of this is likely to change. Great players will emerge, bearing hope, and leave, trailing bitterness. (Sometimes we call this "The Rolen Cycle.") Near-great players will come in and suddenly stink. The front office will be characterized by indifference, proud and belligerent ignorance, and near-transparent contempt for the fans. We only get released when the schmucks sell, and they won't do that until Giles dies, based on his own statements.

Another commenter on that same site offered this bon mot on the Groundhog Season Phillies: "Its beyond heartbreaking. It's just plain tedious."

The Counterforce
Over the last few years, as liberal-leaning websites have grown in size and importance and evolved into something one can describe as a true political movement, I've watched and to some extent joined in with eighty percent gratitude and excitement, twenty percent anxiety and concern. In a real sense, the convergence on the left has served as a defender, one of the strongest defenders, of American democracy in its time of challenge from a dangerous and coherent movement on the right, led by the Bush administration. That convergence has pushed the Democratic Party to stand its ground, rewarding those who do so with financial and logistical support, and has called to account a media that had been steadily adopting right-leaning contexts and premises. Starting with the Howard Dean campaign of 2004, focusing through Daily Kos, and spreading out to dozens of mid-size blogs and thousands of small ones, the online progressives have hosted countless helpful discussions and arguments, given new candidates and embattled incumbents platforms with which to reach people open to help, and more broadly built a sense of community and hope among millions of us finding little grounds for either in conventional and mainstream political life.

That's the eighty percent. The twenty is that the online progressive movement, like all movements, has drawn to itself dogmatic thinkers, self-appointed loyalty enforcers, and would-be demagogues who often seem eager to seize upon the near-crisis context of the Bush years for their own ends.

Assuming our society persists long enough, no doubt there will be weighty books and seminars and college courses and all the other media of collective remembrance in years to come that will seek to explain, track, analyze and spin this movement. But it's The New Republic, ironically enough, that might be first out of the gate with an explanation of how the online progressives emerged, and why they matter, in a great piece by Jonathan Chait. Here's a taste:

The 2000 recount is an apt birthing ground for the netroots. It perfectly fits their view of U.S. politics as an atavistic clash of partisan willpower. And their analysis of that episode, while somewhat crude, has a certain truth. The liberal intelligentsia, and much of the Democratic establishment, tried to hold itself above the fray. During the recount, liberal pundits were concerned above all with maintaining civility and consensus, and they flayed Democrats for any hint of partisanship or anger. (In a New Yorker editorial, Joe Klein scolded that Al Gore "reinforced his partisan reputation by challenging the results in Florida" and cautioned that "vehemence of any sort--ideological, political, analytical--seems ill-advised.") Elite liberal opinion-makers insisted that their side play fair. Gore, they declared, must allow for the possibility that his opponent could win a fair recount, must renounce street demonstrations, must be intellectually consistent--permitting, say, military ballots that did not fulfill the letter of the law to be counted. Members of the Gore recount team like William Daley and Warren Christopher, seeking to uphold their reputations as statesmen, nervously complied.

The contrast with the Republican side could not have been more stark. The only complaint conservative pundits had with the George W. Bush operation was that it was too soft. (George Will wrote that there was a "ferocity gap"--but, in a classic case of projection, he insisted that Democrats were more ferocious.) Bush never conceded the possibility that he could lose. Nor did he feel any obligation to maintain intellectual consistency. His campaign demanded the letter of the law be carried out in those instances when it suited his side, and it flouted the letter of the law in those (military ballots, illegally submitted absentee ballots in Seminole County) when it did not. It whipped up a mob to halt a recount in Miami-Dade County that at the time appeared potentially decisive. Conservatives celebrated these developments without a hint of dissent. While Democrats in Washington constantly undermined the Gore campaign by telling reporters that Gore should concede, Washington Republicans maintained ranks. Through their greater resolve and partisan discipline, the Republicans triumphed.

All the lessons the netroots have gleaned about U.S. politics were on display in this noxious denouement, and those lessons have been reinforced time and again throughout the Bush presidency. The Democratic leadership and the liberal intelligentsia seemed pathetic and exhausted, wedded to musty ideals of bipartisanship and decorousness.

Chait spends considerable time discussing the element of the online progressive movement that I'm most ambivalent about: its willingness, or perhaps eagerness, to take on other actors within the center-left coalition in pursuit of larger (and longer-term) strategic objections. To my mind, there are moments when it's useful, or even necessary, to smack your sometime allies: the Democratic Leadership Council, to take perhaps the most frequent and notorious of online left frenemies, has undercut the progressive message, and triangulated for the sake of triangulation, so many times that it was vital to create consequences and pushback for their doing so. And the primary challenge to Joe Lieberman last summer was justified both by Lieberman's evidently pathological wish to be accepted and loved on the right, exemplified by his more-Bush-than-Bush stance on the war, and by the fact that the circumstances were in place--a solid blue state, a viable challenger, and sufficient money--to mount the campaign.

But there's sometimes among the lefty blogs a certain joy in attacking organizations and leaders who might agree with you on 75 percent (or 95 percent) of the issues. David Sirota, whom I've come to call "Der Kommissar," might be the worst offender here, but there are dozens if not hundreds of high-profile posters across the liberal blogs who sometimes do the same. Again, sometimes I think this is justifiable--see Clinton, Hillary--but when you're attacking Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid or Barack Obama for this or that sin of political noncomformity, it's very questionable whether you're doing more good than harm. The same question can be asked of whether it makes sense to lump in groups and publications generally in agreement with the Forces of Evil:

Just as the Goldwaterites reserved their strongest contempt for the moderates who controlled the GOP, the netroots are at their most single-minded in their opposition to the moderates who they believe control the Democratic Party. The netroots often identify this enemy in amorphous, populist terms--"the Beltway," "the D.C. establishment," etc. When it comes to identifying its adversaries more specifically, the two institutions named most often are the DLC and tnr. Netroots activists speak of these two institutions in stark terms. "This is the modern DLC--an aider and abettor of Right-wing smear attacks against Democrats," wrote Moulitsas, who proceeded to threaten to "make the DLC radioactive." In a posting about tnr, titled "tnr's defection to the Right is now complete," Moulitsas wrote that this magazine "betrayed, once again, that it seeks to destroy the new people-powered movement for the sake of its Lieberman-worshipping neocon owners." Both the DLC and tnr are perpetually described as "dying" or "irrelevant," yet simultaneously possessed of sinister and ubiquitous control over the national discourse.

In reality, of course, the DLC is a political enterprise and tnr a journalistic one; each has on its staff individuals who do not always agree with each other; and neither institution exerts total control over every individual on its payroll. While both the DLC and tnr supported the Iraq war, both stridently opposed almost every other element of the Bush agenda. The overwhelming majority of DLC missives and tnr articles are perfectly congenial to mainstream liberalism and perfectly hostile to the Republican Party of George W. Bush. But these sorts of subtleties generally escape the Manichean analysis that pervades the netroots.

What makes such internal enemies so dangerous is that they engage in self-criticism. It is not that the netroots forbid internal debate. Far from it: They indulge in all sorts of disagreements, tactical and substantive, just as conservatives do. What they consider treasonous is any criticism of any part of the Democratic Party or its activist base from the right. You can attack the Democratic leadership in Congress for failing to force a troop withdrawal from Iraq, but you cannot attack it for opposing a troop surge. ... It is permissible to divide the party from the left, by opposing a moderate Democratic position. But if you divide the party from the right, you are an enemy of the movement.

I'm not sure we'll really understand the true nature of the online progressive movement until the crisis moment passes and a new president, likely a Democratic president, takes office. I can see the push for "unity" in the context of an opposing movement that, even now when its popularity is in the toilet and some of its adherents fervently wish the standard-bearer would go home to Rancho Plastico, still pushes inexorably for an unbound unitary executive, war without end, and de-distributive taxing and spending policies. As Paul Krugman pointed out, the "loyal Bushies" (including the Dobsonites and Norquisters) are a "revolutionary power"; pushing back the rabidly partisan challenge they've posed to the established American system merits a higher degree of partisan discipline on the other side.

My question is how the liberal bloggers and netroots will respond if and when we have a Democratic president--especially if it's a relative progressive like Obama and Edwards--and Democratic majorities in Congress. Mark Schmitt recently published a thoughtful article (also in TNR) about how the experience of 1993--the last time Democrats held unified control of government--is informing, or haunting, party leaders today. Back then, the Democratic coalition was different, and more obviously divisible against itself; if history repeats in 2009, the question might be whether the netroots activists can reconcile their enthusiasm and impatience with a system of checks and balances that, even after Bush (and happily so), isn't really conducive to rapid major changes.

A second concern will emerge if and when Democratic leaders start to show the same propensity for corruption and self-dealing that helped undo the Republicans in the middle years of this decade (and hopefully is continuing to do so). Already, there's a sense that the 110th Congress is less prone to self-dealing and special-interest pandering than its predecessor--but that's a low bar. There's William Jefferson, the corrupt Democratic congressional backbencher from Louisiana who unfortunately won re-election last year while waiting for federal charges; he hasn't been embraced, but he hasn't been kicked out of the caucus either. What happens when a more prominent Dem comes under serious allegations of self-dealing? Will the online progressives stick to their principles, or try to explain away the misdeeds as so many Republican apologists have done in the DeLay/Bush era?

As always, we'll see. I don't think anyone of progressive outlook can disagree that the rise of the online left has helped bring American politics back into something resembling balance and served to counter the rabid right that organized itself through talk radio and church-related institutions. But all movements carry the seeds of their own undoing: self-righteousness, hypocrisy, and overadherence to dogmatic thinking. That this is an essentially conservative fear may or may not be ironic.