News of the Weird and Sad
I'm out of town for a week starting in a couple hours, but this story of Bob Allen, the family-values Florida state representative who offered to fellate an undercover cop, is too good not to notice. First, Rep. Allen's version:

Allen has already denied any wrongdoing, but the recordings and documents offered new details about what he and police say happened on July 11 inside the men's room at Veterans Memorial Park.

"I certainly wasn't there to have sex with anybody and certainly wasn't there to exchange money for it," said Allen, R-Merritt Island, who was arrested on charges of soliciting prostitution.

"This was a pretty stocky black guy, and there was nothing but other black guys around in the park," Allen, who is white, told police in a taped statement after his arrest. Allen said he feared he "was about to be a statistic" and would have said anything just to get away.

Allen, who couldn't be reached for comment Thursday, has repeatedly declared his innocence, his intention to fight the charges and his desire to stay in office.

Gotta love the appeal to ignorant white fear. And now the officer's version:

In a written statement released Thursday, Titusville Officer Danny Kavanaugh recalled entering the restroom twice and said he was drying his hands in a stall when Allen peered over the stall door.

After peering over the stall a second time, Allen pushed open the door and joined Kavanaugh inside, the officer wrote. Allen muttered " 'hi,' " and then said, " 'this is kind of a public place, isn't it,' " the report said.

The officer said he asked Allen about going somewhere else and that the legislator suggested going "across the bridge, it's quieter over there."

"Well look, man, I'm trying to make some money; you think you can hook me up with 20 bucks?" Kavanaugh asked Allen.

The officer said Allen responded, "Sure, I can do that, but this place is too public."

Then Kavanaugh said he told Allen, "I wanna know what I gotta do for 20 bucks before we leave.' " He said Allen replied: "I don't know what you're into."

According to Kavanaugh's statement, the officer said, "do you want just [oral sex]?" and Allen replied, "I was thinking you would want one."

The officer said he then asked Allen, "but you'll still give me the 20 bucks for that . . . and that the legislator said, "yeah, I wouldn't argue with that."

As Allen turned and motioned for the officer to follow him to his car, Kavanaugh identified himself as a police officer by raising his shirt and exposing his badge.

The South Park episode pretty much writes itself, doesn't it?

Demented America
How about this one:

The Club For Growth is targeting Mike Huckabee in the run-up to the Ames straw poll next weekend, clearly hoping to blunt any appeal he might have with state's religious right GOP base. This TV ad, with a buy costing a total of $85,000, attacks Huckabee for raising various taxes when he was governor of Arkansas, tax hikes that Huckabee has said were necessary to improve the state's ragged infrastructure.

Their ad went up today. Is it obliviousness or shamelessness that these vicious, greedy fuckers renew their anti-tax jihad as rescuers are still trying to save the victims of a bridge collapse in Minneapolis--the perfect example of what happens when you neglect the public's infrastructure?

Huckabee's obviously wrong about a great many things. But if he has the gumption to tell off Pat Toohey and his collection of sociopaths--to invite them to drown themselves in Grover Norquist's bathtub--I'm sending him money.

On the "Democratic" side, more madness from our would-be Kinder, Gentler Empress:

The ongoing Hillary-Obama skirmish has flared up into a major firefight this afternoon, with Clinton chiding Obama at a press conference for ruling out the use of nukes against terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Earlier today Obama was asked by the Associated Press whether he'd consider using nukes against terrorists in Afghanistan or Pakistan. His answer was No:

"I think it would be a profound mistake for us to use nuclear weapons in any circumstance," Obama said, with a pause, "involving civilians." Then he quickly added, "Let me scratch that. There's been no discussion of nuclear weapons. That's not on the table."

Hillary has now responded by chiding Obama for ruling out the use of nukes. Here's what she said today at a press conference, according to a transcript provided by the Senator's office:

"I think that presidents should be very careful at all times in discussing the use or non-use of nuclear weapons. Presidents, since the Cold War, have used nuclear deterrence to keep the peace. And I don't believe that any president should make any blanket statements with respect to the use or non-use of nuclear weapons."

You're fucking kidding me. Right?

How sick have we become as a society when our most likely next president is publicly countenancing the use of nuclear weapons--the same instruments of death and havoc that we are endlessly willing to go to war to stop others from acquiring--against a bunch of thugs in caves?

I took a lot of classes in college about the Cold War, deterrence theory, all that stuff. I understand the thinking. But... this is beyond irrational. It's one thing to deter aggression from a hostile, nuclear-armed power; it's quite another even to hold open the possibility that you would irradiate an entire region--killing who knows how many people who have nothing to do with whatever it is you're trying to stop--just to score political points.

It's times like this I'm glad I'm agnostic. Because if I were a person of faith, I'd be worried in the extreme about the wrath of a just God.

A Hat Tip for Hillary
Obviously, I'm not a fan... but you have to admire this.

Few political fundraising e-mails have ever carried the subject header “cleavage,” but White House hopeful Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign sent a solicitation to supporters Friday with the attention-grabbing header in order to decry a recent Washington Post article devoted to the New York Democrat’s chest — and raise campaign cash in the process.

“Frankly, focusing on women’s bodies instead of their ideas is insulting,” Ann Lewis, a senior adviser to Clinton, wrote in the e-mail. “It’s insulting to every woman who has ever tried to be taken seriously in a business meeting. It’s insulting to our daughters — and our sons — who are constantly pressured by the media to grow up too fast.”

“Take a stand against this kind of coarseness and pettiness in American culture,” Lewis adds, with a link to make a contribution to the campaign. “And take a stand for Hillary, the most experienced, most qualified candidate running for president.”

"Brilliant" actually might not be a strong enough compliment here. One of Sen. Clinton's enduring problems in trying to win the Democratic nomination is that she actually does much better among working-class and less educated women than with academic high-achievers and extremely accomplished professional women like herself.

But one experience common to probably every single woman who could be thus described is being objectified in a professional context, and getting pissed off about it. Thanks to the vapid Washington Post article, Sen. Clinton now has a shared experience, and an emotionally resonant one at that, with "every woman who has ever tried to be taken seriously in a business meeting."

These people really do play the game of politics at a much higher level. I'm rooting against them, but the strategery is masterful.

Is Sen. Clinton "Bush-Cheney Lite"?
So says, or at least implies, Barack Obama:

"The Bush administration's policy is to say that he will not talk with these countries unless they meet various preconditions -- that's their explicit policy, and that was the question that was posed at the debate. This is the assertion that she made during the debate and subsequently, was that she would not meet with various leaders unless certain preconditions were met. Now, if that's not what she means, then she should say so, but that was the question that was posed at the debate."

Obama also said: “I’m not afraid of losing the PR war to dictators...I’m not going to hide behind a bunch of rhetoric. I don’t want a continuation with Bush-Cheney. I don’t want Bush-Cheney light. I want a fundamental change.”

What specifically prompted this is a rather insubstantial argument about "talking to America's enemies," in which Obama endorsed diplomatic talks without conditions and Clinton quickly smacked him for "naivete." In reality, both are probably in the same place: more willing to engage in diplomacy than the Bush administration, but hardly prepared to offer tea and sympathy to the worst regimes in the world.

In a larger sense, though, I believe Hillary Clinton *does* represent what we could call "Bush/Cheney Lite." To be fair, I'm not so sure it's different from the stance Bill Clinton took during his two terms, or how Al Gore would have approached the world had he been allowed to claim his victory in 2000. But the stakes of this approach are higher now, and its risks are commensurately greater.

First, the disclaimer. Though I'm clearly not a Hillary fan, I have no doubt that her administration would conduct foreign policy at a level of competence and thoughtfulness light years beyond what the current crop of goons, dimwits and sociopaths have wrought. But Sen. Clinton offers no challenge to the increasingly problematic foundational premises of American foreign policy:

1) Our unmatched power essentially gives us the right to do what we want, when we want

2) We should not be held responsible for our own past actions, and they bear no relation to what goes on now (e.g. Iranian distrust of U.S. actions and intentions is in no way justified by the fact that we staged a coup in their country more than 50 years ago, replacing a democratically elected government with a repressive tyrant)

3) Nobody worries about the larger budgetary and systemic (as in the ramifications for our democracy at home) consequences of our de facto empire except some weenie academics and losers who hang out on the Internets

It probably can be argued that the only candidate in the race on either side who's even thinking about these issues is the renegade Republican/Libertarian Ron Paul. And, of course, he's a nut on myriad other grounds. But I have vastly more faith that Obama at least might grapple with these issues than that Hillary Clinton--the chosen candidate of the Establishment, the most likely to embrace the Bush/Cheney vision of Executive Superpowers, and the Senator who didn't even bother to read the intel on Iraq because she'd made up her mind to cast the "right" political vote--ever will. If you think it's important to even question the premises of how we work in the world, you shouldn't be supporting Clinton.

Relative Quietude
I've been having trouble motivating myself to post all that much lately. The reason why isn't that I've not been paying attention to things, or that I don't think anything important is going on... but rather a sense, always there but stronger at some times than others, that things have quietly gone so far out of control that as a society, and as a nation, we're left only to see how long we can continue to coast on past accomplishments. I got myself terribly depressed this past Friday after reading about the Bush administration's unfathomable argument that whenever it claimed "executive privilege," it essentially could end any investigation, any oversight, any check on the powers the president and his Loyal Bushies have so egregiously misused by ordering the Justice Department not to pursue contempt charges from Congress.

The outrage over this absurdity has been pretty much nonexistant, at least beyond the circles where people are paid to be outraged by what the Other Party is up to. Maybe it will ramp up somewhat, after the farcically inept and dishonest Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez issued another series of unambiguous "fuck you" answers to Congress yesterday and the House Judiciary Committee approved contempt citations for two of the Most Loyal Bushies, Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers, on a party-line vote today. Maybe not. I'd guess not. But the mere fact that this was a party-line vote--that not one Republican put the prerogatives of their institution, and the Constitution, ahead of their party and their widely despised Leader--is much more depressing still.

I hate the idea of reflexive partisanship. Everything I read into American history, as well as my own life experience, pushes me to reject the notion that one side ever has all the answers. But at this point I struggle to see even the least bit of good in the modern Republican Party. What do these people care about? It comes out today that not only Bush, but his enablers in Congress, are now prepared to reject the idea of expanding the State Child Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP), which helps provide health coverage for low-income children. Why? Because it "goes against their philosophy," which I guess is "free-market fundamentalism, except when we have a donor constituency to protect."

I suspect the reason for this is nothing more and nothing less than not wanting to give the Democrats a political success. And to me, this is a perfect issue for the Democrats, with a far greater command on the public's attention now that they have congressional majorities and high-profile presidential candidates, to demagogue. But this is not something they've been particularly good at.

How can we solve any of the great problems of this time when we can't even agree that the health of kids is more important than little political pissing contests? Or that preserving and defending the Constitution is a nobler cause than Party Uber Alles?

Now I've gone and upset myself again. So you see why I'm having trouble writing about these things.

Sympathy for Two Devils
I did something unpleasant last night: put on an Atlanta Braves game on TBS. Aside from the Dallas Cowboys ("or, NAMBLA"), there's no franchise in pro sports I hate like the Braves. From the all-American adulterer Larry Jones, Jr. to John "I hates the gays and loves the Baby Jesus" Smoltz and Bobby "wife-beating drunk" Cox, and especially the tortured-Muppet announcer Skip Carey--who mercifully wasn't on the broadcast last night--I just detest the Braves. And while I didn't stay up late enough to get this particular dash of salt in the wound, they doubly screwed me last night as two fantasy pitchers of mine, Tim Hudson and Bob Wickman, squandered a 4-0 lead, and a win and a save, in the 9th inning last night. Had the Braves ultimately lost the game, the benefit to the Phillies would have rendered this acceptable--but they won in 13. No soup for me.

But this isn't really about the Braves per se. As they were playing in San Francisco (one more side note: evidently my political leanings are strong enough that whenever a sports team representing a clearly liberal city plays one representing a right-wingish area, unless there are very strong offsetting circumstances, I'll want the Blue team to win; this is pretty much the strongest rooting interest I have in for the NHL and NBA at this point...) whoever was announcing the game started talking about Barry Bonds' pursuit of Hank Aaron's home run record and the decision of MLB Commissioner Bud Selig to try to be in attendance when Bonds hits #756. Per the Braves announcers, when Selig was asked whether he thought Bonds would be legitimate as the record-holder despite all the performance-enhancement allegations that have dogged him for some years now, Selig answered to the effect that everyone is entitled to their opinion. Good enough, but then he added, "For me, it's difficult to put aside my personal feelings."

Selig reveres Hank Aaron, so I guess that's understandable, but it seems to me that after 15 (mostly painful) years in the job, he should know when to keep his frickin' mouth shut. Even considering that Bonds is a jerk, and that he almost certainly did take PEDs, to put that on him now is, I think, really piling on. Given the current level of scrutiny, if he took drugs last season, or is doing so this year, he shouldn't be playing baseball; he should be running the CIA. Yet at age 42/43 this year, he's got 19 home runs and an OPS well over 1.000; last year he hit 26 bombs in 367 at-bats with an OPS of .999. That's probably the best offensive performance at that age in baseball history, and it's almost certain that he did it clean.

So much for Bonds. For Selig's part, I can see not wanting to absolutely commit to being in attendance. It's not like when Cal Ripken broke Lou Gehrig's consecutive games played record: you could look at the schedule and see the date when it would happen. With Bonds, who knows? He generally sits out two days a week, but is likely to pinch-hit in those games. He's been in a terrible slump lately; maybe he comes out of it and ties the record in a flurry with a two-homer outburst, like he had last week in Chicago. Selig, ineffectual jerk that he is, is also going to turn 73 years old next week, and he has a day job. Having him go Deadhead following Bonds around for two weeks or three weeks or a month is neither feasible nor, in a sense, fair to Selig.

Now I gotta go bathe.

Bread and Circus
On the way home from the gym last night, I read what struck me as a pretty important "think piece" in Democracy Journal: "America's Teaching Crisis." The article pithily details one of the biggest problems in public education: how we recruit, train and compensate our teachers. It makes a crucially important and uncontestable point that, frankly, I'm a little embarrassed I hadn't thought of previously: through the 1970s, teaching (like nursing, where I was aware of this factor) had a big competitive human capital advantage just by the fact that the full range of career options weren't open to women and, to a somewhat lesser extent, non-white men, so people of talent and ambition were more likely to go into the field. Because of this advantage, there was less need to aggressively recruit or robustly compensate great educators.

(My mom was one of those people. Had she been born even 15 years later, I think she would have gone into the law or academia; as it was, she became a teacher. It was her students' gain, but similarly talented people are now far less likely to enter the profession.)

I don't know if it's possible to show that aggregate teacher quality has declined in recent decades, but at the least, the article suggests that today's teaching workforce is not replete with the sort of inspirational, mind-opening instructors we all wish for:

If the principal objective of a teacher-preparation program is to develop highly effective educators, then it ought to select its students with attention to the characteristics that correlate with effectiveness in the classroom. One such broadly recognized characteristic is the level of a prospective teacher’s "literacy"–not merely an individual’s ability to read, but rather one’s "world knowledge," general academic proficiency, and ability to communicate. To be sure, this broadly defined literacy does not, by itself, guarantee effective teaching, but it is, on average, very much related to success in the classroom. Multiple studies examining different proxies for literacy have shown that educators who are considered "highly literate" consistently produce student achievement that outpaces that of their "less literate" peers, sometimes by more than a third of a grade level per year. One study of Philadelphia students suggests that this effect may be greatest for low-income and minority students. Summarizing the evidence, the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), of which we are both members, reports that, "clearly a prospective teacher’s level of literacy, however measured, should be a primary consideration in the hiring process."

Despite this evidence, many schools of education do not select their students with an aggressive eye toward this broadly defined literacy. For example, one study of the graduates of the State University of New York system found that, on standardized aptitude tests, elementary and secondary teachers were more likely to score on the lower end of the distribution than their non-teaching peers, and less likely to score at the higher end. National data reflect the same trends: Fewer than 7 percent of public school teachers, for instance, graduated from "selective" colleges. Of course, test scores and college selectivity are not the only indicators of effective teaching; a range of factors leads to excellence in the classroom. However, research suggests that there is a real connection between effectiveness in the classroom and "literacy" that could be more fully addressed in how current teacher preparation programs select candidates.

I suspect that part of this is bound up in the problem that so many of the "best and brightest" teachers leave in frustration after a couple years on the job. The attrition rate for NYC schoolteachers is something like 50 percent within their first three years, and many of those who don't leave the profession entirely relocate out of higher-stress assignments with lower-achieving kids and inadequate resources to easier and better-paid postings in the suburbs. It is hardly an overstatement to say that the needier the students, the worse teachers they are likely to have.

My personal conceit about how to reform the teaching profession has been that it needs to become a true "profession," with high standards for entry and competence and lucrative compensation like medicine or the law. The article, however, swats aside this premise and offers a different prescription:

Some commonly proposed ideas to improve the quality of teaching in our schools are well intentioned, but untenable when scaled to the enormity of the challenge. Substantial across-the-board raises for teachers, for example, make great political rhetoric but would require extraordinary tax increases that the public is unlikely to accept. Moreover, across-the-board raises will not create the right incentives to bring high-quality people to work in the districts and to teach the subjects that need them the most.

Similarly, the notion of making education more like law or medicine–with a large body of canonical knowledge for all practitioners and the expectations of a lifetime career–makes for great talking points but ignores key differences between these professions. What’s more, many talented young people today are not looking for static careers spanning 30 years in a singular profession. The labor market is more mobile and dynamic than it was a generation ago, and public schools should embrace and exploit this trend in a search for talent, rather than resist it.

Instead, the nation needs a New Deal for teachers and the nation’s school children. Such an effort would involve more (and smarter) pay, better training and support, and increased opportunities for professional growth. It would also allow more people to come into education at different points in their careers, and it would structure the incentives to more effectively promote the goals of student achievement and educational equity. It would also involve more responsibility–namely more accountability for job performance in the service of our children.

It goes on to urge "raising the bar" for admission into the profession, which I think is a needed step but might not work unless the rewards rise ahead of professional expectations. A better recommendation is to develop a "market-based" system for teachers to pursue their own professional development, arming them with vouchers to get higher education institutions to compete for their business. Done right, this could lower turnover and boost teacher quality. Finally, the authors urge significant change in how teachers are evaluated and, ultimately, compensated. This strikes me as a nearly uncontestable point.

Public education is the foundation stone of both American democracy and American economic competitiveness. With the arguable exception of climate change, there's no issue that's more important for our national well-being over the long term. The ideas raised in this piece are serious and worthy of an extended "national conversation" involving not just politicians and experts (or even policy wonks who focus in other areas but find this stuff really compelling), but parents and students--particularly those stuck in failing schools and floundering districts.

Instead, though, we've got coverage of David Vitter and his ho (or ho's); the media's ongoing John McCain Political Deathwatch; and on and on it goes.

I don't know how to make "issues" interesting to the general public. But until someone figures this out, we're going to be forever watching parades pass by while the neighborhood burns down.

The Authenticity Paradox
Sunday morning I was up in time to watch Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) do verbal battle with Republican Lindsay Graham of South Carolina on the Tim Russert show. As is his wont, Webb was unscripted, unrehearsed, and devastating; as Graham tossed out one meticulously crafted talking point after another, Webb tore apart each of them. Carpetbagger has some highlights:

GRAHAM: Have you been to Iraq and — have you been to Iraq and talked to the soldiers?

WEBB: You know, you haven’t been to Iraq.

GRAHAM: I’ve been to — I’ve been there seven times.

WEBB: You know, you go see the dog and pony shows.

GRAHAM: I’ve been there as a reservist, I have been there and I’m going back in August.

WEBB: That’s what congressmen do. Yeah, I have, I have — I’ve been a member of the military when the senators come in.

GRAHAM: Well, all — listen, something we can agree on, we both admire the men and women in uniform. I don’t doubt your patriotism.

WEBB: Don’t put political words in their mouth.

I was so excited to see Webb defeat George "Felix Macacawitz" Allen last year not just because Allen is a snivelling racist shitbag, but because Webb is the sort of guy who can change perceptions of Democrats. A former Reagan administration official who voted for Bush--and Allen--in 2000, Webb left the Democrats over cultural and foreign policy issues during the 1970s after fighting in Vietnam, and came back thirty years later after realizing that his objections to Republican abuses of the military and idiocy on the world stage trumped those differences. (For his part, Webb also has pushed back on some social issues--gun control, which he vehemently opposes, in particular--and tried to pull the Democrats further to the left on economic issues, where he never felt comfortable with the Republicans. Elected to the Senate with other economic populists like Sherrod Brown, Bob Casey and Jon Tester, he seems to be having some impact in this area.)

As a decorated military veteran whose son is on the ground in Iraq, a novelist and journalist who has written extensively about war and fighting, and former high official (Secretary of the Navy under Reagan) in the defense hierarchy, Webb probably has more credibility on issues of war and peace than any other Democrat. As a political giant-slayer--a year ago, most figured that by now Allen would be a leading presidential candidate after easily winning re-election--who won in a state that's gone Republican in ten straight presidential elections--he seems a natural for vice-presidential consideration next year, regardless of whom the Democrats nominate for the top job.

But I can't see it happening.

The reason why I doubt Webb will be on the ticket is the same reason I think he'd be so good: he doesn't take direction. Webb refuses to muzzle himself in support of the Party Line. When he gave the Democratic response to Bush's state of the union speech in January, he was given a speech by party hacks; he threw it out in favor of his own, and got more positive press than any response address in memory. If he had any doubts that he was smarter than the established DC crowd--and I don't think he did--that experience surely erased them.

Perhaps the most interesting thing Webb said on Russert’s show yesterday was when he pushed back against Graham’s apologetics for “the surge.” Graham was talking about how the military had “taken back” Anbar Province because the population there had been won over by Petreus; Webb countered that what had happened was the population exacting “redneck justice” against al Qaeda in Iraq, which would have happened whether or not the Americans were present in force. Everything we know about Webb indicates that he’s not unsympathetic to notions like “redneck justice.” I believe that such a view probably resonates with the American electorate. But can you imagine Hillary Clinton’s campaign advisors taking on a guy who dares to voice such uncouth thoughts? David Broder might get upset!

I suspect that if you polled the public on which candidates were most and least "authentic," Hillary Clinton would come out at the bottom. Fairly or not (and I'd argue it's more fair than not), she is regarded as supremely scripted, endlessly packaged. Webb is not; watching him on Russert's show yesterday, he seemed sufficiently upset that I was actually a little worried he was just going to kick Graham's ass on national live TV.

But while we as a country crave authenticity--the perception of it is why the painfully unqualified Bush was close enough to Al Gore in 2000 to steal the presidency--the parties crave message discipline and predictability. Given the choice between a likely winner they couldn't control and a more dubious candidate who could be relied upon to stay on message, the professional class of politicals will take the latter. (John McCain, in his much more appealing "maverick" incarnation, would have crushed Gore in 2000.)

Given his perception and potential to make Clinton acceptable to some chunk of the 50 percent of the country that claims to hate her, Webb makes so much sense politically as Hillary’s running mate that maybe they’ll ask him anyway, and just sweat through the days waiting for him to say something that upsets their delicate stomachs. But I doubt it (and I doubt he’d accept second billing on a Clinton-headed ticket). They'd worry, with much justification, that the authentic #2 would overshadow the plastic-seeming presidential candidate.

Webb’s appeal just reminds me that the two-party system really does constrain our options and unacceptably narrow our choices. At this point, I plan to support the Democrats next year-–but my ideal really would be a Bloomberg/Webb ticket unfettered by all the political baggage and obligatory ass-kissing that goes with being labeled as Democrats.

Hello Hillary? Goodbye, Majority
I've had an idea rattling around in my head for a couple weeks now for how to demonstrate one of my three big arguments why the Democratic Party absolutely should not nominate Hillary Clinton for the presidency next year: that her nomination would seriously endanger not just Democrats' chances of winning the White House, but also their newly captured majority in the House of Representatives. (The other two are disgust for the Two-Family Duopoly--maybe a non-starter in a culture that seems to revere celebrity ever more--and my strong suspicion that Sen. Clinton holds a similarly expansive view of presidential power that has caused so much trouble during the Bush Misrule.)

The methodological concept I'm playing with is this:

1) Of the 30 or so seats that the Democrats gained in the 2006 midterm elections, take all those who represent districts where Bush won a majority of the vote in 2004.

2) Compare the Democrat's margin of victory in his/her race last year to Bush's margin over John Kerry in '04.

3) Subtract Bush's margin from the Democrat's margin; the resulting figure is the likely 2008 margin either way with a generic Democrat against a generic Republican.

4) Measure polling response (Approve/Disapprove, "Would you consider voting for," etc) to Sen. Hillary Clinton in each district.

5) If "disapprove" is larger (and it will be), divide the difference in half and then subtract that from the figure derived in Step 3.

Example: Gabrielle Giffords (Arizona, 8th district) won her race last year by a margin of 54-42. Bush beat Kerry in that district by 53-47. Subracting that six-point difference from Giffords' twelve-point advantage, she's still up by six. But if Hillary Clinton has 45 percent approval, 55 percent disapproval in the Arizona 8th, and we divide that -10 figure in half, Giffords goes from a six-point edge to a one-point edge. If she's badly outspent (or Clinton is more disliked than I'm positing here), Giffords is very likely sunk.

Nominating Sen. Clinton will severely exacerbate the difficulties many of the first-term Democrats in somewhat hostile territory are already anticipating in their initial--and by normal historical standards, the toughest by far--bid for re-election. Already, many of them Democrats from more conservative districts have tried to inoculate themselves against the ever-looming charge of "liberalism."

[A] CQPolitics.com vote analysis underscores that some Democratic lawmakers, particularly the more centrist members of the freshman class, have been less party-line than others. Twelve of the 25 lowest party unity scores of House Democrats were registered by freshmen.

These 12 hold seats that were among the 30 captured from the Republicans last fall — and all but one represent districts that voted favored Bush for president in 2004.
...
This is not to say that these dozen Democratic freshmen are iconoclasts. They side much more frequently than not with their party on votes that divided Democrats and Republicans. Even on Iraq, before voting for the “clean” war spending bill, all of them previously voted for legislation — subsequently vetoed by Bush — that made a reduction of U.S. troops in Iraq a condition to continue funding.

Some of the dozen Democratic freshmen with the lowest party unity scores in 2007 lean to the right on some social issues. Four of them were among the 14 Democrats who voted against a bill to expand the definition of “hate crime” offenses to include certain violent crimes against an individual because of race, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability. Three of them joined just 13 other House Democrats in voting against legislation to promote embryonic stem cell research.

The Democratic leadership in the House is smart enough to understand that on "hot-button" social issues like abortion and stem-cell research, representatives have to vote with their districts. (It also helps that even now, enough moderate Republicans remain who will cross party lines to vote with the Democrats that the lack of support from conservative Democrats isn't generally enough to kill legislation.) Letting them go on those fights helps ensure that they'll stay on the reservation for big votes on economic and (to a lesser extent) foreign policy issues. If voters are really moved by emotional connections to their public officials, it's a good trade for the Democrats to cede a few legislative votes in exchange for preserving the sense that those officials share the values of their communities.

But the presence of a polarizing figure at the top of the ticket badly strains that perceived connection. No election is ever truly local--in that the personalities of the candidates, provincial issues, and related factors are ALL that matters--nor are they ever entirely national (in that those local factors matter not at all). In years when the presidency is at stake, however, the balance generally tips more toward the national side of the spectrum. Given how popular he remained in most of the "red" states, Bush might have helped a decent number of Republicans vying for lower office in 2004; possibly more significant was that John Kerry, or at least the caricature of him offered by the Bush political team and enabled by Kerry's own awful campaign--really hurt Democrats in those same states. The Oklahoma Senate race that year comes to mind; the Democrats ran a very strong candidate, Brad Carson, who had served in Congress for a few terms and was well within the mainstream of politics in that state, while the Republicans ran an eccentric and extremist obstetrician named Tom Coburn. Smartly, Coburn ran ads that slammed Carson as a "John Kerry Democrat"... and after months of polls showing a close race, he wound up winning by 12 points.

Carson was caught between trying to run his own race and focus attention on Coburn's many nutty qualities, and the need to keep emphasizing how he was different from his party's presidential nominee. This was a hard enough task for local down-ballot candidates with Kerry, who wasn't previously well-known (much less widely loathed) nationally. Sen. Clinton, who might be the most polarizing public figure in America (Bush can't really claim the title anymore with less than one-third of the public supporting him) is likely to have an even stronger "negative coattails" effect.

With the right opponent--pun partly intended--Senator Clinton could win the presidency with a "smarter Kerry" strategy: hold the blue states and run better races in Ohio, New Mexico, Iowa and maybe Florida. But in the states she'll write off, like Kansas and Indiana, a number of Democrats very likely will suffer defeat by association. Whether that's something Democratic primary voters are prepared to accept, I don't know--but I would like to feel more confident they're making an informed decision on the question.

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...