alternative hippopotamus

Prof. Warren:

Prof. WARREN: Well, they’re trying to push money into banks and the question the oversight panel was asking is, `are you getting an equivalent amount back?’ And so that’s what this was about. Now there could be lots of policy reasons that Treasury might decide that it wanted this money to be in the banks. But our question is the one we put to Secretary Paulson, and that is, `are you putting it in and getting back assets that are worth equivalent value?’ He told us yes; our independent investigation said no
CHEN: So are you saying he was lying?

Prof. WARREN: Well, I’m telling you he told us yes and our independent investigation said no.

Chuckette:

Many thanks to all of you who voted for us for Best Liberal Blog at the 2008 Weblog Awards. You still have time to vote if you haven’t yet today. Apologies to those blogs we recommended whose leads were squashed by the spiteful actions of The Blog That Must Not Be Named. They sort of ruined the fun for the rest of us.

As a rule of thumb, try to have a sense of humor about yourself, and if you can’t, at least try to pretend that you do. This was a case where Wonkette, after the thin skinned ones went on and on about how Wonkette cheated, endorsed the PUMA competitors in other categories. Chuckette was the one who lost awards for the other bloggers.

A word about Wonkette, by the way. Wonkette is the only A list blog that takes the time to link to local DC blogs, including this humble hippo. The writers and commenters are funny, if a tad snarky. I’m glad to see them win in the liberal blog category. The best men and women truly did win in this case.

I really have to pay more attention to McPalin. These right wing nut cases want to raise our taxes: (Steve Benen)

On the substance, Klein is exactly right. McCain’s proposal would count the healthcare benefits Americans receive from their employers as taxable income, leaving tens of millions of middle-class families paying higher taxes and leaving millions more without insurance behind.

But on the politics, I’m not sure if Klein’s observation is quite right. He finds it “amazing” the Obama campaign hasn’t pointed this out yet. But here’s the thing: the Obama campaign has pointed this out. Obama talks about it on the stump, and his team have been writing about it for quite a while.

It hasn’t generated any real interest from political reporters, though, because a) it’s substantive; b) it takes a few seconds to explain; c) there’s no provocative video to accompany the story; and d) it makes McCain look bad.

Now, I’m not objecting just to the idea of someone raising my taxes. I’m objecting to them raising taxes so they can bring more and better wars to the Middle East. Raising taxes to create a better world? That’s socialism. Raising taxes so they can bring Christianity to the infidels? Republicanism.

I really hate it when bright people say things that are just kinda dumb. I also hate to be the blogger who calls them out for it.

Since the Democratic primary the formerly progressive types have split into pro-Hillary and pro-Obama sites. This made a certain amount of sense when the primary campaign was going on, but it doesn’t now. Admittedly, most of the pro-Hillary sites have morphed since the end of the primary, and they’re more like pro-Obama (barely) with significant reservations.

On one hand, it’s tempting to say that this is the nature of a democratic republic. On the other it’s tempting to say that our system doesn’t really know how to deal with the aftermath of a bruising primary. I do recall the Hillary campaign pointing out that it’s okay for the primary to extend into June, because the Democratic party knows how to adapt to these things, even if it goes late into the primary season (or if someone gets assassinated, not that anyone would take an allusion to political assassination in a negative light). Well, I’m not so sure about that.

Lambert at CorrenteWire is such a reluctant supporter of Obama that he says things like this: (CorrenteWire)

And if it’s legitimate to vote for Obama as a blow against racism, regardless of his policies, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin as a blow against sexism, regardless of her policies. And if it’s legitimate to vote for Obama because of his compelling life story, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin because of her compelling life story. And if it’s legitimate to vote for Obama because he’s charismatic and gives a good speech, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin because she’s charismatic and gives a good speech.

These equivalences are blatantly false. I’m quite frankly embarassed for Lambert in this case. What Obama stands for is pretty consistent with the Democratic message, what Palin stands for is consistent with the Bushies. No, tribalism doesn’t legitimize the equivalencing of the two candidates. You know, both Genghis Khan and Joan of Arc were charismatic figures, but that doesn’t mean you can somehow compare their work.

The Prince of Pudding ponders:

What I find interesting about the New Yorker cover is that it’s almost exactly the sort of cover you could expect to find on the front of National Review.

Consider that, for a moment, a work of art so PoMo that its meaning changes based on where it’s published.

In another world, it might be possible for a white guy to satirize the right-wing by dressing the first black nominee and his wife as Muslims and terrorists, and people would get the “joke.” In this world, the Jonah Goldberg’s, Fox Newsers, and Limbaugh’s will get the last laugh at the expense of the haughty intellectuals that run great bastions of progessivism like The New Yorker.

From looking at the various blogs I see the most cited reason for Clinton supporters to back Obama in the GE is potential McBush Supreme Court nominees. And, despite Sidney Blumenthal’s argument that people don’t look at McCain and see Bush, as far as Supreme Court nominees go, he’s beholden to the same coalitions that Bush is. You can predictably expect another Scalia, Alito, or god forbid, another Thomas.

My personal bete noire is everything else. Those right-wing freak show-vaudevillians that tap dance their way through the Bush administration. For instance, I was just reading about Dr. Susan Orr who recently resigned as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs: (Think Progress)

• In a 2001, Orr embraced a Bush administration proposal to “stop requiring all health insurance plans for federal employees” to cover a broad range of birth control. “We’re quite pleased, because fertility is not a disease,” said Orr.
• In a 2000 Weekly Standard article, Orr railed against requiring health insurance plans to cover contraceptives. “It’s not about choice,” said Orr. “It’s not about health care. It’s about making everyone collaborators with the culture of death.”
• Orr authored a paper in 2000 titled, “Real Women Stay Married.” In it she wrote that women should “think about focusing our eyes, not upon ourselves, but upon the families we form through marriage.”

It could just be that my elitist latte-sipping lifestyle here in the heart of The Village has lead me to the mistaken impression that birth control is part of most people’s life. How distopian do you have to be to associate birth control with a culture of death? How bleak is your general impression of your fellow human beings? I mean, the glass isn’t half empty for Dr. Orr. It’s half zombie.

Aka, Goodbye, Mr Chip-on-His-Shoulder:

I do plead guilty to this: bringing to the attention of superiors at the Justice Department the legal manipulations of ideologues in the Civil Rights Division who passed themselves off as professional civil servants while carrying water for their friends and allies in left-wing organizations like the ACLU. Had I kept silent, I would likely be in a far different position than I am today. But I did not, and those I butted heads with have their revenge.

My own hard feelings will pass. [ed: Hahahahahahahaha.] But the political system has been damaged once more by the poisonous tactics of the left, and there is no reason to think that the whole sorry spectacle will not be repeated again and again and again. So long as such tactics are accepted and even encouraged by politicians and the media, it will become harder and harder to find ordinary citizens willing to submit to the character assassination that now passes for our confirmation process.

My impression of Von Spanky is that he genuinely believes that politicizing the Justice Department is perfectly okay, ’cause the liberal justice gets balanced out by the conservative variety. As if in the Bush administration we do Republican-style justice, and in an Obama administration he can do whatever kind of justice suits his personality. Enforcing the Flag Pin Burning Amendment, for instance, not likely. But, of course he’s in favor of fewer likely Democrats voting. That’s part of his job.

I didn’t realize that Jake Tapper, late of “The Note” is back at the blogging grind. It looks like ABC wanted to open an anti-Obama, anti-Clinton bureau, and found just the hack for the job.

An excerpt, so you don’t have to read it for yourself:

In the National Journal’s annual ratings of senators’ standings on the political prism you have to hang a Left before you find Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois.

Pass Barbara Boxer…Ted Kennedy…keep going.

Pass Sheldon Whitehouse….Robert Menendez…

Keep going….

Oh, look, here’s Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a self-described socialist…

Keep going.

Ah, at the waaaaaaay end.

Senator Obama, good to see you sir.

Somehow I picture Tapper hanging out at a bar with Jeff Gannon and Michelle Malkin, lamenting how the Democrat Party has become the party of cut and run.

I thought it would be interesting to look at two definitions for the word progressivism.

First, wikipedia:

Progressivism historically advocates the advancement of workers’ rights and social justice. The progressives were early proponents of anti-trust laws and the regulation of large corporations and monopolies, as well as government-funded environmentalism and the creation of National Parks and Wildlife Refuges.

Second, Lord Pantload:

The early progressives saw the world as a contest between ethnocultural groups and Yglesias does too. But we don’t really have to prove any arcane point of ideological resemblance in order to rebut his charge of ahistorical reductionism. My book argues that national socialism in this country, which used to be called progressivism, changed its name to liberalism after World War II. Hillary Clinton herself – the virtual embodiment (according to her supporters) of modern liberalism — rejects the liberal label and proudly proclaims her spiritual kinship with the Progressives. Does she understand what it means to link herself to a nationalistic, socialistic, eugenicist project? Do any of today’s self-proclaimed progressives?

I think someone’s been hitting the Cheetos past their bed time.

More later. I’m off to the Drinking Eugenically happy hour.