Jack Kelly today on Afghanistan

There are three points worth talking about in Jack Kelly's column today. Today's column is a rejection of the concept of nation building, with the usual complaints about Obama and his policies along the way.

The first point to mention is that while Kelly does not say it explicitly, he implies that Afghan soldiers are attacking US and/or NATO soldiers because they hate Obama. Kelly says ""Green on blue" attacks were virtually unheard of before October 2009. During the entire war in Iraq, there were only three such incidents." "Virtually" strikes me as possibly a weasel word, and Iraq had a whole insurgency against US soldiers.

What's interesting is that one could make a case that Obama's reliance on drone attacks might be affecting the views of Afghan soldiers. Attacks using drones on civilians to get to (suspected) terrorists in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and probably others gets back to people across the Middle East. But Jack Kelly doesn't mention drones. Could it be that the Tea Party (and thus Jack Kelly) approves of the use drones, even if civilians get killed?

The second point I think worth talking about is Kelly's general indictment of nation building. The obvious question is, if you bomb the heck out of a country when you invade them and you want them to be a democracy when you are done, what's the alternative? Kelly calls it expensive. But isn't it more expensive to fail in nation building.

By the way, it should be pointed out that the Marshall Plan and the reconstruction of Japan was nation building. I think if you say that nation building in Europe and Japan was a failure, you better have a pretty strong, unshakeable argument. Still, I would not surprised if Tea Party mouthpiece Jack Kelly made that suggestion.

The third point I want to look at is Kelly's final point that Ronald Reagan had aided the mujahideen "freedom fighters" without engaging in nation building in Afghanistan. To suggest a comparison to our current situation is ludicrous and basically insulting. It was the Soviets who were the invaders in the 1980's, and until they left, the US could not engage in nation building in Afghanistan. And by the way, who was more responsible for aid to the mujahideen, Ronald Reagan or Congress who controls the purse strings? This is the question raised by "Charlie Wilson's War". Interestingly, the movie also suggests Wilson wanted to engage in nation building in Afghanistan after the Soviets withdrew. But although Wilson had secured perhaps 500 million for the Afghan resistance plus 500 million more from the Saudi's, according to the movie he couldn't get a few millions or even hundreds of thousands for roads, schools and hospitals later.

The final thing to say is that whether you blame Ronald Reagan or Charlie Wilson for our not helping the Afghans out after the Soviets left, there is a direct link from the victorious mujahideen to the Taliban, and from the Taliban/mujahideen to al Qada and 9/11. How expensive is nation building?

Romney and Bain ...

I am not sure I am supposed to do this, but I want to comment on a post on Two Political Junkies. The post is about the recent discovery that Mitt Romney was listed as Bain Capital's CEO and drew a paycheck for some years (perhaps four) after he said he left to run the Olympics.

Actually, part if the 2PJ post was about how Fox News did not cover the SEC statements, rather they were talking about how the campaigns sparred.

The Obama Campaign (in the person of Stephanie Cutler) promptly declared that Romney had lied, and possibly committed a felony. Unfortunately, no less an organization than Factcheck dot org disputes the Obama campaign charge.

Factcheck does not say that Romney was not in fact the titular (heh heh) head of Bain, nor do they say that Romney did not get a paycheck. However, Factcheck states this is not fraud, let alone a felony. I tend to believe them, which means the Obama campaign erred in trying to go for the simplistic charge.

Meanwhile, it may be true that Romney committed no felony in remaining the (non-functional) CEO of Bain, or even has any responsibility for Bain's activities after he left to run the Olympics. However, I am not sure that is the end of it.

OK, Romney broke no laws. While a case can be made that Romney was less than truthful with all of us about the entirety his relationship with Bain, it may will be that one has to say that Romney was not making the decisions that led to outsourcing or driving companies into bankruptcy and depriving workers of their retirements.

But here's the thing: the case Romney and the Republicans are making is that Obama has not done enough for unemployment. Anybody else would be better as long as they are willing to work harder than Obama on unemployment.

But what it turns out that Romney's commitment to fighting unemployment is not that strong? How would we know? Well, suppose Romney was not working at Rain anymore, but because he was still technically the CEO, he could step in and prevent Bain from outsourcing American jobs. How strong can we say Romney's commitment is to American jobs, if he didn't raise a finger to save jobs Bain was eliminating, when Romney still had the ability to?

Admittedly, that is a more complicated argument to make than "Romney committed a felony". But it is maybe more important. Romney wants to criticize Obama on jobs, yet Romney had the ability to save jobs Bain was killing during the time romney was running the Olympics, and he didn't. How hard will work for ordinary Americans as President?

Kelly goes round the bend

In today’s column, Jack Kelly has finally declared his vision of what the world (really just America) actually looks like. If you ask me, Kelly modeled it after what liberals (and to a small extent Democrats) accused George W Bush of, Emperor Dubya the first who supposedly wanted a permanent Republican majority, and (in the weird nightmares of some liberals) to stay in power indefinitely. Actually Dubya ended up kind of like Slick Willie (hey, we should be non-partisan in our insulting nicknames, yeah?), his term ended with a reversal that was more a whimper than a bang. His somewhat hysterical descriptions aside, Barack Obama’s term as Presidency will end either later this year or in four years, and if history is any guide, likely a Republican will take over the White House (if it is in four years it probably won’t be Mitt Romney). And our giant cultural juggernaut with be pushed along by inertia in a continuingly negative direction of income inequality and diminished benefits for the poor and elderly, whether or when our economy recovers.

But to the matter at hand, Jack Kelly’s dog whistle column today. More like a dog foghorn. Before I even address the insanity therin, I want to reference this unrelated column from last someone else, last September. This column is another dog whistle, essentially saying that no attempt should be made to register the poor, since all they do is vote in politicians who get them more benefits. If you buy that, you will buy all of today’s Jack Kelly column.

The thing is, the world is not that black and white. Barack Obama has done some things that appear to be designed to perhaps appeal to or at least assuage the concerns of independents (assuming true conservatives are essentially a lost cause). Some pundits would put the too small stimulus in that category (although part of that is also the fault of Congress), and perhaps the increased program of arrests of medical marijuana shops in California and the war on whistleblowers. Or perhaps there is something more going on with Obama, where he is actually more extreme than even Bush was, on marijuana, whistleblowers and the assassinations Jack Kelly mentions.

Which brings me back to the world not being black and white. There are reasons like the ones listed above to criticize Barack Obama, and more. Obama’s and Obama’s administration‘s connections to Wall Street, and the fact that Wall Street has not suffered much since the meltdown and in fact has prospered (those who merged, and probably even those who were merged) is a great concern. The use of drones to kill terrorists that ends up killing civilians (who if they are male adults are promptly dubbed also terrorists, and if women or children, they simply aren’t acknowledged) is another great concern.

But as I have said there is only one of the concerns I listed that Jack Kelly also lists as a concern. The assassinations are serious, but Kelly’s and apparently all Republicans don’t seem to care about Wall Street, drones, whistle blowers or medical marijuana. Instead Jack Kelly trots out a bunch of in this early paragraph: “King Barack I treats the public treasury as his piggy bank, enforces only the laws he likes and asserts the power, without oversight from Congress or the courts, to kill American citizens suspected of terrorism. His attorney general dodges lawful subpoenas while protecting and promoting vote fraud.”

Kelly claims both the judiciary and the press (except presumably for News Corp and he rest of the right wing noise machine) are in the bag for Democrats. I guess its fortunate that an election is coming up, but I fear what might happen if Obama is re-elected. Jack Kelly might call for the assassination of Barack Obama.

Meanwhile the Republicans are going after different issues than the ones I listed. Some of then, such as debt, are real issues. I personally think the debt is something that we can’t afford to deal with until after we reverse the recession. I think Bill Clinton showed extraordinary wisdom when he suggested that the deficit/debt should be addressed when thinks are good, not in the middle of the worst recession since the Great Depression. But then the rest of their issues, that the Obama administration is spending money on unemployment, food stamps and Medicaid because of the massive up-tick in unemployment. And universal health care has not destroyed the governments of all other industrial democracies, or are Republicans saying that Greece, Ireland, China and Russia are dictatorships (well, China and Russia … never mind)? And this business of not obeying the laws of Congress, well, Bush’s attitude toward FISA and signing statements make that issue a lot more complex (except the Republicans I have talked to refuse to acknowledge Bush’s actions).

Are Republican and independents getting good information from their leaders and the right wing noise machine? Admittedly on the other side I wouldn’t know some things if I hadn’t stumbled on to Glenn Greenwald, but there is Charles Ferguson’s “Inside Job” and apparently Ezera Klein is not too bad. But a lot of the media is obsessed with being fair and finding two equal sides for every story, and there is a smaller group that does actually worship Obama (much like conservatives accuse). So the left doesn’t always have the best sources either, but at least they are there for people to find. As far as I know the right has no equivalent, only people like Bill O’Reilly, the late Andrew Breitbart, Matthew Vadum and Jack Kelly.

That’s the state of political debate today, and Jack Kelly’s contribution.

Jack Kelly Foreign Policy, and other fantasies ...

The first thing to say about today's Jack Kelly column “Dangerous naivete: Obama's policies allow radicals to rise in the Middle East” is that he wants you to change your view of Barack Obama depending what type of politics we are talking about. The Barack Obama who is masterminding the voter fraud to steal is an evil genius, while today's Barack Obama is a naive moron stupidly encouraging our enemies. Kelly starts with this "Since 2009, the percentages of Middle Easterners who have a favorable opinion of America, and of President Obama, have declined by 40 percent and 37 percent, respectively, according to Pew's annual poll." (Pew has an annual poll of Middle Easterners?). Kelly goes on to say that the "Arab Spring" has produced new breeding grounds for terrorists.

Personally I think that Middle Easterners see an America that in many ways is the same as America was under George Bush. We are killing civilians and we are still supporting the puppet governments of Iraq and Afghanistan that we cobbled together after we allowed better alternatives to be literally killed off. They don't like us because they see what we doing. Obama has turned out not only to not reach out to the Middle East, he is making thing worse. Of course they’re ticked off.

But Jack Kelly sees Barack Obama as a wide eyed innocent, blundering through the world thinking everyone who says they are our friend are actually our friends. Kelly sort of conveniently forgets the assassination program he mentioned Friday in an online column.

The thing is, Kelly’s world view apparently includes the idea that we can control the governments of other countries. Kelly talks about Carter’s naiveté concerning Khomeini and Obama’s naiveté concerning Eqypt’s President-elect Mohammad Morsi. It’s true that we were essentially able to install the Shah of Iran and various governments of South Vietnam in the past, but look how well that turned out for us in the long run. Kelly apparently thinks (or wants us to think) we still should be able to do this, or at least wants to blame Barack Obama for not doing it.

Mind you, Jack Kelly is not talking about installing democracy in the Middle East. In fact, our goals have never been about installing democracy in the Middle East, unless you were taken in by George W Bush’s claims about Iraq, made some time after we had actually invaded and hadn’t found anything (much) in the way of WMD’s and found that rather than Iraq already being involved with al Qaeda, our invasion had brought them in. Dubya decided that the real (third) reason we had invaded Iraq was to bring democracy to Iraq, which would then be an example to the rest of the Middle East. By the way, how well did that work out.

I mention all that because of Kelly’s line in his column – “The utter failure to date of his outreach efforts hasn't shaken Mr. Obama's confidence that the force of his personality will convert Islamists into democrats.”. Mr Kelly shows that selective memory, What he accuses Obama of is pretty close to what Dubya was supposed to be trying.

As I mentioned, Kelly’s world view apparently includes the notion that we can control who runs countries, at least in Middle East. Kelly suggests that Syria’s Assad and Libya’s Qaddafi (when he was alive), while brutal and supporters of terrorism, are/were “secular dictators who accepted limits ignored by ardent jihadists.” Is Jack Kelly really suggesting that we control Assad?

I remember the Star Trek episode where a history professor from earth established a form of Nazism on some underdeveloped planet. I suppose in some debating society venue there are arguments to be made for fascism as an efficient form of government, or Bashar al-Assad as a lesser evil. But surely we have learned from Saddam Hussein and Hosni Mubarak that our dictators do no better and in the end probably worse for countries, plus often end up creating lots of ill will towards us in a country we think is important to us (see Iranian government)(you don’t think Saddam was one of ours? See the Reagan and first Bush adminitrations).

By the way< Jack Kelly trots out the line about the Nazi’s “mentoring” the Muslim Brotherhood. I have read in other places that it occurred, but I don’t believe there is any current influence. But it is a powerful image for Jack Kelly, especially with Israel being right there (a little gratuitous, n’est pas?).

So isn’t Jack Kelly showing us his own naiveté about the Middle East? Take a country like Iraq, Iran, Egypt, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan or most others (including Saudi Arabia and Kuwait). Over the years that they have been ruled by kings or dictators, what has been their experience with democracy? How many democratic traditions have they built up? Well, OK, you say, what political traditions do they have … none, except being told what to do. At best the dictator was unable to totally suppress Islam. Which means that when democracy is thrust on an Eqypt or (to some extent) an Iraq, Islam is their only cultural tradition which can be linked to politics. Politicians able to show some links to Islam have a built in advantage.

But does all this mean we should advocate (or subvert, or whatever), as Kelly says, for “secular dictators”? That strikes me as unsustainable in the long run, and since we never know when the dictatorships will unravel, there is no way to help prepare for transition to some other government. Democracy (as we are finding ourselves – Citizens United) is not necessarily stable or sustainable, but still surely it is worth the effort.

Will the Muslim Brotherhood cause Egypt to run amok, causing problems in the region? Honestly I don’t know, all I can say is that in the last twenty five years, the region has had some problems from both Iran (theocracy) and Iraq (secular dictatorship). The region doesn’t have enough experience with democracy, but Kelly’s preferred secular dictatorships really haven’t done any better than the religious dictatorships. Jack Kelly’s assessment of Barack Obama as naïve suffers from its own form of naiveté.

It's never OK when Democrats do it.

Today's Jack Kelly Column about "Emperor Barack I" evokes a weird sense of deja vu. Have we all forgotten the time in the Bush administration maybe 2005, 2006 when John Yoo was talking about the "Unitary Executive" theory, essentially that famous statement immortalized in the movie "Frost/Nixon" - "When the President does it that means it is not illegal"?

I was watching the first season of "West Wing" in the last couple of days (my girlfriend had not seen it, I thought she might like it, so I took it out of the library). It strikes me that the era depicted in that show is currently gone. Now, one can certainly argue that 9/11 justified some of that change. A President at war does need additional powers to prosecute that war. And of course the "global war on terror", being a special kind of war, involved interesting problems in what powers might be needed. After all, the enemy does not have a home country where they can be found (or hold prisoners), wear's no uniform when fighting us so they could be anyone, has the most rudimentary of leadership structure so they are unable to sign the Geneva convention.

But many Americans (maybe even most)(who had an opinion) finally decided that warrant-less wiretaps entirely without independent monitoring of who knows who (supposedly only foreigners, but exactly hard would it be to listen in on Americans). Few Americans who aren't Republicans express unqualified support for the Patriot Act and in fact many (maybe most) Americans opposed it. But there it was, and first Republican Congresses and then a filibustered Democratic Senate was unable to help the American public. Assuming enough of Congress actually agreed that the Patriot Act is a enough of a bad thing.

Now, of course, Republicans now want to block anything and everything President Obama does. Although in some cases Republicans/conservatives seem selective about what they object to. Jack Kelly was at plans to tell us how granting the children of undocumented aliens essential amnesty is the act of an emperor (and then he goes into how political it is, and how Obama wants to steal the election by having illegals vote multiple times). Kelly also talked about Obama's assassination program, the one where Obama can kill even US citizens as long as they are suspected of being terrorists. But Kelly didn't mention the drone attack program, something that Glenn Greenwald has talked about numerous times. Could it be that Obama does something that Kelly approves of, wants to preserve for a potential President Romney?

The Presidency is often about pushing the bounds of power, from (Saint) Lincoln suspending habeous corpus to FDR's infinite Presidential terms (until death clipped that), trying to stack the court, all sorts of things, to Truman trying to nationalize the steel industry. If my liberal friends suggested Republicans do it more (in the last forty years) I would probably tend to agree. I mean, no one ever accused Jimmy Carter of being power mad.

But besides Obama's continuing the Bush administration's coddling of Wall Street and pushing the war in Afghanistan, there is the doubling down on whistle blowers, and the assassination program, which is new. Is it unprecedented? Personally, I don't think so.

I realize I have biases, but I think I can keep enough perspective to say whether something is a significant new precedent or not. Assassination is new, but as long as it is limited to (suspected) terrorists outside the US, even if some fraction are US citizens, then it perhaps more incremental than revolutionary.

Meanwhile, it seems safe to say that Jack Kelly is unconcerned about the concept of perspective; for him there is only a partisan agenda.

Kelly tries to make Obama into the liberal characterture of Dubya

Today's Jack Kelly column is a startling study in what information to leave out when you try to persuade your readers of a point of view. I don't believe anything Jack Kelly says (or anything he quotes) is, strictly speaking, untrue, but he leaves out information that would indicate the reverse of the points he is trying to make and, I would argue, tries to persuade us of arguments not supported by reality.

The title of the column plays off the media stereotype of Mitt Romney - "Out-of-touch Obama: The president doesn't understand how the private sector works". Right of the bat Kelly is referencing the soundbite from the President - "the private sector is doing fine". Pretty much everyone knows Obama was making a comparison between a weakly growing private sector and state and local governments that are laying off employees. Yeah, that sentence was a stupid thing for Obama to say, but the point of the entire press conference was not lost on the public, since right after Mitt Ronmney said we have enough teachers and firefighters right now, we don't need any more (maybe in the wealthy suburbs where your three current houses that I know of are).

Actually, starting with that title and in the rest of the column, it really reminded me of the media stereotype of George W Bush. Kelly starts the column talking about how Obama has set a record for fundraising appearances. This is certainly true (I have seen it reported elsewhere), but Jack Kelly omits a couple of interesting facts. First, in a list of the top ten groups that give money to candidates, seven of the ten are industry groups that are now giving to Republicans. The other three are unions that are now giving to Democrats, but they are in the process of shrinking largely because of what is being done to public service unions by Republican governors. The second point is, despite Obama's numerous fundraising appearances, Mitt Romney is now raising more money than him. So when Jack Kelly insinuates that Barack Obama does not understand how bad the economy is for ordinary folks because all he does is hang out with rich people at fundraisers, why shouldn't we think that applies even more to Mr Romney?

Kelly takes throwaway shots at Obama along the way, reminding us of Scott Walker's victory in Wisconsin and how he describes "green" energy projects as "crony capitalism". You have to kind of assume that Jack Kelly's readers know that billionaire businessmen are giving record amounts of money to Mitt Romney and other Republicans, so I guess this constant rant about "crony capitalism" is the far right's attempt to paint the Democrats as worse in this area. It is an attempt to paint efforts to curb carbon emissions as having a financial benefit for the President's pals. This all fits into the greater narrative of the far right, that global warming is an obviously refuted hoax, created to solidify government control of our lives redistribute wealth from the rich to the bureaucrats by robbing energy companies of their income and impoverishing us all. I guess, I don't really follow the sketchy logic of the far right world view (where Jack Kelly lives) all that well.

At this point in the column, Jack Kelly describes the current state of the economy, which is not good. I guess he does this to show that while Barack Obama is out of touch, Jack Kelly (and I suppose by extension we are supposed to think Mitt Romney) is in touch with the pulse of the economy. This could be a risky strategy; on Bill Maher's "Real Time" on Friday night David Frum suggested the hidden message of the Romney campaign is that Barack Obama can't fix the mess the Republicans created.

Jack Kelly then does an abrupt about face, he suggests that in fact Barack Obama is wrong about state and local governments. First Kelly cites an interesting unemployment number (4.2%) for government workers. Honestly I don't know quite why it is so low, but I will say that a) it is for the feds, state and local, and Media Matters takes considerable pains to explain the effect of state and local job cuts. Among others, they quote the Economist magazine expressing alarm about the job cuts.

Kelly then points out that state revenues grew by 4.1 percent in the first quarter of 2012. There are two reason why this statement is so incomplete as to be misleading. First of all, tax revenues starting falling hard in 2008. and didn't start recovering until 2010, and just like the economy at large, tax revenues have not recovered to 2008 levels (hint: part of that is unemployment not having dropped to 2008 levels). So to illustrate the point with totally made up numbers, if tax revenues were at 100 in 2008 (100 percent, perhaps), they might have dropped to, say 75% by 2010, and have slowly grown back by maybe 10 points in 2011 and now by 4 more points in the first quarter of 2012. That's still more than 10 points down from 2008 levels, and there is the state and local debt incurred in 2008 through 2010. The stimulus defrayed some of that in 2009 and 2010, but it was temporary and (now generally acknowledged) too small, so it is no surprise that state and local governments are scrambling to cut jobs - a half million or so in the last couple of years. Add in Republican governors pursuing an anti-union agenda to the mix, and we see a special enthusiasm for cutting government jobs.

Kelly also raises that old canard that government workers are paid 16 percent more in pay and benefits than public sector workers, but that misses the point that many government workers such as teachers pretty have to have at least bachelors degrees in order to teach. Government workers are, in general, better educated and therefore better paid than the private sector as an average. Actually, I have read that government workers are in fact more poorly paid than their equivalents education wise in the private sector (teachers making less than corporate trainers, for example).

But a larger point is that Jack Kelly is making contradictory arguments here. First he is telling us the economy in general and the private sector in particular are doing badly. Then he tells us that the public sector is doing well. Yet how can this be the case if states and local governments have to depend on tax revenues, which we have already indicated are likely quite reduced. Remember, they can only borrow for capital projects, and then only by issuing bonds. Kelly's contention that the private sector is doing well (too big) makes no sense. Which is one of the problems of the Republican narrative as a whole.

Kelly's final snark about Obama being more out of touch than Romney is undermined by Kelly's distortions by omission throughout his column. Maybe Obama is out of touch, but how would the Republicans know when they think a half million laid of workers is a sign of healthy state and local governments? And anyway it is still true that the Republican is building a car elevator in his vacation home.

Republicans and unemployment

Unemployment and its flip side job creation are things that have been bothering me recently. The issue has been important all through Obama’s Presidency, but it also neatly illustrates the depth of Republican hypocrisy.

Right at the beginning when the stimulus was moving through Congress, Republicans were already grumbling that the county couldn’t borrow and spend its way to recovery. Obligingly, Obama and Congressional Democrats made the stimulus some 40% tax cuts (because Republicans love tax cuts), but still no House Republican voted for the Stimulus. Could it be that because the tax cuts only benefited people with incomes below a quarter million that Republicans suddenly weren’t in favor of them.? Of course, three Republican Senators (the two women from Maine and Arlen Spector) did vote for the stimulus, after they had made it smaller (and thus less effective). But essentially the Republican Party as a whole said that the government could not help put people back to work, that temporary jobs (where people could afford to buy groceries, pay rent and not have to declare bankruptcy) would have no benefit to the economy.

After that for about nine months we had health care reform/death panels (and “you lie”). But once the ACA passed, we got close to the mid-terms and all of a sudden Republicans started talking about unemployment, after having tried anything and everything to block health care reform. Republicans found the unemployment message very useful in the mid-terms, and were able to take back the House. So of course in January when the new members took their seats, Congress immediately started to work on their campaign promises to address unemployment, yeah?

Well no, instead the Tea Party dominated House took the United States government to the brink of default and bankruptcy with the debt ceiling fiasco. Where was unemployment in January 2011 and after? Well, the Republicans stopped talking about it and so the media (feckless government watchdogs that they are) stopped talking about it.

After the debt ceiling debacle, the assassination of bin Laden (I won’t say anything about why that was a disaster here now), the Arab Spring and Libyan war, we did hear from some conservatives some occasional snarking particularly about how the Obama administration had (stupidly) said unemployment would not go over 8%, but mostly there was silence since the Republican House was not able to make the unemployment situation any better either.

By now we were getting to the Republican primary season, where the only thing the candidates could agree on was that Obama’s policies had failed, particularly for unemployment. Mind you, the Republican candidates had essentially no proposals of their own to make things better, mostly they pledged to undo what (little) Obama had gotten done, like repealing the ACA and Dodd-Frank.

Now somewhere around this time there was discussion about taxing the rich somewhat more heavily, by about four percentage points. Actually, the discussion really started in December of 2010 when the question of whether to let the Bush tax cuts expire or not came to a head (and Republicans took unemployment compensation hostage). When rich people started to complain aloud about having to fire gardeners and maids, Republican politicians and pundits took over the message and repackaged it by saying the small businesses would be hurt by this tax on the top bracket. You know, they told us, these are businesses so small that they do not become corporations (become incorporated) and thus file just a schedule C subject to personal tax rates, yet these small businesses are so profitable that they have over $250,000 grand in bottom line income (as opposed to 250 grand in revenue, from which expenses – like wages for employees and costs of supplies are supposed to be taken out before you get to bottom line income). Anyway, regardless of the fuzziness of the Republican tax and income logic and math, I think this is where we first started to hear about the wealthy being “job creators”. At least when they were talking about small business men (not persons, Republicans don’t roll that way), it almost made sense. But quickly job creator became a generic term for any and all members of the top 1%.

And when Mitt Romney emerged as the clear candidate, he had a ready made narrative about why he would be a better President that Obama. See, Mitt has business experience and he is a member of the top 1% income/wealth-wise of Americans. He has created jobs as a member of that 1%. And suddenly Republicans were talking about unemployment again.

Except that right around and after the debt ceiling debacle, Republicans were also fretting about the deficit. It is too high, it needs to come down so our children and the private sector aren’t strangled by it. The reason unemployment isn’t coming down, according to the Republicans, is because it is the private sector that creates jobs, not the government.

Wait a minute, isn’t there a point where Mitt is extolled as a superior candidate because of his experience in the private sector, creating jobs. But if the government can’t create jobs … shouldn’t we send Mitt back to Bain capital, since according the Republicans the government can’t … uh …

Just to square the circle, as I said Mitt wanted to run on his record, tell us it is his biggest asset. But when Democrats started to dig up deals where Bain ended up bankrupting or carving up some of the companies they acquired, and putting hundreds (or perhaps even thousands) out of work, Republicans accused Democrats of distorting the record . Still, if a candidate says that he is a superior candidate because of his record, isn’t it fair to look at that record?

Such is the tortured path of Republicans on unemployment as a political issue. Meanwhile, I can’t help bur remember Republican accusing John Kerry of being a flip flopper. I guess it is OK as long as the entire party does it together.

Jack Kelly on Wisconsin

Jack Kelly doesn't care.

This week Jack Kelly talks about Tuesday's recall election in Wisconsin. He starts by complaining that a headline from an unidentified collection of news sources "Walker survives recall in Wisconsin," is not vindictive enough. Kelly snarks about Reagan beating Mondale, Nixon beating McGovern, but doesn't say what the headline should have been (kind of weaseling out of actually telling us what specifically he believes).

By the way, Kelly weasels later when he tells us "A caller to a Washington D.C. radio station Tuesday said he was on his way from Michigan in a union-organized four bus caravan to vote in Wisconsin." without any verification or even telling us which radio show. A vague accusation that is impossible to verify, but I strongly suspect it will make the rounds of right wing blogs and Fox News.

But what most impressed me is that Jack Kelly admits Walker had much more money than Tom Barrett, but then says that Democrats outspent Republicans "in last year's recall elections, in their attempt to oust a conservative state Supreme Court justice and in the petition drive to force the election Tuesday.". Jack Kelly doesn't say how much was spent by Democrats or Republicans, or how much was spent in the 2010 general election. And perhaps most importantly, Jack Kelly doesn't mention how much of Walker's money for this recall came from out of state and/or wealthy donors.

Of course, the hidden subtext of this whole discussion is the Obama/Romney fight upcoming. Republicans have learned/verified that they can buy an election, even getting people to vote against their own interests with a candidate less likable than Ronald Reagan. Just barrage the State/nation with six times as much money as raised by the opposition.

The economy is still struggling, and Obama deserves his share of the blame for that. But so too do Republican Senators since 2006 and Representatives since 2010, with their absolute opposition to anything the Democrats propose. Still, States cutting funding for a half million public sector employees when unemployment is so high ... the only way Republicans can spin that is to point out it allows taxes to be cut (in a time of decreased revenue because of the recession!). Of course, we may all remember that the GOP (I believe Paul Ryan) has suggested that the payroll cut for the middle class was not useful at all, what we need is greater tax cuts for the top 1% (even though person income tax rates for the 1% are are at their lowest pretty much ever). Somehow that justifies putting a half million people out of work in this time of high unemployment.

Jack vs Gail and Maureen

There have been a lot of newspaper columns recently about Mitt Romney, now that he has clinched the nomination. Who is he, what is he all about? Although it is funny, I can't recall seeing anything about Romney's time as governor, only a piece or two about Bain's effect on that steel company, Romney's barber(ous)) attack on an assumed gay fellow student and Gail Collins continuous mention and occasional explanation of Shamus' car roof adventure. Somehow, the exposes of Romney's closet skeletons end up still being boring.

Maybe it was inevitable pundits attention would turn back to our previous once and future President, the orator who was supposed to help us all talk politely about race. But three years later, as he asks us for another term, we are left wondering what happened. The economy is not fixed, somehow the fixed healthcare system hasn't yet made much of a ripple, and racial issues seem alternatively swept under the rug and popping up inconveniently. Oh yes, and the President recently finally suggested gays should enjoy the same rights of marriage as straight America (which considering our divorce rate is not much of a blessing).

So today Jack Kelly has a column describing in typical detail how the President is losing support. As I thought about this column, I noticed Gail Collins had an interesting column on John Edwards' recent acquittal in court that was not any sort of absolution. And today Maureen Dowd writes her own detailed examination of Obama: "Dreaming of a Superhero", wondering what happen to our once and future President.

Kelly's column talks about George McGovern's 1972 defeat, he wants us to believe a similar defeat is coming. Kelly then goes through various groups, Jews, Catholics and veterans, and how they don't like Obama for a variety of reasons. Now, from what I can see, probably there are some special interest groups (possibly right leaning) that do have a grudge (legitimate, not? you decide), but I am not sure that translates to actual voters (how many voters will base their vote on our Iran policy?). Kelly also mentions the various Democrats who are running away from Obama's attacks on Bain because the party is dependent on Wall Street money (we might see voters turn on those Democrts who defend Wall Street as hypocrites). But the message the title of Kelly's column: "Defecting from Obama: The president is losing ground among 2008 supporters" (which of course Kelly doesn't actually deal with) does seem worth considering.

Barack Obama had an interesting voter coalition in 2008. I do think there was a hard core of racism in America that Obama had to get past. He did that in a few ways, benefiting from the economic collapse, winning some voters over with his oratory skills, bringing a lot of young voters into the electorate (well, even doubling the number of under 24 voters actually is still a pretty small number, but it is something) and John McCain's poor performance in the debates.

Now it is June now, and while it would be nice for Obama if he had a commanding lead now, there is still a long road to the election. However, it is hard to see how Obama can win young people, possibly even the ones who voted for him in 2008. As I suggested above, things have no gotten better faster enough, and while (I think) there are lots of reasons for that, eventually people do blame the President (even as they would (perhaps naively) give him credit when things are good).

Maureen Dowd actually does look at Obama in detail in her fairly fascinating column. Obama showing signs when he is a community organizer of being unwilling to take risks, until he is forced to? Obama in New York, feeling he is too white, and could never find a black woman he would be comfortable with? Obama dreaming of being a super hero? This is interesting stuff. I am not sure whether it would make an average voter more or less likely to vote to keep Obama in the White House, although it makes me want to have dinner with Obama and try to have a frank discussion.

Gail Collins Saturday column did not mention Obama at all, although I have to say he is an unspoken shadow in the column. Collins simply rakes Edwards over the coals and good for her. Conservatives like Kelly like to say that Democrats never police their own, but Collins' column is a dissection in detail of John Edwards, his shallowness on policy compared to John Kerry and Bill Clinton. Make no mistake, John Edwards health care reform proposal dragged Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama toward the left during the campaign (didn't last into his Presidency for Obama), but Collins catches Edwards not knowing about a peripheral policy. Collins doesn't want to see Edwards doing anything public going forward, and I am heartened to say every Democrat I have heard comment on it echoes that message.

Does Dowd's column amount to a similar negative dissection of Obama? I don't think so. It is the sort of thing that would have been good to have had in 2008, but honestly I think it makes him seem a lot more like the rest of us. I think polls say that voters/Americans still like Obama more than they dislike him. Now, the sluggish progress of Obama's may keep voters at home, but I have to wonder, when voters look at the other choice, what will they think? Conservatives like to point out taxpayers get a lot of benefits from the Feds (what is it, half getting a net plus from the government?); will those taxpayers realize Romney wants to take a lot of those benefits away form them?

Which bias?

I have heard other bloggers (at Podcamp) say to never apologize for not posting. Yeah, but, you feel bad ...

I mentioned before that Jack Kelly himself is writing more columns. I don't believe I mentioned that there is a comments section at the bottom of his (and I assume all PG columnists') column. I have been frolicking (so to speak) there. Kelly has his share of ditto heads. People who think that Obama's not having released his transcripts proves something nefarious.

I am back here today for Jack Kelly's Sunday column, where he spins a story of how biased the media is toward Barack Obama, and how since it has been done so many times, it might be losing its effect.

Let's look at these broad statements first, before getting to picking apart some of his statements in detail. Now obviously everything I say is colored by my opinion, so your mileage may vary (as they say) in your reaction to what I say. I hope y'all realize the same is true for Kelly, that is the whole point of my doing this. But I will say now that watching Meet the Press or This Week (with Stephanopolus/Ammanpur/Tapper - and no, I don't feel like finding the correct spellings), these shows almost always start a discussion from the conservative point of view. The discussions were always "what's bad about the health care reform plan""Why are people so angry in town hall meetings""What about the death panels" or before the midterms "Why hasn't the President done more to lower unemployment". I believe a Jack Kelly would deny this as an evidence of bias, and spin it around somehow. Now, I will admit I think the press has shown a certain amount of affection for the President as a person. I think they like him in a way that they did not like George Bush (maybe because they sensed Bush's antipathy towards the press when he called a New York an asshole or maybe because in some ways Bush seemed like a dry drunk). But I don't think that affection for Obama carries over into discussions of policy.

Cory Booker's recent defense on Meet The Press of a generic "private equity" and Harold Ford's and Steve Rattner's defense of Cory Booker shed's light on another interesting media bias - a willingness to let Wall Street off the hook for past and current crimes and misdeeds. While the example I gave is of Democratic politicians, I will say that it is only media outside the "mainstream" that really seem to be investigating, examining and complaining about Wall Street and their actions. I am talking about Mother Jones, Democracy Now, Democratic Underground, Huffington Post, Talking Points Memo, scores of liberal blogs, etc, etc. I mean you get the occasional New Yorker or Vanity Fair piece, which are generally only partially negative (don't want to bite the hand ...) and there is Paul Krugman's column in the New York Times. I may have missed one or two (they're in the "etc's"), but by and large these outlets can be dismissed as fringe or having a known bias. The "mainstream media" chuckles at their antics, pat them on the (collective) head and tell them to leave Real News to Real Reporters. Real News being anything that doesn't harm Wall Street. (Honestly, do they know they are on TV on "Washington Week in Review"; maybe that's why it is on Fridays, to do the least harm).

To some of Kelly's more specific charges, I will say that despite the Monica Lewinsky episode, or perhaps because of it, the Press does show some deference to political candidates. Did you know that Al Gore developed what he thought of as almost an addiction to marijuana after he came home from Vietnam (yes, Al went to Vietnam, as a journalist, but still in country, unlike Dubbya)? I suspect most everyone who reads this blog also knows that George W Bush had a cocaine habit in the eighties (in fairness, like a lot of people who could afford it) in addition to his drinking problem. But think about it, do you recall any major news stories on these particular topics? I am certain 95% of the media knew these stories were out there, but chose not to talk about them. Deference.

With that in mind, what about Jack Kelly's complaint that the media is using Romney's Morman faith to attack him. Well, we have not had a Morman President, surely some in the public are curious about a religion that seems to be such a big part of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. That the religion's history and/or relative weirdness reflects badly upon Romney is not the fault of the messengers. And should it be a secret that Mitt Romney is very, very wealthy? Jack Kelly thinks talking about Romney's wealth is showing bias, although presumably he is eager to talk about Romney's business skills as a basis for being President (although not his time as Governor of Massachusetts apparently). Kelly thinks that the media is wrong on the facts of "a nasty prank" from 1965 based on the victim's sister who "said she had no knowledge of the incident but that the portrayal of her brother was "factually inaccurate"". Hmm, could a victim of a vicious attack based on the victim's supposed homosexuality keep that from his family? I don't know if John Lauber is or isn't gay and frankly don't care, it is only important that a young Mitt Romney apparently thought he was, and that humiliating Lauber was something Romney should do. We also know the adult Romney thought that the family dog should ride in a crate with a windscreen strapped to the roof of the family station wagon on the highway. Romney says the dog liked it up there, but I suspect dog owners could tell us about how far dogs will go to please their owners. Had the dog traveled at highway speeds up on that perch before or if ti had, had it been up there that long? Regardless of that, on that particular trip the dog reacted with what I think many of us suspect was terror, and had considerable diarrhea. Romney reaction was to hose to dog and car off and continue. Yet according to Kelly we should never have heard these stories as they show the clear bias of the media, he thinks we should know only what Romney wants us to know about his character. Kelly then pivots and launches a series of attacks on Obama under the guise of things the media didn't cover even though they are crucial. Isn't that actually being hypocritical?

Kelly talks about the primaries in Arkansas and Kentucky, how other candidates (or "uncommitted") got 4 in ten votes. Kelly gushes, when Eugene McCarthy got 40 percent of the vote in New Hampshire in 1968, Lyndon Johnson decided not to run for re-election. Well, maybe there were other, more important factors in Johnson's decision (Vietnam, although the primary vote may have sealed that decision), and of course, New Hampshire fall in a different place in the primary season than Arkansas and Kentucky. But it is fine with me that Jack Kelly is that excited about this.

Kelly then comes back to Jeremiah Wright (and later he will go back to Obama's birthplace, again). Look, frankly, I am a bit alarmed at what Wright has said (and I don't know if it was once, occasionally or all the time that he God-damns America and expresses hatred of white people). But keeping in mind that at least in the past I probably had more contact with African Americans on TV than in real life (I always had some, more recently), I might be forgiven for thinking that I wish they would stop being scary criminals, get over it and just get along with us white people. But I have also always had the thought at the back of my mind - I have no idea what life is like as a black man - or less to my credit - I am glad to have that extra little advantage of being white, for while we have no secret handshake, there is the implicit connection of shared heritage that most of us whites are not "Christian" enough to extend to blacks. Now, I don't think I would say whites are born with a leg up, but I think most honest people would say that all blacks in America, even Jaden and Willow Smith, are born with a leg down with at least some and often most white people.

I could go into more detail about my thoughts of race relations, but suffice to say what I learned from reading and a few conversations with blacks, the constant oppression over literally two hundred year of blacks in America puts perspective on Reverend Wright's feelings about history. Douglas Blackmon wrote a book "Slavery by Another Name" that puts a different perspective on segregation (more than just separate water fountains). I think Reverend Wright, far from intending to offend, is trying educate everybody in America (although he cares more that blacks get a positive message about their own situation). Kelly wants to pin guilt by association on Obama, even as he wants to exempt Mitt Romney from the same treatment. Yet we have already heard about Jeremiah Wright (even if Kelly thinks an Obama supporter trying to buy him off makes him relevant again), we are only just now learning about about Mitt Romney, and his associations.

before putting Obama's birthplace in Kenya, Kelly mentions lawsuits brought by the Catholic Churches top hierarchy. It is a sad and cynical statement that the only contraceptive the church can attack is the one that has medical uses as well, and that the church claims a constitutional right to oppress poor women. But we have heard the story in the last few months and know that Republicans have tricked the Church into being being their dupes.

And finally we get (back) to Obama being born in Kenya, which one literary agent had written in a book of clients in the nineties. That trumps the birth certificate, newspaper notices and family memories. Kelly thinks this one point should be the headline story, trumping unemployment, natural disaster and *some* international news (the triumph of austerity in Europe and/or the triumph of the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt could *share* the headlines).

Kelly's column really is nothing more that the umpteen millionth recycling of the eternal conservative complaint that Nixon made (probably not even the first instance) about the vast Eastern intellectual conspiracy. Kelly speculates that the familiarity of the liberal bias in the media might render it impotent this time (certainly the mainstream media, let alone left wing media, has no chance to penetrate the right wing noise machine for those immersed in it). As I argued, the mainstream media is actually rather more conservative in their leanings than liberal. Conservatives themselves have done an excellent job of playing their own race card, in part by accusing Democrats of playing the race card, and making sure Barack Obama's blackness has stayed front and center (if often unspoken) for many to fear or despise, and many others to show contempt towards. But I think there is a danger of the conservative noise machine falling into the very trap Kelly thinks the mainstream media is in, of showing too much bias, of trumpeting faux issues while ignoring the real problems in ordinary people's lives.

And once again, what is the PG thinking?

Jack Kelly wants to help Obama get re-elected

Or so it would seem in today's column.

Well, actually, not really.

By the way, I've noticed that almost if not every week, the Obama administration/campaign is described by Kelly as desperate.

The theme this week is a Kelly implication that Joe Biden is such a liability to Obama that he should be dumped. No wait, Kelly says, that would smack of too much desperation. And there is so much for Obama to be desperate about, great Republican victories in the recall primary (although I thought primaries were separate races?) and the fact that in the West Virginia Primary 40% of the vote went to a convict currently incarcerated in Texas. Kelly uses the term "Slow Joe" for Joe Biden, a not so subtle suggestion that Biden is retarded. Definitely another dog whistle column.

I do have admit that with the weak economy Obama is vulnerable. I don't expect that a lot of people are reading Glenn Greenwald, so not a lot of people are seeing the liberal criticism of Obama. Greenwald had a good piece about Obama's relationship with the banks (which actually referenced a Newsweek piece on that subject, an indication maybe more people will see it). There are several reasons to be annoyed with Obama, things that liberals are saying quite different from the conservatives complain about (not enough tax breaks for the rich).

Still, I think that the merits and detriments of both sides need to be considered. Frankly at this point Romney and the Republicans have literally no merits, nothing for the economy or foreign policy. While Obama does have his faults to be sure, so too the Republicans have them, I believe at least slightly more. Perhaps when re-elected Obama can be talked out of the drone program, the assassination program, the bank coddling ... maybe Obama will let loose on one or more of those, once the first (actually) black President is re-elected (actually because of course Bill Clinton claimed to be the first black President). By contrast, I suspect Romney will not revert to moderate (like he was in Massachusetts), and I think the Republicans will maintain all the policies of Obama's that we don't like now. Nor do I think it will be possible to convince Romney to change those programs (much like Bush did pretty much whatever he wanted).

Columns like this "Slow Joe" are just a distraction, and I still wonder whether the PG really wants to be associated with the wild sorts of accusations backed by shaky facts that Jack Kelly keeps making.

Kelly on Earth Day

As I mentioned recently that instead of reining Jack Kelly in (fact checking or limiting his shilling for the Tea Party), the PG has expanded Jack Kelly's column's. On Tuesday Jack Kelly suggested that Earth Day was ignored this year because people realize Climate Change is a hoax. Now, I have to agree that Earth Day was not a big event this year. Would it surprise you to know I disagree about why that was the case?

Kelly starts with by slamming the turnout for an Earth Day rally at the DC mall. I have no idea where he got his information, since the five hits I found in Google search I made never mentioned a number for turnout. In fact, only two of the five were about the DC rally, and the Washington Post talked about the rain that day instead of the turnout. Fairly clever of Kelly to talk about something difficult to verify.

Kelly mentions "Gallup's annual environment poll" where he claims that concern about Climate Change has declined since 2000, and that of seven issues (not defined), "global warming" ranked lowest. I couldn't find that particular poll, but I did find other Gallup polls that indicate a slim majority believe climate is real and something to be concerned about, and has since 2000. Kelly does go on to suggest that in a difficult economy and with a violent occupation still going on in Afghanistan, "People who worry where their next meal is coming from tend not to worry much about polar bears or the rainforest" Not that Climate Change is concerned solely with polar bears or the rainforest, but being snide is much more fun than being accurate. Kelly's next sentence - "But it's due mostly to the collapse of hysteria about anthropogenic (man-made) global warming." sets the tone for the rest of the column.

As part of that tone, Kelly also takes a cheap shot at a favorite conservative target - "As recently as 2006, former Vice President Al Gore could claim that as a result of melting polar and glacial ice, sea levels could rise as much as 23 feet in a century, and draw a respectable audience. That's inconceivable now." I can't be certain but I guess Kelly is referring to Al Gore's Climate Reality event last September. As before, I made a Google search and found some conservative claims that there wasn't much of an audience, but little in the way of impartial analysis of the audience.

So I have spent a lot of time on the first six or so paragraphs of this Kelly column, with several more to go. But I think I can deal with them more succinctly. Kelly next quotes several "climate scientists" who (I suppose) reveal the truth about global warming (so to speak). He first mentions a James Lovelock, "perhaps the most prominent scientist among the alarmists". Lovelock apparently said "We were supposed to be halfway toward a frying world now" and that would be interesting if a) anyone had actually said that by 2012 we would be halfway to a "frying world" (whatever that means) and b) I could recall ever having heard of James Lovelock before. Apparently he was a visionary in the 1970's, back when everyone was talking about Climate Change(?). Oh wait, the seventies was overpopulation, which of course has not panned out (even though we are almost seven billion now, but fortunately the populaiton rate is declining).

Kelly goes on to mention "climate scientists" Richard Lindzen, John Christy,Roy Spencer and Gordon Fulks. They are identified by several sources as climate change deniers, yet Jack Kelly identifies them as climate scientists, essentially intentionally misleading his readers.

Now, as far as I know, Kelly is not far off when he says that "In March, the CRU said a study it has completed for Britain's Met(eorological) Office indicates global temperatures have risen just 0.75 degrees Celsius (1.35 degrees Fahrenheit) since 1900.". What I will say is that really smart people, all the National Academies of Science, NOAA, NASA, the American Meteorological Society, the UK's Climate Research Unit, etc, all say that the level of warming we have experienced and will continue to experience (even if we stop burning fossil fuels now) are significant. To accept what Jack Kelly says, you have to agree that the National Academy of Science, NASA, NOAA, the American Meteorological Society and the rest are captive to a vast liberal conspiracy, that their so-called science are nothing more than lies.

Is that what the PG wants to tell its readers?

The column Jack Kelly should write/have written

Today I saw a column about how certain significant parts of the media (really the most well known parts - the Washington Post, The Atlantic, The New York Times. Time, NBC) are slavishly trumpeting the achievements of the Obama administration, and in return are granted extensive access - to Osama bin Laden's private documents, to the White House Situation Room and to comments from high officials. My first thought was this is the sort of thing Jack Kelly wants to say exists, yet it was not a product of the PG and/or Jack Kelly. This column came from Salon and Glenn Greenwald . I suppose I should have known it could not be Jack Kelly since the column was rather scrupulously fair. The column noted that much the same thing (part of the press corp being slavishly positive and thus being granted exclusive access) occurred during the Bush administration. I would suggest that some time during Bush's second term increasing parts of the press corps started to attack the Bush administration, but certainly it seemed the press was incredibly faithful in reporting exactly what the administration wanted them to say in the run up to the war in Iraq.

The lesson Greenwald takes from this similarity of affairs (I assume one might well find such a situation in all administrations going back 40 years or more) is that the motivation of these reporters is specifically not political. The reporters are not interested in supporting Obama because he is a Democrat per se, they are intoxicated by the proximity to the power of the office. I will say I remember Bob Woodward (surely the very icon of liberal journalism) wrote some rather positive books about George Bush during the Bush administration, books made at least better by some pretty exclusive access.

Still, the point of Greenwald's column should not be understated. The Obama administration have taken drone attacks to a new level, both in Afghanistan and Pakistan. There is a war on whistle blowers and on legal (at the state level) medical marijuana that has exceeded not only what the Bush administration did, but to some extent all previous administrations. There is the assassination of Anwar Al-Awlaki and his son, both American citizens, without the benefit of trial or any sort of due process. There is even the failure of the administration to examine the activities of the Bush administration.

I suppose it is good news that the Obama administration has not come up with some "unitary executive" theory of government, although it is bad enough that the administration is saying these assassinations of American citizens are being reviewed and decided on by a secret group of advisers. Even though Kelly (stupidly) thinks that a liberal media is in bed with the Obama administration, his actual point that the press is not doing its job; it is not challenging the administration on many substantive issues. Unfortunately Kelly can almost always only just repeat the (Tea) Party line, so he is no help on this front either.

Too bad the PG hasn't syndicated Glenn Greenwald.

Facts or Dog Whistle?

Let's look with an open mind at the President. I will say that Obama could have done more with the economy if a Republican blocked Senate and (now) Republican controlled House had helped him out. In areas where Obama does have control (and I am not talking about this silly "Fast and Furious" thing) Glenn Greenwald claims Obama is behaving immorally and frequently illegally (you can read the variety yourself at Greenwald's columns). Yet the majority of Republican attacks on Obama do not use anything Greenwald says. Jack Kelly did write "Obama can kill you", but even then Kelly contradicted his own past statements and claimed no liberals were covering this issue (thus losing credibility with anyone who has read Greenwald).

I didn't write a post last week, in part because I noticed Jack Kelly is writing more than I thought, and I started to think I should go back and write about these mid week efforts. I might still do that (I guess it started in the last month).

Even though I missed last week, looking back at last week's column "Obama the loser: His arrogance, ignorance and laziness have led to failed policies" and this week's column "Romney might win big: He's talking issues while Democrats attack", there is a certain irony in Kelly first attacking (and also insulting) Obama, then turning around and claiming that Democrats are the ones making personal attacks.

So Kelly claims that while Democrats are only attacking Romney, Romney is raising real issues. Yet Kelly fails to mention any specific policy issues, and at best raises a sort of non-policy issue of competency. Competency is a complicated issue (how does one look at Massachusetts, and "Romneycare"?), but let's face it, Kelly's column is essentially a series of dog whistles, not specifics. Right off the bat, he mentions Hillary Rosen and Obama eating (being fed) dog as a child in quick succession. (By the way, do you think there is a difference between an adult deciding to place his dog on the roof of his car for a multi-hour highway trip and a child living with a stepfather and his mom after his biological dad abandoned them?).

To his credit, Kelly does note that others say that a second term election is a referendum on the current President's performance, yet refuses to connect the dots and admit that said referendum essentially means attacks on (not issue discussions with) the President. Although maybe he tacitly admits that, since he gives us personal attacks on Obama before and after the referendum remark, and also last week.

Why doesn't Jack Kelly give us any issues that Romney is (supposedly) talking about? Maybe because the policies Romney advocates are things like the Ryan budget, eliminating the department of Housing and Urban Development and the state and local tax deduction for itemization. Romney says he doesn't worry about the very poor because they have a safety net, yet he promises wealthy donors to gut that safety net (partly through eliminating HUD) when he (Romney) thinks the general public can't hear.

In any event, Jack Kelly's attacks on Democrats and Obama certainly seem like dog whistle type attacks, and (perhaps you'll agree) distortions of reality. For example, Kelly says "this time Democrats are emphasizing abortion and gay rights". Well, whatever you think of how the Affordable Care Act controversy concerning paying for contraception played out, everyone should agree it was about contraception, not abortion. And as fas as I know, it has been Rick Santorum talking about gay rights, not Democrats (except perhaps in response to Santorum) and certainly not Obama.

As I mentioned at the topic of this post, there are reasons to attack Obama. But unfortunately in our current system there end up only two candidates to choose from, so we have to choose from that tiny pool. Between the two, I think there is a possibility that Obama could be persuaded to change his ways. I think that people like Jack Kelly push Mitt Romnney so far to the right that he will sign into law the gutting of government aid to the poor. (Which of course raises the question of why the PG allows Jack Kelly to continue to write columns, let alone expanding his platform)

Romney has a "Bitterly Clinging" moment

Everybody must know by now that Mitt and Ann Romney spoke to wealthy donors in Palm Beach. You'd think after Barack Obama's experience in the last campaign (in 2008), candidates would never stray from their public script (maybe if there was only one other person in the room).

Romney promises the wealthy additional tax cuts (nothing we haven't heard before), and apparently says they will be paid for with some cuts in deductions and cutting some cabinet level departments. He suggests that education could be reduced until its only activity was to bust teacher's unions, and HUD might not be around too much longer.

But I found the suggestion of which deductions he would end most interesting. I mean, ending the mortgage deduction for second homes might have hurt some of the donors at the event. Which means I should give points to Romeny for at least doing that. However, Romney immediately loses points when someone for suggesting ending the deductionS (for itemizing purposes) of State and Local taxes. I mean, sure, Florida has no state income taxes (only real estate taxes, which Romney did not suggest ending) so no better places to announce that. But ending that deduction would hurt middle class itemizers, especially those who have more modest houses. The Republicans accuse Obama of initiating class warfare, and then Romney pulls this.

But Mitt's real "bitterly clinging" moment is when he and Ann talk about what a gift Hilary Rosen's charge that Ann Romney had never worked a day in her life is. Hmm, the Romney's care so much about women that they will exploit any comment made about Romney (Ann or Mitt) (comment not even made by Obama, but stuck to Obama by the Romney's).

Two things about this. First Romney made a comment a while back that a poor single mom should have to work to get welfare. So much for how much like real work for pay raising children is. Of course, considering how Bill Clinton ended long term welfare, the earned income credit is one of the few ways single (working) women can get any government assistance. Still, Romeny is falling easily into a contradiction. Not a good way to attract independents and undecideds.

Second, I have to say, glancing at the Romney biography on Wikipedia, the Romeny's had kids at an awfully early age. They started in undergrad, and had at least one more before Mitt finished grad school. A heck of an example for the moralizing Republicans clearly want to do. Much like Romney has taken to calling Obama a Harvard educated snob, funny considering Romney has twice as many Harvard graduate degrees as Obama.

As I said, a "bitterly clinging" moment.

Kelly weighs in on Zimmerman

Strangely, although I was able to buy a Post-Gazette Sunday "Early Edition" at 8:30am yesterday morning, Jack Kelly's column has not made it to the PG web edition at of 9:50am on Sunday morning. So no link yet (maybe later).

Today Jack Kelly declares his man love for Rick Santorum, and describes the steamy weekend they had in ... what, your print edition doesn't have that column? Well, show me a link ...

Naw, today Jack Kelly veers away from racist economics and returns to racist sociology, talking about how the media, in talking about George Zimmerman, engaged in a "Rush to Judgment" (see, this is where there would be a link, since "Rush to Judgment" is the title of Kelly's column).

This is something of a complicated topic. It would be impossible to deny that there has been a lot of attention paid to this topic, one crime out of hundreds of thousands. Yet, what my girlfriend pointed out to me when I mentioned Kelly's line of thought here, is that without all that media attention, Zimmerman would not have been arrested. Probably that is the result Kelly would have wanted. On a recent Bill Maher, a conservative (woman, I forget who) was complaining that Zimmerman was/is being convicted by liberals without having a day in court, to which Van Jones (who was also on) plaintively said "That's what we want, Zimmerman in court".

Of course, that's not all Kelly said. One issue he raised was a surveillance tape from the police station when Zimmerman was brought in for questioning on the day Martin was shot. I saw a brief version on the Maher show, and first of all, you certainly see Zimmerman from the front. One of Zimmerman's claims is that Martin punched him in the nose. Well, there was no sign of blood on Zimmerman from the front. Even if the paramedic's cleaned him up, it seems likely his shirt would have shown some blood, yet there was none I could see. Perhaps the paramedics or cops gave Zimmerman a clean shirt ... but why would the cops or paramedics have a spare shirt? How far do we have to stretch the bounds of credibility?

Now, Kelly claims there is a longer version that shows injuries to that back of Zimmerman's head, supporting his claim that Trayvon Martin had been slamming Zimmerman's head to the ground (perhaps sidewalk pavement). Now, once again, my girlfriend has been paying a lot of attention to this issue, and just recently has had the time to search on the internet. She says she saw a longer version of the police tape, and she disagrees with what Kelly says. Given that Zimmerman claimed a nose injury for which no evidence was shown on the tape, and the explanation for why there is no sign is tortured and far fetched, it calls Kelly's statement into doubt.

On another point Kelly raises, there is, first, the fact that Zimmerman called 911 so often that the police had him call some other number to report "crimes", to keep him from clogging the 911 line. So he called the number on the fateful day, and talked to an operator. Kelly details how there is the actual version of the call, that somehow shows Zimmerman is not being racist, compared to an edited soundbite that was replayed by the media countless times. I disagree, I think the longer version shows the same racism as the shorter version, it actually adds American stereotypes about black crime. For example, Zimmerman asserts (at the time) Martin "looks like he is up to no good, or on drugs or something. It's raining and he is just walking around, looking around".

And by the way, let's not forget what Kelly doesn't mention, that Zimmerman tells the police operator that he is following Martin, to which the operator replies "we don't need you to do that". Zimmerman did anyway, carrying a gun, which, especially in light of what then transpired, I think provides ample evidence to support a charge (if not conviction) of reckless endangerment.

There is also apparently a (and pardon the word, I am quoting) "coon" remark, which I don't know much about. I could easily find out, but I haven't been motivated to do so. So apparently this remark is on tape (perhaps Zimmerman was still talking to the police operator). Kelly claims what is actually said is "It is (expletive(fucking?)) cold". Was Zimmerman focused on Trayvon Martin or on the weather?

Kelly also mentions an incident where a black Sanford homeless man is killed by the son of a cop, and that Zimmerman is "foremost" aomng those calling for justice. Citation? No no, we are just supposed to accept Kelly's word for it.

But the final straw(s) for me are how Kelly ends his column. As an example of a rush to judgment, Kelly brings up the Duke lacrosse case, and then brings up Dan Rather's story about letters to get Dubya Bush into the Texas Air National Guard as example of what should happen to reporters who quote facts they (Kelly would say) they know are untrue. Kelly never mentions what should happen to columnists who selectively present facts, who quote what are deliberate lies.

But what is most important to me is that Kelly refuses to discuss the Martin/Zimmerman case on its own merits, and instead raises these two Republican dog whistle issues. When Democrats/liberals say that the current bad economy was caused by events that occurred on George W Bush's watch, Republicans/conservatives ask when it will become Obama's economy and for Democrats/liberals to stop bringing up ancient history. Yet Duke Lacrosse was apparently from 2006 and the Rather thing from 2004.

Democrats are not models of consistency and Obama, as President has done things which should be grave crimes. Yet Republicans/conservatives, in a depressing race to the bottom, and as exemplified in part by Jack Kelly's various columns, continue to show how they would (as they did from 2000 to 2008, and particularly from January 2003 to December 2006) make things so much worse. Jack Kelly shows with his dissembling about the Martin/Zimmerman issue/case what sort of commitment to the truth he has.

Why does the PG allow him to present the distorted and deceptive conservative perspective?

Kelly wants the poor and unemployed to suffer

I have said before, Jack Kelly is no economist. Today, he is toeing the Tea Party line about government spending, even to the point of questioning Paul Ryan's conservative credentials, based on the budget the House just passed. Kelly goes so far as to suggest (without attribution to any source) "Trouble starts with sluggish growth, but ends typically with a spectacular crash, hyperinflation and depression". I'm surprised he didn't mention frogs and boils.

Kelly simply makes statements like that throughout his column, lumping together unemployment, slow growth and high gas prices and blaming "chiefly" the government. Since government measures show inflation at no more than 2.9 percent, Kelly references the American Institute for Economic Research which has it's own ""Everyday Price Index"" that says inflation "rose 7.2 percent" (a year, a month; Kelly doesn't say). If what the government says is inconvenient, find someone who says the right things

By the way, Kelly has referenced the American Institute for Economic Research previously. It is described on the internet as centrist, but there are indications of an agenda (involving George Mason University?!).

Kelly keeps on in this vein, quoting Republican donor Ray Dalio among others or making his own interesting assertions: "The nations which recover fastest after a crash are those which sharply restrict government interference in the economy. The "economic miracle" in post-WWII Germany is the most spectacular example, but history is replete with others." I don't know what the government of post-WWII Germany did, but I have to wonder if Jack Kelly has heard of the Marshall Plan?

Kelly's grasp of economics is pretty clearly murky at best. He is trying to appeal to "common sense", that running deficits is not sustainable, that government regulations - rules of behavior, are ruining the free market and thus causing the slowdown and our current massive unemployment. He simply ignores the housing bubble, the incredible fraud amoung financial institutions - a willful blindness. He has no idea what following his advice would actually achieve/cause.

But further there is the sheer meanness of what he proposes. As I said earlier, Kelly apparently can't support the Ryan budget "Yet when times are tough, few propose that government tighten its belt. The budget that House Republicans passed last week is "thinly veiled social Darwinism," Mr. Obama said. But even under the GOP budget, federal spending rises year after year.".

The Ryan budget in fact (vaguely) reduces government spending across the board, including "reforming" Medicare by giving senior citizens a voucher for private care. When that program was attempted during the Bush administration, it consistently lost money (the government had to give the private insurance companies more and more money). The reason the Ryan budget still grows the deficit is that the Ryan budget actually forces the defense department to accept more money than was planned in the event Congress couldn't agree to a budget (at least for next year). Kelly apparently wants defense at least not to grow, if not shrink.

Make no mistake, though, Paul Ryan, Jack Kelly and the rest of Republicans, conservatives and the Tea Party wants domestic spending to largely disappear. Unemployment compensation, aid to families with dependent children, Child's health program, aid to public schools, basic research in health (the National Institutes of Health), aid to poor students to go to higher education of any kind, Mediciad ... all on the chopping block. Think about what the country would look like if we ended unemployment compensation; according to Republicans more American would find jobs, and possibly some few would accept huge cuts in pay, taking a job as a McDonalds fry cook after having made cars. But there are only so many McDonalds jobs, let alone good paying jobs that companies seem to have but don't offer to those who are currently unemployed. Further the ones who didn't find a job before their retirement savings (their dreams for the future) run out, who still can't make ends meet or don't have savings, they would end up perhaps on the street. The country would not have the benefit of the spending fueled by unemployment compensation - the foreclosures our neighbors would suffer and the sales at mostly grocery stores.

Which brings me to my final point (I know, finally). Just before throwing Ryan under the bus, Kelly says "The federal government will spend about 31 percent more in the current fiscal year than was spent in 2008. The president's cronies will benefit. Most Americans won't.". What goes into current federal spending? Is some significant fraction money flowing to liberal-owned solar power companies, like Kelly would like you to think? Not so far as I can see. But what is different between 2008 and the current year. Well, the stock market crashed in the fall of 2008, but the real effects of that did not really hit until Obama took office in 2009. Since then, some say "automatic stabilizers" such as unemployment compensation and food stamps are the biggest part of the what (actually smaller) increase in federal spending has occurred. This as unemployment went from 5% in January of 2008 to near ten percent in January of 2010.

Without this spending, those who were unemployed would have had suffered so much more. The rest of us would not have had the benefit of their spending. Essentially the country would have slipped into a full blown depression. Period. And Jack Kelly's blathering can't change that. The 2009 stimulus was too small, the result of Obama trying to accommodate Republican concerns. But without it and the automatic spending on unemployment compensation and other programs for the newly poor, this would be 1932.

(by the way, state and local spending, especially in Republican controlled states, has contracted, threatening our fragile recovery).

Things sort of environmental, on the personal front.

I have been working on this post for (like) a week.

Earth hour was last Saturday. Just like I am only mentioning it now, I kinda blew it off, watching TV (and later driving over to my girlfriends to walk her dog while she worked). I watched a LCD TV in my apartment which has all CFL's (expect for a couple of LED lights). But do I feel bad I didn't turn off my lights (I can't even remember what I was watching).

I just recently bought a Prius C, which was probably a bad or at least unnecessary decision. The "C" is a new model hybrid, which Toyota says is selling quite briskly. It is smaller, a hatchback built on the Yaris sedan's frame, and starts under 20 grand (mine was around twenty). It is being marketed to people in their twenties getting their first car, which is funny in a way because I am finding that to maximize mileage, you kinda need to drive like a 70 year old on tranquilizers. More on that later.

I am pretty sure I have mentioned I had a 2003 Honda Civic Hybrid with a manual transmission. Was there a problem with the Civic? Well, yes and no. It was starting weirdly, that is, sometimes when I turned the key lights would come on, it would wuh wuh like cars do when the battery is low, then it would catch. Mind you, the auto-stop, which turns the engine off at traffic lights, still worked fine. The starter problem actually scared me some.

Plus, there was a (not really official) mechanism for tracking mileage that was estimating high. The car has a real time mileage horizontal bar graph below the odometer, which was hard to get exact readings from but worked well enough to give me a sense of where I was MPG wise at any given moment. But with the trip odometers there was also an average mileage reading, showing the mileage from the last time you tripped the trip odometer. I would trip the trip odometer every time I got gas (I generally let the tank get pretty low), so I could have a sense of how I was doing. I also tracked my mileage on fueleconomy dot gov, each fill up. Well, the trip odometer was showing mileage higher than what fueleconomy.gov was showing me. And the car's mileage in general was down. I had been in the low 40's pretty consistently (except on trips when I was in the low 50's!), but now I was in the upper 30's.

Bothersome, but these things should not have been enough to make me want to replace what was still quite a good car. I mean, I felt a sense of mortality about the car, but it was/is a Honda, and potentially good for another 100,000 miles (not with those hybrid batteries, though). Still, the Prius C really caught my eye. It appeared to be everything the Honda Insight (second generation) hybrid should have been but was not turning out to be. The Insight (second generation) was the first hybrid to sell under 20 grand. But the Insight (second generation) got only about the same mileage as my 2003 Civic hybrid and it's drive-ability was pretty well slammed by reviewers.

The Prius C (c for city), on the other hand, also starts under 20 grand (my level two was a bit over 20), gets a bit better mileage than a regular Prius and is supposed to be reasonable to drive. As I mentioned, it is built on the Yaris frame (I believe it must be the four door sedan frame), so it is truly a small car. The front seats are roomy, the rears are OK if the front seats are pushed forward by/for short people like me, and the cargo space is pretty small (although you can fold down the rear seats).

But the Prius C is turning out to be a challenge to drive in such a way as to get the EPA rated gas mileage. Let me back track on this issue for a second. With the Civic hybrid, I obsessed when driving about how the hybrid battery was doing. That battery would discharge when one accelerated, and recharge when one "engine braked", which to say let my foot off the gas pedal while the car was going and still in gear. When one did that in the Civic, the car would apparently change to have only one cylinder firing, although the other three kept moving (presumably from the motion of the car), and of course the electric motor was spinning in reverse or something to do the charging and braking. Engine braking gives you fantastic mileage on the Civic hybrid. You could see whether the battery was charging or powering the electric motor by looking at the dash (which once prompted my mother to tell me to stop looking at my dash). So obsessing about the state of the battery was actually a good way to get good mileage out of the Civic, although it tended to make one look for hills to drive down, and make one shudder at big rolling hills on the highway.

But if driving the Civic stick shift hybrid took some skill, the Prius C has brought a whole new set of challenges. So far, the way tracking the gas mileage in the Prius C works is this: every time you start the car, it starts from zero gas mileage. There are ways to set up recurring mileage, but so far I haven't attempted that. But I am using an energy monitor-type thing, that tells you whether the car is running in gas only, gas and electric, electric only, recharging mode, gas and also recharging mode and maybe other modes too (cloaked?). This monitor also displays the mileage for your (my) current trip.

Now, being as it is spring and therefore somewhat cool in the mornings, when you start the Prius C, the gas motor kicks on after about thirty seconds. When the gas motor is on, when the car is warming up, the mileage really sucks. Once the gas motor warms up, you can take off from a stop light using the electric motor if you accelerate really (really, really) slowly. There are times when accelerating that slowly drives my fellows American drivers somewhat crazy, but the more you use the electric motor, the better the city mileage.

Of course, in busier traffic, one feels pressure to accelerate faster. What you can do in that situation is when you do reach 25 MPH, you start to "pulse and glide". To pulse and glide, one needs to let one's foot off the gas and coast and then speed back up at some point. Then if you are coasting/rolling along at, say, twenty three MPH, when you put your foot on the gas (gently) the car will run on electric only, which really helps keep gas mileage up higher despite the earlier faster acceleration.

Now as I said, the Prius C starts gas mileage fresh each time you drive it. Getting up to 40 or (ideally) 50 miles per gallon in any given city trip can be a considerable challenge, especially on trips of three miles or shorter. If I didn't try to drive so gently, if I just put my foot down and went, I suspect my mileage would be in the 30's or (maybe) low 40's. Many people would be happy enough with that sort of mileage, but the person likely to buy a Prius C is likely to expect more. So I roll slowly, keeping an eye on the dashboard energy monitor thingie.

As I said, the "C" is being marketed to people in their twenties, a whole new market for the Prius line. Now, I suspect a significant fraction of the current brisk sales are people like me, mileage enthusiasts excited by a twenty grand hybrid that gets Prius mileage. We will be the trailblazers, who will work at getting the high mileage, who will have the patience and different priorities to accelerate and drive so gently (read: slowly) to get there.

But what of the twenty years olds who are being courted by Toyota? Well, the car has kind of a regular (automatic) gear sift instead of the other Prius model's joystick like tiny gear shift. It also has an almost alarming array of audio type features (as if the energy monitor were not enough to distract you). There is a CD player and of course car radio. The car radio, by the way, sometimes tells you stuff about what song is being played. There is a port for a USB cable (from your iPod or increasingly your smart phone's music player). There is bluetooth as well, to either sync your phone for calls, your phone for playing music, or to sync it for both.

What happens if the twenty year old starts having kids? Time for a Prius V (as in Victor, apparently, since we have forgotten about the Romans, except when counting Super Bowls).

Obama is the worst, says Jack Kelly

The first paragraph in Jack Kelly's column today lays out his view of Obama in history: "The presidency of Richard Nixon was destroyed, and that of Bill Clinton nearly ruined, by scandals that erupted over lies they told. But no president ever before has lied as frequently, as flagrantly or as foolishly as has Barack Obama.".

If you read Two Political Junkies or my past posts, you know that I (and others) think Jack Kelly himself frequently omits important details or selectively chooses "facts" (sometimes myths) to present, at the very least. Given Jack Kelly's extreme partisan beliefs, it is not surprising that he would describe Obama in such extreme terms (can we say cognitive dissonance). The problem with that is that any legitimate criticism (criticism that more than just Tea Party people might agree with) gets lost in the noise. Kelly's last criticism in the column, that Obama has done the opposite of creating an unprecedented level of openness in his administration, is one that probably Glenn Greenwald could agree with. But since Kelly simply throws everything Obama says back at him, no such unified criticism would be possible.

About two thirds into his column, after presenting distorted facts about the Keystone XL pipeline and Solyndra, Kelly says "Mr. Obama lies most often about energy, but not only about energy.". I could mention that there is much more to the Solyndra story than Kelly ever bothers to mention, or that tar sands are considered to possibly be the final straw that pushes man made climate change beyond our ability to reduce.

But I want to talk about energy in general, somewhat separate from either Jack Kelly's accusations of lies or President Obama's somewhat watered down energy policy. As I see it, we have the ability right now to choose one of three possible energy paths. We could continue as we are progressing now, drilling some for oil and natural gas, watching the price rise (seemingly caused by speculator) and I guess eventually adding some solar and wind to electricity and biodiesel to auto fuel. Or we can do what Republicans and conservatives like Kelly seem to advocate, and double down on extraction and consumption, using tar sands for gas and fracking out natural gas frm shale formations. Possibly fuel costs would com down (though personally I doubt it), and we would have both local and possibly global negative environmental effects.

Our third option would be to pursue a more sustainable energy system. We, three percent of the world, consume twenty percent of the world's oil. What we do will not be the absolute factor that will affect climate change, be we have the opportunity to set the tone. Either we will make it clear that modern life requires unlimited consumption, or we can show the rest of the world that mindful consumption is not only possible, but positive. I have seen people say to me that the future will take care of itself, and maybe it will. But there is not certainty that what we are doing now will not cause suffering for many millions, if not the entire planet in the future. Future generations may have some use for the fossil fuels in the ground now (currently we use oil not only for fuel, but also for fertilizer and plastics, and probably other things I forget about). I think we need to start to minimize our use of fossil fuels, transitioning to hybrids, biodiesel vehicles as well starting to increase our use of mass transit, encouraging businesses to locate with walking distance of population centers and setting up incentives to live in walkable parts of cities and disincentives to live further away. but that doesn't mean we need to suffer. I think that internet shopping can replace driving to malls, and for that matter, if the population of the planet declines (which Jack Kelly has addressed in the past), the internet can still provide perhaps even more effective links to keep critical mass of collective discussion, debate and ultimately thinking to move science and culture forward.

It's too bad that Jack Kelly doesn't think our future is an issue worth examining, that he is only interested in advancing the agenda of the Tea Party.

PG, do you think your readers are best served by politically biased columns, that blindly accepts the word of corporations that their practices are safe for the environment. Do you want to encourage the anti-scientific thinking of climate change denialism.