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Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

David Shuster: How FAUX News got the Secret Service bus story wrong.

Thom: FAUX News doesn’t know jack about economics.

More Rotting NewsCorpse:

Christine O’Donnell gets all weird and walks out of a CNN interview.

Thom: How Republicans avoid angry constituents…outsourcing?

Jon does Michael Steele.

Koch Brothers Exposed:

Seattle’s Hempfest arrives.

White House: West Wing Week.

Ann Telnaes: The New Media censorship.

Thom: What happened to compassionate conservatism?

Ed: Hannity Psychotalk on unemployment.

The Libertarian Floating Petri Dish Dream:

Young Turks: More town hall heckling.

Sam Seder: Missouri Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder’s strip club problem.

Liberal Viewer: FAUX News on Texas’ prayers answered.

Thom: more Good, Bad and Very, Very Ugly.

ONN: Supreme Court rules first amendment does not apply to one annoying man.

The Republican Primary Nut House:

Newsy: Bill Clinton goes vegan.

Sam Seder: Who is the Tea Party?

Thom: Darrel Issa and the Lobbyists.

Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma shoots up his way to Worst Person in the World.

Highlights of Obama’s Rural Economic Tour:

Jon: hose money grubbing fat cat poor people:

Tweety: Coburn’s racist attack on Obama, and other crazy sideshows events.

SCTV: Eco-Maniac.

On Wisconsin:

Young Turks: Is Allen West Harriet Tubman?

Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Jane Hague’s big troubles

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One of my favorite outcomes from Tuesday’s primary election was in the King County Council District 6 race.

Incumbent Jane Hague is in trouble.

Yesterday’s data dump shows Hague with 38.8% of the vote. Next is Democrat Richard E. Mitchell with 29.1% of the vote. Port Commissioner John Creighton is third with 24.6% of the vote, and Patsy Bonincontri took 7.2%.

(One reason I like this outcome is pure vanity. Political uberwonks Erica Barnett and Josh Feit predicted Hague and Creighton making it through. I predicted Hague and Mitchell. So there.)

We cannot generally read too much into a top-two primary result. But, holy shit, 38.8% for the incumbent? That cannot be considered positive. I see no way that Hague takes anything close to half the Creighton vote in the General. Many Creighton voters were making a statement—a protest against the incumbent.

The votes tallied yesterday were greatly skewed relative to the election night dump: Mitchell was within 2% of Hague.

Why the shift in the later ballots?

Mitchell’s campaign offers the explanation:

“Undecideds clearly are breaking for Richard because they’re tired of the personal and legal drama of the other opponents. That is clearly reflected in the numbers,” [Mitchell’s political consultant, Jason] Bennett said.

Maybe. Bennett offers another possibility:

[Hague] may have suffered from a backlash by Tim Eyman and other anti-tax conservatives over Hague’s decision to vote for an annual $20 car-tab fee to maintain Metro bus service.

This seems less plausible. First, as Goldy points out in this must read piece featuring Goldy defending Hague, King county rejected Eyman’s most recent “Thou shalt have $30 car tabs” initiative by a 60-40 margin.

Secondly, the anti-government nut jobs that would actually change their vote in response to Tim Eyman’s apoplectic screeds against Hague would most likely throw their vote behind the politically androgynous Creighton before Mitchell, who told The Stranger Election Control Board that

…he would approve a $20 car-tab fee to avert a devastating 17 percent cut in Metro bus service and believes in a minor sales tax bump to rescue the county’s underfunded criminal-justice system.

(As an aside, Eyman produced a:

wanted poster-style enemies list that pictures and labels four County Council members. The word “Liar!” appears below mug shots of Jane Hague and Kathy Lambert.

Does Tim “Biggest Lie of my Life” Eyman really want to go there?)

My hunch is that some folks who mailed their ballots at the last minute simply did a little on-line research. Mitchell looks great when investigated on-line. Hague…not so much. Like here.

Perspective

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Via CBS News:

So far, President Obama has taken 61 vacation days after 31 months in office. At this point in their presidencies, George W. Bush had spent 180 days at his ranch where his staff often joined him for meetings. And Ronald Reagan had taken 112 vacation days at his ranch.

Among recent presidents, Bill Clinton took the least time off — 28 days.

Yes…Elvis was the hardest working. Obama’s a close second. George W. Bush? To be kind, let’s call it The National Guard Plan.

Right-wing nutjobs point out with sophomoric glee that “Obama plays more golf than Bush!!!” Of course he does. I mean, after this “performance”, Bush pretty much had to recreate by other means. (He had to give up carrier landings for similar reasons.)

Other metrics could be manufactured out of arbitrary presidential pastimes: Bush spent much more time than Obama destroying habitat clearing brush, perch fishing, Segway “riding”, and mountain biking. On the other hand, we must admit that Obama has spent a lot more time engaged in presidential dribbling than did Bush.

But golf, mountain biking, hoops…whatever. Only one President was too distracted by vacationing to act on a daily briefing titled, “Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US”. That inaction started another big mess that Obama has spent years cleaning up. Apparently using some of his vacation days.

Celebrating Elvis’ birthday!

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If there is one thing that Americans can agree upon and rally behind is that Elvis Presley was the King.

So it’s just plain ol’ good, smart politics for Rep. Michele Bachmann to head down South today to help celebrate Elvis’ birthday:

Only one problem. It’s a small wrinkle, but one we shouldn’t overlook…today isn’t the anniversary of Elvis’ birth.

It’s the anniversary of Elvis’ death.

Holy shit…someone’s been taking stupid lessons from Sarah Palin!

Election Night Drinking Liberally — Seattle

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DLBottleIt’s an election night! This time it’s in Washington (but Wisconsin, too). So get that ballot postmarked by today or take it to a drop box. Then, please join us for another evening of election-watching under the influence at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally.

We meet at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00 pm, but a few folks will show up before then for dinner.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Drinking Liberally Tacoma meets this Thursday, 7:00pm at the Hub Restaurant. The Shelton Drinking Liberally meets next Monday 6:30pm at the Grove Street Brewhouse. And the Everett chapter of Drinking Liberally meets at the Buzz Inn in Snohomish next Monday at 7:00 pm. There are 234 chapters of Living Liberally, including thirteen in Washington state and six more in Oregon.

Fringe campaigns

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The Washington Post’s Jonathan Bernstein makes a couple of good points today. First:

Here’s what you need to know about the Republican candidate field: this is it. No one starts running for president in August, less than six months before the voters start getting involved in Iowa and New Hampshire, and has any chance at all. At least, it’s never happened since the modern process has been fully in place (say, by 1980).

He does suggest that Sarah Palin could be a quasi-exception, because she has been running for President—in her quirky, Wasillaly way. (I think she started her Presidential bid in September of 2008, after realizing that there would never be a President McCain.)

So if you are a Republican, don’t hold out for a savior in Rudy Giuliani, Chris Christie, Paul Ryan, The Donald or even John Bolton’s mustache. Boltons_mustache

The second point:

What you’re upset with isn’t the candidate — it’s the party. It’s inconceivable that anyone could get the Republican nomination while using anything but solid Tea Party rhetoric on pretty much every issue. They’re all going to claim that taxes should never, ever, ever be raised no matter what, that half of what the government does is evil or unconstitutional or whatever, that the scientific consensus on climate is some sort of crazed conspiracy, and so on down the line.

In other words, the Republican Party has vacated the center for the fringes. The party hasn’t really moved to the traditional right-wing, fiscal and social conservative fringes. Rather they seem to have moved to some fringe in another dimension: a fringe in which validation and proof comes from the emotional reaction an idea evokes; a fringe where facts that don’t pass the “feels good” test are dismissed; a fringe that is largely divorced from the everyday wants and needs of Americans.

Frankly, the only candidate that stands out from the fringe is Mitt Romney—a candidate who is seriously flawed by his numerous position reversals, and a candidate that comes of as totally disingenuous every time he spews a talking point. Even with these flaws, chances seem high that Mitt will succumb, first and foremost, to right-wing religious bigotry….

Déjà vu and other tales of the early 2012 campaign

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The 2012 presidential contest took an interesting twist this weekend. One lackluster candidate, a former governor of a mid-west state, dropped out after being unable to upgrade his image to “presidential class” and, more importantly, after not finishing first or second in the Iowa straw poll.

And another candidate, after months of great anticipation, jumped into the race with high praise and huge expectations.

You know what this reminds me of? The summer of 2007, and the Tale of Two Thompsons.

Former Wisconsin Governor Tommy Thompson was an early Republican candidate in the 2008 race. I guess he though his gubernatorial experience (elected four times), his experience a Bush cabinet member (Sec. of Health and Social Services), and his small town “charisma” would make him a natural in the eyes of Iowans.

After practically living in the state for months, poor Tommy placed sixth in the August Iowa straw poll. The next day, he dropped out of the race.

This is eerily similar to the Tim Pawlenty story. Pawlenty is 18 years younger, and has far less political experienced than Tommy Thompson. What they both lacked was presidential charisma. Nobody had any idea why either one of them was running for President.

The other Thompson that ran in the 2008 campaign was former Senator and actor Fred Thompson. Good ol’ Fred, teased for months and months. He eschewed the Iowa Straw poll, and didn’t officially declare until the first week of September, 2007. He was immediately placed among the front-runners. It seemed the Republicans had found their next Ronald Reagan….

Ol’ Fred was briefly the darling of the Republicans—at least, the ones paying attention to the primary. But it quickly became apparent that Fred just wasn’t up to the task. He came off as a tired old dog that just needed a front porch. He withdrew toward the end of January, 2008. (Parodies of his withdraw—here, here, and here—were among my favorites of the 2008 campaign.)

This is the problem with finding a “savior” that nobody knows anything about.

And that seems analogous to the lateish entrance of Texas Governor Rick Parry Perry. Everyone knows he prays and he is a fundamentalist. A few folks may remember his hint of a Texas secession, which sounds too extreme to be real. Republicans would likely attribute it to an attention-getting, teabagger upgrade to Ronald Reagan’s “…the government is not the solution to our problems; government is the problem.”

Ahhh, yes, the Republicans have found their new Ronald Reagan. The don’t really know him, but the love him anyway.

And here is where the analogy with Ol’ Fred ends. Because Gov. Perry isn’t a tired old dog. Rather, he is a fucking extremist! I am talking an order of magnitude more extremist than Rep. Michele Bachmann (a.k.a. Ol’ Crazy Eyes).

Ezra Klein has an excellent, and quite positive, review of Perry’s book, “Fed Up!: Our Fight to Save America from Washington.” Klein highly recommends the book. In it, Perry lays out his extreme “State’s right” position that would remove the federal government from civil rights protections, labor laws, creation of a minimum wage, environmental regulation, gun regulation, Medicare, Medicaid, and education.

This is a level of extremism that is not acceptable to the majority of Republicans, and is likely threatening to the Republican establishment. Hell…it’s pretty much too extreme for FAUX News. Perry has about the same chance of winning the nomination as fellow Texan Rep. Ron Paul does.

If Obama is lucky, it will take many months until Republicans figure out who Perry really is.

To some extent, each major Republican candidates has “issues” that make him or her unacceptable to big chunks of the Republican base. In 2008, McCain was chosen because he was the least unacceptable candidate, and he performed better than any other candidate in most head-to-head polls against Clinton, Obama, and Edwards.

Acceptable choices for the Republicans seem even more limited this cycle.

An inconvenient reporter

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Yesterday CNN’s Don Lemon was roughed up by Michele Bachmann’s thugs. And the “thugs” included Michele’s totally not gay husband Marcus:

“She came out, after speaking for just a couple minutes,” Lemon said. “There were other reporters and cameras there. And I asked her very respectful questions: ‘How do you think you did in the debate last night?’ and ‘How do you think you’re going to end up in the Ames Straw Poll?’ And her two campaign aides started elbowing me.”

Lemon continued: “I told them, asked them not to elbow me. And then her husband Marcus started doing the same thing. And then he elbowed me into the cart. And I said, ‘You just pushed me into the cart.’ And he goes, ‘No, you did it yourself.’

“It was just, I don’t know, why they would choose to do that. We weren’t asking any ‘gotcha’ questions,” Lemon added.

Why, indeed!

I’m left wondering…is Don Lemon blacklisted by the Bachmann campaign? And if so, is it because he is gay? Or because he is black? Or both?

Either way, Don Lemon just needs to cool off and accept personal responsibility for their actions….

Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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Thom: The Good, the Bad and the VERY, VERY Ugly.

On Wisconsin:

White House: West Wing Week.

Sam Seder: Al Franken confronts anti-gay group’s lies.

Olbermann with Markos: Obama’s “plan” to destroy the Mittster.

Stephen: Liberal media’s big temperature.

Sam Seder: How the American Legislative Exchange Council uses taxpayers money to destroy our government.

Commissioner Dean Foster on redistricting Washington.

Following the Hostage “Situation,” S&P Downgrades U.S. Political Process:

Greenman: This is not cool—heatwave 2011:

Thom: Is FAUX News now a bastion of Socialism?

Rep. Michael Burgess of Texas resolves his way to Worst Person in the World.

Obama: Celebrating Ramadan at the White House.

The Onion: Week in Review.

Ed with some major psychotalk from Hannity.

Sam Seder: Job are missing from the discussion in Washington.

The week in presidential campaign.

Olbermann: The GOP downgrade.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) on workforce investment act.

The GOP Primary Funny Farm:

Young Turks: Another gay Republican hypocrite.

Greenman: Lord Christopher Monckton brings the crazy to New Zealand.

Second City: The Bachmann Institute for curing gayness : .

Obama at Johnson Controls battery plant.

Thom: The Good, the Bad and the VERY, VERY Ugly.

The Friday Funnies.

“Concerned parent” Amber Hahn is Worst Person in the World.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Republicans CAUSED the credit rating downgrade

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Why was the credit rating of the U.S. downgraded by S&P? An S&P director explains in unambiguous terms:

…[O]ne reason the United States lost its triple-A credit rating was that several lawmakers expressed skepticism about the serious consequences of a credit default — a position put forth by some Republicans.

Without specifically mentioning Republicans, S&P senior director Joydeep Mukherji said the stability and effectiveness of American political institutions were undermined by the fact that “people in the political arena were even talking about a potential default,” Mukherji said.

“That a country even has such voices, albeit a minority, is something notable,” he added. “This kind of rhetoric is not common amongst AAA sovereigns.”

In other words, the Republican party has become so fringe, that they jeopardize the fiscal health of the United States.

Yeah…it’s just a minority of Republicans. But the rest of the congressional Republicans didn’t have the intestinal fortitude to stand up to that nut-case minority. Instead, they permitted—indeed, they fully participated in—the process that sank into a chaotic battle of ideology that brought the U.S. to the brink of default.

Congressional Republicans tangibly harmed the U.S. In doing so, they failed to live up to their oath of office.

The Republican sitcom debate

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I just finished watching the Republican debate. And…Wow!

No, not “wow” about the debate. That was pretty much formula. Political debates have become as formulaic as TV sitcoms. And this debate could be, perhaps, the archetype of political debates. We had a stage full of people who want to be President of the U.S. and they were parroting bullshit lines fed to them by political consultants, designed to invoke an emotion.

Let me explain. As a teen, I was given some bullshit advice about how to win a woman’s heart. “In an early encounter, you must evoke a strong emotion from her. It doesn’t matter if it is pity, or lust, or anger, or fright, or extreme nausea. Just make it extreme. Because later on she’ll only remember that you stirred her passions.” (No…I’m not endorsing the idea….)

Contemporary political consultants must have all heard that same story. That’s what the candidates were doing all evening. Trying to evoke a little anger, patriotism, angst, fear, disgust, etc.—hoping to connect with voters so that the only thing they remember the next morning is how much candidate X stirred their passions.

The problem is, they all did it and it was formulaic. It was generic political sitcom. Tim Pawlenty was transparently engaging in it—he came off as a total buffoon. Michelle Bachmann was just off…she seemed detached and robotic. At one point, coming back from a break, she wasn’t at the podium! She came scurrying back whilst on camera. WHAT. THE. FUCK. (My guess is she was in the middle of a debilitating migraine and puking her guts out in the restroom. But who knows.)

There were two exceptions to the robot-a-thon. Newt Gingrich did less of it than the rest. He seemed much more earnest and analytical in his answers (even if the underlying ideas are lousy).

And Ron Paul was certainly passionate and genuine and honest. After all, madness has it privileges!

None of that was the “wow” part.

The “wow” part was the “Spin Room” post-debate circle-jerk on the FAUX News livestream. (Were they on TV too? Beats me. I don’t have a functioning TV in my house.) The “wow” part is that they said many of the same things about candidates I just articulated. No…worse, they outright savaged each and every one of the candidates. They savaged the debate format. They savaged the questions. They made the excellent point that none of the candidates on the stage inspired people to the point of personal sacrifice and devotion. Its because none of them showed real leadership—just formulaic sitcom bullshit answer after answer.

And so I am in the hugely embarrassing position of agreeing with a panel of fucking FAUX News infotainers, none of whose names I know or even remember. (In fairness…they probably don’t know who I am, either.)

Here’s the thing. Newt would lose because he is a deeply flawed person. Ron Paul would lose because he is a nut-case. And all of the rest of them would lose because they are a “relationship of convenience” to Republican voters. Just like Bob Dole, who was “their guy”. He was ok-ish. “he’ll do.” Blah.

And that’s just not good enough.

What we have on the Republican side is a group of people who desperately want to be President, but haven’t given Republicans a good reason why. George W. Bush got away with the sitcom-like formula, but times were good.

Not so much right now.

Liveblogging the cheddar uprising

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6:30: The polls closed at 6:00 West coast time, so the results are slowly trickling in. As of 6:30, the advantage goes to the Republicans, who lead in every race with a small proportion of the precincts reporting.

You can follow the results here or here.

In a normal election I would point out that early returns typically favor Republicans. But this is no normal election!

6:50: Hmmm…the 32nd Senate District between Kapanke (R) and Shilling (D) is now a tie with 21% reporting. (But no time stamp change?) Kapanke is considered the most vulnerable of the six Republicans undergoing a recall.

6:55: Another results page.

6:57: Results are given as cool graphs here. (Well…they’ll be cool when more results come in anyway.)

6:59: With 24% reporting, Kapanke (R) surges to +2….

7:12: And with 26% reporting, Shilling (D) surges back to lead Kapanke by +2.

7:15: With 67% reporting in the 2nd senate district, Cowles (R) is leading Nusbaum (D) 59% to 41%. Cowles is obviously going to win. This is a seat that nobody thought was winnable for Democrats anyway.

7:19…in fact, I just saw a Tweet saying the AP has called it for Cowles. Score: Democrats 1, Republicans 1.

7:29: The Harsdorf (R)-Moore (D) race in the 10th district has been called for Harsdorf. Again, no surprise in this race.

7:34: In district 8, with 18% reporting, Pasch (D) is leading Darling (R) 57% to 43%.

7:36: Back in the 32nd, with 45% reporting, Shilling now leads Kapanke 53% to 47%. If results hold, Dems will take two seats away from the Republicans.

7:42: In the 18th, with 19% reporting, King (D) leads Hopper (R) by less than 1%. The exact tally: King 7,464, Hopper, 7,368.

7:54: With 95% reporting in district 14, I think we can call Olsen (R) over Clark (D). The score is 54% to 46%. This gives Republicans three wins. One Democratic incumbent is safe (from a previous election). The three remaining races tonight are the ones people thought would be close. Two look favorable for the Democrats and one is exceedingly close.

8:15: The race in the 32nd has now been called for Shilling (D). The current total is Shilling 55, Kapanke (R) 45% with 82% reporting.

8:37: In the 18th, King (D) now leas Hopper (R) by 27,123 to 25,951, which is 51% to 49%. That is with 97% of precincts reporting.

8:17: With 87% reporting in the 18th, the race remains incredibly close with King (D) 24,458 leading Hopper (R) 24,321.

8:31: Now with 63% reporting in the 8th, Pasch’s (D) lead over Darling (R) has shrunk to 51% to 49%.

Drinking Liberally — Seattle

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DLBottle
It’s an election night!

Not so much in Washington. But it is in Wisconsin, where a series of recall elections are taking place against six Republican incumbent state Senators. The latest polls suggest that two, and maybe three, Democrats will win. But the elections are unprecedented in the modern era of polling, so anything could happen.

Please join us tonight for an evening of election-watching under the influence at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. We meet at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00 pm, but a few folks will show up before then for dinner and early election returns.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? There are 233 chapters of Living Liberally, including thirteen in Washington state and six more in Oregon. Here are some other meetings over the next week:

If none of these works for you, consider starting a new chapter that does.

See Jane Run

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Do you remember what we learned about Jane Hague the last time she ran for the King County Council sixth district seat?

KUOW‘s Amy Radil has an interesting profile of the candidates for this seat. The story begins with a reminder:

Jane Hague was first elected to represent the Eastside on the King County Council in 1994. She’s always won reelection fairly easily, despite some personal mishaps. Mostly recently, in 2007, she was arrested for driving under the influence. And her then–opponent revealed that Hague, King County’s former elections director, did not have a college degree from Western Michigan University as she’d claimed.

Hague denied ever intentionally deceiving anyone about her education.

But a public records request from King County shows that Hague put a Bachelor of Science degree from Western Michigan University on her resume when she applied for the elections job in 1986.

You can listen to the audio version here:
[audio:http://www.kuow.org/mp3high/mp3/News/20110808_ar_hague.mp3]

So, besides getting pulled over and arrest after blowing a 0.14, an incident in which she verbally abused the arresting officers, we also learned that Hague got her career in government started by lying about having a college degree on her application for King County’s manager of records and elections.

And somehow the fake degree perpetuated:

But Hague denied intentionally providing incorrect information and initially said she was puzzled at how several “Who’s Who” books, The Seattle Times, the Municipal League of King County and the National Association of Counties all reported erroneously that she had a bachelor’s degree from Western Michigan University.

Two things. First, let’s not forget the real victim here. Until this became public, the lack-of-degree secret must have been a horrible burden for Jane. Imagine knowing you built your entire career on a fabrication that your political opponents could easily uncover.

I mean, a burden like that can drive one to drink!

Second, electing Jane Hague to King County Council after she lied to get an appointment to King County Elections Director, seems akin to…well, sort of like hiring the person who just robbed you as your Head of Security.

I think it’s likely that Jane Hague and Richard Mitchell will be the top two coming out of the primary. But let’s not make it easy for Hague. If you’re eligible to vote for this race, be sure to vote…for someone other than Jane.

Get that ballot off your kitchen table and into the mailbox!

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