HorsesAss.Org

Over the coming months I plan to roll out a series of updates to HA, including more content, more features, and better layout. Some of the changes will be rather trivial, and some quite dramatic (including the total redesign I’m currently elbow deep in coding.) And some might be only passing fancies, as I intend to experiment freely, modifying or even tossing “improvements” as I go along. It will be a work in progress.

The goal is to provide the HA community a better and more compelling user experience, and so I hope you not only tolerate the disruption, but work with me to help get it right. I’m willing to consider anything, no matter how radical, so if there’s something you’d like to see HA do better — or completely different — please consider this comment thread a suggestion box, and freely offer me your input over the coming months.

(Oh… and if a professional graphics designer wants to offer me some pro bono service, I could use the help.)

Ever wonder what kind of grizzled veteran of world affairs and international trade has the kind of credentials to win a $300 million Pentagon bid to supply ammunition to our troops overseas?

Well, you can check out his MySpace page.

The whole amazing story about how a tiny Miami company being run by a 22-year-old was being paid with our tax dollars to send boxes of ancient ammunition to our troops is right here (more at TPM here).

With 44 Democratic challengers now having signed on to the Responsible Plan for ending the war in Iraq, the national media is beginning to pay attention not only to the Plan, but to the “infectiously energetic” force behind it: Darcy Burner. From today’s Washington Post, page A3:

Rejecting their party leaders’ assertions that economic troubles have become the top issue on voters’ minds, leaders of the coalition of 38 House and four Senate candidates pledged to make immediate withdrawal from Iraq the centerpiece of their campaigns.

“The people inside the Beltway don’t seem to get how big an issue this is,” said Darcy Burner, a repeat candidate who narrowly lost to Rep. Dave Reichert (R-Wash.) in 2006.

From MSNBC:

One criticism of Democrats in past elections is that they have railed against President Bush on Iraq without having a plan of their own. But 38 Democratic House challengers along with four Senate contenders have decided to run on a common platform outlining a strategy of withdrawal from Iraq.

[…] The plan was introduced about a week and a half ago, after six months of preparation. The plan combines existing legislation in Congress, packaged by Darcy Burner, a candidate for Washington’s eighth congressional district, with assistance from national security experts and retired generals.

And from The Nation:

At the plan’s unveiling, Burner–articulate, impressive and infectiously energetic–refused to be pessimistic. Despite the White House’s indifference, despite the war’s diminished presence on the front page, the people want the war to end.

“We can do this,” she said.

This fall, Rep. Dave Reichert will attempt to run as a Beltway outsider, fighting the entrenched D.C. establishment, while characterizing Darcy as just another Nancy Pelosi clone, blindly adhering to the Democratic party line. Don’t you believe it. Darcy is obviously not your typical politician — that’s what so endears her to the netroots, and that’s what’s beginning to endear her to the national press.

This week, Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank plans to introduce a bill to decriminalize the personal possession and use of marijuana. When announcing it on Real Time with Bill Maher, he jokingly referred to it as the “Make Room for the Serious Criminals” bill. Out here in Washington State, Edmonds resident and travel show host Rick Steves continues to fight for similar reforms. He has a column in the Seattle PI and, as always, he does a great job of explaining why we need to completely re-think our marijuana laws:

Some concerned U.S. parents are comforted by the illusion of control created by our complete prohibition of marijuana. But the policy seems to be backfiring: Their kids say it’s easier to buy marijuana than tobacco or alcohol. (You don’t get carded when you buy something illegally.) Meanwhile, Dutch parents say their approach not only protects their younger children, but also helps insulate teens over 18 from street pushers trying to get them hooked on more addictive (and profitable) hard drugs.

After a decade of regulating marijuana, Dutch anti-drug abuse professionals agree there has been no significant increase in pot smoking among young people, and that overall cannabis use has increased only slightly. European and U.S. government statistics show per-capita consumption of marijuana for most of Europe (including the Netherlands) is about half that of the U.S., despite the criminal consequences facing American pot smokers.

When it comes to marijuana, European leaders understand that a society must choose: Tolerate alternative lifestyles or build more prisons. They’ve made their choice. We’re still building more prisons.

To be fair, though, I should probably point out this news article from November to provide an example of the how dangerous this drug can be:

Bear Stearns CEO James Cayne fired back Thursday at criticism of his leadership and allegations of inappropriate behavior published in the Wall Street Journal.

The Journal reported that Cayne was playing bridge and golf and was often out of touch from his embattled Wall Street firm this past summer while its hedge funds collapsed and helped to spark a credit crisis in global financial markets.

The Journal said that during what it described as 10 critical days of the crisis in July, Cayne was playing in a bridge tournament in Nashville, Tenn., without a cell phone or an email device.

Cayne shot back in a memo to Bear Stearns employees that he “stands by” his 14-year record at the firm and that allegations of “inappropriate conduct” are “absolutely untrue.”

The paper also reported that Cayne has sometimes smoked marijuana after bridge tournaments, citing attendees at the tournaments, although the paper did not say whether he did so in Nashville in July.

Cayne denied one specific alleged incident in 2004 that the paper asked about, but it reported that when it asked more generally whether he smoked pot during bridge tournaments or on other occasions, he said he would respond only “to a specific allegation.”

Remember kids, if you smoke pot, the stock holdings in the company you run might fall from $1 billion to less than $100 million. Stay away from that shit.

Presenting Recession: the Movie….

The folks at Crosscut got ahold of an in-house Seattle Times memo, and well, things aren’t looking so rosey these days over at Fairview Fanny. Print revenue is down 10.7% for January and February compared to the same two-month period last year. That’s worse than the 9% drop Times publisher Frank Blethen had been predicting, and considerably steeper than the 7% average decline for the newspaper industry last year. But the news only gets worse:

An even more ominous stat is the drop in the Times online revenue for January and February. That number was down 6.5% from the same period last year, according to Kelly’s memo.

The Times, like the rest of the newspaper industry, has been banking on the continued brisk growth of its online ad numbers to head off the well-documented drop in print advertising, as readers move to the Internet…

I’ve never been shy about airing my beefs with Blethen and his paper, but I’m not one of those bloggers who cheers the decline of the legacy media. I love the dailies, and typically browse at least a dozen a day. Indeed, I consider myself as much a media critic as a political commentator or reporter, which in itself should be understood as an act of love and respect. (You wouldn’t become a theater reviewer if you didn’t love the theater, or restaurant critic if you don’t appreciate dining.)

So let me offer a bit of free advice to Frank and the next generation of Blethens preparing to replace him: the medium is not the message. You can’t just move your content online, add a comment thread, and coast through the rest of the 21st century. If you want to thrive in this new medium pioneered by upstart bloggers like me, you need to do more than just update your technology. You need to update your content. You need to think a little more like a blogger.

Or maybe… you could just hire some of us. Really. You could benefit from a little blogger perspective (not to mention a more engaging writing style), and I could benefit from… well… a steady paycheck.

So Frank, gimme a call. Let’s work something out before I get a job offer from an industry that isn’t seeing its revenues decline ten percent year over year.

On March 17, when Darcy Burner stood at a podium in Washington D.C. and introduced the Responsible Plan to end the war in Iraq, it was hard to predict what might happen. It was an overly ambitious venture for a mere Congressional challenger to cajole a group of generals, national security experts and fellow candidates behind a unified legislative blueprint on such a divisive issue, and while the nine initial co-endorsers comprised an impressive lineup, that coalition was months in the making. Candidates are generally advised not to get too specific on the issues this early the campaign; you don’t want to give your opponent even the tiniest club with which to bash you. Would other challengers momentarily put conventional wisdom (and their precious “call time”) aside, and join Burner in sticking her neck out on such a bold endeavor? Or would the Plan, and Burner’s energetic efforts to promote it, more than likely fizzle?

Only ten days later, 43 Democratic challengers have already signed on to the Responsible Plan — with many more closely considering it — and the national media is beginning to take notice. Mother Jones, the Washington Post and NPR have all cited the plan, and The Nation will publish an editorial in their next issue. Beltway buzz has been building ahead of a media conference call scheduled today with Burner and several of the other endorsers, and the call is expected to be well attended by both local and national journalists. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a flurry of fresh coverage in the coming days, and with it, a flurry of new endorsements.

Some have started comparing the Responsible Plan to the GOP’s “Contract With America” back in 1994, but the differences are as striking as the similarities. Like the Contract, the Plan delivers to voters a clear and coherent message about what they can expect from the endorsers should they be elected, but while the Contract never reached beyond core principles, the Responsible Plan offers specific proposals and cites existing legislation. And while the heavily focus-grouped Contract was formulated by GOP uber-strategist Frank Luntz and imposed on the challengers from above by incoming Speaker Newt Gingrich, the Responsible Plan is the outcome of a genuinely grassroots efforts, outside the purview (and I’d wager, the wishes) of the DCCC.

Back in August of 2007, when Burner closed her Internet Town Hall on Iraq with a promise to work with Gen. Paul Eaton to develop a plan, her staff and advisers dared to hope that the announcement was just some clever political ploy; indeed they strongly advised her not to get distracted from a candidate’s primary task: raising the millions of dollars necessary to wage a viable campaign. Well… if they thought they’d dissuade her, they sure didn’t know our Darcy. Burner may be eager to seek out advice, but she’s not so quick to follow it blindly. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in the three years I’ve known her, it’s that she’s not to be underestimated.
 

Support the original ten endorsers of the Responsible Plan:

Darcy Burner (WA-08)	$
Donna Edwards (MD-04)	$
Eric Massa (NY-29)	$
Tom Perriello (VA-05)	$
Chellie Pingree (ME-01)	$
Jared Polis (CO-02)	$
George Fearing (WA-04)	$
Larry Byrnes (FL-14)	$
Stephen A. Harrison (NY-13)	$
Sam Bennett (PA-15)	$

There’s a great piece in the New York Times laying out the many woes facing NRCC chair Tom Cole, including this particular gem illustrating the lack of enthusiasm amongst the Republican base:

Many conservative activists have become so dissatisfied with the party’s heresies, particularly on immigration and government spending, that as Cole’s staff took over, the committee’s fund-raising pleas were being ignored and, on at least one occasion, returned in an envelope stuffed with feces.

Because, of course, stuffing an envelope with shit is one of those “conservative values” we hear so much about. It is a fascinating (if lengthy) read, and I’ll probably come back to it in a later post, but I just wanted to highlight the following tidbit regarding a meeting Cole held with an unnamed Congressional challenger:

Cole began to talk through Republican figures who might be brought in to help raise cash. If McCain were the nominee, Cole and the candidate agreed, donors would turn out for a fund-raiser he headlined. Cole mentioned Bush, but everyone thought that would be a mistake. “I think this cycle he and the vice president are going to be doing a lot of fund-raisers in the South and the Plains,” he said, and everyone guffawed in agreement. Even for an audience of Republican donors, in politically contested parts of the country, the president provokes complicated feelings. On another occasion Cole said to me, “I love the president, but his appeal isn’t universal.”

Huh. It would be “a mistake” to bring the President of the United States in to raise money for a Republican candidate. I wonder where they got that idea?

Back in August, when a coalition of national and local bloggers set an ambitious $100,000 fundraising target to help Darcy Burner counter President Bush’s funder on behalf of Dave Reichert, I was very clear about our objective:

Sure it’s a lot of money, but money seems to be the only political currency Republicans understand. Reaching our target will not only send a strong message that we want our troops out of Iraq, it will also teach other Republicans that bringing in Bush isn’t worth the financial and political cost, thus neutralizing the GOP’s most effective fundraiser.

In fact, we raised $123,000 from over 3,400 donors… and President Bush virtually disappeared from the Congressional fundraising scene. Mission accomplished.

I know there are some in the netroots who worry about turning their blogs into online ATMs, but I’m not one of them. The money we raise, and our growing ability to focus national resources into local races, is absolutely crucial to extending our influence and challenging the longstanding political hegemony of corporate America. We may never be able to get money out of politics, but at least we’re beginning to even the playing field. And the powers that be are beginning to take notice.

Speaking of which, it’s the end of the quarter, so please show Darcy some love.

By now, HA’s regular readers must have an inkling of how much time, energy and passion goes into making this blog informative, relevant and entertaining, and to be honest, I couldn’t possibly have kept up the pace without the help of my co-bloggers. Will Kelley-Kamp has been especially helpful covering very local issues I don’t have the time or knowledge (or interest) to cover myself, along with his OCD-like focus on all things transportation. Well, now it’s time to help Will out a little in appreciation of all his hard work.

Last summer Will quit his day job to go back to college, and the part time work just isn’t enough to pay all his bills, so I’m launching a little fundraiser on his behalf. Will is an integral part of HA, not just through his frequent posts, but in taking some of the daily pressure off me, and so I urge you all to show your appreciation by clicking on the “Donate” button below and throwing a little cash his way via PayPal. (And some kind words in the comment thread would likely be appreciated as well.)

All donations go directly to Will, not me — I won’t even see them. But I personally thank you for your generosity as well.

The end of March is fast approaching, and as always, Darcy Burner is racing to meet her end-of-quarter fundraising target. I hate that these races are so much about money, but they are, and if we want real progressives like Darcy in the other Washington, willing and able to challenge the orthodoxy in both parties, then we all have to do our part.

37 other challengers have now followed Darcy’s lead and signed on to the Responsible Plan for ending the war in Iraq. Please show your support by going to the Responsible Challengers ActBlue page, and giving whatever you can. Thanks.

I don’t generally make a habit of passing on third-hand accounts from unnamed sources, but this source is so credible, the account so believable and the timing so impeccable that I just can’t resist.

My source, who travels in high circles within the sports/entertainment industry, was talking to an executive with an NBA team, when the subject of the Sonics came up. My source expressed the opinion that he couldn’t believe the owners would let the Sonics move from a market like Seattle to Oklahoma City, and the executive replied that the decision had already been made. (My source emailed me the news half a day before NBA commissioner David Stern made his recent public comments, so you understand why the timing strikes me as so impeccable.)

The executive went on to say that his own boss wasn’t too thrilled about the prospect of the Sonics moving to such a smaller market, but that Stern had insisted that Seattle “must be made an example of.” Essentially Stern had determined from the moment Clay Bennett bought the team that there wasn’t much chance of keeping the Sonics in Seattle, so he decided to use it as an opportunity to teach other cities a lesson that if they don’t play ball with NBA owners, the owners will take their ball and, um… go to a different home.

Yeah sure, it’s a little bit of whisper down the lane — Stern to an NBA owner to the executive to my source to me — but it sure does explain one of the most confusing aspects of this whole sorry affair: Stern’s absolute failure to intervene constructively in an effort to keep the Sonics in Seattle. From day one Stern’s manner has wavered between standoffish and heavy-handed, ignoring Seattle fans and their plight when he wasn’t issuing an ultimatum or a threat. Seattle’s business and media establishment been waiting patiently for Stern to put aside the tough guy act and finally broker a deal, but it’s never happened; indeed, the commissioner has seemed determined to scuttle the few hopeful developments that have occasionally popped up.

So Stern wants to “make an example” of Seattle, as a warning to uppity taxpayers in other cities. He tells us that if we let the Sonics go (as if it was ever up to us), we’ll never get another NBA team. Well I think it is time for the citizens of Seattle to tell Commissioner Stern that his product sucks, his business model is broken and quite frankly, he needs our market more than we need him. The NBA’s loss will be the Huskies and the Cougars and the Storm’s gain, not to mention the hundreds of other businesses that are happy to vie for our entertainment dollars. I think it is time to tell Stern that if he takes the Sonics away, we’ll never take the NBA back… at least not while he is still commissioner.

If Stern wants to make an example of Seattle, I say we happily oblige. Let’s make Key Arena the heart of a revitalized Seattle Center, and work to fill those 40-some dates of sorry-ass playground hoops with other events. Let’s show other cities that there is life after the NBA, and that our culture can flourish and our economy prosper without paying half a billion dollars of taxpayer money into the league’s arena ponzi scheme. Let’s shrug our shoulders and say goodbye, and wait for the league to come crawling back to what is, after all, one of the most dynamic, prosperous and trend-setting regions in the nation. It may take a decade or two before we see Seattle atop the NBA standings again (…hell, it may have taken that long regardless), but if Los Angeles could survive just fine without an NFL franchise, we can surely thrive without the Sonics.

As I was finishing up my recent post on religion, I put off raising this issue that Josh Marshall posts about today:

Here’s one other point I want to raise about Wright. Having watched the full sermons that his sound bites were grabbed out of, it’s pretty clear to me that the snippets running on Youtube were taken out of context and heavily distorted. (But that’s life, to a degree — political hits don’t usually come packaged with extenuating context) I’m also not going to get into the business of full-scale defenses of someone who has apparently suggested that the US government had some role in “inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color.”

But in the debate about Wright, which Sen. Clinton has just reignited, it seems to be spoken of now as an unquestioned assumption that Wright traffics in racist rhetoric or hate speech. But is that really true? I’ve seen some stuff that strikes me as whacky. I’ve heard soundbites that critics would not have much trouble spinning as anti-American. But are there really quotes that justify the charge of racism? I’m not saying that purely as a rhetorical question. I have not made myself a full Wrightologist. But I do get the sense that a lot of people believe he’s so radioactive that it makes no sense to point out when others are treating as granted claims that appear demonstrably false.

I often get annoyed at how easily some liberals throw out the racist tag when it’s not deserved (see: Imus, Don), but this looks a case where the shoe is on the other foot. Criticizing America, even being insanely paranoid about our own government, isn’t the same thing as racism. Has Wright said anything that qualifies as being racist? If so, what?

Join us at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally for an evening of politics under the influence. We meet at 8:00 pm at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E—some of us show up a little early to sample from the terrific menu.

If you find yourself in the Tri-Cities area this evening, check out McCranium for the local Drinking Liberally . Otherwise, check out the Drinking Liberally web site for dates and times of a chapter near you.

(Courtesy of DownWithTyranny!)

Darcy Burner has an op-ed in the Seattle Times today on our disastrous five-year occupation of Iraq, and her Responsible Plan to end it: “Five years is long enough.” My understanding is that the Times offered Burner the opportunity to write an op-ed, unprompted, which suggests to me a possible shift in attitude from the powers that be at a paper that once attacked her in perhaps the most viciously one-sided, mean-spirited and dishonest editorial endorsement I have ever had the misfortune of reading. We’ll see.

One of the most persistent attacks on Burner has always been her supposed lack of experience, as epitomized in Reichert’s mockingly sexist (and apparently effective) job interview ad. (How a two-year AA degree and a police career prepares one to be an effective legislator, I’ll never know.) But Burner’s leadership in developing and promoting the Responsible Plan puts that canard to rest:

Over the past six months, I have worked with military and national-security experts such as retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, who was a predecessor of Gen. David Petraeus in Iraq, to create a clear path forward for our country. […] The response has been phenomenal. More than 30 House and Senate candidates from across the country have signed on — including both Democratic U.S. Senate challengers in Oregon — and the list is growing. Some of the leading minds in the national-security establishment have reviewed and endorsed the plan, including Lawrence Korb, a former assistant secretary of defense under President Reagan, and Rand Beers, a counterterrorism expert who served on the National Security Council under Presidents Reagan, Clinton and both Bushes.

What Burner has demonstrated as a mere candidate is exactly the kind of legislative leadership, initiative and effectiveness we have never seen from Reichert — who GOP Beltway insider Robert Novak describes as having “not distinguished himself during three years in Congress.” She consulted closely with national security experts, drafted a proposal, sought additional input from fellow candidates and other interested parties, and ultimately built consensus around a comprehensive Plan so credible that it has already earned the endorsement of 37 Democratic challengers, only one week since its introduction. That is effective leadership. That is exactly the process by which one successfully crafts and passes legislation. And that is also exactly the kind of job Burner was trained to do as a high-level manager at Microsoft.

Anybody who has worked in the product development cycle can recognize in Burner’s efforts creating and promoting the Responsible Plan, the skill set necessary to successfully bring a product to market on time and on budget. As a longtime Macintosh partisan it pains me to suggest this… but couldn’t we use a little bit of that Microsoft culture in the House of Representatives? Perhaps Darcy’s high-tech experience is at least as applicable to the job of representing the interests of the 8th Congressional District as Reichert’s 18-year investigation of the Green River Killer?

And if our editorial boards are going to place such an emphasis on experience, perhaps it is time to ask Dave Reichert what he has to show for his three years in Congress?