EPA abolished
eh, don’t know about that one. it’s very difficult to abolish a federal agency, despite the easy way that politicians bring it up on the campaign trail. even if you’re johnny “mc-no-no” McCain. MCCAIN!
The sight of Ricardo reminds me: the performers who would be invited to a McCain white house would be of a different calibur.
dead?
Or as near as can be.
OBAMA BIDEN 2012
for superlative whitehouse in-house entertainment
I can think of better slogans, but not any that are grounded in reality.
Having spent the last few years studying the Supreme Court in my capacity as a non-lawyer, I’ve realized that the hot air breathed by whole sides — if X wins he’ll change the Court! — has little to do with history. Even if eight conservatives sat on the court they would start to fracture in weird, unpredictable ways. Look at FDR’s court! He appointed more justices than any since Washington, and no one expected Frankfurter, Reed, and Jackson to become the “conservative” bloc.
so there’s a senate deal on the payroll tax extension. a key concession is that the review process for the keystone xl tar sands pipeline will be dramatically sped up—60 days, rather than the 12+ months that was the previous timeline. i’m sympathizing with shakey’s comment (this thread? another thread? don’t want to look, sorry) that this could be a good thing for opposers of the pipeline. after all, since there’s no way the state department’s re-review will be complete in 60 days (and i don’t even know if that counts the time for the Inspector General of the State Dept. to complete the review of the corruption-riddled initial review), obama could legitimately refuse to grant the permit on the grounds that the information he needs to make the decision isn’t yet available. beyond that, though, this might end up being a good thing for enviros because it moves the deadline for decision from 12+months—after an election, when the momentum from the tar sands action movement would have mostly dissipated—to 2 months from now, when the momentum will only build. in fact, just now all the tar sands people were sent a fist-pumping LET’S FUCKING DO THIS alert, and with a more short-term target of 2 months, i think it’s likely we’ll be able to raise an even greater fuss than a few weeks ago when we surrounded the white house 5 people deep.
anyway, tl;dr but it’s going to be fascinating to see how this plays out.
oh yeah, another key concession for the local DC area:
The bill would prohibit the District of Columbia from using federal or local tax money to pay for abortions for low-income women under Medicaid.
federal OR local tax money. WTF
No local taxes, because D.C. is actually administered by Congress, despite having a mayor and local police force, so they can make laws specific to D.C. if they’re feeling pissy.
Having spent the last few years studying the Supreme Court in my capacity as a non-lawyer, I’ve realized that the hot air breathed by whole sides — if X wins he’ll change the Court! — has little to do with history. Even if eight conservatives sat on the court they would start to fracture in weird, unpredictable ways. Look at FDR’s court! He appointed more justices than any since Washington, and no one expected Frankfurter, Reed, and Jackson to become the “conservative” bloc.
you don’t think things have fundamentally changed since then tho? in how we nominate people, in how they’re vetted, in what kinds of judges can even make it?
He’s an historian!
Having spent the last few years studying the Supreme Court in my capacity as a non-lawyer
Well then.
okay...I’m gonna switch sides just so I don’t have to agree w/ gabnebb
you don’t think things have fundamentally changed since then tho? in how we nominate people, in how they’re vetted, in what kinds of judges can even make it?
Maybe before John Paul Stevens and David Souter die they can tell us how they “disappointed” their supporters (Ford wasn’t though).
my point being that things have changed not just since fdr but since stevens and souter even
partly due to them
aw is it really you gabs?
Of course it’s changed since FDR’s time. It would be impossible for a sitting senator like Hugo Black to join the court; but I insist that no matter how closely nominees are examined they’re not machines. It doesn’t happen immediately; it may take several years.
you really think there’s some chance alito or roberts are not solid conservatives 20 years from now?
Roberts and Alito are not the same kind of conservatives as, say, Thomas, or the Most Important Man in America.
But to answer your question more directly: I’m sure they’ll be conservatives of a kind in twenty years, but who the fuck knows what conservatism looks like in twenty years, let alone what kind of country gabbneb or melting ice caps give us.
right but we’re talking about a swing to the degree that the republican party would feel regret w/r/t that nomination. whereas I’m gonna say “I’m guessing they’re gonna stay pretty content w/ those nominations”
...the Most Self-Important Man in America
fixed
this could be a good thing for opposers of the pipeline. after all, since there’s no way the state department’s re-review will be complete in 60 days (and i don’t even know if that counts the time for the Inspector General of the State Dept. to complete the review of the corruption-riddled initial review), obama could legitimately refuse to grant the permit on the grounds that the information he needs to make the decision isn’t yet available
I think it may be more about politics than policy for the other side. They want to point to something to suggest that Obama is standing in the way of job creation.
aw is it really you gabs?
Belay on.
lol tbh i don’t get why some itt are so eager to distance themselves from gabbnebism
“Symmetry”
let’s keep conservatives off the Supremes by reelecting the guy who just codified unlimited detention.
just in case C Dexter is gabbneb I’m quitting this sandbox thread.
Pundneb
http://www.miller-mccune.com/politics/why-a-democracy-needs-uninformed-people-38398/
In experiments where a minority of fish was trained to swim toward a yellow target, and a majority toward a blue target, the minority swayed the whole group more than 80 percent of the time. Then the researchers added “uninformed” fish to the mix, and a curious thing happened. “Adding those individuals dramatically changes the outcome of group decision-making,” [study author Iain Couzin] said. “They inhibit the minority and support the majority view, and this allows the majority to be heard and that view to dominate.” ... “We thought, ‘Wow, that’s kind of interesting,‘“ Couzin said, ”because you don’t normally think that adding uninformed individuals to decision-making processes would have that sort of democratizing effect.“
Even if eight conservatives sat on the court they would start to fracture in weird, unpredictable ways. Look at FDR’s court! He appointed more justices than any since Washington, and no one expected Frankfurter, Reed, and Jackson to become the “conservative” bloc.
― Lord Sotosyn, Friday, December 16, 2011 7:43 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Permalink
We seem to be on quite the streak of Presidents getting exactly what they expect out of their nominees, however. Perhaps times have changed?
It seems like Souter changed the game.
just in case C Dexter is gabbneb I’m quitting this sandbox thread.
― Dr Morbius, Saturday, December 17, 2011 7:25 AM (13 hours ago) Bookmark Permalink
I call 3 days.
i think Poppa Bush knew exactly what he was getting in Souter ... an old-school New England Republican (like himself, really). the only people who were unpleasantly surprised about him were the early 1990s-style Teabaggers.
Yeah, maybe. I guess I should say that since Souter the political parties have gotten what they wanted.
I don’t think anyone was “surprised” about him, because no one really knew what to expect in the first place.
can’t count votes/control his caucus etc
We seem to be on quite the streak of Presidents getting exactly what they expect out of their nominees, however. Perhaps times have changed?
This often takes years to show itself, if it does at all.
it took what, 3 years to find out Souter would support Roe? I think we can conclude that Roberts and Alito are what we expected them to be.
lol: espn analyst craig james leaving the sports desk to run for congress as a republican.
Meanwhile Obama be havin’ fun with drone rockets:
Many administration lawyers strongly disapprove of opinions written under President George W. Bush that justified detainee interrogation methods now widely regarded as torture. But they worry that Obama’s 2009 decision to make them public has set a precedent for the release of normally classified opinions.
The Defense Department’s Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), which has carried out strikes in Yemen and Somalia, refuses to discuss drones or any other aspect of its secret counterterrorism operations.
Senior administration officials say they deserve to be trusted on drones, in part because Obama kept his pledge to do away with the CIA’s secret prisons and the use of harsh interrogation techniques.
House GOP to vote to raise taxes! ALLRIGHT!
just like in Braveheart!
They haven’t voted yet but...
At the raucous, two-hour closed-door meeting, House Republicans compared themselves to the underdog, principled Scots in the movie “Braveheart” and, over takeout chicken sandwiches, promised to knock down the Senate bill.
We seem to be on quite the streak of Presidents getting exactly what they expect out of their nominees, however. Perhaps times have changed?
This often takes years to show itself, if it does at all.
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, December 19, 2011
I think since Souter you have and will continue to see justices doing exactly what the Presidents who nominated them wanted.
Ok, now the House Republicans have voted down the 2 month payroll tax extension. Will they succeed in getting even more things added to a year long bill via Dems caving or will Dems actually stay strong(although they have already dropped the millionaires surcharge tax and agreed to the quicker pipeline decision)
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal/2011_12/gop_scuttles_bipartisan_deal_o034225.php
inclusion of ‘over chicken sandwiches’ somehow incredibly undermining & damning, while keeping neutral nyt tone
Dems are not gonna cave on this, it’s too much of a coup politically to make Boehner eat shit (again)
also Boehner = worst speaker ever? I cannot recall another speaker in my lifetime who was so shitty at counting the votes of his own caucus.
It’s an inchoate bunch, this group.
watching the Senate dems pwn Boehner is a source of almost sadistic pleasure—dude has wanted the job he’s got for so long and they’re just hanging him out to dry without breaking any visible sweat
it is pretty funny, yes
would be funnier if Reid and Obama just went straight to negotiating with Cantor in the future
Let’s just say it’s taken the Senate Dems long enough to play nasty.
well I’m not entirely sure they saw this coming and deliberately passed something they knew he couldn’t muster the votes for—but now that Boehner’s in this situ they’re obviously going to play hardball, they have nothing to lose
that reminds me, i saw al franken on local morning sunday tv a week or so ago. i guess he was on because he organized a secret santa thing in the senate and it made the news.
the host was like “do you think this will help collegiality? do you think it will improve things in the payroll tax cut debate?” and he was like “yup, it’s gonna solve the whole thing.”
lol
Matt Damon be angry at Obama.
How come Ralph Nader never runs for president anymore? We need more options!
good post
Do you really think the Republican’ts and the Demorats represent all of America? They don’t represent me!
so you’re represented by left-leaning racists; good to know
What are you talking about? You don’t know what I believe in! I’m not a racist!
lol
valuable poster
LBJ was literally incapable of pronouncing “negro” without transforming it into the n-word. He also signed the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act.
My point being, actions speak louder than words, and measuring a public figure’s racism is a tricky business.
sometimes it isn’t very tricky at all
Shep’s “....really.” OTM
xpost
Asked to clarify whether he thought Obama does try to “talk white,” Nader said: “Of course.
”I mean, first of all, the number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency should be is to candidly describe the plight of the poor, especially in the inner cities and the rural areas, and have a very detailed platform about how the poor is going to be defended by the law, is going to be protected by the law, and is going to be liberated by the law,“ Nader said. ”Haven’t heard a thing.“
jeez, dan. this is horrible. nader thought that a black candidate for president ought to forthrightly address some specific issues that affect blacks and he thought it was cuet to characterize avoiding these issues as ”talking white“. ok, so it wasn’t as cuet as he thought. let’s all throw rotten eggs at him.
Nader’s too smart not to know that you don’t use “Uncle Tom” in any context about a black man.
Actually, Nader seems entirely tone deaf in that regard. But I’ve argued before that ignorance and racism need to be seen as connected, but not identical. This argument usually gets no sympathy in ilx. I continue to agree with myself on this, even if no one else here does.
Actually, Nader seems entirely tone deaf in that regard.
fixed.
I still have no regrets about supporting him in 2000.
One further observation: there is no such thing as being too smart not to know something. One’s exposure to any subject is not predictable by examining one’s intelligence. Nader was raised in a segregated America. Most ilxors were not. Given his background, Nader probably has the same vague and generalized set of ideas about race that are the common property of liberals his age.
Me neither, people said it was Nader’s fault that Bush was president for eight years but it was important to send a message! And people got that message!
The GOP will cave, ABC News reports.
Me neither, people said it was Nader’s fault that Bush was president for eight years but it was important to send a message! And people got that message!
― billy goat, Wednesday, December 21, 2011 2:21 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Permalink
I literally wrote “suggest ban” with a sharpie on the screen of my laptop above this post just so I could click it
I don’t know what you’re talking about but Aerosmith rocks!
<3
jeez, dan. this is horrible. nader thought that a black candidate for president ought to forthrightly address some specific issues that affect blacks and he thought it was cuet to characterize avoiding these issues as “talking white”. ok, so it wasn’t as cuet as he thought. let’s all throw rotten eggs at him.
how could you possibly read NADER’S ACTUAL WORDS and come to this conclusion, glossing over the overt, blatant “he isn’t really black because he isn’t talking about the issues that I, a rich white man, think he should be talking about”
it is really never excusable for anyone to call anyone an “Uncle Tom”
unless that person is actually your uncle named Tom
even then
call him “Tio Tommy” or something, ixnay on the uncle-hey om-tay
Furthermore, it is pretty easy to tell the difference between ignorance and actual bigotry; when the offensive remark is pointed out to the person and they are mortified and apologetic, that person said something out of ignorance. When the person doubles down and says “I meant exactly that and here’s why,” that is unambiguously bigoted. Bigotry expressed along racial lines is an expression of racism. It’s not that difficult to understand.
xp: my godfather is “Uncle Tommy”, I never realized why until high school
there’s actually a character named ‘uncle tom’ in p.g. wodehouse’s ‘code of the woosters’ and it pulls me up short every time he’s mentioned.
Wow, Obama allowing EPA to go ahead with mercury limits...although Republican Senator Inhofe is vowing to try to prevent them from being fully implemented
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/21/e-p-a-announces-mercury-limits/?hp
The Environmental Protection Agency introduced new standards on Wednesday sharply limiting emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from the nation’s 1,400 coal- and oil-burning power plants.
If and when the new rule takes effect, it will be the first time the federal government has enforced limits on mercury, arsenic, acid gases and other poisonous and carcinogenic chemicals emitted by the burning of fossil fuels.
Lisa P. Jackson, the E.P.A. administrator, said that the regulations, which have taken more than 20 years to formulate, would save thousands of lives and return financial benefits many times their estimated $9.6 billion annual cost.
...
Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, the senior Republican on the Environment and Public Works Committee, vowed to block the new regulation.
“Sadly, this rule isn’t about public health,” he said in a statement. “It is a thinly veiled electricity tax that continues the Obama administration’s war on affordable energy and is the latest in an unprecedented barrage of regulations that make up E.P.A.’s job-killing regulatory agenda.
Inhofe is one of the stupidest people in the Senate
how goes the war on affordable energy, comrade?
we will not rest until the last oil baron is strangled with the entrails of the last American worker
The GOP will cave, ABC News reports.
Are you sure they weren’t intending to build a “man-cave” while stuck over the holidays?
can they get chicken sandwiches delivered to this man-cave
Inhofe is just smart enough to remember to say “job-killing” in every third sentence. This also appears to be just smart enough to become a senator from Oklahoma the fossil fuel industry.
x-post re House Republicans in their cave:
Where they will watch Braveheart some more. Here are further details and comments on the Braveheart stuff from generally annoying W. Post columnist Dana Millbank:
Turns out they were talking Monday night about their favorite scenes from “Braveheart.” About 10 House Republicans went to the microphones to share their memories of the Mel Gibson film, Republican sources told my Post colleagues Paul Kane and Rosalind Helderman.
One member spoke about the apocryphal scene in which the 13th-century Scottish rebel William Wallace ordered his troops to moon the English. Another member recounted the scene in which Wallace commanded the rebels to hold their positions before raising their spears against the charging English cavalry.
This inspired the assembled lawmakers to chant: “Hold! Hold! Hold! Hold!”
Finally, toward the end of the meeting, Rep. Rob Bishop (Utah) bravely rose to tell his colleagues that he hated the film. He introduced a motion that all references to “Braveheart” be banned. His colleagues laughed and heckled. The motion was not adopted.
But Bishop was right: “Braveheart” is a conspicuously poor choice for the House GOP.
For one thing, the Republicans are, if anything, in a reverse-“Braveheart” position: In this fight, they are the nobles putting down the overtaxed peasants. For another, the Scots they are emulating were defeated and slaughtered, and Wallace was captured (possibly betrayed by his own side), then drawn and quartered.