Another possible motive was to damage the future political prospects of those not deemed sufficiently partisan (or compliant) to do the dirty business of helping ensure the permanent Republican realignment (snicker).

Posted at March 23, 2007 2:55 PM in response to What was the U.S. Attorney Purge Meant to Achieve?

Fox News doesn't broadcast.   It's a cable network.

Because it doesn't use public airwaves, it is excempt from FCC regulation. 

Posted at October 5, 2005 12:39 PM in response to Gore on the Threat to American Democracy

This guy should run for president.   I'd vote for him.

Posted at October 5, 2005 12:32 PM in response to Gore on the Threat to American Democracy

Do the Republicans have a special 800 number, to pick up the latest talking point?   The amount of coordination they can muster is just awe-inspiring.   Suddenly, every Republican, from Haley Barbour to  Michael Chertof to George Bush, to every conservative blogger on the web is spouting the itentical line.

 Now is not the time for finger pointing.   There will be plenty of time for that later.   Now we must all turn to the cost of fixing this horrible, horrible situation in New Orleans.   Now is no time to be playing the "blame game."   Besides, it's the state and city government's fault.

Honestly, how do they get the word out so quickly, and so universally?   Do they have transmitters in their heads? 

Posted at September 7, 2005 8:49 AM in response to Follow the Bouncing Meme

I can't help thinking that the primary reason for the administration's actions is geostrategic: putting a finger in China's eye. With these new "peaceful" nuclear technologies, India will be better able to put military pressure on China, and to force it to divert resources to counter.

Posted at July 19, 2005 8:27 AM in response to Nuclear Rights and Nuclear Wrongs

In one aspect, there's no difference between "economic security"--understood as providing social insurance and a floor--and reducing inequality...

Just as important, I think, is constricting the amount of money and power those at the top of the food chain can accumulate. The structure of our political system is evolving to specifically service those on top.  This aspect of income inequality I would consider particularly corrosive.

"Economic security" is about economic policies that greatly soften the differences in living standards between the middle class and the poor...

It would also include, I think, policies and programs that reduce the volatility of income:  swings in income level from year to year.   These swings are becoming increasingly deep, and can be especially hard on the lower income, as a medical or legal catastrophe can end up causing years of pain and dislocation.

Posted at July 6, 2005 11:42 AM in response to Please May I Retake the Test

This may seem like wishful thinking, but this nomination could spell the end of the Republican coalition.

For many voting Republicans, opposition to abortion is more a symbolic issue than a real one, particularly, I think, in the South.   Abortion is thought of as the wages of a libertine lifestyle, and the discomfort with sex and sexual promiscuity gets all mixed up with feelings about abortion.   But, since 1973, it's all been rather abstract.

But people do have sex, and sometimes birth control fails.   And when a daughter, or a wife, (or even a mistress) becomes pregnant at an awkward time, many these people will be reconsidering their discomfort with abortion.    The options will seem rather stark--bear this child and give it up for adoption, or bear this child and spend the next eighteen years raising it.   There is a humane aspect to abortion rights that many are not currently considering.  If abortion rights are severely restricted, support for it--and for the party that has bound its fate with the issue--will decline.

So, consider Bush's (and, more importantly, Rove's) dilemma.  Here are the basic alternatives:

Nominate a strongly pro-life jurist.   This will just be lighting a time delay fuse on the Republican coalition.  Political strength comes from the promise to end abortion.   Once ended, the political advantage to be gained from the issue diminishes.   And the libertarian and establishment conservatives will start to drift away from the party.

Nominate a conservative that will continue to support abortion rights.   The religious right will go bananas if this happens.  They care deeply about abortion, and would abandon the Republican coalition in the blink of an eye, if they feel betrayed on this point.   This is the moment they have been waiting for for 32 years, and they will not be denied.

Nominate an unacceptable candidate.   Here's where I think things will end up.  Bush will nominate an anti-abortion nutcase that even the 7 Republican "moderates" couldn't stomach.   After this nominee is voted down, a regular economic conservative, but one who supports limited abortion rights, will be put forth (someone in the Rehnquist mold), and will be confirmed.   The administration will blame the "liberals," and they will use this in future election cycles to push for expanding the Republican majority.

Abortion has been the edifice upon which the post-Reagan conservative movement has been built.   And for 25 years, the Republicans have been able to use the issue to bind themselves tightly to the evangelical right.    But now, the limitations of that strategy will bite them in the ass.    No matter which way they go, things start to fall apart.   Unless they can blame it on the Democrats.

Posted at July 1, 2005 5:56 PM in response to Could Bush Surprise Us? I Don't Think So

It is not insignificant that G.W. Bush is our first MBA President.   Reformist Republicans of the 70s used to wax rhapsodic that government would be better if it were "run like a business."   Well, they got their wish, and the result isn't pretty.

This is not as specious an argument as it might first appear.   The administration has thoroughly absorbed the culture and ethics of the modern corporation, and are applying it robustly to its tasks as political leaders.

Use Every Tool at Your Disposal.    Once policy objectives are determined, they are pursued relentlessly, with virtually no constraints of ethics or tradition.  The political culture is almost entirely disconnected from the democratic ethos of discourse and rational persuasion--total market domination is sought. 

 Maximize Shareholder Value.   Increasing the stock price to stockholders is the central precept of modern corporate governance.   So, too, is the case with the Bush Aministration.  Although, in their case, the "shareholders" are those who already had a large stake in the existing order.    I think this is something primal:  the administration is deeply committed to increasing the wealth and power of those who they perceived as "America's stockholders."

Branding is Everything.  Coincident with the rise of the "megabrand"--the Nikes, and Cokes, and MTVs, the Republicans have made a similar--and singularly successful--branding effort.  Any read of public polling makes it clear that the Republican brand is ascendent.   Liberals feel constantly confounded by the split between the policies that America supports, and the party they identify as more dynamic, more committed, and more moral.  The "liberal" brand has been devastated in the marketplace, and the Republicans continue to carefully and consistently place maintaining and building their brand identity before other goals.

In the Market, Perceptions are Everything.   Just as WorldCom and Enron spent extraordinary efforts boosting the appearance of a healthy bottom line, the current Administration has placed next quarter's results before the long-term interests of the economy or the country.   Employing an ironically-Keynesian strategy of massive and unprescedented deficit spending, the coming economic crisis is deepened by being continually deferred.   From the very start, the Bush Administration has made economically huge commitments, with the benefits front-loaded, and the price back-loaded (think tax cuts, Medicare, estate tax, global warming, etc.)

"Business is Total War"   Current B-school teaching is that business is war, fought by any means within one's disposal.   The Bush administration has followed this precept through to it's inevitable conclusion.   In its conception of the president as the CEO of the nation, coupled with Bush's love of the ethos of "bold leadership," the very conception of the government has changed.   We are no longer constituents (i.e. "parts") of the government, but customers:  the roles have been reversed.  It is now the role of the government to sell its policies to us.

The scariest part of this whole transformation of government to me is that--by its very nature--business is conscienceless.  It exists only for one purpose--to make money.   That is not necessarily a condemnation;  only a recognition of the world for what it is.  

Once disconnected from promoting the general welfare, what is the purpose of government? 

Posted at June 21, 2005 8:02 AM in response to Sui Generis or Same Old Song and Dance?

There seems to be an inference by many of the posters here that saying that the Republican Party is a party of white Christians, that that is somehow insulting to white Christians, and whites, and Christians.  Why is that?

If some Republican said that "the Democrat Party (don't you love this?) is the party of working class Americans," would we be all up in arms about how working class people had been insulted?  No.   It doesn't make any sense.

 All Dean is doing, it seems to me, is framing the Republicans as having a narrow constituency, which is not entirely off base, and seems like smart politics to me.   Certainly, if we're going to have a positive identity, it is standard rhetorical tactics to set up the other guy as a straw man.

Dean has said nothing bad about whites or Christians.   The subtext here, I think, is that the Republicans serve the interests of only a thin Velveeta slice of America.   

So what's the problem, folks? 

Posted at June 10, 2005 4:57 PM in response to Howard Dean is Doing What Dems Need: Shaking Things Up

Good points, all, Viviane !

Although I, too, consider myself as a centrist liberal, there are issues in which I think the left is, well, wrong.  It goes without saying that these probably don't match with your list of pet issues, but that's the nature of the beast.    I personally think that ideology is the enemy of intelligence: Of course, I'm not running a political party.

There's a fascinating test online called The Political Compass that measures your world view one two separate axes:  liberal-conservative, and authoritarian-libertarian.  I don't know how statistically valid the results are, but I've had some really interesting discussions with people after they've taken the test.

There is an American political center, and--on the whole--it seems pretty tolerant and pretty pragmatic.  There are some issues on which I differ considerably (e.g. the death penalty), but polling of informed public opinion usually gives me hope for the country.   It doesn't seem like either of the parties are showing the centrists much attention, though, but if some smart candidate did, I think we'd have a better country.

Posted at June 8, 2005 6:39 PM in response to What If There is No Center?