Steele's pro-choice comments zero in on a long-standing contradiction in the GOP stand on abortion: Being pro-choice is a conservative, libertarian position. Plus, there is no discrepancy between being personally pro-life and corporately pro-choice. It is a quite supportable conservative view that the state should not involve itself in such issues, that they should be left to the individual. Thus, you can have a person who holds a pro-life view also supporting public policies that leave the decision to the individual. Pro-choice, no matter what has happened and been said over the years, does not equate with pro-abortion. It simply means: Leave me alone, and leave others alone as well. Perhaps Steele can help clarify that, because it really needs clarifying, though I sincerely doubt the crowd that wants to ram anti-abortion public policies down everyone's throat will be open to the argument.

Last evening on Lou Dobbs (I know, I know, but at least the woman replacing him at the moment is a little better, and I forgot to switch to Lehrer after Blitzer was done), they had Michael Steele, the new RNC chairman, who was pushing tax cuts as better stimulus. They talked about the Pentagon spending money on hospitals that were "shovel ready" but not the highest priority, and agreed it didn't make much sense.

 

Actually it makes great sense: These are needed projects that have gotten quite of a lot of attention already, which is why they are ready to go, so they produce great bang for the buck in job creation. And the GOP tax-cut argument has been thoroughly discredited (so why does CNN allow them to continue to recycle it without challenge?)

It got me to thinking about my favorite parks in Minneapolis, at Minnehaha Falls and along the Mississippi. Much of the work was done by the WPA in the 30s and endures. Imagine, they actually spent money on parks. And my favorite trout stream in northeast Minnesota, not far from our home, still shows considerable evidence of work done by the CCC boys. Creepers, spending public money on improving habitat for brook trout!

Of course, both the CCC and WPA had conservative critics (Roosevelt had a devil of a time getting the WPA, dubbed "We Piddle Along," through the Senate), but the two programs created tons of jobs and had a very positive impact on a lot of lives, not to mention a lot of communities that benefited from beautiful, enduring projects.

I know that compromise is necessary in the legislative process, but I hope we do not let the critics win too much. Tax cuts don't work very well as stimulus. As President Obama said in his speech to the retreating House Democrats: Spending is the name of the game. Good spending, certainly, but we must spend a great deal of money to stop this economic slide. Long live John Maynard Keynes.  

On CNN just now, Jack Cafferty said Minnesota has no credibility on elections because it elected a wrestler to be governor, Jesse Ventura. Well, Ventura did win, in a three-way race, with about 35 percent of the vote if I recall correctly. And in fact he was a pretty decent governor, despite the occasional silly tantrum; because he owed no one anything, he was free to, and did, appoint the best cabinet we've seen here in decades, and they developed quite good policies overall, certainly better than the mainstream Republican governor we now have.

Cafferty used Ventura as ammunition to pour scorn on the continuing saga of Coleman vs. Franken. I hear this elsewhere, too, and I just don't get it. Sure there is a lot of noise coming from the partisan camps, but the PROCESS is going along just as it should. There was a recount, an automatic recount, and then the candidate who is behind, Coleman, is allowed by law to bring an "election contest," a lawsuit to hear his issues on why he thinks the procedures used in counting the votes were faulty. The three judges appointed to hear the contest are just doing their job in listening to the arguments, however goofy some folks think those arguments are.

I just do not get all the snotty comments about how screwed up this is. I don't think it is screwed up at all. The officials involved, from the secretary of state to the judges appointed to hear this contest, seem to me to be doing their jobs very well. There will be an end when the process has run its course. That may not suit some folks, but it is what the law prescribes.  

The Star Tribune in Minneapolis (my old newspaper) has put together an absolutely fascinating way that users can experience what is happening in the recount between Norm Coleman and Al Franken: They've selected 599 challenged ballots (don't have a clue what their selection requirements were) and give users an opportunity to judge how each ballot should be decided. Whoever had this idea should get a bonus; it is a really slick way to let folks understand what the recount involves firsthand.

One interesting point for me is that no matter one's (or mine, at least) preference in the election, it is relatively easy to set that aside and decide the ballots fairly objectively. Of course, each person, lacking the instructions given the judges, will apply somewhat idiosyncratic criteria. But, still, it is an interesting, informative exercise.

I did the first 100 ballots and came up with: Coleman, 40; Franken, 39; no one/other, 21. Note: if you see no mark, look at the whole ballot before concluding the voter intended to vote for no one. Sometimes there are very clear preferences, but in the wrong place

Also, I was interested that the order of the names never varied; I thought it was SOP to randomly vary the order in which the candidates appeared???

The url is: http://senaterecount.startribune.com/

... for secretary of energy? Is that too outrageous to hope for?