The Enablers

I’m hearing Democrats making a lot of hay about the Republicans’ “war on women.”  As outraged as I am at Rush Limbaugh, the Catholic Bishops, and pretty much any right-winger who tells me I have no right to look in his gun cabinet while he has every right to stick his nose between my legs, I can’t help but think that the fact that we are arguing over birth control has as much to do with alleged liberals and progressives as it does with those who would like to take us back 100 years.

Hillary Clinton had it right when she spoke to the U.N. 4th World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995:

It is time for us to say here in Beijing, and for the world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to discuss women’s rights as separate from human rights.

These abuses have continued because, for too long, the history of women has been a history of silence. Even today, there are those who are trying to silence our words. But the voices of this conference and of the women at Huairou must be heard loudly and clearly:

It is a violation of human rights when babies are denied food, or drowned, or suffocated, or their spines broken, simply because they are born girls.

It is a violation of human rights when women and girls are sold into the slavery of prostitution for human greed — and the kinds of reasons that are used to justify this practice should no longer be tolerated.

It is a violation of human rights when women are doused with gasoline, set on fire, and burned to death because their marriage dowries are deemed too small.

It is a violation of human rights when individual women are raped in their own communities and when thousands of women are subjected to rape as a tactic or prize of war.

It is a violation of human rights when a leading cause of death worldwide among women ages 14 to 44 is the violence they are subjected to in their own homes by their own relatives.

It is a violation of human rights when young girls are brutalized by the painful and degrading practice of genital mutilation.

It is a violation of human rights when women are denied the right to plan their own families, and that includes being forced to have abortions or being sterilized against their will.

If there is one message that echoes forth from this conference, let it be that human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights once and for all. Let us not forget that among those rights are the right to speak freely — and the right to be heard.

“Human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights . . . “

Then why are our rights always used as bargaining chips?  Why are our private health care decisions “carved out” as something outside of normal health care? You think they haven’t been? Explain the Hyde Amendment to me. Explain President Obama’s Executive Order that enshrined the Hyde Amendment and now will never again have to come up for an annual vote in Congress. Explain all the “conscience clauses” for doctors, nurses and other “health” practitioners that allows them to deny women legal medical procedures that provider finds personally “immoral.”  Explain why pharmacists have been given permission to refuse to fill a woman’s legal prescription from a licensed M.D. because he objects on “religious” grounds.

All of this has been done on the Democrats’ watch or with their acquiescence.

You might not realize it but a lot of us of the female persuasion have been warning about this for years. We were told to not rock the boat. Can’t you see we’ve got really, really important stuff to do FIRST? Your turn will come, we were told. In the meantime, can you come help out with the phone bank or walk a precinct? Yes, we LOVE women! We VALUE women! Really, really, really! But, you know . . .  the Republicans!!! 

In order to pass President Obama’s “signature” Health Care bill, women’s rights regarding their right to choose was sold down the river. Abortion was singled out for special treatment. No other medical procedure was given this carve out. This was done by Democrats who, instead of drawing a line in the sand, caved.

Another example: The Lily Ledbetter Act passed both houses of Congress early in 2009, but the more important Paycheck Fairness Act, the bill that would actually put some teeth into Lily Ledbetter, and after having passed the House in 2009 by a greater margin than Lily Ledbetter, languished for two years in a Democrat-controlled Senate until just before the 2010 election when it was becoming clear that Democrats were probably going to get their asses handed to them, so they’d better throw the wimmenz a bone.  The vote didn’t happen until after the “shellacking” and failed pretty much on a straight party vote. Hmmm. Do you think that this bill might have stood a better chance if it had been voted on at the same time as its sister legislation? Why wasn’t it? Because, women’s priorities always take a back seat. Always. Until it is an election year and the Dems need to get us stirred up again so we’ll walk those precincts and staff those phone banks.

There may be a huge backlash now because of the overreach of the conservatives, but what is happening now is not an event in isolation. All along the way Democrats and “progressives” gave them the green light to take an inch, and then another inch and then a yard, then half mile until, well,  here we are. As Dr. Violet Socks writes:

Women’s contraception is the only medication associated with normal human activity that is described as some kind of weird off-the-wall thing that shouldn’t be covered by insurance. The only one.

We told you they wouldn’t be happy until they put all women under their thumbs. Those of us who embrace a secular government and the separation of church and state also warned you about the dangers of letting other people’s religions interfere in our government.

You didn’t listen.

Maybe now you will.

(By the way, I was quite pleased to hear that the Democratic women walked out of Darryl Issa’s hearing the other day. Let me know when the all Democratic men do the same. Seriously, when are all of you going to have our backs?)

Indeed, the problem is two-fold

Michael Brenner lays the blame squarely where it belongs: Obama himself, and those who did not, do not, hold him accountable. 

Obama has unmoored the Democratic Party from its foundations — philosophical and electoral. No longer is it an expression of the persons, programs and ideas that crystallized with the New Deal and which dominated the country’s politics for sixty years. Its future is that of ad hoc assemblage of hustlers and special interests whose sole claim to govern will be that it is not the amalgamated Tea/Republican Party. Obama, by this Oedipus-like act of patricide, has also betrayed the country that voted for an enlightened leader with a social conscience — a country in desperate need of the opposite to the fate he has laid on us.

[ . . . ]

Most striking is a behavior pattern that resembles closely the narcissistic syndrome — even if he is not a clinical narcissist. A narcissist has no convictions other than a total dedication to his own gratification. That gives him the freedom to maneuver without inhibition or conscience with the revered self as the only reference point. All expressions of ideals, of opinions, of intentions are implicitly so qualified. A complementary narcissistic trait is an ease with blurring the line between virtual reality and actual reality. Narcissists believe everything they say — at the moment they say it. Their declarations are sterile acts that have no pride of parentage nor can they expect honor from offspring. Witness Obama’s momentarily rousing support of a labor movement that he has scorned for thirty months. This is the same President who has launched an all-out campaign against public school teachers whose unions serve as the whipping-boy for all that ails American education.

[ . . . ]

The instinct to protect Obama was so powerful that it stilled the voices of those who should have been both bolstering and cajoling him to remain true to his avowed commitments. To this day, the hesitation about calling out Obama is manifest — witness the minimal reaction to his brazen reversal on clean air standards that is required by legal stipulation to promulgate. Pressuring Obama early on also would have been the line of political realism since opinion surveys have made clear that it was the Republicans who were out of step with prevailing attitudes on issue after issue. That remains true today despite the White House and the Democratic Congressional leadership jettisoning them wholesale. It cannot last for very long, of course, with the mass defections that have left American politics with only one narrative, the legitimizing of a Darwinian social philosophy, the ensconcing of moneyed interests on the throne of power, and the deference now shown the Tea Party outrages.

The vow by so many not to hold to account a President (the first person of color to occupy the White House) who engaged in one unseemly sellout after another emboldened Obama to go further and further down that road. Only now that the disaster has occurred are a few tentative, mild voices of serious criticism raised about the man, his methods and his politics. They have little practical meaning since the damage is done, the game is lost, the Democratic Party is denatured, and the great progressive wave of the 20th century that reconciled Americanism with the social ethics of the modern world reversed. Free of any mea culpas and lacking a sense of urgency, these mild chastisements fall into the ignoble category of “grandpa reassurances.”

I recommend you read it all.

Matt Stoller’s Must Read

If would be one thing if Obama were failing because he was too close to party orthodoxy. Yet his failures have come precisely because Obama has not listened to Democratic Party voters. He continued idiotic wars, bailed out banks, ignored luminaries like Paul Krugman, and generally did whatever he could to repudiate the New Deal. The Democratic Party should be the party of pay raises and homes, but under Obama it has become the party of pay cuts and foreclosures. Getting rid of Obama as the head of the party is the first step in reverting to form.

So why isn’t there a legitimate primary challenger to Obama to make this case? Forty years ago, primaries were instituted in the Democratic Party as a response to party insiders having too much influence over nominations. These reforms were implemented before the prevalence of money in politics was as extreme as it is now. At this point, primary challenges are so expensive that a serious 2012 campaign would ironically require support of party insiders for viability. The party, inflexible as it was in 1968, is perhaps even more rigid today. As a result, no candidate has stepped up to challenge Obama in a primary, even though 32 percent of Democratic voters want one.

This is an institutional crisis for Democrats. The groups that fund and organize the party — an uneasy alliance of financiers, conservative technology interests, the telecommunications industry, healthcare industries, labor unions, feminists, elite foundations, African-American church networks, academic elites, liberals at groups like MoveOn, the ACLU and the blogosphere — are frustrated, but not one of them has broken from the pack. In remaining silent, they give their assent to the right-wing policy framework that first George W. Bush, and now Barack Obama, cemented in place. It will be nearly impossible to dislodge such a framework without starting within the Democratic Party itself.

Read it all here.

FDR on today’s Republican Party

I. Love. This.  

“Progressives,” what does he have to do?

Come to your house and personally kick you in the teeth?

Now, Democratic commentators — mostly the President’s most hardened loyalists — continue to invoke this “he’s-weak-and-inept” excuse for Obama, but the evidence is far too abundant to sustain it any longer.

As I was driving to work this morning I was listening to Hal Sparks (who is sitting in for Stephanie Miller), and he almost started to call Obama on the carpet. You could hear the confusion in his voice. How could his idol do this?  He was almost ready to see it.

But, no.  He got hold of himself, put his blinders back on, and true to form, he blamed Democrats who “stayed home” in November. That’s where he went.  It wasn’t Obama’s fault at all.

Pathetic.

What I Fear vs What I Hope

What I fear will happen:

Yes, yes, however the process shakes out to replace putative senator Dean Heller in CD2, the larger Angle’s role, the better the chance for some Republican-lite Nevada-style Democrat to win that seat.

What I would like to see:

Mainstream Republicanism is now defined by the vote to kill Medicare. Greg Brower, Brian Krolicki, Mark Amodei and other assorted potential CD2 wannabes would have to discuss that cornerstone of contemporary Republicanism, even if Angle hogs the spotlight. Yet with Angle screeching about guns, god and other goofiness, the race would ultimately be about her.

The proposed elimination of Medicare gives Democrats something big to be against. That’s probably about as good as it’s going to get, agenda-wise, for customarily spineless Democrats, and a special election should be a fine opportunity to take it out for a spin in a ruby red district, open it up and see how it does.

Voters need a real choice.  They need to see someone willing to take it to the Republicans, not another faded-out version of a Republican. Harry Truman was right.

The conventional wisdom is that a “real” Democrat/Liberal/Progressive doesn’t stand a chance in CD-2.  I wouldn’t know. We’ve never had the opportunity to really hear from one.

Reactions elsewhere

Center for Economic Policy Research (Yay that Obama plans to protect Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.  Not happy he isn’t asking a proportional sacrifice from defense budget. And by the way, what about jobs?)

“President Obama’s statement was about as encouraging as could have been hoped for in the context of an agenda committed to deficit reduction. He rightly stressed that the wealthy, who have been the big winners in the economy over the last three decades, can afford to pay more in taxes. He also correctly pointed out that Social Security is an essential program for the nation’s retirees and workers, and that it does not contribute to the deficit. He also pointed out that the way to fix Medicare and Medicaid is to fix the private health care system, not to privatize Medicare as the Republicans in Congress have proposed.

“On the negative side, it is unfortunate that President Obama accepted a formula that cuts three times as much from projected spending (including interest) as he proposes to increase taxes. It is also striking that he proposes to cut twice as much from domestic discretionary spending (the portion of the budget that includes most investment spending) as he does from defense spending, especially since defense spending is projected to be about 20 percent larger than domestic discretionary spending over the 10-year budget horizon.

“More importantly, a deficit reduction agenda is a serious problem in the context of an economy that badly needs additional demand. While the economy is much healthier today than it was two years ago, the pace of job growth is not acceptable.

[ . . . ]

“Jobs should be the top priority for policymakers right now. The people who are out of work are not the ones who gave us this recession. It is the fault of the people who design economic policy.”

David Dayen at Firedoglake echoes the Center for Economic Policy Research. (The speech was fine, but the focus is wrong)

I wrote at the end of the liveblog on Obama’s speech today that, but for the fact that the speech should never have been given, I didn’t have much wrong with it. Obama got suckered into making a big show of his deficit reduction bona fides at a time when the biggest problem in the country concern millions of idle bodies who could be working and contributing.

[ . . . ]

And the rhetoric in the speech, with its defense of government action, was mostly fine too. But the direction of the debate is all wrong. We’re wasting human potential with a focus on deficits. It’s the wrong time and place. The speech is fine a) if you believe the lines in the sand will not be crossed and b) if you ignore the fact that millions of people are out of work.

UPDATE: Then there’s the point about this becoming the new baseline, the leftward pole in the debate, a point Paul Krugman makes here. That’s a dangerous step, and even worse is the silly “failsafe” which will mandate spending cuts and tax hikes if these deficit targets aren’t met by 2014. That’s essentially a spending cap, and it’s a terrible idea.

Yep, that “failsafe” part freaked me out too.

Greg Sargeant, Washington Post

We cannot know right now whether the steadfastness of Obama’s rhetoric in defending core liberal and Democratic ideals will be matched by equal resoluteness in practice when the battles heat up and the temptation to make deals and jettison core priorities intensifies. But Obama did tell us in clear and unequivocal moral terms what he thinks it means to be a Democrat, and those who have been waiting for him to do so should be quite satisfied by what they heard.

I was quite struck by the tone and content of this part of his speech. I thought, If this Obama stays and fights, I will have his back. My regular readers know what an amazing thought that is coming from me.

When I was married to husband #1, he used to tell me that I shouldn’t judge him on past behavior. But that’s all I had to go on. He could promise until the cows came home that he was turning over a new leaf, but until I saw some consistent behavior changes, I had no other point of reference. The same applies to Obama.

Words are easy. And they do come easy to Barack Obama. What he has trouble with is (A) conflict and (B) follow-through.   He’s going to have to stand up to the Republicans. He appears to have drawn a line in the sand.  I would prefer one chiseled in granite. 

And again, the devil is in the details and the final deal.  We’ll know soon enough if in the next few days and weeks Obama starts walking it back. 

As the Rude Pundit put it:

The Rude Pundit’s Five-Word Response to President Obama’s Magical Speech o’ Deficit-Reducing Wonderment and Marvels:

Why should we believe you?

Just settling on the price

What we need from our politicians is a good old-fashioned Lincoln-Douglas debate.

What is Lincoln Douglas debate?

A: Lincoln-Douglas debate is one-on-one debate and is primarily focused on competing values. Every two months, a resolution is decided upon by coaches across the nation and it is debated at most tournaments within that two month period. Resolutions generally take the form in which two values are pitted against each other. A great example is the recent resolution – “Resolved: A just social order ought to place the principle of equality above that of liberty.” In this resolution, the value of liberty and equality are at odds, and the goal of the debate should be to determine which value is of greater importance in a just social order. Other resolutions may not be as clear or blatantly straightforward in establishing what values are in conflict. Examples include: “Resolved: Secondary education in the United States ought to be a privilege and not a right” or “Resolved: When they are in conflict, a business’ responsibility to itself ought to be valued above its responsibility to society.” After an examination of these resolutions, underlying values will emerge. Debaters then write cases (the affirmative should write a 6 minute case and the negative should write a 3 and 1/2 minute case) that they present and continue the debate in the form of spontaneous rebuttals that should not bring up any new arguments that weren’t already addressed in the cases.

Unfortunately, there can be no debate when both sides agree on the same value premise.

What is a Value Premise?

A: From all these values that arise, your first goal should be to decide on a “value premise.” In some regions, debaters refer to their value premise as a core value, but the term value premise is more generally recognized. A value premise should be the ultimate value that you seek to uphold and/or achieve in the debate round. Examples include things like Justice, Morality, Societal Welfare, Individual Welfare, or Liberty. Some debaters tend to use more obscure values, but sticking to the basics is generally preferable unless you have a specific goal in mind. It is important to remember that your value premise must be a VALUE, and not something else like the Social Contract which is an IDEA but not a value in and of itself. Every argument that you make in a debate round should relate to this value premise. If you cannot show how your side better achieves your value premise, then you (ideally- if you have a good judge) should lose the round. Therefore it is very important to choose a value premise wisely and never forget that your arguments should focus on it at all times.

Remember the old joke?

He: Would you have sex with me for five million dollars?

She: Yes.

He: Would you have sex with me for five dollars?

She: Of course not! What kind of woman do you think I am?!?

He: We’ve already determined that. Now we’re just haggling over price.

Obama and the Republicans regarding the budget? Same thing.

. . . Obama is not so much legitimizing Republican claims as agreeing with and putting forth the same claims. It’s only a matter of size and timing upon which Obama and the Republicans are having a debate. Democrats are not even at the table for this discussion, except on social policy.

Steve Benen:

But then there’s the flip side. Once Democrats commit to systematic debt reduction as policymakers principal goal — as opposed to, say, economic growth — it sets the terms of the debate. The unyielding dynamic locks everyone into answering the same question: how do tackle the deficit and the debt?

That’s the question Republicans (and much of the media) want as the central focus, but there are more pertinent and important questions that should be prioritized, such as, “How about a jobs plan to reduce unemployment?” Or maybe, “How will taking money out of the economy and reducing public investment lead to more growth?”

What’s more, it also sets baselines for a “compromise.” If Obama presents a credible vision for long-term debt reduction this week, we’ll have one pillar, which will serve as a counterweight to Paul Ryan’s radical House budget plan presented a few days ago. But a moderate counterweight may not be wise — if recent history is any guide, negotiations will produce a deal that’s somewhere in between.

 

New Deal Democrats – Fairness, Dignity, Respect

And so it begins.

Anglachel: Hillary is Not Going to Save Us

The Democratic Party has been brought up brutally short by Obama and made to look at the deep division that splits most of its traditional base from the current leadership and a very vocal and dominant, though numerically minor, constituency, a group that mostly identifies as “Independent” (fearful of seeming too loyal to a party – how gauche!) and constantly threatens to bolt and protest vote. Their ideal candidate is someone who lauds Reagan and won’t put “Democrat” on his campaign literature. If a primary challenge is made, it needs to be done not merely against Obama, but also against this political faction within the Democratic Party. Modern New Dealers must retake the party and make it, once more, the party of FDR.

[ . . . ]

An FDR Democrat begins each day with a single question – What will I do to make the lives of ordinary Americans better? – and ends the day by saying what he or she has accomplished towards that end.

[ . . . ]

Give up fantasies of political perfection and the notion that any one candidate can save us from the bad guys.  New Deal 2.0 is going to be a multi-year effort in party capture and rebuilding.

Joe Cannon: New Deal: A Manifesto 

New Deal Democrats. If you don’t feel comfortable with that phrase, maybe you need another blog. Another party. Another nation.

[ . . . ]

The trick, of course, will be to keep contentious factions together: The Hillary hailers, the Gore groupies, the Kucinich kids, the friends of Feingold — not to mention people like my ladyfriend, who has always had a soft spot for Carol Moseley Braun. There will be those who say that the best strategy for the new party is to go radical; others will prefer a more centrist approach.

What will unite us is this slogan: Anyone but Obama in 2012.

No. I tell a lie. It has to go deeper than that.

This isn’t about a presidency; it’s about an entire party that has taken the wrong direction.

[ . . . ]

Have any Democrats really pushed to end outsourcing? Have any Democrats pushed for tarrifs on cheap imports? Have any Democrats proclaimed that unfettered trade is a failure? Have any Democrats called for government investment in new American factories?

How many Dems would dare to tell you that Toyota would still be a minor maker of looms if not for the massive help it received from the Japanese government?

Today, the Dems are poised to cave on tax cuts for millionaires, even though polls show that the majority of Republican voters don’t want such cuts.

Riverdaughter: Fairness, Dignity, Respect: Conducting Subversion in Public

That means showing up at public meetings and not allowing others to shout you down.  That means sticking up for the working people, even if they are public servants who seem to be benefitting from your taxes.  That means rewarding solidarity with your support.  That means giving to others when you don’t have much yourself: feeding the poor, buying a gift for a disadvantaged child at Christmas, donating money to classrooms in need.  That means helping your friends who have become unemployed through no fault of their own.  That means standing up for them when the ignorant and narrow minded call them parasites after all of their years of hard work and taxes for the public good. That means never accepting the fate that others would assign to you.  That means women sticking up for themselves and letting go of Roe that has created a false sense of equality and has been used by your enemies to rally the opposition to tear down your rights.  That means never giving anyone consent to treat you as an inferior.  That means conducting your business in public, transparently, creating your principles and values and inviting others to join you.  That means imposing discipline on yourself and others to stick to the point, not be distracted by identity politics.  That means insisting on equality for all because the country can use all the help it can get from everyone regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, education level or any other criteria that separate us from one another.

Do not let them separate you from your friends.  Hold hands, get together, brainstorm, meet, plan, do, solve and never, never let the bastards grind you down.  Push back forcefully.  You don’t have a choice.  This is your country.  Take it back.  Insist on Fairness, Dignity, Respect.  Demand a New Deal.

Joe Cannon (again): New Deal: It’s time to fight back!

What’s that? You say that you would prefer to mount a third party challenge?

Pheh. Come on — think about it: Have libertarians working within the Libertarian party ever accomplished anything? No. But libertarians working within the Republican party have accomplished astonishing things. Astonishing and horrifying.

We must mirror their tactics if we want to undo the damage they’ve done.

The best image we can present is that of Franklin D. Roosevelt, the man in the wheelchair who kicked Hitler’s ass.

Yeah. I’m liking that image. Liking it a lot!

The Conservative Myth

What Anglachel said.

Obama is wholly captured by the conservative myth of the strong entrepreneurial Republicans leading the nation out of the divisive, wasteful wilderness of the weak Democrats. He said so in his campaign, he has said so every day of his administration, and he may very well bring about the end of the Democratic Party given his determination to follow in Saint Ronnie’s footsteps.