What's Up With Obama?

I started writing something yesterday about Obama's bizarre political choices last week, but today I discovered that Duncan Black has saved me the trouble of finishing it:

So, Obama's week so far: Fake social security issue, and telling gay people they need to have a "dialogue with" (translation: listen to) people who say that they're killing America's children.

The details are here and here.

Obama used to be my #2 pick, behind Edwards, but I must say he's slipped at least a notch over this last bit of craziness. I'm not sure whether it's that Obama is loonier than I thought he was, or whether he has a staff composed of idiots, but either way, it's not a good sign.

Lyndon LaRouche

As someone who worked on Capitol Hill for a number of years, I often walked passed the kids outside the subway pushing pamphlets that spouted LaRouche's latest conspiracy theory. I took a few just out of curiosity, but I never really got what he was about, apart from making up some wildly crazy shit from time to time.

After reading this informative profile (via Kevin Drum) of the man and his movement, I can confirm that yes, they are crazy, but in ways that make for an interesting read. LaRouche himself comes across as almost Maoist in the cult of personality he managed to engender among his core group for over 40 years, despite the torrents of personal and financial abuse he heaped upon them. But while Mao got the revolution he wanted and changed the world, the same cannot be said about Lyndon LaRouche. In the end, his is a tale "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

More London Photos

Mary and I aren't prisoners of consistency, so our second set of pictures from our London trip is actually from our last day there. We rode the London Eye in the morning, looked at art in the afternoon, and ate great Indian food at night. A wonderful day to finish off a wonderful trip.

Doing Iran's Bidding

Today's Washington Post editorial on the Bush Administration's new Iran sanctions is wrong from top to bottom, but this statement stood out in particular:

If this diplomatic offensive fails, President Bush or his successor is likely to face a choice between accepting Iran's acquisition of the means to build nuclear weapons and ordering military strikes to destroy its facilities.

Describing these new sanctions as a "diplomatic offensive" is simply ridiculous. They are nothing of the sort. The US has had several opportunities in the last six years to engage with Iran in meaningful dialog, but the US response has always been "do everything we want now or else." Whatever else that might be (stupid warmongering comes to mind), it's not diplomacy.

It is interesting to note that Akbar Ganji, an Iranian dissident published in the very same op-ed section, is basically calling bullshit on the Administration's "freedom agenda" in Iran. If I didn't know better, I'd be tempted to speculate that President Bush is just Ahmadinejad's puppet. Certainly, you couldn't invent a foreign policy that better fed the paranoid delusions that increasingly solidifies Ahmadinejad's political power if you tried.

Heck of a Press Conference

So yesterday FEMA holds a press conference to talk about the response to the California wildfires. The presser is carried live on cable news. And according to all who saw it, it was a public relations triumph for FEMA. Deputy Director Harvey Johnson appeared poised and answered the reporters questions in an informed way.

Just one thing, though: reporters weren't asking the questions. The press conference was staged. As Al Kamen reports:

We're told the questions were asked by Cindy Taylor, FEMA's deputy director of external affairs, and by "Mike" Widomski, the deputy director of public affairs. Director of External Affairs John "Pat" Philbin asked a question, and another came, we understand, from someone who sounds like press aide Ali Kirin.

Heck of a job, guys.

"Poor Children First"

That's what Bush said was his reason for vetoing SCHIP. And hey, no surprise, the SCHIP bill he vetoed does put poor children first, while his administration's policies have done exactly the opposite by cutting coverage.

While Rep. Stark's diatribe might have been over the top, the motivating sentiment was dead-on. The President doesn't even blink as he pours hundreds of billions of dollars down the Iraq rat hole (not to mention thousands of American lives and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives), but goes into full righteous mode when he kills $7 billion a year to insure 3.8 million uninsured kids. That's less than a month's worth of Iraq spending. Expect more of the same later this year when his outrage grows over the $22 billion (about 2 1/2 months of Iraq) Congress wants to spend over "his" budget. He's got nothing to lose politically, and he's itching for a fight, so expect the vetoes to fly.

And that's what's so depressing about the President's kabuki on these budget issues — it's petty, it's personal, and it's in direct contravention of some of his previous positions, like when he was praising SCHIP and expanding the program just a few years ago. There's no principle here, just a tired, bitter man trying to stick it to his enemies before leaving town. It's pathetic.

24

No, not the series — Bush's approval rating in the latest Zogby poll. Ouch, another record low.

And yes, Congress's rating is half that. But I'm betting if they would start standing up to Bush instead of caving in every chance they get, they'll start doing much better. There's really nothing to fear by hitting back hard against such a deeply unpopular president.

Jesusy

I got the latest alert from the Family Research Council this morning, and no surprise, Tony Perkins doesn't like ENDA. His stated reason?

If this legislation passes, it will mainstream homosexuality and provide homosexual activist [sic] a legal tool for punishing employees who do not approve of their lifestyle.

Now, maybe I'm being too hard on the bigot, but I don't have a hard time imagining him making the same arguments about uppity blacks and bitchy feminists when they were given employment protections. And he certainly takes the opposite tack when he perceives the rights of his imagined community of Christians to be under siege. "All for me and naught for thee" — I'm sure that's in the New Testament somewhere.

First London Photos Are Up

The USB cable was found, and the .99GB of images have been downloaded. And after a weekend of work, Mary and I are proud to say we actually have photographic evidence that we were in England. So follow us around during our first two days, as we moved our jet-lagged bodies from pub to pub, and saw some other interesting things in between.

Who Do You Give It To, Then?

Yesterday, the Bush White House demonstrated yet again its utter lack of class by its refusal to congratulate Al Gore for winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Instead, all that it offered was a brusque dismissal by press spokesman Tony Fatto: "Obviously it's an important recognition, and we're sure the vice president is thrilled." Nice.

Proving that they can be just as crass, however, the Washington Post editorial board decided that this award was a good excuse to call Gore a liar again, and for bonus points, slam the Nobel Committee for its obvious partisanship, thus calling into question whether Gore legitimately deserves the honor.

The Nobel committee chairman said that awarding the prize to Mr. Gore and the IPCC was not meant to be "a kick in the leg to anyone." The White House said it didn't see it that way, either. But these denials are hard to take seriously from a group that has handed the peace prize to adversaries of President Bush in several recent years.

One has to wonder which "adversaries" the Post is thinking of. Mohamed ElBaradei in 2005? Yes, he was right about Iraq's (lack of a) nuclear program while Bush got it wrong, so one can see how he might be counted as an adversary. Jimmy Carter in 2002? Forget two decades working tirelessly for democracy, he's a Democrat, so that probably counts. The United Nations in 2001, otherwise known as "the world"? True, Bush isn't very popular around the globe right now, so another mark in the "adversary" column, I guess.

But really, if the Post is saying that the rule should be that you can't give the Peace Prize to critics of our warmongering President, there aren't a lot of candidates left. Gore has the virtue of being right on global warming, and if that makes him an opponent of Bush, who's reckless do-nothing policy has put us years behind the rest of the world in addressing this crisis, then more power to him.

London Calling

And Mary and I dutifully answered by spending 8 days there. Pictures will be up as soon as I can figure out what I did with the camera's USB cable.