We Don't Need No Stinking Daschle!

This is great news from Senators Max Baucus and Ted Kennedy, especially after Think Progress damn near gave me an aneurism the other day.

The President

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20500



Dear Sir:

We were saddened to hear about Senator Daschle's decision to withdraw from the nomination process. While we continue to believe that Senator Daschle is highly qualified to hold the position of Secretary of Health and Human Services, we respect his decision and wish him all the best in his future endeavors.



We are writing to affirm our continuing commitment to enacting comprehensive health care reform this year, and to express our confidence that you will swiftly choose an exceptionally qualified and dedicated alternate nominee for Secretary of Health and Human Services to assist in our efforts. As you have emphasized, we must act now. The ranks of the uninsured grow larger each day. The cost of health care to families, businesses and government are crippling and, although we spend more on health care than any other country, the quality of care provided by America's health care system is often uneven compared to other industrialized nations.



We have a moral duty to ensure that every American can get quality health care. We must act to contain the growth of health care costs to ensure our economic stability; to help American businesses deal with the health care challenge; and to make sure that we are getting our money's worth. Incremental efforts will no longer suffice and we cannot afford to wait any longer. With your continued leadership and commitment, we remain certain that our goal of enacting comprehensive health care reform can be accomplished this year.



Respectfully yours,



Senator Max Baucus Senator Edward M. Kennedy

CHECKMATE

Majority Leader Harry Reid says they have the votes to pass the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Neon Leon

Incoming head of the CIA Leon Panetta throws Dick Cheney's shit right back in his face.

Unintentionally Revealing The Truth

The Republicans have been harping for weeks now that they have been excluded from the process when it comes to formulating the economic stimulus bill. Today we find a very unlikely source that demonstrably proves those claims false, the Wing Nut Wall Street Journal. In a story framed ostensibly to paint Senate Democrats such as Majority Leader Harry Reid as being bad guys and adding "pork" to the bill (imagine that framing from the WSJ) we find that evidently the Democrats aren't alone in their request for money for their home states. In fact the article clearly implicates Harry Reid's fellow Senator from Nevada, Republican John Ensign in this passage:

Last week, Mr. Reid worked with his Nevada colleague, Republican Sen. John Ensign, to include one version of the debt-buyback provision in the stimulus plan in the Senate Finance Committee. Mr. Reid's spokesman said the senator got involved because he "heard from businesses in the state that the current tax treatment for cancellation of debt is hindering their ability to restructure their debt so they can move forward."

This week, Mr. Reid has helped a group of Republican and Democratic senators who are trying to iron out a compromise on the provision. The senators hope to add the compromise to the final bill in the next week.

Now quite honestly I don't know if Reid is guilty or innocent of adding "pork" to the bill, however what I do know is that he was working with Republicans when he did or didn't do so. This gives truth to the lie that there hasn't been bipartisan cooperation or input when it comes to the economic stimulus package. Right about now the wingnuts in Congress are quickly running out of excuses. At some point the American people are going to tell them to cut the shit or show them in a few years just how much we don't appreciate the political games they are playing.

Scott Mayerowitz Is A Dumb Ass

If you don't believe me, just read his article. Great effing job ABC.





(h/t DougJ)

Its Time To Stop Singing And Start Swinging.

Showing that he has a little bit of Malcolm X in him to offset that MLK Jr persona President Obama has an op-ed today in the Washington Post largely echoing the statements he made yesterday about his economic stimulus bill. Setting aside for a moment that our previous President would have needed crayons to write an op-ed, this one by President Obama is just right. It lays out the challenges facing us, it describes in details how his plan will address them, and he directly and forcefully takes on his detractors. Damn good job Mr. President now if you can just get the rest of your party to follow suit. Thia bill is in fact a risky and very expsensive proposition. We need more people willing to stand up and fight for it and make the case to the American people instead of letting the Rethugs frame the argument. This op-ed is a very good start but there is still much work to be done.


First he lays out the situation we all see ourselves in right now

By now, it's clear to everyone that we have inherited an economic crisis as deep and dire as any since the days of the Great Depression. Millions of jobs that Americans relied on just a year ago are gone; millions more of the nest eggs families worked so hard to build have vanished. People everywhere are worried about what tomorrow will bring.

snip

Because each day we wait to begin the work of turning our economy around, more people lose their jobs, their savings and their homes. And if nothing is done, this recession might linger for years. Our economy will lose 5 million more jobs. Unemployment will approach double digits. Our nation will sink deeper into a crisis that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse

Then he lays out his plan to tackle these problems.

That's why I feel such a sense of urgency about the recovery plan before Congress. With it, we will create or save more than 3 million jobs over the next two years, provide immediate tax relief to 95 percent of American workers, ignite spending by businesses and consumers alike, and take steps to strengthen our country for years to come.


This plan is more than a prescription for short-term spending -- it's a strategy for America's long-term growth and opportunity in areas such as renewable energy, health care and education. And it's a strategy that will be implemented with unprecedented transparency and accountability, so Americans know where their tax dollars are going and how they are being spent.

And now the much appreciated conservative smackdown.

In recent days, there have been misguided criticisms of this plan that echo the failed theories that helped lead us into this crisis -- the notion that tax cuts alone will solve all our problems; that we can meet our enormous tests with half-steps and piecemeal measures; that we can ignore fundamental challenges such as energy independence and the high cost of health care and still expect our economy and our country to thrive.

I reject these theories, and so did the American people when they went to the polls in November and voted resoundingly for change. They know that we have tried it those ways for too long. And because we have, our health-care costs still rise faster than inflation. Our dependence on foreign oil still threatens our economy and our security. Our children still study in schools that put them at a disadvantage. We've seen the tragic consequences when our bridges crumble and our levees fail.

Next President Obama lays out his vision for the future.

Now is the time to protect health insurance for the more than 8 million Americans at risk of losing their coverage and to computerize the health-care records of every American within five years, saving billions of dollars and countless lives in the process.

Now is the time to save billions by making 2 million homes and 75 percent of federal buildings more energy-efficient, and to double our capacity to generate alternative sources of energy within three years.

Now is the time to give our children every advantage they need to compete by upgrading 10,000 schools with state-of-the-art classrooms, libraries and labs; by training our teachers in math and science; and by bringing the dream of a college education within reach for millions of Americans.

And now is the time to create the jobs that remake America for the 21st century by rebuilding aging roads, bridges and levees; designing a smart electrical grid; and connecting every corner of the country to the information superhighway.

One final shot across the bow at those who persist in having tin ears to the public's will.

So we have a choice to make. We can once again let Washington's bad habits stand in the way of progress. Or we can pull together and say that in America, our destiny isn't written for us but by us. We can place good ideas ahead of old ideological battles, and a sense of purpose above the same narrow partisanship. We can act boldly to turn crisis into opportunity and, together, write the next great chapter in our history and meet the test of our time.

I did happen to catch a Democratic Congressman (didn't catch his name) this morning on Morning Joe and he did a pretty good job of echoing the President's talking points so we have the foundation of a good platform here, now we just need to follow it up aggressively pushing back against the framing by the wingnuts who would rather play politics and score points than get our country back on track. Its time we painted them as the anti American, selfish hacks that they are and use their own kind of rhetoric against them. I can't think of anything that could prove any clearly that they want America to lose than their obstructinist tactics in a time of crisis in this country, can you?

P.S. Remember when President Obama first introduced the bill and everybody was saying that $775 billion was too little. Has anybody noticed that its almost $900 billion dollars now? Of course not.

Needed To Be Said

Building on his bunches of interviews last night underlying his case for passing his economic stimulus plan, today President Obama went more assertively and directly at the GOP obstructionists who are now trying to win the public relations war and turn public opinion against the bill. Now personally I don't think President Obama should have been the one to go after them but since nobody else was stepping up to the plate I was glad to see him do it. In case people were beginning to forget that we have heard this song and dance before from the Republicans he gave them a refresher course.

Now, in the past few days, I’ve heard criticisms that this plan is somehow wanting, and these criticisms echo the very same failed economic theories that led us into this crisis in the first place, the notion that tax cuts alone will solve all our problems, that we can ignore fundamental challenges like energy independence and the high cost of health care, that we can somehow deal with this in a piecemeal fashion and still expect our economy and our country to thrive.

I reject those theories. And so did the American people when they went to the polls in November and voted resoundingly for change.

Now in recent days wingnut Republicans in Congress have taken great satisfaction in twisting President Obama's words to use his bipartisan outreach against him. I wonder how many of them will be clammoring to repeat these words though. I would bet not many. Hopefully now we can get some stronger representation from the usual Democratic suspects on cable news now that Obama has shown them how to frame the conversation. Hopefully next time it won't take him doing all that for them to get the picture though.

Ragin Cajun

I know James Carville rubs some people who supported President Obama the wrong way but I love the guy. And I tell you one thing, if we had more Democratic surrogates like him on all of the talking head shows, President Obama would be winning the spin war right now over the stimulus bill.

Red Meat

President Obama is on my Tee Vee right now handing out plenty of it to the liberal and progressive base. Its going to be hard for the Village to try to say he is mad at Democrats now that he called out the Republican's and their tax care only stimulus bullshit.

But What About Haircuts?

Just watching Morning Joe again today and listening to Scarborough harp about how President Obama is "naive" to try to limit the compensation of executives at financial institutions who take TARP money to $500,000 a year. According to old Scar, with an assist from Mikaborg, its necessary to pay Wall Street execs enormous bonuses even after they come to the government for a bailout. Now setting aside for a moment that this is a 180 from just yesterday when he was cheering the idea of cutting executive pay on when it was Claire McCaskill's idea, but doesn't anyone else remember all the talk about haircuts when it came to bailing out the Big 3 auto workers? I remember Mika and Scar vividly. "Ohhhh the union workers have to take a haircut to get this money". So a person making say $30 or $40 an hour actually making something in this country, THEY need to take a paycut. But some fatcat big wig who has lot people's money and has in many cases lied to their clients, THEY should continue getting paid out the ass in Mika and Scar's world. Do these people know ANY regular Americans at all? Their ears aren't tin at this point, they are aluminum.

Gibby

Is it just me or has anybody else noticed that Robert Gibbs is now kicking the media's ass on a daily basis in his press conference? I think he is breaking them down with his "aww shucks" southern persona and then killing them with his sharp wit. Much better than his first couple of days.


Updated with a link to the video.

Verbal Assassin

I guess President Obama finally figured out that all of the clown ass Democratic surrogates who were going on all of the talking head shows to advocate for his American Recovery and Reinvestment Act were doing a shitty job because he came out with guns blazing today, blitzing all of the major networks with his own set of talking points. Like that old saying goes, when you want something done you gotta do it yourself. Check out the master at work...



President Obama gives John Gibson a stiff arm on Daschle and keeps right on to the endzone stimulus bill. John seems speechless that a President would actually admit they made a mistake lol. Gotta love it!

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

You gotta love how President Obama chin checks Chris Wallace on this one. "Shut up bitch and let me answer your question!" At least thats how I heard it...




Eat your heart out Sarah Palin, President Obama makes Katie Couric look pedestrian.


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If you were listening close you noticed one thing repeated over and over. ONE PERCENT BITCHES!!! (again that's how I heard it). That's right out of all the hemming and hawing and pissing and moaning that the GOP is doing if you put it all together it only adds up to one percent of the whole stimulus package. When the American people heard that tonight I am pretty sure an audible groan went up across the nation. It is one thing to think your Congressman or woman is standing up for you on principle, it's another thing all together to find out they are playing games with people's lives over one percent of the package. Since the Republican's didn't like the carrot it was time to give those bastards the stick and make them feel the pain. Now if we can only get the rest of these Democratic jackasses surrogates to follow President Obama's lead I predict smooth sailing the rest of the way.

If You Want Howard Dean To Head Up HHS...

Then you might want to go sign the petition!

Xenophobes And White Supremecists, Two Peas In A Pod

John Amato, who has done his own share of good work linking the talking head xenophobes to white supremecists groups, has a great post up at his Crooks and Liars blog about the new Southern Poverty Law Center report that exposes definitively the connections between anti immigration "think tanks" and these white supremecist groups. For those people who for whatever reason enjoy watching the Lou Dobbses and the Bill O'Reillys of the world you need to take a look at the report and see where your favorite talking head is getting their talking points from.

Molehills/Mountains

Steve Benen calculates the percentage of President Obama's stimulus bill that the House Republicans disagree with. What kind of idiot votes against a bill that is comprised of 98% of things that you agree with? A Republican idiot, that's who.