Limbaugh Says 'No' to America, Again


When Motor Trend named the Chevy Volt its 2011 Car of the Year, Rush Limbaugh criticized it and the Volt. Todd Lassa of Motor Trend then printed "Rush to Judgement" and argued the Volt

expensive for a Chevy, but many of those families will find the gasoline saved worth it. If you can stop shilling for your favorite political party long enough to go for a drive, you might really enjoy the Chevy Volt. I’m sure GM would be happy to lend you one for the weekend. Just remember: driving and Oxycontin don’t mix.

Wednesday, Rush struck back, remarking

The other day I sort of chided Motor Trend magazine for jumping on this bandwagon of the Chevrolet Volt, and the guy at Motor Trend has responded to me very nastily. He said I should drive one and that I have probably never seen one. I should ask General Motors for a loaner and they'd probably give me one for a weekend but I probably couldn't fit in it.

No, Rush, "the guy at Motor Trend" did not say you "probably couldn't fit in it." He wrote "driving and Oxycontin don't mix."

Jeff T. Wattrick of Motor Trend believes

Limbaugh’s beef with the Volt isn’t a question of automotive aesthetics or engineering. He just doesn’t like the Volt because it’s one of them librul eel-eck-trick cars that Muslim-Socialist Obama forced on the real ‘Mericans in Detroit.

But since when has Rush Limbaugh, arch-foe of President Obama's rescue plan for General Motors, been concerned about "the real Americans in Detroit?"

Short answer- never. Longer answer, from Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm:

It’s just un-American. I can’t believe that somebody would say this about this American product. He hasn’t even driven it. He hasn’t sat in it. You know, why wouldn’t you be supportive of American manufacturers building American vehicles with American workers, who now have jobs as a result of this. Why wouldn’t you be supportive of that?

Surely, Granholm isn't serious when she asks "why wouldn't you be supportive of American manufacturers building American vehicles with American workers?" Limbaugh isn't supportive precisely because it is American manufacturers building vehicles with American workers. If American business thrives- as it currently is- it undermines Limbaugh's argument that President Obama wants to destroy the private sector. And if there are jobs for American workers, there is less pressure driving down the wage rate, as well as benefits for workers.

Limbaugh (and George Will) had criticized the $7500 federal tax credit for electric cars and Lassa noted

The Obama tax credit extends to the new Nissan Leaf, too, but if you or Will slammed that car, I’ve not heard or read it. I’d be surprised if you did, though, as Nissan is building the Leaf in a non-union factory in a right-to-work state represented by two Republican senators. A factory located there because Tennessee offered Nissan big tax credits. Maybe you’re worried that if the $7,500 tax credit works, too many people will buy the Volt, and that could reduce the need for oil drilling tax credits?

Rush is hostile to environmentalism, energy conservation, and small cars. Bbut what he's really about is hostility to unions, the American worker- and to the success of American business, as long as the President is Barack Obama.... or any Democrat.



HAPPY THANKSGIVING

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Mike Huckabee, Pro-Choice

Say it ain't so, Mike!

On his Facebook page, Mike Huckabee writes

President Obama is defending the humiliating and unconstitutional electronic strip searches by machines that are making its manufacturers filthy rich and the flying public hopping mad. The President also says that there isn't a choice about the federal fondling and groping of the private parts of totally law-abiding citizens by government agents. Mr. President, I issue a challenge---if you don't find anything wrong with these practices that presume the guilt of an American before he or she proves innocence, then I ask you to take your wife, your 2 daughters, and your mother in law to Reagan National Airport and have them go through the full body scanner and then be subjected to the same and full body grabbing grope by the government agents that you authorized to do it. Do it in public where all can see. When you do that, maybe some of the rest of us won't be as angry as watching our wives, daughters, and mothers humiliated and degraded like criminals just in order to fly on a plane.

To summarize: "President Obama is defending the humiliating and unconstitutional electronic strip searches by machines .... and groping of the private parts of totally law-abiding citizens."

On Fox and Friends (video below), the former Arkansas governor was more explicit, referring to the "totally unconstitutional intrusion of their privacy." (He added "This is more about people making millions and millions of dollars off the machines that they manufactured and then lobbied to sell to the government." Follow the money, Governor.)

But as to that pesky constitutional right to privacy. Where have we heard that before? Oh, yeah:

The question remained whether the Ninth Amendment or the Fourteenth Amendment protected the right to privacy, but Blackmun sidestepped it, writing, “This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.”

That would be Roe v. Wade, largely guaranteeing a right to an abortion in the first two trimesters of pregnancy. It has been a decision attacked regularly and enthusiastically by the pro-life community the past 37 years- and doubted by some pro-choice legal scholars skeptical of the existence of a right to privacy in the United States Constitution.

But no longer! Reverend Mike Huckabee has himself discovered a right to privacy in the United States Constitution, thereby acknowledging a sound legal basis for the 9873 Court ruling which granted to women the right to terminate a pregnancy. Much obliged, Governor; you have given needed assurance to those of us unsure of the constitutional foundation of abortion rights. Welcome to the pro-choice community.

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Benign Motives Secondary

There may be a legitimate reason for Republicans to oppose the new START treaty, which modernizes the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty negotiated by the Reagan and Bush 41 Administrations with the former Soviet Union. But not according to Richard Burt, chief negotiator during the latter administration.

On the PBS NewsHour (transcript here) on November 17, Mr. Burt contended

Well, again, I don't think it's because of problems with the treaty. Jim talks about ballistic missile defense.

The -- there are no constraints on this administration or any future administration's options for developing ballistic missile defense. The language in the treaty which is in the preamble is exactly the same as in the language in the treaty I negotiated and previous administrations negotiated.

Why is it getting so politicized? Well, first of all -- and, here, I can say this as a Republican -- this is the first time a Democratic administration has sought to get ratification for a strategic arms treaty. And I think that is a -- it makes -- creates a difficult dilemma for Republicans.

It's hard for Republicans to oppose a Republican administration's treaty, particularly in the current hyper-partisan and polarized atmosphere in Washington. I think it's much easier for Republicans to oppose this administration.

In a panel discussion (transcript here) sponsored by the Arms Control Association on November 8, Burt explained in greater detail this line of reasoning, as well as its potential repercussions for national security:

.... as people describe it to me, Kyl is part of a number of Republican members of the Senate that are more worried about Obama, and this almost kind of reminds you of some of the rhetoric you’ve heard over the last two years, and the argument is this: that yes, the treaty has some problems but they’re not big problems and under normal circumstances we could support it. But you know this guy Obama has talked about eliminating all nuclear weapons, and I don’t know if we could support a treaty when Barack Obama is president because we don’t know where he’s going in the long term on nuclear arms control.

That’s a tough one, it seems to me, because what you’re really saying there is you’re not so much interested in the details of the treaty, what it constrains, it doesn’t constrain. You don’t trust the commander-in-chief, and that’s sort of the augment you’re beginning to hear, and what I’m worried about is that if that argument gets traction, particularly if the treaty isn’t ratified in a lame-duck session, I think some of the new Republicans who are coming into the Senate could buy into that argument that it’s not the treaty, it’s the president, and that I think would be very dangerous and very corrosive.

By the way, it was an argument that I remember when I was a young reporter for The New York Times covering the SALT II debate because Republicans in the 1970s made a similar argument about Jimmy Carter. They said, you know, we just don’t know with this guy and it makes it hard for us to vote for the SALT II Treaty.

Burt did note, however

an old tactic that’s usually done in these arms control debates. People want money for their favorite programs and projects, and of course they dress it up as saying that this is necessary, this spending is necessary to keep the country strong under this arms control regime. As I understand it, most of the money is for basically the nuclear weapons themselves, the warheads and keeping them secure, keeping them reliable and ready....

While Republican Senators Inhofe of Oklahoma and tea party heavyweight DeMint of Tennessee (and incoming tea party favorite Rand Paul of Kentucky) oppose the treaty on ideological grounds, Arizonan Jon Kyl (as Minority Whip, in a powerful position) seems to be fronting for the nuclear-industrial complex. Having already squeezed from the President $10 billion (deficit hawks, doncha know) for nuclear weapons modernization atop the $80 billion already planned, Kyl is negotiating for more and more. Burt observes that administration officials

have clearly walked the extra mile to deal with Senator Kyl's concerns. They are talking about spending $80 billion on the infrastructure that actually makes nuclear weapons, not the missiles or bombers or so-called delivery vehicles, but the weapons themselves, that -- that ensures that they continue to be reliable and effective.

And they're talking about $80 billion over 10 years, and adding another $4 billion in the coming year to ensure that the nuclear weapons labs and the country's infrastructure is capable of maintaining our nuclear stockpile.

And I have to say that, again, not speaking for the administration, but this is a much larger amount of money than was spent by the previous administration on the nuclear weapons complex.

Digby contends that on MSNBC on November 19, host Andrea Mitchell

.... said, "I haven't seen Richard Lugar that fired up about this issue in quite a long time, and it's because, on the face of it, what is the explanation? When you read this treaty, the preamble to the treaty, what is the explanation for saying that this is bad for U.S. interests? He replied, and I kid you not, that he thinks Republicans only want nuclear treaties to be signed under GOP administrations.

Mitchell largely ignored the comment, and a transcript of the exchange seems to be unavailable except by subscription.

There is ideological opposition from a few Republicans and an appeal to Senator Kyl of increased campaign contributions from corporations poised to benefit from increased nuclear weapons appropriations. Nevertheless, there is GOP opposition to the treaty because it is being proposed by a Democratic administration, as reflected by Digby's recollection (whether or not strictly interpreted) and Burt's remark

If we can’t ratify this treaty, we are going to send a signal, I believe, of almost total incompetence to the rest of the international community. People on Capitol Hill love to talk about American leadership. Well, I’ve got to tell you, this is not American leadership. I mean, this is what J. William Fulbright in the Vietnam period called America as a helpless giant and that’s what we become if we can’t pull ourselves together to get this treaty ratified.

This would fit in conveniently with the charge of the Republican right that Barack Obama is a weak president for whom there is no respect abroad, and who is damaging the prestige of the United States everywhere. He cowardly denies, the drumbeat goes, American exceptionalism, as expressed in the demagogic words of the former half-governor of Alaska: "Could it be a lack of faith in American exceptionalism? The fact is that America and our allies are safer when we are a dominant military superpower - whether President Obama likes it or not."

The U.S. Senate may end up yet ratifying the new Start treaty. But President Obama, as with so many issues, is fighting GOP intransigence little based on substance but more so by the party's responsiveness to powerful special interests and its determination to bring this president- and with it, possibly the nation- down.

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"Social Conservatism" Goes Hollywood

Sarah Palin has it covered.

The former governor of Alaska, touted as a "social conservative," is little different on economic issues than on cultural ones. David Corn of Mother Jones notes that Palin criticized the Troubled Asset Relief Program at a tea party convention on February 10, 2010, then on Fox News Sunday the following day blasted the program as "crony capitalism." Campaigning for Joe Miller for U.S. Senate this summer, Palin suggested that Miller would never repeat Lisa Murkowski's support for "endless bailouts."

Oops. When CBS News' Katie Couric had interviewed the vice-presidential nominee, Mrs. Palin gave a rambling answer while appearing to endorse TARP. Her support was much clearer when interviewed a few weeks later by CNN and she was adamant in her 2009 book Going Rogue, when she knocked those Republicans who had voted against the "Bush-backed economic bailout plan."

In her latest book, America By Heart, Palin knocked as "victims of the cult of self-esteem" contestants on" American Idol," which features a "seemingly endless supply of people who can’t sing but are deluded enough to get in front of a national television audience anyway.”

True enough, as far as that goes. Unfortunately, the on-again, off-again governor has a different impression of Hollywood when it comes to "Dancing with the Stars." As her daughter was due to appear on the Southern California-based program, Sarah enthusiastically tweeteed "SWEET diversion from politics! Dancing W'The Stars party in r livingroom tonight w/friends who r lovin' this change of pace 4 Sweet Bristol!" She followed, after the dance, with "Over-the-moon excited and happy for Bristol! Cheering her on @ DWTS party in the Palin living room." It was accompanied by this photograph:




Her supporters believe this is the same Sarah Palin who, at the GOP presidential convention, declared that small town people are "the ones who do some of the hardest work in America, who grow our food and run our factories and fight our wars" and boasted "I grew up with those people." It is also the Sarah Palin who was for Wall Street bailouts before she was against them and grew up with "those people" in the heartland but now has gone Hollywood (except when convenient to pretend otherwise). And in the words of Dick Cheney, "big time."

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Sarah Palin, You're No John Kennedy

It appears unfair, prejudicial, and obsessive, but really isn't. And Mrs. Palin herself, if asked, would probably play the victim card she favors and blame it on sexism if people continued to refer to the exchange she, had in September, 2010 with Katie Couric of CBS News:

Couric: What, specifically?

Palin: Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me all these years.

Couric: Can you name a few?

Palin: I have a vast variety of sources where we get our news, too. Alaska isn’t a foreign country, where it’s kind of suggested, “Wow, how could you keep in touch with what the rest of Washington, D.C., may be thinking when you live up there in Alaska?” Believe me, Alaska is like a microcosm of America.

Palin brings the opprobrium onto herself. A 44-year old governor of a state and nominee of a major political party for Vice-President of the world's leading superpower could not name a newspaper or magazine she read. Later, she would claim she reads "USA Today, yes, and New York Times." In her new book, "America By Heart," the woman who was unable to finish her term in statewide elective office addressed Senator John F. Kennedy's approach to his religion, as reflected in his speech (text here; partial video here and below) given to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association during the Democratic nominee's presidential campaign in 1960.

I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for president, who happens also to be a Catholic.

The Associated Press' Jocelyn Noveck writes

Palin writes that while growing up she was taught that JFK's speech reconciled religion and public service without compromising either. But revisiting it as an adult, she says, she realized that Kennedy "essentially declared religion to be such a private matter that it was irrelevant to the kind of country we are."

She praises former Massachusetts Gov. Romney, a Mormon, for not "doing a JFK" during his campaign for the 2008 GOP nomination. "Where Kennedy seemed to want to run away from religion, Mitt Romney forthrightly embraced it," she writes.

In fact, Kennedy's reference to being "not the Catholic candidate for President" but a "candidate for President, who happens also to be a Catholic" was an acknowledgement, not a denieal, of the role of religion in American politics" (and an accurate statement). But if she were accused of being aware of nuance, or sensitive to complexity, Mrs. Palin probably would vigorously deny the charge. And attack the accuser.

But Palin's more serious charge was "Kennedy seemed to want to run away from religion..."

The charismatic Republican may be unaware Kennedy's speech to the Houston ministers came in response to the following fears of a non-Protestant president:

.... the editor of Eternity magazine argued that although Kennedy pledged to abide by the separation of church and state, the Catholic Church would not allow him. It was “unmistakably clear” that he must be a Catholic first and president second in matters involving their church.

An article in Christianity Today, widely distributed as a pamphlet by the organization Protestants and Other Americans United for Separation of Church and State, predicted that if Catholics became a numerical majority and gained political control, they would make Catholicism the nation’s official religion, restrict Protestant worship, prohibit evangelistic services, and forbid criticism of the Catholic Church in print or on the air. The National Association of Evangelicals, the Church of God, and the Southern Baptist Convention expressed similar fears.

Even liberal Protestants such as Charles Clayton Morrison, the long-time editor of Christian Century, insisted that contemporary democratic societies faced “two powerful monarchical” competitors—“the Communist Dictatorship and the Infallible Papacy”—and argued that Kennedy’s allegiance to the Constitution “would be qualified by his prior and equally sacred allegiance to another State.”

A group of 150 Protestant ministers espousing varied theological perspectives, including Norman Vincent Peale, well-known author of “The Power of Positive Thinking,” and Daniel Poling, editor of Christian Herald, issued a public statement on September 7 questioning whether a Catholic president could successfully resist pressures from the Catholic hierarchy

The Baptist Pastors' Conference of St. Louis issued a statement in which

With deep sincerity and in Christian grace, we plead with Senator John F. Kennedy, as the person presently concerned in this matter, to appeal to Cardinal Cushing, Mr. Kennedy's own hierarchical superior in Boston, to present to the Vatican Mr. Kennedy's sincere statement relative to the separation of Church and State in the United States and religious freedom as represented in the Constitution of the United States, in order that the Vatican may officially authorize such a belief for all Roman Catholics in the United States.

Sarah Palin evidently cannot imagine an America in which someone could be denied serious consideration as President because of his/her religious affiliation, though given the attitudes of many in her party toward American Muslims, a little humility is in order.

No reputable candidate for president should be unaware that the United States of 2010- or 2008, given the ex-governor's reference to the Romney campaign- is not the U.S.A. of 1960. The Democratic nominee was facing a virtual religious test for office, notwithstanding Article VI, Section 3 of a constitution which Palin claims to hold dear. Even Mrs. Palin's failure to name a magazine or newspaper that would have kept her up-to-date on current events can excuse her from a basic knowledge of fairly recent American history.

Someone might wish to remind Mrs. Palin that Mitt Romney was originally the favorite for the Repub nomination for President in 2008, an arguably stronger general election candidate than his party's eventual nominee, and formidable vice-presidential option with extensive access to money from proud and affluent Mormons. But he was unable to land a spot on the 2008 ticket. And if she believes that had nothing to do with Romney's religious affiliation, she might be hankering to buy a bridge in Nebraska.

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Limbaugh's Abbreviated Week

Rush Limbaugh recently took a break from inciting racial animosity among his followers for a lie about health care, as well as commentary about Lisa Murkowski reflective of the patriotic impulse of today's conservative Republicanism. And this in a week in which Rush graced the airwaves only thrice, turning the microphone over to right winger Mark Steyn Thursday and Friday.

On Monday, Limbaugh put words into the mouth (in itself a legitimate tactic) of Paul Krugman and remarked

".... We think we've succeeded in beating back this whole notion that there are death panels here," and of course anybody with any common sense knows that this is a dead ringer for the British health care system and rationing of health care, if this thing is not repealed, if it holds up.

The British health care system is called the National Health Service, established in the 1940s. It emphasizes preventive care which, even with passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will not be a hallmark of the American health care system. Aside from prescription care and dentistry, the NHS typically pays for health care services. If a public option (which Senator Barack Obama supported and President Barack Obama opposes) had been proposed and adopted, something similar would have been available for the few Americans who would have been eligible. Alas, at least in part as a sop to Republicans and moderate/conservative Democrats, it was not seriously considered. Some of those Republicans still attack it as "socialistic" and at least as big government run amok, and many of those Blue Dog Democrats have been unceremoniously rejected for admission to the next Congress.

Surely, British doctors would not recognize the health care reform Congress enacted. They are paid directly by the federal government, whereas doctors in the U.S.A. will continue to be paid privately, by patients and health insurance companies. Even single payer advocates never suggested, as Limbaugh could not have failed to notice, that doctors themselves be socialized.

And of course he noticed that direct payment of doctors was not advocated or implemented, Medicare and Medicaid remain the only competitors to the private insurance system, there is no public option, and single payer, endemic to the British system, is nowhere to be found in the colonies. Unlike in the U.S.A., where health care will remain predominantly in the private sector, care in England is socialized, as Limbaugh likely knows. It is, in all likelihood, precisely why the comparison was made to Britain; if Rush had compared "Obamacare" to health care in the Netherlands, which relies primarily on the private market, it would have clashed with Limbaugh's theme that Obama is trying to destroy the health care industry. Even by the standards of Rush Limbaugh, equating the two systems is brazenly dishonest.

Not as dishonest but arguably more revealing were Rush's comments this past week about the once and future senior Senator from Alaska, Lisa Murkowski. Once upon a time- even just a few years ago- it would have been unremarkable for a Republican or a Democrat to say of the President of the United States

I will tell you, I am not one of those who wants Obama to fail. If he does well, that means the country's doing well. We don't have time as a nation to spend all of what we do blocking. We have got to figure out how we get to a point where we can be sitting around the table and talking about these difficult problems and advancing some solutions.

Now, we have a conservative blogger remarking "In other words, Murkowski wants Obama to succeed — in destroying America" and Rush labeling Murkowski "stupid" because

how can someone even consider themselves a Republican, like Murkowski, and even run as a Republican when she's saying that if he succeeds or the things that he wants to do will succeed, then that will be good for the country?

It's heresy! Heresy, I say! for a Republican to say that she wants the President to succeed because that would mean the country is doing well. If that (apart from challenging the GOP nominee in a general election, which was not Limbaugh's point) makes a conservative Republican a RINO, it says more about Rush Limbaugh and the modern Republican Party than about Lisa Murkowski. A lot more.

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Inviting Abuse

CNN's Ed Henry reports

After months of all-out political war with the nation's most powerful business lobby, President Obama appears to be on the verge of launching a dramatic peace offering to the president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Tom Donohue.

Two sources familiar with the negotiations tell me that Obama was giving serious consideration to going into the lion's den and delivering a speech at a Dec. 2 jobs summit hosted by Donohue, whose organization just spent tens of millions of dollars trying to bring the President's agenda to a screeching halt by helping to elect more pro-business lawmakers in the midterm election.

"It was my impression they were looking very favorably on the invite," a senior Chamber official told me about the White House, and a senior administration official did not quibble with that account when I checked with the White House on Friday....

"This would show the President will engage people with different views," one senior Democratic strategist told me. "I think it would be a good thing."

In fact, top Democratic strategists tell me senior White House officials like David Axelrod have been working aggressively behind the scenes to help facilitate a chance for Obama to finally bury the hatchet with Donohue and the rest of the business community.

It was only weeks ago, on the eve of the election, that Obama was slamming the Chamber, alleging that the might be using illegal foreign money to influence the midterms - a charge the Chamber vehemently denied.

The Chamber, Henry charges, "vehemently denied" an 'allegation' made by the President. Slipping by theliberal media unnoticed, however, were the Center for American Progress reports documenting the manner in which the Chamber raises money from foreign corporations, the name and location of the foreign companies, the amount donated, and the partisan attack ads used with the money. (Thank you, Citizens United: aren't you glad you have the same freedom of speech as foreign corporations?) (video from msnbc via americablog.com) Something is not true simply because the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says it is; as Rachel Maddow explains below, "just printing something somebody says is not news; it's publicity."

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

While senior officials like Axelrod and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner have publicly tried to downplay any tensions with the business community, I'm told by these Democratic strategists that the administration is privately more concerned than they're letting on about just how politically damaging the image of Obama being anti-business has been.

It was already reported this week that Geithner tried to start brokering a detente of sorts by appearing before the Chamber's board, with the senior official there telling me that the Treasury Secretary's visit was "refreshing" and a good start.

Beyond the political intrigue, the significance is that there has been a lot of pessimism in Washington about whether or not Obama can really get much done in 2011 with a Republican House and a shrunken Democratic majority in the Senate.

But there are signs that Obama may be able to form an unlikely alliance on some key issues with the Chamber of Commerce, which has a lot of sway with incoming Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and could help each side bridge at least some of their differences on economic matters.

Jen Psaki, White House deputy communications director, told me that a lot of the tension with the Chamber was overblown anyway and she believes they will be able to work together on billions in new infrastructure spending the President is trying to secure, as well as Obama's push to double U.S. exports within five years - an idea that Chamber officials diplomatically note was actually first pushed by Donohue.

"The economic recovery is more important than political battles of the past," said Psaki. "There a number of issues that we can see eye to eye on."

Digby quips "think NAFTA, only with social security." That would be part of the agenda, but also this, as Henry continues:

A turning point in this often testy relationship may have been the President's trip earlier this month to Asia. Administration officials credit Donohue with flying to South Korea while Obama was there to try and help the President push along the pending free trade agreement (though it's still stalled), while Chamber officials credit Geithner with literally being available to Donohue at 3 a.m. during the trip to help iron out a sticking point.

During that trip, the President offered a curious argument:

Calling India a creator and not a poacher of US jobs, Obama said the relationship between the countries had evolved to a stage where India was "creating jobs, growth, and higher living standards in both our countries."

According to The Economic Populist (from which the graph below, utilizing data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, is taken) "A working NBER paper, 'Estimating the Impact of Trade and Offshoring on American Workers Using the Current Population Surveys' found a negative correlation between U.S. employment and offshore outsourcing to low wage countries."




Despite the President's apparent comfort with offshoring, the U.S. Chamber is getting ready to undermine Mr. Obama, if past is prologue:

Nevertheless, an Obama speech to Donohue's group would be a dramatic gesture because the White House and the Chamber have been at each other's throats for much of the past two years.

While Donohue supported the stimulus plan as well as the auto bailouts early on in the Obama administration, the cooperation pretty much stopped there. It "went off the rails," in the words of a senior Chamber official, over the President's health care reform.

It's always been known that the Chamber was fighting that plan tooth and nail, but nobody knew just how aggressively until this week, when Bloomberg reported that health insurers gave the Chamber a whopping $86.2 million to battle the plan - a staggering amount.

The Chamber spent tens of millions of dollars more to support Republicans - as well as some conservative Democrats - in the midterm election. Those efforts helped knock the President's party out of power in the House, and weakened his hand in the Senate.

And despite the happy talk now about working together on other issues, let's not forget that the Chamber will be glad to be part of any Republican effort on Capitol Hill to weaken the President's signature health care and Wall Street reform laws.


Digby maintains "I don't think Obama is dumb enough not to realize that they will stab him in the back politically again anyway," which suggests that the President knows he is figuratively being led to slaughter, and is happily acquiescing. True or not, nothing good for the American worker can come of this alliance forged in an economy in serious decline. And that is not only bad for the concept of good jobs in this nation, but also for Obama's presumed party of preference, "shellacked" a few weeks ago over alarm about the economy.

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