Miserable Lives



If only.    If only Rush Limbaugh were accurate, we'd have a president demanding a fair share for the 90% of the American people who aren't ultra-wealthy.

Rush wants his followers to believe that President Obama is a racist Socialist rather than the pragmatic centrist he has governed as.      Tuesday, he played a clip of Obama promising

In the months to come, wherever we have an opportunity, we're gonna take steps on our own to keep this economy moving.  Because we've got a choice right now.  We can either settle for a country where a few people are doing very well and everybody else is having to just struggle to get by, or we can build an economy where everybody gets a fair shot and everybody's doing their fair share, and everybody is taking responsibility.  And everybody's playing by the same set of rules.  And that's the economy that I want.

Rush, who hears what he wants to hear, responded

Yeah, in a few months, pal, what you want isn't gonna matter.  That's the economy you want?  Who are you?  That's the economy you want?  Where everybody's equal?  And you get to define equal?  Don't forget what I told you yesterday, quoting Tocqueville.  Americans in the early 1800s fought the perils of equality, not the perils of inequality.  They fought the perils of equality. 

Everybody gets a fair shot, everybody does his/her fair share, everybody takes responsibility, and everybody plays by the same set of rules.      That sounds like equal opportunity, no matter the outcome, fair or unfair; and a summary of a center/right, free-market perspective.

But we are dealing with a bloviator from the far-right who is offended- offended- by the idea that everyone should get a fair chance, play by the same rules, and take responsibility.

Media Matters for America calls Limbaugh out for arguing that medical costs play virtually no role in bankruptcies.     In the video (way below) from the Media Matters website, Limbaugh plays a clip from Obama, then comments    

What a cloudy, gray, raw, overcast October day this guy presents us. "You're willing to put in the work. The idea is you ought to be able to raise a family and own a home, not go bankrupt 'cause you get sick." And I ask again: Who the hell does? How often does it happen that people go bankrupt from getting sick in this country? I'm sorry, this offends me. We have the best health care system the world has ever seen. It does not drive everybody into bankruptcy. No, but he wants you to think it will! He wants you so afraid of getting sick, so afraid of having to go to the hospital!

In a study published in 2007 in The American Journal of Medicine, researchers observed "Using a conservative definition, 62.1% of all bankruptcies in 2007 were medical; 92% of these medical debtors had medical debts over $5000, or 10% of pretax family income."       Limbaugh, though no doubt unaware of this study, couldn't possibly believe "This constant portrayal of health care as something that can cause you financial meltdown.  To how many people does that actually happen?  The percentage is so small you couldn't calculate it."    

A day without a flat-out lie from Rush Limbaugh, like a day without time, is impossible to imagine.     But it isn't every day (only most days) that Limbaugh demonstrates his utter contempt for average Americans, as he did yesterday:    

Obama will save you. And you'll have your little 1800-square-foot house, your 2.8 kids, a white picket fence, a dog, a couple of electric cars -- 48,000 hour charge the damn thing so it's able to drive 40 miles. They really want you on a mass transit, stupid little bus going to your mass job where you're nothing but a number.

A moment later- perhaps concerned that his sycophants haven't gotten his message- Limbaugh stated

So "hope" equals a nine-to-five job. You get home on some form of mass transit. When you have to go to the grocery store, you get in your little electric car or whatever. Your house looks like everybody else's house. It's where everybody else's house happens to be.

So now we know.    If you own a little bit of the American dream- a house of modest size, raise children, own a dog, work hard 40 hours a week providing for your family- you are worthless in Rush's world.      You're not someone who lives in a 24,000 square feet mansion, with five other buildings for guests, on your private estate (Limbaugh compound, below).     You may not be as lucky as individuals like Rush, able to separate yourself from the rest of the middle-class and (horrors!) have to live "where everybody else's house happens to be."      

The elitism characterizing this guy may be unparalleled in American society.

                      






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Educational Malfunction


It's easy to get caught up in Rick Santorum's intolerant views toward birth control, abortion, and religious views different than his own and neglect to notice his other reactionary opinions.         Richard A. Oppel of The New York Times reports Santorum in Columbus, Ohio

said the idea of schools run by the federal government or by state governments was “anachronistic.” Mr. Santorum did not say public schools were a bad idea, and he said that there was a role for government help in education.


But it was the latest in a series of comments by the former Pennsylvania senator — who is tied in polls in the critical Ohio and Michigan primary contests — suggesting that he takes a dim view of public schooling. He and his wife home-schooled their children.


For the first 150 years, most presidents home-schooled their children at the White House, he said. “Where did they come up that public education and bigger education bureaucracies was the rule in America? Parents educated their children, because it’s their responsibility to educate their children.”


“Yes the government can help,” Mr. Santorum added. “But the idea that the federal government should be running schools, frankly much less that the state government should be running schools, is anachronistic. It goes back to the time of industrialization of America when people came off the farms where they did home-school or have the little neighborhood school, and into these big factories, so we built equal factories called public schools. And while those factories as we all know in Ohio and Pennsylvania have fundamentally changed, the factory school has not.”

Inconveniently, the idea of public schools goes back a little further than that  (H/T to Blue Texan of Crooks and Liars) to the Founding Fathers, whom conservatives adore citing when convenient.      It seems

For Thomas Jefferson, public education was the key to preserving republican government. To secure the broadest level of popular education Jefferson prepared his "Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge" as part of the revision of Virginia's laws. As chair of the committee, Jefferson proposed a three level system in 1779, (never adopted): three years of primary education for all girls and boys; advanced studies for a select number of boys; a state scholarship to the College of William and Mary for one boy from each district every two years.

Jefferson advocated public education not only because it lifted individuals out of ignorance, but also as an institution fundamental to America's republican system of government.     He noted in his State of the Union address in 1806

Their patriotism would certainly prefer its continuance and application to the great purposes of the public education, roads, rivers, canals, and such other objects of public improvement as it may be thought proper to add to the constitutional enumeration of Federal powers.

It appears that Santorum would not end subsidies for public education but would eradicate the influence of taxpayers, as expressed through their elected representatives.    The Times continues

While he said he did not oppose government financing of schools, Santorum said that "public education should be a dynamic process that's locally run."


"I think the parent should be in charge," he added, "working with the local school district to try to design an educational environment for each child that optimizes their potential."

From the party of small government, we have a proposal for a school system with, say, 10,000 students:     10,000-20,000 parents working with thousands of school employees to develop 10,000 curricula.      At best, Santorum simply hasn't given any thought to this.    More likely, it's a conservative's wet dream:      taxpayers funding private schools with no standards and guidelines, chaos abounding.

And while he's at it, educational expert Rick Santorum, who urges "an educational environment for each child that optimizes their potential," might consider that each child instead should optimize his or her potential.     Just saying.





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Reverend Santorum


On Friday, CNN reports, Rick Santorum "sought to bring some clarity to his birth control position" by stating in Columbus, Ohio "My position is birth control can and should be available."         Alexander Burns and Maggie Haberman at Politico write "while the ex-senator doesn't favor outlawing birth control...."   

So, the ex-Pennsylvania Senator from Virginia doesn't want to ban artificial contraception.      Case closed.

Or not.      In Mckinney, Texas Santorum on Wednesday had maintained  “It’s not because I want to be the pastor of the United States.         I have no intention and no desire to be the pastor of this country."

But in his Friday speech in Columbus the candidate went on to say

The president’s agenda is not about you.    It’s not about you. It’s not about your quality of life. It’s not about your job.    It’s about some phony ideal, some phony theology.        Oh, not a theology based on the Bible, a different theology, but no less a theology.   

Santorum was not suggesting President Obama is not a Christian, National Communications Director Hogan Gidley comforted us, but rather “Rick was talking about the President’s belief in the secular theology of government — and how believing that theology is dangerous...."

Whether a non-theology, such as secularism, can be (or should be) elevated to a theology is debatable.    But Santorum is positing that Obama subscribes to a secular theology, one which " teaches that it’s perfectly fine (to) take away our individual God-given rights and freedoms," according to Gidley.        Conveniently, his candidate divides the nation into two religions:     real Christians (and Jews, perhaps), who are noble or virtuous; and secularists, who are ignoble or wicked.       And then he says:      "I have no intention and no desire to be the pastor of this country."

Unless Rick Santorum holds to an idiosyncratic definition of "pastor," he is being dishonest or, as the media likes to picture him, refreshingly candid.

When Santorum says "my position is birth control can and should be available," he is being similarly mendacious.      This is no libertarian, who might hold to a reactionary point of view but is fundamentally, philosophically opposed to government action.        This is Rick Santorum, who has asserted "I am not a libertarian, and I fight very strongly against libertarian influence within the Republican Party and the conservative movement."

Santorum is not a libertarian, and in some ways that's reassuring.       But when it comes to your most personal beliefs and values, including sexual mores, Rick Santorum is an authoritarian, and that is not reassuring.
      

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A Pleasing Outcome


Now they've gone and done it.

The Virginia Senate, and now its House of Delegates, has passed a bill which "would require a woman seeking an abortion to undergo an ultrasound at least 24 hours prior to the procedure."     The doctor would be required to show the woman the resulting image; if she refuses to watch, it is to go on her permanent record.

Early in the pregnancy, an abdominal sonogram would be insufficient to provide the information mandated by the legislation, hence requiring, as Democratic Delegate David Englin put it, "many women in Virginia to undergo vaginal penetration with an ultrasound probe against their consent in order to exercise their constitutional right to an abortion, even for nonsurgical, noninvasive, pharmaceutical abortions."  

The resultant charge among many on the left that the procedure constitutes legalized rape would strike many as hyperbolic.      But it's only barely so:      in an interview with RH Reality Check, Englin cited


 § 18.2-67.2. Object sexual penetration; penalty.
A. An accused shall be guilty of inanimate or animate object sexual penetration if he or she penetrates the labia majora or anus of a complaining witness, whether or not his or her spouse, other than for a bona fide medical purpose, or causes such complaining witness to so penetrate his or her own body with an object or causes a complaining witness, whether or not his or her spouse, to engage in such acts with any other person or to penetrate, or to be penetrated by, an animal, and

1. The complaining witness is less than 13 years of age, or

2. The act is accomplished against the will of the complaining witness, by force, threat or intimidation of or against the complaining witness or another person, or through the use of the complaining witness's mental incapacity or physical helplessness.



It doesn't meet the dictionary definition of rape, but it is coercive, violent, and subjects the offender to a penalty of five years to life.The bill's sponsor (a woman), responding to the obvious charge that a forced sonogram is invasive, responded “If we want to talk about invasiveness, there’s nothing more invasive than the procedure that she is about to have.”        
Seriously, she did.         An abortion may be medically necessary, is voluntary, and is safer (on average) to the patient  than is childbirth.    But the main purpose of the legislation isn't to end, or even to deter, abortions.      Libertarian Megan McArdle remarks   

I think that abortion should be legal, but I also think that it should be a last resort, and I’m all for the government using any non-coercive methods it can to encourage women to carry their pregnancy to term, including things that will make them feel bad about aborting. I think, for example, that sonograms should be mandatory before termination, I’m in favor of waiting periods and parental notification laws, and I’m agnostic on spousal notification.

Keep it legal, but make them feel bad about the life she thinks they're ending.     Similarly, a Red State blogger pleads "abortion proponents are being disingenuous when they argue that this is a restriction on a 'woman’s right to choose.'  In no way will a mother be forced to pay for this test, nor will any result make her abortion more difficult to procure."

Oh, yes.     The legislation is not intended to decrease abortions but to harass women.      And "abortion proponents" are the ones who are disingenuous.         Assessing an abortion restriction intended not to reduce the incidence of "murder" but instead to shame women, Digby comments

I'd also point out a little known fact about Virginia's state rape law: they are to be used even for women who are having chemically induced abortions. They must be probed as well --- in order that the government "make them feel bad" for what they are legally entitled to do. (And, by the way, if they refuse to look at the ultrasound, that's supposed to be noted in their medical record --- I'm assuming for some sort of future reference, the purpose of which is obscure.)

So patients will be required to obtain and view an ultrasound, presumably to convince them that the fetus is a living, breathing human being who should not be killed.      No doubt it will deter some women, the ones whom the anti-choice contingent believe are worthwhile- those who, presented with undeniable evidence, will conclude that saving a life is paramount to all other considerations.     The women who (in the right's view) refuse to be swayed by evidence and are selfish will press on with the abortion.

Presto; mission accomplished.    Women are successfully intimidated- but only those whom, ironically, the pro-life people would approve of.        Odd thing is, they probably find that very satisfying.




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Celebrity Culture



Rule of thumb:    if Rush Limbaugh is against it, be in favor of it; if Rush Limbaugh is for it, be against it.

That applies even in the rare- very rare- instances in which Limbaugh can be credited with being (euphemistically speaking) tolerant.

And so it is with the kerfluffle in New Jersey.     Not the important one- gay marriage- but the unimportant one, Whitney Houston.     On Thursday Limbaugh argued

This Whitney Houston in New Jersey and the flag at half staff. I have a question. If she did not have in her life a problem with drug abuse and alcohol -- take a little out of it -- and she died prematurely...? We don't yet know what the cause of death was, but let's assume that alcohol and drugs had nothing to do with it. Take that out of it. How many of you would be upset that the flag was lowered to half staff? How many of you are upset about it simply because, in your mind, "She was just an entertainer. Come on! We lower the flag for statesmen, for heroes. What is this entertainer business?

(Insert cheap Oxycontin joke here.)

Rush backed the decision by Republican Governor Chris Christie, who would be ordering flags in New Jersey to be flown at half-staff today, the day of singer Whitney Houston's funeral in Newark, largest city in the state and  city of Ms. Houston's birth.        Limbaugh added

keep in mind: New Jersey lowered the flag for Frank Sinatra and Clarence Clemons of the E Street Band with Bruce Springsteen. So it's not that uncommon. It really isn't.

No, it's not uncommon, and the life of Whitney Houston should not be celebrated any less than that of Clarence Clemons or the mob-related figure.    

Here "is this entertainer business":        flags should not have been lowered to half-staff for those individuals, either, because they were entertainers.         Celebrities are mere celebrities, deserving in death no special consideration on the basis of their popularity in life. Honor is- or, rather, should be- bestowed upon "statesmen" and "heroes," such as members of the armed forces and selected political leaders, because they served the community, whether local, state, or national.      Their professional lives stand as a commitment to the public interest, in which they strive less for economic advancement than for the public good. Whitney Houston should not be penalized for being extremely talented and successful, but neither should either be a basis for honoring her memory, any more than it is for your extremely talented and successful (but less applauded) neighbor.    

Rush noted, approvingly, that Christie stated

I'm disturbed by people who believe that because of her history of substance abuse, that somehow she's forfeited the good things that she did in her life.  I just reject that on a human level.  What she is is a cultural icon in the history of this state....

All of us should learn to be a little more understanding of that, and understand that this is a disease and that we need to help these folks to try to conquer this disease and not ridicule them for it, because it's a struggle for everybody.

But it is roughly as misguided to honor Houston because of her record of substance abuse as it is to withhold the honor because of her checkered past.       Its significance is lessened further because we know not what role (if any) illegal drug use- or prescription drug use, alcohol use, bad choice in romantic relationships, or anything else- had in her death.       (And thanks for the lecture, Governor.)

Defending his decision, Governor Christie could have kept it simple by referring to the examples of Sinatra, Clemons, or others and left it at that.       But he decided instead to wax empathetic about Whitney Houston's drug involvement.    He did it, moreover, not because of a sense of compassion but as a weapon in the continuing controversy over drug use in his state.      In so doing, he missed an opportunity to remind us that great statesmen and ordinary soldiers are not entertainers and are deserving of honors that mere mortals, including the likes of singers, saxophone players, and actors, are not.





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In Attack Mode



Foster Friess, Rick Santorum's sugar daddy,  told Andrea Mitchell onThursday  

We have jihadist camps being set up in Latin America, which Rick has been warning about and people seem to be so preoccupied with sex -- I think it says something about our culture. We maybe need a massive therapy session so we can concentrate on what the real issues are.       This contraceptive thing, my gosh it's such [sic] inexpensive. 

Back in my days, they used Bayer Aspirin for contraception. The gals put it between their knees and it wasn't that costly.

Later, Friess apologized (sort of) for his ludicrous and offensive remark, blogging

After listening to the segment tonight, I can understand how I confused people with the way I worded the joke and their taking offense is very understandable.       To all those who took my joke as modern day approach I deeply apologize and seek your forgiveness.

It was closer to an unequivocal admission of wrongdoing than heard from most public figures (politicians, athletes, and others) who make a disgusting remark and was, relatively speaking, fairly classy.

Not so than the guy he wants to put into the White House and control.          Appearing Friday morning on CBS' Morning Show, Santorum commented

This is someone who is a supporter of mine, and I'm not responsible for every comment that a supporter of mine makes.        It was a bad joke, it was a stupid joke, and it is not reflective of me or my record on this issue.

Good, Rick, now stop speaking.       But no, he just couldn't:

This is what you guys do. You don't do this with President Obama. In fact, with President Obama, what you did was you went out and defended him against someone who sat in a church for 20 years, and defended him, that he can’t possible believe what he listened to for 20 years.      That’s a double standard, this is what you’re pulling off, and I’m going to call you on it. 

Friday afternoon, he referred to the dustup as "crap" and boasted "I went at Charlie Rose this morning a little bit for bringing this stuff up."

Be honest, readers.      When you saw Foster Friess opine on contraception, you thought:   "oh, my gosh!     This is just like Jeremiah Wright!"    No.

Probably not.     One fellow is a minister, the other is a former investment manager.      One guy is middle class, the other worth approximately $530 million.         One guy is black, the other white.  

They don't look or sound like the other.     But Santorum is right about one thing.      This wasn't done to Barack Obama (not President Obama, Rick:    it was Senator/candidate Obama).       No, Foster Friess volunteered his remark and his candidate was given the opportunity to respond to it.       But the media, without being prompted, broke the news of Reverend Wright and his relationship to the presidential candidate.     Longtime ABC investigative reporter Brian Ross wrote in March, 2008

The Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama's pastor for the last 20 years at the Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's south side, has a long history of what even Obama's campaign aides concede is "inflammatory rhetoric," including the assertion that the United States brought on the 9/11 attacks with its own "terrorism.   

In a campaign appearance earlier this month, Sen. Obama said, "I don't think my church is actually particularly controversial." He said Rev. Wright "is like an old uncle who says things I don't always agree with," telling a Jewish group that everyone has someone like that in their family.Rev. Wright married Obama and his wife Michelle, baptized their two daughters and is credited by Obama for the title of his book, "The Audacity of Hope."

An ABC News review of dozens of Rev. Wright's sermons, offered for sale by the church, found repeated denunciations of the U.S. based on what he described as his reading of the Gospels and the treatment of black Americans. 

Thus began a controversy which continued for months, and continues- to this day- in the words of conservative Republicans, including Rush Limbaugh.       And now Rick Santorum, who, dogwhistle firmly between lips, brings it up in a wholly unrelated matter.

But there is- or may prove to be- yet another difference between the Foster Friess and the Jeremiah Wright matters.  Soon after Wright's existence came to light, Obama condemned the loathsome remarks the minister had made.         The following month, the Senator went further, asserting "I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened by the spectacle that we saw yesterday."      Shortly afterward, he and his wife left the church.

There is still time for Santorum, who blamed the media for reporting what his most important and powerful supporter had said, to concede that his excuse was nearly as loathsome as Reverend Wright's sermons.      Though Oba ma disassociated himself from his pastor, Santorum need not unload his benefactor, who more or less apologized.   But his own invocation of media bias where none exists was inaccurate and demonstrated a severe (as Mitt Romney would have put it) lack of character.

Barack Obama did what was necessary, cutting ties to a man who did not deserve (or need) his loyalty.      Santorum, however, blamed others for his troubles.       He merely may have been reflexively paranoid.      Alternatively, he was cunning, attacking the media which, Newt Gingrich has found, is effective Repub campaign strategy.     The response of media matters will be enlightening, as they confront and probe Rick Santorum's inflammatory response-  or roll over and play dead, allowing the GOP to intimidate them.





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David Letterman Signs Up Republicans


In an overwrought book review reeking of paranoia, the editors of Human Events wrote

They did it to Dan Quayle, they did it to George W. Bush, and they've done it to numerous other conservative politicians: liberal media talking heads and late-night comedians chortle repeatedly and relentlessly over their flubs, their gaffes, their errors -- and their alleged scandals, incompetence, and stupidity. The plan is to get the whole country laughing at the victim of this tactic, so that his effectiveness on the national stage is ended, and his political career in ruins. It worked with Quayle, and severely damaged Bush. But every now and then a conservative politician emerges who is courageous and intelligent enough to defeat this nasty and brutal assault.

The (alleged) victim to whom they were referring was not Mitt Romney, but Sarah Palin, who deserved, oh, about 150% of the criticism and ridicule she received.

Mitt Romney is another conservative, not subject to as much ridicule as was the governor of Alaska, who was plucked out of virtual obscurity to stand for election to an office to which the American people realized she was not qualified.     But Romney has been ridiculed, and not at all helpfully to those of us eager to see a liberal working majority in the nation's capital.

The culprit- and this word is far milder than deserved- is David Letterman.        I get it- Obama is cool, Romney is not; Obama can sing, Romney cannot.        But making the point by showing (video below) just how much a rube Mitt Romney is because he sings 'America the Beautiful' (a little off-key) in public is flat-out wrong.     And it smacks of the elitism conservatives, such as the editors of Human Events, delight in accusing liberals of.  

Romney wasn't moved to a spontaneous display of heartfelt patriotism.      He was currying favor with the crowd in a manner in which he would be inoculated from criticism, not unlike Barack Obama ending every speech with "and God Bless the United States of America."    (God will do so if and when He chooses.)     Or Senator Obama wearing on his lapel in 2008 an American flag pin, while John McCain, whom no one would ever accuse of a lack of patriotism (or African birth or Muslim preferences), found unnecessary.

Ridicule, however, is a no-lose proposition for Letterman.    He is guaranteed a few laughs and, if it indirectly advances the cause of congressional conservatives, he would suffer nothing worse than even bigger tax cuts from the Party of the 1%.  

A few days ago, Politico observed "as the president gears up for a reelection run that's going to struggle with independents and moderates, his team is looking to revive the cool appeal." Video of the President covering an Al Green hit works up to a point- until such time as it is contrasted with his likely opponent singing  (heaven forbid)  "America the Beautiful."      It reinforces in voters the myth that Hollywood (or Manhattan, in this case) is in bed with the Democratic Party and opposed to the values of ordinary Americans.       And that cannot end well.










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