Obama Lied, People Did Not Die

Friday night on Real Time, Bill Maher hosted a discussion among three guests supportive of Barack Obama, including U.S. Representative Debbie Wasserman-Schultz of Florida.  Wasserman-Schultz argued not only that health care reform would usher in utopia, but that President Obama did not lie when he promised that no one would lose his or her insurance because of the Affordable Care Act.

Of course, unless the President was completely unaware of what is going on in one of his cabinet's departments- Health and Human Services- he knew after HHS wrote regulations implementing the ACA (sometime after passage) that some individuals would not be able to keep their insurance plan. For her part Wasserman-Schultz, if President Obama stated that it will snow in most of the country tomorrow, two days hence would say he was only warning Americans to prepare for a potentially brutal winter.

That brings us, as is my habit, to Rush Limbaugh.  Leave it to Rush- in the interests of fanning outrage among his listeners-  to take a serious shortcoming of Obama (misleading Americans about their health options) and blow it up into something unrecognizable to the informed.  On Friday, he maintained

Folks, this is a huge lie.  This is a purposeful, huge, fraudulent lie known by everybody in the regime with the intention of deceiving the American people for the express purposes of electing Barack Obama in 2008 and reelecting him in 2012...

This is huge, folks.

It's a purposeful, deceitful, fraudulent law.  I think Obama's lie about keeping your insurance may be the biggest lie ever told by a sitting president.  This is not an error.  It was not a mistake.  This was a calculated, purposeful lie...

It was not a lie when during the uncertainty of 2008, Senator Obama wanted voters to believe no one would lose his or her insurance.  But perhaps that's nitpicking. The claim that Obama's lie "may be the biggest lie ever told by a sitting president" represents a monstrous effort to mislead Limbaugh's audience. (It's not, however, a lie given the qualification of "may be."  It may be the biggest lie. It may be the smallest lie.  Or it may be- oh, you get the point.)

"Richard Nixon resigned over a lie nowhere near this big," Rush claimed.  Admittedly, Watergate- a word he was sufficiently crafty to avoid- was such a long time ago and committed by a president who aside from being corrupt was superior to any of his party since that time.    (But then, "otherwise, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?")

Bush II, however, was such a short time ago.   In June, 2003 Christopher Scheer of Alternet compiled ten lies the Administration told about Iraq in order to gin up support for the forthcoming war.   Seven were uttered by President George W. Bush and the others by Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, and Donald Rumsfeld. Complete with explanation, the Bush 7 cited are:


LIE #1: "The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program ... Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons." -- President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in Cincinnati.
LIE #2: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." -- President Bush, Jan.28, 2003, in the State of the Union address.
LIE #5: "We've learned that Iraq has trained al-Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases ... Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints."-- President Bush, Oct. 7 .
LIE #6: "We have also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We are concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] for missions targeting the United States." -- President Bush, Oct. 7.
LIE #7: "We have seen intelligence over many months that they have chemical and biological weapons, and that they have dispersed them and that they're weaponized and that, in one case at least, the command and control arrangements have been established." -- President Bush, Feb. 8, 2003, in a national radio address.
LIE #10: "Yes, we found a biological laboratory in Iraq which the UN prohibited." -- President Bush in remarks in Poland, published internationally June 1, 2003


My favorite is Scheer's #2 because, although Saddaam Hussein had not "sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa," it appears not to be a lie because Bush seemed to be contending only that the Administration had been told it had transpired.  But days after that infamous State of the Union address, Michael Kinsley explained

Bushies fanned out to the weekend talk shows to note, as if with one voice, that what Bush said was technically accurate. But it was not accurate, even technically. The words in question were: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." Bush didn't say it was true, you see—he just said the Brits said it. This is a contemptible argument in any event. But to descend to the administration's level of nitpickery, the argument simply doesn't work. Bush didn't say that the Brits "said" this Africa business—he said they "learned" it. The difference between "said" and "learned" is that "learned" clearly means there is some pre-existing basis for believing whatever it is, apart from the fact that someone said it. Is it theoretically possible to "learn" something that is not true? I'm not sure (as Donald Rumsfeld would say). However, it certainly is not possible to say that someone has "learned" a piece of information without clearly intending to imply that you, the speaker, wish the listener to accept it as true. Bush expressed no skepticism or doubt, even though the Brits qualification was only added as protection because doubts had been expressed internally.

It is not possible to "learn" something that is not true.  But as Bush likely understood, it would have been foolish to state "the British government has said."  A lot of people discount what someone says he has heard or read: "Do you believe everything you read (or are told)" is a common reaction.  It's much wiser, though in this case dishonest, to claim "we have learned" or "they have learned" because "have learned" suggests the information already has been confirmed.

So in the context of lies told by other Presidents (not only Bush II and Nixon), President Obama's lie "if you like your plan, you can keep it" is not historic (unlike his election which, we all were told, was historic.). Controversy over the Administration's statements should draw attention to the improvement of insurance benefits gained by most individuals who do lose their plan- and to the reality that President Obama's policies are superior to the man himself.



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Proceed With Caution

Even before the 2012 off-year elections- when Democrats had to defend 23 seats and Republicans only 10- the conventional wisdom had begun coalescing around the view that Repubs were in danger of losing the presidential election for the next 340 years.   In May of that year, Reid Wilson of the National Journal got a jump on most of his colleagues when he wrote

Demographics are destiny. This much, in American politics, is true. But we rarely appreciate the pace of the racial and ethnic change happening throughout the country. To step back and see the broader, long-term picture is to recognize that, while we’re an evenly divided country now, we may be close to a tipping point after which the entire landscape will change.

If recent electoral and population trends hold, Democrats need only wait a few presidential election cycles until they begin every White House contest as clear, eventually even overwhelming, favorites.

That’s the conclusion of a new report from Lincoln Park Strategies, a Democratic consulting firm in Washington. A Democratic firm predicting Democratic wins may not sound like news, but their reasoning has strategists on both sides convinced that unless Republicans start making serious inroads in minority communities, the party is doomed to run from behind.

Current Census Bureau estimates say the nation’s population will grow by about 61 million people over the next 18 years, to 373 million. That growth will come largely among minorities; the bureau believes the nation’s Hispanic population will grow by 63 percent, the number of African-Americans will increase by 27 percent, and the Asian-American population will increase by 55 percent. At the same time, the number of whites in America will rise by only 4 percent. Those numbers point to a much more diverse nation: Today, about 64 percent of the population is white. By 2030, that figure is predicted to shrink to 56 percent.

That’s frightening news for Republicans, a party that has had little success winning over minority voters in recent years. In a presidential year, an 8-point drop in the percentage of white voters is enough to move mountains—or at least purple states.

At the moment, Democrats can count on at least 165 electoral votes in base Democratic states, where the average level of Democratic performance is higher than 55 percent, as calculated by Lincoln Park Strategies. The party also has an advantage in states with another 86 electoral votes, where average Democratic performance is between 52.5 percent and 55 percent. Republicans can count on 143 electoral votes from their own base states and another 53 from lean-Republican states, leaving 91 votes in seven pure swing states, where neither party’s average candidate is projected to win more than 52.5 percent of the vote.

Disproportionate minority population growth will mean substantial changes to the electoral map by 2032. Twenty years from now, increased minority populations in Nevada, North Carolina, Georgia, Ohio, and Iowa have the potential to move those states toward the Democrats, giving the party 274 base and lean electoral votes, according to the Lincoln Park Strategies report—more than a candidate needs to win the White House.

After the Todd Akin-inspired Senatorial debacle of 2010, Republicans themselves got nervous and started touting their openness to some sort of immigration reform so they would be seen as sympathetic to the concerns of Hispanic immigrants and not continue to get shellacked by the Latin vote.  Still, the Democratic Party is perceived by Democrats, most Republicans, and most of the mainstream media as having an advantage in presidential elections.

The conventional wisdom better be right, or we're in for some dangerous times, as foreshadowed by the esistance from the Senate minority on nominations for important positions. The Associated Press' Alan Framm explains

Senate Republicans on Thursday blocked President Barack Obama's picks for a powerful federal court and a housing regulatory agency, prompting Democrats to threaten curtailing the GOP's ability to derail nominations.

"Something has to change, and I hope we can make the changes necessary through cooperation," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said after the votes.

In a setback for the president, Republicans derailed his picks of Patricia Millett to become a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and Rep. Melvin Watt, D-N.C., to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The Senate voted 55-38 to end the delays against Millett and 56-42 to end the blockade against Watt _ falling shy each time of the 60 votes Democrats needed to prevail.

The defeats immediately subjected Democratic leaders to pressure from liberal groups and newer Democratic senators to change Senate rules that let the minority party _ currently Republicans _ force the majority to muster 60 votes on controversial nominations, instead of a simple majority.

Within minutes, a coalition of Democratic-leaning groups including the Alliance for Justice, the Communications Workers of America, Common Cause and the Sierra Club issued a statement saying "Democrats must be prepared to change the Senate rules."

Said freshman Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., "The conversation on rules changes can't come fast enough for me." He called the GOP procedural hurdles "a government shutdown by another tactic."

No. 2 Senate GOP leader John Cornyn of Texas said he doubted Democrats would act on their threats, which they'd been hinting at for days.

He said if Democrats change the rules and Republicans win the White House and Senate, "Then we could confirm another Scalia, another Thomas with 51 votes," a reference to conservative Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. "So I think they need to think twice, and I think they understand that."

Hint, hint.  Cornyn's warning, though, may be more than an effort to sway Democrats from rushing headlong into amending the Senate rules, from requiring 60 votes to a simple majority to move a nomination forward. He is probably prescient, for if there is a Repub elected president, as ultimately there will be (comprehensive immigration reform or not, voter suppression or not), there will be nominees appointed from the hard, hard right.  And most likely there will be a bloc vote of Republican Senators voting in favor of the nominees selected by a Republican president. Gaining assent from a majority of Senators would be a done deal; getting 60, far more difficult.

The ideal course for Senate Democrats, then, is to modify in an advantageous manner the filibuster rule, for nominations and other matters.  But the 60-vote threshold then may work to their advantage when there is a Repub president and Senate- if Democrats prove willing to play hardball.  Otherwise, the likes of Secretary of Defense Graham, Secretary of Defense Paul, or Secretary of Education Christie might not be fantasy.



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Not Insanity, Just Routine

There oughta be a law.  No more stating, as Harry Reid did in his interview with Rachel Maddow on Wednesday, "Einstein said this, pure definition of insanity is somebody who does something over and over and over again and expects a different result."   

As this fellow points out, the statement is as likely to have originated with Mark Twain, Ben Franklin, mystery writer Rita Mae Brown or none of the three. Insanity is  "a spectrum of behaviors (sic) characterized by certain abnormal mental or behavioral patterns" (Wikipedia). or "a deranged state ofthe  mind usually occurring as a specific disorder"  (Merriam-Webster), or "a mental disorder that deprives a criminal defendant of capacity to be tried" (Webster's New World Law Dictionary), or "persistent mental disorder or derangement" (American Heritage Medical Dictionary). Doing something repeatedly while expecting a different result is stubborness or foolishness, but not insanity.

Otherwise, however, Reid spoke the truth: 

He also said he’s not as concerned about the tea party Republicans who drove the GOP through the shutdown, but rather the other members of the party that went along with it, voting to repeal Obamacare 45 times.

“My disappointment in all of this is not the 80 or 90 people who live in some other political world that I don’t understand. But my disappointment is the so-called moderates who went along with this vote after vote after vote,” Reid said.

If we can't stop attributing to Einstein something he likely didn't say, can we- as Reid has- stop pretending (as do so many Democratic politicians) that the "Tea Party" is some weird, exotic cult bent on destroying the Republican Party which spawned it?  The notion that the tea party is not joined to the hip of corporate America is so ingrained that it appears even among those who proceed to debunk the myth, such as The New York Times' writer who in March, 2011 wrote "The Tea Party movement is as deeply skeptical of big business as it is of big government. " More conventionally, two Bloomberg reporters two weeks ago contended "A battle for control of the Republican Party has erupted as an emboldened Tea Party moved to oust senators who voted to reopen the government while business groups mobilized to defeat allies of the small-government movement."

And then a  Republican is nominated for some office and what is mistakenly perceived as separate factions both condemn the Democratic opponent for being insufficiently obeisant to the (fictional) free market.  Sometimes we don't need an election for clarification.  Eric Lipton of The New York Times noted Wednesday

The House of Representatives, with bipartisan support, passed legislation on Wednesday that would roll back a major element of the 2010 law intended to strengthen the nation’s financial regulations by allowing big banks like Citigroup and JP Morgan Chase to continue to handle most types of derivatives trades in house.

The bill, which passed by a 292-122 vote, would repeal a requirement in the Dodd-Frank law that big banks “push out” some derivatives trading into separate units that are not backed by the government’s insurance fund.

But the debate Wednesday regarding this decidedly technical matter quickly turned into an impassioned dispute over the role the federal government has played since the recession in regulating financial markets. Advocates of the legislation argued on the House floor that the federal government is partly responsible for the slow rate of economic growth because it imposed excessive new regulations.

“America’s economy remains stuck in the slowest, weakest nonrecovery recovery of all times,” said Representative Jeb Hensarling, Republican of Texas, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. “Those who create jobs for America are drowning in a sea of red tape preventing them.”

But opponents of the measure said that reckless activity by banks like JPMorgan Chase, where a group of traders in London ran up $6 billion in losses in 2011, demonstrate that the tough requirements contained in the Dodd-Frank law, passed in 2010, should not be weakened.

Perhaps you did not hear the cries of outrage from such "tea party" stalwarts as Justin Amash, Michele Bachmann, Paul Broun, or Louie Gohmert.  Only 3- Jimmy Duncan of Tennessee, Walter Jones of North Carolina, and Tom Massie of Kentucky- of 225 Republicans who cast a vote chose not to weaken Dodd-Frank.   Steve M., while acknowledging that some (70) Democrats went over to the dark side,  recognizes tea party supporters

don't hate big business -- they love big business. Yes, it was easy to get confused when they forced a government shutdown and threatened to bring about a debt default, but they were just showing love for big business the way Annie Wilkes showed love for Paul Sheldon in Misery. Like Annie Wilkes, they're certain they know what's best for their beloved, even if their beloved doesn't understand. 

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It Only Seems Progressive

The disadvantage to having no commercial sponsor and no advertising is obvious.  The advantage, however, is one has the freedom to alienate both the left and the right.

Last December, The Atlantic published a profile by Molly Ball of Evan Wolfson, a high-powered New York lawyer and head of the gay rights group Freedom to Marry.  Ball writes

To Wolfson, the fight for marriage was about making gays full participants in American life and fully human in the eyes of their fellow citizens. "This was something that would transform non-gay people's understanding of who gay people are," he told me. "It would help people understand gay people as fully rounded human beings, with the hopes and dreams and human aspirations we all have." Other gay-rights struggles were mainly about convincing people to overlook sexual orientation, in employment or medical care or military service. Marriage is about what makes gay people who they are: their relationships with others of the same sex. In ratifying marriage for gays and lesbians, society would be ratifying the core of their identity -- their love for one another.

Wolfson believes that neither civil unions nor any other arrangement can guarantee to gays the rights marriage confers. But at the core of his determination to end all prohibition on same-sex marriage is not rights but the very nature of marriage.  Ball explains

"I worked on the marriage campaign in Oregon in 2004, and we had ads with a judge in a law library, talking about rights, saying it was wrong to deny people these rights," Zepatos said. "That was considered one of the most effective campaigns [for gay marriage] in the country." Yet it failed, like all the others, and in a sudden, breathtaking epiphany, Zepatos saw why. The advocates of gay marriage had successfully convinced people that gay marriage was something different from regular marriage. It was presented to the public as a technicality -- a matter of hospital visitations and burial plots. Such technicalities were important to activists, especially in the wake of the AIDS crisis, when they'd had real and devastating consequences. But it was no wonder fair-minded, tolerant straight people couldn't see that gay people wanted to get married because they loved and wanted to commit to one another.

What, then, was the better way to sell gay marriage? The first step was to stop calling it gay marriage or "same-sex marriage," which put it in its own category. In the same way clever Republican pollsters once rebranded the estate tax the "death tax," gay-marriage proponents started talking, simply, about marriage. (This has produced some confusing situations, as both sides of the gay-marriage debate now call themselves "pro-marriage." In Maine, for example, the group in favor of gay marriage on this year's ballot was called Mainers United for Marriage, while the anti-gay-marriage group was Protect Marriage Maine.) To liberal audiences, the new preferred term is "marriage equality"; to conservatives, it's "freedom to marry."

The research found that the most effective message was "committed, long-term gay couples doing the same things that married couples do," in the words of a November 2011 Freedom to Marry research memo -- "mowing the lawn, helping an elderly neighbor, and talking about their hopes and dreams." Gay people needed to talk about marriage more: Many assumed their friends, colleagues, and relatives accepted them as deserving of marriage the same way they accepted them as people, when in fact, the same friends often figured that since their gay friends never talked about marriage, it must not be important to them.

Freedom to Marry began field-testing a new type of campaign in Oregon in 2010. Mailers and television ads for the effort, dubbed "Marriage Matters" and undertaken in partnership with a local organization, showed gay couples and straight couples side by side, talking about how long they'd been together and the meaning of marriage to their everyday lives. ("We've been together for 31 years.... We share the laundry, cooking, vacations and the happiness we wish for our children and grandchildren," a beaming lesbian couple said in one mail piece.) 

Gay marriage proponents in Oregon are aiming to put onto the 2014 ballot an initiative authorizing same-sex marriage.  The November, 2011 memorandum from Freedom to Marry suggests the campaign will emphasize

Marriage matters to gay people in similar ways that it matters to everyone. Gay and lesbian couples may seem different from straight couples, but we share similar values - like the importance of family and helping out our neighbors; worries - like making ends meet or the possibility of losing a job; and hopes and dreams - like finding that special someone to grow old with, and standing in front of friends and family to make a lifetime commitment. 

The need to enjoy the same rights as straight individuals and the basic concept of civil rights is to be deemphasized in favor of the stress on the beauty of making a "lifetime commitment" to one another.

Neither Wofson nor his allies would interfere with the right or ability of heterosexuals to marry whomever they choose.  Neither is it likely that Katie Roiphe, professor at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University, would oppose the struggle for, as its supporters put it, "marriage equality."  But make no mistake: their perspectives diverge significantly and are nearly mutually incompatible.  Roiphe visits Amsterdam and finds

The Dutch attitude, which I like, is that marriage is not for everyone; it is a personal choice, an option, a pleasant possibility, but not marrying is not a failure, a great blot on your achievements in life, a critical rite of passage you have missed. Sometimes people get around to getting married, and sometimes they don’t. Several Dutch women in their 40s, with children and rich romantic histories, tell me about marriage, “It just wasn’t something that mattered to me.”

She concludes

If we suddenly stopped being in thrall to the rigid, old-fashioned ideal of marriage, we could stop worrying about low marriage rates and high divorce rates. We could stop worrying about single mothers and the decline of marriage as an institution, especially in the lower middle class, and the wasteful industry of wedding planning. We could instead focus on actual relationships, on intimacies, on substance over form; we could focus on love in its myriad, unpredictable varieties. We could see life here in the amber waves of grain not for what it should be, but for what it is.

To Freedom to Marry and those on whose behalf  it advocates, same-sex marriage not only guarantees full civil rights but, more importantly, the opportunity to participate in an institution without which couples would not be "taking responsibility for each other, taking care of each other, putting their partner first, taking care of their children, their elderly parents, and their community." To the contrary, Roiphe suggests if  "in America marriage was suddenly regarded as a choice, a way, a possibility, but not a definite and essential phase of life, think how many people would suddenly be living above board, think of the stress removed, the pressures lifted, the stigmas dissolving."  And I suspect, take care as they wish of each other, of children, elderly parents, and their community.

Same-sex marriage advocates gradually have come to view marriage not as an option, but as "a definite and essential phase of life."  There is another group in American politics that believes marriage- with, preferably, childbirth- is an essential phase of life.  That would be.... the Christian right, which demonstrates that two groups, rhetorically opposed to each other, can both be fundamentally and dangerously wrong.




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Timing Is Everything


In late August, the online edition of the northern New Jersey newspaper, the Star-Ledger, reported

President Obama is not planning to campaign for Democrat Barbara Buono in her quest to rob Gov. Chris Christie of a second term, the Associated Press reported Friday.

This year and next, Obama only plans to lend his political firepower to close races where he could help cinch a win for his party, a Democratic official involved with Obama’s political plans told AP. The official wasn’t authorized to discuss strategy and requested anonymity, the wire service said.

No one has discovered who the "Democratic official" was, but he or she apparently was right on target.     Polls in Virginia's gubernatorial election have displayed a 5-10 point lead for Democratic gubernatorial nominee Terry McAuliffe over Repub Ken Cucinelli.  However, with a relatively large number of undecided likely voters and a third candidate, Libertarian Robert Sarvis, McAuliffe never had eclipsed the golden 50% market.  Third party candidates with no chance of voting usually end up with fewer votes than pre-election polls indicate, making the outcome less certain than otherwise.

On the evening of Monday, October 28, however, The Washington Post unveiled a survey which found Virginia Democratic gubernatorial nominee McAuliffe opening a 12-point lead over his challenger, 51 percent to 39%, with 8% of voters stating they intend to opt for Sarvis.  

News of the poll was published by Politico promptly at 8:24 p.m. Monday.    Like clockwork, as Politico's Alexander Burns reported less than three hours later at 11:06 p.m.

President Barack Obama will campaign for Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe this weekend, giving a late boost to McAuliffe as he seeks to energize core Democratic voters in an off-year governor’s race, Democratic sources told POLITICO.

Obama is set to appear at a Sunday afternoon get-out-the-vote rally in Northern Virginia. It will be the president’s first campaign appearance for McAuliffe, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Presumably, a tentative decision for Obama to enter the campaign had been made earlier.  Just as likely, the decision was tentative, subject to change at the last moment if it appeared there was any chance the GOP candidate would surge to victory.  Indeed, Burns observed

McAuliffe’s embrace of Obama is little surprise this late in the election, but it confirms that the political ground in the race has shifted since the start of the year, when Republicans hoped to win the governorship largely by running up the scoreboard among conservative Virginians hostile to the president.

It appears at this point that such a strategy is unlikely to produce a winning coalition for Cuccinelli, leaving little down side for McAuliffe or Obama in campaigning together.

The Obama camp may take some credit for Cucinelli's decisive victory after Election Day while being given little or no blame for waiting until the last minute.  And he will receive little criticism even after assiduously avoiding the gubernatorial campaign in New Jersey, a state whose GOP governor the President appeared with earlier this year and has lavishly praised.

Bold, Mr. President. Self-serving leadership we can believe in.


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Turning His Back

Virginia, there is no Santa Claus.

But Virginia is the site of the most (more, actually) closely watched gubernatorial election in the U.S.A. this year, with unpopular Democrat Terry McAuliffe facing off against unpopular Attorney General Ken Cucinelli, whose first name appears to be "tea party favorite" (whatever that means).  MSNBC's Rachel Maddow has been particularly vigorous covering the Virginia election, on Thursday even interviewing Chesterfield County election board registrar Lawrence Haake about voter suppression efforts in the state.

Virginia is clearly a swing state, and one in which the gubernatorial election is very much in doubt, though the Democrat is favored to win.   Neither factor is in play in New Jersey, where Governor Chris (don't call him fat, whatever you do!) Christie is expected to cruise to victory in what is otherwise a Democratic, and strongly culturally liberal, state.

There are many reasons for Christie's strong position, including a lack of awareness in the state of how much of an extremist he is.  In the waning days of the campaign, the governor is exploiting this blissful ignorance, such as deciding not to appeal to the state's highest court approval by a lower court of same-sex marriage, a struggle which would have cost him support in next week's election, which he is determined to win by a large margin.  He also was probably motivated to take off the table an issue which in a presidential election would have detracted from his emphasis on screwing workers unions and lowering taxes on the wealthy, always advantageous stances in Repub presidential primaries.

Continuing to fight same-sex marriage might also have cost him support among editorial boards.  Sunday, the nominally liberal editorial board of The Philadelphia Inquirer noted 

Christie has wrongly demonized teachers and abandoned a school aid formula that attached funding to at-risk children. And he should forget about an income-tax cut that would favor the wealthy and unnecessarily reduce state revenue.

Christie's opposition to same-sex marriage and Planned Parenthood funding are retrograde. And he should improve his poor environmental record by replenishing open-space funds and setting more ambitious clean-energy goals.

Christie has also shown an unfortunate tendency to be self-serving. His scheduling of a special U.S. Senate election for last week seemed calculated to keep the popular Democrat Cory Booker from affecting his race. He was featured too prominently in taxpayer-funded tourism ads. As a possible presidential candidate, Christie must be more careful to keep New Jersey's interests above his personal ambition. And he should kick his habit of publicly insulting other people.

Then it endorsed him for re-election though, admittedly, it had described what it considers favorable aspects of his leadership.  In so doing, it ought to draw comparison to the editorial in the state's largest (and the nation's 21st largest) newspaper, The Star Ledger (of Essex County, N.J., but sometimes inaccurately labeled "The Newark Star-Ledger") .  Last week, the editors of the newspaper, based in the extraordinarily densely populated northern portion of the state, explained

The property tax burden has grown sharply on his watch. He is hostile to low-income families, raising their tax burden and sabotaging efforts to build affordable housing. He’s been a catastrophe on the environment, draining $1 billion from clean energy funds and calling a cease-fire in the state’s fight against climate change.

The governor’s claim to have fixed the state’s budget is fraudulent. New Jersey’s credit rating has dropped during his term, reflecting Wall Street’s judgment that he has dug the hole even deeper. He has no plan to finance transit projects and open space purchases now that he has nearly drained the dedicated funds he inherited from Gov. Jon Corzine.

His ego is entertaining, but it’s done damage as well. By removing two qualified justices from the Supreme Court without good cause, he threatened the independence of judges at all levels, and provoked a partisan stalemate that has left two vacant seats on the high court. This was a power grab gone wrong.

The public gives him top marks for his handling of Sandy, but the record is mixed. Why would his administration park NJ Transit trains in a low-lying area where they flooded, causing $120 million in damage? Why did the federal government have to strong-arm the state to include more relief for renters and Spanish-speakers than Christie had proposed? And why should anyone believe taxpayers got the best price on refuse removal when the governor awarded a no-bid contract through a political friend?

Our own view is that Christie is overrated. His spin is way ahead of his substance.

Then it endorsed him for re-election, arguing that his support for destroying public education  the charter school movement- warranted his return to office.

But few people care about newspaper endorsements anymore.  Of greater importance is the failure of state Democrats and national Democrats to endorse Christie's Democratic opponent, State Senator Barbara Buono.  Both the leading Democratic presidential contender and her husband, the nation's most popular politician, have endorsed- and campaigned for- the Virginia gubernatorial candidate. McAuliffe once was a fundraiser for Mr. Clinton, though one can be forgiven for thinking they could have managed at least a pro forma endorsement of the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in New Jersey.   (Recall Hillary Rodham Clinton once boasted of breaking the "glass ceiling."  Good for me, not for thee, presumably.)

But the dagger to the heart of the Buono candidacy has come from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.    The Clintons, at least, overlooked also the U.S. Senate race in New Jersey, neglecting to endorse the expected- and eventual- winner, Cory Booker. The interests of arguably America's most famous political couple was 282 miles down Route 95.    But Barack Obama did endorse, and later release a video on behalf of, Cory Booker, who in addition included the President in a campaign ad.  Obama also has taken time to campaign with New York City Democratic mayoral nominee Bill de Blasio, who will be elected unless he announces his favorite activity is watching pornographic movies with Anthony Weiner. And then it would be close.

The failure of the nation's first black President even to endorse the party's gubernatorial candidate in a state in which the former remains fairly popular has had a particularly significant impact upon Barbara Buono's standing among black voters.    African-Americans are among the many Democratic office-holders who have endorsed Christie and black voters have appreciated the relationship between the state's governor and Barack Obama, who once ostentatiously praised Christie for "extraordinary leadership."     They (and the rest of us) are not used to seeing a Republican demonstrate any respect at all for this President- a low bar, but one many Repubs appear unable to clear.  Obama's endorsement of the Democratic nominee would, obviously, go a long way in establishing the latter's credibility among black voters, if not also undermining support among some of them for the incumbent.

Disturbing? Yes.  Reprehensible?  Yes.  (Don't you just hate people who ask and answer their own questions? Yes, you do.)  But perhaps most telling is that is not terribly surprising. Barack Obama has spent over four years avoiding supporting progressive causes while maintaining overwhelming support among Democrats partly because the loyal opposition has been relentless, extreme, on occasion racially prejudiced, and sometimes not even loyal. And now, in his fifth year, he is just plain gutless.


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Bully Economics

When Politico publishes something under the title "How Well Do You Know Chris Christie?" you expect a puff piece.  And you get what you expect, including such questions as

Chris Christie calls himself one of Bruce Springsteen’s greatest fans. How many Springsteen concerts has Christie attended?

Christie is a fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks. What NFL team does he root for?

What TV show will Christie make a guest star appearance for this fall?

This past weekend, Christie joined the elite group of politicians who have been elected into the Little League Hall of Excellence. Which of the following politicians is not also an inductee?

Christie played catcher on his high school baseball team and his son Andrew followed in his footsteps. What college does Andrew play baseball for?

Christie and President Barack Obama played a football tossing game at an arcade during a tour of the rebuilt Jersey Shore earlier this year. Obama failed at the game, but Christie won on his first try. What prize did he win Obama?

As a U.S. attorney in Newark, Christie racked up 130 convictions. How many cases did he lose?

The answer to the last question, which appears substantive, is zero.  But without context, the question is at best misleading because Christie's time at the U.S. Attorney's office was marked by ethical improprieties. Additionally, a prosecutor's won-loss record, like that of a head coach, says more about the people serving under him than about himself.  You, too, probably would coach the NBA's Miami Heat (with LeBron James) to a winning record; and no one who ever lived could get the NFL's Jacksonville Jaguars to a .500 record. Moreover, few if any media outlets have pointed out that a U.S. Attorney's office has considerable discretion over what cases to pursue and the plea bargains it offers in order to avoid "losing" a case.

We all know Governor Christie cares little about the rights or dignity of women in need of preventive health care, public employees promised a pension, public school students in urban areas, or workers earning minimum wage.  But a short quiz about the economy might be entertaining and couldn't help but be more meaningful than Politico's. For instance:


1) Property taxes in New Jersey are among the highest in the nation.  How has the property tax burden been affected since Chris Christie has been governor?

a) declined across-the-board
b) remained virtually the same
c) increased across-the-board
d) generally increased, but declined for the wealthy

2) Employment has increased across the nation in the four years Chris Christie has been governor.  How has employment fared in New Jersey compared to that in other states?

a) increased more than in any state
b) increased less than in some, but in more than most, states
c) increased approximately as much as in most states
d) increased than in all but 6-10 states

3) Mortgage delinquencies are dropping across the nation but still are higher than before the recession.   How is New Jersey ranked compared to other states in holding the line against mortgage delinquencies?

a) in the top quartile
b) in the second quartile
c) in the third quartile
d) in the bottom quartile

4) Personal income is on the upswing throughout the U.S.A.  Where does the increase in New Jersey place it among other states?

a) in the top quartile
b) in the second quartile
c) in the third quartile
d) in the bottom quartile

If you answered (d) to each, you deserve an "A," especially because the mainstream media has been hard at work convincing you Christoper J. Christie has been a successful governor.


The deterioration, including economic, of the State of New Jersey the past four years cannot be completely attributed to Governor Christie, though some of it- such as the increasing property tax burden- results from his obsession with keeping income taxes low for the state's wealthy residents.   Although liberals, conservatives, and moderates all have experienced the impact of leadership long on egomania and short on leadership, one aspect of the governor's economic record may delight the right-wing which dominates the GOP presidential primaries foremost in Christie's mind.  While tax revenue has increased in New Jersey, it has risen less than in 44 other states, a good way to suffocate government and programs which help the poor and middle class.




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