A Modest Proposal

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Wednesday June 10, 2009 · 8:04 AM PDT

2009/06/10 · 08:04

Now that some banks are being allowed to repay the TARP money they received, some portion of that money should be diverted to a new and different form of stimulus, one that would have significant short-term economic benefits as well long-term benefits for the country's soul. Specifically, I am proposing the creation of a new national university, similar to the military academies but devoted instead to the study of science, diplomacy, linguistics and other subjects beneficial to the nation as a whole and specifically to those who would aspire to serve the civilian branches of government. Like the service academies, this institution would be free to those who attended, but would require four years of government employment following graduation. Like the service academies, a certain percentage of admissions could be reserved for appointments by members of Congress and the rest could be awarded on the basis of financial need. Think about it for a moment - this is a win/win for everyone involved.

texvol

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Friday February 27, 2009 · 6:12 AM PST

2009/02/27 · 06:12

After listening to Bobby Jindal's insipid response to President Obama's sweeping vision for America, it should now be clear to everyone that the Republican Party is intellectually bankrupt. Rather than offer constructive solutions to the multiple crises confronting America, Republicans have been reduced to shouting "Tax cuts!" and "Deregulation!" as if the last eight years had never happened.

That may be good news for Democrats, but it is unfortunate for the country because we really are facing a large number of seemingly intractable problems for which solutions are not readily apparent. No one really knows the most effective way to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, or expand health care access, or reduce carbon emissions, or win the war in Afghanistan, or deal with the collapsing financial system. The Obama Administration is ready to tackle all of these problems and more, and they have good ideas about how to begin, but they are not omniscient and the devil is always in the details. It would actually to useful if the Republicans could engage on these issues, offering critiques and alternatives where appropriate, perhaps even forging a consensus on the most critical issues. Unfortunately, they appear to be both unable and unwilling to play that role.

texvol

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Thursday November 06, 2008 · 11:03 PM PST

2008/11/06 · 23:03

In a recent column, Paul Krugman publicly stated what many of us have know for years, that during the period of recent Republican ascendancy, particularly during the years 2002-2006, America was governed by monsters. (Krugman column here: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/... It is hard now to even remember how corrupt, despicable and incompetent many of these people really were because the Democratic victories of 2006 and 2008 have (or will, as of January) consigned the vast majority of them to the perdition they so richly deserve. Donald Rumsfield, Karl Rove, Rick Santorum, and Tom Delay are just bad memories now, a distant nightmare best forgotten. The most corrupt members of the extortionate Delay gang like Duke Cunningham, Bob Ney, John Doolittle and Richard Pambo are in jail, under investigation or in disgrace, as are Rick Renzi and Curt Weldon. Tom Tancredo has resigned and Bill Sali and Marilyn Musgrave finally earned defeat this year. Ted Stevens will soon be gone, one way or another.

Poll

149 votes Show Results

Who will be the worst person in the new Congress?

149 votes Vote Now!

Who will be the worst person in the new Congress?

Michelle Bachmann

65 votes

Jean Schmidt

8 votes

Steve King

12 votes

Jean Schmidt

2 votes

James Sensenbrenner

15 votes

Joe Lieberman

27 votes

Someone we haven't learned to hate yet

20 votes

John McCain's last, best service to his country (and it's not what he thinks)

texvol

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Sunday November 02, 2008 · 7:46 AM PST

2008/11/02 · 07:46

John McCain has always prided himself on his service to America and, until recently, most of us would have had to agree that much of his pride was justified. Even if you disagree with McCain on virtually every issue, as I do, he deserves at least our grudging respect for his military service and the work he did in the Senate before he brokered his unholy alliance with Karl Rove and the forces of darkness back in 2004. Since then, of course, his fealty to the Bush Administration and its policies has been an embarrassing repudiation of everything McCain once claimed to stand for. Most of you, I suspect, would argue that McCain's legacy has been further tarnished by the disgraceful way in which his presidential campaign has been run. I would suggest, however, that if McCain loses this election - and he will - then he will have unintentionally performed the greatest service he could ever have provided America.

Consider the following benefits that the McCain campaign will have rendered by the time the election is over:

texvol

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Wednesday October 29, 2008 · 6:49 AM PDT

2008/10/29 · 06:49

Pronoun aside, that's the question I used to ask myself every time I heard George Bush speak. I never really decided on the answer and eventually just stopped listening to him. With Sarah Palin, however, the question has taken on new importance because yesterday she escalated the attacks on Obama with a series of remarks that are not merely wrong, not merely slanderous, but dangerously delusional. As ABC News is reporting this morning:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin went beyond her running mate's recent attack on Sen. Barack Obama -- inaccurately claiming that Obama called the lack of "redistributive change" during the civil rights movement a "tragedy" -- and used Obama's 2001 interview to insinuate that he wants to re-write the U.S. Constitution and appoint radical Supreme Court justices and judges who would confiscate the property of American citizens.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/10/palin-suggests.html

Just ponder the absurdity of that for a moment.

Poll

232 votes Show Results

Sarah Palin is . . . .

232 votes Vote Now!

Sarah Palin is . . . .

A fundamentalist fanatic who is completely detached from reality

108 votes

Suffering from paranoid delusions

6 votes

An evil Machiavellian liar

49 votes

A living Barbie doll who simply says what she is programmed to say

13 votes

It doesn't really matter because she's kind of hot

3 votes

All of the above

53 votes

Get Ready: Here comes the next smear

texvol

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Monday October 20, 2008 · 2:55 PM PDT

2008/10/20 · 14:55

Having failed to interest voters in the silliness about Bill Ayers, the Republican attack dogs are moving on to new topics, desperately hoping to salvage McCain's floundering campaign by drowning Obama in a sea of baseless slanders. So far, the thugs on the Republican side have suggested that Obama was a secret Muslim, that he hated America, that he had ties with Hamas and al-Queda and something or other in Kenya that no one has ever heard of (and which probably doesn't even exist), that he had ties to the Chicago mob, that he is a Marxist (or a communist or a socialist, depending on the day of the week, I suppose), that he wasn't born in the United States and is thus ineligble to be president, that he "pals around" with terrorists, and - my personal favorite - that he might actually be the AntiChrist. (I'm sure I have missed a few, but you get the point). Indeed, since McCain seems incapable of articulating a single affirmative reason that he should be elected, the entire campaign has come down to potraying Obama as some variety of 'the other" in order to stoke primitive tribal passions and fears among the electorate.

texvol

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Tuesday October 07, 2008 · 7:59 AM PDT

2008/10/07 · 07:59

Dear General Powell,

I am writing today to urge you to end your silence on the presidential campaign and to publicly endorse Barack Obama. I do so because I believe you to be a man of honor and integrity who has devoted his life to the service of our country. I do so because I believe your country needs your service now more than ever. Given the numerous problems America now faces at home and abroad, and the severity of those problems, this election was already going to be the most important of our lifetime, but by his desperate - and dangerous - efforts to avoid defeat through demonizing Barack Obama, John McCain has upped the ante even further. This election is now about hate, about fear, about the resurrected nightmare of open and overt racism. This is no longer merely a battle for control of the White House, it is a battle for the soul of America. And it is a battle you must join, sir, as difficult as that choice may be.

texvol

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Friday October 03, 2008 · 8:08 AM PDT

2008/10/03 · 08:08

Yesterday, I received a threatening letter from a group called the Americans for Limited Government Foundation. Though it was addressed specifically to me, it was clearly a form letter and I suspect many of you will receive one too.

I have never heard of this particular group, and I was shocked by the contents of the letter. Apparently, I have been identified as a donor to an unspecified "left-wing organization" and Howard Rich, the Chairman of this Foundation wanted me to know that I was no longer going to be able to "engage in these activities, operating in relative obscurity." To the contrary, Mr. Rich wanted me to know that: "Your name has been put into our database" and if it appeared again it was his intent "to publicize your involvement in your local community." Worse, should any of the unnamed organizations to which I have been donating be found to be engaged in illegal or "questionable" activity, "it is our intent to publicize your involvement with those activities." To make the threat sound even more ominous, Mr. Rich kindly warned me that "instances of coordinated voter fraud are surfacing all across America and investigations into possible criminal coordination are underway."

texvol

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Tuesday September 30, 2008 · 6:01 AM PDT

2008/09/30 · 06:01

The biggest news of the day yesterday has been neither widely reported nor commented upon. Apparently anticipating the failure of the bailout proposal in Congress, the Fed announced that it would, in essence, inject several hundred billion dollars into the international banking system, accomplishing by fiat what Congress refused to do. The net effect to the taxpayers will be much the same as what Paulson originally proposed, and all of the outraged voters railing against the bailout didn't even notice. Here is the Fed's announcement: http://www.newyorkfed.org/...

The Fed's decision is disturbing on several levels. First, it is an indication of how serious the problem in the credit markets really is. Second, it shows that Wall Street is going to get its rescue no matter what the people - or Congress - have to say. Third, it means the Fed itself is now teetering on the edge of insolvency.

texvol

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Thursday September 11, 2008 · 6:48 PM PDT

2008/09/11 · 18:48

While the flag-waving, God-fearing delegates to the Republican Convention were celebrating the small-town values of giant, multinational oil companies by chanting "Drill Here! Drill Now!" the inspector general of the Department of Interior was finalizing a scathing investigative report about the Mineral Management Service ("MMS"), the federal agency which would be responsible for collecting royalties from all of those new oil wells. Unless small-town values encompass lots of sex, drugs and corruption (which, now that I think about it, they actually might), the shenanigans at MMS were somewhat inconsistent with the pious platitudes of the RNC.

Apparently, the staffers at the MMS have been living the Republican dream since 2002, awarding cushy consulting contracts to their buddies and accepting prodigious gifts from industry lobbyists, while partying hard and actually having sex with the very people they were supposed to be regulating. They got away with it by bypassing the normal channels of reporting within their own organization and intimidating anyone else who tried to complain. In general, the report concluded that a "culture of ethical failure" pervaded the agency.

Poll

19 votes Show Results

If you worked for the MMS, would you:

19 votes Vote Now!

If you worked for the MMS, would you:

Use the money you saved on discounted sex toys to buy cocaine from your secretary?

4 votes

Sleep with oil company lobbyists in exchange for free gas?

2 votes

Invite the MMS Chicks to an office happy hour every day after work?

3 votes

Refuse gifts from lobbyists unless they were purchased in small towns?

2 votes

Volunteer for the Obama campaign!

8 votes

Hooray for John McCain!

texvol

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Wednesday September 10, 2008 · 5:51 AM PDT

2008/09/10 · 05:51

Sobered - and somewhat depressed - by the tightness of the presidential race, I have tried to think objectively what John McCain's election would actually mean for the country and whether there is anything positive that might result. The results of that analysis are not particularly encouraging.

If McCain is elected, It is reasonable to assume:

That he will appoint at least one justice to the Supreme Court, that this nominee will tip the current balance of opinion on the court, and that the nominee will support both overturning Roe v. Wade and granting the office of the president near-despotic powers to wage the illusory "war on terror" - powers that will be expanded and inevitably abused by future presidents.

texvol

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Friday September 05, 2008 · 7:35 AM PDT

2008/09/05 · 07:35

Last night John McCain pledged to stop sending $700 billion "to people who don't like us." This was, presumably, his shorthand description of his plan to end America's dependence on foreign oil. As is typical, however, what McCain said was merely a soundbite, not a strategy, delivered in codespeak to a narrow base (translation: Drill! Drill! Drill!), and like so many of the Bush Administration policies and proclamations, it has no connection to reality. Analyzing this statement thus leads to several important conclusions about McCain, his campaign, and his real plans if elected. There are so many problems with McCain's statement that it is difficult to know where to start, but let me try.

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A Modest Proposal

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Is she stupid, or is she lying?

Get Ready: Here comes the next smear

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Drill Here! Drill Harder?

Hooray for John McCain!

$700 Billion? Bull%#@*