If only these things worked.
Dana Milbank says the TPP is just as bad as you think it is. And Elizabeth Warren? Well...
No, President Obama, Elizabeth Warren isn’t wrong.
Obama told MSNBC’s Chris Matthews on Tuesday that the populist Democratic senator from Massachusetts is in error in opposing a free-trade agreement his administration has been negotiating with 11 other Pacific nations.
Warren is right: The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is an abomination — not because of the deal itself, and not because free trade in general is a bad idea. The TPP is an abomination because Obama had a chance to protect American workers from the harm that would inevitably come from such a pact, and he didn’t take it, or at least he hasn’t.
As bad, Obama’s anointed successor, Hillary Clinton, waffled on the trade pact this week, offering only the banality that “any trade deal has to produce jobs and raise wages” — which, of course, they all claim to do...
more than 20 years after NAFTA and 14 years after China joined the World Trade Organization, there is no real question among economists that expanding trade has been good for the world and has helped reduce poverty. It has also unquestionably been good for U.S. corporations as they grow their global reach. But there is equally no doubt that trade liberalization has hurt low-skill manufacturing workers and aggravated income inequality, which is now at its worst since the 1920s.
Helping corporations "grow their global reach" is not exactly at the top of a good economic to-do list. Who is right about the TPP? Well, there's no doubt it will shuffle jobs to the lowest bidder and shuffle money to those who already have it. Because that's what these things do. Is this treaty particularly bad? It would help if the president would
let us read it.
Come on in, let's read some pundits...
Frank Bruni Looks at the GOP's big gay wedding problem
No matter how much we’d like the ceaseless chatter about gay marriage to go away, it won’t, not with the Supreme Court about to hear another round of arguments on the issue and not with this inextinguishable debate over “religious freedom” laws.
And we Republicans find ourselves in a bind, caught between the Bible Belt and a need for fresh accessorizing, between Mississippi and modernity, with evangelicals over here and millennials and soccer moms over there. We have a primary process that won’t graduate anyone who loves the gays too much but a general election that could, for the first time, punish anyone who loves the gays too little.
William Eskridge shows just one of many reasons that the GOP's position on gays is becoming increasingly bleak.
This week, committed gay couples seeking the right to marry will take their case to the Supreme Court. The plaintiffs in Obergefell v. Hodges are supported by amicus briefs submitted by a variety of institutions and people, from the former N.F.L. player Chris Kluwe to Ken Mehlman, a past chairman of the Republican National Committee.
Religious groups are on their side, too. While several prominent religious organizations have filed briefs in opposition, leaders in the Episcopal Church, the United Church of Christ, the Unitarian Universalist Association, the official organizations of conservative and reform Judaism, and more than 1,900 theologians signed a brief urging the court to legalize same-sex marriage.
The New York Times knows where to find the "missing black men," but the answer isn't good.
An analysis in The Times — “1.5 Million Missing Black Men” — showed that more than one in every six black men in the 24-to-54 age group has disappeared from civic life, mainly because they died young or are locked away in prison. This means that there are only 83 black men living outside of jail for every 100 black women — in striking contrast to the white population, where men and women are about equal in numbers.
This astounding shortfall in black men translates into lower marriage rates, more out-of-wedlock births, a greater risk of poverty for families and, by extension, less stable communities. The missing men should be a source of concern to political leaders and policy makers everywhere.
This is an insanely awful circular system that's grinding down not just black men, but black families. Black men are being locked up—or killed—at a rate that disrupts their homes, for which they are getting 1) blame and 2) laws that accelerate the process. Does the collapse of many black families represent a broken culture? Yes it does. Only, it's not
black culture that's broken.
Ross Douthat notices the endless war.
The drone strike that accidentally killed two hostages held by Al Qaeda, one of them American, in Pakistan’s northwest frontier was a rare moment of media attention for a seemingly endless military campaign. It’s six years old if you date it to President Obama’s escalation of drone warfare, 11 if you date it to the first American drone strike inside Pakistan, and 14 if you date it to when United States Special Forces first slipped into Afghanistan after 9/11. ...
In theater after theater, this administration has us in just far enough to shape events, but without a plan to win it.
Over the next 18 months, you’re going to hear Republican politicians and — barring a Rand Paul upset — the eventual Republican nominee campaigning vigorously against this state of play, and arguing that America should be fighting more to win and less to draw. Napoleon’s maxim, “When you set out to take Vienna, take Vienna,” will be repurposed as a critique of this president and all his many half-fought, un-won wars.
What did Napolean say when you don't want to take Vienna? Probably something like then stay the hell home.
Ruth Marcus thinks foreign cash means domestic issues for Hillary.
In thinking about donations to the Clinton Foundation from foreign governments and interests, an adage attributed to Benjamin Franklin and a Yiddish word come to mind.
From Franklin — actually, from Franklin’s alter ego, Poor Richard — comes the saying, “He that lieth down with dogs shall rise up with fleas.” In foreign policy, as in fundraising, lying down with dogs goes with the territory. Combine the two, and fleas become an occupational hazard.
Let's just stop there. Can I give my own homespun aphorism? How about "that dog won't hunt?" Better yet, how about "People trying to turn foreign donations to Bill Clinton's foundation, much of whose activities are overseas, into a scandal for Hillary are idiots?" Yeah, I like that one. Oh, and speaking of lying down with dogs? Marcus, and all the others, are taking the word of one of the most consistently deceptive Republican operatives as the basis of this "problem."
Leonard Pitts on the facts... and fact checkers.
“Obama is a Muslim,” it said. “That is a FACT.”
As best I can recall — my computer ate the email — that was how the key line went in a reader missive that had me doing a double take last week. It was not the outlandish assertion that struck me but, rather, the emphatic claim of its veracity. We’re talking Shift-Lock and all-caps so there would be no mistaking: “Obama is a Muslim. That is a FACT.”
Actually, it is not a fact, but let that slide. We’re not here to renew the tired debate over Barack Obama’s religion. No, we’re only here to lament that so many of us seem to know “facts” that aren’t and that one party — guess which — has cynically nurtured, used and manipulated this ignorance for political gain.
...
like stinkweed in a bouquet of roses, the studies also produced one jarringly discordant finding: Republicans are significantly less likely to view fact checkers favorably. Among those with lower levels of political knowledge, the difference between Republican and Democratic voters is fairly small — 29 percent of Republicans have a favorable view, versus 36 percent of Democrats. Surprisingly, among those with higher levels of knowledge, the gap is vast: 34 percent of Republicans against 59 percent of Democrats.
The traditional rejoinder of the GOP faithful whenever you bring up such disparities in perception is that they mistrust “mainstream media” because it is biased against them. Putting aside the dubious validity of the claim, it’s irrelevant here. Fact-checking journalism is nonpartisan.
Reality has a liberal bias and THAT IS A FACT.
Perhaps we ought not be surprised given the pattern of party politics in recent years. On topics as varied as climate change, health care, terrorism and the president’s birthplace, GOP leaders and media figures have obfuscated and prevaricated with masterly panache, sowing confusion in the midst of absolute clarity, pretending controversy where there is none and finding, always, a ready audience of the fearful and easily gulled.
As political strategy, it has been undeniably effective, mobilizing voters and energizing campaigns. As a vehicle for leadership and change, it has been something else altogether. When you throw away a regard for fact, you throw away the ability to have effective discourse. Which is why American political debates tend to be high in volume and low in content. And why consensus becomes impossible.
These two paragraphs are the most succinct, most factual, summary of the last decade that I've read.