Back in the good ol’ days, you’d merely text your old pal I.B. Loaded, CEO of Amalgamated Rules Bender Inc. Loaded’s given you tons of cash over the years for your campaigns. He, his wife and children, his employees, his vendors — all have seen the wisdom of slipping dough to you, your official campaign committee, and, of course, your “Leadership PAC.”

And, of course, Loaded would have his Gulfstream V (I mean, rather, his corporate-owned private jet) fly into Reagan National to pick you up (after, of course, a taxpayer-paid car and driver deposited you, your luggage, and golf clubs there). Loaded himself would be on the plane to entertain you and see to your every need. After you’d both consumed a few hits from Loaded’s stash of 40-year-old Glen Garioch, he’d probably steer the conversation into an arcane tax-policy issue that would likely benefit Amalgamated Rules Bender Inc. to the tune of millions of dollars.

You’d be the only passenger on a sophisticated jet costing $59 million with an hourly operating cost of about $7,000. Yet, before 2007, you’d only pay the cost of first-class airfare to LA — maybe a grand or less, depending on discounts. Then Congress shut the door to corporate-provided air travel by passing the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act.

And this week, those idiots at the Federal Election Commission reopened the door.

The act plainly states “a candidate for election for Federal office … may not make any expenditure for a flight on [a noncommercial] aircraft unless … the candidate, the authorized committee, or other political committee pays … the pro rata share of the fair market value of the flight.”

But the FEC changed that by redefining when a member of Congress is or is not a “candidate.” Here’s the explanation from The Campaign Legal Center:

Yet the FEC today adopted a final rule nonsensically declaring that a candidate is not a “candidate,” for the purpose of this statute, when that candidate “is traveling on behalf of another political committee (such as a political party committee or Senate leadership PAC).” Instead, where a candidate claims to be traveling “on behalf of” their own leadership PAC, or one of the many committees controlled by their political party, or any other political committee—the old rules apply, allowing that candidate to pay the price of a commercial air ticket instead of the price of the private plane the candidate is actually flying on.

To make matters worse, FEC Chairman Walther published a statement explaining his decision to provide the necessary fourth vote for the final rule put forth by his three Republican colleagues on the FEC. Preposterously, Chairman Walther cited comments filed in the rulemaking proceeding by the Campaign Legal Center, together with Democracy 21, suggesting that we support this new rule gutting HLOGA. Chairman Walther wrote: “The Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21 agreed and indicated their support for ‘retain[ing] the existing reimbursement rate structure for non-candidate travel.’” (emphasis added). While we did support retaining the old rate for non-candidate travel, nowhere in our comments did we suggest that candidates should be considered to be engaging in non-candidate travel through the simple expedient of claiming that they are flying “on behalf of” their leadership PAC or other federal political committee. Chairman Walther should know better.

Candidate travel is candidate travel—period.

The FEC’s new rule illegally contradicts the plain meaning of the statute. Unfortunately, gutting or ignoring federal law—that Commissioners would have written differently themselves—has become a recurring habit for the FEC. In an earlier rulemaking, the FEC gutted the intent of another key aspect of HLOGA, allowing lobbyists to easily evade required reporting of bundled campaign contributions.

Provision of non-commercial travel by corporations (and unions) to members of Congress or federal candidates is simply more legalized corruption.

So I wonder how long it will be before enough members of Congress step up to close this loophole by updating the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act. Days? Weeks? Next century?

Since we’re asking rhetorical questions of ill-defined groups of people, i have a few for conservative-land…

Question 1: If we’re to be so afraid of creeping socialism, how come nobody in conservative-land is complaining about the redistribution of individual wealth through the state for the benefit of the military industrial complex? It sure looks like we could cut close to $1 trillion in taxes every year if we weren’t supporting big government Pentagon mismanagement.

Question 2: How come when i visit conservative-land i hear so much about the philosophy of Ayn Rand, but nobody ever talks about her near-militant atheism? She said that the non-existence of God is self evident, and i find it difficult to reconcile her philosophy of extreme individualism with any belief in a higher power. What gives with the picking and the choosing?

Question 3: Why does conservative-land insist on conflating corporatism with capitalism?

Question 4: If conservative-land is so big on free markets, why is it for locking up non-violent participants in the drug market and pouring billions into constraining that market?

Question 5: What exactly are conservatives conserving?

Preemptive Calling of Bullshit: Don’t tell me that it’s about “values” or any derivation of “God, mom and apple pie”.

This was not founded as a Christian nation. It was founded by a bunch of Masons back when Masons weren’t “everyday people” who took care of the gas money for the Shriners’ awesome little cars. They considered themselves heirs to a secret wisdom going back to at least ancient Egypt, and they were serious about it. The only mention of religion in the Constitution is to guard against it, and in the Declaration of Independence Jefferson choose “their Creator” rather than “God”. He could have just written God and everyone would have understood, but he didn’t, did he?

No, don’t give me the Pilgrims bullshit story either. They weren’t persecuted in England. The English got tired of the Puritans running the country like a 17th century, Christian Taliban and took their political power away. The English went back to dancing and celebrating Christmas, and the Puritans left to build their holy land in the New World. They weren’t alone in the wilderness either. Those banks have been fished by Europeans for a long time. The fishermen didn’t help them because the Puritans were self-righteous assholes. Our Masonic founders were trying to protect us from them, deal with it.

I’m pretty sure that darkies, Mexicans, homos, Muslims and commies have moms too.

Apples weren’t wholesome until the temperance movement. Johnny Appleseed was a capitalist paragon, staying two seasons ahead of the settling movement. Not only would he claim the choicest bit of land in a likely location, he would plant apple seeds. Apples don’t come true from seed (every Macintosh you’ve ever eaten is genetically identical to every other Macintosh on the planet). The chances of getting an eating apple from a bag of seeds are about the same as winning the lottery. All those apple trees that Johnny sold were used to make cider, which, with no processing beyond setting up, becomes booze in a short amount of time. Johnny was a drug king-pin and his apples were the scourge of good, Christian society.

So spare me all that. I’m conservative enough to believe that bullshit shouldn’t be worshiped but rather composted and spread on the field to grow more grass to feed the cows that i’ll eat as steaks.

Question 6: My visits to conservative-land have indicated that a good many people their realized that Bush was a fraud during his first term. So tell me, why the fuck did you all vote for him again?

No, you can’t turn that last one around on me. I’ll admit to voting for Obama, but i never would have done it if conservative-land hadn’t nominated a crazy old man with a history of treasonous behavior and health problems backed up by Sarah Palin. What fucking choice did i have?

But i’ll tell you this, with Isis as my witness, barring a massive and unlikely turn by the Obama administration, i won’t be voting for him again. This was the Dems last chance with me, and they blew it.

I don’t speak for liberal-land. I don’t want to speak for liberal-land. I speak for my own cranky, misanthropic damned self. As far as i’m concerned, if you managed to unite mainstream liberal and conservative-lands into one big happy family, it still wouldn’t be able to pour piss out of a boot with the instructions written on the heel. I’ve been plenty critical of Obama, so you can drop the “partisan attack” cry and answer my questions.

Bonus Question: Exactly when will conservative-land start opting out of all the socialism run amok and quit cashing social security, medicaid, disability checks, etc?

Bonus Question 2: For eight long years we were all told to respect the office of the Presidency while the President’s godless, Trotskyite advisers took away our civil liberties, started wars at every opportunity and used the Constitution to wipe their collective asses. So tell me, how does conservative-land now feel it’s right and proper to argue for military coups, impeachment and assassination?

In case the answer eludes you, here’s hint 1 and hint 2.

May the gods bless whoever produced this ad. I’m sure they didn’t mean to communicate so much unvarnished truth.

Flip, from 2007:

I promise that when I am elected to Congress, I will always put the American public above everything else. Unlike 99.9% of Congressional Candidates, I have never accepted a single cent of Corporate PAC money … [emphasis added]

Flip, from 2007:

I believe if you’re going to talk about campaign finance reform, you have to be willing to do it to prove your point. And I did and I would not be able to look myself in the mirror if I took money from ExxonMobil. My opponent gets over 70% of his money from PACs… Of all the issues we face, the core issue has to be campaign finance reform because nothing will change til we get the Board Room out of the voting booth. [emphasis added]

Flop, from 2009:

I’m not going to go to the working families of the 29th Congressional District and ask them to fund a congressional campaign when my opponents aren’t willing to do the same thing. I believe in playing on a level playing field [emphasis added].

Rep. Massa argues that he must accept corporate PAC money because the GOP does. He hides behind the “level playing field” argument. Why now? He beat the GOP incumbent without it. His only announced Republican opponent, Corning Mayor Tom Reed, has yet to be offered serious money from the National Republican Congressional Committee — which heavily funded the incumbent he defeated.

Rep. Massa knows the GOP wants this seat back. He wants a fat war chest and he wants it fast to deter any serious GOP challengers (and, perhaps, a Democratic primary one). That’s what incumbents do. That reflects his swift, dramatic shift from principled challenger to Beltway insider.

To disguise this, he suggests he does not want to return to hitting up district voters who are hard-pressed economically, “the working families,” as he labels them.

But that argument is disingenuous. He didn’t depend heavily on the “suffering middle class,” those he now says he wishes to protect from being dunned for contributions.

Federal Election Commission records, aggregated by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics, show that Rep. Massa raised $2,151,657 for the 2008 election cycle, $600,000 more than the GOP incumbent. He did not rely as heavily as he claims on the “suffering middle-class” district residents: His top 29 contributors gave him nearly $680,000. And ActBlue contributed nearly half of that. The list of these 29 contributors is dominated by labor unions ponying up $10,000 each.

Sliced another way — by industry totals— $1,292,621 of his total $2.1 million came from the usual suspects of campaign finance: Democratic and liberal organizations; leadership PACs; retired individuals; other candidate committees, lawyers and law firms; industrial, building trade, public sector and transportation unions; the securities and investments community; real estate and health professionals; and others.

As of the June 30 FEC quarterly filing deadline, Rep. Massa has raised $515,119 for the 2010 election cycle. More than half — $284,975 — has come from PAC contributions. His leading contributor is, again, ActBlue, with $73,000. The list of top industries for 2010 is similar to that for 2008. Those industries have given $310,772 so far.

Rep. Massa will need much more than the $2.1 million he raised for 2008. The national GOP wants that seat. And 2010 will be the year that New York state loses one seat in the House due to redistricting. Rural districts like the 29th are always convenient targets to be cut. If the 29th gets whacked, he’d have to run against, perhaps, longer-term New York congressional incumbents. Perhaps that influenced his change of financial heart.

Rep. Massa has said that he would not take corporate PAC money from harmful interests, such as cigarettes and Big Oil. Perhaps he’ll post a clear definition of “harmful” on his re-election website — if and when he announces for 2010.

Congress is taking a vacation from its hard work of fixing health care (yes, sarcasm intended). All the members are town-halling like mad, trying to divine the will of the electorate. Which Rep. Massa will tour District 29 this month?

This one, from June 2007:

I believe that we also need to address the problem of lobbyists in Washington, and as such, I do not accept Corporate PAC money. Thus I am reaching out to all of you to support my grassroots campaign. I am asking for 1000 people to step up and donate $100 to my campaign so we can tackle the issue of global warming in Washington. I need you to join me. Together, we can change the world.

Or this one, from February 2009:

[GOP critics] want to attack me for taking legitimate political action money that they are taking 10 times more of. I don’t quite get why the pot is calling the kettle black.

photo credit: Esquire

Q: Let’s say you’re sick with a potentially deadly disease. Who do you want for a doctor?
A: The smartest, most experienced and highly qualified expert in the field.

Q: You’re looking to invest your life savings. Who do you trust to handle your money?
A: The brightest, most agile financial mind I can find.

Q: You’ve been selected to participate in a “private citizens in space” program. Who do you want in charge of building the rocket?
A: The most brilliant and reliable engineers in the nation.

So far, so good. One more.

Q: You live in a time of unimaginable complexity and danger. Who do want to be the leader of the free world?
A: Somebody I can have a beer with. You know, a regular guy, a Joe Sixpack.

It’s said that people tend to get the leaders they deserve, and I can’t imagine better proof than the United States. At present we’re watching as a new president attempts to arm-tackle an array of national political and economic crises of evil supervillain jailbreak proportions, and at this early stage it’s far from clear that he’s Rushmore-bound.

• He may or may not get health care reform passed, and if he does it may or may not be as comprehensive as the programs pursued by previous arch-progressives Richard Nixon and Dwight Eisenhower.
• He may or may not bog us down in a vastly expanded quagmire in Afghanistan, although at present only an idiot would bet on him meeting his campaign promises regarding getting the heck out of Iraq.
• He may or may not decide to honor the pledges he made to the gay community.
• He may or may not spearhead a green revolution that saves the species from itself.
• And his economic policies may boost us to new, unprecedented levels of universal prosperity. Or they may plummet us nards-first into a meat grinder of a global recession so epic it will make the Great Depression look like a weekend in the Hamptons.

So the jury is still out on Mr. Obama. But… While past performance is no guarantee of future results, there’s also that thing about those who don’t understand history being doomed to repeat it. And America’s history of electing dolts, buffoons, scoundrels, knaves, low-jackers, pig-fuckers, gomers, dog-whistlers, Kloset Klansmen, recidivists and sheep pimps to the Highest Elected Office in the Land does not make one optimistic about the prospects for Barackapalooza. I’d love to be wrong, but let’s be honest. An indicator that can pick a loser 100% of the time is every bit as valuable to the shrewd investor as one that always picks the winner, and the Electoral College is as reliable a Finger of Doom as the world has ever seen.

Let’s review, shall we?

George W. Bush: Worst president ever? Dumbest president ever? Hard to say for certain, although put me down for “hell, yes.” The nation apparently elected a string of semi-housebroken wombats in the 1800s, and contemporary polling feels obliged, in the name of “balance,” to humor the estimations of conservative “scholars” who rate him the sixth-best ever. For my money, that opinion alone is sufficient for the credentialing institution to revoke the PhD, but such is the price we pay for the privilege of living in an society that not only tolerates fools gladly, it gives them television shows.

Bill Clinton: In so many ways, Clinton was the archetypal president of our age. He was the distilled, undiluted essence of the modern political animal. He was like everything in Washington, only moreso. And I don’t mean that in the good way.

Bubba may not be the man who invented the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, but he was damned sure the one who established it as the only wing that mattered. The irony, of course, was that he was reviled by the GOP. I’ve always wondered if the source of that rage was that Clinton was a better Republican than they were.

In addition, he cheapened the office at every turn: whether renting out the Lincoln Bedroom to the highest bidder, pardoning Marc Rich or “hiking the Appalachian Trail” like mink freebasing Viagra, it seemed as though his every action left us feeling the need for a shower. From the poor house to the penthouse to the whore house, we’ve never seen anything like him. God willing, we never will again.

George HW Bush: It’s still hard to fathom how this mealy-mouthed little wimp stumbled into the White House. All the Democrats had to do in 1988 was find a candidate with a pulse. Instead, they trotted out Mike Dukakis, a man with all the charisma and passion of an accountant on a phenobarbital drip.

Bush the Elder was the latest incarnation of an established and thoroughly corrupt dynasty, and between him and his fuckwit kids there is no better argument, could be no better argument, in favor of a 100% inheritance tax. If they’d had to earn anything on their own merit their only entree into a country club would be as assistant assistant assistant greenskeepers reporting to Carl Spackler at Bushwood.

Ronald Reagan: Wow. Where to start. Back in the 1960s Marshall McLuhan, in writing about where television was taking the culture, predicted Reagan in terms so accurate that you’d think you were reading a history instead of a precognition. The only thing missing was the name and home address. The failing in McLuhan’s analysis, if there was one, was this: as cynical as he was, the reality turned out to be even worse than he feared.

Ronnie was as anti-intellectual a leader as we could have imagined prior to Dubya. A man who somehow managed to remain immensely popular despite the fact that most Americans disagreed with his policies. One of the most corrupt collections of advisors, staffers and appointees in history. And the man who represented the grand triumph of years and years of scheming by wealthy conservatives bent on by god rolling the rich-poor gap back to feudal levels. An intellectually void, amoral cesspool of a human being who will nonetheless go down as one of our “great” presidents.

Jimmy Carter: Carter has the distinction of being one of the very few politicians that Hunter Thompson ever said anything nice about, and his record since leaving the White House has made clear what an outstanding statesman and humanitarian Carter really is. History will not mark him down as the most adept practitioner of the presidential arts, however, and for those who bemoan the erosion of the line between church and state, let’s remember just how very publicly Baptist Jimmy was. Now, thanks in part to him, we’ll never get the smell of the fundamentalists out of the furniture. (Which reminds me – Phish is playing four dates at Red Rocks, so those of us who live in downtown Denver are hoping the wind isn’t blowing straight west-to-east for the next few days.)

Gerald Ford: Nice enough guy, seemed like. For a politician and all. But he wasn’t ever elected.

Richard Nixon: Please tell me we don’t really need to talk about this one.

Lyndon Johnson: Ever heard of Vietnam? It’s hard to recall the last time somebody took an idea so bad and managed to make it even worse. He does get credit for important civil rights legislation, at least.

Still, in the final analysis he was a president from Texas with a lust for illicit, unwinnable wars. If that reminds you of somebody else, don’t blame me. I’m just reporting the facts.

John F. Kennedy: He invaded Cuba, and once the troops started landing he changed his mind. He nearly got us into a hot nukular shooting war. Then there was that Vietnam thing – he and LBJ can share this honor. Marilyn Monroe was either a plus or a minus, depending on where you stand with respect to the marital infidelity issue.

Ultimately, though, the only thing that saved his legacy was death. Had he lived to serve out his term(s) he’d be judged today based on his record, which falls somewhat short of the legend.

So, when was the last time America elected a president it could be proud of? By today’s standards Ike isn’t looking bad at all, and his two predecessors, FDR and Truman, also score high marks.

If you look at that chart in the link above, it seems like maybe the country’s ability to elect somebody half decent runs in cycles.

Let’s hope that’s the case, and that the wheel is turning back in our direction. Because damn, America is due.

These 27 nominees contributed $144,431 to President Obama and $57,900 to once-rival and now Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, reports the center. They have bundled (collected, as middleman, donations from others) at least $5 million for the president’s campaign and at least $1,782,500 for the president’s inauguration.

The president’s most recent nominee as ambassador to Germany, former Democratic National Committee finance chair and former Goldman Sachs executive Philip D. Murphy, and his wife “have contributed nearly $1.5 million to federal candidates, committees and parties since 1989, with 94 percent of that sum going to Democrats, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis. They also contributed an additional $100,000 to Obama’s inauguration committee.”

But this isn’t the real news. According to figures kept by the American Foreign Service Association, President Obama is making political patronage nominations to ambassadorships at twice the rate of the previous nine presidents.

The president has made 59 ambassadorial nominations as of July 1, according to American Foreign Service Association records — 35 are political nominees (1 confirmed, 19 nominated, 2 announced, 2 rumored); 24 are career Foreign Service nominees (4 confirmed, 21 nominated, 4 announced, 6 rumored).

According to the association, 110 of the current 175 ambassadorships are filled by career Foreign Service professionals (63 percent) and 45 by political nominees (nearly 26 percent). So far, the president’s record on nominations is reversing that ratio.

About 60 percent of President Obama’s ambassadorial choices so far, according to the association’s data, have been non-career, or political patronage, nominations. That’s nearly twice the average percentage of political nominees in previous administrations. The 40-year average, from presidents Kennedy to Clinton, for nominees is 30 percent political patronage and 70 percent career Foreign Service, according to the association.

Even President George W. Bush, who led the previous nine presidents in political patronage through ambassadorships, made only 36 percent of his 370 ambassadorial nominations political.

In its “Statement on Ambassadors,” the association argues:

The primary authority for choosing Ambassadors rests with the President, and the United States has a long tradition of public service by private citizens. This is appropriate and valuable, and private citizens should continue to serve in the diplomatic field. However, the value of this tradition of public service is undermined when individuals are chosen as ambassadors primarily for the size of their contributions to political campaigns, or for their personal friendship with the President. [emphasis added]

Twelve days before he took office, President Obama said:

I want to recruit young people into the State Department to feel that this is a career track that they can be on for the long term. And so, you know, my expectation is that high quality civil servants are going to be rewarded. You know, are there going to be political appointees to ambassadorships? There probably will be some. [emphasis added]

So far, some is an understatement. If the president continues to nominate political loyalists and fundraisers at this early rate, he’ll easily surpass President Bush’s 36 percent rate of political nominees. Perhaps the Senate, which must confirm nominees, should take note of this trend.

It’s been entertaining watching American public “discourse” since the election. (I use that word in its broadest, most ridiculous sense, since nothing that hinges so completely on self-absorption, rank ignorance and pathological dishonesty can be accurately characterized by such a noble word. But indulge me. I’ve been working on my irony lately.)

On the one hand you have conservatives fainting dead away that we’re now in the clutches of a “socialist” president. Never mind that these folks wouldn’t know a real socialist if he was gnawing their balls off. Never mind that most of these folks think “socialist” is the French word for Negro. Never mind that Obama demonstrably is to socialism what Joe the Plumber is to brie-sucking Northeastern intellectualism. As arch-conservative TV pundit Stephen Colbert says, “this is a fact-free zone.”

On the other you have the righteous outrage of the progressosphere, which feels six different kinds of betrayed by a president who promised them the moon and stars and has now left them to what looks like at least a four-year walk of shame. If I might borrow from an old fraternity joke, imagine the following scene from the Oval Office:

Barack: Hey everybody, what’s the difference between a progressive and a toilet?
Rahm: I give up, Mr. President.
Barack: The toilet doesn’t follow you around after you use it.
[Entire Cabinet]: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

A few days ago Chris Bowers, one of the progressive blogosphere’s smarter and more influential voices, announced that he was becoming a conservative Democrat. His reasoning was compelling. Let me sample a bit for you (and encourage you to go read the rest as soon as you’re done here).

You can “endorse someone other than a Democrat for President, and then have the Democratic leadership do whatever it takes” to keep you in the Party. “You get ten times the media mentions that one gets being a progressive.” You get “more money, too. You can proclaim that you are a conservative Democrat, and still have small, progressive, grassroots donors be by far your top contributors.” You can “hold up, water down, and threaten whatever Democratic legislation you want” with no consequences at all. “You get frequent meetings with the President and proclamations that he is one of your own.” If you bitch about it you get “threats about never hearing from the White House again.” You’re “far more likely to receive a major cabinet appointment. Not even counting the Republicans, New Democrats outnumber Progressives in President Obama’s cabinet by 7-1.” And that’s not nearly all.

Okay, so maybe Bowers isn’t really abandoning his fellow progressives. Maybe he was just being a smart-ass to make a point. I can’t say I approve of such tactics, but hey, my old pal Jonathan Swift was known for the occasional snark, so who am I to judge?

The point is that progressives have a beef with the new fauxcialist administration, and regardless of what you think about their issues, their analysis or their personal hygiene, a review of the facts certainly justifies their pique. Think about it.

• Obama the Campaigning Man was pretty clear in his disdain for the Defense of Marriage Act. Obama the President has apparently decided that gay rights can wait. (Don’t Ask Don’t Tell? Don’t bother.)
• Candidate Obama was balls-to-the-wall about greening the economy, and I mean yesterday. President Obama, whose favorability rating is running better than 2-1 for, seemed unable or unwilling to expend some of that political capital on the just passed ACES bill, which many experts think will accomplish diddley (or worse). (Again, whatever the eventual reality about this bill turns out to be is irrelevant – the point is that Obama did not act in accordance with the more progressive stance he had taken earlier.)
• And what about health care? A recent New York Times/CBS News poll showed overwhelming support for “a government administered health insurance plan like Medicare that would compete with private health insurance plans.” How overwhelming, you ask? Overall 72% were in favor of the “public option,” and 57% said they’d be willing to pay higher taxes to get it. Hell, 50% of Republican respondents want it. So, you have very high approval ratings. And you certainly have a significantly greater mandate than George the Conqueror did after nipping John Kerry in 2004. You have significant majorities in both houses of Congress. You have overwhelming popular support for a public option. And you can’t get it done? Seriously?

I’m sitting here trying to figure out why corporate America, which would stand to benefit tremendously from having the burden of insuring the citizenry lifted from its shoulders, isn’t in open revolt. (That part of corporate America that doesn’t include the insurance industry, I mean.)

It has been observed that the Republicans seem to be more effective with a minority than the Dems are when they have the entire country by the balls. GOPpers derail the train by threatening a filibuster, but the Democrats can’t seem to head off a bad idea with a damned-near buster-proof majority. How the hell is this possible?

This, of course, is what’s known as a “rhetorical question.” The butt-obvious answer is that the contemporary Democratic Party is not really a party, at least not in the same way that the GOP is. Instead, it’s a bizarre amalgam of progressives, “moderates,” bipartisan fetishists, “New Democrats,” DINOs and opportunistic Republicans (see Specter, Arlen). The median at present lies significantly to the right of Richard Nixon, who despite the recent revelation that he was in favor of abortion in the case of half-breed fetuses, posted a record that would make him pretty darned progressive by 2009 standards. (Good thing you dodged that bullet, huh Mr. President?)

Ultimately, Bowers and other frustrated progressives are right. The Democratic party just isn’t that into them. They’re useful when votes are needed, but are utterly incapable of leveraging that into actual influence. As far as the “responsible” centrists are concerned, progressives are the late-date with no self-esteem, the unwitting fat chick at the pig party.

So, what to do?

Playing along isn’t working. So how about rounding up all the members of the Progressive Caucus (and their many allies around the country) and opting out? Leave the Democractic Party. Form a third party of their own (or just join the Greens). All of a sudden the Democratic Party has a numbers problem. All of a sudden they lose majority status, chairmanships, agenda-setting stroke, etc.

I’m no expert on the rules of the American legislature, so I’m sure there are nuances I’m missing. Nonetheless, I imagine the Republican wing of the Democratic Party would wet itself. And in the short term this could be very good for the GOP, which would find itself in the plurality.

Longer-term, though, it seems like the progressives can make an argument – and one that is supported by some actual evidence – that they represent the will of a goodly slice of the American public. Even better, given how the youth vote seems to be trending, they can also argue that their hand is going to strengthen over time. Are these premises accurate? Hard to say. But they are testable hypotheses, and the posit is certainly plausible enough to be worth examining.

Maybe the remaining Dems respond by making the reality of the situation official and decamping for the GOP. Maybe the Blue Dogs and the “moderate” wing of the GOP abandon those pesky snake-handlers on the right and form a new “centrist” coalition. Who knows. If that did happen, however, America would at least have the refreshing luxury of an opposition party that, you know, opposed. We could get all that corporatist DC clutter, which thrives because it dominates both parties, up for a real referendum. What a campaign hook – America vs. the Beltway.

Part of me says “what if it backfires?” But the other part of me looks at the state of the current union, at the looting of the last eight (or, depending on your taste for the long view, 29) years, at the energy way too many Americans have to devote to worrying about what happens if they get sick or injured, at the staggering cost associated with continuing to fuck around with the environment, at the fact that millions and millions and millions of citizens have no hope at all of financial solvency, at the knee-buckling stupidity of a populace that’s been victimized by a brilliantly conceived War on Education, at…. Fuck it. You get the picture.

Off your knees, progressives. The worst that happens is more of the same. At the least do us the favor of dying on your feet.

Excuse me, Mr. President, but I thought I heard you promise not to use supplemental war funding bills any more. Apparently, according to PoliFact, I misheard (thank Bush for only funding Iraq and Afghanistan through September, 2009, instead of the whole year). But still, I’d really like to know how those programs are related to the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Oh, that’s right. They’re not.

I’ve railed against emergency supplemental war funding bills for several years now. After all, we’ve been in Iraq for just over six years and in Afghanistan for nearly eight – you’d think we knew how much they were costing us every year. To his credit, Obama claims that he’s going to regularly fund the military in Iraq and Afghanistan via the normal appropriations bills starting in fiscal year 2010 (as of October 1, 2009). We’ll see. But there’s no way that a cash-for-clunkers program has anything to do with a war supplemental.

My issue isn’t that the IMF money and preparations for flu pandemic don’t qualify as emergencies. Depending on how serious the CDC and WHO think the pandemic will be come the start of this year’s flu season, supplemental funding for pandemic flu preparations may be an excellent idea. And if the IMF needs more money to keep the rest of the world from falling even deeper into recession and, not incidentally, dragging down the US with it, then by all means, procure supplemental funds for the IMF too. But don’t attach it to a “war funding” supplemental. Be honest about what you’re doing, come clean with the taxpayers and voters, and do it with different supplementals – one for the occupations of two sovereign nations, one for IMF funding, and a third for flu pandemic preparedness.

Sure, it’s less efficient – but it’s also more honest because it allows each of the supplementals to pass or fail based on their own merits, rather than on the merits of “funding the troops.” And attaching a non-emergency spending provision like the cash-for-clunkers program to a “must pass” bill is about as honest as attaching an amendment opening up national parks to people carrying loaded and concealed firearms to a credit card reform bill.

Oh, that’s right, Congress already did that.

President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to change the way Washington works and curb the influence of lobbyists. … During the campaign, federal lobbyists could not contribute to or raise money for the campaign. … [T]he president-elect is taking those commitments even further by announcing the strictest, and most far reaching ethics rules of any transition team in history.”

Presumably, that means President Obama wishes to end the pay-to-play philosophy that pervades the practice of politics. Well, he’s got some explaining to do, because what he promises is not always what he does.

Case No. 1: Yes, the president said he’d nominate some of his financial backers as ambassadors. But the number’s growing. According to the Center for Responsive Politics:

President Obama announced another 10 names for ambassadorships last week, and in doing so, he awarded another set of big donors and bundlers with plum positions representing U.S. interests abroad. The new nominees for ambassadors to Belize, Belgium, Liechtenstein, Romania and Switzerland — along with their spouses and dependent children — have contributed at least $637,800 to federal candidates, parties and committees since 1989, CRP has found. Nearly that entire sum has gone to Democrats, including $32,775 to Obama himself and $8,300 to former primary opponent and now-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. These individuals also brought in at least $1.1 million for Obama’s presidential bid as bundlers, and at least another half-a-million as bundlers for his inauguration.

To date, this brings the contribution histories of Obama’s ambassador nominees to roughly $1.8 million in donations since 1989. The 19 ambassadors that CRP has found in our campaign contribution database, along with their spouses and children, have given more than $98,200 to Obama personally, bundled at least $3.4 million for his 2008 presidential run and bundled another $1.4 million for his inauguration.

Do these nominations transgress on his promise of change? Well, these people paid — and now they get to play. To be fair, however, presidents have rewarded financial backers with ambassadorships since the birth of the Republic. Let’s wait a bit and see how his record stacks up against the nomination histories of Presidents Bush I and II and Clinton. But President Obama’s nominations of financial backers are troubling in light of his promise of change.

Case No. 2: Jeff Zeleny, a White House correspondent for The New York Times, reported this earlier this week:

When President Obama arrived at the Mandarin Oriental hotel for a fund-raising reception on Thursday night, the new White House rules of political purity were in order: no lobbyists allowed.

But at the same downtown hotel on Friday morning, registered lobbyists have not only been invited to attend an issues conference with Democratic leaders, but they have also been asked to come with a $5,000 check in hand if they want to stay in good favor with the party’s House and Senate re-election committees.

The practicality of Mr. Obama’s pledge to change the ways of Washington is colliding once more with the reality of how money, influence and governance interact here. He repeatedly declared while campaigning last year that he would “not take a dime” from lobbyists or political action committees.

So to follow through with that promise, Mr. Obama is simply leaving the room. [emphasis added]

I have written about campaign finance for years. I never expected any politician, including President Obama, to live up to any promise to curb the influence of money in politics. Is he following the letter or spirit of his promise of change with regard to political money? Or has he merely developed a system of sidesteps to maintain the appearance of sticking to a promise?

Does this matter? Should we care that the president of the United States promises reform over the influence of money in politics but balks at bold, transparent steps to achieve it? Yes, on both counts.

Surely he will seek re-election. Recall, please, that presidential candidates in the 2008 cycle spent $1.8 billion. That’s more than double the $883 million presidential candidates spent in the 2004 cycle.

Is there any reason to believe — with out-of-power Republicans wanting back in and a Democratic president seeking re-election — that the cost of the 2012 election won’t be twice as high as 2008?

President Obama will need a boatload of bucks. He may philosophically wish to curb the influence of money in politics, but he will continue to be ruled by the need for the money to maintain power … as his opponents will be in their attempts to regain power.

On the president’s “Ethics” page at the White House website, this phrase is repeatedly used: “in the spirit of transparency …” So far, it’s mere fiction.

He will continue the charade of “stepping out of the room” because he needs the money. Can’t say I blame him … but I expected better.

Politics is at its heart a battle for control of language and symbols. Now that the president has nominated Judge Sotomayor, [insert name of political party or faction here] will seek to [support | undercut] that nominee through [messaging | framing | "truth"]. Ideological control of mainstream, a word signifying ownership of the core values of a majority of Americans, is at stake.

From Scott Reed, manager of the 1996 presidential campaign of Bob Dole:

The G.OP. has to make a stand. This is what the base and social conservatives really care about, and we need to brand her a liberal with some out-of-the-mainstream positions.

From Burt Neuborne, legal director of the New York University Brennan Center for Justice:

I have reviewed Judge Sotomayor’s judicial record, and it is undoubtedly well within the judicial mainstream.

From a list of talking points released in error by the GOP and printed in The Hill:

Republicans look forward to learning more about Judge Sotomayor’s legal views and to determining whether her views reflect the values of mainstream America.

Glenn Greenwald at Salon.com on Judge Sotomayer’s comments on gender and ethnicity informing judicial rulings:

It’s possible to take that view too far to the point where it becomes troubling, and Sotomayor should (and certainly will) be asked about it, but the comments themselves are entirely mainstream and uncontroversial.

From David Limbaugh at Human Events:

Even though the nation is mostly conservative and “liberal” is still a dirty word, President Obama is moving us leftward at a breakneck pace by disguising his actions through smooth rhetoric and slick salesmanship. Obama is a consummate practitioner of presenting his extreme leftist agenda as moderate and mainstream.

And even from George W. Bush in 2005:

My nominee will be a fair-minded individual who represents the mainstream of American law and American values.

Imagine a political spectrum from as far left as possible to as far right as possible. (Given the press’s framing of what “far left” and “far right” has been for the past quarter century, left vs. right isn’t as distinct as it used to be. But let’s leave that for another post …)

Where is mainstream? Is it where the Democratic Party used to be before Bill Clinton transformed it into Centrist City? Is it where various progressive groups say they now populate the mainstream? Is it where evangelical Christians say the base of the Republican Party is? Is mainstream more at home with social conservatives or fiscal conservatives?

I don’t know. But it will be fun watching them all attempt to remake mainstream within their own ideological images.

After thinking about it for a while, I’ve concluded that it’s just not worth driving myself crazy trying to determine whether ACES is “better than nothing” or whether it “sucks so bad it must be killed.” We’re less than a week into a process that could make ACES unrecognizable by the time it’s done, and so tearing my hair out over whether it’s enough today is an exercise in futility.

The GOP wants this bill dead – just looking at the insane list of amendments the GOP offered makes that abundantly clear. There’s seven supposedly different “jobs offramp” amendments job counts for Colorado alone, eight for California, five for Kentucky, and so on – all of which would automatically shut down the law if 1000, or 2000, or 10,000 or more jobs were lost in a state as a result of ACES. These aren’t serious amendments in the spirit of “lets make this bill better,” they’re “poison pills” specifically designed to make the bill so stupidly bad that even Waxman and Markey themselves would vote against it.

The fact that the GOP wants ACES dead is a good thing, actually, just as the fact that Greenpeace can’t support it because it doesn’t go far enough is a good thing. Generally, I figure that if both the left and the right hate the same legislation, that’s probably a good sign that the bill strikes the right compromises.

But this time I’m not so sure.

You see, the bill as it is today is almost certainly as strong as it’ll ever be. After passing E&C, it’ll probably go on to Ways and Means since that committee has jurisdiction over government debts, tariffs and so on. After Ways and Means, however, ACES may go through any or all of the following House Committees: Agriculture, Appropriations, Budget, Foreign Affairs, Natural Resources, Science and Technology, and/or Transportation and Infrastructure. Maybe those committees offered their input between the draft hearings and the official introduction on March 18, but then again maybe not. I certainly hope so, considering how much weaker the introduced version of ACES is than the initial draft version was.

And that’s all before ACES hits the House floor, where anyone who hasn’t already offered amendments on it will have the opportunity to do so in an attempt to weaken ACES even further.

Then the bill hits the Senate. Does anyone really think that, after going through as many as ten more committees, ACES will be strengthened in the Senate, especially given the number of conservative and moderate Democratic Senators that have to be mollified to reach a filibuster-proof 60 vote majority? If you do, I’ve got an collateralized debt obligation you could take off my hands too. (The ten committees I think could have jurisdiction over ACES are as follows: Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry; Appropriations; Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs; Budget; Commerce, Science, and Transportation; Energy and Natural Resources; Environment and Public Works; Finance; Foreign Relations; Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.)

After some form of ACES passes both the House and the Senate, there will almost certainly be a conference committee to work out the differences. It’s theoretically possible that the bill could be made stronger here using the same kind of bullshit measures the GOP used to screw with legislation during the Bush years, but I doubt it. Not because I think the Democrats too moral or ethical to try the same tricks, but rather because doing so will probably make the final form of ACES unpassable in the Senate.

And so, when all is said and done, the ACES that gets to President Obama will probably be even more bloated than it already is and will probably be significantly weaker than the version that just passed out of the E&C committee.

Whether I’ll support it by that point is impossible to predict. Will it still be better than nothing? Probably. Will it still be woefully insufficient as compared to what the science says is necessary? Almost certainly.

So I’m taking a wait and see approach. If ACES stay’s in the “better than nothing” column, great – I’ll publicly support it and suggest that everyone else do the same as well. If ACES finds its way into the “sucks so bad it must be killed” column, however, I’ll publicly oppose it and suggest that everyone else also do the same.

Until then, however, writing letters to your congresscritters asking them to strengthen ACES is probably a good idea. After all, there’s definitely a very slim chance that I’m totally off base and the bill can be made stronger through the legislative process instead of devolving to the least common denominator as I expect.

Right now it’s impossible to know. Well, impossible without a MisterFusion and flux-capacitor-equipped DeLorean, anyway….

Image Credit: AFP/Getty Images, via NYTimes GreenInc blog

Senator Arlen Specter’s announcement yesterday that he was defecting to the Democratic Party surprised a lot of people—but not me.

His move was a loooooooong time coming.

Specter ran into trouble with Conservatives in his own party way back in 1987 when he joined Democrats in defeating Ronald Regan’s nomination of Robert Bork to the Supreme Court.

One of those Conservatives happened to be my grandfather.

At the time, my grandfather was a well-connected, influential state legislator who pulled a lot of weight in the state GOP. Specter needed the state party’s support, which meant he needed the support of guys like my grandfather.

I remember sitting at the dinner table in the evenings and Arlen would call the house, trying to convince my grandfather about one thing or another.

This was 18 years ago or so. Even then, Arlen’s relationship with Conservatives was strained. The public got another dramatic view of that strain when Specter had to kowtow to President Bush in order to keep his chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary Committee just a few years ago. And of course, Specter was one of only three Republicans to support President Obama’s stimulus plan, further stirring up Conservative ire.

But I’ve seen the behind-the-scenes strain, too. I’ve overheard the phone conversations. I sat in the room as Conservatives at the state nominating convention tried to force an “open” primary instead of endorsing a candidate. I witnessed political wheeling and dealing and backstabbing disguised as glad-handing (not on my grandfather’s part, I should add!). As a cub reporter, I even had the chance to do a one-on-one interview with Specter–a favor he granted in an attempt to get on my grandfather’s good side.

The strain has been long and it has been ugly.

Specter tried to paint his defection from the party as a shift in principles by the GOP. “I have found myself increasingly at odds with the Republican philosophy and more in line with the philosophy of the Democratic Party,” Specter said, citing “irreconcilable differences” with the GOP. That is, in part, true.

But make no mistake: Specter jumped ship for the sake of political expediency. It’s no surprise that he faced a tough reelection bid in the Republican primary—he characterized his prospects as “bleak”—so the best way around that was to simply not participate in the Republican primary. At the same time, he cautioned Democrats that his vote would not be “automatic,” an attempt by Specter to maintain his independence, I suppose.

Had he truly believed he was independent, he could’ve changed his affiliation to reflect that. There are, after all, two other independents in the Senate right now (Jim Jeffords of Vermont and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, both of whom caucus with the Democrats). Doing so, though, would deprive Specter of the political machinery a party would provide him for his reelection—and that, it seems, is what Specter cares about above anything else.

Republicans should take heed. They can wash their hands of Specter, but they adopt a “good riddance” attitude at their own risk. The GOP is in danger of marginalizing itself into irrelevancy. Yeah, it can go farther right—away from the moderate position Specter has occupied—and thus be proud of its purer Conservative philosophy, but from a completely pragmatic perspective, what would that small minority of Republicans then be able to accomplish? (And don’t forget, socially conservative Republicans and fiscally conservative Republicans don’t always make easy bedmates, either, so the potential for further schism exists.)

There’s one other overlooked factor at work here, too. If Specter has found himself more in line with Democratic philosophy as the GOP has shifted right, doesn’t that also suggest that the Democratic party has shift away from the left to a more moderate position? Is the Democratic party due for the same kind of inner turmoil that Republicans have faced, with centrists in a tug-of-war with the party’s left wing?

On one level, Specter’s defection is nothing more than personal political survival, but also it’s a symptom of the larger issues working against the GOP’s very survival—and Democrats should be careful the same thing doesn’t eventually happen to them, too.

What follows is a series of key quotes from Gingrich’s prepared remarks that illustrate his deceptions.

Gingrich’s claimOur current energy import strategy is entirely a function of our own government’s anti- domestic energy policies. The United States government blocks the development of new energy sources and inhibits the use of existing energy and then explains that we will have a shortage of energy. It is an artificial, government imposed shortage not a naturally occurring phenomenon.

This is a gross distortion of reality. Our import strategy is mostly a function of the capitalistic nature of our oil industry, not of domestic energy policy. When oil prices were high, the oil industry lobbied hard (and largely successfully) for drilling subsidies and the opening of the outer continental shelf (OCS). But now that oil prices have fallen well off their peak, oil companies are stopping their domestic drilling in order to focus on more profitable foreign sources.

Put simply, oil companies and low oil prices are the reason that there’s not much domestic energy production.

Gingrich’s claim Make no mistake about it: This bill amounts to a $1-2 trillion energy tax levied on a struggling economy, which is destructive and wrong.

Carbon capitalism is not a tax. Gingrich is repeating a GOP talking-point that declares capitalism is taxation in the hopes of scaring people into believing that black is white and the sun rises in the west and sets in the east.

In addition, Gingrich didn’t even read the entire Waxman-Markey bill and admits to that fact before even starting to read his written testimony (The statement is at about 2 minutes in the CSpan video of Gingrich’s testimony. He stopped at around page 230 of a 600+ page legislative draft – when the portion about carbon capitalism starts on page 322.

Gingrich’s claim [E]xpect utility bill increases up to $3,128 per year per household.

This is a lie for a number of reasons. The most important is that the MIT study from which this wrong number was calculated was conducted in 2007, and paper author Dr. John Reilly has not updated the conclusions for the details of of the Waxman-Markey ACES draft legislation that Gingrich was testifying about. Furthermore, Dr. Reilly had the following to say at Climate Progress: “it is inappropriate to draw conclusions on the costs of Waxman-Markey.” After all, ACES has a number of cost-containment provisions specifically designed to prevent revenue gained from carbon capitalism such as offsets, public investment in energy efficiency, and an unreasonably low estimate of fuel prices for 2030 between $2.10 and $2.40, while the EIA estimated in it’s 2007 Annual Energy Outlook that gasoline prices would be $3.20 in 2030.

It also doesn’t help that the wrong GOP number would only be correct if you turned all that money into a giant bonfire.

Using an out-of-date study to tarnish current legislation is a misrepresentation of the MIT study at best, and an attempt to mislead Congress and the American people at worst.

Gingrich’s claim According to the Heritage Foundation, the cost of cap-and-trade, with even only a small percentage of allocations being auctioned, would be $1.9 trillion.

While Gingrich is accurately reporting what the Heritage Foundation’s study found, Heritage has a history of misrepresenting economic data and faulty logic as applied to climate, and as such their analysis cannot be trusted. The EPA has analyzed the carbon capitalism portions of the ACES draft and found that the total cost to the national economy is only $22 billion in 2015 and between $54 and $64 billion in 2030. The increase in household energy cost (excluding gasoline) over a reference projection for “business as usual” is 9%, or approximately $200 per year. In addition, the EPA analysis contains a literature review at the end that points out that the Heritage study doesn’t even define the baseline from which it projects the supposed $1.9 trillion, making the results of the analysis and the underlying assumptions impossible to verify.

Gingrich’s claim In a recent paper for the Tax Foundation, Andrew Chamberlain concludes that the costs of this energy tax would be “disproportionately borne by low-income households, those under age 25 and over 75 years, those in Southern states, and single parents with dependent children.”

The effects of energy price increases on struggling households would be a serious concern if it weren’t for one very important fact: everyone who studies carbon capitalism is aware of this problem and so writing legislation and/or regulations to correct for the disparity will actually be quite simple. In other words, this is a non-issue and an attempt at fear mongering.

Gingrich’s claim A recent estimate from the Tax Foundation shows that cap-and-trade could cost America 965,000 jobs, and reduce economic output by $136 billion per year.

This isn’t a false claim by Gingrich so much as it’s a false claim by the Tax Foundation repeated by Gingrich. However, economist Kristen Sheeran, Ph.D., of St. Mary’s College of Maryland, has addressed this directly: “[The Tax Foundation] report assumes that in a cap-and-trade system, there are no carbon revenues recycled back to households to offset the impacts of higher energy prices…. [A] cap-and-trade system where all permits are auctioned will generate a revenue stream that can be recycled back to households in these ways. This is well established in the literature, and the Tax Foundation report makes no reference to this literature at all.” (quote via 1Sky).

Gingrich’s claim The United States government failed to regulate Wall Street correctly, and the result has been trillions of dollars of taxpayer money to clean up the mess that politicians and bureaucrats created.

The U.S. government did fail to regulate Wall Street properly, but to claim that “politicians and bureaucrats” created the problem is a lie. In fact, a number of economists suggest that one of the men most directly responsible for regulatory failures of Wall Street was former GOP Senator Phil Gramm, author of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 that overturned many of the financial regulations that had maintained financial stability since 1933.

Gingrich’s claim Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were charged with managing mortgages, and in 2008 we saw a collapse of the United States housing market.

This is a lie that the GOP has stated repeatedly – and that S&R has exposed repeatedly. See the links for a more detailed deconstruction of the lie itself, but put simply, deregulation of the financial system was the cause of the housing market bubble and subsequent meltdown, not the number of mortgages insured by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and economic data supports this conclusion.

Gingrich’s claim The first good thing in it is a provision that restricts the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from regulating carbon, which the EPA is currently positioning itself to do. This would be a power grab of staggering proportions….

This is a lie. The Supreme Court of the United States decided on April 2, 2007 in Massachussets et al v. Environmental Protection Agency et al that the “EPA has statutory authority to regulate emission of such gases” due to the the fact that the definition “includes ‘any air pollution agent … , including any physical, chemical, … substance … emitted into … the ambient air … ,’ §7602(g) (emphasis added)—embraces all airborne compounds of whatever stripe. Moreover, carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are undoubtedly ‘physical [and] chemical … substance[s].’”

In addition, the Supreme Court rejected the argument that the EPA could choose not to regulate: “Under the [Clean Air] Act’s clear terms, EPA can avoid promulgating regulations only if it determines that greenhouse gases do not contribute to climate change or if it provides some reasonable explanation as to why it cannot or will not exercise its discretion to determine whether they do.”

In other words, the EPA not only has the authority to regulate greenhouse gases (GHGs), the Clean Air Act requires that the EPA regulate GHGs if they’re a public health hazard via the effects of climate disruption. When Congress requires that the EPA act on a pollutant, then it’s false to claim that following the law is a “power grab of staggering proportions.”

Gingrich’s claim Before anyone gives the Department of Energy sweeping new powers they should consider the absolute failure of the Department of Energy to keep its 2003 commitment to build an innovative “green coal” pilot project [FutureGen] by 2008.

The FutureGen program was canceled in 2008 by the Department of Energy (DoE). However, it’s interesting to point out that the failure Gingrich is complaining about happened under President George W. Bush. Painting the Obama Administration’s DoE with the same brush as the Bush era DoE is inaccurate at best.

Newt Gingrich was also caught in a bind by Representative Inslee when the latter pointed out that only two years ago, Gingrich had been a strong proponent of cap-and-trade:

Media Matters also has some interesting quotes further supporting Inslee’s point.

In his testimony before Congress, Newt Gingrich did what he always does – distorted facts, manipulated data, proved himself a hypocrite, and outright lied. If this was the best that the minority of the House Energy and Commerce Committee – Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment could do, then the draft version of the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 is well on its way to becoming part of the U.S. Code.

The response? The USA PATRIOT Act. It authorized expanded powers for US intelligence and law enforcement agencies including surveillance capabilities, broadened the definition of “terrorism”, increased border security and gave the Treasury the ability to stop money laundering the world over.

But its authority is so broad that it can lend itself to abuse. It gives power to wiretap and spy on law-abiding American citizens including monitoring what they read at the library, “sneak and peek”  without a warrant, and access to medical and financial records. Plus, this large bill was being quickly pushed through Congress without giving it full consideration or even being read by those voting on it.

Now imagine if almost every Democratic member of Congress voted against the Act based on those reasons. Or perhaps they didn’t trust this new, untested administration to do what is right. Or maybe they did it to just make a point about party unity. Would there be a public outcry? Would the pundits say that the opposition party did not grasp the enormity of the situation and that in this moment of peril it is better to “shoot first and ask questions later”? With the great danger the country is in, would it be better to err on the side of giving too much power to the government to deal with the crisis than too little?

Remember your mental answers to those questions as I change the circumstances slightly.

Let’s zoom back to the present day. The national and world economies have never been in as bad shape since the Great Depression. We have been losing a half a million jobs a month since the election and now 4.81 million people collect unemployment benefits, the highest number in at least 40 years. Consumer confidence is at a 29-year low. The Dow has lost a quarter of its value since September. The financial sector has $1.17 trillion in defaulted loans on its books which lead to a 12.4% reduction in housing prices. 1 in 9 US homes are now vacant.

The response? The $787 billion economic recovery package. It offers the largest tax cut in US history,  $272 billion for the working class. $58 billion to jump-start green energy infrastructure and another $90 billion to shore up traditional infrastructure – from bridges to roads to levees and transit. There’s $100 billion to boost welfare and unemployment, $112 billion for health care in Medicare, electronic medial records and preventative care. And then there’s billions for school reconstruction, greening federal buildings, Head Start, buying foreclosed homes, and laying down broadband for the entire country.

But this is a big bill. At a heft of over 1000 pages it has the biggest price tag of any stimulus bill ever debated in Congress. And that debate didn’t include many Republicans; only the very moderate got to influence the bill significantly while the more conservative members got their ideas heard out but never implemented. But this bill is so large it would fundamentally change the size and scope of the government’s influence in American lives. And like the PATRIOT Act, this thing blazed through Congress and no one had a chance to read it all.

Now the Republicans had their equivalent of the PATRIOT Act sitting in front of them. So what would they do? What if almost every Republican member of Congress voted against the Act based on the above reasons? Or perhaps they didn’t trust this new, untested administration to do what is right. Or maybe they did it to just make a point about party unity. Would there be a public outcry? Would the pundits say that the opposition party did not grasp the enormity of the situation and that in this moment of peril it is better to “shoot first and ask questions later”? With the great danger the country is in, would it be better to err on the side of giving too much power to the government to deal with the crisis than too little?

Some might balk at equating 9/11 with the current economic crisis. But its impact and reach are very similar. There was a lot of talk about going into the depths of another Great Depression, but the institutions and foundations laid down after the Great Depression would prevent that great of a collapse. Just like there was a lot of talk about 9/11 being another Pearl Harbor, but we were then facing a coalition of highly militarized, fascist countries actively attacking America and invading its allies.   Now we are facing a small number of fanatics with light arms. You can compare the two by type but not size.

Let me put it in an SAT equation:

Pearl Harbor : 9/11 :: Great Depression : today’s major recession

Our country has faced worse in the past and it is entirely within our capabilities to deal with our present crises. And while the Democrats were willing to take on 9/11 on the Republicans’ terms, the Republicans aren’t willing to tackle this economic crisis with the Democrats holding the reins. Every single House Republican voted against this bill along with all but three Senators. This is either because the Republicans don’t appreciate the dire straits that we are in, they had issues about the substance of the bill and way that it was pushed through, or they are more concerned with with their party than their country. My guess that it is a little of all three.

Critical first steps, many would argue, were his appointments of former rival and New York senator Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of State and adviser Susan Rice as ambassador to the United Nations. The president has sent former senator George Mitchell to the Mideast and Richard Holbrook to Afghanistan and Pakistan as special envoys. So far, so good.

Presidents appoint ambassadors to represent American interests abroad. Presumably presidents appoint seasoned, experienced foreign diplomats to such delicate tasks. So President Obama has dozens of ambassadors to appoint. And the first rumor is … Dan Rooney as ambassador to Ireland? The owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers and president and co-founder of The American Ireland Funds?

Neither the White House nor Mr. Rooney have commented. Now, Mr. Rooney may be qualified to be an ambassador. But with a State Department stable filled with foreign-policy professionals, why would a president need to appoint the owner of a professional sports franchise as an ambassador?

Well, we all know the answer, don’t we? Patronage. Presidents hand out ambassadorships like candy to those who helped — financially — put them in the White House.

In June 2007, Scholars & Rogues examined the ambassadorial appointments of three presidents:

President Bush’s 36 percent rate exceeds the 29 percent of President Clinton’s ambassadorial nominees who were non-career appointees. During George Herbert Walker Bush’s presidency, about 31 percent were non-career appointees.

According to a Scholars & Rogues examination of records at the Office of the Historian of the Department of State, George W. Bush has made 370 ambassadorial nominations — of which 133 have been non-career appointees rather than career Foreign Service officers. President Clinton’s 431 nominations included 127 non-career appointees. The first President Bush made 272 nominations, of which 85 were non-career appointees.

The post also examined the financial connections to President George W. Bush’s campaigns of those appointed to patronage ambassadorships.

The post discerned that under these three presidents, some nations knew only non-career, or patronage, appointments. The Obama White House website, under a section called “Renewing American Diplomacy,” says:

Obama and Biden will rebuild our alliances to meet the common challenges of the 21st century. America is strongest when we act alongside strong partners. Now is the time for a new era of international cooperation that strengthens old partnerships and builds new ones to confront the common challenges of the 21st century — terrorism and nuclear weapons; climate change and poverty; genocide and disease. …

To make diplomacy a priority, Obama and Biden will stop shuttering consulates and start opening them in difficult corners of the world — particularly in Africa. They will expand our foreign service, and develop our civilian capacity to work alongside the military. [emphasis added]

President Obama has a promise to keep to the electorate — improve American diplomacy. He ran on that platform. But he — as did the presidents before him — has a political need to retain or curry favor with political donors. Eventually, you’ll see some Obama appointments that produce a “What the …” response.

Should you wonder whom to look for as potential patronage appointments, consider this Center for Responsive Politics list of the 561 bundlers who secured at least $63 million for President Obama’s campaign. Then there’s list of employers of President Obama’s top contributors. And this list of the top 20 industries that contributed to his campaign.

Should you wish to keep track of how seriously President Obama views ambassadorial relationships with foreign governments, check the White House website for “Nominations and Appointments” from time to time — as S&R will.

President Obama promised voters better government and better diplomacy. Let’s keep track of whom he appoints to do that.

The kicker for me, though, this line:

I want Obama to fail because his agenda is 100 percent at odds with God’s. Pretending it is not simply makes a mockery of God’s straightforward Commandments.

Excuse me? Self-governance is mentioned where in the 10 Commandments, exactly? The three versions I’ve read today (Exodus 20, Exodus 34, and Deuteronomy 5) say nothing about government, or “constitutional republicanism” for that matter. And Farah’s immediate segue about “rendering unto Caesar” being invalid since everything Caesar owns is God’s first, well, that’s just an end-run to keep you from thinking about the fact that the Commandments say buptkus about government, centralized or not.

Maybe it’s just me, but doesn’t that quote above sound a little like Farah knows something we don’t? Not only does he apparently know God’s agenda perfectly, but he apparently knows Obama’s agenda perfectly too. After all, you can’t be “100 percent” sure that they’re in opposition unless you know both perfectly, right? That smacks of prophecy, though, maybe even witchcraft. And last I checked, both were frowned upon pretty seriously in the Bible.

And let’s not forget that pride is supposedly a sin. I can think of nothing more prideful than claiming to know God’s agenda and will….

But if you’re all pissed off about that, how about Olympic athletes wrapping themselves in the flag? Or flag napkins? Or a car painted as a flag? Flying a flag in the rain or leaving it up overnight unlit? Flag beach towels? Flags on campaign buttons? In every case, that’s mistreatment of the U.S. flag, according to the Flag Code.

According to the US Code, Title 4, Chapter 1, Section 8, “Respect for the flag”:

(b) The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise.

So much for those beach towels.

(d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery
(j) No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform.

And so much for flag clothing.

(h) The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.
(i) It should not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like, printed or otherwise impressed on paper napkins or boxes or anything that is designed for temporary use and discard.

And there goes those campaign buttons, napkins, cups, and plates.

(e) The flag should never be fastened, displayed, used, or stored in such a manner as to permit it to be easily torn, soiled, or damaged in any way.

And given how dirty cars get (pigeons, insects, road grime, slush), you’d think that a flag paint job on a car would qualify as “easily soiled.”

As for displaying the flag, let’s not forget that all-weather flags are OK in bad weather, but no flag should be displayed unlit overnight – it’s disrespectful, and against US Code Title 4 Chapter 1 Section 6.

Tell you what – you don’t question the patriotism of Obama’s supporters and I won’t question the patriotism of all the Olympic athletes who have soiled a flag with their sweat, of all the swimmers who have lain on a flag beach towel, of all the patriots who throw millions of flags away on the Fourth of July every year. Deal?

Image credit: Baltimore Sun

State populations in the South and Southwest will have grown appreciably more than in the Midwest and Northeast, reflecting immigration and migration trends that took root after World War II. Consequently, the shift of political power from the latter to the former will continue (see map). For example, the population of California, the most populous state in the union and larger than all but 34 nations, will grow nearly 8 percent from 2000 to 2010 — but California will lose a seat in the House.

Following redistricting is important because reapportionment and redistricting may shift power in the House of Representatives. How great a shift depends on an intricate political calculus involving party control of legislatures and governorships.

This decennial dance may determine which party is best positioned to retain or regain control of the House following 2012 elections. That’s why Howard Dean, chair of the Democratic National Committee, pushed his “50-State Strategy” to rule as many state legislatures as possible to take control of mapping new congressional district boundaries. The Democrats now control both chambers in 27 states. But did it really work? In the 21 states expected to gain or lose House seats, 16 seats are at issue with the GOP holding the upper hand for more than half.

In this post, S&R examines states likely to lose or gain House seats through reapportionment and the role and influence of state legislatures and governors in redistricting.

Redistricting is complex, controversial

Given the recent gerrymandering debacles in one state alone — Texas — the early months of the next decade are likely to show American politics at its worst. After all, the deposed speaker of the House, Tom DeLay, demonstrated how to redraw congressional district lines to unduly influence the ability of Texas Republicans to gain seats in the House. Now, here’s the bad news — after reapportionment following the 2010 census, Texas is expected to gain four seats in the House. And you betcha that they’ll be carved out to add four Republican seats in the House that could erode the current Democratic majority. Think Mr. DeLay’s still out of politics? He may be, but the political processes he used are assuredly not.

Redistricting is perhaps the most complicated and mysterious of American political processes because 1) it may differ from state to state due to law and what party controls what arms of government, 2) it is often involves horse-trading out of the public eye, and 3) it has habitually been inadequately covered by the press because of the previous two reasons. As John Dean wrote in Broken Government: How Republican Rule Destroyed the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Branches:

Political pundits and commentators dismiss “process issues” by claiming they are of no interest to Americans. They are wrong. … Today, in Washington, process is the name of the game, and those who do not understand this fact are operating in ignorance. Political observers who do not make an effort to understand process matters will remain uninformed.

To understand redistricting, a useful text is “A Citizen’s Guide to Redistricting” by Justin Levitt and Bethany Foster of the Brennan Center for Justice, available as a pdf.

Mr. Levitt and Ms. Foster point out that redistricting matters because it allows politicians to choose their voters, eliminate incumbents — or challengers — from opposing parties, pack districts with partisan supporters, dilute the influence of minority voters, and split communities along unnatural lines.

Therefore it’s important for political observers in any state to be aware of who redraws district lines. In each state, the usual recipe of influences includes the governor, the leaders of the state House and state Senate, and, sometimes, members of “advisory commissions” on redistricting. In most states, the legislature redraws districts with the governor enjoying veto power, which, in turn, can be overridden by the legislature. And, of course, when no one agrees, the courts step in.

Now, imagine differing combinations of party control in a state: One party holding the governorship and both chambers of the legislature; one party holding the governorship but neither chamber of the legislature; and one party holding the governorship but the legislature divided by party. This is where redistricting can get messy.

Reapportionment after 2010: Winners and losers

Here’s a look at the states expected to gain or lose House seats following the 2010 census. (Clark Benson of Polidata, a political research firm, provided the estimates of gain or loss. Redistricting schemes are primarily drawn from the Brennan Center guide.)

ARIZONA: currently 8 seats; gains 2. Voted for Sen. McCain, 54 percent to 45. Senate: even; House: GOP. DEM Gov. Janet Napolitano. Uses a commission (two DEM, two GOP, one Independent) with exclusive authority. Governor cannot veto. (If Gov. Napolitano gives up her seat to become head of the Department of Homeland Security, GOP Secretary of State Jan Brewer will automatically become governor.) Current seats: 5 DEM, 3 GOP.

CALIFORNIA: currently 53 seats; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 61-38. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 34 DEM, 18 GOP.

FLORIDA: currently 25 seats; gains 2. Voted for president-elect Obama, 51-49. Senate: GOP; House: GOP. GOP Gov. Charlie Crist. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 15 GOP, 10 DEM.

GEORGIA: currently 13 seats; gains 1. Voted for Sen. McCain, 52-47. Senate: GOP; House: GOP. GOP Gov. Sonny Perdue. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: GOP 7, DEM 6.

ILLINOIS: currently 19 seats; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 62-37. House: DEM; Senate: DEM. DEM Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 12 DEM, 7 GOP.

IOWA: currently 5 seats; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 54-45. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Chet Culver. Nonpartisan legislative staff draw district maps sans political or election data that are submitted to the legislature for approval. If the legislature cannot agree, the state Supreme Court may approve the maps. Current seats: 3 DEM, 2 GOP.

LOUISIANA: currently 7 seats; loses 1. Voted for Sen. McCain, 51-49. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 4 GOP, 1 DEM.

MASSACHUSETTS: currently 10 seats; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 62-36. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Deval Patrick. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Following the 2000 census, the Democratically controlled Legislature overrode the then-Republican governor’s veto of new district maps. Current seats: 10 DEM.

MICHIGAN: currently 15; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 57-41. Senate: GOP; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Jennifer Granholm. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. (If Gov. Granholm is tapped for a post in the Obama administration, her seat would be filled by DEM Lt. Gov. John Cherry, but the new lieutenant governor would be chosen by the GOP-controlled state Senate.) Current seats: 8 DEM, 7 GOP.

MINNESOTA: currently 8; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 54-44. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Following the 2000 census, with no legislative agreement, state Supreme Court drew lines. Current seats: 5 DEM, 3 GOP.

MISSOURI: currently 9; loses 1. Voted for Sen. McCain, 50-49. Senate: GOP; House: GOP. GOP Gov. Matt Blunt. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Following the 2000 census, absent legislative agreement, a court drew district lines. Current seats: 5 GOP, 4 DEM.

NEVADA: currently 3 seats; gains 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 55-43. Senate: DEM (change); House: DEM. GOP Gov. Jim Gibbons. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 2 DEM, 1 GOP.

NEW JERSEY: currently 13 seats; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 57-42. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Jon Corzine. Uses political commission selected by majority and minority leaders and state major party chairs; governor cannot veto. (If Gov. Corzine, a former U.S. senator, takes a post in the Obama administration, DEM Senate President Dick Codey would succeed him.) Current seats: 8 DEM, 5 GOP.

NEW YORK: currently 29; loses 2. Voted for president-elect Obama, 62-39. Senate: DEM (change); House: DEM. DEM Gov. Paterson. Uses an advisory commission; governor can veto. Current seats: 26 DEM, 3 GOP.

NORTH CAROLINA: currently 13 seats; gains 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 50-49. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Mike Easley. Legislature draws districts; governor cannot veto. Current seats: 8 DEM, 5 GOP.

OHIO: currently 18 seats; loses 2. Voted for president-elect Obama, 51-47. Senate: GOP; House: DEM (change). DEM Gov. Ted Strickland. Advisory commission draws districts; governor can veto. Redistricting, controlled by the GOP in 2001, may be more contentious with a divided legislature. (If Gov. Strickland, a prominent early supporter of president-elect Obama, leaves office for an Obama administration post, he would be succeeded by DEM Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher.) Current seats: 9 DEM, 8 GOP.

OREGON: currently 5 seats; gains 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 57-41. Senate: DEM; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Ted Kulongoski. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Following the 2000 census, DEM Gov. John Kitzhaber vetoed a Republican-backed redistricting bill; a court drew the lines. Current seats: 4 DEM, 1 GOP.

PENNSYLVANIA: currently 19 seats; loses 1. Voted for president-elect Obama, 55-44. Senate: GOP; House: DEM. DEM Gov. Ed Rendell. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 12 DEM, 7 GOP.

SOUTH CAROLINA: currently 6 seats; gains 1. Voted for Sen. McCain, 54-45. Senate: GOP; House: GOP. GOP Gov. Mark Sanford. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Following the 2000 census, DEM Gov. James Hovis Hodges vetoed a GOP-backed legislative plan; a court drew district lines. Current seats: 4 GOP, 2 DEM.

TEXAS: currently 32 seats; gains 4. Voted for Sen. McCain, 55-44. Senate: GOP; House: GOP. GOP Gov. Rick Perry. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Following the 2000 census, no agreement was reached by the GOP governor, GOP Senate, and DEM House; the redistricting battle was partly settled by the U.S. Supreme Court and cemented Rep. Tom DeLay’s iconic reputation through what writer Jeffrey Toobin called “a Promethean display of political power.” Current seats: 20 GOP, 12 DEM.

UTAH: currently 3 seats; gains 1. Voted for Sen. McCain, 63-34. Senate: GOP; House: GOP. GOP Gov. Jon M. Huntsman Jr. Legislature draws districts; governor can veto. Current seats: 2 GOP, 1 DEM.

Some states, while not gaining or losing House seats through reapportionment, may have to redistrict because of changes in population density within the states, perhaps producing changes in which party holds specific seats.

The struggle to control state legislatures

The 2006 and 2008 elections left America with the fewest number of politically divided legislatures since 1982, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Democrats control 27 statehouses, the Republicans control 14, and 7 statehouses are split. (Nebraska is unicameral.)

The Democratic Party believed control of the House of Representatives could in large measure be achieved by focusing on gaining control of both chambers of state legislatures. Democrats underwrote that effort principally through the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, according to Rachel Morris, writing in Washington Monthly:

[M]any national Democrats have been turning their attention to elections for state legislatures, which in all but eight states draw the boundaries of congressional seats according to the census. The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC), a K-Street political organization focused on state races, is helping candidates in places like Michigan with money, fundraising assistance, training, and logistical support. Emily’s List, a large political action committee that aims to elect more pro-choice women to Congress, is also pouring resources into state campaigns, and training both male and female candidates with the aim of winning legislative chambers to control redistricting. And this August, the DLCC, along with other national groups, established a tax-exempt organization called Foundation for the Future, which plans to raise and spend $17 million to coordinate Democrats’ long-term redistricting efforts. Political reporters this year have been understandably consumed with the few dozen close congressional races that could shift the balance of power in Washington after November. But they’ve missed a similarly fierce and focused battle over state legislative seats, one that could be just as important in determining control of the House in the not-so-distant future. [emphasis added]

That strategy appears, at first glance, to have succeeded. Democrats now control legislatures in 27 states, compared with the GOP’s 14. Of the 21 states (listed earlier) expected to gain or lose House seats, state legislatures draw district boundaries in 17. Of the 21 lose-or-gain states, Democrats control 11 legislatures; the GOP controls 6.

But the states held by Democrats represent a net loss of 8 seats; those controlled by the GOP represent a net gain of 9 seats. The states legislatively controlled by Democrats have a combined 113 Democratic House seats and 49 GOP House seats. The states legislatively controlled by Republicans have a combined 35 Democratic seats and 53 GOP seats.

Is it possible that despite controlling more state legislatures in gain-or-loss states, the Democrats could actually lose seats in the House through reapportionment and redistricting? State legislators are politicians. Within the limitations set by law, they will use redistricting to protect their parties’ interests. But if the Democrats control states that will have net loss of seats in the House, how will their party be best served?

The power of governors

Governors enjoy potent political influence over redistricting. As politicians, they are the titular heads of their parties. Through patronage, they can reward or punish the behaviors of others — such as legislators. They can choose to campaign — or not — for legislative incumbents or challengers. Governors simply know too many people — and have influence over them — throughout their states for their political clout to be ignored during redistricting battles.

In many states, governors, while by law not the principal author of new district lines, hold veto power over legislatively drafted districts. (Note that in cases where governors and legislatures cannot agree, courts often step in to draw district lines.) Obviously, it is to the advantage of a party to control both the governorship and both chambers of the legislature.

Following the 2008 elections, Democrats control governments in 16 states; Republicans are in charge in only 9 states. But …

Democrats rule over 16 states that represent, after reapportionment, a net loss of 5 House seats; The GOP commands 9 states that represent a net gain of 9 House seats.

More change is ahead. Writes Sam Stein at HuffPo:

An abundance of [governorships] are in play. There will be 36 gubernatorial races in 2010, compared to 11 such elections this cycle. Of those 36, 19 are for state houses currently held by Democrats. And of those 19, ten will involve Democratic governors who won’t be running for reelection (either because of term limits or retirement). …

In 28 states, the governor has the authority to veto any redistricting plan. In eight separate states, the governor can veto only a congressional plan. In another five states, the governor is responsible for appointing members to the redistricting board. And in three states — not separate — the governor is directly involved in redrawing the district him or herself. In only eight states does the executive body actually not play a role. As both Democratic and Republican officials readily acknowledge, the partisan makeup of a newly shaped congressional district will almost certainly reflect the politics of the sitting governor. [emphasis added]

The Democrats have enjoyed enormous successes in Congress since 2004 and now control the federal government. A Democrat will sit in the White House. Democrats will run the Senate and the House. But the key to continuance of Democratic control lies in the states. Over the next three years, 49 states will have gubernatorial races. Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson has written that “[r]ight now, the GOP is executing a plan to take 38 governorships over the next three years. If they accomplish this, they will have the power to shrewdly alter election district borders and steal back Congress.”

Similarly, margins of Democratic control in state legislatures are often narrow. A statement on redistricting by the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee says, “Currently, of the 36 state legislatures that control Congressional redistricting, 27 chambers in 21 of these states are within 5 seats of tying or changing hands. These 21 states control 260 Congressional districts.”

Democrats and progressives may rejoice at the televised images of a chastised GOP being driven out of D.C., its tail between its legs.

They shouldn’t get too comfy, and they certainly ought to keep their eyes on coming races for state legislatures and governorships. That’s where power will be maintained — or lost.