When President Bush left office in 2009, the US unemployment rate was around 7.7%. Within the first three months, we lost almost 2.7 million jobs. By year end, on top of the 10 million people who were unemployed, over 5 million jobs were lost or a 10% unemployment rate. According to CBO:

President Obama's much-maligned economic stimulus package added as many as 3.3 million jobs to the economy during the second quarter of this year[2009], and may have prevented the nation from lapsing back into recession, according to a report released Tuesday by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.

If this graph is any indication, President Obama was handed a trashed economy with a huge gap in deficit spending and no money in the bank. .

So I figured we're going to have kind of a light open thread today.  Anyone thought about their new year's resolutions - that is if you make them?  I usually don't care to make much of those, but my one of resolutions this year is to read a few more books - the non-fiction political kind.  Another is to really build this place - The People's View - up.  Sorry it's been a little sluggish the last few days here, but we'll pick back up, I promise.  And lastly, my resolution is to be at my best for the local non-profit I and a few others are working away at.

Anyone else here have new year's resolutions?  If not, what are your thoughts - politically, personally, whatever - as this year draws to a close and a new one begins?  What are you going to do more of?  Pursue a hobby that you have neglected, maybe?

Politically, the next year should be very very interesting and rancorous.  I bet Speaker Boehner's first bill will be to try to repeal the tanning tax!  And can Harry Reid eat some more Republican lunch?  We'll see.

Cross-posted at Eclectablog.com.

In 2008, the Biomass Crop Assistance Program (BCAP) was created as a barely-noticed add-on to the 2008 Farm Bill, signed into law by George W. Bush. What sounded like a good idea -- funding the use of waste biomass (sawdust, etc.) for biofuels and other uses -- turned out to be not such a good idea.

Complaints about the program are best summarized by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) HERE.

FSA’s implementation of the program has come under widespread criticism for straying far the program’s original intent. The FSA began the initial phase of the program before setting clear rules for qualifying grants, and before it had completed a full environmental impact statement as required under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). As a result, nearly all of the more than $164 million in funding that has been awarded so far has gone to the forest paper and products industries to burn waste wood for their own energy needs. Most of these users were already buying or using biomass for pre-existing energy purposes.

“Done right, BCAP could go a long way toward helping farmers transition to growing perennial biomass crops,” said Jim Kleinschmit, IATP Rural Communities Program Director. “But so far farmers have seen very little benefit from the millions of dollars already spent on this program.”

However, recent modifications to the program by the USDA's Farm Service Agency (FSA) have resolved many of the chief issues and, as the president of the Composite Panel Association, Tom Julia, recently said (pdf), "BCAP has morphed from a job-killing welfare program into one that now makes economic sense and environmental sense."

You know how Sarah Palin, Chuck Grassley, et al. screamed and yelled off the top of their lungs about the evils of having Medicare pay for end-of-life planning?  Oh noes, they said, paying for the elderly's end-of-life medical care planning was tantamount to "pulling the plug on grandma!"  Never mind that having such a plan is the only way for grandma to legally ensure that her wishes about what sort of life sustaining care is to be provided should she become incapacitated.

So now, the Obama administration has issued new rules covering just that kind of peace of mind for the elderly, as part of the wellness visits (which are of no cost to the beneficiary) authorized by the new law.  Well, Sarah Palin is not going to be happy about this...

Under the new policy, outlined in a Medicare regulation, the government will pay doctors who advise patients on options for end-of-life care, which may include advance directives to forgo aggressive life-sustaining treatment.

The rule in and of itself is pretty common sense, and quite similar to what was taken out of the health reform bill itself during the summer and fall of pure, unadulterated and uneducated screamfest.

Under the rule, doctors can provide information to patients on how to prepare an “advance directive,” stating how aggressively they wish to be treated if they are so sick that they cannot make health care decisions for themselves.

This is the end of the year - the time when a lot of people take stock of the ups and downs in the past year and prepare for the next one.  I believe that the best way to take stock of the policies is by approximating their impacts on real people, not by filling space on some ideological pie chart.  There was a lot of bru-ha-ha after the President's tax deal, with many on the Left calling him out for giving the rich an inordinate amount of benefits as a price to protect the poor and the middle class.  But if we were to take stock in the last two years and what has been done, who benefited?

This is a look at who benefited, and who is poised to benefit from the laws enacted by this President.  Here is the partial progress from the various actions of the President and this Democratic Congress, so far:

The greatest blessings of all are the ones that don't cost a thing: the comfort of spending time with loved ones, the freedoms we enjoy as Americans, and the joy we feel upon giving something of ourselves. - First Lady Michelle Obama.

The President and the First Lady shared this essential message with all Americans as we celebrate this Christmas day, and a season of love, joy, caring, and most importantly, giving.



We, too salute those who can't be home for the holidays, and we support them.  We also support those who have no home, those who are struggling to keep theirs.  We keep them in our hearts and when we can, we reach out to them not just without hearts but with our abilities, where we have them.

When in mid-November I wrote about retail sales climbing (and its relationship to jobs), I was met with a lot of skeptical eyes.  When I wrote about Black Friday sales and crossposted it over at Daily Kos, I was chided for talking up the economic recovery since, you know, Obama can do no right.  Well, it turns out that this holiday shopping season has continued the upward trend, sometimes even beyond the widest dreams of retailers.

Shoppers this year are gradually upping their spending, with sales increases in retail nationwide estimated as high as 5 percent from last year's relatively dismal Christmas shopping season. However, analysts say consumers are still treading carefully, as though the sluggish economy and lingering high unemployment are still holding them back.

"As we've gotten further into the holiday season, we've seen a continued positive shift that started back in October," said Doug Hart, retail and consumer expert at BDO Seidman in San Francisco. "In August, people were predicting a 2 percent increase in holiday sales over 2009. Now they're talking about anything from 3 to 5 percent, so things are trending better than the experts had initially expected."

Hope everyone is having a great Christmas eve!  So as the President heads to Hawaii (I hear the weather is great there this time of the year!), some things are coming to look forward to in the next year: a White House staff shuffle is coming.  With the Republicans taking over the House, the President is going to focus on what the executive can do, in terms of governing, as well as get the President's re-election efforts started.  2012, here we come.  David Plouffe is back!

The first personnel change inside the White House is the arrival of David Plouffe, who managed Mr. Obama’s presidential campaign. For the last two years, Mr. Plouffe has been one of the president’s closest outside confidants, but he is set to replace Mr. Axelrod as his chief political adviser, with a broad portfolio.

In other news, Vice President Biden was on Good Morning America and predicted that a broad change in public attitude will eventually make marriage equality inevitable.  Here's video from the VP's interview:



Once again, happy holidays to all!

Happy Holidays to all First!

He is a veteran of the US Senate who is a very well respected lawmaker before he became the right hand man for President Obama as a Vice-President. His name is Joe Biden and he is a "fucking big deal" to the success of this Administration and the President.

This man has indeed been the President's Right hand man, someone I have the at most respect for his loyalty to his convictions, his grace and purely kind heart that can be seen all the way from Delaware.

I toast today to give him his props as he is the silent, behind the close door, go to guy that get things done. We, as Americans, owe him a huge debt of gratitude for his life long service fighting the good fight for all Americans and I would like to say thank you to you Mr. Vice-President for a job well done to date!

That's how Rachel Maddow started off her show Monday night, the first segment focused on the Senate passing an end to the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy.  Here's how she opened after clips that documented the path that repeal traveled:

They said it couldn't be done.  They said it couldn't be done.  Actually that was me specifically saying it couldn't be done.  I was quite spectacularly over and over again wrong.  It's done.

Here's the full video, along with Rachel's interview with a few gay servicemembers, it was a thing of beauty.  Watch.

This evening, Ezra Klein reported, quoting the National Journal, that every last returning Democrat in the US Senate has signed a letter to Majority Leader Reid asking that reform of the Senate rules that allow a minority to kill any and all legislation - the filibuster - be taken up at the beginning of next Congress, when the Senate adopts its rules by majority vote. The consensus seems to be coalescing around actually forcing Senators to filibuster instead of the mere threat of it to block legislation.

Filibusters would require continuous debate on the floor of the Senate, and they would only be allowed once the bill is on the floor (no more filibustering the motion to debate a bill, for instance). Democrats would also like to see the dead time between calling for a vote to break a filibuster and actually taking the vote reduced. “There need to be changes to the rules to allow filibusters to be conducted by people who actually want to block legislation instead of people being able to quietly say ‘I object’ and go home,” Sen. Claire McCaskill told the National Journal.

Again, this wouldn't change the 60 vote threshold to overcome a filibuster, but it would ensure that the Senator(s) filibustering actually have to get their behinds on the Senate floor and actually engage in debate.  It would also cut down on the time to take the procedural votes.  You can read more about the Merkeley proposal here or here on Jeff Merkeley's campaign website.

Have you been hearing that lately, how much true liberals really don't like President Obama much these days? It's all over the television. The news shows talk about how he has "lost his base". The pundits wonder if he'll get beat by Sarah Palin in 2012. The liberal blogosphere is all a-twitter (including Twitter) about how the President should be primaried in two years. You know what? It's all bunk. Seriously, take a look at the latest Gallup polling on President Obama's approval/disapproval ratings:

No longer will our country be denied the service of thousands of patriotic Americans who were forced to leave the military, regardless of their skills, no matter their bravery or their zeal, no matter their years of exemplary performance, because they happen to be gay, No longer will tens of thousands of Americans in uniform be asked to live a lie.
~Barack Obama

A compromise measure that deprived Homosexuals from openly serving in the U.S. Military is a thing of the past as of Today. It is HISTORY and A-M-E-N!

I just read the most fascinating article, from HuffPo of all places! It's called "Reality Check" and was written by Marshall Auerback and L. Randall Wray. Auerback works with the Roosevelt Institute and Wray is research director for the Center for Full Employment and Price Stability. In their arguments in support of the payroll tax holiday -- and alternative funding mechanisms for Social Security altogether -- they cite authors such as James K. Galbraith and Warren Mosler.

So what did Auerback and Wray have to say? Many of the same things that have historically been argued against the payroll tax, like the fact that it's regressive. They also use some less historical arguments, such as funding pensions with a payroll tax paid by businesses and workers instead of general public funds leaves U.S. companies at a competitive disadvantage in a global market. And it's still the case that framing Social Security as an earned benefit, as though payouts directly correlated to contributions, instead of a generational social contract actually provides the conservatives ammunition against it. It is precisely the dedicated funding mechanism that allows critics to make dire predictions about shortfalls, etc.:

President Obama this morning signed the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.  But if you indulge me for a minute, I'd like to quote Vice President Biden, who I think summed it up so well:

It certainly could not have been done without the steady, dedicated, and persistent leadership of the President of the United States.  Mr. President, by signing this bill, you will be linking military might with an abiding sense of justice, you'll be projecting power by promoting fairness, and making the United States military as strong as it can be at a time we needed to be the strongest.

In other words, BFD!!!  Amen, Mr. Vice President.  And now, without further delay, I give you the signing ceremony (pay attention the jubilation in the assembled crowd).

You wouldn't know it by listening to the freakout fest of the loud fringes on the Left and the Right against the recently signed Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010, but some pretty high-profile and credentialed liberals voted for this agreement. One of them was Rep. Dennis Kucinich.

Yesterday, in an interview with MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell, he revealed his vote for the President's tax compromise, and was refreshingly pragmatic about it.  Here's the relevant portion of the interview:

Kathleen Sebelius has sent out an announcement discussing the $250 million PPACA provides to states to monitor and review insurance rate hikes. It's an excellent foil to the Medical Loss Ratio requirements, as insurers now have to think twice about upping premiums to boost their profit volume. It's also the foundation and a beautiful prelude to the exchanges, where bad faith actors will be shut out of the market. There's a really groovy widget-thingy at healthcare.gov you can play with; it's basically a timeline of when the different parts of PPACA go into effect. Here is what it says about the oversight grant money:

The law allows states that have, or plan to implement, measures that require insurance companies to justify their premium increases to be eligible for $250 million in new grants. Insurance companies with excessive or unjustified premium increases may not be able to participate in the new health insurance Exchanges in 2014.

Cross-posted at Eclectablog.com.

Historian and syndicated columnist P.M. Carpenter has a new op-ed piece out on CNN's website called Why right and left won't cheer Obama". In it, he attempts to explain the chasm between how President Obama is perceived by those on the left, the right & middle and reality.

Here's how describes how President Obama is seen by those he describes as the "pseudoconservatives" (using that term since he feels that genuine conservatives were long ago killed off by right-wing zealots):

The pseudoconservatives' perception is that Obama's success is a sprinting, despotic socialism enforced by jackbooted bureaucrats of anti-constitutional intensity.

Having spent some time on the Tea Party Nation's mailing list, I can confirm that this is quite accurate and may even be sugar coating it.

So he writes in his latest When Zombies Win Op-ed,

When historians look back at 2008-10, what will puzzle them most, I believe, is the strange triumph of failed ideas. Free-market fundamentalists have been wrong about everything — yet they now dominate the political scene more thoroughly than ever. snip He has praised Reagan for restoring American dynamism (when was the last time you heard a Republican praising F.D.R.?), adopted G.O.P. rhetoric about the need for the government to tighten its belt even in the face of recession, offered symbolic freezes on spending and federal wages.

To make the long story short, Krugmans' beef is that the President has been trying so hard to make sure progress is achieved by working across the aisle and has caved in to "Zombie" ideals not to mention the idealization of Reagan conservatism and not standing by Krugman's Principle especially when Republicans continue to turn around and call him socialist.

What with all the accusations of homophobia flying the way of President Obama from the never-ever-satisfied sanctimonious pretend-Left, you wouldn't know it that the President is about to sign a historic civil rights legislation for gay people, the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, into law.  You also wouldn't know that the White House released this video of its gay staffers standing shoulder to shoulder with today's gay youth who find the world around them cruel and inhumane.



Go to the video's YouTube page, and you can see the transcript of it (click on "Interactive transcript.").

This comes on the heels of messages from the President and the Vice President, Secretary Clinton and many other cabinet officials.  In fact, the White House has made a whole section of its website dedicated to this project.  Visit WhiteHouse.gov/itgetsBetter.

In a quick and easy hit piece published in Politico last Thursday, Robert Kuttner unleashes the next line of completely disconnected-from-reality and pretending-to-be-from-the-left bashing of President Obama: Look over there, Obama's coming to take your social security!  Let's review the charge first. According to Kuttner's "well-placed" but apparently too chicken to be named sources:

The second part, now being teed up by the White House and key Senate Democrats, is a scheme for the president to embrace much of the Bowles-Simpson plan — including cuts in Social Security. This is to be unveiled, according to well-placed sources, in the president’s State of the Union address.

Obama is gonna get your social security and kill your granma!!!  Everyone freak out!!!

Not only is no news outlet, including Politico, reporting this (this is an opinion piece by Kuttner), it also follows a familiar scare tactic designed to do more harm than good.  The scare tactic works two ways: it makes the unsuspecting reader think that President Obama wants to destroy, rather than preserve, social security, and it creates the false impression that doing nothing will leave social security benefits intact for ever.

There is little hope that the next Congress will get much done, thanks to the upcoming Republican control in the House, and a smaller Democratic majority in the Senate.  That logjam, admittedly, will be hard to break.  But that doesn't mean this Congress is slowing down.  It seems that there are more things to come in President Obama's already heavy list of legislative accomplishments.

The Senate passed a food safety bill yesterday, sending to the House for final approval.  The bill will modernize food safety standards and give the FDA broader authority to inspect food processing plants and to force makers to recall foods it deems are unsafe.

After months of shameful Republican filibuster of the 9/11 First Responders health care bill, Sen. Gillibrand has made tweaks designed to win more Republican support, and that bill might come to the floor of the Senate this week.

Democrats are looking upbeat on the prospect of the New START treaty, and the President is not giving up, despite the insane handwringing by McCain and Graham that they could not support the START treaty because - well because, pout, Democrats forced a vote on DADT repeal, and it passed.  Aww.  But Se. Schumer seems to be confident that at the end of the day, the votes are going to be there, even though it will mean "house to house combat."

In today's open thread, I wanted to give the community some updates on where we're going as ThePeoplesView.net community.  In the last month or so, traffic on this site has increased significantly, thanks to all of you.  Here are a couple of things that have been developing behind the scenes:

Resources: I have started working with a member of this community who offered technical help to start building a resources wiki for information as well as activism.  Contacting Congress, media (web, print, TV, radio), and local activism is going to be the focus.  I hope to take it live not too far into the future.  Once the wiki is live, trusted members from here will be invited to contribute so that it's a real, decentralized, social effort.

Content: I am also getting in contact with more talents to contribute and improve content on this site.  In the not too distant future, we hope to feature this content.

The Obama Presidency interrupted a more than 30 year sequence of defeats for America's liberals and, boy, has that made the progressive elites angry. After the Carter Presidency which saw deregulation as the major domestic policy initiative, vainly attempted to keep the Shah of Iran in power, and jump-started Al Qaeda as an anti-communist "ally", Reagan won in 1980 and 1984, then Bush won in 1988. Clinton's 1992 and 1996 victories produced the following significant policy developments:

1. Balancing the budget by increasing taxes - much of it on the middle class and poor.
2. Republican Welfare "reform" that increased poverty and devastated inner cities
3. The NAFTA "free trade" agreement that helped deeply damage the industrial base of the United States and to increase the relative size and economic and political power of the FIRE Sector (Finance, Insurance, Real-Estate) at the expense of manufacturing.
4. Legislation institutionalizing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation: Don't Ask Don't Tell (DADT) and the Defense of Marriage Law (DOMA).
5. A total defeat on health reform.
6. Consolidation of a corporate/right-wing media - Clinton's term saw Rush Limbaugh on Armed Forces Radio, the establishment of the Fox network, the build out of Citadel and Sinclair and the other right wing radio networks, Disney's takeover of ABC and the elimination of the remaining liberal radio talk shows - Jim Hightower's audience of 2 million was not enough to keep him on the air after he attacked Disney's labor practices.
7. Massive expansion of the "drug war" including major military intervention in Columbia.
8. Loss of the Senate and the House to Republican control.
9. Repeal of banking regulation, notably regulation of derivatives trading and Glass-Steagall also leading to increased political and economic power for Wall Street.

I am sure that I'm about to deeply offend Ms. Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake (FDL).  By pointing out that she made a fool out of herself on television.  On this past Tuesday.  See, she went on The Last Word on MSNBC, and asked about the prospect of a stand-alone Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal bill, she dismissed the idea as sheer fantasy, and pronounced that it too would die a death by Senate procedure.



Well, we all know what happened yesterday.  The Senate not only passed the motion to end the filibuster by 63-33, it approved final passage by an even wider 65-31 margin.  Hello Mizz Jane Hamsher's face, here's some egg for you.

Cross-posted at Eclectablog.com.

Fer cryin' out loud, was that so hard?

Rachel Maddow tweeted it second best:



Who tweeted it best? Lt. Dan Choi of course:



What's he talking about? At Netroots Nation last year in Las Vegas, I was privileged to watch history being made when Lt. Choi gave Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid his Westpoint ring along with his discharge papers, saying the ring no longer meant the same thing to him as it did when he received it. Senator Reid said there was no way he would keep it because he didn't earn it but, rather, that he would hold onto it and keep it safe until DADT was repealed.

Video and more after the jump.

There is an assortment of flags on my desk.  American flags and the LGBT movement's rainbow flags.  When the euphoria of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal vote passing in the Senate by 65-31 settled in, I took my eyes up for a moment and looked up at those flags with a sense of immense pride that I couldn't describe yet.  I expected the rainbow flags to catch my eyes, given what a monumental occasion the repeal was for gay Americans.  But it wasn't the rainbow flags that got my attention.

It was old glory.  Red, white and blue.  I looked at it in awe and then it suddenly hit me: no matter how proud I am today as a gay person in this victory, I am prouder in this victory as an American.  I came across this Youtube version of "God Bless the USA" by Lee Greenwald, and while it played, I looked at the flag.  I choked up.  The hair on the back of my neck stood up.

Update at 12:30 Pacific: The YEAs are 65, the Nays 31; the motion to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell is adopted.  Congress passes DADT repeal and sends it to the President!  Press conference on Repeal on C-Span in just a bit.


Highlight from Press conference (Update at 1:10 pm Pacific): Lieberman reveals that President Obama has been working the phones over the past two weeks, calling undecided Senators.  Thank you, Mr. President!

Here's the mishmash:  This year, the President promised. This year.



House passed DADT repeal, twice. Here are two amazing speeches from the floor of the House:

BREAKING UPDATE: (by Deaniac83) DADT repeal cloture motion passes! 63 AYE votes to 33 Nays. That's what I'm talking about! Final vote to approve repeal at 3PM Eastern (12 noon Pacific).

Take a tally. Look at what I promised during the campaign. There’s not a single thing that I’ve said that I would do that I have not either done or tried to do. And if I haven’t gotten it done yet, I’m still trying to do it. ~President Barack Obama

First things first: Thank you Mr. President for doing your best to strike a deal to pass the Tax Deal...and for checking off many of the Holiday gifts in my checklist: 1) Keep $3,000 in tax savings annually - check 2) Unemployment Benefit to 7,000,000 Americans worth $56 Billion. - check 3) $2,500 in tax savings to help pay for college tuition and other expenses - check

To the very very pouting discontent of Senate Republicans, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is making the Senators work weekends.  Oh noes, everybody freak out!

The Senate continues debate on the START treaty, and this morning there will be votes on cloture motions on the DREAM Act and the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.  Senate Republicans have been throwing temper tantrums, pouting and threatening to derail the approval of START if a DADT repeal succeeds.  But Leader Reid seems willing to call their bluff.  Let's put some Senators on the record voting for terrorists with nuclear material.  I think Reid is betting that they can't actually do it, and I think he's right about that.

In another stroke of righteous pressure, servicemembers plan to sit in at the Senate gallery until repeal is passed:

Around noon Friday, Lieberman joined the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) to announce a sit-in at the Senate gallery until repeal is passed.

"Service members are making it absolutely clear that Senators need to stay in town until repeal is passed," said Aubrey Sarvis, SLDN executive director and army veteran. "We simply cannot let the clock run out and lose this historic opportunity."

So, you gotta call your Senators.  Look up your Senators at Senate.gov or use the Capitol Switchboard number: (202) 224-3121.  When you call, tell them to cast vote for three things: the DADT repeal, the DREAM Act, and the START treaty.

Cross-posted at Eclectablog.com.

First off, thanks to Deaniac and the crew for the opportunity to blog here. I will be occasionally cross-posting things from my blog, Eclectablog. Comments and feedback are cheerfully accepted and encouraged!

---

By now, you've probably read Sam Graham-Felsen's Washington Post op-ed, a friendly fire-filled piece suggesting that Organizing for America (OFA) volunteers have been put on the sidelines by the Obama administration for the past year.

I am a Community Organizer (CO) for OFA. Mine is a volunteer position that is the equivalent of the Field Directors during the 2008 Campaign for Change. COs are responsible for organizing Neighborhood Teams (NTs), led by Neighborhood Team Leaders (NTLs) in their area. None of us are paid. Most of us put significant time, energy and our own personal resources into our organizing efforts.

And we have been anything but "on the sidelines" for the past couple of years.

Ezra Klein has an interesting post up today showing that ahead of the Republican takeover of the House and increased Republican numbers in the Senate, and a month and a half after major electoral losses for Democrats, President Obama is still more trusted by the American people than Republicans.

This isn't necessarily surprising except when you consider that at similar points after big election losses, the party opposite has been more trusted than the President.  Here are the last three big losses for the President's party in Congress:

The House passed President Obama's tax cut and unemployment deal in the wee hours of the morning by a 277-148 vote.  The bill passed with 139 votes from Democrats and 138 from Republicans.  The vast majority of the Congressional Progressive Caucus voted against the compromise, showing great disconnect with the vast majority of American progressives.

In other news, the stand-alone repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell is up for cloture tomorrow.  Call your senators now!  Senator Amy Klobuchar is now saying that repeal advocates have enough votes, and a report in the New York Times confirms:

By Thursday, Senator Susan Collins, the bill’s one Republican sponsor, had been joined by three other Republican senators — Scott P. Brown of Massachusetts, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine — in supporting the measure.

“Senator Brown accepts the Pentagon’s recommendation to repeal the policy after proper preparations have been completed,” said Gail Gitcho, a spokeswoman for Mr. Brown. “If and when a clean repeal bill comes up for a vote, he will support it.”

Along with the backing of 54 Democrats and two independents, the Republican support is enough to push the measure to the necessary 60-vote threshold.

But none of this is a reason to sit back and get complacent.  Keep calling!  Also, when you call, demand that your Senator support the DREAM Act on Saturday as well.

Ridiculously, both the "left" and the "right" are deeply involved in a nostalgic fantasy about 1950s America. Because that fantasy is so far from reality, neither are capable of coming up with realistic analysis of the current situation let alone workable plans for what should be done. For the right, in the 1950s government was small and budgets were balanced, Moms were at home cooking while Dads were working in companies that were free of the heavy hand of government. Children were happy. For a lot of the "left", the workforce was unionized and prosperous, marginal tax rates were high, banks were regulated, the social welfare system put in by FDR's New Deal was unchallenged and Ronald Reagan was still a New Deal Democrat. Perhaps all this fraudulent nostalgia should not be surprising, because the 1950s was a period in which kitschy fake sentimentality was really elevated into a mass media art form. A now obscure 1950s TV show called "Mama" combined advertising and sentimentality in a typical way.

Keith Olbermann, sorry, but as much as I used to like you, I am sick and tired of you harping on this President to gain a rating bonanza from 10% of your liberal left population more so than walking on that so called bogus "Principle" - a principle worth questioning. Let me just make it very simple for you and your echoing chamber. Please take a note which sector of the liberal voice you represent. According to the release of a new Washington Post/ABC News poll conducted last week; when asked about the way the President is Handling his job:

	Disapprove in %	Approve in %
All	47	49
Liberal Dems	10	87
Democrats	17	79
Independents	46	50
Republicans	82	15
Conservative Repubs	85	13

I have heard that question enough times to make me puke.  Over and over and over again.  "Why is Obama tougher on Democrats than he is on Republicans?" is almost the rallying cry of the President's detractors on the ideological Left.  They said it during the health care reform debate, the original stimulus debate, everything else under the sun, and now about the budget deal.  Rachel Maddow did it just last week.  It's one of the most nonsensical things I have ever heard.  Because President Obama is much harder on Republicans than he is on his fellow Democrats.

I think the fundamental displeasure comes from not understanding true toughness.  Being tough isn't about delivering verbal beatdowns and pounding the podium.  It's about the courage to get things done, make transformational if imperfect changes and moving this country forward.  Many of the same people who accuse the President of being tougher on Democrats contend that he simply rolls over for Republican and right wing demands.  This of course does not jive with the facts of the record.

It wasn't over unanimous Democratic opposition that President Obama passed historic health reform - something presidents have been talking about but not doing since at least Harry Truman.  And let's be clear about something: this law, while imperfect, was a major progressive and Democratic victory.  As was Wall Street Reform including tough consumer protections - passed also over near unanimous Republican opposition, student loan reform, a massive investment in American infrastructure and the to-date largest economic stimulus package that included an expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit, the Child Tax Credit and a Making Work Pay refundable tax credit.

You know what the cap on civil penalties is when an oil company spills millions of gallons of oil into our waters?  $75 million.  That's right.  See, after the BP oil spill, Democrats tried to raise the cap to $10 billion, but Republicans in the Senate blocked it  (I'm wondering why no one gave an 8-and-a-half hour speech on the Senate floor then).  So with Congressional inaction in the face of the worst man-made environmental catastrophe in US history, the Administration had to act alone.  Here's how they decided to act:

Attorney General Holder announced today that the United States is suing BP, along with eight other companies.

According to the complaint, important safety and operating regulations were violated in the period leading up to the April 20, 2010 Oil Spill, including:

• Failing to take necessary precautions to keep the Macondo Well under control in the period leading up to the April 20th explosion;
• Failing to use the best available and safest drilling technology to monitor the well’s conditions;
• Failing to maintain continuous surveillance; and
• Failing to use and maintain equipment and material that were available and necessary to ensure the safety and protection of personnel, equipment, natural resources, and the environment.

The Senate has moved blazingly fast and passed the unemployment benefits and tax cut deal.  By an 81-19 vote.  This marks a major victory for the President, but even more importantly, a major victory for the American people: the poor, the jobless, the middle class and students in particular.  Some Republicans, including Tom Coburn, waxed poetic about the deficit, but at the end of the day, it was a huge bipartisan majority.

The bill now heads to the House, where the House leaders are scheduling floor time tomorrow, reports the AP.  It might pass the House by the end of the week, and President Obama is urging a swift passage.

In another note, the Senate has also voted 66-32 to advance the START treaty to the floor; debate will begin tomorrow.  The treaty needs 67 votes to pass, and Sen. Bayh was absent from today's vote.  This is looking more and more likely.

Lastly, the House is preparing now to vote has just passed a stand-alone bill to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell.  In the Senate, Senators Collins and Lieberman have introduced a stand-alone measure to do this as well.

Please feel free to use this as an open thread.

The liberal left has been figuratively lynching President Obama for his failure to fulfill his promises to closing the Guantanamo illegal prison. However, last week, the Democrat Majority House of Representatives voted 212-206 in favor of a spending bill that excluded a funding to close the Guantanamo Bay prison for suspected terrorists in 2011.

The legislation prohibits President Barack Obama from spending any money to transfer prisoners to US soil or to acquire facilities to hold them on US soil. It also explicitly bars the transfer of the confessed Al-Qaeda mastermind of the September 11 attacks Khalid Sheik Mohammed to the US mainland or US territories.

In what looked like a big twitter-hashtag-petition-FAIL for the Blogarrati of the Left Puritans, the Senate voted yesterday - 83 to 15 - for cloture on President Obama's tax rate and unemployment extension compromise.  Nearly 7 in 10 Americans and an identical proportion of liberal Democrats back the deal, according to an ABC News/Washington Post poll.  Apparently, failing to join the rebellion are 70% of liberals and the following progressive luminaries.

• Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
• Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND)
• Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)
• Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY)
• Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA)
• Senator Al Franken (D-MN)

Not only has the Senate cleared way for passage in lightening speed (never thought you'd hear the words "Senate" and "lightening speed" in the same sentence, did you?) signs of anger among House Democrats are also subsiding.

There's a reason for all this happening.  The deal does not represent an ideal situation, but it does represent practicality.  It ensures that for the price of extending tax cuts to the rich that are admittedly not needed and not stimulative to the economy, we get a 13 month extension of unemployment benefits, a one-year reduction in payroll taxes most affecting the working poor, two-year extensions for assistance and tax cuts for families and students, as well as an extension of the research and development tax credit and incentives for small businesses.

One of President Obama's major goal is ratifying the agreement signed on April 8, 2010, with President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia that would commit the U.S. and Russia to cut their deployed nuclear weapons by about 30 percent limiting their nuclear warheads to 1,550 within the next seven years. The treaty has passed through the Senate Foreign Relations committee on Sept. 16, 2010, with a 14-4 vote with all Democrats voting to approve the resolution along with Republican Sens. Richard Lugar (R-IN), Bob Corker (R-TN), and Johnny Isakson (R-GA). Four Senators, James Inhofe (R-OK), John Barrasso (R-WY), Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Jim Risch (R-ID) VOTED NO with South Carolina's Senator DeMint a no show for the vote. As of today, the leadership in the Republican Party don't find it important or are too busy plotting the next "how can we undermine THAT ONE" game to actually do something, anything constructive.

So, we caused quite a bit of stir yesterday on Democratic Underground - to the point where a moderator there had to lock the thread discussing this article on racism on the Left fringe.  Funny part is I had no clue it was even being discussed there.

But yes, we were talking about the so-called Lame Duck Congress.  There's a reason it's called lame duck.  Nothing tends to get done in a lame duck Congress.  Well, this one's different.

• The Lame Duck Congress passed, and the President just signed into law, the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, expanding the federal school lunches program to include an additional 115,000 children.
• The Food Safety Modernization Act seems on its way to passage in the Senate and then to the President for his autograph.
• The CALM Act, which mandates that TV commercials be no louder than the program in which they run, passed.
• The House is taking up DADT repeal again (a stand alone bill) and it sure as heck looks like they will shame the Senate into voting for their version of the stand-alone bill sponsored by Lieberman and Collins as well.

Not to mention, the tax rate and unemployment extension deal may clear the Senate as early as today, and the House by the end of this week, with Majority Leader Hoyer indicating that the House will likely vote on the Senate bill without much, if any, changes.  Remember that is a $900 billion bill with major policy implications. Last but not least, as BWD reminds us in the comments, the START treaty is also coming right up.

You have to look into the magnifying lenses to see what is being accomplished yet again by this administration and especially The First Lady Michelle Obama who championed this initiative to helping kids grow healthy. Today, the President and First Lady Michelle Obama jointly delivered remarks during the signing of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 at Harriet Tubman Elementary School, Washington, D.C. This new law will provide $4.5 billion in new funding and will give USDA the authority to set nutritional standards for all foods regularly sold in schools creating a national standard. It also will increase the number of eligible children enrolled in federally subsidized school meal programs by approximately 115,000 students.

There was a point in my life when I used to think racism was the sole property of the political fringe Right.  Lately, I have been disabused of that notion.  Actually, that disillusionment has been hitting me for a while, almost from the start of President Barack Obama's term.  I do want to clarify something: there are legitimate criticisms of this President, and not every criticism of his is racist.  But what has been deafeningly racist is not so much the disagreement but the disrespect.

Disrespect of the President - the first black President (what, you're uncomfortable that I mention that fact and made it bold?  Well then get ready for a lot of discomfort.) - has reached a pivotal point from the fringe Left.  Why does it matter more coming from the Left?  Because the Left is supposed to be better than this, and because the racism on the fringe Left permits the racism on the Right.  Every time a Right-wing fringe person says something racist, they can point their fingers right back and say, hey, look what the "Left" did, so why isn't it okay for us?

But let's get back to the scathing, bold, unapologetic disrespect against the first black President coming from the Left.  First, the seething undertone: the dumb, spineless, stupid, black guy doesn't know what he's doing; he needs to do what the smart, spine-y, know-it-all, mostly white armchair activists tell him to.  I mean, what does the black man who grew up in a single-parent household and spent much of his adult life as a community organizer in the inner cities know about the plight of the poor and the downtrodden?  He needs to listen to us primarily white "progressives" who've never done much more than donate to the occasional food bank to help the poor.

News is breaking that the same George "Macaca" Allen-recommended, George W. Bush appointed, federal judge who allowed Virgina Attorney General Ken Kucinelli's lawsuit against the health care law to proceed has now has held that the individual mandate to purchase health insurance (or face a tax) unconstitutional.  Going against the ruling of two other federal judges (see, judge shopping works!), Judge Henry Hudson had this to say in his ruling:

But Hudson sided with Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli in saying the mandate overstepped the Constitution.

"This case, however, turns on atypical and uncharted applications of constitutional law interwoven with subtle political undercurrents," Hudson wrote. "The outcome of this case has significant public policy implications. And the final word will undoubtedly reside with a higher court."

I'm not sure I understand. He's saying that the mandate is unconstitutional either because it is an "atypical" application of Congressional authority (sorry, I missed the part in the Constitution that defines "typical" applications of Congressional authority and forbids Congress to go beyond it), or because it has significant policy implicatioins and "political undercurrents."  Oh.  Because the Constitution says nothing Congress does may be political.

The runnup to the Iraq war involved the mobilization of what Tbogg dubbed the 101st Fighting Keyboarders - right wing war enthusiasts on the Internet explaining Sun Tzu and pretending Tom Clancy novels were real-life (to his credit, the real Tom Clancy opposed the war). The Obama administration has seen the activation of the Left Wing of this famous unit - a group of macho, rough, tough, internet typists who relentlessly inform us that President Obama is weak, cowardly, on his knees, even "bending over", capitulating, providing "reach arounds", and so on, in a never ending and embarrassingly explicit "venting" of stuff that is, bizarrely, considered appropriate language for discussing politics. The "left", it turns out, wants just as much as the right to be swept away by some macho superhero with a big gun (if you know what I mean ) instead of having to deal with the pragmatic reality of governing and getting stuff done.

Yes; you read that right. It is not a typo and I did not mean to say "oppose Obama's payroll tax holiday." Liberal interests have pretty much been against the payroll tax for all but a brief period of Social Security's existence. And if you think about it, their central argument is pretty unassailable: Like a flat tax rate, payroll taxes impose a higher burden on those with less. If some workers make 20,000 per year, a 15% flat tax rate is going to impact them far more than 15% for someone who makes 100,000 a year. There is a similar disparity regarding payroll taxes. Anyhoo, I found the history of the whole debate and the arguments in favor of general funding for Social Security and other safety net programs quite fascinating. I think you might as well. What started me on this whole trip was this piece in Salon, wherein I learned this:

Social Security supporters warded off the threat when in 1950 Congress passed amendments that prohibited the use of general revenue and ensured that payroll taxes would be the only mechanism through which Social Security benefits were paid for. There have been times when politicians privately thought about this part of the equation. In 1967, for example, LBJ believed that a Social Security tax increase -- which was tied to a benefit increase -- would help restrain inflation at a time that Congress was refusing to pass a tax surcharge for this purpose. But the White House and Congress were very careful to avoid making this part of public discussions or the explicit reason for any change in the payroll tax rates. Many liberal economists were never comfortable with this agreement. During the 1970s, as the political scientist Eric Patashnik argued in "Putting Trust in the US Budget," Keynesian economists challenged the tax structure. They argued that the payroll tax undercut macroeconomic policies. Payroll tax hikes constituted a regressive way to fund benefits and sometimes went into effect when the government was trying to stimulate the economy. There was another strong push to use general revenue. Generally, their efforts failed and the payroll tax remained outside the debates over stimulating or restraining the economy. When Republicans pushed for income and corporate tax cuts after the 1980s, Social Security taxes continued to rise.

This is your Sunday open thread.  Today, I'm doing some highlights from the last couple of days on The People's View.  But before I do that, please sign the petition to tell Congress to support the Obama tax compromise, if you have not already.  Tell Congress: Take the Deal!

• Cedwyn wrote about President Obama's interview with NPR, in which the President explained the tax deal.  It's about smart government.
• Rootless showed us that America, under Obama's leadership, is set to be the global leader in smart battery manufacturing.
• If you missed President Clinton standing by President Obama telling Democrats to take the deal, read about it and watch the video in TiMT's excellent open thread.
• I had a few words to say about Ezra Klein's famous "snowman" chart that has everyone freaking out (everyone, that is, except the originator of the chart), and another few to say about the payroll tax cut and social security.

Oh by the way, can I just point something out real quick?  The 2001 Bush tax cuts were passed by a Republican House and a Democratic Senate.  Which is what we're going to have next year.  So if this tax deal doesn't get done now, why does anyone think that the next Congress will just melt under the weight of demands that the Right release the hostages with no ransom?  Enjoy your Sunday!

I am pretty disturbed about the righteous pompousness happening in some corners of the ideological Left trying to portray the reduction in social security payroll taxes by 2 percentage point as a bad thing.  Even though the lost revenue is replaced from the general fund, their argument is that somehow, it would weaken the political position of social security and thus send it on its way to eventual elimination.

Bullcrap.  First of all, while one is generally required to pay into social security during their working years in order to receive benefits during retirement, social security is not an individual retirement fund.  It is a direct transfer payment.  Current beneficiaries are paid from current tax revenue, and whatever, if anything, is left over is put into a trust fund.  In fact, that is the very nature of it.  That's why it's called social security.  It's a social program to financially protect America's elderly.

In fact, thinking of social security the way ideologues want you to think is exactly the way to end social security as we know it.  If you are thinking about social security as a program in which what you pay in while you are working is stored somewhere to pay you the benefits when it comes time for you to collect, you are thinking about Social Security the way that George W. Bush wanted you: as individual retirement accounts, something similar to 401Ks, 403Bs, IRA's, etc.  Heck, Sharron Angle this very election cycle tried to sell her Social Security privatization plan as "individualized."

The ARRA Stimulus bill is often critiqued as being either too expensive (the right) or too little (a dim part of the "left"). But President Obama has made the point (as noted here ) that being big-government/small-government misses out on whether there is smart government or dumb government ( see this for a description of how the Bush administration threw away billions in cash ). Economists often don't understand the complexity of how the economy works - they tend to reduce it to measures of how much money is spent or invested. There is, however, a huge difference between a government that spends money on cash that gets lost in Iraq and a government that spends money wisely. Here's Bill Clinton talking about Obama's compromise with the Republicans on taxes.

Thirdly, and one thing I haven’t seen much about in the reports, this agreement will really help America over the long term, because it continues the credits for manufacturing jobs related to energy coming in to America. And I’ll remind you, just in the last two years, there have been 30 high-powered battery factories either opened or presently being built in America, taking us from 2 to 20 percent of the world’s share of that. And we’re going to probably be at 40 percent by 2014. This is a really important thing, bringing manufacturing back to America, because it’s a huge multiplier to create new jobs.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2010/12/10/remarks-president-obama-and-former-president-clinton

NPR's Steve Inskeep interviewed Obama yesterday. There really isn't much commentary to add, except that it rather underscores the long-term focus of Obama's goals and methods, present UI crisis notwithstanding:

at the end of the day, people are going to conclude we don't want 2 million people suddenly without unemployment insurance and not able to pay their rent, not able to pay their mortgage, not able to pay their house note.

I think that people are also going to understand that the single most important thing we can do for all of our constituencies is to make sure that the recovery that is taking place right now gets stronger.

And over the last 48 hours, a range of independent economists have concluded that this package would, in fact, increase potential economic growth by as much as 1% and could end up meaning an additional 1.5 million jobs. And that, I think, has got to be the highest priority for everybody.

Former President Bill Clinton was hanging out with President Obama talking about all kinds of things we are not at preview but I can tell it was nothing like the South Carolina moment. In fact, it appeared from watching the Press Conference they have been chatting and comparing notes about how bad the other lost their house majority in the mid-term elections.

I can imagine the former President telling President Obama, how lucky he is that he lost only 63 seats and how bad he would have lost had it been that he was White. :-)

President Obama was gracious in his introduction:

I just had a terrific meeting with the former President, President Bill Clinton. And we just happened to have this as a topic of conversation. And I thought, given the fact that he presided over as good an economy as we’ve seen in our lifetimes, that it might be useful for him to share some of his thoughts.

Well, the former President did not miss a beat as he was at ease and right at home laying that skillful framing and teacher like narration, talking about the tax cut compromise worked out between President Obama and Congressional Republicans:

Ok, everyone chill out.  Everybody on the etherwebs seems to be freaking out at the return of Ezra Klein's "snowman" chart, complete with the compromise tax deal that President Obama made with the Republicans.  Ezra's chart is on the right; click to enlarge.  Even John Cole is "sold."

See the millionaires' portion at the bottom that's huge?  Yeah, Obama's compromise looks a lot like the Republican plan - so, everybody freak out!  Actually, don't freak out.  There are a few things you have to understand about this snowman graph.  First, there's a time differential.  The compromise only extends the tax rates for the rich for two years, not, as the GOP would have it, in perpetuity.  With the Republican plan, that big bubble would stay forever.  So first of all, the chart should have come with a disclaimer that would read something like: "Average tax cut under each plan, for the next two years only."  Because it's an unfair comparison.  The two on the left are permanent proposals, the one in black (the compromise) is temporary in nature.  See, the new proposal under the compromise looks a lot like what's on the left (the Democratic plan) starting in 2013.  And the President has personally committed to continue to make that case to in the national debate over our broken tax system over the next two years.

You know the "resolution" the House Democrats passed to "reject" the agreement?  Well, it was on a voice vote and non-binding.

Shocked, I'm shocked that Fox News is not fair and balanced.  Oh and just a personal point of privilege, we Californians would like to thank Ohio and Wisconsin for their high speed rail funds.

Going back to the Tax Deal, the Senate is going to include tax breaks for alternative energy in the deal.

Blackwaterdog (BWD) has an awesome chart (by the way of the Washington Post) of the numbers on the deal and who got what.  And guess what?  Democrats come out ahead.  Way ahead, actually.

Lastly, President Obama explained, one more time, that he's not going to allow working Americans, the jobless and students to become collateral damage:

I wished it were ONLY the Republicans that were taking the American People Hostage!

So 54 Democrats did not like the compromise that President Obama struck with Senate Republicans on the expiring Bush tax cuts. I hope it is just a symbolic gesture to give the appearance that Democrats in Congress still have muscle to stand against the Democratic President of The United States. A symbol so that they have the spot light as a caucus for whatever it is worth.

The Democratic caucus will be meeting Thursday morning away from the House floor to discuss its options in hopes that they can modify something, anything, so that they can claim some victory to say they made the President do it. But, that is if they actually have any new ideas that they have been sitting on their asses other than let's have that Single Unemployment Extension vote option. Let me not remind you that Republican won the November election blocking the same Unemployment Benefit extension bill all year long so don't tell me you are willing to keep Americans hostage for what will be an assured to fail strategy.

Today, Senate Republicans killed the effort to take up the Defense Authorization bill with a Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal in it.  Apparently, Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) wanted 4 days of debate time, and Senate Majority Leader Reid thought that it would actually end up being a lot more than that, and so he didn't agree (at least that's what Greg Sargent says).  So, basically, the Senate proceeded to gridlock, and John McCain's filibuster, aided by Collins, succeeded.

That, however, is not the end of it.  Today, Sens. Lieberman, Collins and Udall introduced a stand-alone bill to repeal DADT, and Harry Reid has promised Lieberman that he would bring it up under expedited procedure.

"I informed Senator Reid during the vote... that we're going to do that, and he said, 'Same language as in Defense Authorization bill?' I said, 'yes.' He said, 'put me down as a co-sponsor.' I said, "Harry, we're going to ask you to bring this to a vote before the end of the lame duck session.' He said, 'I will bring it to the active calendar under Rule 14.'"

Rule 14 is a Senate procedure that gives the majority leader the right to expedite legislation.

"As far as the efforts to repeal don't ask don't tell, it ain't over," Lieberman said.

Will this succeed?  I hope so.  We don't want the repeal to go into the next Congress, where it will likely be doomed.  Anyway, the floor is yours.

Perhaps 80% of the "progressive" blog content since the 2008 primary elections has been an exercise in fantasy speech writing from people who are convinced in their own minds that poor, dumb, uneducated, confused, naive etc. Barack Obama would do better if they got to write a script for him. The condescending presumption and often barely concealed racism of this torrent of advice was shocking before it became just boring. What was forgotten is that the bloggers need someone to write scripts for them - and, as a public service, here are a few.

Markos of DailyKos needs to write a blog post that goes like this:

I wasted two years of great opportunity by letting the megaphone that I and so many others worked to create turn into a plaything of the main stream media we used to mock. Instead of building an independent news stream that would push back against the tsunami of trivia and right wing spin points that splashes out from corporate media and the interlocking network of right wing "think tanks" and PR shops, I got distracted and confused and let my blog become a contributor to this waste stream. At the peak of the health care reform battle, we put wingnut spinner Michael Barone on the front page and endorsed his argument that Democrats should cave to Republican intransigence - that should have been an overdue wakeup call to me, but I pushed the snooze button and slept through it. Looking over DailyKos front page for the last two years, I can see that we never even tried to set the agenda to focus on key progressive issues like wealth inequality or environment. Sure we had some occasional commentary, some of it great, but there was nothing sustained. Instead, we let cable news set our agenda, repeatedly allowing them to panic us and to set the frame for discussion. Now, looking back over the absolute catastrophe of the 2010 elections: the $10million wasted helping the Republicans take the Senate seat in Arkansas, our support of replacing Arlen Specter with Pat Toomey, the 100% defeat of all the candidates who took the net neutrality pledge - I can see that we failed. All I can do is ask your forgiveness as we try to make this a place where people come for information and inspiration instead of glib defeatism and echoes from Huffington Post.

This morning, we found out that progressive think tanks believe the tax compromise is a good deal for America.  But what do the American people think?  It turns out that the American adults overwhelmingly support the compromise President Obama, the only adult, it seems, in the room in the beltway, made with Republican leaders on extending tax cuts and unemployment benefits.  Americans support both major elements of the compromise - the tax cut extensions (all the tax cuts) for two years, and the extension in unemployment benefits.

If you are on a panel and you are discussing how terrible the Tax Plan agreement reached between the Whitehouse and Republicans is, shouldn't you at least do your homework and know the basic facts about the Tax Plan deal struck with Republicans before appearing to speak about how horrible the deal is for America? I was flabbergasted by what I saw on the Lawrence O'Donnell show, the Last Word (transcript included in link), last night when Jane "Kill the Bill" Hamsher, Roger Hodge and Adam Green were just awfully embarrassing to be the voice of the Liberal Left.

Apparently, the procedural vote to clear the Defense authorization bill that includes a repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell might come as early as this evening.  So, we don't have much time left.  Call your Senators right now.  If you don't want to go to the website, the Senate switchboard is at 202-224-3121.  President Obama's calling.

...as Dem leaders have stepped up their efforts to get moderate Republicans to agree to vote for cloture on repeal, with President Obama personally calling Senators on both sides, the aide says.

Join him.  Call your Senators right now.  After you call your Senators, the folks at Winning Progressive have a list of target Senators (both Democrats and Republicans) for you to also call if you can spare a few extra phone calls.  Start calling.  And then tell us how it went.  If you are looking for what to say, keep it short and sweet.  Tell them you are calling in support of repealing DADT, be polite, and that's it.

Also, feel free to use this as an open thread as well.

I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.

~Barack Obama

I have watched many press conferences and I have to say, this man is the most informed, brilliant, intelligent and graceful person to hold the position of the President Of The United States. PERIOD! No one in this Political Environment can top this man. I respect and admire the man for his practical ways but watching yesterday's press conferences again has given me a reassurance that I have made the right choice to support this man. Please watch the press conference below the fold and the transcript is right here.

Take a tally. Look at what I promised during the campaign. There’s not a single thing that I’ve said that I would do that I have not either done or tried to do. And if I haven’t gotten it done yet, I’m still trying to do it.

Wow, what a presser.  Barack Obama brought it, and he hit it home.  Before I say anything, watch the President's press conference.



The full transcript is available here.  All I have got to say is, amen, Mr. President!  This President has been taking it from the puritan Left and the insane Right, and he decided he had had enough.  It was time for some straight talk with both Republicans and Democrats.  Guys, this was the President of the United States.  All the United States.  He explained the tax and unemployment insurance deal he made last night and didn't spare the rod.

I was going to do a piece on Obama's presser today, and I still will, but first, I would like to ask all of you for a virtual moment of silence for the passing of Elizabeth Edwards.  My heart broke for her children.  The world and this country has lost a woman of unparalleled poise, spirit, grace and dignity.  In a statement, her family said the following:

"Today we have lost the comfort of Elizabeth's presence but she remains the heart of this family," the statement said. "We love her and will never know anyone more inspiring or full of life."

She may be gone, and we miss her dearly, but her legacy will live on.  There's a guestbook online by Legacy.com to send her family your condolences, if you choose.

The "left" that is disgusted with Obama often cites the late Lyndon Baines Johnson as a stark contrast. LBJ was strong, Texas tough, an arm-twisting, hard drinking, real-man who didn't do all this girly bipartisan b.s. as he single handedly rammed the civil rights bills past a cowed and terrified Congress. That's what we get told - as if all these people below were just spectators or didn't exist at all.

The photo above is from the 1963 March on Washington. And that wasn't the only march.

Watching the temperature at the Daily Kos, I realized you have to take cover there because the ozone layer contains a harmful ultraviolet rays.  I also realized... 39% of Daily Kos Makes $100 or more. 75% of Daily Kos makes $60K or more. 90% of Daily Kos Makes $30K or more. No wonder the $2 million People whose Unemployment benefit has run out don't have a voice in the community to support what this Administration is try to do for them.

You can put Anthony Weiner in that 39% as well who is more interested in making political point than getting things done. In fact, I will ask where have you been all this time and before the November election but instead make a cowardly attention seeking noise when the POTUS tries to help 2 million people while you try to keep them hostage to score a political point. Some of you feckless Democrats in Congress seat on their asses without even throwing a fighting punch and kick the field goal on the 2nd down and now try to ridicule the Administration for kicking it on the 3rd down. I guess Mr. opportunistic whining Weiner want to blame the President like he blamed him for not drawing the line in the HCR debate. Bullshit!

Not that anything under the Sun is new, but a good chunk of the Left established media (both new and old) are in uproar over the compromise between President Obama and Congressional Republicans on unemployment extension and tax cuts.  The accusations of President Obama as a sellout are flying left and right (well, mostly left).  Even Democracy for America, a group I have been a founding member of, emailed me yesterday waxing poetic about how the White House should have "dared" Republicans to raise taxes on all Americans.  I mean, it's not that they don't get it - they obviously do - but they think that making some kind of a statement is more important than the following things:

• Extending unemployment benefits for 13 months.
• Reducing the employee portion of the Social Security payroll tax by 2 percentage point for a year.
• Extending all the middle class tax breaks - the Bush tax cuts and the ones given in last year's Recovery Act.

Because that is exactly what the White House negotiated with the Republicans in exchange for a temporary, two-year extension of the current tax rates, including for the wealthy.  Now, mind you, I have myself been for letting all the Bush tax cuts expire as a matter of policy preference (not political battle strategy, which it is a lousy one of, and contingent upon the government spending the money saved in stimulative activities), but this tradeoff actually looks pretty good to me.  I'll let the President speak for himself:

I just finished watching the last part of the Prop 8 arguments in front of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Ted Olson argued for usThis is the same Ted Olson that argued Bush v. Gore.  For Bush.  The same Ted Olson that was the Solicitor General of the United States under George W. Bush. If the Left were going pariah shopping, we couldn't do much better than Ted Olson.

Yet, here he is, leading the fight for same sex marriage - a progressive cause, the civil rights cause of our time. There stands a man that is my reason to never say "I will never talk to my political opposition," no matter how disparate our views are.  Let it also be a lesson for those who are constantly angry because President Obama keeps the door open to talking to his political opponents.  Politics makes strange bedfellows, but more importantly, politics is the art of the possible.

I leave you with Ted Olson hitting it out of the park for us on Fox News, no less: