Just take a hike, Sanford

Let’s see. What was it I said about former Gov. Mark Sanford (R-SC) when we learned he was preparing to run for now-Sen. Tim Scott’s (R-SC) vacated house seat?

. . . if he thinks he could accomplish something in Congress, assuming he could get elected, he’s dead wrong. Like former President Bill Clinton, Sanford will forever be known as a guy who cheated on his wife and lied about it. What other congressional Republican would want to be seen with that?

And, of course, I get results. But it took a couple of instances of further public self-flagellation in order to make it happen. First it was the events leading up to the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) pulling its resources from his campaign, which are explained in the link. Then it was the approximately 1,200-word ad he ran in the Charleston Post and Courier explaining himself, which I can’t do a better job summing up than the headline of the Washington Post‘s account already has. Then there was this, which is either better or worse – I honestly can’t decide – than this.

Let’s talk about the trespassing allegations. Sanford insists that he was in his ex-wife’s home to keep his youngest son company while they watched football, which is a fair excuse, as Jenny Sanford was out of town that day. Although I don’t remember needing a babysitter when I was 14. And one of his older sons was in the house at the time, and there’s no sign that either son was about to party with hookers while Jenny was away. Regardless, being in Jenny’s house without her permission was a violation of their divorce settlement, which both boys should have known.

As for debating a cardboard cut-out of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) . . . well, I’ll let The Hill explain that one.

Sanford’s campaign has been struggling amid legal problems and polling that shows him falling behind . . . Candidates typically don’t demand more debates, or stage political stunts for media attention, when they are the front-runner.

I would never turn down a debate or support anyone else’s decision to do so. But, let’s be honest, the only reason Sanford wants more of those is to deflect attention from the fact that he a) constantly walks into the wrong headlines with his eyes wide open and b) has such a fundamentally bad reputation that he’s lost all ability to reframe the wrong headlines to his advantage. Colbert Busch hasn’t had a spectacular performance as a candidate; however, her kinds of mistakes are the ones voters can let slide.

The special election between Sanford and Busch is in less than two weeks. Under normal circumstances, painting Colbert Busch as a Pelosi acolyte would be all he ever needed to do to win. But at nine points behind her, his best plan is to erase the Appalachian Trail from America’s memory.

Mitch McConnell bugs out

Was Sen. Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) re-election campaign office bugged? The upcoming investigation will tell us for sure – but it probably was. Now I tend to believe that a campaign against a genuinely weak candidate never needs to resort to anything resembling spying, and therefore condemn any such tactics that were employed against McConnell. That’s really all there is to say about that. So let’s move on to what was recorded of his team’s opposition research on non-candidate Ashley Judd:

So you know one of the first themes we can sort of hit on, clearly, is that she openly supports President Obama.

Shocking. A liberal Democrat who supports Obama. I’ve never heard of such lunacy.

Clearly a theme that’s easy to hit is that she’s an out-of-touch, Hollywood liberal . . .

Duh. That even concerned me, although I later admitted she could be a strong voice for rape victims and mental health awareness.

Another thing is she’s clearly anti-coal.

That’s the best line of attack they’d have; it would ruin her in Kentucky.

So you can see there she’s on the record supporting cap and trade. I mean clearly she’s a carpetbagger.

I’m not going to back her up on cap-and-trade, but carpetbagger? Thanks for the update, Scarlett.

. . . she’s actually mocked Kentucky to Tennessee audiences. She was bemoaning the low voter turnout among women in Tennessee; she said, “People, that’s worse than even in Kentucky.”

Should she celebrate low female voting?

She described having children as selfish, and she thinks it’s unconscionable to breed.

Prove that she wants to stop breeding.

. . . she is critical . . . of traditional Christianity. She sort of views it as sort of a vestige of patriarchy.

I never worry about the literal interpretation of my faith, so I’d roll my eyes at her attitude. But it’s irrelevant.

She also is an open advocate of gay marriage.

So is every Democratic senator, even if they won’t vote that way for political reasons.

She’s clearly, this sounds extreme, but she is emotionally unbalanced. . . . she’s suffered some suicidal tendencies.

If you think that’s fair game, fuck off.

In a state that continues to elect McConnell, he wouldn’t have had to do anything more than this if he were running against Judd. But it would have been nice to know he was planning to fake concern for ideas.

Disposal Day #161: Just for the hell of it

STORY #1: Head non-Start

I remember then-Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) favoring universal preschool so much that she mentioned it in her Christmas campaign aid. This is the first time President Obama is actively pursuing it in his administration. (Feel free to fact-check me on this.) The proposal at which he hinted in his State of the Union would provide federal funding equal to state funding for pre-K programs, plus expand Head Start for toddlers, on the ground that early education has been found to help kids do better in later school and in their behavior.

I never went to pre-K, just a couple of day cares, so I cannot personally attest to its effectiveness. (Actually, the only thing I couldn’t already do by kindergarten was color inside the lines.) But considering Obama’s example, Georgia, spends $300 million on pre-K – with only 60 percent of eligible kids enrolled and a relatively low high school graduation rate – expect Congress to brush this aside, on the ground that he thinks it’s a silver bullet, and a pricey one at that. I can think of many more sensible ways to boost high school graduation rates. Like ending the practice of teaching to the test.

STORY #2: The other climate

The Republican Party may be undergoing a chadash, but don’t expect it to extend too far into economic issues, especially when one of them is being spearheaded by a self-professed socialist. Case in point: Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) climate bill, which would put a price on carbon, pour more funding into green energy and advanced transportation and end subsidies for fossil fuels. I’ll let you guess which one of those has a snowball’s chance in hell of advancing in Congress.

I do admire his and other liberal Democrats’ decision to make climate change the centerpiece of their agenda; politically, it gets them a sizable amount of support that won’t peter out soon. But they’ll have to contend with the fact that the majority of the public is still confused about climate science, and is less inclined to support expensive efforts to mitigate it. It may not even help to cite more studies. Who’s going to come up with a way to solve that? Likely not Sanders.

STORY #3: The roundup

Here in Canada, we’ve begun phasing out pennies, and some stores have already begun rounding prices to the nearest five-cent increment. I look forward to one day doing this with nickels. Obama says he would like to sack the penny, since in America, as in Canada, it costs more to produce than it’s worth. There are some mildly effective arguments against doing this – the costs of adjusting financial software and the increased demand for nickels – so it’ll be interesting to find out what the net savings are in a few years. In the meantime, I’m still including pennies in my collection of U.S. currency. I found four yesterday.

Disposal Day #160: Too soon

STORY #1: This state exists?

Who would have thought that people would be paying so much attention to Kentucky, of all states, so soon before an election? This reddest of red states doesn’t even get this much play during an election. But ads against Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) have already hit the airwaves, particularly ads that are indignant about his position on gun control. (Spoiler: He’s not a fan.) I wouldn’t advise putting too much faith in a left-wing ad campaign that depends on a poll from a Democratic firm. But if McConnell continues to be, well, himself, he might learn the hard way that constant ideology only works for a tiny audience. Everyone learns eventually.

Meanwhile, actress Ashley Judd is also on the receiving end of some nasty political PR; Karl Rove’s American Crossroads Super PAC is portraying her as a “radical Hollywood liberal” despite the fact that she isn’t actually running yet. (Radical? She’s no more liberal than the average celeb.) She hasn’t ruled it out, though, which disappoints me profoundly. I’m fine with a celebrity running for federal office if they’ve demonstrated substantive policy knowledge, à la Sen. Al Franken (D-MN); she hasn’t demonstrated this beyond typical causes of fashion.

STORY #2: Rove, if you want to

Rove’s other Super PAC, the Conservative Victory Project, has found the most obvious path to victory in the nation: tell people the candidate is the type of person who says “legitimate rape.” That’s the method he’s employing against Rep. Steve King (R-IA), who is planning to run for Senate in 2014. Polls show he would have an easy time of it against more moderate prospects in the primary; however, those prospects would have an easier time of it than him in a general election. Good thing someone checked.

I’ve only written about King three times, once because he made an effort to illegalize teleconferences that involve a doctor advising a female patient to take RU-486, which is almost enough reason for me never to support him. Rove and his fellow PAC-man, Steven Law, are on the right side when it comes to candidate support. I still think Rove is making an effort to own the entirety of American politics. This clinches that theory.

STORY #3: The Brownout

With former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) refusing to run for Secretary of State John Kerry’s now-vacated seat, the media seems shocked that no other Massachusetts Republican is interested. Everyone with even a whiff of national recognition has declined to run; everyone else comes from the state legislature, and thus probably has zero chance against Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), unless one of them turns out to be a secret political genius. In the meantime, Brown should expect a lot of begging from state party authorities. Changing his mind may be their best hope. Or maybe Rove could offer them some helpful advice.

Disposal Day #156: Hail to the Speak

STORY #1: He’s not dead

Of course it was Rep. Justin Amash (R-MI) who organized the twelve-person “coup” against Speaker John Boehner (R-OH). He hasn’t exactly been willing to fall in line ever since he lost his seat on the House Budget Committee, the same being true for a number of his colleagues, several of whom, like Amash, plan to continue former Rep. Ron Paul’s (R-TX) legacy as the token libertarians. They could afford to vote against him because their voting record on spending matters is much more solid. Had Boehner been deposed over accepting a fiscal cliff deal with very little in spending cuts, there would have been a lot more hypocrites.

Boehner hasn’t been a great success as speaker, and I don’t expect that much would change throughout his second term; he certainly hasn’t hinted at any new visions or strategies. (Except for one, below.) If you want further proof:

Upon taking the gavel, he wiped away tears and delivered an emotional speech to the House . . .

Yes. Of course he did.

STORY #2: That one new thing

A friend, who shall remain nameless (he’s appeared here once), had to meet up with his recent ex-girlfriend several times last month to give each other their stuff back and clear out their once-shared apartment. I imagine that my friend feels about this the same way Boehner feels about all the times he met privately with President Obama this month. To clarify, as he’s been telling his party, he’s “done” with it. (For the record, my friend is spending the next couple of years overseas and his ex is an idiot, so he, too, is done.)

But Boehner can’t spend the next couple of years overseas. Except for their many vacations that should not be, he and Obama will be doing the same business in the same city until 2014 at least. If Boehner thinks he’ll never be in a position to have a closed-door meeting with Obama, he’s thinking much too wishfully for his own good. And trying to get out of that will only make Obama look better, as he must know.

STORY #3: The more united front

On the other side of the House, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) only had five members vote against her re-election as leader, two of whom were out of town for family reasons. The others were Blue Dog Democrats who voted for the following people: Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN), Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), and former Secretary of State Colin Powell, as if he would have accepted that position. Had the Blue Dogs been greater in number and had one person to rally around, that would have been a worthwhile changing of the guard, for some of us, anyway.

Pro is to con as progress is to . . .

Fantastic. Congress and the White House were able to reach a deal with just enough time to make dinner reservations for New Year’s. Of course, that deal only concerns taxes and makes only cosmetic changes to some tax expenditures, while extending various tax credits, with a couple of rate hikes on the wealthy thrown in for good measure, and it defers sequestration for two months with no agreed-upon spending changes, and it does nothing to the debt ceiling . . . but, something!

Here’s a list of everything upon which Vice President Biden and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) agreed:

• Individuals earning over $400K and families earning over $450K get a 39.6 percent top income tax rate.
• They would also be subject to a 20 percent capital gains tax, which stays at 15 percent for everyone else.
• The tax on estates worth over $5.1 million would rise to 40 percent.
• The American Opportunity Tax Credit, the Child Tax Credit, the Earned Income Tax Credit are extended for five years.
• Tax credits for wind energy, biofuels, home efficiency upgrades and “other measures” are also extended.
• The Alternative Minimum Tax patch is extended permanently.
• Fifty-percent bonus depreciation is extended for one year.
• Personal exemptions for the wealthy would reduced by two percent every $2,500 above an unspecified threshold until there’s nothing left to reduce.

Aaaaaaaaaaaand that’s it. Literally.

Now I’ve already yelled my lungs out about the need for long-term reform to the tax code and spending of the mandatory and discretionary varieties, so I’ll spare you what would inevitably be the same rant in different words. Same goes for my attacks on a Congress that on any given day is either do-nothing, do-something-stupid or, in the case of yesterday, both. No, I won’t do any of that again. It exhausts me.

You know who hasn’t exhausted themselves on this? You haven’t, America. The Americans I know have, God love them, but there’s only a few of them. There hasn’t been a “fix the debt” movement on the scale of Occupy or the Tea Party. No Labels and the fiscal think tanks have been there, but they do not a movement make. The Can Kicks Back has some amusing videos, but not much else. And the organizations with the megaphones are too concerned with their sacred cows to think of a real deal.

So it’s obvious that anyone who feels as strongly about the debt as we do will need to coalesce into a grassroots pro-grand bargain movement. Most of you are sensible, hardworking people who look down on the idea of taking time off to protest. Consider that you might have to bite the bullet and do it anyway to accomplish something.

Disposal Day #154: None shall pass

STORY #1: Plan F

Problems with Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) “Plan B,” which at the time of this writing is hours away from a vote:

• It’s not a grand bargain.
• The proposed income tax hike on only people earning $1 million more does not address the underlying problems with the tax code, and is only a token threshold for rate hikes.
• Its cuts focus disproportionately on social services and “mostly” spares defense cuts, meaning overspending on defense will surely continue.
• It’s not a grand bargain.
• It’s being done only so Boehner can give the appearance that he’s leading on something.
• It’s going to be vetoed, anyway, again only for Boehner’s political benefit.
• It’s not a grand bargain.
  

Everybody got that? (UPDATE: HA!)

STORY #2: Grand bungle

How hard is it to put together an “emergency” bill without tacking on over $21 billion of useless crap? (OK, not useless, exactly, but definitely superfluous in the context of this legislation.) For this Congress, impossible, as that’s exactly what happened to a Hurricane Sandy aid package totaling $60.4 billion. Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), one of the bill’s more vocal opponents – because of the crap only, not because he’s evil – names funding for commercial fisheries in American Samoa and roof repairs in D.C. as some of the more grievous offenses.

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) isn’t much help; he “warned the Republicans from disaster-prone regions may not get help from the Northeast if they do not agree to pay for Sandy damage now.” Well, Senator, your party should have thought of that before they presented a bill filled with amendments that don’t address immediate needs. That could have passed within a couple of days, perhaps even one. If they want to avoid problems like this in the future, Congress might consider coming up with criteria for “immediate,” “intermediate” and “low” funding priorities after a natural disaster. I’ll wait to see which one, Ryan or Schumer, will be the first to write a draft of those guidelines.

STORY #3: Explore New Columbia!

That’s Sen. Joe Lieberman’s (I-CT) name for his proposed 51st American state. The areas outside the White House, the Capitol and the Supreme Court would form the new state, and all of those buildings would form the new district. If I were him, I would instead suggest dividing the “New Columbia” area between Virginia and Maryland and then reserve the rest for the new district. But that’s because I’m a stickler for even numbers, especially when they’re on the flag.

Disposal Day #150: Nonsense and sensibility

STORY #1: Miscellany

While the fiscal cliff has, thankfully, dominated the discussion in Congress, there are other things to be done, including:

• farm bill;
• postal service bill;
• reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act;
• reauthorizing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act;
• omnibus appropriations bill.

And that, kids, is why you should always do your homework the day it’s assigned. Then you won’t have to scramble to get it all done at 11 p.m. the night before it’s due. Not that I’ve been there or anything. . . .

Granted, if we’re going to talk about any legislative affairs other than the fiscal cliff, none of these are meaningless. And none is simple enough to merit only a quick rubber-stamping. But if it can wait until after New Year’s, it should. There’s more serious business at hand.

STORY #2: I spit on your pledge

Why is this even a question? Seemingly feeling the pressure to get serious about the fiscal cliff, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) announced his decision to put aside the anti-tax hike pledge he signed “for conservative activist Grover Norquist” (emphasis mine) and vote for whatever was necessary to get a debt deal done. Because he cares more about his country than the head of Americans for Tax Reform. Isn’t it sad that he essentially admitted to prioritizing Norquist above the rest of the country when he signed the damn thing?

But anyway. The pledge required signatories not to vote for loophole or deductions eliminations, much less raising marginal tax rates. But Norquist himself seemed to be focusing inordinately on the latter when questioned about Republican departures from his plan earlier this month. It’s possible that Chambliss took this to mean that loophole closures were back on the table, and he can be publicly open to those. Or he’s open to that and raising rates. Either way, anyone who flips the bird to Norquist is all right with me, although it would have been smarter for Chambliss, to paraphrase a wiser politician, to pledge to nothing but the flag and his wife.

STORY #3: That was pointless

In a move that shouldn’t surprise you, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-IL) announced his resignation from Congress this week, admitting that his “ability to serve the constituents of [his] district has continued to diminish.” (I get results.) This is a very sensible move on his part, and I wish him the best of luck with his efforts to manage his bipolar disorder. But, still, he should have figured this out months before so we could avoid wasting money on a special election.

Priorities for the next four years

One of the more shocking post-election headlines I read yesterday was Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) agreeing, in theory, to a debt deal that would include new revenue, although he did clarify that it would have to come from loophole closures and not increased rates. It’s not much – not even half of much – but, baby steps. Enough to spark a little bit of optimism that the next session of Congress will actually accomplish something.

I hinted at this briefly, but here’s a list of domestic issues on which Congress should focus, starting during the lame duck session. For simplicity’s sake, I’ve organized them into tiers on the basis of urgency:

Tier I: Debt reduction

Nothing, nothing, nothing can come before this, or even alongside this; it’s on a tier all its own. They don’t have to pay down the entire national debt by 2014, by any means – a nice idea, but an impossible one – but they do need to pass enough root-and-branch fiscal reform to put the country on course to pay down the debt expediently. That means everyone agreeing to give up their sacred cows. Steaks for everyone.

Tier II: Jobs, immigration, energy

The level of economic growth we’ve seen over the past couple of months was enough to get President Obama re-elected, but that’s only sufficient for him. Immigration reform and ramped-up energy production both translate into jobs, and if all of Congress can see it in those terms, they might get them done. They will have to tackle the challenges of the immigration process faced by legal applicants and illegal border-crossers, and they will have to pour resources into energy where it has worked, not where it’s politically convenient for it to work.

Tier III: Social mobility, infrastructure

Why exactly is it so damn difficult to pay for college tuition, or a medical bill? Congress should take the lead on figuring that out. I am not asking for increased subsidization or outright cost controls. I am asking for someone to identify where federal action, or the removal thereof, could make these things a little bit easier to afford. (Doing this for health care, by the way, would be a great cause for Republicans looking for an Obamacare alternative.) As for infrastructure, you could treat that as Tier II, but I’m speaking of improvements to infrastructure for their own sake, not for the sake of jobs. That does happen, you know.

Tier IV: Basically everything else

Want to write a bill enshrining the flag’s colors as red, white and blue? Want to pass a commemoration of some anniversary nobody cares about? Do it on your own time, or at least after you’ve done everything else I’ve listed here. But first it’s time for grown-up work. Have fun later.

The tough get going (and going, and going)

It’s time once again for The Future American’s FAIL OF THE WEEK! Every Saturday, I name a person or group who has spent the past seven days behaving in a particularly idiotic way. Since it’s my belief that idiocy knows no politics, nobody is safe.

This week’s fail was brought to you by outgoing Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-OH), who announced his retirement from the House this week after nine terms. By most measures, he’s the kind of congressman I like: He’s popular, he’s non-controversial, he’s pro-Simpson-Bowles, he values compromise, he’s a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership (their answer to the Blue Dog Democrats) and he doesn’t fall into the trap of supporting politically motivated tax cuts. Why would I give him the fail, especially now that he’s retiring? It’s because of why he’s retiring:

It’s been my experience that compromise, cooperation, getting something done, is not rewarded. The group of people that are interested in that type of result — the circle’s becoming smaller and smaller. . . . There’s only so many times you can run your head into a cement wall.

Yeah, and? Tell us something we don’t know. But do you want to know the reason the circle’s becoming smaller and smaller? Because people like LaTourette keep making it smaller. Sens. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Ben Nelson (D-NE) did it when they announced their retirements. (Still not a Nelson fan because of the Cornhusker Kickback, but at least he wasn’t a fire-breathing partisan.) All raised up their hands and said this to the possibility of congressional change.

I get how discouraging it is to watch the wingers win, but I have no sympathy for people who use the dearth of moderation as a reason to jump ship. This is also why I oppose the U.S. leaving the UN on the grounds that it’s full of anti-Western countries. The idea of the UN/Congress is too good to let it be overtaken by the inmates; it needs as many wardens as possible.

It would be one thing if LaTourette was retiring because he wanted to spend more time with his family. I wouldn’t buy it for a minute, but his real excuse, like those of the other two, comes off just plain whiny. So my solution is this: If it’s not ruining your health or breaking your bank, suck it up, stay in Congress and fix this shit. I don’t care how long it takes or how difficult it is. They can’t avoid you if you’re there.

“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing” comes to mind, but that’s giving the wingers too much credit. They’re too short-sighted to be evil.