safe-haven laws,

or how to make a kid feel wanted.

LOL

I'm there.  

On not mailing it in

Apparently mail hoarding is a little more common than I'd like to think. The upshot is that usually instances of mail hoarding involve only junk mail; in other words, hoarding of this variety is somewhat of a public service.

Make note: don't move to Chicago if that $25.00 Christmas check from Aunt Millie is a key item in your annual budget.

My favorite line: "I'm glad in a way," he told his judge. "It needs sorting."

Breaking: Hitler only had one testicle.

hypothetically speaking

(updated)

Let's say any Republican (or independent who caucuses with the Republicans after his homestate Republican voters effectively ejected him from the party) senator who chairs a committee had gone around the country during the campaign and campaigned for Obama, spoke at the DNCC, supported two Democratic incumbent senators against promising Republican challengers, repeatedly intimated and coyly refused to rule out that Sen. McCain was a fascist ("an interesting idea") and Nazi,* and routinely questioned McCain's patriotism.  McCain then wins the election, and the Republicans end up taking a huge majorities in both the Senate and House.  Does the senator get to keep his chairmanship?  Hell no.  And he'd probably suffer far worse consequences than that.  Do you think a Tom DeLay or Mitch McConnell would put up with that sort of treachery?  Of course they wouldn't.  

But what's really interesting, and I'm just totally conjecturing here, but were a Democratic senator to have done some of the things above viz. John McCain--insinuate he's a fascist and Nazi and openly question his patriotism repeatedly--isn't it probably the case that that senator would get more flak and fallout from the Democratic leadership than what Lieberman's getting here?  I can just imagine the furrowed eyebrows and scowls on Reid's face when dealing with a renegade senator who went "over the line" in his/her rhetoric and would be sanctioned somehow as a result.  Fox News would be in a feeding frenzy, as would talk radio and the rightwing blogosphere.  And respectable liberals would chime in to say how unfortunate Senator X's remarks were (enter stage right: Marshall, Yglesias, et al.).  I could see Sen. X even losing his chairmanship of the Homeland Security and Gov't Affairs Cmte; after all, he insinuated that President-elect McCain was unpatriotic and was a Nazi, etc.  That sort of far-out leftist lunatic can't be trusted with something as important as our nation's security!  

Isn't it sad and doesn't it illuminate how the Democratic leadership simply thinks of its earnest leftwing supporters and die-hard partisans who comprise the base as useful idiots and saps?  It's very likely the case that Lieberman will get off with the same sort of punishment (or less!) than hypothetical Sen. X, even though Sen. X merely impugned McCain's patriotism and insinuated he's a Nazi/fascist, but did not campaign for Republicans, speak at the RNCC, etc.  

My point here is that the Democratic Party will treat equally or perhaps punish more severely the rhetorical excesses of those of its own who impugn hard-right, war-mongering Republicans as it will those of its own who savage the Democratic nominee in the most vicious and scurrilous ways on top of a litany of other serious acts of party disloyalty and treachery.  

[*I chose "fascist" and "Nazi" because I think these two terms are roughly the rightist equivalent (at least rhetorically or slander-wise) of "socialist" and "Marxist," respectively.]

Update: And . . . capitulation--standard operating procedure for Democrats when it comes to standing up to the dominant right-wing and imperialistic slant of our politics and discourse.  Taking away that subcommittee chair who no one, including Lieberman, gives a shit about is really gonna teach him.  Reid and most all of the other Senate Democrats are pathetic jokes.   Although I guess the joke's on the Left and the activist base.  We've seen this movie before many times, and I suspect it'll be on heavy re-runs over the next four years.  Notice Sen. Mikulski's obsequious and deferential posture--she'll take her cues from the leadership, which is appropriate enough, and President-elect Obama.  Note to Sen. Mikulski: there are three branches of government and Obama is no longer a member of the legislative branch.  Theoretically, his opinion on this matter shouldn't count any more than mine or yours.  But I guess old habits, deferring to the executive branch no matter who occupies it, die hard.  

This episode with the new White House Chief of Staff illustrates pretty clearly why leftist voters, among other groups, need a vehicle outside of the Democratic Party in which to register their dissent, i.e., America needs (at least) another political party and/or states' ballot access requirements for independent candidacies need to be made less onerous.  It's maddening enough when the Democratic Party can take certain constituencies' support--leftists, blacks, unionists, gays--for granted b/c those groups have nowhere else to go electorally.  Worse is when the Democratic leadership actually uses their base's ineffectual anger at having enabled or ratified Bush lawbreaking to score points with center/right voters, or, as Emanuel put it, to look more "bipartisan."  

Oh never mind.  kos is right, fuck Ralph Nader. 

curious(?)

A major California theater director decided it would be a good idea to fork over $1,000.00 to the Yes on 8 campaign.  Probably not the best idea professionally.  Sort of like a greyhound track owner donating to Yes on 3 in Massachusetts?  

Or the 43rd President of the United States actively supporting the San Francisco sewage treatment plant ballot proposition (Prop R)?

You want self-destructive?  I'll SHOW you self-destructive!!  I fucking wrote, directed and produced self-destructive, and  then set it to a saccharine and absurdly catchy musical tune!  

Master of the House . . . da, da-da, da-da.. .

can someone please kill dead the "open letter" device, or maybe levy a steep surcharge on each usage?  or at least make it vaguely interesting and/or funny, as opposed to the weepy sentimental crap you usually get with the form that makes me want to claw my eyes out?  it's a device where were it to disappear altogether I'd never fucking miss it for one bloody second.  and for whatever reason, big historic events seem to trigger people's open-letter-writing inner dickwad so that you find a sappy one in every corner of the liberal blogosphere.  

An open letter to open-letter writers

Dear fuckwad,

Please stop.  Now.  

Also, I can't tell you how much this moment in history means to me.  

Please use your unique power and role in world history to do X, Y, and Z (in this case, X Y, and Z being the cessation of the production of any further open letters).  

In closing, please close the book on the open letter.  

Breathlessly, 

J

A dubious Rahmulan

See if you can count all of the things that are wrong with this passage--sort of like Highlights, except perverse and without pictures.  

Kaus:

I admire Rahm Emanuel. Without him welfare reform might not have happened in 1996, and the Dems might not have won back a House majority a decade later. (Two milestones that, I think, are not unconnected--welfare reform made liberal government acceptable again.) Emanuel is smart, relentless, disciplined, gets things done, a winner, all that stuff. But here's my problem with having him as chief of staff: Suppose you work for President Obama. You send a memo up the line to the Oval Office. If a week later Rahm Emanuel tells you he's showed it to the President, would you believe him?

By way of an answer, I should add that among Clinton-era welfare reporters, the rule of thumb was that you called Rahm to get the administration's line and then you called Bruce Reed to find out if it was the truth. ... 

P.S.: But Rahm was not the unnamed Clinton official who foolishly boasted to Michael Kramer, early in the administration, that the Clintonites would "roll" Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Ask Lawrence O'Donnell if you don't believe me. ... 8:57 P.M.

Ironically, most community organizers would know these things.  

Droopy

(updated)

can you imagine how Bush and Rove would be dealing with a, say, Lincoln Chafee or someone like that had he committed the same acts of apostasy Lieberman has? would NOT be pretty, and the near-universal view, both among politicians and the media, would be that he made his bed and now he's got to lay in it.  we're talking broken legs territory here.

but not with Lieberman and the Democrats. He can imply the president-elect is unpatriotic and campaign for at least two Republican senators' reelections and speak at the RNCC and, oh, that's just Joe being Joe. Fine, let Joe be Joe. but why on earth should he get to capitalize on the Democratic majority (chairmanships are available ONLY to the majority party) when he actively campaigned against a Democratic majority? yeah, so he contributed money to the DSCC, but that, in my mind, doesn't nearly make up for his vouching (and raising money for in the first instance) on the campaign trail for Sens. Collins and Coleman. whatever--don't have a dog in that fight -the Ds can run their caucus however they see fit. Just seems pretty fucking stupid to me. and all of this nonsense about conciliation etc. rings pretty hollow after Obama just selected Rahm Emanuel as his COS, a guy who's about as conciliatory as a thumb in your eye.

really this seems to be an odd strategy to engender in the caucus the notion of party loyalty, which, like it or not, is important if you want to get anything done. shouldn't you, as a D leader, want folks to think that there are consequences to betraying the caucus and party? if i'm a member of the caucus and I see Reid deal with this situation in this way, I'm certainly not going to be too concerned with any flak I could get from Reid if, in a moment of political expedience, I'm wavering on whether or not to vote cloture. oddly, in the upside down world that is the Washington D.C. Democrat frame of mind, they seem to be offering Lieberman carrots for his perfidy. MORE STICK PLEASE!

Update:

I was going to say, SEE??!!?!!, but then I caught myself b/c I realized this the national Democratic Party we're talking about here and they've long since become every bit as bad as the Republicans when it comes to pro-Israel propaganda and policy--which is saying a lot. If anything, this'll shore up his support within what's now the Democratic Party mainstream.

John Leonard

I'll really miss his great reviews.  I was always so amazed at how prolific the guy seemed.  With each issue of Harper's he'd have his standard review where he gave his shortish take on three or four new books each month.  Then I'd pick up a copy of the NY Review and he'd have a longish review there.  And then he'd have a review in The Nation one month . . . I don't know where he found all of the time to read all of these books, let along write thoughtful, wide-ranging essays on them.  

I'm sorry nation, my hands are tied here

Leave it to TNR to point to the obvious: Obama picked Emanuel as COS because he had no other choice!  

Isn't it obvious, people, that Americans didn't go to the polls in record numbers to elect Barack Obama president last Tuesday.  Nope.  They went to the polls to elect Rahm Emanuel Chief of Staff of the United States of America.  They had to.  Otherwise altering this one immutable, Calvinistically pre-determined certainty of human history would've brought the earth to a grinding halt on its very axis.  Thank God that didn't happen.  

Don DeLillo blogs about the election.

As good as Alan Dershowitz's!

Well I for one feel a lot better now.  

choosing day

From the Boston Glob:

ELECTION DAY, NOVEMBER, 1884

If I should need to name, O Western World, your powerfulest scene and show,

'Twould not be you, Niagara - nor you, ye limitless prairies - nor your huge rifts of canyons, Colorado,

Nor you, Yosemite - nor Yellowstone, with all its spasmic geyserloops ascending to the skies, appearing and disappearing,

Nor Oregon's white cones - nor Huron's belt of mighty lakes - nor Mississippi's stream:

This seething hemisphere's humanity, as now, I'd name - the still small voice vibrating -America's choosing day,