Bully pulpit

By Carl

Interesting poll was put out yesterday by the Associated Press, one that warms my heart a little that maybe this nation is paying attention after all:

NEW YORK (AP) -- Most people still think the country is headed in the wrong direction but a new poll says there are more optimists than before and President Barack Obama's numbers are also on the upswing.

An Associated Press-GfK poll says 56 percent of those surveyed in the past week approve of Obama's job performance, up from 50 percent in September. It's the first time since he took office in January that his rating has gone up.

And those who disapprove of Obama are down to 39 percent, down from 49 percent last month.

While a majority of those surveyed remain pessimistic about the direction of the country, the poll found 41 percent now believe the U.S. is headed in the right direction, compared with 37 percent in September.

Of course, that being a FOX affiliate, you still haven't read the good news:

The latest Associated Press-GfK poll has found that opposition to Obama’s health care remake dropped dramatically in just a matter of weeks. Still, Americans remain divided over complex legislation that Democrats are advancing in Congress.

The public is split 40-40 on supporting or opposing the health care legislation, the poll found. An even split is welcome news for Democrats, a sharp improvement from September, when 49 percent of Americans said they opposed the congressional proposals and just 34 percent supported them.

Anger about health care boiled over during August. Lawmakers returning home for town hall meetings faced outcries that the government was trying to take over the system, ushering in higher costs, lower quality — even rationing and euthanasia.

The key, of course, is that last paragraph.

During the month of August and early September, the astroturfed "Tea Bagger Party" movement made significant inroads in the public dialogue about healthcare by making asses of themselves publicly.

Utilizing the rusty saw "the squeaky wheel gets the grease," these whiny cogs stalked and harassed public officials and raped the public dialogue.

This created an atmosphere where people were not only afraid to speak out in opposition to this brutal patriarchal behavior, but to even agree to abide with it, much like a kidnap victim eventually admires her captors.

No longer, and while I suspected this might turn around, the fact is, it happened so suddenly and with so little reaction from the Obama administration that I began to be concerned if in fact he was getting the point.

I guess he did. Strategically, he must have felt that no one was going to pay attention to him when they were going to the beach or the mountains, but that once he could command a prime time fall television audience, he'd begin to win back the folks who in their hearts want to see the country do better by doing good.

The key to this turnaround has been a full-court press to persuade older Americans that Medicare will not be endangered, and that an extension of Medicare-like coverage to all Americans would not be a bad thing.

Amen.

Too, there's an energy aspect to this strategy: rage usually burns out quickly, leaving a deep-seated sense of embarrassment. Here, I think, is the underpinning to the turnaround in Obama's polling numbers, which sunk as low as Bush's in August 2001.

People just got tired of being angry. Anger is fear and fear is exhausting, and people want Obama to do well (despite the reprehensible and disgraceful cheer that arose when Chicago was eliminated by the IOC).

Too, I think middle Americans watched Glenn Beck all but spew venom with respect to Obama, watched as Tea Baggers all but lynched Obama in effigy (haven't seen that yet, so some credit has to be given the racist contingent), and watched the silliness over Obama's slightest move to relax, and just remembered the Moron-In-Chief who preceded him and said, "Hmmmmm, this is not the side I want to be on."

Kudos, Mr. President. You've done well.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)

"I'm against it"

By J. Kingston Pierce

Finally, a unifying theme song for America's flailing Republican Party, aka "The Party of No." Hit it, Groucho...

(Cross-posted from Limbo.)

Quote of the Day: Tom Shales on David Letterman

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I don't watch Letterman as much as I used to -- in fact, I rarely watch him at all these days, what with Colbert on at 11:30 -- but he's always been, by far, my favourite of the mainstream (network TV) late-night hosts. There just isn't much to say about the blackmail revelation and the admission of affairs with staffers -- he did what he did, he seems genuinely sorry for it, and I'm not going to judge him or his private conduct -- but I think WaPo television critic Tom Shales gets it right in his assessment of Letterman's place in the culture, and of the context of this story:

One of many sad things about recent stanzas in the ballad of David Letterman is that now, in all media, Dave will be lumped in with other sexually misbehaving celebrities, even though he stands head and heart above most of them.

*****

Letterman's misadventures contain potential harm, pain and injustice only for the individuals specifically involved -- and since there have been no allegations about the sex having been nonconsensual or any partners having been underage, it's all unpleasant but hardly some sort of threat to the public welfare.

*****

What Letterman has done, or allowed to happen, is foul up our perception of him by allowing his private self to share air time with Public Dave, the one we know and love -- the wisecracking, self-deprecating, overgrown adolescent who has one of the keenest, cleverest and funniest comic minds of all time.

Agreed. Now let's put this behind us and move on.

The coming (Democratic) victory on health-care reform

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I think TNR's Jon Chait, like his colleague Jon Cohn, has done some fantastic work writing on the health-care reform issue, and one of his latest posts at The Plank is worth quoting in full:

The biggest story in health care reform this year has not been the town hall meetings, or President Obama's big speech on health care. It's that the Senate Democrats have decided they're going to pass a bill. You just haven't heard much about this story because it’s mostly taken place behind closed doors.

Yesterday's Roll Call has some details. Here's what I think is the key passage:

As a fallback, Senate Democratic leaders have stepped up their pressure on centrists to stick with the party on procedural votes. At a minimum, leaders have asked all 60 Democrats to allow them to bring a health care bill to the floor in order to make sure Republicans cannot filibuster it.

Democratic Senate aides familiar with the thinking of Conference moderates said centrists want to vote for a health care reform bill -- even one that is politically problematic -- because it appeals emotionally to their inner Democrat.

A month ago I wrote that it's nearly impossible to see health care reform failing because it would entail a Democrat voting to filibuster the central progressive goal of the last sixty years. That proposition was looking shaky for a while because there were some Democratic Senators who acted as if they actually wanted to kill health care reform. (Hi, Senator Conrad.) But they're all now pretty clearly acting like they really want to pass something.

It's very strange. We've had months of sturm and drang, and massive attention focused on the question, Whither health care reform? It's just quietly turned into a fait accompli.

I hope he's right -- and I think he is. Though I worry about the remaining holdouts -- Nelson, Lincoln, Landrieu, etc. -- I do think Democrats will ultimately pull together to overcome a Republican filibuster, meaning that there will be a vote on the floor on a reform package likely with a public option component (given that Reid seems to be committed to it now).

And I think a lot of this shift has to do with Obama's re-entry into the fray with his address to Congress, as well as, and even more significantly, with his campaigning behind the scenes. Some centrist Democrats may think that coming out against reform benefits them politically, given that they represent heavily red states and need to prove their conservative bona fides to win re-election, but I actually think the reverse is true. Swing voters in their states won't vote against them if they oppose reform, they'll vote against them if Democrats fail, and if Obama fails, that is, if they fail to get things done, notably with respect to health care and the economy. What good would it do for them to campaign essentially on a record of voting against Obama and their own party? Would their constituents actually reward them for that? Unlikely. Much better, it seems to me, to side with Obama and their party, and to hope -- and it's a reasonable hope -- that the economy continues to stabilize (and perhaps begins to show signs of improvement) and that health-care reform (with a public option) proves to be as popular as the polls suggest it might very well be (once people get past the Republican lies and actually understand what's in it for them, and for the country).

What I wonder is how much Obama's huge political machine, the one he built so successfully during the campaign last year, plays into this. Surely these holdouts know that a vote against Obama could be a vote against their very political survival. After all, in return for their support, Obama could unleash his machine in support of them in their re-election efforts. But if they were to vote against the sort of robust reform package Obama seems to want, and that the overwhelming majority of Senate Democrats are pushing for, including the leadership? Do they really want to sacrifice Obama's support, and everything his machine can bring them, just to try to win over some of their Republican-leaning constituents?

But let's not get ahead of ourselves -- or, rather, let's tone down our expectations. Democrats may "want to pass something," but it's not entirely clear what they a) want to pass, and b) will be able to pass. All we have to go on, as of right now, is a lot of talk, a lot of internal party division, and reform proposals, like Baucus's, that are hardly all that desirable.

So while I think Chait is right, and while my optimism is going strong, I still have my nagging doubts. There is still so much to be done, and the opposition is fierce.

Sexism, plain and simple

By Michael J.W. Stickings

According to a new National Republican Congressional Committee press release, referring to Nancy Pelosi, Gen. Stanley McChrystal ought to "put her in her place."

Which means what exactly? That the strong military man ought to ship the uppity woman back to the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, disenfranchised and disempowered?

So it would seem. Why else use that sort of language?

It's a reprehensible and indefensible slur, to be sure, but, as Steve Benen points out, what is also troubling is the actual content of the press release:

[T]he substantive nonsense of the NRCC press release is likely to be overlooked given this ugly condescension towards the House Speaker, but it's worth noting that the Republicans' campaign committee also argued that leading policymakers should simply "listen to a four-star general's assessments" on Afghanistan, and not consider their own judgment.

In other words, what the Republican Party -- and this isn't just some random Republican, it's a party committee -- is saying is that civilian leadership ought to kowtow before the military. Which is, when you think about it, rather un-American.

Or, rather, it ought to do so only when it's Democratic. When it's Bush and Cheney running the show, along with their rubber stampers in Congress, it's fine for civilian leaders to push around the military.

Hypocrisy? Double standard? -- You expected something different?

Breaking the Senate health care deadlock

By Edward Copeland

Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures, and I believe there can be only one, last-ditch solution to shake the U.S. Senate from its torpor, its sense of entitlement, and its addiction to the purse strings of the health insurance industry and other big money lobbyists.

Effective immediately, all members of the Senate must be whisked from D.C. and stripped of their health insurance cards and anything that identifies them as a senator. They will not be allowed to take any aides, cell phones, BlackBerries, etc. Each senator will be flown to an emergency room in a state that is not their own, complaining of nonspecific symptoms and claiming no insurance. They are not allowed to tell who they are or contact their real doctors. Since the majority are well past the prime of life and hospitals love to take tests, odds are they will find something and the senators will be admitted.

These won't be the cushy hospitals they are used to. These will be the types of hospitals real people end up in, where profits are more important than patient care. They can witness first-hand as the understaffed nurses can't answer their buzzes in a timely manner. They can eat what passes for food. They can witness the races for thermometer and blood pressure equipment because everyone has to share and there aren't enough to go around and some time vital signs don't even get taken. They can enjoy being awaken early in the morning for blood tests. They can enjoy the isolation. Maybe it will wake them the fuck up about what a mess health care is in this country while they play their games and worry about re-election. Give them a visit from a staff psychiatrist while they are in the hospital. If the experience hasn't changed them, commit them.

P.S. Any doctors in the Senate can't do any backseat medicine or tell anyone of their profession or we'll place them in a medically induced coma.

Archaeology

By Carl

The Great Wall. The Pyramids. The Louvre.

In a thousand years or so, archaeologists will dig up the remnants of the great culture that was the Third Milennium, and wonder, "What the hell were they thinking?"

We've learned to accept a certain amount of... kitsch...i n our city centers, I suppose. There's a McDonald's across the street from the Empire State Building, as an example, and a block-long shopping center catty-corner to that, with rotating retailers like Victoria's Secret and other mall-centric operations, leading up to Macy's in Herald Square.

Nothing wrong with that. But Pizza Hut and KFC next to the Great Pyramid? That's going to cause some consternation, to be sure.

McDonald's is IN the Louvre, and, in a fit of majestic irony, under the Museum of Communism in Prague. Starbucks next to the Great Wall, and I'm not sure if the irony or the coffee is more bitter.

The best of American culture has become so pervasive that historians will debate whether KFC predated Cheops, or if Starbucks was around in the Mongol uprising.

America was always great at absorbing culture and cuisine. Think about it: those great "American" foods -- the hamburger, the hot dog, pizza -- are all European.

And now we've digested them, repackaged, them, and repurposed them, and sent them on their merry way to infest and infect the rest of the world, so much so that I expect we'll start seeing terror attacks involving fast food restaurants more frequently.

We have in our history symbolized great excess and a squandering of wealth, but now we squander majesty and heritage, as well.

That can't be a good thing.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)

Craziest Republican of the Day: Peter Schiff

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Schiff is the former Ron Paul advisor who's running -- as a Republican, of course -- for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut. And, well, he's rather full of himself:

I'm interrupting my career. It's not like I want my new career in politics. But I'm willing to interrupt it the same way that somebody interrupted their career and joined World War II and went off to fight the Nazis.

Whether he wins or not -- and he'll surely lose -- I'm looking forward to the Spielberg biopic of Schiff's life. Should be a real Saving Private Ryan-ish barnburner, the inspirational tale of one man's fight to defeat the dastardly Democrats.

In related news, I cut my toenails last night and awarded myself a Silver Star for "gallantry in action." (No, I'm not "that heroic," to quote Schiff, but "it's the same principle." Trust me.)

Uncivil war

By Mustang Bobby

Media Matters totes up the number of Republicans and moderate conservatives who are worried that the public might get the wrong idea about them because of the likes of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh:

As Eric Boehlert pointed out earlier today, a significant fissure is opening up on the Right. The increasing influence of extremists like Fox News' Glenn Beck and radio host Rush Limbaugh has shaken more mainstream conservatives who are searching for a new set of leaders -- and the conservative establishment is lashing out. Consider some of the recent comments from prominent conservative media personalities and elected officials:

* Conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks describing Beck, Limbaugh, and radio talker Mark Levin as "loons" who are "harmful for America."

* Former Bush and McCain adviser Mark McKinnon denouncing Levin's "jaw-dropping hate language about the president."

* MSNBC commentator and former Republican Congressman Joe Scarborough blasting Limbaugh's cheers after Chicago lost its Olympic bid: "Republicans have gone off the deep end"

These are just a few examples of a serious trend. Right-wing media figures are now routinely attacking each other's tactics and relevancy. On Friday, Brooks (nonsensically) dedicated an entire column to explaining why conservative media leaders like Beck and Limbaugh are not worthy of attention. He argued that we are once again witnessing "the story of media mavens who claim to represent a hidden majority but who in fact represent a mere niche -- even of the Republican Party." It's a point he made several weeks earlier, when he said that "[i]f the Republican Party is sane, they will say no to these people."

Much as I would like to agree, I think it's a little much to describe this as a "serious trend" for the conservatives; not that they're not over the top on their attacks on President Obama (and I'm still not buying Joe Scarborough's usual tactic of saying that the Democrats were just as bad to President Bush), but that this sort of distancing by the more grown-up members of the conservative community of their misbehaving miscreants is a sign of a fissure in the right wing. It's both a little tepid and a little late, and leaves the impression that they're doing it more out of a sense of obligation rather than a real sense of revulsion for some of the more hateful stuff that gets out there. Of course they're going to say that neither Mr. Beck nor Mr. Limbaugh speak for the party; that would affirm that they don't have anyone in the party that does. But they were all too happy to welcome Rush Limbaugh as an honorary Member of Congress when it suited them.

What I think is really going on here is typical CYA so that when either Glenn Beck goes completely off the deep end or some viewer of his takes up the notion that it is his God-given duty to do something evil to the first black man elected as president, they will be able to say "Hey, we warned you about this and we had nothing to do with it." It's not that they really care about how rotten and uncivil the discourse has gotten; they just don't want to get blamed for it when it leads to an inevitable and tragic climax.

(Cross-posted from Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

Free Tibet! (or at least meet with the Dalai Lama)

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Shame on you, Mr. President.

Why do you continue to reduce human rights to a virtual irrelevance in your foreign policy?

Why do you continue to give your tacit support to China's brutal totalitarian dictatorship? Why do you continue to give in to China's demands, no matter what?

Why do you refuse to meet with the Dalai Lama, one of the greatest and most courageous men of our time?

Is it all about appeasing Beijing? Is it all about dollars and cents? Tell that to the Tibetan people, and to the rest of China's countless victims.

I get realism, I really do. I understand the need to maintain open and strong relations with China. But -- at what cost? At what human cost? At what moral cost?

You don't have to be like your predecessor to stand up for democracy and freedom, for civil and human rights. Surely you can find a way to maintain good relations with China while also expressing your support for Tibet -- and for its leader.

It's time to take a stand. A few carefully worded criticisms now and then aren't enough, and appeasement is no longer an acceptable option.

It won't make China happy, but you should meet with the Dalai Lama, world leader to world leader, and show your commitment to change.

MJWS at HuffPo

By Michael J.W. Stickings

For what it's worth -- and I'm actually pretty excited about it -- I'm now blogging at The Huffington Post. I think I mentioned this a while back, but I finally got around to putting up my first post yesterday.

My first post is cross-posted from here, as many of my posts there will be. It's the one from Sunday on how Obama is pushing for the public option and campaigning for Democratic unity on Capitol Hill. If you want to check it out at HuffPo, here it is.

Also, should you wish to follow me there, here's my HuffPo page. (It includes both my HuffPo posts and my Twitter entries. If you wish to follow me at Twitter, here you go.)

I'll probably do one or two posts there a week. As I say, it's exciting to be part of one of the most important websites around, and one of the most important new media outlets in the world.

Alright, enough about me. Let's get back to the blogging.

Craziest Conservative of the Day: Betsy McCaughey

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I cannot do justice here to Michelle Cottle's excellent article on Betsy McCaughey, one of the leading right-wing voices against health-care reform -- she was against Hillarycare and she's against it now. You may remember her from her embarrassing performance on The Daily Show recently, when Jon Stewart politely, but firmly, exposed as the know-nothing twit she is. She's one of the driving forces behind the whole "death panel" lie, which tells you all you need to know about her principles and priorities. And yet she also seems to be genuinely insane. Some of the critics on the right surely know better, and know that they are spinning misinformation, that they are working, in large part, to manipulate the masses, and their own mob. But McCaughey seems to be a true believer. For her, the lies are the truth, and she doesn't seem to know any better. Just watch the clips (linked to above). Check out her mannerisms, look at her eyes, listen to the utter nonsense spewing from her mouth. She's fucked up crazy. Or so it seems.

Make sure to read Cottle's piece in full.

Ahmadinejad... not Jewish

By Michael J.W. Stickings

So it seems, according to this apparently well-researched piece in The Guardian, that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadmaninejad may not be descended from Jews after all.

So much for the mouth-watering speculation. So much for the possibility, given the man's blistering bigotry, of a ridiculously massive amount of self-loathing, as much as anyone in history has ever exhibited.

Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.

OMG! Just. Go. Away!

By Carl

I'm really getting tired of the collusionary efforts among the mainstream media to sell us pablum and crap WE DON'T NEED TO SEE!

In fact, as a first step in the twelve step program to wean Americans off shit they don't need to focus on, I'm not going to quote a goddamned thing from that link, and will merely tell you it has to do with a certain reality show that is on the ropes because the couple is getting divorced.

And the only reason I even reveal that much is to compare the country's fascination with a couple of losers to the "pout"rage the right wing showed because Barack Obama flew into Copenhagen for four hours to try to salvage the Chicago Olympic bid.

Seriously, some of the twisted-panties crowd on the right were taking umbrage...said umbrage is now all gone...at how Obama was taking his eye off the economy, off the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and other matters of state in order to focus for the briefest of moments on the spectacle of jobs for Chicago.

And yet, here? Nothing. No one would dare criticize the American public for being moronic enough to forget their deliquent mortgages, their lack of health insurance or their jobs dangling by threads all for the sake of feeling superior to people who are one step up from Special Olympians of emotionality.

Indeed, I'd rather the Special Olympics got even half the attention that these two publicity-hungry jackals get!

What is wrong with these people? How can anyone watch this train wreck of a show about a couple who voluntarily decided to drop two litters, and now have to deal with them?

Mind you, this is a show in prime time, which means there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions of parents, neglecting the raising of their own kids to be mindlessly entertained by clown car television.

Now Jon and Kate are divorced, a bit quickly in my book given the number of kids involved, and things have gone from embarassing to disgraceful.

Look, there are hundreds or maybe thousands of families who are in similar situations: multiple children, divorce, and struggling to put even $200 in the bank, much less $200,000. Where are their stories? Will Jon and Kate donate the money they've earned to some fund to help the poor families that they are, in absentia, exploiting?

But soft, no, we must pick on the President for trying to improve the nation as we pick at the bones and carcass of a family that had no right being invited into our living rooms in the first place.

I don't mind that TLC has seen fit to take off its mask of being "The Learning Channel" and started showing the most hideous television programs about families and family life ever. But God forbid TLC spend one minute talking about the costs of being un- or underinsured on a family. God forbid they should follow the struggles of a family in a realistic situation: the loss of a job, a catastrophic illness, a divorce, bankruptcy.

You want reality? There's reality! How does a family cope when the breadwinner has a heart attack and can't survive on disability? We did it, when my dad had his heart attack, and I cut back on my college educmacaychun in order to bring some money into the house. And I know I was not alone in this.

And what is this need Americans have to feel so superior to other Americans? We all do it, right, left, South, North, Texans especially! WTF up with that, huh?

We're all in this together, and we can't move a ship of state forward if we're all pulling in different directions.

(crossposted to Simply Left Behind)

Smartest Conservative of the Day: David Brooks (for being against conservative anti-Olympic fever)

By Michael J.W. Stickings

For saying this about Obama's efforts to bring the Olympics to Chicago on Meet the Press yesterday:

I have to say, I’m with Obama on this. He took a risk, he comes away somewhat humiliated, but he took a risk for his town, he took a risk for his country, he put his country ahead of his own personal prestige, and he lost one. I actually don't mind it. I think he was all right on this.

I object to Brooks's suggestion that Obama "comes away somewhat humiliated" -- he tried and the effort failed, but not necessarily because of him, and there is no humiliation in losing when the Olympics are concerned (more on this below) -- but, overall, I praise Brooks for coming out in opposition on this issue to so many of his fellow conservatives, including his former Weekly Standard colleagues Bill Kristol and Fred Barnes. (He even agreed, more or less, with fellow MTP panelist Rachel Maddow, who said this: "For them to be cheering America's loss here on the right, I think is sort of disgusting." Because, as she rightly pointed out, other world leaders, including Blair and Putin, have campaigned for the Olympics. This time, "all four finalists sent their head of government or head of state to make the argument.")

Kristol, on Fox News yesterday, accused Obama of bullying the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and he was "amused" by his failure, but of course Obama did no such thing. At The Weekly Standard, meanwhile, where he and Kristol are editors, Barnes pointed to "Obama's embarrassing failure in Copenhagen":

[W]hen an American president voluntarily takes up a fight and loses badly, it's a big deal. Obama could have stayed out. Having the summer Olympics in Chicago doesn't involve the national interest. But he thought the matter important enough to fly to Denmark and make the pitch for his hometown in person. He put his prestige on the line, only to be slapped down.

This is also ridiculous. Obama didn't lose badly. Chicago's bid lost out to Rio de Janeiro's. It would be one thing if Obama had gone to the U.N. and, say, been refused support on a key matter. In this case, he just did what so many other world leaders have done, and do, and only one city, only one big, can win at a time. Did the Chicago bid "involve the national interest"? Maybe not, strictly speaking, but what it against the national interest? No, not at all. There have been financial disasters in Olympic history, like Montreal '76 (my hometown, originally), but for the most part having the Olympics is a matter of national pride, an opportunity for the home city, and country, to showcase its best while the world is watching. (We Canadians are certainly excited about the upcoming Winter Games in Vancouver.) Besides, it's not always about financial gain -- though, in the long run, it may well be that having the Olympics is a fantastic investment in a city's, and country's, future.

Getting back to Barnes, it is simply not true that Obama was "slapped down." He supported Chicago's bid, but the vote in Copenhagen wasn't a referendum on Obama. Furthermore, given the IOC's reputation for, and long history of, corruption and insider politics, is there anything wrong with losing such a vote? As much as a city, as well as a country, may want the Olympics, the IOC has its own priorities, and winning has to do with trade-offs and quid pro quos among IOC members at least as much as it does with the actual merits of a bid. Toronto, for example, lost out on the 2008 Summer Games to Beijing. Was that an embarrassment for Toronto, a great loss for Canada. Were we "slapped down"? No. Beijing won because the IOC wanted the Games to be in China, a huge market. Forget that Toronto is an open, diverse, cosmopolitan city. Forget that China is a brutal totalitarian dictatorship. The IOC got what it wanted, and China got its reward. So it's a bit rich and rather disingenuous for these conservatives to be suggesting that an IOC vote is somehow a significant indicator of world opinion -- and that Chicago's loss was Obama's great embarrassment.

Steve Benen (quoting Paul Krugman) is right: "[A]s a political matter, in light of [the] right-wing ecstasy over Chicago not getting the Olympics, Paul Krugman concluded, 'Middle-aged adolescents -- dumb middle-aged adolescents -- rule one of our nation's two great political parties.' Sad, but true."

If there's anything embarrassing, and utterly repellent, it's the right-wing "glee," as Benen put it, over America's failure to win the 2016 Summer Games. Clearly, among conservatives, with one or two exceptions, party and ideology come before country. And they dare call themselves patriots?

Top Ten Cloves: Things that might have happened to Ted Williams' head

By J. Thomas Duffy

News Item: New book alleges Alcor mistreatment of Ted Williams' severed head

10. Had it riding atop the Roomba, but kept falling off

9. Just started bashing things, in anger, after hearing Chicago lost out on 2016 Olympics

8. Goofing off with tuna can stuck to head -- made like Starkist commercial, but used punchline, saying "Sorry, Teddy"

7. Cinco de Mayo, were stuck for a pinata

6. Got kicked, and stepped on, practising routine for new show: "Dancing with the Stars' Heads"

5. Needed something to bang the spigot into the keg

4. Rented out to local minor league baseball team for fungo practice

3. "There's no Cryonics in baseball ... There's no Cryonics in baseball! ..."

2. Pitted Williams' Head against Timex watch ... Timex watch still ticking

1. Let's just say that Ted Williams wasn't the last .400 hitter ... You know what I mean ...




(Cross-posted at The Garlic.)

Obama pushes for public option, campaigns to unite Democrats behind meaningful reform

By Michael J.W. Stickings

When President Obama took hold of, and asserted leadership over, the health-care debate last month with his address to a joint session of Congress, I argued that his speech needed to be "the start of a new chapter in the fight for equitable health care in America," as well as "the start of a public awareness campaign to make sure that Americans understand the truth about the plan without being misled by the distortions of its opponents, "the start of a concerted effort on the part of Democrats to pull together to get this done."

In short, what the president and other leading proponents of reform needed to do was both to boost public support for reform (as well as for the public option) by contrasting the truth with Republican lies and to unite Democrats behind a reform package that will bring meaningful change to America's dysfunctional and unjust health-care system. Obama, for his part, needed to engage in a serious, concerted public awareness effort and, on Capitol Hill, to twist some arms. Without him, and without his leadership, Democrats seem incapable of getting anything done.

The public awareness effort continues -- and, with it, solid poll numbers in support of a public option of some kind. And, it seems, the arm-twisting is well underway, too, as the Chicago Tribune reports:

Despite months of seeming ambivalence about creating a government health insurance plan, the Obama White House has launched an intensifying behind-the-scenes campaign to get divided Senate Democrats to take up some version of the idea in the weeks just ahead.

President Barack Obama has long advocated a so-called public option, while at the same time repeatedly expressing openness to other ways to offer consumers a potentially more affordable alternative to health plans sold by private insurers.

But now, senior administration officials are holding private meetings almost daily at the Capitol with senior Democratic staff to discuss ways to include a version of the public plan in the health care bill that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., plans to bring to the Senate floor later this month, according to senior Democratic congressional aides.

Among those regularly in the meetings are Obama's top health care adviser, Nancy-Ann DeParle, aides to Reid, and Senate finance and health committee staff, both of which developed health care bills.

At the same time, Obama has been reaching out personally to rank-and-file Senate Democrats, telephoning more than a dozen lawmakers in the last week to press the case for action.

Administration officials are also distributing talking points and employing other campaign-style devices to rally support for passing a bill this fall.

The White House initiative, unfolding largely out of public view, follows months in which the president appeared to defer to senior lawmakers on Capitol Hill as they labored to put together gargantuan health care bills.

It also marks a critical test of Obama's command of the inside game in Washington in which deals are struck behind closed doors and wavering lawmakers are cajoled and pressured into supporting major legislation.

To me, the "seeming ambivalence" was part of the plan all along. As I put it here, responding to a Frank Rich column on Obama's supposed "squandered summer, Obama reached out to Republicans in the spirit of bipartisanship, and seemed to back Democratic efforts for put together a reform package with at least some Republican support, but must have known what was coming: Republicans, including the three Gang of Six "moderates," showed that they weren't serious about meaningful reform, coming out either against it altogether or in favor of such concessions as to water it down significantly, to the point of near-meaninglessness. Meanwhile, the right-wing opponents of reform, from the punditocracy down to the mob, descended ever further into "death panel" madness. Obama is a smart guy. Surely he anticipated this. He must have known all along that reform would require united Democratic support. (Any Republican support on top, however unlikely, would just be a bonus.) Indeed, the main obstacle to passing meaningful reform is not Republican opposition/obstructionism but Democratic disunity. Divided, the Democrats are stuck and reform is doomed to watered-down compromise; united, they can make it happen for the good of the country.

What is clear now, it seems, is that President Obama is not just fully engaged but fully in command, assuming the leadership role that is his. And I think there may just be meaningful reform because of it -- as long as Democrats can put aside their differences and unite to do what is right.

Truth in Comics

By Creature



If it's Sunday, it's Truth in Comics.

Moby: "Pale Horses"

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I love Moby. I really do. I used to be into the whole ambient electronica thing, and I still am, sort of, but Moby, of course, is one artist who can't be labelled quite so easily. It's techno, it's pop, it's rock, it's... well, you know, it's whatever Moby wants it to be.

Play remains for me a seminal album, a defining album of a certain time in my life, a musical trip. 18 is also very good, as are Hotel, if somewhat meandering, and Last Night, a fascinating tour through the New York musical (club) scene, if, like Hotel, disappointing in terms of sales. (These are only his most recent albums. He did much more before Play turned him into a mainstream success, and much of his early, distinctly less commercial, music is wonderful, too.)

But Wait for Me... oh, yes. I downloaded it shortly after its release and remember vividly what I thought -- and felt -- upon first listening to it. A brilliant, mesmerizing masterpiece, perhaps the most thematically coherent work of Moby's career, it's one of those albums you just lose yourself in, an album that continues to reward with each listening. I feel it through my entire body, and it reaches into my soul. I can't even explain why. It just does. I find it deeply moving, and it takes me -- like some of Play and 18 -- to an astonishing emotional depth, a place where I am, and am compelled to be, open with myself about myself in a genuinely meaningful way.

Here is the video for "Pale Horses," one of the stand-out tracks (and there are many of them) on Wait for Me -- a beautiful video for a beautiful piece of music:

Fontaine

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I first came across Fontaine Weyman, who goes by "Fontaine," at Radio Paradise, oh, a couple of years ago. It was her song "Running on Empty," from her debut album The Chemistry Between Us, and it was wonderful, a combination, I thought, of Mazzy Star and the Cowboy Junkies, and I became an instant fan. I couldn't find The Chemistry Between Us anywhere, though I didn't look all that hard (I'm sure I could have ordered it), but now, at long last, I found it, along with her second album, Beautiful Thing, released earlier this year, at iTunes, and it has been in heavy rotation on my iPod.

She's a lovely songwriter, with astonishing depth to her music. Her music is slow, and moody, and evocative. She was born in France but grew up in South Carolina (she's now based in L.A.), and there's a haunting, if thankfully not overpowering, southern lilt to her intoxicating, comforting voice, a pleasantly rich and sultry tone. And there is an admirable honesty about her, I find. Her lyrics don't break any new ground, but she sings with soul, and conviction -- again, much like Margo Timmins of the Cowboy Junkies -- and she is, unfailingly, genre-denying, a fusion, of sorts, of alt-country indie folk roots.

She isn't all that well-known, alas, but deserves to be, and I highly recommend that you check out either or both of her albums. As a taste, here's the video for "Paris, Texas," off The Chemistry Between Us. Enjoy.

Unemployment at 9.8%

By Creature

Buy, hey, Wall Street's doing fine so who gives a crap.

Is John Boehner an ignorant fool or a liar (or both)?

By Michael J.W. Stickings

He's our Craziest Republican of the Day for saying this:

I'm still trying to find the first American to talk to who's in favor of the public option, other than a member of Congress or the administration... I've not talked to one and I get to a lot of places... This is about as unpopular as a garlic milkshake.

Of course, polls show solid support for a public option -- remember, it would be an option, not a nationalized health-care system, and it's choice that people want.

But, really, Boner hasn't met a single person beyond the Beltway who supports it? I get that political speech is often hyperbolic, but this is either an out-and-out lie or a statement only a totally ignorant fool could make.

He's the Republican leader in the House, for fuck's sake. Someone needs to introduce him to reality, though I suspect that he's surrounded by a similarly delusional, and similarly dishonest, echo chamber of head-bobbing insanity.

Long live the public option! (revisted)

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Allow me to post Kevin Drum's Chart of the Day:

And here's Kevin's take:

In case you missed it, Jon Stewart had a good riff on this [the other] night. His question: Why are Democrats so lame? It's a good one! They have a huge majority in the Senate, the public is strongly in favor of a public option, and yet... for some reason they can't round up the votes to pass it. Hell, they can't even round up a normal majority to pass it out of the Finance Committee, let alone a supermajority to overcome an eventual filibuster.

If Democrats really do lose the House next year..., this will be why. If they don't pass a healthcare bill at all, they'll be viewed as terminally lame. If they pass a bill, but it doesn't contain popular features that people want — like the public option — they'll be viewed as terminally lame. At a wonk level, a bill without a public option can be perfectly good. But wonks aren't a large voting bloc, and among people who do vote, the public option is very popular. So, um, why not pass it?

Exactly. (I don't think that a bill without a public option can be perfectly good, but I take the point.) There's no excuse.

Chicago Loses Bid for 2016 Olympics

By Creature

And the shame and failure brought upon the nation by President Obama for having tried and failed will cripple his presidency. Or something.

Common decency and the rule of law v. Roman Polanski and the Hollywood elite

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I think Ed Morrissey is right, more or less, that a "Left-Right consensus" is "building on Polanski." I say more or less because I think that formulation oversimplifies the situation somewhat. It isn't so much that both liberals and conservatives are coming out against Polanski and his apologists, it's that pretty much everyone with a modicum of common decency and respect for the rule of law thinks that Polanski ought to get what he deserves, which is, in some form, punishment for his crime. (Still, make sure to read Ed's post in full. It is typically insightful.)

**********

As for Polanski's apologists, check out Katha Pollitt's fine piece at The Nation, which includes:

If a rapist escapes justice for long enough, should the world hand him a get-out-of-jail-free card? If you're Roman Polanski, world-famous director, a lot of famous and gifted people think the answer is yes.

*****

Fact: What happened was not some gray, vague he said/she said Katie-Roiphe-style "bad sex." A 43-year-old man got a 13-year-old girl alone, got her drunk, gave her a quaalude, and, after checking the date of her period, anally raped her, twice, while she protested; she submitted, she told the grand jury "because I was afraid."

*****

Fact: In February 2008, LA Superior Court Judge Peter Espinosa ruled that Polanski can challenge his conviction. All he has to do is come to the United States and subject himself to the rule of law. Why is that unfair? Were he not a world-famous director with boatloads of powerful friends, but just a regular convicted sex criminal who had fled abroad, would anyone think it was asking too much that he should go through the same formal process as anyone else?

*****

The widespread support for Polanski shows the liberal cultural elite at its preening, fatuous worst. They may make great movies, write great books, and design beautiful things, they may have lots of noble humanitarian ideas and care, in the abstract, about all the right principles: equality under the law, for example. But in this case, they're just the white culture-class counterpart of hip-hop fans who stood by R. Kelly and Chris Brown and of sports fans who automatically support their favorite athletes when they're accused of beating their wives and raping hotel workers.

Yes, it has taken Roman Polanski, a 30-year-old sex crime case, and a bunch of "preening, fatuous" Hollywood types to bring not just right (Morrissey) and left (Pollitt) together, but to unite Americans, and people around the world, in common cause.

Don't get me wrong, Polanski has his supporters beyond the circle of his cinematic pals (many of whom I admire as artists), but, increasingly, as the facts, many of them long forgotten, emerge once more into public view, for all to judge, most of the rest of us are just disgusted, and are demanding justice.

**********

Mr. Polanski, come back to America, and defend yourself. If you were wronged, prove it. I, for one, will surely have an open mind. But if you weren't, and you really did what you are alleged to have done, and for which you were convicted, then challenge whatever you like in a court of law and, ultimately, accept responsibility for your crime.

**********

See my previous posts on the Polanski saga:

-- The truth about Roman Polanski;

-- Defending Polanski; or, how the Hollywood left has completely lost its marbles; and

-- Polanski, the French, and the backlash against the rape apologists.

Mandate with a public option, please

By Creature

Senate Majority Leader Olympia Snowe:

“The obligation should be first and foremost on the United States government to ensure that these plans will be affordable in the marketplace,” Ms. Snowe said. “It surprises me that we would have these high-level penalties on the average American when we have no certainty about whether or not these plans will be affordable. I just don’t understand why there’s this impetus to punish people.

Snowe wants certainty on affordability, yet voted against a public option that would surely guarantee exactly that. Head meet wall. Repeat.

Becklash

By Mustang Bobby.

David Brooks laments that Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh are getting all the attention as the voices of the conservatives.

The Republican Party is unpopular because it’s more interested in pleasing Rush’s ghosts than actual people. The party is leaderless right now because nobody has the guts to step outside the rigid parameters enforced by the radio jocks and create a new party identity. The party is losing because it has adopted a radio entertainer’s niche-building strategy, while abandoning the politician’s coalition-building strategy.

The rise of Beck, Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and the rest has correlated almost perfectly with the decline of the G.O.P. But it’s not because the talk jocks have real power. It’s because they have illusory power, because Republicans hear the media mythology and fall for it every time.

As fond of history that Mr. Brooks is, I'm a bit surprised that he traces the death grip of talk jocks on the Republicans only back to the beginning of the last election cycle. It goes a lot further back than that; the recent cycle is only the latest example of fools rushing in to fill the leadership void on the right, going back to the end of the Reagan administration and their desperate search for someone as dominating, uniting, and mythical as Mr. Reagan was. Like him or not, he was the last real leader from the Right, and everyone who has tried to take the role -- Newt Gingrich, George W. Bush, John McCain, Mitt Romney, just to name a few -- has either fallen short or ended up doing more harm than good to their cause. But it's hard to replace a legend. (By the way, the Democrats haven't been immune to this, either; they spent a lot of losing election cycles searching for the next FDR or JFK.)

The problem for the Republicans and the conservatives is that they have cultivated and encouraged these kinds of stark gloom-and-doom oh-god-we're-all-gonna-die prophets, and their political philosophy has played into it: they are so convinced of their bumper-sticker ("Abortion Is Murder", "Where's the Birth Certificate?", "God Created Adam and Eve, Not Adam and Steve") rightness that anyone who doubts them is suspected of treason or insanity. The liberals have their own hard-core, but they have never had as much power over their side; progressives are much more prone to compromise (or caving) than conservatives. Thus we have Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh on the radio 24/7, while the Left has a rumpled Michael Moore coming along every three years with a documentary. (This has historical antecedents; in the 1930's the right wing had Father Coughlin while the left countered with Upton Sinclair. Guess who got more attention.) It isn't the message so much as it is the delivery. As Matthew Yglesias points out, the reason Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) got so much attention for his "Die Quickly!" speech on the floor of the House was because he stole the Republicans' playbook.

Just because someone like Rush Limbaugh is capable of making a lot of noise doesn't mean he can make a difference or sway the electorate. If you are going to turn politics into entertainment, you have to understand that show business may obsess about ratings and box office take, but you should never mistake them as affirming for intellect or art. Hollywood makes blockbusters like Transformers so that they can also make Julie & Julia, but they don't confuse the one with the other. (Were that not the case, Police Academy would have walked away with thirteen Oscars and Schindler's List would never have been made.) It's a lesson that seems to be lost on the conservatives. Steven F. Hayward, author of The Age of Reagan, worries that the intellectuals have left the party, leaving the birthers in charge and Glenn Beck in place of William F. Buckley.

Okay, so Beck may lack Buckley's urbanity, and his show will never be confused with "Firing Line." But he's on to something with his interest in serious analysis of liberalism's patrimony. The left is enraged with Beck's scandal-mongering over Van Jones and ACORN, but they have no idea that he poses a much bigger threat than that. If more conservative talkers took up the theme of challenging liberalism's bedrock assumptions the way Beck does from time to time, liberals would have to defend their problematic premises more often.

As long as Glenn Beck continues to misspell words like "oligarchy" and holds up a tin of snuff to make a point about the president promoting the Chicago Olympics, I don't think the liberals have a lot to worry about in terms of defending their premises, problematic or not. That's too bad; ideas and intellect flourish in a challenging environment. But as the saying goes, it's useless to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent.

(Cross-posted from Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

Long live the public option!

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Sen. Tom Harkin: "We will have a bill on the president's desk before Christmas, a health-reform bill. It will have a lot of good stuff in it. It will have a lot of prevention and wellness programs in there that I've been fighting for. And it will have a public option... The question of if it doesn't isn't even an option."

Plus, Republicans won't be involved in putting a bill together: "This will be a proposal by the Democrats to bring a bill on the floor. And that's what I have said before, that the people of this country... pretty overwhelmingly elected Barack Obama last fall and to make changes. The people of this country overwhelmingly elected Democrats to the House and Senate... We should be proposing the changes to be made."

**********

Sen. Harry Reid: "We are going to have a public option before this bill goes to the president's desk... believe the public option is so vitally important to create a level playing field and prevent the insurance companies from taking advantage of us."

The two comments sound very much the same, suggesting that both Harkin and Reid were uttering talking points. Still, this is a very promising development. As many of us have been saying for a long time, Republicans had their chance. Obama reached to them, as did Senate Democrats. And how did they respond? With obstructionism or outright opposition, because they have no interest in reform and are trying to block it no matter what. And so, of course, it makes sense for Democrats now to go it alone, with or without the few remaining Republican centrists.

It sounds to me, though, like there is now a firm commitment to including a public option in whatever bill goes to the floor. There's really no way Democrats can back away from it now -- their own leader, Reid, has committed to it. But will the bill that ultimately emerges from Congress include a public option? Well, that's the key question. And it's still not clear what the answer is. I certainly hope Harkin is right.

More puny poutrage

By Carl

Glenn Beck ought to try poutine. It might make his memory better:

Last night Fox News continued its disregard for the facts in an attempt to smear the Administration's efforts to win the Olympics for the United States. In the past, hosting the Olympics has been a source of pride and unity for the country, but once again Fox News' Glenn Beck program has shown that nothing is worthy of respect if it can be used as part of a partisan attack to boost ratings.

At the White House blog, there is a list of misstatements and outright lies Beck told just Tuesday night.

Let me add one more: Beck, aided and feloniously abetted by the rest of the rubber-lipped goon squad (e.g., Michelle Malkin, among others), has been outraged that Barack Obama would go to Copenhagen to make the case for the Olympics to come to Chicago, his hometown.

Yet, strangely silent he was when George W. Bush was vacationing in Crawford, TX (I hesitate to say he was ranching) in August 2005 when Katrina hit and 250,000 people were stranded for days without adequate food, water, or shelter.

Even more strange, he had nothing to say about Bush's extended vacation in the summer of 2001, when he was shown a PDB warning that Al Qaeda was imminently to attack Americans on American soil, likely using commercial aircraft.

Indeed, he came to church on Bush in the last few months of the Bush term, finally speaking out against the massive bank bailout... which he supported just days earlier!

The sense I get from the right wing this month is, they've lost the battle on healthcare reform, lost the battle on economic stimulus, lost the battle on government aid for banks and the auto industry, and are faced with having to find some way to attack what appears to be a rock-solid wall around the Obama castle.

By flinging mud, or worse.

And when you fling mud, two things happen to a large wall:

1) Nothing.

2) It back-splatters back all over you.

The past few years have seen the decline of the heavyweights of right-wing punditry: Rush Limbaugh was shown to be a power-craved madman who would tear apart the GOP for his own ego. He was quickly muted. Ann Coulter was shown to be a whiny-voiced harridan who would attack anyone for a buck. She was quickly muted. Michelle Malkin was shown to be a hypocritical fussbudget with a counter-top obsession and a need to punish innocent children. She was quickly muted.

Into the void has stepped Glenn Beck. He will undoubtedly meet the same fate.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)

Yes, conservatives really do worship Ayn Rand

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Many conservatives, including those at Dick Armey's FreedomWorks. Here's TNR's Jon Chait, following up on his excellent book review (of two new books on Rand) from a couple of weeks ago (about which I posted here):

It's certainly true that Rand did not intend her ideas as a blanket defense of the rich in all their forms.

*****

The problem is that, even in Rand's time, her ideas were largely taken by the rich as a blanket defense of wealth and privilege.

*****

My review focused on the real-world impact Rand's ideas have had. There is a large and influential strand of thought on the right which holds wealth to be a sign of virtue and redistribution from rich to poor the most evil thing a government can do. It may not be a precise translation of Rand's ideology, but it's a pretty decent facsimile. The actual influence Rand exerts on the world comes in the form of people like Dick Armey working to protect the interests of the actual rich, not just those rich who meet the ideal of the imaginary Randian hero.

Conservatives can pretend they're not Randian all they want, and Randians can try to distance themselves from conservatism as much as they please, but the reality of the (intimate) relationship is pretty clear.

The Grand Insurrection Party and the politics of treaon

By (O)CT(O)PUS

When does political hyperbole rise to the level of treason? That is my question for today.

First, it started with the Birthers, those who sought to undermine the legitimacy of a newly-elected president with fabricated conspiracy theories about the authenticity of his birth certificate and the legality of his presidency.

Next came the Tea Baggers, followed by the town hall hooligans, followed by gun-toting thugs at presidential rallies, followed GOP Congressman Joe Wilson's outburst of "Liar!" before a special session of Congress, followed by GOP Congresswomen Michelle Bachmann calling for armed resistance against Obama's legislative agenda, followed by GOP Congressman Trent Franks threatening a Birther lawsuit against Obama and calling him an "enemy of humanity," followed by GOP Governor Rick Perry calling for Texas to secede from the union, followed by Newsmax columnist John Perry dreaming of a military coup against President Obama, followed by a Facebook poll asking: "Should Obama be killed?" Get the picture?

For months, we have heard the repeating rhythms of Obama the Communist, Obama the Socialist, Obama the Islamofascist, Obama the Jihadist … and the steady and relentless drumbeats of a GOP run amuck driving us towards civil disorder and insurrection.

There was a time when the party out of power was termed the Loyal Opposition. We called them "loyal" because there was always a tacit assumption that the losing party would accept the results of a fair and decisive election, would always accede to the will of the people, would recognize traditional standards of civility and protocol, and always play by the rules. No longer.

The party out of power has devolved from the Loyal Opposition Party to the Oppositional-Defiant Party, and now to the Grand Insurrection Party. The time-honored art of political compromise and consensus is dead. The GOP has withdrawn from participatory democracy.

Samuel Johnson once said: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." Your humble Octopus disagrees. The U.S. Constitution affords plenty of mud-wiggle room for scoundrels. If patriotism is the first refuge, the First Amendment is the next, where cowards assert their bigotry and stupidity by saying anything they want under Constitutional protection, or so they think. The Second Amendment offers yet another refuge: When reason and civil discourse fail, the malcontents and misfits of the GOP invoke this Amendment to incite others to violence by proxy, or so they think. The fear-mongering, hate-mongering scoundrels of the GOP overlook a fundamental point.

We have the same rights. We won the last two elections. We have a mandate to reverse the failed policies of the GOP whether they like it or not. With each passing day, the GOP has pushed political discourse beyond the fringes of civilization, and the time is long overdue to hold them accountable before more people get killed. I will defend my politics, my principles, and my person with words as I must and with arms (all eight of them) as necessary. Octopus hath spoken.

(Cross-posted at The Swash Zone.)

Two peas in a pod

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Should we be surprised that Palin's Going Rogue ghost-writer, Lynn Vincent, is a partisan Republican, "very conservative," a right-wing Evangelical, and completely insane?

I think not.

More Grayson

By Creature

It's just too damn refreshing not to post.



Contribute to Grayson here.

Polanski, the French, and the backlash against the rape apologists

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Even the French are backing away from their initial support for Roman Polanski (and opposition to his arrest). Foreign Minister (and celebrated leftist intellectual) Bernard Kouchner, along with Polish Foreign Minister (and husband of WaPo columnist and Polanski apologist Anne Applebaum), had called for Polanski to be released, but the French government now insists that "[w]e have a judicial procedure under way, for a serious affair, the rape of a minor, on which the American and Swiss legal systems are doing their job."

Good for the French. (For more on the French reaction to Polanski's arrest, see Ed Morrissey at Hot Air.)

Meanwhile, Polanski has support not just in the international cinematic community but in Washington as well. I suspect there will be a concerted campaign to pressure U.S. authorities, from Hillary and Holder on down, to leave Polanski be. In fact, it's already begun. But there's a little thing known as the rule of law to consider, and Obama isn't about to issue a pardon. So unless the Swiss release Polanski on their own, and unless Polanski is allowed to return to France, isn't extradition an inevitability? What legal leg does Polanski have to stand on?

(And then what? As I've written before, I'm not sure Polanski should be imprisoned, belatedly, for his crime. Perhaps there is some other suitable punishment that could be meted out?)

What is refreshing is that there has been a strong backlash against Polanski's apologists, including the appalling Whoopi Goldberg, who claimed the other day that what Polanski did was "rape," not "rape-rape." (Which, as TNR's Chris Orr notes, is true in a legal sense, as Polanski pled down to a lower crime, but certainly not in any real sense, given the facts of the case, let alone in a moral sense.)

By the way, make sure to read the NYT editorial on the case: "[W]here is the injustice in bringing to justice someone who pleads guilty to statutory rape and then goes on the lam, no matter how talented he may be?"

For more, see my two previous posts on Polanski:

-- The truth about Roman Polanski; and

-- Defending Polanski; or, how the Hollywood left has completely lost its marbles.