Currently viewing the tag: "Conservadems"

Evan Bayh Quit Congress Due To Excessive Partisanship… And Now Joins FOX News

by Metavirus on 14 March 2011

Fire BAD! Partisanship GOOD!

Remember our general disgust with Evan Bayh back in January when he decided to (surprise!) become a lobbyist after leaving Congress?

Well sir, it gets worse:

Today, the former senator who decried “strident partisanship” and “unyielding ideology” will be paid by a ridiculous cable news outlet that exists to spew “strident partisanship” and “unyielding ideology.”

Fox News officially announced on Monday afternoon that former Democratic Senator Evan Bayh is becoming a contributor to the network.

Michael Clemente, the network’s senior vice president for news, announced the move in a statement. He said that “Senator Bayh’s decades of experience in the political arena and his participation in key decisions in Washington will lend a valuable point of view to the entire Fox News lineup.”

“I’m pleased to offer analysis of public policy and politics to the millions of Americans who get their news from Fox,” Bayh said in the statement.

Howard Kurtz said it’s “good” for Fox News to hire “a prominent Democrat.” But that’s fundamentally at odds with what’s transpiring here — Fox News hires Democrats who can be reliably counted on to say unpleasant things about Democrats. Why do you think Doug Schoen is on Fox News all the time? Because of his charming smile or because he’s the “Democrat” who hates Democrats?

I realize that politics has always been a heaping portion of manure slathered onto a warm shit sandwich but did politicians ever try to do a better job of hiding their true nature as corrupt, duplicitous assholes?  I mean, at least give it some effort!

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New Facebook Group: "Progressives Against Harold Ford for NY Senator"

by Metavirus on 12 January 2010

Further to my earlier post (Fuck You, Harold Ford, And The Carpet Bag You Rode In On), I set up a new Facebook group called Progressives Against Harold Ford for NY Senator.

If you care about keeping anti-gay-marriage, anti-choice conservadems out of the Senate, sign up today!

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Random Thought On The Public Option "Opt Out"

by Metavirus on 26 October 2009

Here’s a random thought I wrote on Facebook recently about the announcement today that weak little Harry Reid managed to muster what little gumption he still possesses in order to include a public option in the health care reform bill that’s headed for a floor vote in the Senate, which is qualified by the idea of a state “opt-out”:

If it’s an opt out after the program has been in place for a few years, I don’t think there’s even a slim chance that insane wingnut politicians (even in the south) will have the stones to actually affirmatively yank millions of their constituents out of a health care option that’s been made available to them for years.

In my opinion, the opt-out is just a bit of Washington Kabuki to allow corrupt, spineless conservadems to strut and preen like they forced something “responsible” into the bill while all the liberals were off going crazy with wacky ideas like single-payer, communism and what-not.

What do you think?

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Big Majority of Doctors, American People Want Public Option

by Metavirus on 17 September 2009

So let’s see. Poll after poll shows that:

(a) a sizable majority of doctors support the public option:

Doctors support public option_22633.jpg

and, (b) a really sizable majority of the American people want a public option:
Someone tell me again how passing a bill without such a popular provision like this wouldn’t be catastrophic political suicide for the Democrats?

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One Man’s Struggle to Find His Way After the Collapse of the GOP

by Metavirus on 22 April 2009

I can’t recommend this new article by E.D. Kain over at The League of Ordinary Gentlemen enough. In it, Kain struggles to define and outline the contours of what he believes and then find the appropriate label to slap onto it. It’s a struggle that I have also been going through lately (see A Heartfelt Testament from Someone Who Lost Faith in the GOP).

This particular quote resonates most strongly with me:

I guess I don’t consider myself to be “a conservative” but rather consider the “conservative disposition” to be essential to the well-being of society. Oakeshott resonates with me. Limbaugh does not.

After all, I listen to NPR; watch Colbert and Jon Stewart; loathe Fox News; voted for Obama; am critical of Big Business and the military; opposed torture; support gay rights; support legalizing marijuana; can’t stand conservative talk radio; often agree with Andrew Sullivan (who, it should be remembered, is one of the top 25 most influential liberals in America!); and the list goes on and on. I’m pro-life but I’m not ready to ban abortion outright because I don’t think that’s the right way forward…and on top of that I’m pro-contraception. I’m in favor of a progressive tax system because of my belief in a broad middle class which, in a capitalist economy, sometimes requires that most dreaded of sins – redistribution of wealth! (I suppose the Catholic Church and its social teachings make it, too, a socialist organization – one place where the Obama administration and the Church can find common cause in the fairy tale land of Glenn Beck et al) I think the history of Western Civilization is vital to our understanding of the present and future. I think the arts should be preserved. I think our childrens’ education is more important than almost anything else. I think commercialism is more of a threat to our children than rock and roll.

Read the whole article here.

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Conservadems Help Pass Reckless Estate Tax Bill

by Metavirus on 3 April 2009

Up until now the debate over whether the Senate Conservadems would actively try to undermine Barack Obama’s agenda and act to pass financially irresponsible Republican-led legislation was largely academic, as they hadn’t made actual votes in line with their new Conservadem strategy.

Well, the debate is over.

Ten Democratic Senators just voted in favor of a reckless, indefensible and supremely financially irresponsible amendment aimed at slashing the estate tax for a tiny sliver of multimillionaires.

As Think Progress reports:

Sens. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) and Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) recently introduced a $250 billion amendment to slash estate taxes for the heirs of multimillion-dollar estates. Yesterday, the Senate narrowly passed the bill by a 51-48 vote. Joining Republicans in approving the bill were ten Senate Democrats.

As the New York Times explained, under Obama’s budget, “99.8 percent of estates will never — ever — pay a penny of estate tax. The heirs of the remaining 0.2 percent of estates are who Ms. Lincoln and Mr. Kyl are so worried about.”

As I highlighted in an earlier post:
The proverbial millionaires next door — the plumbers, contractors and accountants who amass substantial wealth through hard work and modest living — are not the intended beneficiaries of the proposed cut. The Obama budget already takes care of them, because it retains today’s law, which imposes the estate tax only on couples with property worth more than $7 million, or individuals with property worth more than $3.5 million. That means 99.8 percent of estates will never — ever — pay a penny of estate tax. The heirs of the remaining 0.2 percent of estates are who Ms. Lincoln and Mr. Kyl are so worried about. Their amendment would increase to $10 million the level at which the estate tax kicks in. It would also lower the top estate-tax rate to 35 percent from 45 percent.
At a time of severe economic crisis, the Conservadems chose to voice their support for dumping $250 billion out of the federal coffers to benefit the heirs of the wealthiest of the wealthy in this country.

At least we now know the following Democratic Senators, who will likely be on my shit list for some time, are more interested in protecting the interests of the powerful and wealthy rather than the other 99.8% of the country:

Baucus (D-MT), Bayh (D-IN), Cantwell (D-WA), Landrieu (D-LA), Lincoln (D-AR), Murray (D-WA), Nelson (D-FL), Nelson (D-NE), Pryor (D-AR), Tester (D-MT)
I suggest you write to these fine upstanding Senators to make your opinion heard.

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Senate Dems Cave, Set GOP Up for Filibuster on Energy

by Metavirus on 2 April 2009

Color me cynical but this news out of the Senate raises all kind of red flags for me:

A strong bipartisan majority in the United States Senate took a firm stand in favor of requiring 60 votes to pass any kind of cap and trade legislation…

This is good for Republicans, since it helps them achieve their goal of destroying the planet. And it’s good for Democrats, since it helps them achieve their goal of pretending to try to avoid the destruction of the planet while ensuring that, in practice, the planet is destroyed.[*] And Senators Johanns was born in 1950, so he’ll almost surely be dead by 2050 (along with countless residents of flood-prone areas of the developing world) so it’s basically all good.

The abuse of the filibuster is a huge problem in the Senate that needs to get fixed.

One way to avoid the filibuster is to use the budget reconciliation process, which prevents the minority from invoking a filibuster.

Under President Bush, the Republicans in Congress used and abused the budget reconciliation process to ram down just about anything and everything they wanted (John McCain admitted as much in a speech at the Heritage Foundation).

So, here we stand at a time of great crisis with a rabid, unhinged minority in Congress that has proven itself to be wholly and fundamentally unserious about governing.

Given all that, what do the cynical establishmentarians currently running the Democratic party do?

Yep, they caved and are practically begging the lunatics in the minority to force the country into another failed effort to address things like health care and climate change that so desperately threaten our well-being as a nation their deep-pocketed campaign contributors.

Maybe I’m just in a bad mood today but, well, I can’t shake the feeling that we’re on the road to getting royally fucked.

* – Yes, Yglesias is being imprecise by talking about the “planet being destroyed”. Yes, no one is suggesting the planet will be “destroyed” by climate change. And yes, what he really means is that the quality of human civilization will be negatively impacted.

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