Jack & Jill Politics

U.S. President Barack Obama winks alongside Senegal’s President Abdoulaye Wade during a G8 session with African Outreach leaders at the G8 Summit at the Deerhurst Resort in Huntsville, Ontario, Canada, Friday, June 25, 2010.
—-AP Photo/Jason Reed, Pool

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I’ve been watching the Elena Kagan Supreme Court hearings with only mild interest. I mean, we all know she’s gonna get confirmed. She’s lived a pretty careful life with a carefully steered career and is well-qualified for the job. After all, this is not a woman who has fought super-hard for racial justice. The BlackProf, Dr. Boyce Watkins, is on it (From TheLoop21):

First, Kagan doesn’t seem to value the act of actually hiring black people. During her tenure as Dean of the Harvard Law School, Kagan hired 29 tenured or tenure track faculty with 28 of them being white men. The other person was Asian. Not one single hire was Black, Native American or Latino. [...]

Secondly, the late Dorothy Height mentioned to President Obama before she died that it was time to allow a black woman to show her face on the highest court in the land. In the 211 years of the Supreme Court’s existence, no black woman has ever had a chance to have the same opportunity that has been offered to scores of white males.

Furthermore, the Congressional Black Caucus according to Watkins also has some questions for Kagan. It says something of the stretch of  road still to travel that none of the senators who will question Kagan during her hearings will be black or Latino. From BlackVoices:

Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), the chairwoman of the CBC and Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), chairwoman of the CBC Judicial Nominations Taskforce, have proposed five questions for Kagan during her hearings. Lee and Holmes-Norton also issued the following statement:

“The Congressional Black Caucus believes that Elena Kagan possesses outstanding academic and professional credentials, and applauds President Obama for nominating a person who understands the real-world consequences of judicial decisions. However, the CBC has questions about the nominee’s views on issues of particular importance to African Americans.”

Their questions are as follows:

1. In a 1997 memorandum to President Clinton, you supported reducing the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine to 10:1. Do you support eliminating the sentencing disparity?

2. In a case pending before the Supreme Court in 1997, Piscataway Bd. of Education v. Taxman, in which a school district used its affirmative action policy to lay off a white teacher instead of a black teacher with the same seniority, the then-solicitor general wrote a memo that suggested filing a brief arguing that the teacher should not have been laid off in this particular case, and that if the court adopted this position, it would not have to address whether Title VII “always precludes non-remedial affirmative action.” You wrote on that memo, “I think this is exactly the right position — as a legal matter, as a policy matter, and as a political matter.” Are race-based remedies ever permissible? If left to you alone, would you have applied the “mend it, don’t end it” affirmative action policy to race-neutral remedies only?

3. Please explain why you apparently opposed the formation of a commission on race by President Clinton during his second term.

4. During your tenure as dean of Harvard Law School, the law school faculty grew by almost 50 percent, with the hiring of 43 full-time faculty, including 32 tenured or tenure track. Of those 32, please explain why only one minority, an Asian American, and only seven women were hired, and, of the 11 non-tenure-track faculty, why only three minorities — two black and one Indian — and only two women were hired.

5. While dean, you apparently offered faculty positions to several minority candidates who turned down the offers. How many were African American?

I’m not hating on Elena Kagan as much as Watkins. I’m sure she’ll end up being an amazing justice. She is well-selected to breeze through the confirmation process. Still, I would have preferred to see a more daring and innovative selection.

And I do think Boyce is asking the right questions. The attempt to paint her in the model of legendary warrior for justice Thurgood Marshall is a bit laughable. People be askin’ her the wrong questions. I get that she’s friends with the Prez — that’s nice — and she seems like a cool lady overall. Great to have over to the backyard bbq – witty, self-deprecating, insightful. These questions are important because they set a tone. President Obama just can’t expect African-Americans to get very excited about Kagan’s appointment. I certainly hope that she will seek diversity in her hires and her clerk appointments…

The National Tea Party Unity convention apparently is a bust. Looks like they weren’t able to make much of a splash in Vegas. Despite their flimsy excuses, it’s clear that turnout was low and they are hoping for more time to boost their numbers. And possibly that October will have folks more interested in the convention.

Originally, this Tea Party was planned to happen the weekend before the Netroots Nation conference hits Vegas. They wanted to upstage one of the most successful progressive conferences that brings together candidates, lawmakers, activists, bloggers, geeks, journalists, nonprofits and more as part of an online-driven movement. This is the 5th year of Netroots Nation and we’re returning to Las Vegas to celebrate. Every year, NN makes the news. And the Tea Party was hoping to steal our thunder. A selection of topics they were planning include:

• Winning Strategy Against the Left: Bring the Asian-Americans into the Tea Party Movement
• OBAMA-NOMICS, Unconstitutional Theft of Taxpayer Wealth
• How to do Voter Registration Drives and Where to Find OUR Voters
• Youth Involvement-Attracting and Keeping Young Activists in the TPM
• Women in the Tea Party Movement
• How to Raise $50,000 in 90 Days for Your Tea Party Group
• Threat of EMP Attack on the Continental US. A Case Study of a Gov’t Which Has Failed to Prepare
• Developing Media Platforms With a Capital Focus Approach While Building Your Brand
• Combating Charges of Racism

That’s a pretty pitiful lineup that manages to combine extreme paranoia, greed and a desperate sense that they need to broaden their base beyond rich, older white male conservatives and figure how to shake the racist label. That’s going to be hard to do given that a major Tea Party founder Dale Robertson specializes in using racist terminology to describe the President including stating that Obama’s visit home during Memorial Day was designed so he could “bump and grind in the hood” while “shooting hoops, smoking cigarettes and goofing-off with his homies.” Um, why not just call him a nigger, straightup? Oh yeah, Robertson already has! (see photo above)

Here’s what Raven Brooks – the intrepid warrior slash executive director of Netroots Nation had to say recently about this turn of events:

A small piece hit CNN’s blog today stating that the National Tea Party Unity convention was moving from its set date of July 15-17 to October 2010. The reasons given by the organizing committee include:

• “it would more advantageous to hold the convention in the middle of October just prior to the November elections.”
• “The heat in Las Vegas in July is keeping many who would like to participate from attending.”
• “We have also received numerous emails from people who were forced to decide between family vacations and attending the convention.”

CNN’s piece basically served as publication of their statement without applying any critical analysis to it. There are some basic questions you should be asking here that don’t even require you to be a veteran event organizer.

To make the point bluntly their stated reasons for moving the convention are bullshit, and CNN buried the real reason this is happening in the story which was “moving back the date allows other Tea Party groups to attend the convention.” In other words they’re two weeks from their event and they’ve got no attendees and no interest in it.

This should be a juicy media story about the staying power of the Tea Party movement. Are they going to keep it going or does the excitement fizzle out at some point? That’s pretty much the first question I’d be asking if I were a reporter covering the Tea Party and this crossed my desk.

But just to drive my point home let me talk a little bit about what would be involved moving an event like this. It’d be a Herculean task that you wouldn’t try simply because you wanted to influence the elections or deal with some attendees complaining about the Vegas heat (when they’d likely rarely leave the hotel anyway). The only reason you’d take this sort of extraordinary action two weeks out is if your event was in imminent danger of completely failing due to lack of attendance and media attention.

[...]most of this Tea Party stuff [is] nothing more than puffed up astroturf and this pretty much proves it. Without conservative donors spending $100,000 to get Sarah Palin to attend or Fox News dedicating tens of hours of coverage to promote events you’re not left with a whole lot. There’s no real movement there, no real organizing being done.

Agreed — Baratunde/Jack Turner and I first met at the original Netroots Nation, then called YearlyKos. What we heard there in part inspired us to launch this troublemaking blog you’re reading right now. Netroots Nation is like getting plugged into an electric socket that also makes you smarter at the same time.

I’m honored to be a member of the board of Netroots Nation and I’d encourage you to consider coming. Tickets to Vegas are always cheap and given the economy, the hotels are pretty reasonable these days. It’s from July 22-25th. I’ll be heading up the African-American Caucus again this year and speaking on a couple of panels. Let me know if you’ve got any questions about Netroots Nation. Until then, let this be a warning to media makers — the Tea Party ain’t nothing but hot air…racist, stankin’ hot air at that.

The GOP Trashes Thurgood Marshall:

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Gov. Haley ” Boss Hogg” Barbour is now begging the Federal Government for help, now that the ‘ incident’ with BP has OIL WASHING UP ON THE SHORES OF THE MISSISSIPPI GULF COAST.

Keith Olbermann and David Corn point out his idiocy.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

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Ed Schultz talks with Senator Harkin about the failure to extend unemployment benefits. Our own CPL has written two powerful posts about Unemployment, and Traitorous Democrats, who helped the Republicans.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

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West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd dead at 92
By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press Writer Andrew Taylor, Associated Press Writer – Mon Jun 28, 6:02 am ET

WASHINGTON – Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia, a fiery orator versed in the classics and a hard-charging power broker who steered billions of federal dollars to the state of his Depression-era upbringing, died Monday. He was 92.

A spokesman for the family, Jesse Jacobs, said Byrd died peacefully at about 3 a.m. at Inova Hospital in Fairfax, Va. He had been in the hospital since late last week.

At first Byrd was believed to be suffering from heat exhaustion and severe dehydration, but other medical conditions developed. He had been in frail health for several years.

Byrd, a Democrat, was the longest-serving senator in history, holding his seat for more than 50 years. He was the Senate’s majority leader for six of those years and was third in the line of succession to the presidency, behind House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a fellow West Virginian in the Senate, said it was his “greatest privilege” to serve with Byrd.

“I looked up to him, I fought next to him, and I am deeply saddened that he is gone,” Rockefeller said.

In comportment and style, Byrd often seemed a Senate throwback to a courtlier 19th century. He could recite poetry, quote the Bible, discuss the Constitutional Convention and detail the Peloponnesian Wars — and frequently did in Senate debates.

Yet there was nothing particularly courtly about Byrd’s pursuit or exercise of power.

Byrd was a master of the Senate’s bewildering rules and longtime chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which controls a third of the $3 trillion federal budget. He was willing to use both to reward friends and punish those he viewed as having slighted him.

“Bob is a living encyclopedia, and legislative graveyards are filled with the bones of those who underestimated him,” former House Speaker Jim Wright, D-Texas, once said in remarks Byrd later displayed in his office.

Rest of obituary at link above.

The President Comments on Byrd:

President Barack Obama says the country has lost a voice of principle and reason with the passing of Sen. Robert C. Byrd.

In a statement, Obama says Byrd had a profound passion for the Senate, and held the deepest respect for members of both parties. Obama says that as a young senator, he appreciated Byrd’s generosity with his time and advice.

He said that Byrd, in his words, was “as much a part of the Senate as the marble busts that line its chambers and corridors.”

Speaking earlier in the day at an event in Louisville, Ky., Vice President Joe Biden remembered Byrd as a tough, compassionate leader and said the Senate “is a lesser place for his going.”

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High Court Rules in Favor of Gun Rights
By NATHAN KOPPEL

WASHINGTON—The Supreme Court ruled for the first time that gun possession is fundamental to American freedom, giving federal judges power to strike down state and local weapons laws for violating the Second Amendment.

In a 5-4 ruling, the court held that the Second Amendment’s right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right that binds states.
“Self defense is a basic right, recognized by many legal systems from ancient times to the present day,” wrote Justice Samuel Alito. He was joined in reaching the result by Chief Justice John Roberts and justices Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

The legal question before the court had much to do with questions of constitutional history. Before the Civil War, courts held that the Bill of Rights applied only to the federal government. After the Union victory, the Reconstruction amendments were adopted to elevate individual rights over state powers and cement the federal role in enforcing them.

I think I’m to the right of the rest of the bloggers here on this issue, but I agree with this ruling completely.

The only people in America, that cannot legally obtain firearms, are law abiding urban dwellers like me.

Suburban folks have them.
Rural folks have them.
The criminals that run rampant in urban areas CERTAINLY have them – the gun restriction laws have never slowed THEM down.

I’m not saying that I will run out and purchase a gun. The point for me was, if I wanted to, I should be able to, as a law abiding citizen of this country.

Coming to an urban area near you: the Crispus Attucks Gun Club.

hat tip-Shanti2

Rachel Maddow: President Obama’s Achievements

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We Have Traitors in Our Midst… and they call themselves DEMOCRATS.

After much googling and searching, I managed to find the names of the traitor Democrats that blocked passage of the unemployment extension bill.  From what I’ve read, all of them except Joe Lieberman and Evan Bayh, are up for re-election, if not this year, then in 2012.

What amazed me is that after finding many articles that alluded to the 12 Democrats siding with the entire Republican bloc of the Senate to block the unemployment extension, very few of these articles declined to name who the Democrats that plunged the nation’s 1.2 million unemployed into being thrown into debtor’s prison (thanks, Minnesots), and therefore, cover up and condone their treachery.

I refuse.  I’m one of thos 1.2 million who got affected by their dereliction of duty.  And I vowed that I would personally make it my mission to assist any candidate that threatening them with a primary when it’s their turn for re-election. 

I don’t really have to wait to get back on my feet.  Blogging is one weapon I do have in my arsenal and I know how to use it.

Ready for the list?  I didn’t write a song about it, but here it is:

Robert Menendez (D-NJ).  No Comment.

Herbert Kohl and Russ Feingold, (D-WIS).  Don’t know about Kohl, but Russ Feingold had the distinction of standing up to ReThugs and looking out for US.  W-T-F?  I don’t think I can give Feingold a mulligan on this vote.  He needs to feel the sting of betraying his constituents.

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President pushes Congress on financial reform

This week’s Address was all about the pending regulatory legislation, which crossed a significant hurdle Friday as Congress reached an agreement on a set of reforms. What’s in the bill? ABC News has a breakdown of the bill’s makeup. Among the reforms are:

• The creation of a new Consumer Protection Agency
• Free credit scores
• New debit card rules
• Tougher auto financing rules
• Wall Street Reforms, which include the creation of an Office of Credit Ratings, regulations on CEO pay, and requiring that derivatives be traded on public exchanges

(article, “Top 6 Changes That Financial Reform Brings To Consumers,” by Dalia Fahmy, ABC News)

You can learn more about these proposed changes by reading the ABC News article here.

Explaining the pending financial reforms bill, President Obama listed some of the benefits from what he says are the “toughest financial reforms since the Great Depression”:

“We’ll put in place the strongest consumer financial protections in American history, and create an independent agency with an independent director and an independent budget to enforce them. Credit card companies will no longer be able to mislead you with pages and pages of fine print. You will no longer be subject to all kinds of hidden fees and penalties, or the predatory practices of unscrupulous lenders.”

And now, the President Weekly Address:

Russia’s First Lady Svetlana Medvedeva, center, and First Lady Michelle Obama, center left, pose with students at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, Thursday, June 24, 2010.
—-AP Photo/RIA-Novosti, Dmitry Astakhov, Presidential Press Service

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