Progressive Politics, Patriotism, and Punditry with a Little Rock & Roll

As much as the Palin-McCain campaign continue to obfuscate, distract from, ignore, lie-about, and try to foil the investigation into the good governor’s firing of Alaska’s police commissioner in a family vendetta, the issue just won’t go away.  When the issue surfaced on the day McCain cynically named her to lead his ticket, the MSM obediently repeated the GOP talking points and ignored Palin’s problem.  However, the Alaska local press and the blogosphere continued to dig, Palin and her family continued to lie, the campaign sent in attack dogs to kill the investigation, and the flames of the scandal continue to be fanned.  So…let’s throw a little gasoline on that scandal fire.  What’s the latest?

Well.  First, she claimed she didn’t know her office and indeed, her husband, called Walt Monegan over 20 times insisting that he fire Palin’s former brother in law, who was an Alaska state trooper.  When Monegan refused to comply with these demands, he was fired.  Palin then admitted that the calls were made, and agreed to cooperate with a state investigation that was unanimously authorized by a state legislative panel.  Recordings have since surfaced of some of those calls.   That’s when the coverup started.  After she was named to the McCain ticket, the stonewalling started.

Now she is refusing to cooperate with the investigation.  McCain now has his goons on the ground in Alaska trying to kill the investigation, stonewalling, and suing the state legislature.  Witnesses are now refusing to testify.  Palin has changed her story multiple times, first that she wanted Monegan to step down from his position in order to head an anti-drinking campaign, then that he was a rogue taking unauthorized trips.  That was proved false this weekend when an internal document approving the trip she recently claimed was unauthorized was indeed approved by her office.  Then her lawyers filed a pleading saying that Monegan was insubordinate on budget issues with a “rogue mentality”.  They’re just throwing as much as they can to see what sticks.  Then, under the category of “you just can’t make this stuff up”,  there is the scandal of her new head cop appointee, Chuck Kopp, former police chief of the huge metropolis of Kenai, Alaska (population 7,000).  The new chief of law enforcement himself is under investigation for sexual harassment.  Sheesh.

Shifting stories…stonewalling…refusal to cooperate…lying in the face of hard evidence…sound familiar?  Palin-McCain are taking verbatim arguments from the Bush-Vader playbook.  It’s so bad that even the MSM can’t ignore it.

But they are doing their best to do just that.

Eh?

I went out to dinner last night at Catalan, partly to get out of the house, but mainly to help friends help friends.  As you may recall, Brennan’s, a culinary fixture in Houston for forty years, was heavily damaged by a freak fire started from an electrical transformer during Hurricane Ike.  Sadly, James Koonce, Brennan’s wine steward, and his 4 year old daughter, Katherine, were severely burned in the fire.  In an odd twist, I actually watched the fire from my apartment and took a photo of it in the height of the storm.

The Light in the Center is the Fire

My wife and I have been friends with the extended Brennan’s restaurant family for years.  All of our own special events have been held in their various rooms and the couryard out back, but my favorite has always been the chef’s table in the kitchen.  There you can watch all the action, and are served personally by Randy Evans, the executive chef, and his staff.

 The culinary business is a close knit community with famous chefs mingling freely with new chefs and loyal patrons.  They frequently visit each other’s restaurants, socialize, and often collaborate for charitable causes.  This closeness went public yesterday as Chris Shepherd, executive chef and managing partner of Catalan, began an ongoing effort to help his extended family.  Chris gained his popularity as executive sous chef at Brennan’s working closely with Randy perfecting his skills in Creole cuisine.  When Chris left Brennan’s, he characteristically stayed close to the Brennan’s family.

He and his business partners, Charles Clark and Grant Cooper, creators of the popular Ibiza, have added a new section to its menu at Catalan; a weekly tasting menu of some of Brennan’s favorite dishes.  It’s a fixed price menu with 4 courses including dessert.  Priced at a very reasonable $60 per person, it’s a bargain; with $10 going to the James Koonce Family Relief Fund, it’s an indulgence you can feel good about.

So…if you miss Brennan’s and need a Creole fix while they are rebuilding, go to Catalan and sample the Homage to a Houston Landmark menu.  I can highly recommend it.  Also feel free to add your own contribution on top of Catalan’s $10.  You’ll feel good when you leave.

This will be my last hurricane entry.  Next week I’ll be back speaking truth to power

During Rudy Giulliani’s nasty, name calling speech at the RNC he told a pack of lies to the nation.  But the biggest lie he told was the falsehood of “drill, baby, drill!”  He started that mantra, picked up by the mostly homogeneous crowd who chanted it for the rest of the convention.  McCain and Palin have repeated that same mantra along with “drill here, drill now” and “drill drill drill”.  I have a news flash for this crowd - Drill, baby, drill, along with the other mantras, is not an energy policy.  It’s a platitude that gives millions false hope, trivializes the most serious issue we face, plays political games, and cheapens the debate.

Not that we shouldn’t drill.  That’s not the point.  We should drill, we should open more lands for exploration, and we should encourage oil companies to invest domestically.  However, increasing drilling now will do nothing for gasoline prices now.  Many areas will take several years to develop, and the offshore even longer.  We should also encourage development of alternatives including wind, solar, biofuels, and nuclear.  The only thing we can do now for prices is conservation.  You’ve already seen the result of reduced demand…prices come down.

Here’s the tragedy…While McCain, Palin, Giulliani and other Repubs shout “drill, baby, drill” like idiots, Senate Republicans, to block any chance of a “win” by the Democrats, continue to block the renewal of wind and solar federal tax credits.  Many other countries implemented these tax credits for 20 years to encourage private investment.  What do we do?  We do it a few years at a time, making it virtually impossible for large, long term investors to take the risk.  Today, the Republicans are risking the nation’s energy security and wasting precious time for cynical political purposes.  Here’s what happens when the tax credit expires:
blog post photo
The year after congress allows the tax credit to expire, investment drops anywhere from 70 to 90 percent.  So.  What are the Republicans in the Senate doing?  They are playing games risking development of one of our most promising technologies.  Just like they did before the 2000, 2002, and 2004 elections.  With the expiration of the tax credit (and wind is not yet profitable without it), McCain and his cronies are playing games with serious energy policy where adults are trying to make investment to fix our problems.  That’s childish, cynical, destructive.

And these partisan morons want four more years?  What?

I say, no way.

We are now a week into the full campaign season, polls are extremely volatile, the rhetoric is heating up, and voters are now starting to pay attention.  Over the years, I’ve watched (and participated in) many on and off year elections.  What is clear to me is that voters on both sides react viscerally to some issues, and tend to ignore information that is negative for their candidate.

But more importantly, when the candidates stoop to knowingly mis-informing the public, it can be very effective, because voters look through their own rose colored glasses to process whatever they see.  The Republicans have been masters of mis-information for years, perfected by Lee Atwater in the eighties and raised to an art form by Karl Rove and his minions.

Part of the success of mis-information (lying) is the general mind-sets of those who tend to vote Republican vs those who vote Democratic.  Republican leaners tend to vote based on ideology.  They normally, based on this ideological filter, tend to see bad in people who are different from them.  Immigrants are bad, people who don’t go to church are bad, poor people are bad, any one weak is lazy.  They don’t just say it that plainly, but it’s clear in their actions and the political positions they take.
One the other hand, people who vote Democratic tend to look through a different filter.  Ideology doesn’t carry as much weight, people are generally good, and those who are weak deserve help.

These two perspectives process information differently.  For those who see bad everywhere, fear and negatives work better.  Snarky soundbites (he’s a Muslim, no-experience, Dems love terrorists, Dems hate the troops) work like a charm.  They not only appeal to cognitive perception, they also appeal to an ideological bias.  For those who lean right hate sells and sells strongly.

Hence, the huge success of Fox Noise, Rush Limbaugh and the whole gaggle of right wing broadcast me-toos.  As is clear everyday on the comment boards on these pages, this kind of messaging and language works and is internalized easily by those of that ideological bent.  Comments of hard right-wingers are always written in absolutes, and those who make those absolute comments very rarely provide citations (links) to support their positions.  The world is more black and white when it comes to critical issues i.e. if you’re not with us, you’re against us.

On the other side, those who vote Dem tend to process information from less of an ideological perspective and more from a cognitive understanding.  That’s why soundbites don’t work as well.  Political and social issues are complex, and those who vote Democratic try to understand the complexity.  Since the good in people tends to be perceived by this group, absolutes don’t carry as much weight.  The world is less black and white, and answers are not as absolute.

So, when candidates like McCain and Palin stand up on national television telling lies and mocking their opponents, those of us on the other side are incredulous.  “How can they say that,” we think.  Well, they say that because it works.  Those who lean towards the “people are bad” school respond to that.  They also ignore the facts about those they support when they lie about their own record i.e. Palin fought the bridge to nowhere when, in fact, she actively lobbied for it.  That’s also why wedge issues like gay marriage, flag burning, and abortion get trotted out every election to stimulate the base and drive voters to the polls.
It’s not that those who fall for these tactics are stupid, as much as many of us believe that.  It’s that the Republicans are very effective in communicating to these voters in the frames they identify with.  If they can generate fear, insecurity, and dislike of those different from them, it motivates.  The answer for Dems?  It’s not easy.  The Repubs have been perfecting this framing of issues for decades now and the culture of simple messaging is ingrained.

Crisis changes culture faster than anything else.  The Dems need to use the economic crisis, geo-political crisis, and energy crisis to appeal to the base instincts of voters.  Unfortunately, logical cognitive thinking and facts often don’t matter.  Appealing in a language others understand does.

Note:  George Lakoff of UC Berkeley and the Rockridge Institute has written and spoken extensively about this issue.

In her first of what I expect to be many “oops”, Sarah Palin demonstrated complete ignorance of the mortgage crisis and the functions of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac this weekend speaking about the government takeover of the two companies.  In a speech before supporters in Colorado Springs on Saturday (before fleeing to Alaska for her week-long cram session), she said, “Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had “gotten too big and too expensive to the taxpayers.”

Uh…Fannie and Freddie are private corporations owned by shareholders with private capital.  Her ignorance of their function and ownerships is pretty scary, knowing that the economy is the over-riding issue in this election.  Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research told Huffington Post that, “You would like to think that someone who is going to be vice president and conceivable president would know what Fannie and Freddie do.  These are huge institutions and they are absolutely central to our country’s mortgage debt. To not have a clue what they do doesn’t speak well for her, I’d say.”

Basically she said that these private corporations were too expensive for the taxpayers, so the government is taking them over so the taxpayers can now shoulder the cost.  Confused yet?  Me, too.

Saturday, I wrote about freshly-minted Veep Candidate, Sarah Palin, running off to Alaska to hide while GOP aides cram as many talking points into her head as they can.  I also predicted that when she does finally give an interview, it would be a softball laced Fox Noise session.  I was wrong.  Not about the softballs; about the network.  As announced last night, the softball pitcher will be Charlie Gibson of ABC (owned by Disney).  Gibson has agreed to interviews over 2 days this week in Alaska, in tightly controlled sessions.  In other words, instead of a normal, one session interview, it will be in shorter sessions so handlers can coach her on what to say in the next session.  Also, if Gibson violates a rule, they’ll withhold any further interview sessions.

Charlie Gibson, ABC News

Gibson was the only reporter who was allowed access to McCain during the RNC.  He is known for being easy on Republicans and indeed, during his session with McCain, he refrained from asking any questions about Palin that the public has been asking for days.  Yesterday, on Fox Noise (of course), Rick Davis, McCain campaign manager, talking about the campaign withholding access to Palin, said that, “So until at which point in time we feel like the news media is going to treat her with some level of respect and deference, I think it would be foolhardy to put her out into that kind of environment,” about when the campaign is going to let her out of the ivory tower.  On Meet the Press yesterday, Biden said, “Eventually she’s going to have to sit in front of you like I’m doing and have done.  Eventually she’s going to have to answer questions and not be sequestered. Eventually she’s going to have to answer questions about her record.”

I agree with Biden.  Palin is going to have to stand on her own hind legs and face the nation.  McCain’s campaign can’t continue to keep her away from “inquiring minds” and answer the questions about her record, her policies, and yes, her family.

Just like every other politician seeking national office.

McCain, who’s been in Washington for 26 years and a government employee for over 40, is now co-opting Obama’s theme of change and trying to style himself as a change agent and outsider, which is probably one of the most absurd claims in recent political history. He’s actually running against himself, which, if the faithful weren’t falling for it, would be entertaining.

But beyond that, his new running mate, Sarah Palin, was brought onto the ticket for 4 reason: steal the spotlight from Obama on Friday after the DNC, be the outside reformer, get the Hillary vote, and motivate the far right, hate-everyone-who’s-different base. They certainly achieved the first and fourth, but will certainly fail at getting the Hillary vote. The Repubs think they’ll vote for her simply because she’s female. I believe that’s a mistake, and the former Hillary supporters I know have confirmed that for me.

But beyond all that, what about the second point, her being a reformer? Fighting earmarks? Bringing transparency and fairness to government? Well. Based on the record, that’s all fiction. She’s a typical right wing machine politician, not hesitating to use her position to do favors for her friends, punish her enemies, and empty the coffers of government without discipline. Don’t believe it? Well here you go:

• Palin, through her surrogate, criminally indicted Senator Ted Stevens, has peddled more pork per capita than any other mayor or governor in the US. As early as 2001 even McCain targeted Palin for ridiculous amounts of earmark requests totalling $500 thousand in 2001, and $1 million in 2002.
• In all, Wasilla, from Palin’s requests, raked in almost $27 million in earmark pork from the feds while she was mayor.
• When Palin came into office as mayor, the town of Wasilla had no debt. When she left in 2002, it was laboring under $22 MILLION of debt.
• Palin hired a paid lobbyist when she was mayor whose sole job was to get earmarks for Wasilla.
• She submitted $150,000 during her tenure for travel expenses for fishery lobbyists.
• When running for governor, one of her key goals was to obtain federal pork for Alaska, pushing for $329 million for the bridge to nowhere. When it was cut from the allocation, she wrote publicly, “We are about $329 million short of full funding … and it’s clear that Congress has little interest in spending any more money. Much of the public’s attitude toward Alaska bridges is based on inaccurate portrayals of the projects here. But we need to focus on what we can do, rather than fight over what has happened.” $60 million was kept in the pork bill. She TOOK THAT and put that in roads.
• Even this year, after earmark requests to the federal government of almost $400 MILLION, she said, “The federal budget, in its various manifestations, is incredibly important to us, and congressional earmarks are one aspect of this relationship.”

Reformer? I think not.

So, we know this: Sarah Palin is a typical big government, big spending “conservative” in the mold of GWB. She is a radical social conservative, pulling the GOP even further right. She’s a virtuoso pork peddler, only becoming a “reformer” when McCain decided to make her his running mate last week.

Worse, she’s a bald faced liar.

McCain/Palin = McSame/Pork

In another weird move, cutsie-smart-mouth, Sarah Palin, freshly minted VP candidate, is preparing to beat feet back to Alaska. She read a repeat of her convention coming-out speech yesterday, including the already over-played community organizer smear at a rally with McCain, and will apparently make a few stops today, then poof! She’ll vaporize. No Meet the Press, No Face the Nation, No This Week with George Snuffleupagus, not even Fox Noise. The McCain propagandists gave a statement that “She’s going to hole up for a while” and see her son off to Iraq.

“Hole up for a while?” What? The election of her life is in less than two months and she’s going to “hole up”? The son doesn’t leave for another week, and you know he’s not going to just sit around with ol’ Mom at the house. He’s out with his friends partying down at the Wasilla Bowl and probably doing a little under-age drinking, so my guess is that the campaign is terrified she’s going to say something really stupid and has the good governor locked up in some underground bunker in Wasilla cramming talking points into her head as fast as they can. They’ve denied all access by the press and are keeping her under wraps while they try to teach her enough so she doesn’t make a complete fool out of herself and blow the election before the month is out.

After McCain’s delivery of the yawner on Thursday night, we may very well have seen the high water mark in his campaign. I can only conclude that Palin’s disappearance is an effort to keep the campaign stumbling along until she is presentable enough in a setting other than a telepromptered stage at least 200 yards from the nearest actual reporter. When she does come out, I’ll lay you 100 to 1 that it’ll be on Fox Noise so Bill O or Hannity can toss her 30 minutes of scripted softballs, answers to which will be put on an endless loop for 2 or 3 days afterwards.

So, if she is such a “qualified executive”, as the talking point is repeated by EVERYONE, where the hell is she? Why isn’t she giving interviews to the press? Campaigning on her own? Taking questions? Holding townhalls? Presenting energy, healthcare, foreign policy, economic, and employment plans? What? You say she doesn’t have any? Huh?

Unfortunately, Cliff Notes doesn’t do “The Presidency”. This is one she’s going to have to do on her own, and with her weak and unstable leader, my guess is she’s not getting much help from him. Therefore, the sequestered cram session. I guess we’ll have to wait to see how the interview with Fox turns out.
I wonder if they’re going to work on the Fargo accent, too. Eh?

As only Jon Stewart can do, last night he did a direct comparison of the right wing’s talking heads criticism of Democratic candidates and their quick about face when it came to their own candidates. It’s pretty entertaining:

DAILY SHOW