Election 2004 update: Kerry tries to separate from the herd by announcing his proposed national energy policy today, which includes raising fuel-efficiency standards (currently at 20.7 and 27.5 miles per gallon for SUVs and cars respectively) to 36mpg by 2015. (Of the other leading candidates, Dean appears to concur with tougher standards, while Edwards – also in Iowa today to call for pension reform – has voted for a truck exemption in the past…the perils of a pickup state.)I like the “Of Big Oil, by Big Oil, for Big Oil” line…hopefully the pack will continue to call out Bush before turning on each other anew.
Category: Election 2004
Don’t Call it a Cover-Up.
Typical. While the term “WMD” gets more and more broadly defined by Dubya, Fleischer et al, the GOP issues a lockdown on joint and open hearings into the Bushies’ use of CIA intelligence, since “criticism of the intelligence agencies has been divisive and could hurt national security.” Um…wouldn’t misuse of intelligence agency information to start a war compromise national security too?
Rogue Exterminator.
Interesting…Tom De Lay has refused Dubya’s call to pass the child tax credit. “Ain’t going to happen,” replied the Exterminator. “The last time I checked, he doesn’t have a vote.” While De Lay’s recalcitrance probably helps Dubya/Rove achieve “triangulation,” I wonder if the White House will make De Lay pay…perhaps by allowing Dems to look into his abuse of Homeland Security mentioned the other day.
Checks and Balances.
While battle lines get drawn over possible Supreme Court vacancies at the end of the month, Timothy Noah makes the case for eliminating the filibuster using Robert Caro’s Masters of the Senate. His logic seems sound, but perhaps it’d be best to wait until at least the fall…
“Lockbox” is still up for grabs…
Ryan Lizza looks at the charges of plagiarism and kleptomania resounding across the Democratic field at the moment, singling out the Dean campaign as the most “protective–some might say paranoid.” It seems to me that, while there’s clearly a lot of protective camouflage going on, one would have to expect some degree of overlap in a field of nine candidates, particularly when the allowable range of leftiness is so frustratingly small.
What would Strom do?
Found via TNR‘s Etc., Trent Lott tells us what he really thinks of helping poor children: “Although almost every Senate Republican voted for the [child tax credit], some clearly were unhappy at having to do so under what they considered public pressure from liberal groups and Democrats. Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi voted for the bill, but as he did so he stuck his tongue out, put his finger in his mouth and made a gagging sound, indicating his apparent distaste for the bill.” I wonder if C-SPAN caught this – it’d make for a great campaign ad to show the families of Mississippi.
The Ministry of Information at Work.
In related news, how are your federal anti-terrorist tax dollars being spent? Thanks to Ashcroft and Tom DeLay, to interdict Texas Democrats, not terrorists. Apparently, DeLay and his Texas cronies brought the Feds in to spy on their political enemies (during their redistricting sojourn to Oklahoma), and then engaged in a shredding-fest the day federal involvement came to light. I suppose with Ashcroft at the helm it was only a matter of time before our terrorist defense shield started operating this way.
What did the President not know, and when did he not know it?
Whether or not WMDs are ever found in Iraq at this point, it has become increasingly clear that the Bushies were contradicting their own intelligence last September and overstating the WMD capabilities of Iraq to the UN, the international community, and the American people. Lying to America? Falsifying intelligence? As John Dean points out for CNN, we’re now entering Nixon territory. (Second two links via Pigs and Fishes and Medley.)
When the Sun Never Sets.
“The Rove-Bush goal is to return government to its size before the New Deal, leaving the individual more exposed to corporate power than at any other time since the 1920s.” Jack Beatty of The Atlantic Monthly examines Rove’s long-term strategy for the Dubya tax cut, and how it’s cleverly designed to help the GOP in 2004 and 2008. Grim stuff. In a related story, Michael Kinsley offers his take on the dividend debacle: “The recently enacted tax bill is such a shocking and brazen gift for the wealthy that it is hard to describe in anything short of…cartoon-Marxist terms.”
The Left Strike Back.
The Democratic candidates find out there’s more to the party than the DLC at the Take Back America conference. Good to see an uprising against the Lieberman Republicrats, and that the rest of the Dem field now – thanks in part to Howard Dean – has to take progressive discontent seriously.