“the largely conservative doubters of man-made climate change are a small minority”
Bryan Walsh has a long analysis in Time magazine that is well worth reading: “The Stolen E-Mails: Has ‘Climategate’ Been Overblown?“ He finds no significant impact on our understanding of the science — like most sober looks at the issue:
Today, the Senate began debate on Sen. Ben Nelson’s (D-NE) amendment to prohibit federal funds from being used for abortions or for plans that include abortion services. Igor Volsky notes that Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) stepped up and drew a parallel to help the amendment’s male co-sponsors better understand its repercussions. Since Nelson’s measure forces women to purchase special abortion riders — which require women to plan for unplanned pregnancies — Boxer challenged “the men who have brought us this” to “single out a procedure that’s used by a man or a drug that is used by a man that involves his reproductive health care and say they have to get a special rider”:
BOXER: There’s nothing in this amendment that says if a man some days wants to buy Viagra, for example, that his pharmaceutical coverage cannot cover it, that he has to buy a rider. I wouldn’t support that. And they shouldn’t support going after a woman using her own private funds for her reproductive health care. Is it fair to say to a man you’re going to have to buy a rider to buy Viagra and this will be public information that could be accessed? No, I don’t support that. I support a man’s privacy, just as I support a woman’s privacy.
This afternoon, as the Senate began debate on Sen. Ben Nelson’s (D-NE) amendment to prohibit federal funds from being used for abortions or for plans that include abortion services, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) drew a parallel to help the amendment’s male co-sponsors better understand its repercussions.
Since Nelson’s measure forces women to purchase special abortion riders, Boxer challenged “the men who have brought us this” to “single out a procedure that’s used by a man or a drug that is used by a man that involves his reproductive health care and say they have to get a special rider”:
There’s nothing in this amendment that says if a man some days wants to buy Viagra, for example, that his pharmaceutical coverage cannot cover it, that he has to buy a rider. I wouldn’t support that. And they shouldn’t support going after a woman using her own private funds for her reproductive health care. Is it fair to say to a man you’re going to have to buy a rider to buy Viagra and this will be public information that could be accessed? No, I don’t support that. I support a man’s privacy, just as i support a woman’s privacy.
Watch it:
When Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) introduced a very similar amendment during the Senate Finance Committee’s mark-up of the health care bill, Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) called the measure “offensive.” “This is an unprecedented restriction on people who paid for their own health care insurance,” Stabenow said. “The assumption that somehow a woman or family would say, ‘you know some day we may have an unintended pregnancy, so we’ll get a separate rider or maybe my pregnancy is going to have a crisis, many, many crises, and so we’re going to find some other rider.’ In my judgment, I don’t even know how that would work.”
Nelson’s amendment — which is expected to fail on the Senate floor — closely resembles the restrictive Stupak language in the House health care bill. Sens. Hatch, Casey, Brownback, Thune, Enzi, Coburn, Johanns, Vitter, and Barrasso are co-sponsoring the measure.
Since leaving CNN, former anchor Lou Dobbs has insisted that he’s always supported “humane immigration reform” and a path to legalization for undocumented immigrants “under certain conditions.” Last Friday, Dobbs provided more details regarding what a path to legalization should look like:
CALLER: We’re going to have to do something about the 12 million illegal immigrants. And rounding them all up and sending them back to countries that will not accept them is going to be way too expensive. What I’m suggesting is force these pepople who want to stay to register, they must then go through a lengthy process of working and paying into our Social Security and Medicare — with no benefit of it unless they become citizens over an extended period of time…
DOBBS: Right…Oh sure, I’ve said this for years…I think Dick, you’re making a lot of sense, and I hope a lot of Americans will be making sense right there with you…There are good faith individuals out there with good faith organizations who can come together and create real solutions instead of the nonsense that has dominated the propaganda campaign from all sides here over this issue.
Listen:
Curiously, the solution Dobbs’ caller proposed is very similar to the path to legalization stipulated in the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 — legislation which Dobbs repeatedly slammed and described as an “amnesty bill.” The bill declared English the national language and would’ve adjusted the status of undocumented immigrants without a criminal record who registered with the government, paid a fine and back taxes, had established five years of residency, and proved they had been employed for three years.
In fact, Dobbs didn’t just employ a “pejorative term favored by Republicans who opposed” immigration reform, he also promoted false claims about the bill. Dobbs reported that “illegal alien gang members are eligible for amnesty,” despite the fact an amendment to the bill specifically stated that any current or former gang members would be deported.
Today, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) appeared at the Economist’s World in 2010 conference (attended by ThinkProgress), where he took exception to NBC’s David Gregory characterizing Republicans as “not really a party of ideas, because they don’t want to be.” Cantor claimed that it’s actually the media’s fault that no one hears about Republican ideas, because “it’s not as sexy of a story to cover our ideas right now.” But when the Economist’s Daniel Franklin gave Cantor an opportunity to present his big idea for job creation, Cantor couldn’t come through:
FRANKLIN: What is the big idea? “Jobs” is not an idea.
CANTOR: The big idea is to get, to get, to produce an environment where we can have job creation again. And see, that’s where the Obama administration’s agenda so clearly disadvantages the Democrats in this upcoming election in eleven months and advantages us.
Watch it:
If Cantor’s goal is “to produce an environment where we can have job creation again,” shouldn’t he have supported the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (i.e the economic stimulus), which has boosted GDP growth and lending to small businesses, while cutting taxes for workers, thereby boosting demand? And shouldn’t he be supporting further efforts in Congress to craft a jobs bill that emphasizes infrastructure spending and lending to small businesses?
Later in the discussion, Cantor replied to a question about the U.S.’s role at the climate change conference in Copenhagen by saying, “I think from the larger sense the question of climate change comes down to, if there’s been any constant in human history it’s been climate change, and the real question is the severity of that and the involvement of humans in all of that.” Watch it:
Former White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart responded, “I wouldn’t have predicted last year that scientific doubters would still have this strong a voice.”
Dana Goldstein has a great reported piece up at the Daily Beast about how even as most liberals think Barack Obama should be bringing troops home from Afghanistan sooner, many feminists feel the problem with his strategy is the reverse—it’s not ambitious enough:
In the wake of the address, a number of prominent women’s and human-rights organizations have declared themselves disappointed—not only by Obama’s choice of words, but, more significantly, by his plan to begin withdrawing American troops from Afghanistan in 18 months, which they say is far too little time to improve the situation markedly and turn women’s rights efforts over entirely to the Afghan government and NGOs.
“It’s more than perplexing,” says Eleanor Smeal, founder and president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, which runs a Campaign for Afghan Women and Girls. “It’s perplexing, disappointing, and I don’t understand why.”
Arguably the message of Human Rights Watch’s latest report on the state of women in Afghanistan is something similar. Ultimately, though, I think that disappointment in US military policy’s ability to advance the status of Afghan women is nearly inevitable. Even a more ambitious strategic commitment wouldn’t alter the fact that this simply isn’t—and isn’t going to be—the main priority of the American military. People in civil society looking to help Afghan women should probably be trying to look past the Pentagon and see what else they can do.
Today, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) appeared at the Economist’s World in 2010 conference (attended by ThinkProgress), where he took exception to NBC’s David Gregory characterizing Republicans as “not really a party of ideas, because they don’t want to be.” Cantor claimed that it’s actually the media’s fault that no one hears about Republican ideas, because “it’s not as sexy of a story to cover our ideas right now.” But when the Economist’s Daniel Franklin gave Cantor an opportunity to present his big idea for job creation, Cantor couldn’t come through:
FRANKLIN: What is the big idea? “Jobs” is not an idea.
CANTOR: The big idea is to get, to get, to produce an environment where we can have job creation again. And see, that’s where the Obama administration’s agenda so clearly disadvantages the Democrats in this upcoming election in eleven months and advantages us.
Watch it:
If Cantor’s goal is “to produce an environment where we can have job creation again,” shouldn’t he have supported the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (i.e the economic stimulus), which has boosted GDP growth and lending to small businesses, while cutting taxes for workers, thereby boosting demand? And shouldn’t he be supporting further efforts in Congress to craft a jobs bill that emphasizes infrastructure spending and lending to small businesses?
Later in the discussion, Cantor replied to a question about the U.S.’s role at the climate change conference in Copenhagen by saying, “I think from the larger sense the question of climate change comes down to, if there’s been any constant in human history it’s been climate change, and the real question is the severity of that and the involvement of humans in all of that.” Watch it:
Former White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart responded, “I wouldn’t have predicted last year that scientific doubters would still have this strong a voice.”
In September, former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) told Catholic leaders that he was “thinking about” a run for the GOP nomination for president in 2012. “I hate to be calculating, but I see that 2012 is not just throwing somebody out to be eaten, but it’s a real opportunity for success,” he said. Today on ABC’s Top Line, Santorum appeared to be leaning more towards running. “Absolutely — absolutely taking a look,” he said, adding, “[W]e need to stand foursquare on the traditional values.” When asked if Sarah Palin — another potential GOP candidate — is qualified to be president, Santorum dodged and later took a veiled shot at the former Alaska governor:
SANTORUM: No, I’ll let the people decide that. I think, you know, she’s done a lot to draw attention to herself that’s positive. She’s done some things that, you know, certainly are going to cause her to have to do some explaining if she runs for president. But right now I think she’s on a roll, she’s having a good time, she’s having an impact.
Watch it:
Back in July, Santorum said Palin is one of his wife’s “biggest fans” but added that Palin’s resignation as Alaska governor “hurt women in politics.”
Kevin Drum treats this as a bit of a joke, but I worry that it’s actually having an impact in terms of helping to foster a political climate that’s hostile to an appropriately expansionary monetary policy. A big part of the gold sales pitch is to do a lot of nonsense fearmongering about the state of monetary policy in America being too lax. These gold hucksters have helped create a political context in which instead of the right calling for less fiscal policy and more monetary policy, they’re calling for less fiscal policy and less monetary policy. That’s not the only reason the Fed isn’t doing more—they are “independent” after all—but it’s not helping.
