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Alyssa

Dear Kari Matchett,

By Alyssa Rosenberg on Aug 24, 2010 at 3:41 pm

Where have you been all my life? I realize, dear readers, that as a bureaucracy nerd and as someone who keeps a careful cultural eye on Washington, that I am a tad in the tank for Covert Affairs, even recognizing that it’s not more than smart, fizzy fun. But one element of the show I think deserves for credit above and beyond the call of a USA Network summer series is Kari Matchett, the wonderful actress who plays the main character’s boss, and the wife of a competing CIA directorate.

Part of it is it’s just a very good role. Joan struggles between competing with her husband because she wants to beat him and because she’s interested in the fate of her directorate. She is a failure at being “a good CIA wife,” who accepts that she simply must trust her husband precisely because she’s a good CIA employee, conditioned to distrust. Her desire for a good marriage and a good life conflict, leading her to waste resources, and occasionally to put her sympathy for other betrayed women above organizational imperatives. Despite her failures, she’s competent and tough, and she’s a good role model for Annie, her newest employee. The setup is a novel twist on the professional woman’s balance between marriage and career, tackling the dilemma by making both elements inextricably linked. I like that Joan’s errors don’t make her a bad person, but the show doesn’t hesitate to outline the gravity of them. Tying up NSA spying capability to keep tabs on your husband’s communications is both a bad idea because it’s a waste, and because it speaks to an embarrassing, but sympathetic, neediness.

Her husband (played by the inestimable Peter Gallagher) is, in many ways, a less decent person than Joan is, but like Joan, his decency is tied up in his role at work. He is probably cheating on his wife, but we don’t quite know, because the line between personal and professional use of tradecraft is so thin. He leaks to the press, mostly because he feels it’s his responsibility to try to control the agency’s media coverage. And he fights with Joan over control of Annie’s time and mission because he sees a valuable asset in her.

On both sides, it’s a deft portrait of a marriage. And I’m particularly pleased for Matchett because it’s one of only a few regular roles she’s had. She’s done stints on ER, Studio 60 and 24, but I’m turning into Covert Affairs increasingly for her. More folks should make use of her.

Politics

Marine Corps Commandant Conway Reiterates: Marines Should Not Have To Share Quarters With Gay Troops

By Igor Volsky on Aug 24, 2010 at 3:36 pm

Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway

Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway

NBC’s Jim Miklaszewski is reporting that Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway has reiterated his position that if Congress repeals Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Marines who “don’t want to room” with openly gay soldiers should be allowed to live separately:

On a different, but related subject, Conway suggested that if the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” law is repealed, the Marines may consider allowing Marines not to share quarters with homosexuals.

Conway said the Marines may make such housing arrangements “voluntary” to accommodate any “moral concerns.” He said many Marines are “very religious” and because of their moral concerns “don’t want to room” with homosexuals.

But Conway stressed that if the law is repealed, the Marines would take the lead in implementing it. “We cannot be seen as dragging our feet. We’ve got two wars to fight. We’ll implement it and move on,” said Conway.

Conway came under intense criticism in March when he told Military.com he will insist that the Marines have the option of not living alongside gay servicemembers. The Wonk Room looks back at his comments and what they would mean for the forces.

Health

Former McCain Aide Holtz-Eakin Stands Up For Insurers In MLR Debate

By Igor Volsky on Aug 24, 2010 at 3:36 pm

Former McCain campaign aide, CBO Director, and current GOP policy intellectual Douglas Holtz-Eakin has a provocative editorial in Kaiser Health News in which he completely dismisses the notion that health insurers should be prohibited from deducting taxes that have nothing to do with providing health care services before calculating their medical loss ratios. To step back, the ‘federal tax’ issue has become what some consumer advocates have described to me as the defining battle in the MLR debate. Under the new health care law, insurers are required to spend 80% to 85% of premiums on health care and issue rebates to consumers if they fail to meet this threshold.

Insurers have seized on a single mention of “federal taxes” in Section 2718 of the health law — the section that deals with MLR — to argue that they should be allowed to exclude all federal taxes from their revenue (the denominator in the MLR ratio), a move that would save issuers millions of dollars and allow them to meet the MLR requirements without necessarily spending more on care. Democrats are disputing their claim and insisting that they did not intend for issuers to exclude all federal taxes — only those that pertain to health care. Judging by the tone of his op-ed, Holtz-Eakin believes that this is simply untenable:

To begin, there is no defense for including taxes in any measure of available resources as part of an MLR. Whether used to measure dollars available for payments for medical expenses or devoted to administrative costs, taxes are simply not available for those purposes and must be excluded – six chairmen notwithstanding.

Worse, including taxes raises the threat of damaging and inappropriately double taxation. Most health plans are required to pay federal income taxes as well as payroll taxes. If these taxes paid to the federal government are not excluded from the premium revenue, the health plans’ MLR will be paying a potential double tax or rebate on the same net income: first paying taxes to the federal government and then a rebate to consumers using the same dollars. Double taxation is wrong in principle and in practice may be the death knell for smaller insurers.

During the election, Pat and I closely monitored Holtz-Eakin’s television appearances and joked that, judging by the veracity of his answers, the man was about to implode and was in desperate need of a vacation. I think, regrettably, that the same may be true now.

First of all, broad taxes were not part of the MLR prior to the health law and using investment taxes as a subtraction from premium revenue is just a way to circumvent the intent of the law — which is to keep insurer profits in check until 2014 — without improving efficiency. Secondly, an MLR rebate Is not a tax. It is the act of returning money to the consumer that was not spend on providing health care services — the opposite of a tax.

Further in his piece, DHE complains that the law “federalizes the MLR and employs a blunt one-size-fits-all approach that does not permit review and fine-tuning of its impacts.” But this too completely ignores the fact that the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) — the organization tasked with defining the MLR — has gone out of its way to fine tune the MLRs to deal with smaller plans and different plans and has allowed a wide variety of quality improvement expenses and a procedure for adding more!

Finally, DHE argues that in order to satisfy the new MLR requirements, insurers would have to take steps that “may disqualify policies’ grandfathered status and violate the Obama administration’s promise” of keeping what you have if you like it. But again, this too demonstrates a complete misunderstanding of the MLR. The easiest way to meet the new standards is by lowering cost-sharing, which actually increases the likelihood of retaining grandfathered status.

Politics

Dick Armey Questions President Bush’s Qualifications On The Economy: Bush Wasn’t ‘A Big Thinking Guy’

By Tanya Somanader on Aug 24, 2010 at 2:38 pm

dick-armeyFormer House Majority Leader and FreedomWorks Chairman Dick Armey is making the rounds this month to promote his new book, “Give Us Liberty: A Tea Party Manifesto.” In proselytizing for the conservative agenda of the “leaderless” Tea Party, Armey touts the humble foundations of the movement’s agenda, saying the “best practices come from the ground up, around kitchen tables, from Facebook friends, at weekly book clubs, or on Twitter feeds.”

In trying to reestablish the conservative brand, Armey is attempting to throw President Bush under the bus. In an interview aired last night on the O’Reilly Factor, Armey dismissed the qualifications of Bush who pushed for the 2008 financial bailout funds. When right-wing pundit Bill O’Reilly tried to defend Bush’s decision, Armey told O’Reilly that “Bush isn’t a big thinking guy” and he lacked “adult discipline,” unlike Armey, who knows better because “he read Hayek and Mises”:

O’REILLY: So you think the federal government should just step back and let it go?

ARMEY: Yeah the whole notion of too big to fail is simply a rationale for government intervention mostly.

O’REILLY: Bush isn’t a Big government guy..

ARMEY: No Bush is… Bush isn’t a big thinking guy either. Quite frankly He’s not well-schooled on economics. [...] Look I’m an economist by training, I studied it all my life. I have an advantage over them because I read Hayek and Mises. But the fact of the matter is the most critical affliction that came to the economy for those few days was the nations see in the secretary of treasury and the president in a total panic. If they would’ve had an adult discipline.

O’REILLY: So if you were there, you wouldn’t have done anything, no intervention. You would’ve let whatever happen happen

ARMEY: Absolutely right. You’ve got to let..you can’t privatize profits and socialize loss.

Watch it:

Armey is not shy about his current contempt for the former president. At a Christian Science Monitor lunch last month, Armey dubbed Bush the “quickest, biggest bitter disappointment.” But, during Bush’s administration, Armey found plenty of policies to praise Bush about. In 2001, Armey even touted Bush’s “rare ability to ‘tune out the noise’” to get things done:

House Majority Leader Dick Armey said yesterday President Bush has a rare ability to “tune out the noise,” which is helping him define and organize the new initiatives of this administration. “There’s a new demeanor in Washington,” Mr. Armey told a group of constituents at a breakfast coffee klatch. Mr. Bush “knows what he wants to accomplish and is busy going about it.”

While he now slams Bush’s No Child Left Behind policy, Armey published an op-ed in the Washington Times in 2001 to congratulate Bush for “finally changing the way Washington views education.” Blaming President Clinton for “simply talking about a failed education system,” Armey said Bush “is doing something about it.” When Bush pushed to privatize Social Security in 2004, Armey saluted Bush’s “strong leadership” in “clearly understand[ing] the profound issues at stake.”

Yglesias

Maine Tea Party Travel Guide to DC

By Matthew Yglesias on Aug 24, 2010 at 2:29 pm

While I’m in Maine, Maine Tea Party leaders are sending the following advice to Tea Partiers headed to DC to fight tyranny:

Many parts of DC are safe beyond the areas I will list here, but why chance it if you don’t know where you are?

If you are on the subway stay on the Red line between Union Station and Shady Grove, Maryland. If you are on the Blue or Orange line do not go past Eastern Market (Capitol Hill) toward the Potomac Avenue stop and beyond; stay in NW DC and points in Virginia. Do not use the Green line or the Yellow line. These rules are even more important at night. There is of course nothing wrong with many other areas; but you don’t know where you are, so you should not explore them.

Five years ago I would have said definitively that the most terrifying thing about the Green/Yellow lines is the black people, but more recently this may be a caution against interacting with hipsters. But honestly this is bad advice. When visiting DC you might want to check out the baseball stadium, the many bars and clubs of U Street, the dining and shopping options of Columbia Heights, all of which are best-reached on the Green/Yellow lines. You can also take these lines to the vibrant Gallery Place / Chinatown station.

Economy

Toomey: ‘I’ve Never Said I Favor Privatizing Social Security’

By Pat Garofalo on Aug 24, 2010 at 2:00 pm

Last week, Pennsylvania’s Republican candidate for Senate, Pat Toomey, touted his plan for privatizing Social Security, without actually using the word privatization. “I’ve got a whole chapter in a book that I wrote that deals with how I think, one of the ways I think we could reform Social Security to make it viable,” Toomey said. “That would be a very important start.”

A section of the chapter which Toomey referenced is called “Personal Accounts Lead to Personal Prosperity.” And when President Bush released his plan for privatizing Social Security, Toomey said, “I have been arguing for many years in favor of Social Security personal retirement accounts. “I’m thrilled that the President is taking up this critical issue,” Toomey added.

But when directly asked at the Pennsylvania Press Club yesterday whether he still favors privatization, Toomey actually replied, “I’ve never said I favor privatizing Social Security”:

Q: Do you continue to favor privatizing Social Security?

A: I’ve never said I favor privatizing Social Security. It’s a very misleading — it’s an intentionally misleading term. And it is used by those who try to use it as a pejorative to scare people…[T]hat doesn’t mean that we must perpetuate exactly this structure for future workers and for very young workers. So I’ve advocated that we consider offering young workers an alternative — a reform within Social Security that would give them the opportunity to take a portion of their payroll tax and actually save that and own that and allow that to accumulate over the course of their working years and for that to provide a portion of their retirement benefit. I think that’d be a very constructive reform, and that’s what I’m going to advocate.

Watch it:

Toomey seems to be under the impression that if you aren’t in favor of privatizing all of the Social Security system then you aren’t in favor of privatizing, period. But make no mistake, Toomey absolutely favors privatizing a portion of the program, as he makes painfully clear through his advocating that young workers “own” an account. Such privatized accounts would have experienced sharp negative returns in the market turmoil of 2008.

As Josh Dorner noted, a recent CNN poll “found that 59 percent oppose privatizing Social Security and Medicare.” 46 percent of voters said such a plan would make them “very uncomfortable” and a further 21 percent had reservations about it. Toomey tries to dress this up by not calling it privatization, but his formula is the same one that was roundly rejected when President Bush tried it in 2005.

Climate Progress

New Mexico GOP candidates deny global warming reality

By Climate Guest Blogger on Aug 24, 2010 at 1:59 pm

We’ve seen that every GOP Senate candidate in NH is a global warming denier.  We’ve seen that Republicans across the country are embracing pro-pollution, anti-science candidates.  And so it is with New Mexico, as Brad Johnson explains.

Even though New Mexico is facing a future of perpetual drought, killer heat waves, water scarcity, and wildfires, the crop of Republican candidates for major office in the state are in denial about the threat of global warming pollution.

Gubernatorial nominee Susana Martinez denies the science of manmade climate change. All three congressional candidates “” Steve Pearce, oil engineer Tom Mullins, and corporate lobbyist Jon Barela “” similarly believe scientists are engaged in a conspiracy to destroy our economy. Barela and Pearce are signatories of the “No Climate Tax” pledge organized by Americans for Prosperity, the front group supported by the Koch Industries brothers that fights limits on global warming pollution:

Read more

Climate Progress

Energy and Global Warming News for August 24th: Shift to solar power easy, affordable with group-discount program; France announces massive investment in cleantech

By Climate Guest Blogger on Aug 24, 2010 at 1:54 pm

Shift to solar power easy, affordable with group-discount program

The high cost of installing solar panels can be one of the biggest roadblocks when it comes to homeowners deciding whether or not to embrace solar energy.

A San Francisco-based company called One Block Off the Grid is hoping to use a combination of government incentives and a group discount to persuade Pittsburgh-area residents to invest in the alterative energy source.

Read more

Politics

Toomey: ‘I’ve Never Said I Favor Privatizing Social Security’

By Pat Garofalo on Aug 24, 2010 at 1:43 pm

Last week, Pennsylvania’s Republican candidate for Senate, Pat Toomey, touted his plan for privatizing Social Security, saying, “I’ve got a whole chapter in a book that I wrote that deals with how I think, one of the ways I think we could reform Social Security to make it viable.” A section of the chapter which Toomey referenced is called “Personal Accounts Lead to Personal Prosperity.” And when President Bush released his plan for privatizing Social Security, Toomey said, “I have been arguing for many years in favor of Social Security personal retirement accounts. “I’m thrilled that the President is taking up this critical issue,” Toomey added. But when directly asked at the Pennsylvania Press Club yesterday whether he still favors privatization, Toomey actually replied, “I’ve never said I favor privatizing Social Security”:

Q: Do you continue to favor privatizing Social Security?

A: I’ve never said I favor privatizing Social Security. It’s a very misleading — it’s an intentionally misleading term. And it is used by those who try to use it as a pejorative to scare people…[T]hat doesn’t mean that we must perpetuate exactly this structure for future workers and for very young workers. So I’ve advocated that we consider offering young workers an alternative — a reform within Social Security that would give them the opportunity to take a portion of their payroll tax and actually save that and own that and allow that to accumulate over the course of their working years and for that to provide a portion of their retirement benefit. I think that’d be a very constructive reform, and that’s what I’m going to advocate.

Watch it:

As The Wonk Room explains, Toomey’s plan is most certainly privatization, and the majority of Americans oppose it.

Alyssa

A Message From Robyn

By Alyssa Rosenberg on Aug 24, 2010 at 1:37 pm

ALL YOUR EMOTIONS ARE BELONG TO US:

One thing I’m genuinely curious about: why hasn’t some smart American female star picked her up for a collaboration? Not that working with Snoop Dogg, or Royksopp, or I Blame Coco isn’t awesome, but you’d think someone with a taste for indie cred and emotional sincerity would enlist her? I feel like she and Lady Gaga could do incredibly heartfelt covers of standards and hang out and Robyn could be Gaga’s older sisters who’s graduated from her acting-out-via-fashion stage, or something.

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