A noun, a verb and Bernie for the #IronStache!

Now that Rob Quist and Jon Ossoff got their butts kicked in special elections, the David Brock wing of the Democratic Party is now touting Randy Bryce, the "Iron Stache," as a hero for the 2018 midterm regular election. A spate of national news stories came out about him shortly after he cut his first campaign video announcing his run in Wisconsin against Speaker of the House Paul Ryan.

Those stories didn't come out of nowhere. They came out of the D.C.-based Democratic PR former of Hilltop Public Solutions, a place so astroturfy it invented the word "grasstops." That's the "HPS" in the photo.

And yes, it is astroturfy, too.

Meanwhile, in our Peter-principled inside-the-Beltway media, a young Washington Post writer Wednesday was clueless that she was even being fed this shite by high-dollar PR flaks.

When American democracy dies, it will be from the last reporter swallowing the PR sausage in entrails of political flaks, to riff on Voltaire.

As for policies, Bryce has none that he's willing to stand on.

Asked by Sarah Jones of The New Republic to comment on single-payer national health care, the response of the man who went through testicular cancer and whose family is a walking billboard for it, said, "I favor getting there."

Yep, that was it.

This, of course, leeds to spoofing.

Higher minimum wage? "I favor getting there."

Peace in the Middle East? "I favor getting there."

Draining the swamp? "I favor getting there."

Campaign finance reform? "I favor getting there."

Trans Pacific Partnership? "I favor getting there."

Moving beyond the current Democratic establishment? "I favor getting there."

Sadly, short of Counterpunch, that will never be covered. Even at The Nation, John Nichols can't or won't tell you that Bryce is already being "packaged" by DC political consultants. Or that these consultants are ultimately the David Brock wing of the Democratic Party.

Down with Tyranny puffs him too, insinuating he's a Berniecrat, when he's not, per his Twitter at right, and that doesn't mean that much anyway, other than the Sanders Institute funneling money to him, maybe?

(Bryce has now pulled down the Twitter post. I'm leaving the photographically blank space as a sign of how much of a political "Player" he is. In the first 72 hours after his campaign, after people like me and others started looking through his Twitter feed, he started doing — or HPS started doing — a massive cleanup effort on his account.)

Update, March 28, 2018: At DWT, Howie continues to puff the Stache to the point of ignoring he has a primary opponent, Cathy Myers, who arguably is to his left. More about her here.

Beyond that, the Stache is "meh" on the Trans Pacific Partnership and otherwise closer to being a Hillbot than a Berniecrat. Don't believe me? Go to his website or run through his Twitter feed, especially before he tries to clean up more stuff.

DWT also says "But Obama won that district in 2008." Big deal. Obama won by 3 percentage points while Ryan dodged Dear Leader's short coattails and was re-elected by 19.

Also don't forget he is not the only Dem in the race. Yes, there's an actual primary. And one of Bryce's three previous electoral losses was in a primary.

This obviously a coronation by DC folks sniffing way too much George Lakoff.

And there's more. The Stache loves him some Russian nutbar conspiracy theorist Louise Mensch. Loves her so much that he even offered her some neocon "Freedom Fries" in one Tweet.

This guy is Joe the Plumber with the addition of a David Brock tramp stamp.

And an FEC fine for failure to disclose campaign contributions when treasurer for Rob Zerban's Congressional run, it seems.

Others are noting his establishmentarianism, along with some of his fence-straddling. This one is not bad, though it tries to paint him as a full Berniecrat, which he wasn't at all.

I do appreciate one Twitterer for pointing me toward some of the things for this post. Sadly, I cannot recommend following him overall; it would probably be like the frog asking the alligator for a ride across a stream, or similar anecdotes about taking a scorpion too close to one's breast.

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Howie at Down with Tyranny also won't tell you that Bryce's DCCC national endorsement, like several others in House primaries (think of TX-07) has pissed off activist local Democrats. But Vice will tell you that, as well as tell you other issues that Bryce has, like stretching the truth in various ways.

That includes a link to a NYT piece about buying Twitter followers.

New season of The Biggest Loser starting now — reality TV, DC style

The three main characters in the new season are Mitch the Turtle, Sieg Heil and Eddie Munster, as pictured from left.

The season, at the start, revolves around the plot twists over Obamacare, Ryancare, Trumpcare, the Affordable Care Act, and the American Health Care Act.

Besides the three mail main characters, waiting in the wings as the possible real Biggest Loser, all along, has been the American public. Within it, the potential Biggest Loser was a TrumpTrain core — older, lower-income white voters.

And, our story line develops from there

Besides reminding us of a classic classic rock song, here with a new cover by Reservoir Dogs:



"Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, Here I am, stuck in the middle with you" isn't totally true, per the pic, which I saw, with this caption, from a TrumpTrain rider on Twitter. Trump is actually as much a clown or joker than either of them.

And, he got punked, in part because between Nov. 8 and Jan. 20, he never stopped to realize that health care is indeed hard. (Well, if you have a single-payer system, with one set of rules, it's not quite so hard.)

Now, per some of the inside-the-Beltway chattering class postmortems, Trump may eventually learn more of a political game. Or, he may remain like a more narcissistic Ross Perot, thinking he can be CEO to Congressional mid-level business execs, with him just snapping his fingers and getting results. (That igmores that when Trump snapped his fingers in the business world the results were often bad, except in cases where he often allegedly had the help of organized crime.

But, Trump's going to have to do a lot more political learning.

His threat to primary House Republicans who wouldn't get on the Trump Train basically got laughed at by the likes of Gohmert Pyle and other teabagger members of the House Freedom Caucus. More quietly, House GOP non-wingnut conservatives (please, don't call them "moderates") laughed at Trump their own way.

Speaking of the House GOP, Speaker Paul Ryan has already been labeled a poseur and dilettante by the chattering class. More clearly, he's now damaged goods. Will he be considered damaged enough that Gohmert Pyle and other Freedom Caucus members threaten him with a leadership challenge, just like they did with John Boehner? It wouldn't surprise me. Breitbart already has out the long knives; stay tuned for what Faux News says in days and weeks ahead.

Question No. 2 and related — if this drumbeat against Ryan increases, will he stop kissing Trump's ass and try to find his own long knives? Or more subtle anti-Trump sicarii?

Next loser? Rinse Penis, that is Reince Priebus, is already getting dinged. Besides GOP civil war, Trump staff civil war will surely increase.  Eminence grisé Steve Bannon is already pulling out some long knives there, but more toward Eddie Munster, which is surely what's fueling Breitbart. That said, Bannon, contra his nominal buss Trump, is being honest that this was a big defeat.

Related to that, Bannon reportedly wanted to force a public vote, so that he had his own "enemies list" over the issue in the House.

Trump himself is reportedly boo-hooing over letting Ryan do the bill-writing. But, that's simply bullshit. Congressional GOP has been calling for more action, more leadership, from Trump for some time. If Bannon wants to play this game, at least some in the House are more savvy than Ryan in knowing who they're dealing with.

Winner of sorts? The Turtle. The bill never got to the Senate. He never had to threaten a nuclear option requiring actual stemwinder filibustering from Senate Dems. And, he can now play himself up to Trump as elder statesman, vs. Ryan. And, Bannon knows (I think) that even he can't mess with McConnell.

Tom Price, Trump's new HHS secretary, has been named in that last link above, as another loser. If so, that shows every Trump cabinet member who came from Congress is on some sort of hot seat. Given his role in many spots, OMB Director Mick Mulvaney shouldn't sleep easy.

Loser again? Trump. His own aides are all but calling him an idiot for trying to put blame on Dems for the bill's failure.

Loser again again? Trump. That info above is coming from a flood tide of leaks inside his staff.

That said, I disagree with the likes of Washington Monthly when it says Trump didn't care. No, he did care a lot — as long as it was easy. As soon as the going looked tough, and it looked like he could still blame Ryan et al, and not take too bad a hit himself, he bailed.

Don't forget, WM is part of the neoliberal wing of the Beltway chattering class — the type of folks who agreed with Hillary Clinton 12 months ago on trying to promote Trump's candidacy over other Republicans.

Mixed loser/quasi-winner? House Freedom Caucus. Trump himself called it a loser, as noted here, where its head, Rep. Mark Meadows, thinks O-care can still be defeated. That intensifies the loserdom, if he's that clueless. (And he is; none of the Freedom Caucus members chair any committees, let alone one in position to put forth O-care repeal bills.) But, it's a quasi-winner to its diehard wingnut supporters.

Meanwhile, the American public, even though not the Biggest Loser, remains a loser.

• The Congressional GOP stands officially exposed as having no desire to make Obamacare actually better;
• A full 25 House Progressive Caucus members have yet to cosponsor HR 676, John Conyers' single-payer bill;
• Bernie Sanders has yet to introduce a similar bill in the Senate, and his last excuse has now been removed.

None of these three will change soon. Sorry. Blogs like Down With Tyranny will keep looking for ponies while continuing to refuse to #DemExit. And nothing will change.

Democrats who still don't get it on the GOP, the budget, and Catfood!

And, no, this time, it's NOT Dear Leader, President Obama, who doesn't "get it."

It's a Democratic Senator.

The Washington Post has a story about how the shrinking budget deficit is gutting the likelihood of grand deals on debt-cutting.

First, how shrinking?

This:

In February, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office predicted that this year’s deficit would fall to $845 billion, down from nearly $1.1 trillion in 2012. Goldman Sachs recently predicted that the deficit would fall even further, to $775 billion, and return to sustainable levels within two years.

Take THAT, austerians, Catfood Commission, etc.

In turn, that's pushing back the next time the Congressional GOP gets to hold America hostage via hitting the debt ceiling limit.

That, in turn, has House GOP wingnuts like Eddie "Paul Ryan" Munster boo-hooing.

Now, the "Democrats who still don't get it." And, the Democrats who are "part of the problem."

They're the same person, this time:

“The American people — all of us — are tired of management by crisis,” Senate Budget Committee Chairman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said at the Peterson summit. “We need to start working now.”

WTF?

First, why is an alleged liberal like Patty Murray at a Pete Peterson (aka Catfood Commission eminence grise) "debt summit"? The same one Eddie Munster was at, to boot?

If you want to get a clue, read about austerity costing 2.2 million jobs.

That's the conclusion of a new study by Michael Greenstone and Adam Looney at the Brookings Institution. In the 46 months since the Great Recession ended, state, local and federal governments have cut about 500,000 jobs. In contrast, in every other U.S. recession since 1970, the government hired approximately 1.7 million people, on average. That means the U.S. is an estimated 2.2 million jobs in the hole.

Given the size of the U.S. labor force, an extra 2.2 million jobs would mean the U.S. unemployment rate would be about 6.1 percent, instead of 7.5 percent. That would be below the 6.5 percent rate the Federal Reserve is targeting with its extraordinary bond-buying program known as quantitative easing.

Second, if "The American people — all of us" includes "House GOP," you're dead wrong. As your own party's cave on airport traffic controllers shows, the House GOP has seen management by crisis kind of, sort of, work, for its own ends.

Ergo, given A and B, and to riff on LBJ, er ... Patty?

Eddie Munster's got your ovaries in his pocket.

And, once again, people ask me why I continue to push Green Party voting?

Ross Douthat's crush on #PaulRyan

Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat occasionally has a strongly factual NYTimes column; sometimes he has a reasonably factual one. He at least seems to give more effort to dealing with the reality-based world than do "Teapot Tommy" Friedman or "Send in the Boboes" David Brooks.

Usually.

Then, there's times where he sounds like a kinder, gentler, larger-vocabularied tea party-type wingnut.

This paean of love to Paul Ryan, claiming that moderates should love him, is exactly that.

The real fun starts here:

Most Republicans would have been happy posing as deficit-reducers while arguing for deficit-financed tax cuts. But Ryan, despite his own supply-side sympathies, deliberately drew up a plan for deficit reduction that would work with our current tax code, and doesn’t require any rosy fantasies about how tax cuts will spur unprecedented growth.

Totally wrong, of course. Douthat's colleague, Paul Krugman, has already called Ryan's plan a fraud because he refuses to talk about specific deficit cuts (other than his plans to privatize things like Social Security). Krugman's on the trail again, now. And, Ryan hasn't ruled out supply-side tax cuts, either.

Douthat then shows he thinks moderates should like the entire House GOP:

Most Republicans would have been happy to hang the White House’s decision to help pay for its health care bill with $700 billion worth of Medicare cuts around President Obama’s neck without proposing any entitlement reforms of their own. But Ryan didn’t just propose a much more sweeping Medicare overhaul, he proceeded to do the hard work of persuading his fellow House Republicans to actually vote for his entitlement-reforming budget – twice.

The Senate GOP, of course, knew that such a plan was a non-starter and wouldn't touch it with a 10-foot pole. But, with computer-driven increased gerrymandering of House districts combined with the uncompromising, unthinking, "What's the Matter with Kansas" stance of tea party voters, the GOP House freshmen, especially, weren't so likely to be punished for such a vote. In fact, in some cases, they were more likely to be punished for NOT voting with Ryan.

Next, after lauding Ryan's "courage" earlier in the column, Douthat does a hypocritical backtracking:

The budget’s proposed tax reform, meanwhile, specifies new lower rates but not the deductions and loopholes that would be closed to pay for them. But Ryan clearly has an idea of which deductions he would cap and which shelters he would eliminate. He just hasn’t persuaded his fellow lawmakers to shoulder the political risks involved in getting specific.

So, it's that damned Mitch McConnell's fault!

Douthat's hypocrisy neatly mirrors that of fellow conservative Catholic Ryan, who claims he draws inspiration from Thomas Aquinas, not Ayn Rand, as noted in this column showing how Ryan is (when he's not hypocritical) bringing the social conservative vs. libertarian struggle in the GOP to the fore.

Finally, it's false dichotomy time! What else would you expect as part of the kitchen sink, and here you go:

That agenda is, as I noted at the outset, quite conservative. If you believe that middle class taxes should go up dramatically in order to keep the existing welfare state exactly as it is, as current liberal premises require, then you have every reason to reject Ryan’s proposals. And if you think that his proposals could be amended to require more of the wealthy and well-connected, and invest more in upward mobility for the down-and-out – well, then welcome to the club.

Wrong again. Social Security and Medicare are, of course, largely middle-class entitlements. So too, are much else that's "welfare," including guaranteed student loans that actually help banksters as much as students, but that's another story. We could spend plenty of time listing middle-class entitlements besides that, such as SBA loans, but you know the drill.

The point is, much of our welfare state is for the middle class. As Douthat knows but will never say in public, "old Europe" has more socioeconomic class mobility than the US.

This might not be his worst column in terms of lack of facts, but in brazenness of lying other under terms, it may well be.

Americans were greedy long before Atlas Shrugged

Creative Commons via Alternet

I see a new Alternet column is making the rounds of liberal bloggers, etc., claiming, per the title, that: "Ayn Rand Seduced Generations of Young Men and Helped Make the U.S. into a Selfish, Greedy Nation," and per the subtitle, that: "Thanks in Part to Rand, the United States is one of the most uncaring nations in the industrialized world."

Note: The following comments are not meant as in any way being a personal attack on any of those bloggers, Google+ or Facebook posters. Rather, they're simply my assertion, and documentation, that greed is a far bigger, more ingrained, more diversely rooted problem in America than a simple attack on Randian Objectivism would suggest.

The reality? American greed was around long before Ayn Rand. Look at all the gold rushes, and "salted" gold and silver mines, of 100-150 years ago. Look at the rampant railroad speculation, to the degree that Congressmen accepted stock shares on the floor of the Capitol in the Credit Mobilier scandal. Look at Grover Cleveland's hard-hearted response to the Panic of 1893.

Rand, and Randian Objectivism isn't cause; it's pseudo-intellectual justification for a worship of money and greed that was around long before Ayn Rand popped out of the womb chain-smoking cigarettes as Ann Coulter's fairy godmother. Alexis de Tocqueville, in observing what he perceived as the alleged leveling of class effects in America, cautioned how such leveling and mass democracy would likely lead to a rise in materialism. And he was right.

Beyond that, the success gospel, or prosperity theology, per the Wiki entry, has a history in America, too, arguably going back to Ye Olde Massachusetts. Plenty of proclaimed Christians who would be horrified to be lumped with Rand are, if anything, even greedier than she is.

So, let's get past these attempts to blame Rand for all of today's GOP hard-heartedness just because the likes of a Paul Ryan or Rand Paul are in Congress today.

Prosperity theology, if anything, provides more of a "veneer" for more greed in America than Ayn Rand does. It certainly has a LOT more followers. You can see Joyce Meyer, Benny Hinn, and others hawking their ideas, sermons and wares all over the place. (I've never seen a Randian website where anybody had a $20,000 marble commode lid for sale like the one Meyer originally has. [Note to Joyce Meyer: Buying shit like that doesn't help you heal from child abuse. Note to Meyer devotees: Wake up and smell the shit in the commode and on her TV show, eh?]) I don't see a Rand channel on cable TV, though. Hell, New Agers, with "The Secret" and older versions of the same idea, are a more integral part of American greed today than is Objectivism.

But, in part because New Ageism is liberal, and because not all success gospel preachers are politically active conservatives, they don't make as easy of targets as do Randians, along with the politicians mentioned above and Alan Greenspan.

But, even in the political sphere, success gospel preachers who are also politically active conservatives surely have more influence than Randians. George W. Bush likely never cracked a page of Rand in his life, but President "Jesus is a philosopher" hung out with success gospelers both black and white.

And, there's another dirty secret. The success gospel isn't limited to white, so it's harder to criticize its effect on American greed for that reason, too. It's a lot easier to bash Alan Greenspan or Paul Ryan than it is the likes of T.D. Jakes.

Beyond that, the column ignores other history. For example, the "charity inducing" Harriett Beecher Stowe? She wound up living in post-Reconstruction Florida and supporting Jim Crow. Nathaniel Branden has moved further beyond Rand than Levine credits. (And, his writing shows it. The Branden of the 1990s and beyond is further separated from Randianism than is the Branden of the '70s or 80s.)

And, per Tocqueville, let's admit that he had a fair degree of true insight about the connection between materialism and modern American democracy. Whether one is "liberal" or "conservative" politically.

In a democracy, especially one that theoretically (if not actually) has class movement, it's actually easier for greed to get inflamed, if anything. This gets back to the Occupy Wall Street protests, too. What needs reform goes beyond even political structures and into social psychology and social structures. That said, perhaps morality can be legislated in some ways, including through more progressive taxation, but this is a virus, a retrovirus that's deeply engrained in America's cultural DNA. Let's not pretend otherwise, whether with simplistic blame games or something else.

For a more in-depth view on this, and on how computerization may actually be making this all worse, read about Adam Curtis' documentary "All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace."

I guess what I'm really getting at, ultimately, is what skepticism involves, for me. It's more than just the science-minded skepticism of "professional skeptics." Rather, my skepticism is also influenced by philosophy, and says let's expect to see little in the way of blacks and whites in the world. In an America of 310 million people, now, technology (per Curtis), mass-movement democracy and semi-leveling sociology of the 19th century, and religion, American-style going back to Plymouth (not Jamestown, nor, totally, Santa Fe, N.M., Catholicism) are all factors on American materialism with longer bloodlines and more adherents than Ayn Rand. (Jamestown was secular greed from the 17th century predecessor to a joint-stock company and its board of directors. The Spanish in Santa Fe knew New Mexico held no riches of gold.)

Related to all of this is the issue of "blame." Greed isn't necessarily just a conservative issue. And, greed also isn't limited to money. If we talk about greed for fame and other things, the iGeneration mentality of at least a segment of Occupy Wall Street shows that greed is pervasive indeed.

You and I are greedy. Zen monks from Tibet can be as greedy for fame as Steve Jobs. It's part of who we are.

One could even trot out a "Gods Must Be Crazy" type of claim that private property accelerated greed 10,000 years ago. That said, to the degree it's true, I don't think any anti-Randians want to go back to Paleolithic times. Ditto for those who say we need to go back to "natural living," of course; they never volunteer themselves to be part of the 90 percent of the Earth's population we'd have to kill off to sustain pre-agricultural population.

Bill Keller hearts Romney with a tin ear

I think I'm beginning to understand why the New York Times has so many idiotic op-ed writers: Bill Keller hired them.

In his latest column, the former executive editor of the old puce lady lays out the case for how Mitt Romney can beat Barack Obama, with a series of talking points.

First, an idiot could make the "not-Obama" case.

But, really, Keller? You think Romney running as the "CEO President," as Occupy Wall Street sits practically outside your office window, is a good strategy?

The "taming Congress" case? If the GOP maintained control, in a Romney win, Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan in the House would hold Romney as a tea party hostage.

This just shows the stupidity of the inside-the-Beltway media establishment, as Keller and Teapot Tommy Friedman continue to whore after a fictitious "centrism."

Don't forget, this is the same Bill Keller who's either a liar or an idiot about the NYT having a paywall, when six months after a two-bit Javascript hack was invented to defeat it, the Times has done zip to upgrade.

Why? As I blogged here, fear of loss of influence.

It's default of the Republicans

So, Paul Ryan says no big deal if we have a "short term default" on the national debt? And, other alleged paragons of GOP fiscal sanity, incluindg Mr. Fiat Money, Ron Paul, agree?

Yet the inside-the-Beltway press corps still treats these people as sensible grownups. (And, so does Preznit Kumbaya.)

Why?

It's clear this is ultimately just about politics, as is hwho takes credit for good j ob-creation months and passes blame for bad ones.

Paul Ryan kidnaps Joe Nocera's brain

How else to explain Nocera's paean to Ryan, even with caveats, about his wisdom on Medicare in light of the NY-26 Congressional special election?

Nocera buries his nutgraf as the last one:

It would be nice if we could treat the Ryan plan not as an object of derision but as a launching off point for a serious debate. That way, maybe for once we could avert a crisis instead of acting shocked when it finally arrives.

Nice? Even if the cost savings of Obamacare are overrated, Ryan's opposed those savings. Ryan would shit bricks on Nocera's desk over the idea of national health insurance regulation, complete with a Washington bureau or agency.

Nocera then refuses to consider Ryan's idea within the larger context of Ryan's Randian political philosophy. And, that's why it is NOT and cannot be, the "launching off point for a serious debate."

Well, so far, Nocera's yet to measure up to the moderate but not too high standards of his NYT columnist predecessor, Frank Rich.

Charles Blow, his colleague, gets it much more nearly right, when he says:

This is not to say that Medicare isn’t in crisis. It is. But, we don’t have to gut it to save it.

But, Ryan wants to gut it. After sucking the brains out of people like Nocera.

Douthat doesn't like Ryanomics

Ross Douthat says it looks too much like Reaganomics, from "Rosy Scenario" through trickle down equivalents to fill-in-the-blank economic numbers.

The fact that Ryan's doing all of this should be no surprise. He knows that punting the change from Medicare to Medic-Where down the road a dozen years isn't enough lipstick on the pig of Ryanomics by itself.

So, instead of being as bold as Ayn Rand would want him to be, he's trying to be too cute by half.

Why Douthat gave him "initial praise," I don't know. At the least, Douthat is smarter than David Brooks. (Not that that says a lot.)

That said, he does promise to review the suicide note political implications of Ryanomics in a future column.