Atrios Blog

It never ends.

The central theme of the cartoon is that Rumsfeld is an asshole, which he is. They repeatedly deflect criticism of the civilian leadership by implying it's a criticism of the troops.

Wingnut code.

Last night Amy Sullivan said something interesting. I suppose I've heard version of it before but never quite as succintly. Roughly paraphrasing, she said that Republicans speak to their base in code and then yell loudly to more moderate voters, while Democrats tend to to do the opposite.

I wasn't sure how true much this was or if true what it meant, but I've been mulling it over since. I certainly don't see a lot of yelling loudly to the base by most Democrats, though it's probably true that the few Democrats who do "pander" to the base do so loudly and proudly. It's also the case that many in the media equate anything expressed by Democrats in a passionate and strident way as pandering to the base. Democrats internalize this and think that what moderates/independents is bland moderation, which I don't really think is true.

Anyway, random thoughts, open for discussion.

Oh my.

Fitzgerald, who is fighting Libby's request, said in a letter to Libby's lawyers that many e-mails from Cheney's office at the time of the Plame leak in 2003 have been deleted contrary to White House policy.

Of course, this is rather unsurpring given that barely remarked upon action by Abu Gonzales:

Washington -- Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said Sunday that he spoke with White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card immediately after learning that the Justice Department had begun a criminal investigation into the leak of a CIA operative's identity. But Gonzales, who was White House counsel at the time, waited 12 hours before officially notifying the rest of the staff of the inquiry.

Scrub scrub scrub...

Olbermann performs a public service.

The only good moment at the SOTU.

His hackery knows no limits.

You can tell him what you think here.

And every time he does the baby Jesus cries.

A rollicking band of threads we.

When the foeman bears his thread.

Connecticut residents, especially, sign up to help Ned Lamont.

A wee reminder from last year.

Joe Biden.

Drum outlines the basic HSA proposal that the preznit didn't even bother talking about last night. Check out #5. Now that's comedy!

And, contra drum, these don't actually sound like appealing ideas. 4 seconds in any hospital and you've blown through your deductible. The fact that your deductible is deductible doesn't actually save you that much money. That fact that your out of pocket expenses are deductible doesn't actually save you that much money. Making things deductible only saves you whatever your marginal tax rate is. So, what, 15% discount? 20% discount? Big whoop!

I have no idea why the idea that you get to save money tax free so that you can spend it when you get sick is appealing. I have no idea why going to see medical personnel without the bargaining power of your insurance company behind you is appealing.

What the hell was that all about anyway?

How beutifully blue the thread.

I'm off to go waddle on the treadmill for a bit. Let me know how it ends.

The Center for American Progress Action Fund/Think Progress is hosting a little SOTU party in conjunction with the Majority Report tomorrow night. Sam Seder will be broadcasting basically as normal from 7-8. From 8-9 there will be a panel discussion video webcast at Think Progress/broadcast on Air America, and from 9-10 during the speech Sam Seder and I and whoever else might be around will be MST3King the speech, without robot helpers.

All is prepared! Your gallant thread awaits you!

That's classy.

Accepting the premise that AARP played ball with Bush on the Bush/DeLay Medicare drug scam because they thought that they would be able to work with him more on others... what the hell were they thinking?