I’ve read a bunch of editorials like this and this blog post from the Washington Post’s Jo-Ann Armao in the last couple of days. It makes me marvel that people with so little understanding of the first amendment can be in journalism. Of course, with the quality of journalism for the last decade, perhaps I shouldn’t marvel. No one is infringing Limbaugh’s free speech rights. There’s nothing “unamerican” about this as the Jackson Sun put it. This is the free market that conservatives worship at its finest. The NFL doesn’t want to alienate customers. Whether it would be Limbaugh himself (almost certainly) or his detractors–all exercising their free speech rights–having him as a part owner in the league would do that. The market spoke when it made Limbaugh the very wealthy drug addict that he is today. Likewise, it spoke when the NFL made a business decision not to invite him into their owner’s club. That’s why a lot of us don’t worship the market the way conservatives do. There’s no appeal to fairness or anything other than the bottom line.

A couple of days ago, Michael Moore gave a speech at Public Citizen’s HQ in DC. The whole thing is about 18 minutes with another 12 minutes where he takes questions. It’s worth a watch and you can find it here. But my favorite bit from it comes well into the speech part and it is this:

“To the Democrats in Congress, who don’t quite get it: I want to offer a personal pledge. I - and a lot of other people - have every intention of removing you from Congress in the next election if you stand in the way of health care legislation that the people want. That is not a hollow or idle threat. We will come to your districts and we will work against you, first in the primary, and, if we have to, in the general election. You don’t think so? You think that we’re just going to go along with you because you are Democrats?

You should think again. This is the No. 1 domestic issue on people’s minds right now. It’s the No. 1 cause of bankruptcies in this country. Medical bills. It’s the No. 1 cause of foreclosures in this country. Medical bills.

We will organize the thousands of people in your district who have suffered as a result of this cruel health care system that we have - we will organize them and we will come after you and we will remove you from office. Make no mistake about that. You had better get behind the President. If you think you were afraid of a few people at a town hall meeting, you haven’t seen anything yet. And let me just say, there are some people in this room, if you remember back to the election of 2000, that are fairly reckless individuals when it comes to politics. They don’t really care - when they see a hypocrite, when they see somebody who’s turned their back on the people who put them into office, they will be relentless, relentless in working against you. Even if it means that the Democrat doesn’t win.”

I still think that voting for Nader was an irresponsible act in 2000. Look at our Supreme Court today for my answer as to why. It’s the same answer I gave at the time. But knocking out some Democratic congressman and senators can be a powerful act and often has been in the last hundred years in this country.

In a (gated) article at the Washington Post today Paul Kane writes that it is complacency among rank and file donors that has led to a 25% drop in donations to the Democratic party’s three major fund raising arms. He also notes that third party groups don’t appear to be preparing to put the same effort into electing Democrats this time around. For much of the article, he also tries to put that on equal par with a drop in large donor donations as well. However, the Ds are still bringing in three times the money from large donors that the Rs are.

It’s not complacency that’s causing us to close our check books. The surge in Democratic fund raising in 2006 and 2008 came from progressive, grass roots democrats who were desperate for a change. We got our change and we’re not that happy with it. The House is certainly better than the Senate where we’re being told that it takes 60 votes to do anything. The fact of the matter, though, is that progressive groups are finding themselves having to run ads against Democratic congressmen and senators to get them to do progressive things that are supported by solid majorities in their districts and super majorities of Democrats. There is some talk among grass roots groups and labor of finding and supporting progressive primary challengers. It’s a sure way to turn some of these seats back over the Republicans, but it’s also a way of showing that you can’t take our money and votes and then ignore us anymore–like you’ve done since the 80s.

We’re not complacent. We’re pissed. Not giving the bastards money is the hardest hitting outlet we’ve got for now.

It’s certainly true that some of the fight we’ve seen this summer over health care reform is about protecting the profits of insurance companies, insurance companies who make their money by denying you coverage. It’s also true that there’s a strong ideological component to it. There are laissez faire types who genuinely believe that greater government interference will reduce the quality of care. There’s also a republican strategy of obstructing whatever Obama tries to do and appealing to the fringe crazies who think he’s an illegitimate president. But what this is really about is plain, old electoral politics. The Republicans understand something that seems to elude a lot of the democratic party and the progressive blogosphere. It’s a simple thing. When Democratic social programs subsidize the quality of life of middle class and working class Americans, they win their votes. Just like when Republican and Democratic policies subsidize the bottom lines of different industries, they win those industries’ support. The difference between the two parties is that while both are content to subsidize the hell out of corporate America, only one has even a passing interest in subsidizing American families. A successful, overtly government run health care option would give the Democrats a lock on congress for several sessions if they can get it implemented before they’re voted out. A single payer plan would give them control of congress for a generation, but they lack both the vision and courage to seize that opportunity.

It’s been a while since I’ve put anything up on this space. I had a whole bunch of personal stuff going on this summer, including starting a very demanding new job. Hopefully, some of you are still reading.

I have a 90 mile a day commute. It gives me a lot of time to think. I had an idea this morning that I believe is simple, but also pretty damn clever. My proposal for a simple reform as part of the supposed reform of our financial system that’s on the horizon is this: No one who works in a regulated financial services, banking, or insurance organization can make more money in bonus or commission than they make in salary. Let’s put that hefty compensation right there on the books as a regular, recurring cost. If you think an employee might be worth $100 million dollars a year, you pay him $50 million and let him make the other half in bonus. If you don’t think an employee is worth that guaranteed $50 million a year, then maybe you should rethink what you’re paying him and others like him. I’m sure that the toady boards of directors probably wouldn’t have a problem approving outrageous salaries like this at many companies, but I bet their shareholders would.

This isn’t a cure for, well, almost anything, but it’s an idea that I like and that could be easily implemented. What do you think?

All of the progressive opinion I’m reading is opposed to the ballot measures that Californians will be voting on soon. When I look at each of these propositions, I can certainly understand the recommendation. They all kind of suck. The budget deal that went through a couple of months back was dependent on these measures passing, though. If they don’t pass, the budget deal doesn’t can’t stick and we have to go back to the drawing board…or so I read.

If anyone can answer the following questions with something more than “not my problem”, I would really appreciate it.

1. What happens if all of these props fail?
2. What happens if any one of these props fail?

The current budget is non-viable without them, right? The stubborn refusal of a small minority of Republicans in the state Senate to increase any taxes shows no signs of changing. Does this mean that we go back to looking at massive cuts in state services. That’s the only thing the Republicans in the senate would agree to. Are those massive cuts somehow better than what’s in these props?

The switch by Arlen Specter to the Democratic party is big news. It’s not big news that also requires big analysis. Frankly, the Republican spin on this is probably more accurate than the Specter spin. This was a simple political calculation. If I had to put money on who would have won a Specter vs. Toomey primary battle, I would have put that money on Toomey. Specter barely beat him in 2004. The Obama and Clinton campaigns got a lot of moderates to switch to the Democratic Party. That primary electorate would be even more conservative now than it was six years ago.

In a Specter vs. Toomey general election, Specter probably walks away with it pretty easily.

I had planned to take lunch at about 12:30 today, but I was working on a project and looked up and found that it was well past 2:00. I turned on Hardball. I am somewhere between amused and frustrated (but mostly amused) at watching the northeastern media elite try to parse the current, controversial statements from Sarah Palin. For better or worse, growing up in the south means that I generally understand what evangelicals mean when they open their mouths. The coded way in which they often speak means that you have to be precise in parsing their words.

Sarah Palin said, in reference to the folks at the McCain campaign that she couldn’t find anyone that she wanted to hold hands and pray with. Repeatedly, Chris Matthews and his guests have stated this as “she couldn’t find anyone to pray with” and then saying that she’s accusing the McCain staff of being godless or something. The operative word in this context is “want”. It’s a judgment that is as much about social attitudes and relationships as it is about religion. Where religion comes in on the thing isn’t “I’m a Christian and you’re not”. It’s something closer to “you’re not my kind of Christian”.

I had several comments about my last post. They were largely along a similar line. It’s a line I’ve heard before. Essentially, people are bothered by what they see as an anti-feminist message where women are portrayed as blank slates that can, or perhaps need to be, programmed to do various kinds of dangerous or skeevy things. This is precisely what I was talking about when I said that I see Joss Whedon doing things here that other people don’t seem to be seeing. I would say Dollhouse is every bit as subversive of those notions as Buffy was subversive of the notion of the helpless blonde cheerleader who either falls victim to the scary forces in the world or who needs a man to save her. Every bit as subversive. It’s not as over the top. It’s far more subtle. It should be. Thanks to Joss Whedon and a lot of other folks, the TV viewing audience (or at least the right segments of it) are a lot more sophisticated than it was a dozen years ago. The thing about Dollhouse–the problem with Dollhouse from a marketing perspective–is that it doesn’t give away its secrets in the first episode or two. We’re used to getting the hook for a show early and then seeing how it builds over time. I think it’ll take a full season to even get the hook for this thing, though I’m feeling out more and more bits of it over time. What you may have seen as the gimmick behind this show as revealed in the first episode or two isn’t the gimmick behind this show.

If you’ve only seen an episode or two of this show, decided that you knew what it was about, and then quit watching on the grounds listed above, you should reconsider. This is a darker show than what he’s done before. That’s for sure. Whedon himself has said that the premise makes him uncomfortable and, therefore, he’s not surprised when it makes other people uncomfortable.

After the first episode of Dollhouse, I wondered whether I was a moron or just too big of a Joss Whedon fan. The show was so roundly panned by most people I know that I doubted whether the wonderful potential complexity that I saw was really there. People whose opinions I respect on TV shows, on movies, on fiction generally were not very high. Since the days after the first episode, I have largely avoided reading anything anyone I know was saying about the show. I figured I would watch it for however long Fox was willing to keep it on the air and be sad and outraged when they eventually cancel it–probably just as it’s really hitting its stride.

I have been more and more impressed with the show each week. When I have read stuff in the media about the show, it has still mostly been not that positive. A lot of the specific story and plot objections have seemed completely unfounded to me, though. It really seemed to me that they didn’t understand what Whedon is doing with the show. Again, I was starting to wonder whether I was a moron or too much of a fan boy. If the media people (who generally appreciate Whedon’s style) weren’t big on the show, weren’t seeing the layers that I see, then maybe they aren’t there. Maybe the fan boy thing was clouding my judgment. Maybe I looked at the lengthy period of brainstorming and development between Whedon and Dushku prior to actual production as an indicator of quality that wasn’t there.

I feel pretty vindicated after last night.