February 14
It's been brought on. Al Franken announced his senate candidacy at the end of his final radio show this afternoon. He also has a video announcement on his campaign site or if you prefer you can read it. I'll miss his show and I hope some of the other Air America programs pick some of his regular guests. Joe Conason and Norm Ornstein have more free time Rachel, Laura, Young Turks, somebody. I wondered that Franken left his show so long before the election. Jesse Ventura waited until I think the summer of the election year before giving up his show, and Tim Pawlenty stopped doing his show only after a long fight over campaign finance laws well into last year. Franken would have been fine legally through this year and had a platform, but maybe he wants to work full time on the campaign. Can't blame him for that.
I don't recall a senate election ever starting this early. Probably candidates thought about it. My best guess is the early start is a spinoff of the ridiculously early start to the presidential race. I can't recall the presidential election getting seriously started, at least in media coverage, the October before the midterms. Though as I wrote that, I vaguely recalled the 2000 election starting literally the evening of the day the senate acquitted Clinton. Anyway, as long as it has started, I'll indulge myself with some speculation. I avoid making predictions because not only is it easy to be wrong, but there's a record of me being wrong. Well, at that risk: I think Franken will win the DFL (Democratic Farmer Labor Party --- the Minnesota Democrats) nomination without a problem. He already said he'll abide by the party endorsement, which is a big deal to the grassroots activists who show up at the precinct caucuses, so I think he just about has the endorsement already. I expect he'll out-fundraise the other candidates enough to clear his way through the primary. Mike Ciresi, who has announced an exploratory committee and is a guest tomorrow (Thursday) on Minnesota Matters, is able to self-finance, which makes him the only one with a chance to beat Franken.
Though I wondered at Franken giving up his show this early, he has shown some sound political instincts. I noticed he announced midweek, when he can get maximum TV news exposure. TV is still by far the most important news source, whether we heavy Internet users and newspaper subscribers like it or not. In terms of Franken's medium until now, the weekday talk radio tends to react to the prior and current day's news much more than weekend shows, which tend to be less immediate or even pre-recorded, plus I think I've heard weekend radio gets smaller audiences. Radio does matter, at least according to some people who got elected last year, including Tim Walz, Keith Ellison, and Bernie Sanders.
Besides the timing of the announcement, he took on the word "comedian", which the Republicans use as a perjorative. He doesn't run from it, but takes it straight on. Notice too how his announcement is a defense of social programs like Pell grants and the Social Security survivors benefits. He's going to be accused of being a big government liberal no matter what he says, but he appears to be trying to frame that debate in more favorable terms. He's smart to try to make conservatives attacking the legacy of FDR do so by trying to knock down something that is assumed at the start to work.
Franken also mentioned Paul Wellstone. It's a politically smart move for anyone seeking a DFL nomination to seek to put on Wellstone's mantle, which ought to be somewhat easier against the man who won Wellstone's seat in accidental circumstances. That's a matter of opinion of course, but when Wellstone's poll numbers actually improved after his vote against invading Iraq -- the last vote before his death -- I didn't like Coleman's chances without something big happening. I wrote after last year's elections that I was thinking about Wellstone when I blogged or dooknocked, especially during GOTV on election day. However, the beneficiary of the memorial and the twisting of it in the conservative media still holds that seat. Wellstone is still an icon for Minnesotans of a liberal bent, and whoever can plausibly present himself as Wellstone's worthy successor has a big advantage. Franken can do that from having campaigned for Wellstone, from having been a strong proponent of Wellstone's issues, and it probably doesn't hurt that Franken also wears his heart on his sleeve. If he can appear genuine, as opposed to the slick Coleman, he can avoid the Bob Dole/Al Gore mistake of hiding your real self under a consultant-applied patina, and based on day one he seems to be doing that.
He also took on the "angry" charge: "Well, as you can see, I'm an angry man." That was said while hugging staff members after his last show. Just like referring to his former job as a comedian as an insult, he's taking the "angry" charge head on instead of trying to run from it. He has often said on his show that there are important things to get angry about, and today I think it was Norm Ornstein recommended retorting by asking what Republicans get angry about.
As far as the general election, it's too far in advance. I think there's an assumption that the 2006 elections were a precursor for what's to come. I'll just remind sanguine Democrats that the Democratic win 1974 didn't really carry over to 1976, and might not have mattered at all without Ford's pardon of Nixon. More recently, the cocky Republicans of 1994 did not win the presidency they assumed was theirs in 1996. It wasn't even a particularly close election. Not that Republicans are bound to comeback -- I'm just saying their repeated implosion isn't guaranteed. So I won't predict Franken will win the general election, just that I think he's the heavy favorite for both the endorsement and the primary, and he has a chance against Coleman.
February 9
For those of you in doubt that the torture in US prisons in Iraq was policy and not just a few guards gone bad, one of the interrogators, Eric Fair, says straight out he was following instructions. If you still think like a dittohead that the abuse was on the level of fraternity pranks, get a load of this:
"American authorities continue to insist that the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib was an isolated incident in an otherwise well-run detention system. That insistence, however, stands in sharp contrast to my own experiences as an interrogator in Iraq. I watched as detainees were forced to stand naked all night, shivering in their cold cells and pleading with their captors for help. Others were subjected to long periods of isolation in pitch-black rooms. Food and sleep deprivation were common, along with a variety of physical abuse, including punching and kicking. Aggressive, and in many ways abusive, techniques were used daily in Iraq, all in the name of acquiring the intelligence necessary to bring an end to the insurgency. The violence raging there today is evidence that those tactics never worked. My memories are evidence that those tactics were terribly wrong."
On another aspect of the occupation of Iraq, if you get sick of hearing that opponents of the acting president are rooting for American troops to lose, and you would like a good comeback, Matt Taibbi tells those who use the word "root" like it's a ballgame instead of killing:
"For most of us, if we thought there was any chance this thing could work, we'd have been for it, or at least not so violently against it. Instead, our opposition to the war was based on our absolute conviction that it would end in disaster -- which it incidentally has. But according to [Time columnist Joe] Klein, if we see a guy step off the top of the Empire State Building, we're supposed to root for him to nail the dismount. The whole issue is irrelevant and absurd. This is a catastrophe, not a baseball game. 'Rooting' is a kid's word; grow the f___ up [Taibbi didn't use underscores].I think "grow up" is a plenty good insult without the f bomb. In fact, I think it's stronger, since it sounds like an adult scolding a kid.
February 8
There are two pieces of good news regarding election fraud and voting rights. The big one comes form Florida, where Gov. Charlie Crist is asking the legislature to replace touchscreen machines with optical scanners. Why should you care? Because the touchscreens are the biggest reason so many of us doubt the honesty of our elections. Obviously they aren't the only form of election fraud as shown by the acting president's "win" in Ohio, but they are the only form where the fraud is undetectable, meaning the results can never be trusted. If they're abolished in Florida, it has to be possible in every other state. Remember, this is FLORIDA, where the fraud in 2000 caused me to dub Bush "the acting president" since he holds the post until there's a legitimate president. That was before touchscreens, but after the touchscreens went into use, there was a surprising result in the 2002 Democratic primary where a relatively unknown candidate beat Janet Reno, and then got squashed by Jeb Bush. In 2004, Florida got little attention because it didn't look so close as Ohio, but there were plenty of allegations of fraud. Last year, touchscreens in Sarasota County lost 18,000 votes in the US House race when the counted votes went Democratic, and the Republican got in by a tiny margin no one believes but can't be disproven. Especially noteworthy is that the Republicans have run Florida and its elections all this time, and have been the beneficiaries of the fraud they've allegedly perpetrated. Crist is a Republican, which means his party must hate him. In fact, he's referred to as Republican in name only in the comments attached to the linked article. I expect he's a Republican for a reason, but he has done the right thing here and bucked his party to do it. Moreover, he was elected by touchscreens, and incumbents tend not to want to change systems that keep them in power, so here's another virtual pat on the back. If there's one state above all where we should hope for this reform, it's Florida. So Floridians, please contact your state legislators and tell them to back this. The Republicans can still kill this.
The other good news comes from Minnesota, where we already have optical scanners almost everywhere. The new DFL (Democratic Farmer Labor Party) secretary of state, Mark Ritchie, is asking the legislature to make voter registration automatic when eligible voters get their drivers licenses or state IDs. He also wants to make address changes automatic based on post office change of address forms (my wife and I ran into that problem ourselves last September). The DFL controls both houses of the legislature so my guess is this will be passed, but given the Republicans' reflexive dislike of increasing voter turnout and making voting more convenient, Gov. Pawlenty will be tempted to veto. Conventional wisdom holds that increased turnout helps Democrats -- conventional wisdom I doubt given what I've observed the last few years, but it's a liberal principle to seek increased participation -- and I've heard, though I can't point to a study at this point, that studies have shown habitual nonvoters who can be talked into registering will probably pay attention to the election and vote. That could mean a whole lot more Minnesotans voting. So Minnesotans, we need to contact our legislators, we need to tell the governor to sign the bill, and a thank you to Mark Ritchie won't hurt.
A recent segment on Talk of the Nation answered basic questions about the trial of Scooter Libby connected to the Valerie Plame leak. By basic, I mean questions like, why isn't Robert Novak on trial since he wrote the column that blew Valerie Wilson's cover (the law against exposing undercover agents only applies to people with security clearances), and why isn't Richard Armitage on trial since he leaked to the columnist who actually revealed her identity (Fitzgerald wasn't confident enough he could show Armitage knew she was covert). If you've been getting the conservative spin without the countervailing facts, you can find out things like Mrs. Wilson was definitely covert, and it was indeed Cheney's office that asked the CIA to look into the Niger uranium story so Joseph Wilson got that right. Cheney didn't specifically ask for Wilson to be sent, or specifically ask for someone with Wilson's experience, but Wilson never claimed that.
February 6
Want another good reason to oppose a war with Iran? I've suggested before (in fact, suggested more than once) that part of the reason the war in Afghanistan is still going and going like crap is the removal and withdrawal of resources for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Imagine what could have been done in Afghanistan with $200 billion that's been squandered in Iraq, like finishing off the Taliban, constructing highways, building schools, or developing crops other than poppies for the heroin trade. A heavier presence right away would have allowed more progress in women's rights and asserting government control over warlords. Now think of the effect of withdrawing yet more resources for a war on Iran. You conservatives, you think withdrawing troops from Iraq will be a disaster, but how will that be avoided with a war on Iran? Not just troops will have to be redeployed, but contractors and of course money. What, you don't believe Afghanistan is going very badly? Please read Women come last in Afghanistan and tell me that. Can anyone who has studied history say it's a lousy idea to start a second war before your first war is over if you don't absolutely have to? How much worse then to start a third simultaneous war. If I knew nothing else, that alone would tell me a war with Iran is a dreadful idea if there's any way to avoid it until Afghanistan and Iraq are resolved. And yes, I do realize either will take years. It wasn't my idea to invade Iraq and shortchange the Afghan war effort to do it. If you didn't speak up before Iraq War II, here's your chance to redeem yourself by opposing war with Iran.
February 4
On the day Molly Ivins died, I put a quote of hers over in the quotes on the right, "Raise more hell." Though I strongly suspect the acting president plans to attack Iran in the next few months, he hasn't yet, and maybe if sane people raise enough hell in the political sense, we can prevent the lunacy of Bush raising more hell in the military sense. To get started on that, I've added a new quotes archive specifically for Iran, and I'll be watching out for meaningful quotes on the subject. Speaking of raising hell, as I was going through the Iraq archive I came upon a quote that's one of my favorites. It was Christine Loria, wife of Spc. Robert Loria, who lost an arm in Iraq and was discharged with all of his last paycheck taken, a debt hanging over him and no money to get home, to his commanders who responded to her call for help by asking why the wife was calling instead of the soldier: "Because on some level, he still respects you. I don't have that problem."
Speaking of raising hell, let's do that for the American Enterprise Institute. They have reacted to the IPCC report on climate change by offering $10,000 to any scientist who will write an essay casting doubt on the IPCC report. Notice they're not looking for scientific studies, just essays. They aren't thinking about something that can pass peer review, just something for the Wall Street Journal editorial page to print, which can then be picked up by the conservative propaganda machine to offer as science that refutes what is actually agreed upon by every scientist who isn't getting bribed by the likes of AEI and its major funders like Exxon. How handy the article comes with a photo of a polar bear, because AEI has earned a Dead Polar Bear Award.
Speaking of deceiving people about science, tonight (I should be in bed by now) let's also give out a Take the Red Pill Award. Dr. Abdul Majid Katme, who heads the Islamic Medical Association in Britain, is telling Muslims to avoid vaccinations because they contain unislamic ingredients. Instead, Muslims just have to be good enough Muslims to stay healthy: "You see, God created us perfect and with a very strong defence system. If you breast-feed your child for two years -- as the Koran says -- and you eat Koranic food like olives and black seed, and you do ablution each time you pray, then you will have a strong defence system." So forget protecting your child against small pox, polio, measles, etc, and just wash well enough when you pray. When you wash, Dr. Katme, try not to splash any on your shiny new award. Prayer just won't get those water stains out. [The Times of London was having some trouble when I wrote this, but most of the story is quoted on Respectful Insolence.]
