Category Archives: American Politics
Rahm Emanuel on the way out?
[UPDATED 6/21/10] Ha’aretz, via the Telegraph, is reporting that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel will leave at the end of President Obama’s second year in office. Unconfirmed but definitely of interest — especially the detail about Emanuel finding Obama too “idealist” — although Raw Story‘s Stephen Webster has questions about the story’s sourcing and bias.
Peter Daou Dares Call Out Our Nation’s Shameful Response to the BP Oil Spill
All Hail the Glorious Teabag Comrades!
I direct your attention to this one sentence:
The Tea Party movement’s dirty little secret is that its chief financial backers owe their family fortune to the granddaddy of all their hatred: Stalin’s godless empire of the USSR.
You know you have to read the rest. Click here for Yasha Levine’s terrific article on the Tea Party’s Bolshevik bankroll.
Crossposted to APJ
Mom, Apple Pie, Baseball, and Mass Transit
I couldn’t agree more:
[H]ere the problem is that merely being located in the United States of America isn’t good enough to pass the inane identity politics litmus tests of the contemporary right—New York City isn’t America (except for purposes of exploiting 9/11 on behalf of torture and aggressive war) nor are Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, DC, etc “really” American. So therefore mass transit is un-American and therefore it’s socialist, so it follows that anyone who wants to build mass transit is doing so out of socialistic hatred for the United States.
— Matthew Yglesias
— Matthew Yglesias
Read the rest here. (Hat tip: Atrios.)
For the record, I use regional mass transit for about 80% of my local commuting and travel, a bicycle for about 15% more, and a car for the rest. It also merits mention that much of the anti-mass-transit agenda can be traced directly back to the national effect of policies enacted by the enormously influential Robert Moses in the mid-20th century; his closer-than-previously-known ties to both the automotive and petrofuel industires are at last being examined by historians.
America Versus the Supremos’ Appalling Ruling on Corporate Megabucks in Political Campaigns
It’s no surprise, but it still sets back the cause of democracy. Continue reading America Versus the Supremos’ Appalling Ruling on Corporate Megabucks in Political Campaigns
Greg Palast Asks a Troubling Question
Consider this:
How did Haiti end up so economically weakened, with infrastructure, from hospitals to water systems, busted or non-existent – there are two fire stations in the entire nation – and infrastructure so frail that the nation was simply waiting for “nature” to finish it off?
And that’s not the only question he has. Read the entire article (title may be NSFW) here.
Crossposted to APJ.
Inside “The Great Game,” 1968
… or, more accurately, as inside as Allen Dulles would allow the media to go in 1968. “We’re not spies. We’re intelligence gatherers.” Newstalgia has posted the audio of an amazing interview with then ex-CIA director Allan Dulles, first broadcast in 1968 on NET (now PBS). It’s a must hear for all students of “The Great Game” then — and now.
Digby Has Your Turkey Day Talking Points
Thursday is Thanksgiving day in the USA, and families will be gathering to enjoy the traditional turkey dinner. So if you’re going to have to dine with your ultra-right-wing Uncle Vern or Palin-worshipping Aunt Sadie, you may benefit from reading this (and memorizing the bolded sections).
Lee, Ling sprung by Clinton
MSNBC reports that North Korea has granted a “special pardon” to Euna Lee and Laura Ling, two US journalists for Current TV, and will release them following a meeting between Bill Clinton and Kim Jong-Il. In a related story, the No Quarter blog reports on just about the last headline one would expect to see from the usually insufferable Drudge Report.