Political Blog—April 2010

April 1—Would that this were an April Fool's joke.

Scott Roeder, the murderer of abortionist Dr. Tiller, was sentenced to life in prison today. He will be eligible for parole if he lives past 102. On Rachel Maddow's show tonight, she and Eugene Robinson were discussing the case and the growing lunacy on the right—for, as Robinson pointed out, the danger of political violence has come from the right thus far. I hesitate to label it domestic terrorism as they did, because terrorism has a specific legal definition, identified by weapons used, political goals, for whom the terrorist is working, etc. A single nutcase going off the rails is terrifying but not terrorism, and I don't want to label every violent lunatic a terrorist lest I lessen the meaning of the word.

Newark, New Jersey's mayor, Cory Booker, was also on Maddow's show, and I have to say he was awesome. Newark, commonly known as the most dangerous city in the country, just had its first calendar month without a murder since 1966. Um—congrats? He told a few stories about improvements to the city that I enjoyed, such as a guy who bought a lawn mower with his stimulus check and mowed the grass in this overgrown area where drug dealers hung out, and he made it look so nice that the drug dealers left. Granted, they most likely just went somewhere else, but I liked it. Booker also talked about cleaning up the city in other ways, like trying to make the streets safer so people didn't fear walking down certain streets during certain hours, because you shouldn't surrender to forces you don't believe in. He wound up by saying that Newark is improving not because of its mayor, but because of people coming together.

Then Rachel moved on to a story about the U.S. Navy capturing some Somali pirates. (Go Navy!) But she didn't know the term "the brig" and used "boat jail" instead. For shame! For crying out loud! I sent her an email telling her the term and called her a landlubber. I may be ever so slightly biased since my grandfather was a Naval officer, I used to live on a sailboat, and I have several series of books of nautical fiction . . . but really? "The brig" is a pretty common term. *sigh*

April 6—Our New Nuclear Policy

Yesterday, Obama said he was revamping our nuclear policy as part of a global goal of making nuclear weapons obsolete all over the globe. Obviously, this must be done in baby steps, and our new nuclear strategy renounces the development of any new nuclear weapons. We will also not use nuclear weapons against non nuclear states, even if they attacked us with biological or chemical weapons, though that will likely include an option to reconsider, which as far as I can tell means it may as well not be included at all. Also, the new nuclear policy excepts outliers such as Iran and North Korea that have violated or renounced the main treaty halting nuclear proliferation.

April 11—I foresee more filibustering . . .

Liberal Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens is retiring, so Obama will have to make another Supreme Court appointment. I wonder if he were waiting to retire till a Democrat was well established in office. Anyway, Obama said, regarding his consideration of the impending appointment, that the person would have to realize that powerful interests cannot override the concerns of everyday citizens, which sounds like he wants a judge who will fight for the little guy, or at least not rule in favor of Wall Street. It matters that the appointee can help unite the country, because the Court has been losing trust lately. Of course, the Senate has been losing trust too, what with the GOP's obsession with needing sixty votes to get anything done, which is straight up false. It only takes fifty-one. But of course, the GOP will insist on sixty votes in an attempt to thwart whomever Obama selects.

In other news, President Obama just traveled to Prague to sign a treaty with Russia to reduce each nation's nuclear stockpile by about thirty percent. This week Obama is hosting forty nations' leaders for a global nuclear summit beginning tomorrow. The summit will determine our place in the world and also, with any luck, work toward ensuring no terrorists ever get their hands on nuclear weapons. Iran and North Korea haven't listened to us yet, which has in a way made our case, as Hillary Clinton observed.

April 16—Not Another Wise Latina

Obama will soon make another appointment to the Supreme Court, possibly Goodwin Liu. Much as with Sotomayor, the GOP is pitching a hissy fit and making every silly argument against him that they can. The only thing I can possibly see against him is that he is fairly young, not yet forty years old. But for all that he's well qualified; I don't think I will be qualified to sit on the Court when I'm forty. Anyway, I'm anticipating weeks of vaguely racist commentary from the right before Liu gets appointed anyway.

April 18—Freedom for All, Not a Free for All

The Goldman Sachs scandal broke this week in a fabulously timed coincidence with the Senate's debate over financial deregulation. What gets me is the sheer arrogance of its orchestrator, Fabrice Tourre, who had the sheer gall to refer to himself as "Fabulous Fab" in his incriminating email. He sounds really incredibly shallow, worse than a schoolgirl, and he admitted that he didn't even understand the implications of everything he had done. Having said that, it's not like we really needed a case for reform. As Timothy Geithner pointed out on Meet the Press this morning, millions of people have lost their jobs and homes, and tens of thousands of businesses have failed; we don't really need more of a case for reform.

Meet the Press was overwhelmingly focused on finance this week, which, while I recognize its importance, I also find dull. Therefore I was relieved when the topic shifted to immigration reform, specifically, the racist nature of the new Arizona law. Like the Goldman Sachs scandal and the Senate talking about financial regulation, the Arizona law comes right at the peak of the overwhelmingly white tea party movement. All of this boils down to, as far as I can tell, barely-closeted resentment over the fact that we have a black president. It is so disturbing to think, to feel reassured for one moment, that we live in a free country . . . only to have it all thrown back in your face by a bunch of narrow-minded bigots who only want freedom for themselves.

April 23—Arizona's Latest Embarrassment

I was at work all day on Monday and thusly missed all the coverage of the gun rallies in DC that were tactlessly held on the anniversary of Waco and the Oklahoma City bombings. I'm sure the rallies were held on April 19th because it was the anniversary of Lexington and Concord, but that date has been tarnished by those other unfortunate events and thusly should not have been used for the sake of avoiding further controversy . . . unless that's what they were going for, in which case, fuck them.

I saw the distressing news of the oil rig that caught fire and sank in the Gulf of Mexico the other day; they just announced that they're not going to continue to search for the eleven people still missing since there's no chance they could have survived. Those poor people, not to mention the wildlife. Unless, of course, you're John McCain, in which case those fish are just fine to eat. Somebody should catch a fish covered in toxic chemicals and hand it to him and say, "Oh, yeah? Eat it, mother fucker."

Speaking of tools from Arizona, the Arizona governor has just signed into law a bill that enables police to pull over anyone they think might be an illegal immigrant, meaning Mexican Americans. Of all the fucked up . . . I can't believe this happened. I'm sure it'll be signed out of law relatively quickly, as soon as some guy takes a court case to a higher authority (which, considering the state of Arizona's current legal system, probably means the local high school principal), but it should never have been thought of in the first place.

April 25—A Beautiful Sentiment

Obama echoed my sentiments of a week ago with the following beautiful sentiment: "A free market is never meant to be a free license to take whatever you can get however you can get it." As he said, irresponsibility at the federal level leads to irresponsibility everywhere else. So that's trickle down economics. The problem with financial reform, of course, is that it is quite likely to be the health care reform debacle all over again, with epic childishness and pointless battles waged by the party of no, resulting in flaws in a bloated bill that gets its good points ignored. You show me a pessimist; I'll show you a realist.

Anyway, Obama called Arizona's immigration law "misguided" in the understatement of the decade. I took that as a sign that it's only a matter of time before that law gets repealed. The question is, how much time?

In other news, the CEO of Goldman Sachs will face questions on Capitol Hill this week, deepening distrust of government's role in the economy. Those responsible will pay in ballots come November. I just hope it's good for the Democrats.

April 29—How's that drill-y, spill-y stuff workin' out for ya?

Arizona obviously not yet repealed its unconstitutional law regarding illegal immigrants, to the acrimony of, well, anyone hoping to travel anywhere near Arizona anytime soon. One Arizona sheriff has already refused to uphold the law, though the damage has already been done. Mexico has issued a warning to its citizens considering traveling to the U.S. How embarrassing. Even within our borders, Arizona is facing a well-deserved boycott: Comedian Paul Rodriguez canceled his Arizona show, plus at least conventions have been canceled due to people pulling out. One convention, ironically, was for immigration lawyers. Good job, douchebags.

In other "oh gawd" news, Charlie Crist just announced his independent bid for the Senate. Independent, my ass. Just like Joe Lieberman.

Anyway, onto the more problematic, real news. I mean, yes, Arizona is a disaster, but I'm more worried really about the oil spill off the Gulf Coast. Arizona's law will be repealed soon enough, once the economic implications hit home. In the meantime, though, thousands of gallons a day are spilling into the Gulf of Mexico, on fire, and heading for the coast. That is what I'm worried about; it's much more likely to have devastating long term effects. And this of course is right on the tail of a major mining disaster. Of course, the oil spill occurred eleven days after Sarah Palin said it was perfectly safe to drill off the Gulf Coast. *sigh* If the spill doesn't get reigned in soon, it could well be worse than Exxon-Valdez. I hope this changes Obama's opinion of offshore drilling.