Sunday Muse, 3/29/09

Obama's full plate:

Could the axiom "all politics is local" derail the president's green jobs agenda?

Obama skips the Gridiron dinner but appears on 60 Minutes...is he risking offending the Beltway elite?

The recession ripples outward:

Will Congressional micromanaging of financial change the American professional sports stage?

Some local officials worry the foreclosure crisis could result in severe undercounting in next year's census. California could actually lose a seat for the first time since it entered the Union.

Fundraising totals are plummeting for all the campaign committees; will the recession mean more self-financed Congressional candidates in 2010?

Is anyone paying attention?

It looks like all those fears about Diebold being able to highjack our democracy weren't misplaced.

An Amnesty International report describes America's immigration system a virtual black hole of human rights abuse.

Our military men and women are paying a high price for the Bush/Cheney wars.

Is That the Best the Press Can Do?

I tuned in to watch President Obama's second prime time press conference curious to see how he plans to push his budget proposal through a reluctant Congress, respond to the ongoing AIG bonus scandal and the upcoming G20 Summit. Instead, I was numbed by the performance of the representatives of the Fourth Estate. Honestly, the man gets better questions at town hall meetings populated by average Americans.

If this is the best group of reporters we can assemble for a White House press conference, it's obvious why Americans are as ill-informed as we are. How do I get my press pass? I'm confident I can ask a more productive question than the one Anne Compton asked.

Did anyone else get the feeling the President was getting a little annoyed with the inane questions? Shouldn't he expect college-level inquiries? Instead, he's got junior high heathers pushing GOP talking points about embryonic stem cells and charitable tax deductions for the wealthy.

I admit putting the press in their place - "I like to know what I'm talking about before I speak" -makes me feel good, but wow, he bruised some fragile egos in the room. Public smack downs of people who have cameras, mics and twenty four hours of television airtime to fill may not be a smart strategy.

One thing I wish the President would say is, "Yeah, the Republicans seem to have a short term memory problem. But, you know what? So does the press." I understand why he can't, but just wish he could. Their role in helping Republicans push the Bush presidency into our collective memory hole is yet another example of journalistic malpractice right up there with their cheerleading our way into the invasion of Iraq.

Hillary Doesn't Prefer Blondes! More Meaningless News From the Sunday Morning Pundits

Sunday mornings at Chrispy's home have a predictable routine. This week was like most others...until I heard something about blondes...and brunettes...and I soon found myself wondering, "Is this what passes for a real discussion about issues and politics in 21st century America?"

Now, I'm no Hillary fan, but I found myself wondering, is this fair?

For nearly two decades I lived in DC, and I religiously watched the Sunday morning talkshow lineup (Inside the Beltway they conveniently schedule the shows so you can watch one after the other - its the politico's version of NFL football). When I moved to the West Coast, I realized my weekly political junkie fix would be limited (three years later, I still haven't succeeded in locating CBS's Face the Nation). As a result, Meet the Press and the Chris Mathews Show provide my Sunday morning political insider 'spin.'

This Sunday's Meet the Press had a segment titled "Slick Hillary" in which Timmy and the gang talked about Ron Fornier's recent article describing Hillary's political skills as less "slick" but not as "slick" as 'uber-political' husband Bill.

Stop the presses, folks.

Let's be fair here - and acknowledge there are 20 candidates in the field with political instincts that are no match for Bill Clinton. Hillary isn't going to measure up to him, but neither are any of the others.

As far as being "too slick," PBS's Gwen Ifill came to Hillary's rescue by observing,

"Guess what? Almost every other candidate in this race has some sort of 'slickness' which has been attributed to them - from Mitt Romney to Rudy Giuliani to Barack Obama. And guess what? It turns out that that doesn't matter as much to people as the issues which concern them. How are they going to get their kids in school? How are they going to get their healthcare paid for? So, even though it infuriates us - the media... I don't know that there is any evidence that voters are sitting here thinking, 'Well, I don't know what she thinks, I'll have to vote for somebody else.'"

Amen, Gwen.

Oh, but I made the mistake of leaving the TV on too long and wound up catching Chris Matthews and his gang of merry misfits. Misogynist TweetyBird took particular delight in devouring Hillary this week - but it was the WaPo's Kathleen Parker that really shocked me when she commented on a recent front page picture in the WaPo accompanying an article about the role of women in Clinton's presidential campaign by saying:

"It makes a case with a certain demographic, and I noticed the picture on the front of The Washington Post the other day showed her with all these women and her crew, and did you notice, there was only one blonde out of about 15 women, so it sort of -- I thought that was very telling."

The photo in question can be found here. And, yes, there's only one blonde. Not sure what that says about Hillary's qualifications to be president, but Ms. Parker found it noteworthy.

Most troubling is that this answer came during Tweety's line of questioning about Hillary's qualifications to be Commander-in-Chief, which he prefaced by this comment:

OK, let's put the gender thing in here. I love gender politics, guys. We have two women here all the time to make sure we're balanced on this show. But Elisabeth, I know you're a feminist, in the best possible sense of that word. You [Parker] probably are in a more traditional word.

I found myself wondering, "WTF? What does Matthews mean by "you're a feminist in the best possible sense of that word?" And, if Parker's more "traditional" feminism means making vapid observations about hair color, I can only shake my head in utter dismay. Who cares about the hair color of the women on Hillary's team?" I can't believe this passes for political discourse in modern America.

Twelve hours later, as I tuck myself into bed, the late-night local news reports there are 23 million single women in America today. They are likely to be the 2008 version of Soccer Moms and NASCAR dads, the anchor tells me.

"Oh, please," I find myself begging, "don't let them care how many blondes the next president has in their cabinet. "

Can't we do better than this? Doesn't America deserve more?