Straight up: do you think Obama was bought off? I’m talking about his decision to abandon new air pollution rules, of course.
I think he was. If he got enough for his re-election campaign, then I don’t necessarily blame him, but I also wonder how that works. How do you know they that wont’t give even more money to the other side, have a secret PAC run ads against you etc.? I’ve often wondered about how these kinds of deals can be made.
Update. Davis X. Machina writes:
It’s all about how the EPA is perceived by white working-class voters in a small number of pivotal coal and/or rust-belt states, and how that will determine whether Democrats have any shot at keeping control of the Senate.
That might make more sense. Maybe we’re answering to chain-emailers rather than Galtians.
Zam
Well they probably are giving a ton to the other side, pretty certain big interests like this like to play both sides. Never really understood why dems are so willing to play ball like this. You are indeed correct to think they will give some to a PAC to run shit against him, they prefer republicans but will settle for a democrat owing them a favor.
eemom
well, this post ought to keep us busy for a while.
Kifaru1
….As long as he doesn’t touch the Chesapeake Bay order for TMDLs, I will still have a job….
aisce
no, he was not “bought off.”
that’s juvenile and reductive thinking that completely ignores the reality of other competing powers and interests existing within our government with their own individual agency to do and not do things.
to put it bluntly, troll stop trolling.
Davis X. Machina
It’s all about how the EPA is perceived by white working-class voters in a small number of pivotal coal and/or rust-belt states, and how that will determine whether Democrats have any shot at keeping control of the Senate
Obama can raise a metric shit-ton of money without whatever boodle he allegedly was bought off with this time.
eemom
why can’t it be as simple as what I read somewhere today, i.e., that the new rules will hurt Democrats in 2012?
Marc
No. Come on.
Look, there are some issues where the costs of inaction are very high – ozone depletion; climate change; lead abatement; etc.
But there are other cases where you’re looking at issues where the science is honestly in doubt. Once you get to low exposure levels it becomes very hard to establish a link with human health. Maybe there is extra risk at very low levels; maybe there is actually no risk at all. The EPA has an established metric for this: the cost per life saved.
See http://www.epa.gov/ttnecas1/regdata/RIAs/6b-ozoneriachapter6appendixb.pdf
for the actual metric in this case. These regulations are *expensive* by EPA standards, which means that the call to make the regulations isn’t obvious. The lowest cost was 1.6 million, below the EPA threshold for action; the highest was 29 million, far above it. (The threshold for the EPA deciding that a regulation is “worth it” is about 6.4 million dollars per life saved.) Note that the estimates of “lives saved” becomes very hard to do reliably at low dose levels, and the actual lives saved could be far lower (or higher, of course.)
People are evaluating this based on prejudice – corporations bad, Obama bad, EPA regulations good. But the actual situation is more complex, and Obama has a good record on these sorts of issues (e.g. mercury levels.)
I think it was based on this being extremely expensive, likely to get tied up in red tape, and not being an open-and-shut scientific case for action.
EDIT: the actual cost estimates are on page 7b-31, for those who want to scroll to the bottom line. This is not a cheap fix issue.
Ecks
Well you figure they’re giving to the R’s anyway. You don’t pretend you’re buying undivided loyalty, just the money they actually deliver.
And who knows what is really going on here. Maybe it’s $$$, maybe it’s a fight the Prez decided wasn’t going to be worth once you got to the final end game, maybe there’s something personal going on with someone… You can never really tell for sure from the outside. It ain’t great, whatever it is though.
ETA: Plus everything that was said above at #7.
virag
who’s abl gonna blame for this one? olbermann was on tonight, kinda pissed, and was very clear that this was all obama and nothing to do with the house, the senate, the supreme court or anything other than the whitehouse and executive authority. a cave is a cave is a cave is a cave.
handy
Those sissy fines wouldn’t have made any difference anyhow. I say we leave Obama alone.
eemom
@Davis X. Machina:
yeah. That.
Yutsano
I thought the big lobbying push was from the Democratic Senators from the Rust Belt states. Now them being bought off doesn’t shock me, nor does having them owe a big favor to Obama. Maybe I’m wrong about the players here though.
Darkrose
Not bought off. Scared off, maybe, by another weak jobs report, and the fear that Republicans would trumpet this as another instance of soshaliszt ani-business attitudes.
Jewish Steel
I agree with Bob Loblaw on the previous thread.
But, yeah. How does that work? Handshake? Omerta? Bushido? Honor among thieves. Off-shore account?
Zam
@eemom: Oh they hurt us, they hurt us bad. Its just that its not all on the money side that we are getting blasted.
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom: I may go watch a movie.
On topic: I don’t know that Obama was bought off per se as much as Rust Belt Dems felt they needed it in order to get reelected and Obama bought into their logic. I am not sure this is it, but it is something that I have been kicking around a little.
ETA: Others seem to be kicking around the same thought.
The Snarxist Formerly Known As Kryptik
I just have no idea what such a decision would be worth if he was ‘bought off’. But then again, I have no idea what, aside from internalizing the awful, stupid, backward ‘regulations create uncertainty!!’ meme, would prompt an ass-backward decision like this.
And the worst thing is how it’s become seen as a carte blanche to further push for outright abolishing the EPA by such folks wont to do so. I won’t lie, it feels like a nail in sane climate/energy politics coffin in this country.
Big Baby DougJ
@aisce:
That sounds a lot like a snarky way of saying he was bought off.
JPL
He caved to the lobbyists and knowing the President it was for nothing except empty promises..
btw ..I’m an obamabot
West of the Cascades
I don’t think so — I think he genuinely believes (and his economic advisors are telling him) that implementing the rules at this point will stifle some economic growth. That’s almost certainly wrong, and (more tragically) buys directly into right-wing talking points on “regulation OMG will kill jobs,” but I think he believes that.
The only reasonable reasons I can see for delaying the regulations are if his legal team warned there was a good chance that industry could get the rule stopped in court, and the fact that the scientific studies that supported the standard are being redone with an estimated date for reissuance of 2013. There’s some practical sense to not implementing a rule in 2011 when it’s almost certain to be revised in 2013. If that had been the only justification given, I could have lived with it.
cathyx
You don’t blame him for being a sellout? Interesting.
Big Baby DougJ
@Davis X. Machina:
Yeah, could be that too.
Unabogie
By now, isn’t it clear that Obama tells people around him to assemble the facts so he can “know what he’s talking about before he speaks”?
I think it’s likely this simple. He had a decision to make, so he tasked some economists to create a report that detailed the costs and benefits of changing the rules here, and when that report came back, it said that X number of jobs would be lost due to Y costs incurred by drivers and businesses. And in light of the crappy economy, he decided to not go forward. Now, you might think that health is more important than other concerns, and you may be right. But I think this was the crux of the decision, nothing else.
Certainly not some “payment” from the Galtians.
Zam
@Davis X. Machina: You might be right in this, all those ads by big oil and gas telling us all about their mighty job creation skills can go a long way towards losing the energy states.
Little Boots
PICK SOMETHING, OBAMA! and fight for it. hell, invade Nova Scotia! Something!
khead
Right DougJ, but I’d just like to say in all fairness to Mr. Melon here….it was a pretty big check.
The Snarxist Formerly Known As Kryptik
@Omnes Omnibus:
Too bad it’ll never keep them from being seen as Dirty Fucking Hippies by simple dint of the D beside their names.
Jewish Steel
I agree with B0b L0blaw on the previous thread.
And yeah, how does that work? Handshake? Omerta? Bushido? Honor among thieves? Off-shore account?
Davis X. Machina
@Zam: The odds are, in politics, there’s a political explanation.
Strange how that works.
JGabriel
DougJ @ Top:
Nah.
I’m disappointed, of course. But I think Obama cut bait on what was destined to be a losing battle against Republicans terrified of getting more oxygen to their brains and accidentally having an having a moment of sanity.
ETA: I see that Davis X. Machina got there first, but without the meanness.
.
LT
“If he got enough for his re-election campaign, then I don’t necessarily blame him…”
And if Jeffrey Dahmer got a great whopping hardon and a Vesuvial orgasm – then I don’t really blame him, either.
Little Boots
stop calculating! obviously nobody cares. nobody will vote for Rick Perry because he carefully calculates who gets what. it’s all instinct. stop dicking around Obama, and anyone around him! pick a fight and stick to it.
khead
In response to the update…
No way in hell it makes a difference in WV.
Omnes Omnibus
@The Snarxist Formerly Known As Kryptik:
Come the fuck on. The people who want to push for abolishing the EPA would do it no matter what Obama did on this issue and they would use Obama’s action as their excuse. Further, this decision, and I am not arguing that it was the right decision, does not mark the incipient destruction of the EPA or its power to regulate. Get a goddamn grip.
LT
@Little Boots:
Awesome.
Li
Barack Obama was bought off, but long before this. Long before he even got into the White House.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_International_Corporation#Barack_Obama
He’s been in deep cover ever since. He’s, essentially, an intelligence agent for the international corporatocracy.
Big Baby DougJ
@JGabriel:
I think you guys are probably right.
The Snarxist Formerly Known As Kryptik
@Doug:
Who says they’re really any different?
LT
@virag:
Emoprogs, who else?
handy
@Little Boots:
Sounds good to me. Unless you’re suggesting that the Third Way Mushy Middle path is the thing he’s picked and is fighting for.
Zam
@Davis X. Machina: Well its still a worthless idea, there’s gonna be a ton of ads in those states from multiple sources flooding the opposite opinion, and I know from experience even if the candidate has done the exact opposite of what is claimed they will never believe the 20 something at their door over the TV.
Davis X. Machina
@khead: Manchin’s a lock?
Linkmeister
As I said in my post about this:
At some point, who’s he got left to do the GOTV operations he’s gonna need in 2012?
El Cid
__
The glass half-full view of it says, ‘Hey, federal jobs & infrastructure program coming right up!‘
You gotta like the tone of this, though:
‘Be a shame if s’in was to happen to yerrelection, ya know? ‘Cuz, you know, otherwize, we’re allz inta you stayin’ there, knowhatI’msayin?
aisce
@ unabogie
this is complete fucking bullshit.
i will never understand the obot mindset? what is it that compels you to twist yourself into knots trying to make every last decision the man makes into some glowing masterclass on pragmatic virtue and wisdom?
cutting the epa off at the knees didn’t have a damn thing to do about the merits of the regulations themselves. not a damn thing. it had everything to do with parochial senators doing what parochial senators have done since the creation of the institution itself. nominees have to get confirmed, committees have to pass appropriations, unanimous consent has to be gotten unanimously, the grind goes on. that requires compromises to be made. it is often virtueless work. deal with it.
Anne Laurie
IMO, you have it backwards: it’s not a promise of cash for campaigning that the Obama re-election team wanted. It’s the (probably implicit) promise by the companies who’ve just been given a huge savings that they won’t take those funds and spend them fighting against Obama’s re-election.
Much easier to ‘encourage’ the corporatists not to spend more of their money, than to directly solicit funds from them. As the Rethugs have been proving for the last 40 years, it’s not about being the best competitor, it’s about gaming the system to cripple your opponents.
Omnes Omnibus
@Zam: That may well be, but it is a vastly different thing than being bought off by Big Energy.
fhtagn
Why bother to buy Obama? Just suggest he negotiate with himself over the EPA, sit back and wait for the inevitable “grand bargain”.
Davis X. Machina
@Zam: Close races are won at the margins. All those races bid fair to be close. Prudential principle at work.
The extra vote you get, for an entirely, and legitimately worthy, perceived-as-green move, from a voter in a safe Senator’s state doesn’t matter.
khead
@Davis X. Machina:
It’s Obama’s opponent that is the lock in WV and I’m not sure Manchin is worth saving.
The Snarxist Formerly Known As Kryptik
@Omnes Omnibus:
It’s already pretty much become political conventional wisdom in this country that ‘Global Warming is a Hoax’ and greenies just really want to turn the country into a tax wasteland for the sake of sweet sweet plum grants. We got subjected to months long of being told we need to stop persecuting poor poor BP for all those hoocoodanodes about the well, and they still essentially got off as close to scot free as they could. This decision basically lays the groundwork for completely fucking chucking any kind of decent environmental change politically as long as enough of those vaunted ‘job creators’ cry fowl and play the victim.
JGabriel
Zam:
If it’s any consolation, they’ll never believe the 40-something either. Age has nothing to with it. Whether you’re some sort of dirty fucking hippie or dirty fucking preppy, you’re never gonna persuade anyone who gives authority to Fox News hosts.
.
Earl Butz
You can keep Obama or get George Bush III: The Hair Model, with a side dish of theocracy and a government run entirely by the demands of those goddamn teabaggers in their motor scooters.
I don’t like the choices but stop pretending like you have a third option. You don’t.
Omnes Omnibus
@The Snarxist Formerly Known As Kryptik: Okay, and …?
General Stuck
I keep clicking threads here at Balloon Juice and end up at FDL. Strange. Did Obama sell that out too?
Davis X. Machina
@khead: I’ll be happy to lose WV’s electoral votes — Obama won in ’08 without them — and keep the Senate, at just about any cost.
Only Justice Ginsberg’s oncologist could convince me otherwise.
Tata
Why didn’t they change the rules? That’s not really the question, is it? That’s shouting about quatloos.
The question is why do we look past deregulation that’s killing us to debate about trivial things that won’t matter when we have cancer?
Bruce S
“Was Obama bought off?”
Wow – how about some analysis of the impact of the policy over the two-year window, before review, and then some analysis of the politics and exactly where the pressure was coming from? Frankly, if this is short-term it doesn’t bother me as much as the absence of a coherently packaged, campaign-worthy jobs agenda would. But “bought off” isn’t the way this administration works, even when it tilts totally in the wrong direction. I just don’t buy that at all. Yutsano’s scenario sounds plausible, although I haven’t followed this. The negative response from environmental groups to the action itself has been across the board – not limited to some “left” freakout – which indicates pretty clearly that this is leaving some very crappy policy in place.
The “bought off” angle in this post will allow some of the usual suspects here to make your “tone” the issue, rather than what the fuck Obama is actually doing with his presidential powers (not how he’s playing the politics of a deadlock with Congress), which doesn’t ever seem to matter to some. I think I’ll not follow how this thread “arcs.” I think I could already write it…
El Cid
@Anne Laurie:
Fun game: Let’s list those companies, how much money this decision can be estimated to have saved them, and then see whether or not they spend lots of money to beat Obama. I’m not sure too many companies have a leadership which gives a shit if President Teavangelibertarian looks to cause complete national collapse within a year or two.
Little Boots
@JGabriel:
the question is whether you’re going to persuade someone that this time, this time Obama is really gonna do that thing you thought he’d do last time. that is the real dilemma. he can go strong or he can go home. there is no point in voting for somebody who kinda, sorta, maybe a little stands up for you.
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots:
Not that I accept your premise, but there is a point to voting for that guy when the other option is someone who actively working very, very hard to harm you.
Ira-NY
This and the upcoming decision to authorize the pipelie do not represent caving. They represent accepting political reality.
In tough economic times environmental concerns are big political losers.
I reget that is so, but that is the way it is.
fhtagn
@Omnes Omnibus:
And what if you know that the “nice” guy won’t stand up for you enough to make a difference? What if you think he’ll just talk about what a problem bullying is and how we need to find a way to compromise and be civil?
The Spy Who Loved Me
Given the state of the economy and the private sector hunkered down and not hiring, this was probably a wise decision, especially when looked at through a political lens.
I’m more interested in the Solyndra deal. It’s not just Congressional Republicans sniffing around. Networks (I’ve seen a report on ABC and I’m sure others will follow) and independent groups are wanting to know why Solyndra got better loan terms than other solar manufacturers, why Solyndra got federally backed loans in the first place, given their precarious financial condition from the get-go, why the Treasury was loaning them the money directly (rather than some other entity) and where the hell over a half a billion dollars disappeared over a period of 18 months when the company employed only around a thousand people.
John liked to a thing the other day, by some guy that laid out the keys to re-election. One of the keys was no scandals. That one might just change.
Davis X. Machina
@Omnes Omnibus: The split between O-bots and firebaggers comes down to a split between deontolgists and consequentialists, and I’m pretty sure that’s not a.) bridgeable or b.) going away any time soon.
Which is why everybody here is talking past each other most of the time.
fhtagn
@Ira-NY:
What precisely is the difference between “caving” and “accepting political reality”? Is the sad smile/look of impotent regret on the face of the person caving/accepting?
General Stuck
I wonder if anyone even realizes here, that campaign money from a single industry, in post CU, is pretty much moot from what it used to be. The unlimited money to outside groups will be more than can be spent by either candidate. And the remaining restrictions on candidate donations is on it’s last legs, as the landmark SCOTUS recognition that money is free speech will wipe any rules remaining, regarding any restrictions whatsover in political campaigning. Maybe even before the election.
I don’t know about this action, but being a trained environmentalist, it sounds like it may suck to high heavens. I’m just burned out right now from the neverending Obama poutrage over any and every thing that happens, no matter how big or small. So someone else can grind that stone.
Anya
Bought off? Seriously? The hard fact is the EPA regulation is a hard sell at anytime in this right leaning motherfuckin’ country, but specially in such a period of economic hardship. The region most affected are the areas most hit by the financial crisis, but you asshole armchair Presidents, pretend that you’re living in another country under a different economic conditions. Maybe is has something to do with strong opposition from Senators Rockefeller, Begich, Sherrod Brown, Casey, McCaskill, Levin, and Baucus. But when it comes to President Obama you spare nothing to malign and attack him.
Little Boots
@fhtagn:
not looking like you’re caving. not getting into some stupid tiff and then backing off. that’s the difference.
fhtagn
@Little Boots:
Ah, so it’s just a matter of the bread around the shit in the sandwich.
Amir Khalid
I see everyone (well, all but one commenter) looking at this as politics. No one seems to have considered the point Marc raised in comment #3, that there might be a good technical reason for not adopting the regulations.
Omnes Omnibus
@Davis X. Machina: You are probably right. OTOH my plans for the weekend fell through so I have time on my hands.
@fhtagn: And that is where we get to fact that I did not accept the premise. For the sake of the discussion though, I will say I can never see the point of choosing the side that is against me.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
true, but there’s a lot of people that need to be brought back. they won’t be, if they feel like there’s no point, that there’s nothing this guy will fight for anyway, so may as well stay home. and yeah, i don’t think obama wouldn’t really, but he sure as hell looks that way to a lot of people right now.
MikeJ
@Little Boots:
This is exactly the sort of reasoning I’ve come to expect from firebaggers.
El Cid
Guess That Tea Partier, brought to you by the Iowa Democratic Party.
Triassic Sands
It’s nice to have high ethical standards for the candidates one supports.
@Anne Laurie:
Can’t the interested parties simply funnel money to others and let them do the work for them? That way they win twice. In this system, I don’t know if it’s even possible to effectively buy off one’s opponents anymore. There’s always away for the corrupt to have their cake and eat it too.
fhtagn
@Omnes Omnibus:
But why choose the side that adds insult to injury by pretending to be for you and then tells you you need to compromise with the bully – while giving him free rein to beat the crap out of you and the people you care about?
Even if you don’t accept the premise, for whatever reason, it’s still not a particularly appealing option.
aisce
@ fhtagn
nothing. no difference. that’s what “caving” is: acquiescing to reality. picking and choosing one’s battles.
if you only accept a winning percentage of 100%, then I can see why “caves” would offend you. but that’s a plainly stupid way to live.
the administration plainly caved to outside pressure from congress and industry lobbyists. the epa was left out to dry. but that’s different from “being bought off.” one can lose politically without losing one’s integrity.
accusations against the administration’s integrity should be made very, very sparingly.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Marc: Thanks, Marc.
Did anyone else, especially you, Doug, actually read what he wrote?
Davis X. Machina
@MikeJ: As a Mainer, I’m concerned about potential terrorist blowback from any invasion of Nova Scotia.
Dennis SGMM
I would reject out of hand the idea that Obama was bribed. I think that the cold calculation of defending nearly two dozen Senate seats in ’12 played the greatest part in his turnaround. That’s a sensible political move. The negative for Obama is that he championed the measure before taking the temperature of Senate Democrats. That’s just plain sloppy and a president wishing for re-election every mis-step may be harmful well beyond.
fhtagn
@aisce:
I don’t see that one needs to assume a lack of integrity in the administration when persistently demonstrated weakness and inability to message worth a damn are available as alternative explanations.
FWIW – 100% of caving doesn’t strike me as being an intelligent way to live either. If we are going to raise hypothetical extremes.
Little Boots
@Dennis SGMM:
I believe there’s homeland security money available to protect you, if you have the right connections.
cathyx
So by caving, Obama is just accepting reality. That could excuse everything, and it does for Obamabots. I mean really, do you want President Perry (it used to be Palin), or President “accepting reality”? Is there really a difference at this point? And don’t tell me about the supreme court or abortion rights. Any supreme has to pass congress, and abortion rights will never be overturned.
Jewish Steel
@Davis X. Machina:
Wait! I thought this was post-structuralists vs analytics?
Is this the right room for an argument?
Omnes Omnibus
@fhtagn:
I just don’t see the situation that way. This next observation is not aimed personally at you since I do not know if it is remotely applicable. I think a lot of people became very emotionally invested in Obama and saw his as something new and different in politics. As time has gone on and Obama has behaved like a politician, these people have become disillusioned. I did not have that kind of emotional investment in Obama; I saw his as the best option out there and I still do. On the other hand, I know that, as a politician, he will disappoint, baffle, and infuriate me. Anyway, that is my take.
Little Boots
@Jewish Steel:
do NOT unleash the python. it will never end.
JGabriel
Little Boots:
I confess — and maybe I’m wrong — but my outrage over this particular Obama betrayal (it’s a SLAP IN THE FACE) kind of dropped when I realized we were talking about a difference of 5-15 parts per billion in ozone levels. TPM:
Look, I want to see lower ozone levels too, but this isn’t urgent. If Obama thinks there are political reasons to delay this controversy until 2013, I’m okay with that. I’m not okay with putting it off forever, but this is nowhere near as immediate a concern as jobs and the economy.
.
Big Baby DougJ
@Triassic Sands:
No, it’s not.
Little Boots
@Little Boots:
wait, that was directed at Davis X. I blame Doug, the big baby.
aisce
@ amir khalid
because (1) we’re not republicans, (2) it’s a completely bullshit premise, and (3) not a single one of the people backtracking on the economics of the regulations would have done so in opposition to the administration had they pursued their original course. not a single fucking one. marc wouldn’t be posting shit about the potential “costliness” of the regulations if the headline is a positive “obama epa to regulate smog.”
it’s so transparent as to be laughable.
fhtagn
@Omnes Omnibus:
I don’t have an emotional investment in Obama. I just wish he showed some signs of being a savvy politician, because these days he seems to spend a lot of time rolling over for bad policy, idiot Republicans or anyone who looks offended or hurt in his general vicinity. I don’t mind him being Machiavellian – provided he does it competently. That’s what I am not seeing these days, and it worries me, because it’s putting us all on a slow train to President Perryville and I really don’t want to go there.
Linda Featheringill
I really am not up on that particular set of regulations but . . .
A. If the science needed to be rethought, the regulations should have been postponed.
B. If the administration of the regulations needed to be reworked, postponing might be a good move.
C. Just about any other reason is not good enough to justify postponing the regulations. Regardless of who did what.
Another Bob
It’s almost as inspiring as watching a corporate attorney litigate. Maybe those who wish Obama would do more to support their interests just can’t afford to pay him enough.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
and I think he’s going to need some kind of emotional investment again, and it ain’t happening. he cannot just keep doing the above it all schtick. he needs a new strategy, and it has to have some kind of emotional content. most people look around and see a pretty shitty country. he’s got to do more than say, yup, but hey, I ain’t rick perry. that is not gonna solve the problem.
JGabriel
Help! I’ve been Moderated!
.
Davis X. Machina
@Little Boots: Feh. The kraken will make short work of the python.
Ira-NY
The problem with the professional left and their acolytes is they do not understand the difference between caving and accepting political reality.
fhtagn
@Ira-NY:
And your explanation of the difference is…?
Marc
@aisce:
I’m a scientist, and this sort of thinking on any issue really pisses me off. We’re not supposed to be tribal; we’re supposed to actually look at how things work.
I strongly defend the science behind climate change because the science is strong. I think we should do a hell of a lot more about it, and the behavior of our society on this matter is a moral blot with catastrophic consequences for future generations.
Nuclear winter turned out to be poor science, by contrast. That’s not politically convenient, but Teller had the better case than Sagan.
And in this case I look at the data to see if I should be pissed off….and it’s actually looking muddy to me.
Scientists just don’t put everything through a tribal filter. I wrote what I wrote because I believe it, no because I’m scraping for excuses. If I see a compelling health case on the merits I’ll change my mind – because that’s what I do in matters like this.
Step away from the scapegoating. We’re complex people. I may be wrong on this, but I’m absolutely sincere on this – and have always had related misgivings on topics like this for precisely the reasons that I gave. We’ve made some expensive mistakes in some cases, and epidemiology is a very blunt tool.
Jewish Steel
@Little Boots:
Funny, you’re not the first lady to tell me that.
Ow ow!
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots: We could post the list of Administration accomplishments, but that would just take us down an “Aside from that, what have the Romans done for us” road and no one wants that.
Davis X. Machina
@fhtagn: Reminds me of the old Socia1ist slogan that a bayonet is a weapon with a worker on each end.
Doesn’t really matter which end is which, at some level.
Little Boots
@Davis X. Machina:
heh, but on the internet, the kraken got nothin on the python.
Little Boots
@Omnes Omnibus:
and that won’t do it either. i know what you’re saying, you’re right (as usual) but nobody cares. he has to be exciting again. maybe you didn’t care that much the first time around, but a lot of people did, and that’s why he’s president. he can’t just hope to coast this time around.
fhtagn
@Omnes Omnibus:
It also won’t explain why the administration has been so disastrously incompetent at messaging, why they’ve gone into a fetal crouch rather than trying to seize the initiative, and why the 11-dimensional chess game looks like a pretty badly screwed up grade school checkers match these days.
aisce
@ marc
great, dude. in 2013 when the administration actually does create new standards that are tougher than the 98 or 08 versions, i look forward to you stopping by to warn us again how economically dodgy they are and how they should be rethought some more.
really, should be fun. because you’d obviously do it, right? maybe bring some charts. put on a whole big show. or will the “science” have changed by then? a lot can happen in 18 months.
Elie
i can’t read this anymore.
I am very disappointed in the administration about this. VERY
Little Boots
@Jewish Steel:
hey, whatever I am, I ain’t no lady!
hilts
@virag:
Obama / Biden 2012
The Republicans are Worse
Ira-NY
Caving is folding when you have a full house and plenty of chips. Recognizing political reality is folding when you have pair of deuces and
a short stack of chips.
Big Baby DougJ
@hilts:
That’s been how I’ve voted every election, for the lesser of two evils. I don’t expect to change all of a sudden.
Marc
@aisce:
I’d have to read up on what they actually propose. I can parse the primary documents, for example, to read what they’re actually doing.
The EPA made the call that stricter regulations were worth it, but it wasn’t a slam-dunk. That makes this look like a judgement call to me.
And, your sarcasm aside, I try damn hard to understand what the science is in cases like this.
This isn’t all about scoring points for some side or another in a debate.
fhtagn
@Marc:
My problem with your case is that you aren’t actually demonstrating that good science lay behind Obama’s decision – a decision which flew in the face of what the scientists and the EPA thought advisable. Instead, you seem to be saying that it’s all about money/politics.
fhtagn
@Ira-NY:
Have you ever met anyone in politics who met your definition of caving? If so, whom and when?
eemom
@Marc:
You’d like my husband. He just said, in effect, that anybody who opens their yap about this issue without first studying the regulations, the science, and the cost of compliance is full of shit.
Of course, if THAT were the standard for political commentary, things would get a lot quieter around here. And everywhere else.
LT
@JGabriel:
That’s inane. You have to speak to what those levels mean toxicity wise. You can’t just say “Well billion’s a big number!”
LT
@JGabriel:
Here’s how you measure this:
http://www.waka.com/news/9114-sen-jeff-sessions-praises-pres-obamas-ozone-decision.html
And do you think the ALA is just a bunch of idiots on this? And the EPA, for that matter?
Omnes Omnibus
@Little Boots:
@fhtagn:
I don’t know. It’s been a long week and I don’t have all the answers on the tip of my tongue. I really just don’t see the situation as being as dire as you guys do. Obama is going the a rough patch right now and the GOP clown show is putting a new star every couple of weeks that is sucking the oxygen out of the room. I still see Obama as more than a match for anyone one the GOP puts up. YMMV.
eemom
@Marc:
I myself, though only a lowly lawyer, have come to appreciate this from working on toxic tort litigation. It’s a blunt tool but it’s the best we have.
fhtagn
@eemom:
I wonder whether we could implant matoko with a micro-chip that enforces a basic knowledge and logic requirement before she opens her yap?
hilts
@Big Baby DougJ:
The same goes for me and I don’t expect that the situation will ever change. The slogan was simply the first reaction I had when I read about this decision earlier today.
Rather than speculating about Obama’s motives, I’m more interested in an answer to this question:
Why won’t America embrace the left?
http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/08/26/michael_kazin_interview
aisce
@ marc
fantastic. and so i repeat myself, in 2013 (or whenever) when the administration allows the topic to be revisited and new guidelines are issued at 70ppb or 68ppb or 63.4528961681ppb, i expect you to fret about what a tough, tough judgment call it was. in the name of consistency, of course. because you wouldn’t want to be one of those people who only concern trolls counterfactuals, right? anybody can explain why inaction was the totally wise choice, obviously. if the “science” (which is a mysterious usage on your part, since you’ve been talking exclusively about the actuarial standards of what a “life is worth” and not a whit about a proper standard of ozone exposure should be) is cloudy in 2011, it damn sure better be cloudy in 2013.
unless it has nothing to do with science at all.
Ron Beasley
I’m not going to try to defend this decision but the title is misleading. Ozone down here has nothing to do with the lack of ozone in the ozone layer. It was fluorocarbons like freon that were thought to be depleting the ozone layer. Even that was not cut and dried. While freon et. al. contributed it may well have been fluctuations in the earth’s magnetic field that was/is responsible for much of the ozone depletion over the poles.
burnspbesq
@Big Baby DougJ:
Seriously, this is weak shit even by your standards.
You think he was bought? Fine. Show us the money or STFU.
The fact that you like the Clash doesn’t excuse this laziness.
cat48
Didn’t read all the comments but Stabenow, Levin, Manchin, Rockefeller, McCaskill were all pissed about this and asked the prez to not implement the new rules until the review in 2013. Of course everybody & their brother lobbied against it, too, so perhaps he was paid off in $$ or paid off with a Dem Majority in the Senate in 2013 b/c some of them are up in 2012 & like Doug mentioned; the white working class don’t like all these regulations, especially in John’s state! They hate “Obummer” in WVirginny!
Marc
@aisce:
If you know more about the topic at hand, educate me.
I mean it. Dig something up for me to read; convince me that things are different. And if warranted I’ll change my mind. Sometimes in these cases I dig a bit and it’s obvious that the wrong call got made. This isn’t one of those cases.
If the EPA drops CO2 regulation, for example, I won’t be making excuses, because climate change is deadly serious and that’s the only tool we have. That’s why I liked the mileage standard changes for cars and trucks, for example.
The Raven
@Davis X. Machina:
Obama, of course, is from Illinois, a coal and auto state.
As to, “How do you know they that wont’t give even more money to the other side, have a secret PAC run ads against you etc?”
Well, that depends on history and reputation. He is buying some Democratic support, and he can make that stick. In negotiating with Republicans, I would croak that, in fact, Obama has consistently made poor deals in many areas. He just doesn’t seem to be competent in his assessment of his opponents.
JGabriel
@LT:
Which I did when I quoted TPM noting that we were talking about a recommendation of 60-70 ppb versus 75 ppb as the current standard (down from a previous standard of 80 ppb).
I assume most of the people reading this thread can do enough math to ballpark that as a further 6.7% – 15% recommended drop. Since we’ve gone several decades with even worse ozone standards, waiting another 2-3 years for that 15% reduction isn’t going to cause mass genocide in our cities.
It’s healthier to have lower ozone emissions. I’m not disputing that, and I’d like to see it enacted sooner rather than later.
What I’d also like to know is whether there’s a curve-or a sharp linear gradient-such that we’re saving greater than 6.7-15% more lives, or if it’s a smaller slope where we’re saving much less than that. From what I’ve read so far, I believe it’s the latter. But, as I also noted in the comment I linked (#87), I may be wrong. I’m not doctrinaire or certain about this.
LT:
Of course not. And I don’t think (most of) the people upset about it here are idiots either. I’m just trying to explain why it might not be as bad as they fear.
LT:
You measure this by whether it gives Jeff Sessions a woody or not? Then linking a 404 page error as your source? And you accuse me of being inane?
Jeepers.
.
Constance
Had to turn off NPR when the guy on “All Things Considered” led with “We’re going to talk about a retreat.” Obama has never been good on the environment or ecology so I wasn’t too surprised. I mean, Ken Salazar? And he does need to get re-elected. I do agree with that asshole Mitch McConnell. The decision to not mess with the clean air whatever WILL create more jobs. All in the health care field. Maybe we could figure out a way to train however many unemployed there are to take jobs in health care someplace. Let the folks coming into the work force for the first time eat cake.
JGabriel
Help please, Moderated again. I exceeded the link limit, my bad.
.
Constance
I wasn’t criticizing Obama. I will vote FOR him, not AGAINST whatever asshole the Repugs run. Did not mean to sound critical, more like realistic.
OGliberal
@cat48: And while the white folks in WV may never, ever, vote for Obama (let me make that clear, they will not) there’s a good chance they’ll vote to re-elect Manchin and Rockefeller IF they stand against this and IF they force the president from their party to stand-down. Chances are these folks hate the regs because Obama is for them and/or because they believe some right wing BS that Obama wants to take money from white working class people and give it to nigras, but we can’t change that. And while Manchin and, to a much lesser extent, Rockefeller, may tick off libs, is the alternative any better…is it even close to being “not that much worse”? I can see a Manchin voting against stuff like this but I can also see him defending SS and Medicare and labor rights. A GOP alternative would be all about gutting any “social welfare” program.
JGabriel
Ooh, hey, that’s 5 comments mentioning WV, one for each of its electoral votes!
Why are we giving a fuck who WV votes for in 2012? Not being critical — I’m just actually kind of curious.
.
fhtagn
@JGabriel:
I think it’s something to do with Appalachia and Hillary Clinton, but I might be wrong.
aisce
@ marc
this has nothing to do with pulmonology or the cost of regulations. it has everything to do with the current makeup of the senate and the state of the economy that can be demagogued against.
if you want to say that abandoning these regulations because non-scientists (who explicitly don’t care about science and never have in any comparable scenario in the past) made a federal case (har har) about it was a stroke of good luck, then as i said, when the administration revisits the issue in 2013, you better not say it’s any more of a “slam dunk” then than it is now.
but let’s be honest, when the regs change, you’ll do what everybody else in the world does: not give a shit because they won’t actually be a big deal or tough to implement in any way.
Marc
@aisce:
Why did the EPA estimate costs of 19 to 90 billion dollars if that’s true?
I believe their estimates of 4,000 – 12,000 statistical lives saved (don’t ask, it’s the currency in these estimates.) That makes a cost roughly equivalent to the benefits, including an assessment of what a live saved is worth (again, you need to do this to set priorities.)
This decision is never made without balancing benefit and cost. There are small risks with incredibly expensive remedies; we have to decide between worth-it-for-public-health and not.
I expect that in a couple of years we’ll know more about the science, the costs will have dropped, and there will be some threshold where the EPA estimates that the two are approximately balanced. Just like now. Hopefully either we’ll see that the risks are lower than thought (which I doubt), or that the case for action is more compelling.
But setting a threshold of 60, 65, 70, 75 or whatever is always going to involve a calculus just like the one I describe above.
Quiddity
The most favorable explanation regarding Obama’s tactics is that he did it in exchange for jobs-legislation support from the Chamber of Commerce. A sort of private side-deal nobody will admit to.
I don’t believe that’s been established (time will tell) or if it’s a worthwhile trade off. I think the language from the White House was poor in that it reinforced the uncertainty meme. Considering the further alienation of core support group and a general “what does he stand for?” head scratching, I’d say today’s action was a mistake. If he was determined to do this, then it might have been used more effectively as a bargaining chip in the upcoming legislative wrangling.
Anne Laurie
@El Cid:
I didn’t say it was a smart decision, just that I read it backwards from DougJ’s opinion. To be honest, the Obama re-election team is working under the same constraints as the MBA short-termers we all so justly abhor: In 14 months, win or lose, they’re out of a job. So the question for those individuals, stripped of rhetoric, comes down to what they need to do to ensure their next job — they want resumes that will guarantee them a place in the current administration’s second term, or that will make them more desirable to the next campaign looking for proven “winners”. Like all short-termers, these people will chose narrow not-losing strategies over risky its-the-right-thing-even-if-it-makes-powerful-enemies choices. The President, of course, has the ability to override his campaign strategists’ choices, but (to quote his defenders) the man has so much on his desk already…
Lojasmo
Not “bought off”, but electoral politics.
PA, OH, WV etc, all need tradfofuel.
Arundel
@Marc: Nuclear winter turned out to be poor science, by contrast.
Right, because after that global thermonuclear war we had, it didn’t quite pan out that way. Look, the concept of “nuclear winter” was predicated on a specific type of global catastrophe- total nuclear war. It was a theory, a hypothesis . I don’t care about Teller v Sagan in discussing this theory, because it was a hypothetical. Climate change is real and occurring, as you agree. But its relation to “nuclear winter” is truly tangential. It’s not the other side of the coin, it’s a different coin. A different topic. That involves climate yes, but takes an exctinction-level event as its spur, it’s all about what happens after that.
I am hoping you weren’t referring to the spate of theories in the 1970’s about “global cooling” under the name “nuclear winter”. I don’t think you were, but it’s highly dubious to conflate climate change with either theory, really. A pointles distraction. And you’re notably vague about what field , of the many sciences, you are in. But “I’m a scientist” is meant to show authority? Frankly your argument here seems more bureaucratic than anything. And hey, even BP has scientists, there’s all sorts of scientists on many, many corporate payrolls. Have a great weekend!
Another Bob
@OGliberal
In an era immediately after the massive cluster fuck that was the Bush administration, which should have proved once and for all the uselessness of conservative ideology, why should Democrats be content to watch their president and their party back-pedal yet again? Has the situation deteriorated to where being “ticked off” is the liberals’ least-bad alternative? Obama’s defenders have thrown down the gauntlet and declared that “political reality” is kryptonite to what was once hailed as “the audacity of hope.” But maybe there’s a certain kind of audacity behind claiming the mantle of “audacious” when Obama has fallen short of that mark by so much.
fuckwit
Holy shit. Are we so cynical and fucked up that it is impossible to EVER think that a policy decision might be made for POLICY reasons, not out of political, Rovian, cynical calculation and scheming for some kind of electoral advantage?
And this is one of OUR guys, a Democrat!
This is insane, what we have become. This country is fucked up beyond all repair. If we seriously think that every little policy decision is made for some kind of horserace partisan advantage, then we are not just going down the toilet, we’re already there.
William Hurley
Sorry, but DxM and the subsequent guess-work is flat out wrong. What we witnessed in the President’s decision to punt on the smog policy revision was Obama being Obama.
The mechanics of implementing policies that actually meet the black-letter law of the Clear Air Act were wholly within the President’s authority – solely. Neither Chamber of Congress nor any obscure legally autonomous bureau had any say in the Executive’s decision. The perverse irony of Obama’s decision to reject the EPA’s proposals is that in doing so, the President A) breaks a oft repeated campaign promise to environmental groups, a promise that included quid pro quo dropping of advocacy groups’ legal actions against the EPA and Executive Office over Clean Air Act implementation failures and B) that in leaving the policies as they are at present, Obama has chosen to enact Clean Air policies that are unquestionably worse than those of his predecessor – George W. Bush.
The circumstances and outcomes of Obama’s Clean Air Act insult mirrors other decision or courses of action the President has made. For example, after prompting then pushing the Democratically led House and Senate to pass a bill targeting deficit reduction via an “independent”, extra-governmental committee failed in Congress, the President simply issued an Executive Order and made it so. After multiple reviews and in light of his campaign promises to close GITMO, Obama simply dismissed internal and external intelligence conclusions that the “optics” of and practices at GITMO were more damaging to the “war on terror” than closing it would be. Congress may have lacked coherency of voice on the matter, but we’ll never really know because the Executive chose not to execute a policy change on his own – a policy had and still has the power to unilaterally rewrite – with nary one actual vote or consideration in debate within Congress.
Then there’s the housing market and mortgage disaster – an economic avalanche that’s still rumbling “downhill” crushing everything in its path. HAMP and its affiliated satellite programs have been worse than disastrous. Home owners have been screwed badly in the overwhelming majority of instances they engaged the “process”. Simultaneously, neither the President nor his chief law enforcement officer, AG Holder, have done anything about lenders’, services’ and underwriters’ gross negligence and brazenly open fraud – behaviors that are to this day STILL the norm in the mortgage lending industry. But, making matters worse, leaving states’ AGs to workout a plan with lenders themselves – that’s 50 states with distinct problems and interests negotiating with numerous nationwide lenders each with gross revenue of 9 and 10 figure numbers – wasn’t exactly the how the President plays hands-off delegation. Ask NY state’s AG Schneiderman and others about the pressure from Executive branch officials to expediently settle with banks – settlements that are premised on legal instruments that would grant all lenders retroactive and future immunity from civil and criminal entanglements in perpetuity.
How about the President’s insulting prevarications regarding his secret face-to-face negotiations with industry-side executives in which he gave away many crucial policy and structural elements of HCR without breathing one word to Speaker Pelosi or Sen President Reid. And that’s after campaigning on health care reform – loudly and ubiquitously – only to then see him punt the entire matter to ConservaDem Max Baucus who was to be a champion for the President’s goals with out the benefit of an outline, framework or even a list of “nice to haves” and “must haves”. All the while, the President is – of his own volition – lying to Congress and the citizenry about his own expectations and detached role outside of Congress’s work of crafting legislation.
Then there’s the President’s unilateral decision to piss on the War Powers Act. He wanted to act on the Libyan front – and chose to do so. He merely informed select members of Congressional leadership that his decision was a done deal, period.
These are but a few examples of the President’s duplicitous behaviors.
The “salt on the wound” insult of the President’s decision to punt on Clear Air is to be found in the language Obama/Plouffe chose to use in attempting to rationalize their preferred course of action. The language used by the President, and de facto head of the Democratic Party, was nothing other than radical, right-wing talking point psycho-babble about “regulations and job creators” and “businesses’ uncertainty”. Reagan, Bush, Bush and Nixon would be proud!
The fact is that Obama can not be re-elected. It’s a shame, but it’s true.
You may disagree with me, but hedge your politcal/electoral bets on Obama by doubling-down on the Democratic Rep or Senator seeking re-election or first time victory next Nov. A beach-head must be held – and betting “all-in” on one proposition – especially the President – may leave you very disappointed come the morning of the first Wednesday after the first Monday of the month of November 2012.
NR
@Unabogie:
Except for the little inconvenient fact that these regulations don’t cost jobs.
But go on thinking Obama is anything but a corporate stooge. People have to believe something, I guess.
NR
As for the political calculus here: It’s simple. Obama just doesn’t give a fuck.
He figures that everyone on the left will rally around him next year, no matter what he does, because they have nowhere else to go.
And the sad thing is, he’s probably right.
But it won’t matter. Independents have turned against him. Unless Perry self-destructs, he’s the president in 2013.
Darnell
Oh no, it can’t be due in part to Dem Senators in Rust Belt and Coal States trying to keep their seats;
http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2011/03/with_a_new_climate_change_deba.html
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The coal industry and U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, don’t agree on much.
But both are trying in their own ways to stop President Barack Obama’s administration from imposing rules this year on new or upgraded power plants and large factories that use coal because, both say, the rules would hurt Ohio manufacturers and consumers.
….and this was regarding the NEW CARBON REGULATIONS that Obama “fought for” and are now in effect in spite of the objections of the Republican AND DEM SENATORS. No credit for that though.
I have to ask: When douche-nozels like Ed Schultz et al’ famously told progressives to “stay home” in 2010, and a GOP House was then elected, what the fuck did you think was going to happen?
Did you think there would be no hell to pay, or real consequences because the GOP was allowed to take the House?
Even FDR (i.e. Liberal Jesus) CAVED and retreated from the New Deal, cutting spending that in turn caused the now infamous recession of 1937, and that was WITH A DEM MAJORITY still in the House and the Senate. FDR caved, cut the New Deal, caused recovery to stall, AND DID SO WITH A HOUSE MAJORIITY OF 334-88 AND SENATE MAJORITY OF 76-16. What the fuck was HIS excuse?
Oh, but wait…Obama needs to “fight.” Just like FDR. Right..
Oh, and Obama already fought against the efforts to stop the new Carbon Regs, which are now law; (that doesn’t count though)
http://earth911.com/news/2011/03/11/subcommittee-takes-aim-at-epa-carbon-regulation/
Just like he never has, and never will get credit for;
Public Land Management Act of 2009
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Statement-from-the-Presidents-signing-statements-on-HR-146-the-Omnibus-Public-Lands-Management-Act/
Or the effort to end whaling once and for all;
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/15/science/earth/15whale.html?src=mv
And the list of environmental accomplishments goes on and on….
**** This detour into the facts was brought to you by Reality. “Reality”, bringing up uncomfortable facts that clash with the accepted narrative for over 5 thousand years…
….we now return your regularly scheduled hand-wringing and Democratic self immolation, already in progress.
Darnell
@NR:
Ah, even though..
— Obama’s ratings are in the same territory as both Reagan and Clinton are the same point in their terms.
— Even though Obama faces no primary challenge whatsoever.
— Even though poll after poll showing the public still blames Bush for the economic downfall, and not Obama.
— Even though every respected pollster shows Obama BEATING Perry in 2012.
Even though….oh fuck it.
Far be it from me to deprive the handwringers from the joy they derive from planning for the fall of a Democratic President.
PLAN FOR THIS THOUGH; As 2012 approaches, expect the those who love to say “I WANT Obama to win, but he won’t unless he starts doing what I say” folks to go FULL-NADER when it is clear Obama is going to be re-elected.
Why? Because, if Obama is re-elected without taking ever taking the advice of the millions of armchair-Presidents in the country, then well…it would appear that the armchair-Presidents (cough, Kos..etc) were FUCKING WRONG. And that can’t happen.
Thusly, as Obama appears to be headed for a 2nd term, expect people like Kos, Hamsher, etc, to just take their ball and go home, to Nader, or something like Nader.
Triscula
I think the problem here was the costs that would be involved in implementing the new rules. From the news report I heard yesterday, they would have been significant for bothbusinesses and state and local governments. Considering both the recent jobs report and how utterly broke local/state levelgovernments are it’s unsurprising that the administration decided to drop the matter. I can easily see state governments responding to added burdens on their budgets by cutting more public sector jobs. Those job losses would be blamed on the White House, who hasn’t done much to sell the importance of these new standards to the public anyway.
khead
Catching up. Had to go out last night.
Uh….folks…
Rockefeller will keep his Senate seat until he retires or until he dies while in office like Byrd.
Original Lee
@Marc: Exactly. Plus, a whole bunch of utilities have been threatening to close power plants in strategic locations because they can’t afford to upgrade or replace the coal-fired plant to meet the new rules, and suddenly key areas are looking at possible electricity shortages. Whether or not the utilities would ACTUALLY close these plants, the stampede of panic has been awesome to behold. Not enough electricity! Wolverines!
tomvox1
@ Triscula:
While I would like to believe this sort of logical and well thought out rationale for hamstringing the EPA’s efforts and hope it works out for the best, the optics of this decision are absolutely terrible.
The perception has just been Retreat, Retreat, Retreat lately. And all the bromides or even hard statistical data about EPA regulations harming jobs cannot do much to deflect the image of Obama caving/getting rolled/abandoning progressive principals yet again. Eventually perception becomes reality and Obama the Capitulator is beginning to be enshrined in our national mythology.
Obama is my president and if he were to be defeated by a Republican in 2012 it would truly be the end of hope for this country, so no way I’m going to take my ball and go home or support a primary challenge/3rd party candidate. But he damn well better give the appearance of holding some core convictions and willingness to fight for something bigger than politics sometime soon. Because this EPA decision is just the latest in a series that can be portrayed as meek surrender on a long term issue for the sake of illusory short term gain. Even your enemies respect you when you go down swinging. No one respects constant surrender in the obsessive pursuit of the unloved “virtues” of centrism and compromise.
In short, color me disheartened.
kindness
I don’t like what Obama did, but I can see why he did it. 2012.
My only hope is that he wins in 2012 & allows the EPA to change it in 2013 when it’s up for review next.
Sell out? kinda. At this point, he almost had no chance though really. Had he allowed it to go through there would not be one media operative in the world who wouldn’t be repeating ad nauseum how Obama’s job killing regulations are strangling American jobs (and shoving socialism down our throats….they love them some sex and violent imagery over on the dark side). It’s not true, but that’s exactly what they’d ALL be saying.
2012 is more important. Really it is. I mean put the nation in the hands of President Perry and what do you think? Naaa, I’ll take the wimpy Obama any day. Am I a sell out? I’m a realist.
El Cid
@Anne Laurie: It isn’t always about Obama. Really.
The point was that these businesses may very well go after Obama even in the real or hypothetical case that he gave them what they want.
Bruce S
Darnell – you’re pretty fucking crazy and hysterical. Also fact-challenged.
El Cid
@Davis X. Machina:
One problem is that people who consider themselves consequentialists are not necessarily any more consequentialist than those people they consider not to be consequentialist.
There is not a clean division between those who believe their preferred analyses and policies are most taking into account the likely consequences of their adpoption, and those who that group believes does not, given that there will be conflict over things like the definition of the preferred ultimate consequences, for and/or upon whom, how, within what time scale, and just as importantly, one’s estimation of what exactly is likely.
An argument that an act which appears helpful in the short term would be harmful in the long term would also be consequentialist — else the notion of the consequences of one’s actions be limited to some undefined but presumably short time period.
An argument that a “rule oriented” precedent set at one time would have a very high likelihood of causing definite, real harm in the future is also consequentialist.
Very frequently the people I’ve encountered who believe their favored analyses and policies, in these terms, to be “consequentialist,” are no more correct to do so than the best arguments of those whom they believe not to be consequentialist.
Another Bob
@tomviox1
Yes. You just wonder how long Obama’s hard-core supporters can deny the worsening problem of Obama demoralizing his natural allies while emboldening his enemies. It’s not good enough to dismiss disenchanted liberals as a bunch of “emo-baggers” and scold them for not being supportive enough. A lot of regular, rank-and-file liberals have just had it with the constant capitulation and the spineless “bipartisan” rhetoric. It’s as if the liberal agenda has been reduced to a bunch of old hand-me-downs to be bartered away for chump change at a yard sale. The post-Bush era was the perfect opportunity for a liberal resurgence, but instead it’s like watching liberalism be dismantled before your eyes.
AhabTRuler
@JGabriel:
No, you are wrong. Here:
(via Digby Downer)
Talk about uncertainty: 1998, 2008, 2013?? And, need I point out, any change in 2013 is entirely predicated on Obama getting reelected.
Duckest Fuckingway: Ask not for whom the Duck Fucks. . .
Elie @ 107: Ratfucking firebagger.
Davis X. Machina
@OGliberal:
I can see Manchin easily changing parties… keeping him on the reservation is a chore by itself.
NR
@Darnell: Shorter Darnell: Nader! Nader! NaderNaderNaderNaderNaderNader! Nader! NADER! NADER!!!!!
Hilarious.
AhabTRuler
@Darnell:
Gack! Zombie lie returns! I thought that they would ignore him, and they did. 2010 was all about an enthusiastic Republican base. Democrats as a whole were complacent, but it wasn’t helped by Congressional Dems running screaming from PPACA.
And then, let us also restate that in the main, the so-called ‘professional left’ has much less influence than mainstream political actors.
kindness
@AhabTRuler: One of the saddest aspects of American politics (where Democrats are concerned) is that in order for a moderate to be taken ‘seriously’ by the Village, they have to publicly denounce not only the most extreme elements of the Democratic party (many of us) but also many very moderate and well thought out ideas. Public Option, Wall St. regulations, etc. They make a Democrat go way higher up the liberal to conservative scale than they would ever, ever think of asking a Republican to go down. And even when the Democrat does sell out, they will still be labeled ‘extreme liberal’ come next election.
No, the best answer for elected officials is to stand up and explain why Public Option, etc, IS best for everyone & defend progressive ideals. By running for cover it just sets the media up like a dog giving chase. Ya gotta stand up to the dog and conquer it, give it no quarter. Defend your beliefs & principles.
Donut
As mentioned abouve, the Chamber, manufacturers, energy companies, they have all been meeting with the White House. They likely did tell Daley, “that’s a nice presidency Mr. Obama has. Be a shame if something happened to it.”
Daley, being a Daley, received the message loud and clear. The information funnel that the Chief of Staff controls to the president was likely stacked accordingly. That’s how we get to these decisions.
So yeah, Obama was bought off, but not directly, and not in a way that hasn’t been done since, like, forever, in human politics.
Nothing new to see here, really.
Sucks, mightily, about the EPA regs, but I’m still voting for him.
Ronbo
Dead Americans (COPD anyone?) don’t vote. It helps the political process. Keeps the rabble from voting.
JGabriel
@AhabTRuler: A bit belated, but I wanted to respond simply to acknowledge that you make some good points.
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Corner Stone
@AhabTRuler: A bit belated, but I simply wanted to respond that I miss you and want to rub melted chicken fat on your naked body.
William Hurley
Looks like the American Lung Assoc will have to add language to this campaign launched in defense of the Clean Air Act to include defending it from both Congress and the President.