Month: December 2009

Steve Lombardo analyzes:

[F]or Obama to realize some kind of January bump from health care reform's eventual passage, he will need to explain to the American public a) what the bill does and b) why it will be a good thing for them personally. Perhaps then, as is typical after these protracted legislative battles are won by a President and his party, Obama might get a modest (three-to-five point) bounce in his approval rating. But that is far from a certainty. Today, Quinnipiac University released another poll that showed a majority of voters disapprove of the Senate's health care plan. It is going to take some work to convince voters that this bill is a good thing. Not impossible, but increasingly difficult.

I don't think this is about a short term five point bump. Here's what has happened: a liberal Democratic president has just passed universal health insurance. No Democratic president has done something like that since Johnson. It is designed to show that government can do something real and tangible for the working poor. And in that respect, its impact on the political culture will be deep and lasting, unless the opposition can stop it, demonize it, or jump up and down enough to make it seem as if Obama is out of step with the times rather than them.

My suspicion is that they will fail in the end to achieve this; and that this new landmark for liberalism will reorient American politics the way Reagan's first year did – profoundly. I may be wrong and I will be accountable for this judgment. But the age demands government action. And Obama is doing as much of it as consensually and as civilly but as ruthlessly as he can.

Why so pragmatic and centrist? Because he wants it all to last.

Julian Sanchez further unpacks his much linked-to post form last week:

[A] populist right animated by ressentiment isn’t going to do a good job of injecting conservative ideas into deliberation in a useful way. This is not, just to be clear, some kind of white-gloved complaint about “tone,” because really, fuck tone. The ascendancy of angry bluster isn’t the problem; it’s a symptom.  The problem is what the anger obscures.

Today on the Dish we continued to keep the spotlight on Iran. Khamenei smeared Montazeri, Abbas Milani honored Montazeri, NIAC touched on the significance of Qom, the Dish honored Neda, and we were all awed by protest footage.

In other news, we saw marriage equality on the march in Latin America, anti-gay rumors on Rwanda were muted, a Dem congressman switched teams, and Palin continued her war on bloggers. Andrew revisited the '90s, Pawlenty blabbered to Newsweek, and Frum disapproved of the healthcare bill.

The Dish aired more depressing Xmas songs from Robert Earle Keene, Paul Kelly, Woody Guthrie, and Judy Garland (again). We chronicled two more Recession View updates here and here. We talked more Laredo here and here. Andrew begrudgingly issued Von Hoffmans here and here. 

And don't forget to vote! 

— C.B.

Laterra Hopkins, photographed by Chip Somodevilla just before Obama's inauguration, is running a strong second. From the comments of the poll:

As I submit this comment it's interesting to note that Protester leads with Hopkins not far behind. Despair and Hope, Grief and Joy, Exhaustion and Energy.

Vote here.

Yes, that's Chuck Schumer and Ben Nelson. Ben Smith explains.

Palin draws up a list of pesky bloggers, has their faces recognized by local cops and then ejects them from her last book tour stop. The press, one should recall, threatens her First Amendment right to say anything and never get called on it.

A reader writes:

You're going to have a hard time finding any Christmas song more depressing – or chilling – than Woody Guthrie's "1913 Massacre". Based on a horrible chapter in US labor history, it is one of the most powerful songs I've ever heard. It also demonstrates why Guthrie was among the greatest of American songwriters.

Another reader passes along an unreleased Bob Dylan cover from 1961. Lyrics after the jump:

Take a trip with me in 1913,
To Calumet, Michigan, in the copper country.
I will take you to a place called Italian Hall,
Where the miners are having their big Christmas ball.

I will take you in a door and up a high stairs,
Singing and dancing is heard everywhere,
I will let you shake hands with the people you see,
And watch the kids dance around the big Christmas tree.

You ask about work and you ask about pay,
They'll tell you they make less than a dollar a day,
Working the copper claims, risking their lives,
So it's fun to spend Christmas with children and wives.

There's talking and laughing and songs in the air,
And the spirit of Christmas is there everywhere,
Before you know it you're friends with us all,
And you're dancing around and around in the hall.

Well a little girl sits down by the Christmas tree lights,
To play the piano so you gotta keep quiet,
To hear all this fun you would not realize,
That the copper boss' thug men are milling outside.

The copper boss' thugs stuck their heads in the door,
One of them yelled and he screamed, "there's a fire,"
A lady she hollered, "there's no such a thing.
Keep on with your party, there's no such thing."

A few people rushed and it was only a few,
"It's just the thugs and the scabs fooling you,"
A man grabbed his daughter and carried her down,
But the thugs held the door and he could not get out.

And then others followed, a hundred or more,
But most everybody remained on the floor,
The gun thugs they laughed at their murderous joke,
While the children were smothered on the stairs by the door.

Such a terrible sight I never did see,
We carried our children back up to their tree,
The scabs outside still laughed at their spree,
And the children that died there were seventy-three.

The piano played a slow funeral tune,
And the town was lit up by a cold Christmas moon,
The parents they cried and the miners they moaned,

"See what your greed for money has done."

"When Palin talks, people from all walks of life listen. When she says we need to be cutting taxes instead of raising them, fighting terrorists instead of babying them, supporting our military instead of second-guessing it, and backing off the seeming endless push for global warming legislation until all the ramifications of Climategate are clear, conservative Americans hear a common-sense approach that sounds very much like Reagan," – AWR Hawkins, Pajamas Media.