Matt Yglesias says progressives have failed:

I got a great email today from a self-described “well-educated, politically literate, 30-something person with a job and a kid” who spends “let’s say 45 minutes a day that I spend thinking about politics” [she reads the Klein Group of self proclaimed "wonk" bloggers] and who had a great question:

I’m starting to realize that I am part of the problem as well. I don’t actually DO anything besides read and fulminate in the quiet of my own home.

Yglesias agrees that it is her fault:

Tebow! Tebow! (Just for the Denver/Gator audience.)

Open Thread.

There is something pathetic about this post from Kevin Drum about a GOP plan to make some states likely to swing Dem in the 2012 Presidential election not winner take all (example, Obama wins Wisconsin, but only gets 6 of the 11 EVs. See also Obama winning an EV in Nebraska in 2008.) Kevin writes:

[H]ere's what really so disheartening about the whole thing. As recently as a couple of decades ago this would have been a bridge too far for most of the party's mandarins: conservative pundits and senior GOP officials would have sounded off against it because it was just too raw a deal even for flinty political pros. But now we live in the era of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove and Tom DeLay and Fox News. There's really no one left who might object to this merely out of a decent respect for institutional integrity and fairmindedness.

I suppose it is disheartening, but it is not new. What is disheartening to me is how the Democratic Party and some pundits, including on occasion, Drum, handwring over Dems and liberals being "too mean." It is a complaint of longstanding for me. Fighting Dems was something first talked about on the Left blogs in 2003. 8 years later, some are still shocked and disheartened by what the GOP does, and still tut tutting if Dems and progressives are "too mean."

Speaking for me only

Via Glenn Greenwald, Mother Jones blogger Rick Ungar:

On a day when Americans of all stripes should have been giving thanks to both President Bush and President Obama for doing whatever it is they do that has protected us from a tragic repeat of the events of September 11, 2001[.]

(Emphasis supplied.) Who was Mother Jones?

[When she] was denounced on the floor of the United States Senate as the "grandmother of all agitators," she replied:

I hope to live long enough to be the great-grandmother of all agitators.

I'm not sure that she would consider Rick Ungar one of her political descendants.

Speaking for me only

Jacob Sullum has the October cover story at Reason on President Obama: Bummer: Barack Obama Turns Out to Be Just Another Drug Warrior." As if anyone should be surprised.

I'm not. I've been writing since 2007 that he would do little to temper the War on Drugs. I would have called the article "Bummer: Barack Obama is Still A Drug Warrior." Why?

[More....]

Conservative Republican Bob Turner was elected yesterday to replace Rep. Anthony Weiner. The District encompassed much of Queens and a small part of Brooklyn:

Turner, 70, a retired cable television executive who has never served in elective office, defeated Democratic State Assemblyman David Weprin, 55, who has two decades of public service experience, to fill the seat left vacant when Anthony Weiner (D) resigned in disgrace in June after more than 12 years in the House.

The last time a Republican won in that district was in the 1920's.

Many will see it a referendum on Obama and the economy, and a sign for 2012. I think it's way too soon for that, too many unforeseen things can happen to change the public's mind between now and then. Voters are fickle and can change like the wind. Also, Israel/Palestine may have been a significant factor in this particular race: [More...]

Matt Yglesias writes:

It’s often best in life to try to avoid assuming that people you disagree with are motivated by “absurd” lines of reasoning. Perhaps [White House Chief of Staff Bill] Daley['s support for the President's decision to suspend EPA rule writing on ozone] is [due to being] persuaded by Matthew Kahn’s point (based on research from Michael Greenstone) that enhanced EPA regulations cause job-shifting out of non-attainment counties into attainment ones. Regulations that break up concentrations of extreme pollution in part by shifting polluting activity to less-polluted areas are perfectly sound public health measures, but there’s nothing absurd about the theory that it could do political damage to the standing of incumbent politicians in the areas that suffer from the negative short-term effects.

I checked the link Yglesias provides and find his political reasoning to be absurd. From the link:

Public Policy Polling released a new poll today. President Obama would beat Mitt Romney by 4 points and Rick Perry by 11 points.

The president’s more solid standing in the Perry and Romney horseraces comes from consolidating his party support. He was losing 13% of Democrats to each candidate in August, but only 11% to Romney and 9% to Perry now. Obama has meanwhile upped his own crossover support, from 5% to 9% of Republicans versus Romney and 10% to 11% against Perry. The president leads Perry by ten points with independents, but Romney tops Obama by two with them.

One reason for Obama's increase over Perry: Perry's position on social security, which is likely to cost him swing voters.

There have been 234 executions in Texas under Gov. Rick Perry (database here.) Four more are imminent, scheduled over the next 8 days. One is Duane Buck. At Buck's sentencing, prosecutors argued in part he should be sentenced to death because he is black and therefore a threat to public safety.

Duane Buck is one of four men scheduled to die by lethal injection in Texas, where Perry is governor, over the next eight days – an exceptional rate even in this execution-happy state. At Buck's sentencing hearing, the jury that set his punishment was informed by a psychologist that black people had a higher rate of violent behaviour, a statement used by the prosecution as its key argument against giving him an alternative penalty of life imprisonment.

[More...]

Some of my legal work has stirred some deeper thoughts on the law and I expect to be writing some lengthier pieces at Talk Left this week on the law.

I just don't have much to say about GOP politics and debates right now, and nothing new to add about President Obama's moves of late. I'm a little more optimistic than Jeralyn on where he is headed these days. I'll try to explain why in a post later today.

For now, an Open Thread.

The Associated Press has this analysis of Obama's assertion that his job bill pays for himself:

The jobs plan is an IOU from a president and lawmakers who may not even be in office down the road when the bills come due. Today's Congress cannot bind a later one for future spending. A future Congress could simply reverse it.

Anyone else notice Obama is proposing taxes on those who make $200,000 rather than $250,000? Is that gross income before deductions? Or taxable income? Or what?

In other news, How Obama Wants to Pay for His Debt Plan.

The military appeals court at Guantanamo has upheld a life sentence for Osama bin Laden's media director, Yemeni Ali Hamza al Bahlul, age 41. The 139 page opinion takes substantial liberties with the meaning of conspiracy.

Copyright troll Righthaven is about to go down for the count. It told a federal judge it is considering filing bankruptcy after being ordered to pay $34,000 in legal fees to a blog commenter it sued for reposting a LV Review Journal article.

The Denver Post and 50 other papers who are part of the Media News Group that signed with Righthaven are terminating their relationship . The new chief executive of MediaNews Group, John Paton, who replaced Dean Singleton last week, "said it was “a dumb idea” to sign in the first place."

Paton said if he was MediaNews’ chief a year ago, he likely never would have signed on with Righthaven, which hoped to fix the print media’s financial ills by suing bloggers and website owners for reposting snippets or entire copyrighted articles. Terms of the Righthaven-MediaNews deal grant each side a 50-percent stake in settlements and verdicts.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.