Chris Dodd has apparently decided to end his career as a poster boy for everything that is wrong with the Senate and Democrats. When he was running for President, he acted the progressive champion, but of course it was an act. Pols are pols and all. But it is amazing to see how he has chosen to end his tenure, with one embarrassing statement after another. Matt Yglesias on Dodd's latest:

We’ve got a limited amount of time here, I don’t know if there’s going to be any appetite to deal with these Fed nominees,” Dodd said.

I think I’ve shouted myself hoarse about the importance of these nominees already, but just to underscore it the Federal Reserve controls the economy. [. . .] Meanwhile, on the “limited amount of time” note how insane the Senate is. A sane legislative body could easily vote on three nominees in twenty minutes if it’s in a rush. If the Senate wants to take more time to actually debate, that would be nice too. But these nominees have been on the table since April and nobody seems to have anything to say about them. So just vote!

Chris Dodd is a disgrace. Good riddance to him.

Speaking for me only

Atrios comments on the Beltway Dem thumbsucking about the "new" Extreme Republicans (a/k/a Tea Partiers):

I'm really not on board with the "Republicans will rule one day so let's hope they're not crazy when they do" idea. First of all, Republicans... already crazy! I think the new batch of crazies are just more likely to be up front about it and less likely to be well trained in how to speak crazy in code. Second, yes Republicans might rule one day, but the existence of amateur crazy candidates makes that less likely. As for the fact that Republican voters are crazy...well, that isn't new either. What's new is they've gotten permission from their leaders (Rush, Glenn, Sarah) to stop voting for the establishment.

Amazing that this needs to be said. Do these Beltway Dems really think O'Donnell is more extreme than Inhofe or DeMint? Or Cornyn and Kyl? Really? Then again, the Beltway Dems are the same people having the vapors because Markos notes that there are similar world outlooks expressed by the foreign Taliban and the American Taliban. Dems need to be saved from these weenies.

Speaking for me only

Dem political ineptitude remains the most serious obstacle to their political success - Tea Party notwithstanding. Case in point - the Congressional Dems' reluctance to bring the Obama Middle Class Tax Cuts to a vote:

[M]embers of Democratic leadership [are] reflecting concerns from vulnerable members who don't want to take another politically juiced vote only to see action stall in the Senate and have to return to their districts without an accomplishment to boast about. "We're looking for the Senate to show leadership on the tax cuts, but we're having our discussions ourselves," said Xavier Becerra, Vice Chair of the Democratic Conference, in response to a question from TPM after a Democratic leadership meeting this evening.

Ok, waiting for the Senate to lead on any issue, much less this one, is waiting for Godot. The Senate must be cornered. But here's the larger point -who does not want to be for middle class tax cuts? "Vulnerable" Dems should be clamoring for this vote more than anyone else. Indeed, if the Dems do not bring this to a vote, the Republicans win the issue, as they want a vote on THEIR proposal to extend the Bush tax cuts. And it will be the Dems who block tax cuts for the middle class. This is so stupid that it is shocking, even from Dems.

Speaking for me only

Ezra Klein delivers the, as usual, obtuse Beltway blogger analysis:

Politicians are, by nature, a fearful species. But their nightmares became a lot more specific last night. The Tea Party, for all its unexpected successes, cannot topple every incumbent Republican in the country. But by toppling the right ones, it can make every incumbent Republican vote and speak and act with the Tea Party in mind. So though the Tea Party isn't likely to send all that many of its own Republicans to Washington, the likely outcome of last night's primaries is that the Tea Party takes over the Republicans who are already in Washington, and don't want to be sent home.

(Emphasis supplied.) Ezra fears GOP intransigence now that Mike Castle has gone down. Unlike the GOP instransigence that we have seen the past 20 months. Incredible. I suppose Klein is thinking of Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins. But I think it is clear by now that they had no plans to vote for any Dem initiatives. The small business stimulus bill, which is essentially Republican in its thrust, cleared a filibuster only because retiring GOP Senators Voinovich and Lemieux (a Crist protege) broke ranks. Snowe and Collins didn't. In terms of how Republicans in Congress will vote, the O'Donnell win means nothing. And anyone with eyes should know that. But the Beltway makes people blind.

Speaking for me only

New York is all but assured of having a Democratic Governor in November, thanks to Carl Paladino beating Rick Lazio in the primary. Cuomo is a lock. Keep going TeaPartiers, you're handing victory to the Dems. This is getting quite amusing.

Charlie Rangel also sailed to victory in the primary.

Here's Politico's map of primary results.

Christine O'Donnell wins in Delaware. The Republican party digs themselves into a grave.

In Colorado, Denver District Court Judge Will Hood ruled today third party candidate Tom Tancredo can stay on the ballot. The latest polls show Tancredo leading the Republican nominee Dan Maes. The impact: Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper will have an even easier time winning in November.

Kevin Drum:

I'm rooting for O'Donnell with no quiet mourning for Castle at all. I'm not sure at this point why [E.J.] Dionne still wonders "if" there's room in the modern GOP for guys like Castle, since that seems about as clear to me as anything could possibly be. The answer is no, and Castle's fate won't change that one way or the other. The die has been well and truly cast here for some time: the GOP is irrevocably committed to the undiluted Fox/Limbaugh/Drudge party line, and there's no going back.

I'm with Drum on this one.

Speaking for me only

I have not thought about Richard Cohen for a while, but Balloon Juice mentioned his latest stupidity ("Terry Jones, As Right As John Brown") and it made me think of The Portent:

Hidden in the cap
Is the anguish none can draw;
So your future veils its face,
Shenandoah!

But the streaming beard is shown
(Weird John Brown),
The meteor of the war.

You think they will be writing poems about Terry Jones? Anyway, Frederick Douglass said of John Brown:

His zeal in the cause of my race was far greater than mine – it was as the burning sun to my taper light – mine was bounded by time, his stretched away to the boundless shores of eternity. I could live for the slave, but he could die for him.

You think someone is going to write something like that about Terry Jones? Maybe Richard Cohen.

Open Thread.

Seven states and the District of Columbia are holding primaries today.

The storyline seems to be about the splitting of the Republican party into conservatives and those who are more conservative. I think of all Repubulicans as conservative, so I don't much care who wins their primaries. I care who wins in November, and I doubt any far-right radicals will win any traditionally Democratic states in November. That doesn't mean the Dems won't lose control of the House or Senate in November, but since they didn't do much while they had control, I'm not sure anyone will notice. That part is a shame.

As to Sarah Palin: She can endorse every winner at the Republican racetrack from now until doomsday and she still won't ever be elected to a position where she has a view of, let alone a seat in, the Oval office. That ship has sailed for her.

This is an open thread for today's primaries.

Obviously, I agree with Atrios on the value of calling the middle class tax cuts proposed by Democrats as the "Obama Middle Class Tax Cuts." Ezra Klein opines from the Kaplan Ivory Tower:

Greg Sargent reports that House Democrats want to rebrand the extension of Bush's middle-class tax cuts as "the Obama tax cuts for the middle class." Sigh. Whether you think this is a good idea, a bad idea or a totally meaningless waste of time -- and you can guess which view I hold -- it's worth remembering that Democrats have known about the expiration of these cuts for 10 years now. If they wanted to create their own middle-class tax cut to replace Bush's expiring program and make sure they got the credit from the voters, they could've done that.

If Ezra Klein has not yet figured out that politics is stupid, then he should stop writing about politics. While politics is, and will always be, stupid, it still matters. If you can't deal with the fact that politics is stupid, you stop writing about it.

It's also worth noting that in fact President Obama DID run on middle class tax cuts that included those being proposed now.

Speaking for me only

Russ Feingold is having a money bomb today. I am contributing to his campaign and I urge you to do the same.

Glenn Greenwald explains why you should:

Feingold is responsible for what is easily one of the most courageous political acts of the last decade, when he stood up on the Senate floor a mere six weeks after the 9/11 attacks -- in a climate in which almost nobody with a real platform was willing to dissent on anything, let alone anything significant -- and vehemently warned of the dangers posed by the U.S.A. PATRIOT Act. He then proceeded to cast the only Senate vote against that Orwellian-ly named bill, making it a 98-1 vote in favor. [MORE . . .]

Mike Castle, fighting for his political life in Delaware, pulls out the standard retort every challenged Establishment figure relies on -blame the "outside agitators:"

Rep. Mike Castle is blaming the influence of outsiders for the closer-than-expected GOP Senate primary he's locked in against tea party favorite Christine O'Donnell.

[. . .] "This has been a complete out-of-state operation, a political action committee from California, a couple people from Washington, D.C., and that's it. It's not been a local campaign. It's not had local donations," Castle told reporters in downtown Wilmington[.]

Of course only Republican voters in Delaware can actually deny Castle the Senate nomination. We'll see tonight if they do.

Speaking for me only