Joshua, I agree with you that Scott Walker is consistently ahead in the polls. You’re of course correct about the WSJ poll. But what is the aggregate of the polls? Do they all show him 8 points up, or do some show him down at 3, others at 6, and one at 8? From what I can see, the polls haven’t been showing any significant changes in months in spite of a massive amount of money being brought in by both GOP and Dem supporters. And yes, they do show Walker ahead enough that he may well keep his office in two weeks. But not by a landslide or even by a margin of comfort.

This is why I think he needs to do something to address the whole state and not just his backers, exactly as you point out. I don’t know what Barrett can do in this, but if Walker wants him to be part of an attempt to be a cross-aisles peacemaking, that would probably be a good idea.

Regarding the healthcare/pension issue, I think I should point out that while we are regularly told that Social Security is “doomed” or “bankrupt” or “going over the cliff”, the fact is that Social Security will be solvent for at least another 25 years, after which it is projected to still be able to pay up to 80% of scheduled benefits without making any changes to the existing setup. And that situation assumes something like 1% growth every year for the next 25 years, which would mean that we’d been in something close to a depression for a heck of a long time. If we want to fix the situation with Social Security, we can simply do what a president about 30 years ago did – adjust the payroll tax in a minute fashion. That president was Reagan, and what he did insured SS solvency for future decades.
I do think we can afford single payer healthcare, but the country will not be ready to embrace this idea until the costs of healthcare rise to the breaking point for everyone. So far, we’ve been able to keep that wolf at bay. But it won’t last forever, and eventually the insurance companies will have to let go of that idea and just cover the many other areas they already handle. (They won’t go out of business – they’ll just lose the healthcare portion of it.)

As for the idea of everyone taking care of their own pension and healthcare costs individually, I must differ there. I believe that this would be incredibly expensive for most people – to the tune of several hundred dollars a month over and above their current costs of rent, utilities, food, etc. The wealthier among us could afford this – the less wealthy would wind up going to the ER as many uninsured do today. And then we all pay higher hospital costs, which would totally undo the point of such an approach. Further, if we were to abandon the idea of Social Security, you’d have exactly the scenario we had in the Great Depression where people were completely broke at the time of retirement even after working their whole lives and saving – since the banks went under, they lost everything and the result wasn’t pretty. Hence, social security for everyone. And by the same line of thought, it’s a darn good thing we did NOT do what George W. Bush was suggesting in 2004 of switching Social Security for private investment accounts – if we’d done that, the mess of 2008 would have been many factors worse.

Interesting post, Joshua. Allow me to respond.

I’m not sure who you are referring to as “you guys.” I live in California and I’m not interfering in how Wisconsin voters determine their future. This is why I ignored Walker’s request that I give him money with some bemusement.

I’m glad that you remember that over 900,000 registered Wisconsin voters signed the recall petitions for something to be done about Scott Walker. I see no sign that their movement has dissolved, as you put it. I do see indications that Walker has brought in 25 times more money than they have to fight them rather than listen to them.

Walker is indeed ahead in the polls, in the single digits consistently. He certainly isn’t pulling ahead by any strong number, unless you’re only looking at a poll skewed to favor him. He may well keep his office, but he’ll be seriously damaged by this entire affair. I’m sure you’d like to see the matter called off before it can do more damage but the wheels are already turning. Further, repeatedly bringing up the cost of the recall is a right wing talking point that ignores that EVERY election costs taxpayer money. It is part of our system of governance and voting. We all agree to be part of this as part of this society. If you’re saying, you don’t want to pay for this particular recall, then people who disagree with you could tell you various sectors of government they would rather not support. Or are you saying that there should be no recalls? Because GOP pundits in California were overjoyed at the 2003 Recall and cheered on the radio when Gray Davis was knocked out of office. Are you repudiating that?

I’m curious what polls you believe show union members in strong support of Scott Walker. Certainly there are some union members who do agree with and support him. But I’d be very surprised to see consistent polling across the board in Wisconsin that shows a majority of union members supporting a political operative who viciously attacked them in public and then insulted them while doing so.

The idea of making the state employee unions rejustify their existence every year is a deliberately onerous step designed to take advantage of the fact that most people don’t pay attention to that stuff. Giving them extra boxes on their timecards and extra tax materials and forms just to mess with the unions is a clear attempt to force the unions to spend a lot of time and money just to tell people about this – hence defending their own existence rather than actually working to protect their workers. And that’s part of the point. If Walker had his way with this, the unions would lose more and more members and funds until they simply ceased to exist. Which would coincidentally help the GOP as they would benefit from not having any union support for their Dem opponents, while the GOP could freely draw on unlimited corporate funds. Had Walker pulled this off, he’d be on a fast track to a White House run for the GOP as a miracle worker. Instead, he’s fighting for his own job and will face a serious problem in trying to be reelected even if he survives this situation.

You are correct that I am a union member, but not of a public employee union and obviously not in Wisconsin. I always find it interesting when the response to union rights is to attack the fact that unions protect the health and pension plans of their members, as though people should not have those things unless they operate their own businesses. Now, if you’re arguing that we should instead have a single payer healthcare system and that there should be a guaranteed retirement system like Social Security, than we can discuss that. But I think you’re arguing the former argument instead, which is truly unfortunate. And while we’re on the subject of state employee health and pension plans, let’s remember that your state employee unions agreed to change the terms of those things to help the state out of its budgetary problems. Walker ignored this and took what may have been a fatal political step for himself and his supporters.

I’m not asking for Scott Walker and Rebecca Kleefisch to “fade away”, but yes, they do need to acknowledge that they are not just the governor/lt governor of the people they like. They are the public officials over the whole state of Wisconsin, including the nearly 1 million voters who petitioned to have them removed. Simply telling those voters that they’re wasting taxpayer resources, or dismissing their concerns in a smug tone will not erase the issues these voters have. Walker and Kleefisch need to learn their lesson and humbly acknowledge that they are public servants – not just of some business owners and wealthy taxpayers who don’t want state employee unions in their state, but of the whole state. If Walker and Kleefisch are unable or unwilling to do this, then they really do need to think about whether they should be in public service. And if they continue behaving the way they currently are, they are only increasing the likelihood that they will actually fade away within another election cycle or two. Not because I want them to – my intentions are irrelevant, but because they will have ignored a massive section of their own constituents.

Politics is the art of compromise. Walker could have had this if he had left it when the state employee unions agreed to the terms he demanded of them. When he then tried to take the kill shot as well, he revealed that he wasn’t interested in either the compromise or even the financial issues you say are the core here.

Joshua, I’m sure the Chicago Tribune has an article on the recall, but that doesn’t change the facts you’re ignoring about his constituents in Wisconsin – the ones who overwhelmingly voted for this recall to happen after his disreputable behavior the year before.

I realize that the right wing talking point is to say this is “wasting more of the tax payers money” but that ignores the taxpayers who demanded the recall in the first place after Walker and his guys attacked the union workers in his state.

And it’s a fact that most of Walker’s own support is from out of state, including the mailing he sent to me and many, many other people in California.

If you want to find a source for the divide and turmoil in Wisconsin, you might look to Walker and the GOP state legislature, which openly attacked union members, even after the unions had agreed to the financial givebacks that Walker demanded of them. The GOP move was intended to first defund the unions and then disband them – by making the union members repeatedly vote to support the union and to support the union’s right to exist in the first place. Walker was clearly intending for the support numbers to drop as most people don’t pay any attention to those boxes. Had his plan succeeded, he would have accomplished a complete end run on the unions and killed them with one shot. And yes, that kind of behavior does make one a “rock star” for the far right. Walker clearly thought it would make him material for higher office. Instead, he’s now fighting for his political life.

The appropriate course of action for Walker and Kleefisch would be for them to humbly apologize to the voters and rededicate themselves to serving ALL of their constituents, and not just the right wing ones who have listened to the stories about unions. The union members are also a large number of the taxpayers and voters in Wisconsin, and it’s a shame that the right wing does not think that their voice should count here.

Again, I have hopes that Walker and Kleefisch and even the state legislators can learn their lesson and do the right thing. But their current rhetoric does not indicate that they are hearing what the voters of Wisconsin are saying. And has been stated on 538, even if Walker narrowly keeps his office, he’s likely to be drummed out in the next election. Many voters who don’t want to deal with a recall will still throw him out at the next opportunity. I personally think it would be a better learning experience for him to take the loss now, as he could still come back to office with a better idea of what he was doing. But one way or another, he’ll eventually get the message his voters are trying to send him.

The entire show was a bit shocking for Van Susteren. The clear intent was to promote Walker and his Lt. Governor as nice, sympathetic public servants just trying to help out the taxpayer while the evil liberals and government unions were spending lots of money (including taxpayer funds) to waste everyone’s time.

The Dem candidates did get a few moments to make their case, but far, far less time than the GOP candidates were given.

What is most shocking is the total lack of understanding by Walker or Kleefisch as to why the voters are holding them accountable for their behavior. The recalls were not put together by out of state union thugs. They were called by Wisconsin voters and taxpayers who were horrified by Walker’s vicious attack on the unions. Walker’s recently released comments about “divide and conquer” only point out that this was a planned move to weaken the Dem base in Wisconsin. (No union contributions for Dems means they cannot compete with the big business contributions for GOP. No unions in Wisconsin means no union contributions.)

Walker’s obvious intention was to pull a “shock and awe” move to essentially kill the public employee unions in Wisconsin with one shot. Had he succeeded in this, he would have been able to catapult himself to national prominence the same way Ronald Reagan did when he attacked the Berkeley protesters in the 60s. Instead, Walker was challenged by the voters of his state and forced to retreat into a purely defensive posture.

The proper response by Walker and Kleefisch should have been to humbly apologize to their constituents and to promise to uphold their oaths to serve all the people of Wisconsin and not just the GOP interests there. The proper response to the recall should have been to humbly acknowledge that the people have a right to hold them accountable and to promise to behave themselves. This was intended to be a teachable moment for Walker and Kleefisch – so that they could learn their lesson with the proper humility and good grace. It appears they are stubbornly refusing to do so.

I also strongly doubt Walker’s assertion that 75% of his funding for this campaign is coming from people donating 50 bucks or less. He’s outspending the Dems at 25 to 1. I don’t doubt that he’s fooled many GOP donators into sending him money – I received a request for money from him, and I live in California, and I’m not a GOP voter. But most of his funding is coming from some very well-heeled sources who don’t want to lose their standard bearer.

Hopefully, the recall may swing a little before the date and Walker and Kleefisch will finally receive the moment of clarity they so desperately need. I have hopes that after a few months back home thinking about their behavior, they may learn something.

Colin Powell lived up to his role as an elder statesman. He made intelligent statements, even some of which I might disagree with around the edges. But he was very much on top of his facts and on top of the situation. And he did not give Hannity the license or the room to do much past his initial talking points.

I particularly appreciated him saying that he rejected the very premise of the talking point of Obama going on an “apology tour”. In several places, he corrected Hannity and then made the point that it would take too long to point out everything wrong in his statements.

I find it interesting that Fox tried to jump on the idea of Powell not endorsing Obama. But that’s not exactly what he said. He said he has not decided who he will back. He may well back Romney. Or he may go with Obama again. But he hasn’t outright said that he will not support Obama. Readers and viewers of Fox might not know that distinction.

I find it interesting that Crowley has never been asked on Fox about her swipe at Sandra Fluke on the occasion of her engagement. Anytime a Democrat or someone Fox doesn’t like has a verbal gaffe, the clip runs on a loop forever. Crowley makes an openly nasty and demeaning statement and it’s immediately dropped. I’ll give her credit for apologizing – but apologies haven’t earned non-Fox commentators any leeway on that network…

The GOP always goes after the 9th Circuit because they don’t like those judges. Go figure – it’s the least conservative circuit in the country. So any chance they can attack it, they will. Notice how McCarthy snuck in a nasty shot about the 9th Circuit being the most overturned one in the country – something I doubt is actually the case.

Further, the 9th Circuit has made clear that they are holding a legal conference – any non-conference activities like the snorkeling and other fun vacation stuff Van Susteren sniffed about have to be paid for by the individual attendees. This is also not the first time they’ve met in Hawaii – I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a deal with the hotel.

McCarthy’s other nasty shot was to tell the Circuit judges and staff to either have their meeting via teleconference or to hold the get-together in his own district in Bakersfield. Van Susteren herself came up with the novel idea of telling the Circuit to use a high school gymnasium “for free”. As though this would actually be free and forgetting that one big part of the cost of the event is the travel and lodging to put everyone together in a single location. You could hold such an event at any high school (and have to pay for the resources) and you’d still have to get the attendees there.

The Colmes/Crowley segment was one of the worst I’ve ever seen. Crowley was given a clear shot to make some very nasty and snide allegations while Colmes wasn’t even afforded the “20 seconds” that O’Reilly offered him before he was cut off by the others.

I’ve gotten to the point where if I see Palin on the tube, I hit fast forward.

I was more interested in Hannity trying to stir something up out of the Breitbart non-story about the high school kid antagonizing his teacher and getting more of a response than he bargained for. Of course, that bit didn’t include all the prior instances of him ringing this bell and pushing the teacher with this stuff.

If things turn out the way they’re shaping up, this could wind up being O’Reilly’s waterboarding moment. You could have a monthly update on whether Hannity has fulfilled his promise to be waterboarded and whether O’Reilly has confirmed that Dick Morris is finished on Fox…

Thanks for noting this Ellen. I tried to tag it in another thread, but it’s silly enough to need its own spotlight. The best part of this is Morris doubling down into the corner.

I have no problem with people saying that this will be a close election – there are plenty of people polarized to each side, just as there were in the last 2 presidential elections. But for Morris to be brazenly calling a landslide for Romney right now is not just arrogant – it’s like he’s openly handing people the pies to throw at him in November.

The Maddow piece was quite helpful in illustrating this sham. Vandersloot has been repeatedly waving this flag, even before his name popped up on a blog. And the blog mention was legitimate, since he’s a National Finance co-chair (read fundraising organizer) for Romney in an official capacity.

And just as soon as that idea had hit the Fox airwaves, when i would have expected Hannity to run with it – instead Hannity jumped back on the Ed Klein bandwagon to trumpet Klein’s latest attack book. (And when Juan Williams challenged Hannity on this, Hannity tried to shout over him that he didn’t have time to actually discuss the source of his latest attack material and only wanted to talk about the attack…)

The issue isn’t whether Nixon was smart – he was actually a very smart political animal. Unfortunately, he was also paranoid to a tee and it was this paranoia that ultimately did him in.

The issue is that Stein is trying to say that Nixon was some kind of genius when it came to understanding the presidency – and while Nixon was wily and at times quite effective, he was no genius. If he had been, he never would have been forced from the White House in disgrace.

But on another topic, I found the Dick Morris talk more interesting. Even when pushed by O’Reilly, Morris stuck to his guns that he thinks that Romney will win the election in a landslide. (And it sounds like Hannity is drinking this Kool-Aid too, as he was saying that he thought the presidential campaign would be over very soon since Romney was so far ahead…) O’Reilly actually told Morris “If this doesn’t go the way you’re saying, you’ll be finished. You’ll be lucky to get a job in Topeka. You’re really out on a limb.” Morris, pushed into the corner, chose to double down and insist on a historic defeat for Obama. One wonders if O’Reilly will remember this discussion on the day after the election…

The fact that Hannity can’t find anything else and is now resorting to angrier personal attacks is an indication of how weak he believes his case is for supporting Romney. Interesting that last night Dick Morris referred to Obama as “a drug addict” without any challenge. These guys are really getting frantic if that’s all they have.

Stein’s comments fall under the idea of “contemptuous words” and under the UCMJ have correctly resulted in his removal from the service. He can complain all he wants about it, but he took an oath and then violated it. Open and shut case.

I agree that he’s actually trying to get himself a nice little speaking/talk radio gig where he can sit and opine all day. Good for him. I’m sure there are plenty of KFI-like stations where he can peddle his wares and make nasty comments about Democrats to a receptive audience.

I also agree that if he had done this under Bush, Fox News and the radio pundits would have pilloried him. Just as they did various military people who refused deployment to Iraq or came out against the wars. Interesting that those were bad people for opposing Bush, but this guy is gold because he doesn’t like Obama.

Rove is on shaky ground and he knows it. His own electoral map is not working out the way he was hoping, and he had to actually acknowledge that on the air. (This is another one of those moments that show how frantic Dick Morris is now becoming.)

But the double standard is consistent: If Rove and his PAC put out an attack ad against Obama, they’re “just pointing out the facts” (to the delight of Sean Hannity). If a Democratic PAC puts out an attack ad against Romney, it’s “just politics.” That makes sense, doesn’t it?

One other thing – there’s nothing new in this “vetting” nonsense that Hannity and the Breitbart survivors are trying to peddle. Pretty much everything they are discussing are personal attacks that were batted away in 2008. And much of it was actually discussed in the debates that McCain lost – McCain actually did bring up his concerns about Bill Ayers and others in the debates and Obama easily batted that one away.

The real reason this stuff is being churned again is that Hannity and the others are seriously worried about their candidate – a man they didn’t really want but are now stuck with for this election cycle. Since they can’t really promote Romney, they can only try to tear at Obama, and since they don’t really have any ammunition, they have to go back to the same attacks they mounted before.

And for the next time that Hannity or the others try to say that the revelations about Romney “always backfire”, let’s really think about whether their false equivalencies work or even make basic sense. An adult-aged Romney leads a group of guys in his prep school to attack another student because Romney doesn’t like the way he looks. The same Romney in school voices homophobic slurs in class, and is noted for doing so. The same Romney as an adult parent, nearly 20 years later, cruelly puts the family dog on the roof of his car for several hours, not even relenting when the dog has a clear anxiety attack up there. The same Romney, as a presidential candidate, repeatedly has issues relating to other candidates or the public on a human level and is seen as having an attitude of superiority and arrogance, for example when he actually laid hands on Rick Perry during a debate as a way of trying to control him. That’s a pretty consistent throughline, and that’s the impression voters have of him.

Contrast this with the reverse attacks on Obama. A pre-pubescent Obama is given a plate of food in Indonesia and is told by his stepfather what the various foods are, including insects and various wild animals. Obama as a young boy samples the food, and remembers enough of this to mention it as a life experience in his memoirs. A young Obama in elementary school is teased by his classmates about a girl he has befriended, and he responds in typical fashion for a young kid being teased – he lashes out at her and them before the teachers put them back in their classrooms. A teenaged Obama, approaching adult age, blows off his classes and spends more time drinking beer or smoking pot, as an avoidance of the real issues going on around him and his own abilities. There really isn’t anything unusual about this. And it doesn’t change the fact that Obama pulled himself together as he became an adult and began to apply himself.

So in the one case – Romney – you have a clear history of arrogant and at times abusive behavior that dates back to his first moments of adulthood in 1965 and continues up to the present. In the other case – Obama – you have a fairly typical series of teachable moments in a very young child’s life, followed by a difficult teenage experience, followed by a laudable example of pulling oneself together and achieving something with one’s life. How do the right wingers really think they can get away with this kind of false comparison?

Thanks for spotlighting this moment. Murphy did a good job of calling Hannity on what he was doing. Hannity had no real answer to Murphy and could only dodge. He’s clearly trying to go down the Donald Trump road of insinuating that Obama’s transcripts from college would show bad grades. (I remember Trump firmly stating “I hear he had terrible grades!”) But of course Hannity isn’t saying so directly. He’s just asking. Kind of like the birthers were “just asking” to see a birth certificate.

The false equivalence the right wing is trying to use here is staggering. The Washington Post researches a story for months that provides yet another example of Mitt Romney’s callousness and meanness. In addition to the attitude of superiority we’ve already seen and the account of him as an adult cruelly putting his dog on the roof of his car, we now have a sourced account of him doing fairly nasty things to other students as an 18 year old – meaning that he was old enough to know better. When Romney is asked about this, he acts like he doesn’t remember doing it – which either means he’s lying or that it wasn’t a memorable act to him – which presents a troubling scenario whichever way you think this happened.

In response, the GOP desperately tries to fog up the issue by bringing up stories from Obama’s memoirs. First, Hannity brings up Obama discussing his own delinquent behavior in high school. Except that the story only really says that Obama at the time was trying to tune out and numb himself, which is not the same thing as attacking your fellow students, much less leading a mob attack. Hannity tries to spice this up by “just asking” how Obama then got into Harvard. Thankfully, last night one of his Panel guests called him on this, openly challenging him to admit that he’s saying that Obama didn’t deserve to go to Harvard. Hannity dodged the question, but it was at least asked. (And for the record, Obama didn’t go directly to Harvard. He went to Occidental and Columbia Colleges, where he had to actually apply himself, and based on that, he later got into Harvard Law.)

Then, Hannity really pushes it by bringing up what he says is an example of Obama bullying someone. Except that the example is of a 10 year old Obama in elementary school being taunted by a bunch of kids for talking to a girl and behaving badly toward her and them. So let’s see if we can find the commonality. Romney led an attack on a boy he didn’t like when he was 18 years old and effectively an adult about to go to college; Obama didn’t respond well to taunting when he was 10 years old in elementary school. Yeah, that’s the same… Riiiight.

(And I won’t even go into Hannity trying to make an issue out of Obama quoting the kinds of sermons that woke him up to the injustice in the world around him…)

And to top it off, you have O’Reilly and Rove trying to play the game of, “Well, this is silly on the part of both sides.” Granted, O’Reilly does have a point that it’s not an answer for the right wing to answer the charges with a ridiculous assertion about Obama. But it doesn’t negate the charges.

The reality is that Romney just isn’t that appealing of a candidate – mostly because voters sense he’s remote and superior, and because he does have a history for doing things that indicate a lower level for compassion for those not part of his inner circle. Beating up a kid he didn’t like and putting his dog on the roof of his car are indicators of the same mindset.

Cuccinelli passed up one opportunity here. O’Reilly tried to play the card that the two journalists’ lives are in danger as there were threats made after the attack. Cuccinelli could have made the case that by making this such a public discussion and by publicizing the names of the journalists and putting their photos on the Factor every night, O’Reilly has generated this part of the problem.

The two journalists told their editor that they didn’t want a story done on this. Easy to understand why – it’s embarassing, indeed humiliating to have that kind of thing spread around. And it invites the crazies to respond.

If anyone here is adding to the problem, it’s O’Reilly.