Actual NYT headline: Energy Department Loan Program Needs Oversight, Audit Finds

Entire second graf (emphasis mine, for emphasizing):

The audit, led by Herbert M. Allison Jr., a former financial executive and senior Treasury Department official, found that the government could lose as much as $3 billion of the total loan commitments so far of $24.3 billion granted to 30 companies under two Energy Department programs.

Entire third graf (emphasis mine, for emphasizing):

In setting up the loan guarantee programs, Congress set aside $10 billion for potential losses.

Proposed, better NYT headline: Energy Department Loan Program Functioning Exactly As It Was Supposed To

When Krugmans Attack:

There are a number of such climate cowards, but let me single out one in particular: Senator John McCain.

There was a time when Mr. McCain was considered a friend of the environment. Back in 2003 he burnished his maverick image by co-sponsoring legislation that would have created a cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gas emissions. He reaffirmed support for such a system during his presidential campaign, and things might look very different now if he had continued to back climate action once his opponent was in the White House. But he didn’t — and it’s hard to see his switch as anything other than the act of a man willing to sacrifice his principles, and humanity’s future, for the sake of a few years added to his political career.

(Italics mine, to highlight the act that Krugman will probably not be invited to the barbecue this year.)

I can't figure out how to embed it here, but check out the video (here) attached to this article, describing the catch-22 confronting innocent prisoners facing the parole board: only by admitting guilt do they have any realistic chance of gaining parole, but that same admission of guilt will destroy any possibility of future exoneration (in that prosecutors can and will use the prisoner's parole testimony against them). Wild -- and devastating -- stuff.

I've been saying this for a while, but in the wake of my brilliantly correct predictions in the two of yesterday's races that I cared enough about to predict (Sestak beating Specter and the Dems holding PA-12), I figured I should write this down and publish it, so that I may claim credit for it come November 3: the economy will continue to rebound (albeit slowly), the Tea Partiers will fade, and the Dems will maintain control of both chambers.

House

• Currently (including Critz): 255-177 Dems
• November 3: 235-200 Dems

Senate

• Currently: 59-41 Dems
• November 3: 55-45 Dems

Republicans will pick up seats across the board, but they won't come anywhere close to retaking either the House or the Senate. Mark my words.

Sometimes bad people do good things. Kudos, Wal-Mart.

(It's also a pretty amusing example of corporate oneupsmanship. Yesterday, Target announced "a $2.3 million program to create pantries in schools that can be used to teach children about good nutrition at the same time they are fed." That's an admirable idea, and they deserve some [relatively smaller] kudos of their own, but could they have picked a worse time to announce it than the day before their biggest competitor announces a plan to spend $2 billion? I don't think they could have.)

This is phenomenal.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Michael Steele Plays the Race Card
www.thedailyshow.com

This is uncomfortable to think about (on any number of levels):

The Obama administration has taken the extraordinary step of authorizing the targeted killing of an American citizen, the radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who is believed to have shifted from encouraging attacks on the United States to directly participating in them, intelligence and counterterrorism officials said Tuesday.

(Let's just hope they don't try to do it on U.S. soil...)

My top five recommendations from borders.com right now:

• American Conspiracies: Lies, Lies, and More Dirty Lies That the Government Tells Us by Jesse Ventura
• Lies the Government Told You: Myth, Power, and Deception in American History by Andrew Napolitano
• Courage and Consequences: My Life as a Conservative in the Fight by Karl Rove
• No Apology: The Case for American Greatness by Mitt Romney
• Defining Conservatism: The Principles That Will Bring Our Country Back by Jonathan Krohn (this kid)

They know me so well! (Seriously, Borders: what the fuck?)

Dark times for cap and trade:

Today, the concept is in wide disrepute, with opponents effectively branding it “cap and tax,” and Tea Party followers using it as a symbol of much of what they say is wrong with Washington.

Two thoughts:

• 1. Dear Tea Party followers: I know irony is not your strong suit, but I really wish you could stop decrying earmarks the stimulus the bailouts health care reform cap and trade as "a symbol of what's wrong with Washington" long enough to appreciate how blatantly you are being used.
• 2. Want to make something that's not scary sound scary? Add the word "tax" to it! Doesn't matter how nonsensical it is; it always works! Watch:

  Not scary: "Cap and trade"
  Scary: Cap and tax
  
  Not scary: "Medicare"
  Scary: Meditax
  
  Not scary: "Magazine"
  Scary: Taxazine
  
  Not scary: "Bird"
  Scary: Taxbird

I'm willing to accept that these folks are not a representative sample of the opposition to the healthcare bill, but I think it's also pretty clear that there are more of them out there than intelligent Republicans would like to admit.

God, these people.

As the House engaged in initial parliamentary maneuvering, hundreds of anti-reform protesters gathered on the south side of the Capitol between the building and the House office buildings across Independence Avenue, chanting and jeering Democrats and applauding House Republicans who egged them on.

“Nancy Pelosi you will burn in hell for this,” one woman intoned repeatedly through a bullhorn as members of the crowd rang bells, blew a bugle, waved a varied assortment of flags and chanted “Kill the bill.”

After racial slurs and other derogatory terms were hurled at Democrats by protesters on Saturday, numerous Democrats walked en masse from the House office buildings to the Capitol, running a gantlet of jeering and booing demonstrators. One was heard calling Representative Barney Frank, the openly gay Democrat from Massachusetts, a slur generally uttered against gays.

Emphasis mine. Do you think they go home at night and congratulate themselves for having contributed to public policy? How are Republicans not humiliated by these people?

“It is almost like the Salem witch trials,” Mr. Frank said. “The health bill has become their witch. It is a supernatural force and you get hysteria. There is an anger obviously that goes beyond anything connected to the bill.” Mr. Frank said he thinks the name-calling will backfire.

“I don’t think this is the way you win over the American people,” he said. “I think the average American says ‘No, I don’t like this anger, this bigotry.'"

Barney is so wise.

Do Republicans realize how ridiculous they sound when they rail against the healthcare bill on the floor of the House by using the phrases "Cornhusker Kickback," "Louisiana Purchase," "Gator Aid," and so forth, as if those were actual things? I don't think they do.

(Also, Chris Smith just helpfully explained that abortion is about "the exploitation of women." Good to know!)

Norm Ornstein and Thomas Mann on reconciliation:

Neither party has been shy about using this process to avoid dilatory tactics in the Senate; Republicans have in fact been more willing to do so than Democrats.

The history is clear: While the use of reconciliation in this case — amending a bill that has already passed the Senate via cloture — is new, it is compatible with the law, Senate rules and the framers’ intent.

Boom, bitches.

I'm not generally a big Keith Olbermann fan (he veers into polemicism a bit too often for my taste), but I happened to see a fair-sized chunk of Countdown today (in between periods of the Canada/Russia game, for the most part), and the man was on fire.* There are two things in particular for which I must laud him:

Thing One
For showing, in its entirety, this absolutely magnificent Anthony Weiner meltdown ("Every single Republican I have ever met in my entire life is a wholly owned subsidiary of the insurance industry!") on the floor of the House:



Thing Two
For this genuinely moving essay about his father's failing health:



Kudos, Keith.

* - Unlike some people.

Nick Kristof goes satire-mode to imagine what life might be like if the news industry were more like the healthcare industry:

By the way, columns such as this one about health care reform are out-of-network. Your insurance plan fully covers columns about many important topics, such as nephrology and Gregorian chant. But politics, health care, international affairs and anything that I might actually write about are all out-of-network.

Quite well done, overall (and significantly more entertaining than the last time I thought Nick Kristof was going satire-mode).

I was recently struggling to remember the wording of Nick Thune's awesome "two birds with one stone" bit, and found the Internet to be utterly unhelpful. Accordingly, in the theme of my Daily Show post from a few weeks ago, I've tracked down the video and transcribed it here, in order to help The Googles. Grateful kudos to Comedy Central, for posting it online, and to Nick Thune, for performing it.

Nick Thune - Two Birds

comedians.comedycentral.com

Thune:

Do you guys think birds ever say, "Hey, I know this sounds crazy, but hear me out. Tomorrow, I'm going to try and kill two people with one stone."

Like, the guy who actually wrote that saying, "killing two birds with one stone."

When in history was there an abundance of birds and a shortage of stones? Like, when was some guy just like, "Oh, you know what, guys? Can you just use one from now on? No, no... well, actually, we're trying to conserve rocks, but thanks for questioning the authority. You know what, though? Try and get two with that one. Yeah, there's a shitload of birds. I appreciate it. You know what? Remember that, and tell everyone, forever."

Unemployment: it's the new "employment"!

Every downturn pushes some people out of the middle class before the economy resumes expanding. Most recover. Many prosper. But some economists worry that this time could be different. An unusual constellation of forces — some embedded in the modern-day economy, others unique to this wrenching recession — might make it especially difficult for those out of work to find their way back to their middle-class lives.

Labor experts say the economy needs 100,000 new jobs a month just to absorb entrants to the labor force. With more than 15 million people officially jobless, even a vigorous recovery is likely to leave an enormous number out of work for years.

Why won't Barack Obama apologize for personally ruining the economy?

(It could be worse, though: I could have linked to this article, instead.)

I'm no expert, but I did take a few comparative religion classes in college, and I'm pretty sure that people who believe in karma have a word for this:

Alleging a plot to tamper with phones in Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu's office in the Hale Boggs Federal Building in downtown New Orleans, the FBI arrested four people Monday, including James O'Keefe, 25, a conservative filmmaker whose undercover videos at ACORN field offices severely damaged the advocacy group's credibility.

Or, as Wonkette put it:

The same pasty biotch who did Andrew Breitbart’s bidding to entrap ACORN in some minor prank that would get Congress to immediately revoke its entire funding… which was completely successful… has been arrested by the FBI for TRYING TO WIRETAP A SENATOR’S OFFICE. Cannot wait to hear the conservative spin on this one. (Perhaps he is really a liberal? Let’s just call him a “liberal” from now on...)

I've seen this commercial several times, and it never fails to make me want to donate money. Way to be, Feeding America.



The song is Never Let Go, by Tom Waits.

The fire-breathing response to Citizens United from the authors of the bill that it decimated:

Senator Russ Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, called it "a terrible mistake." Senator John McCain of Arizona, the Republican presidential nominee in 2008, said in a television interview on CNN that he was "disappointed."

Whoa, whoa, whoa, Senator McCain! You're "disappointed"? Cool your jets, man! Back away from the ledge!

Okay, perhaps that's a little bit unfair. It's just a throwaway quote at the tail-end of a newspaper article; I'm sure it doesn't accurately reflect the full dismay with which he read the decision. Let's just head over to his website and check the language in the press release he issued (given his famous temper, I'm sure it's spectacular).

Let's see here... well, that's odd. It seems to be missing. It should be right here between "Senators encourage state attorney generals [sic] to expand investigation of Senate health care bill" and "Statement by John McCain regarding the sanctity of marriage." Surely a man like John McCain -- a man of legendary temper; a man on record with his disdain for "activist judges"; a man whom the venerable New York Times has described [incorrectly] as "a champion of public financing of campaign [sic] throughout his career"* -- surely such a man would at least issue a press release addressing the biggest Supreme Court decision on his "signature" issue in almost two decades. Hell, he made the time to issue a release reassuring his mouth-breathing constituents that he still hates The Gays! But nothing on Citizens United?

Color me shocked.

* - Except when he just ignores campaign finance law completely.