Employment Up Again

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the economy added 214,000 new jobs last month, making it the ninth straight month of over 200,000 jobs added since 1995.  The unemployment rate ticked down from 5.9% to 5.8% in the same month.

Income inequality, stagnant wages and salaries mitigate the consistently good economic news, as the economic recovery has provided uneven benefits.  The trick that the Dems haven't learned is to emphasize the economic achievements, not the least of which was pulling the nation out of a near-Depresson.  At the same time, they needed to be clear about who was responsible for the original crash and who has been obstructing measures that would get the economy humming again -- infrastructure, minimum wage, equal pay for equal work, and so on.  They failed.

Post-Election Cartoon Three-fer

(click to enlarge)

(Steve Benson, Arizona Republic)

(Mike Luckovich, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

(Clay Jones, Claytoonz.com)

The Grand Poobah Has Spoken

Rethuglican Grand Poobah and voice of their inner rage, hate radio's Rush Limpballs, has given orders to his underlings that were elected Tuesday, and it's not to sing Kumbaya:

"...it is the biggest, and perhaps the most important mandate a political party has had in the recent era. And it is very simple what that mandate is. It is to stop Barack Obama. It is to stop the Democrat Party. There is no other reason why Republicans were elected yesterday. Republicans were not elected to govern." (emphasis added)

We're waiting for the Rethuglican Party's reaction to their guru's orders…..waiting….. waiting…..

BONUS:  And "mandate"?  It was a low turnout election, with under-30 voters (cough) slacking off in particular.

Reality Check Quote of the Day

"Mitch McConnell and John Boehner have bet that working against President Obama’s 'agenda' for the sake of working against it is the proper way to build Republican majorities in Congress, and it’s gone swimmingly for them. These Republicans will see no need to change course now in order to 'show that they can govern.' Showing that they can be oppositional, and deflect all blame for the resulting dysfunction onto the presidency, has won them results." -- (emphasis added) Jim Newell writing in Salon.  The Rethugs just want to ride out the next two years, and continue the gridlock by posturing publicly that they want to work with the President while refusing to compromise behind the scenes, knowing that the President (and Dems) will get the lion's share of the blame.  Why should a party which has a deep antipathy toward Government try to make it work, especially when they've just been richly rewarded for obstructing it?

Mid-Week Waves Song

Dennis Stehr, the Dutch singer that goes by the name of Mr. Probz, has a recording out that's (cough) made waves since its release last year.  Expect the Republicans and their media enablers to be singing about "waves" after yesterday's elections.

Dems Fall To Rethugs

It was a big night for the Rethuglicans, who won almost all of the expected contests in their red states, and managed to beat Dem candidates in purple or blue states as well.  The body count was staggering:  losses of incumbent Dem Governorships in Massachusetts, Maryland, and Illinois, and the U.S. Senate flipping to the Republicans with incumbent Dem defeats in North Carolina, Colorado, Arkansas, and (probably) Alaska.  House Rethugs add another 12 seats roughly.

What were presumed to be tight races turned out not to be, like Kentucky where human/turtle hybrid Sen. Mitch "Missy" McConnell easily won over Alison Lundergan Grimes, and Georgia, where David Perdue avoided a runoff election by defeating Dem Michelle Nunn by getting over 50% of the vote.  Hog castrator Joni Ernst appears to have beaten Dem opponent Bruce "Not Bailey" Braley by a decent margin.  The election results mean we'll have to endure the likes of Gov. Rick "Voldemort" Scott in Florida, Gov. Scott "I'd Like To Buy The World A Koch" Walker in Wisconsin, and new Governors plutocrat Bruce Rauner in Illinois, Charlie "The Fish Tale" Baker in Massachusetts and Larry "Gun Ho" Hogan in Maryland.  Great.

So let the second guessing and finger pointing begin.  For starters, we've often noted the Dems don't talk about their successes, and ceded the field to the Rethugs and their dark money allies.  Maybe it didn't occur to them that an increasingly robust recovery, lower unemployment, lower gas prices, affordable health care, pension funds replenished, etc. might appeal to the voters.  Hand it to the Rethugs, though:  they nationalized the election, diverted attention from their candidates' extreme positions, and managed to play the political press with "gotcha" issues about their opponents.

BONUS:  Jon Stewart's take on the midterms: "...the Democrats’ strategy seemed to be — again, I’m not a political strategist — curling up in a ball and hoping you didn’t kick them in the face too hard?”

BONUS II:  It didn't hurt the Rethuglicans that voter suppression worked in reducing normally low Dem turnout further.

BONUS III:  Both Charlie Pierce and Kos take the President to task (as we do, too) for the numbnut decision to hold off on executive action on immigration until after the election in order to "save" several conservaDem Senate seats.  That didn't turn out so good, did it?

Election Day Photobomb

One voter in Kentucky isn't having any part of Rethuglican Sen. Mitch "Missy" McConnell, (foreground) and he's showing it with a big "thumbs down" at the polling place. Well done. (h/t tpm.com)

(photo: Aaron P. Bernstein, Getty Images News)

Get Out And VOTE

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Of course it's more than just the right to "complain".  It's a right earned in wars, bloody demonstrations for civil rights and marches for women's suffrage.  It's something that radicals on the political right want to curb or deny altogether.  So get out and vote.

BONUS:  The League of Women Voters has a great web site giving you accurate information about your polling locations, candidate positions, and much more.  So, no excuses.

(cartoon:  Steve Breen, San Diego Union-Tribune, via Gocomics.com)

It's Why We Call Them Rethuglicans, Homicidal Edition

Trying to prop up carpetbagging centerfold Rethuglican Scott Brown for Senator in New Hampshire has been an arduous struggle, but New Hampshire's Rethuglican Party Chair thinks she has the solution:  crush and drown Democrats.  Here's Chair Jennifer "Horns" Horn whipping up the mouth breathers:

"You are the wave. I need you out there for the next two days, it will not happen without you. This is our time, we need to crush it. We need to crush it. We need to grab it, run with it, push their heads under over and over again until they cannot breathe anymore, until the elections are over on Tuesday night and we’ve won it all!” (emphasis added)

Lovely, isn't she?  There may be no better representation of the reptilian Rethug id -- the rage, the violence and the aggressive nuttery -- than Horns' fantasy for Democrats.

It's why we call them "Rethuglicans" and why they will destroy the country if left unchallenged.

(photo:  Horns letting her freaky fantasies fly.  To our eye, she looks more than a little like "Gladys Kravitz" from "Bewitched", no?)

Horserace Reporting

American Enterprise Institute scholar Norman Ornstein has an article in The Atlantic that explores a theme that we've touched on:  the pass that's been given to extremist Republican candidates by the political press, in particular the formerly great Washington Post Bezos Bugle and the New York Times.  Ornstein believes that it's because to expose their radical views -- which are in part borrowed from the John Birch Society -- would run counter to the "narrative" that the press has established for this election cycle.  The narrative, in brief, is that "establishment" Republicans have re-captured their Party from the "kooks," represented in the past by such luminaries as Christine "Not A Witch" O'Donnell and Todd "Legitimate Rape" Akin.

With campaign journalists locked into "The Narrative," any evidence to the contrary is avoided, and focus is placed instead on gaffes and miscues from the opponents. As Ornstein concluded:

"For horserace reporting, the broader narrative is a good one to frame and organize stories and coverage. But it’s not a very good way for readers to figure out how the people they vote for might actually behave in the Senate. And that’s not very good news for voters or the political process."

BONUS:  Charles P. Pierce has more evidence -- if that's even necessary at this point -- of silly, blinkered, horserace reporting at the expense of, you know, real journalism.

"I'm A Democrat"

Steven Perlstein rightly faults Democrats for their incompetence at not proudly "branding" their party, instead defensively playing into Republican themes.  Economy gathering steam?  Huh, wha?! Unemployment cut almost in half?  Shhh!  More people with affordable health insurance?  Quick, hide!  A twice popularly elected President heading your party? Run for your lives!

Here's what Perlstein would suggest as a "branding" message for Democrats (albeit waaaay too late for the mid-term elections):

“I’m a Democrat. In economic terms, that means I believe we need an active, competent government to ensure that prosperity is broadly shared by protecting ordinary people from the occasional excesses of markets and the undue power of businesses. That’s why Democrats are for raising the minimum wage, closing down corporate tax scams, putting tighter regulation on Wall Street and providing adequate funding for a world-class public education system from pre-K through college. And it’s why we are proud to have passed legislation to ensure that all Americans finally have a basic health insurance plan regardless of income or health or which company they work for. With oil and gas prices falling, it means I’m even willing to raise energy taxes by a few pennies per gallon so we can reinvest in the infrastructure — highways, ports, airports, subway systems, the electric grid, the Internet — on which all of us and the economy depend. Republicans are uninterested in, or unwilling to do, any of these things or in making any of these investments. Are you with them, or are you with us Democrats?”

Doesn't that sound remarkably like Sen. Elizabeth Warren's message?  As we've said before, if more Democrats had even a fraction of Sen. Warren's clarity, conviction and guts, they wouldn't be shaking in their boots every time an election rolled around.

From The Sports Desk….

You have to be pretty lame to avoid a pre-game handshake with your opponent in college football, but the Maryland Terrapins managed to lame it up before their game with Penn State today.  Maryland was then penalized 15 years for unsportsmanlike conduct at the opening kickoff.  ESPN has the embarrassing clip.  The Terps (or Twerps?) may be smarting after their humiliation last week (52-7) at Wisconsin, but today's antics at Penn State were inexcusable.  Their next practice should involve a few extra laps around the field.

Letters We Wish We'd Written Dept. - Media's Enchantment With Wingnuts

From this morning's once great Washington Post Bezos Bugle:

Having read coverage in other media outlets about Iowa Senate candidate Joni Ernst’s right-wing politics, I was disconcerted by The Post’s front-page profile of her in the Oct. 27 paper [“Joni Ernst, once a long shot, hopes to take ‘the Iowa way’ to U.S. Senate”]. The article depicted Ernst as a “biscuit-baking, gun-shooting, twangly, twinkly farm girl,” a “hugger” who wants to show the federal government “the Iowa way,” rather than as someone who, if elected, would be one of the most radical members of the Senate. 

The Post’s report never questioned or challenged what Ernst means by “the Iowa way” — it’s loosely defined: something about Iowa values, “thrift, self-reliance, lack of pretension.” The Democratic opponent, Bruce Braley, was depicted as hanging out with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) “in more liberal Iowa City,” and it’s implied that he somehow lacks Iowa principles. 

Other than two sentences acknowledging that Ernst proposed dismantling the Environmental Protection Agency and supported a “personhood” amendment, her political views were not explored. These views include support of antiabortion legislation that would ban many forms of contraception and of legislation that would allow local law enforcement to arrest federal officials attempting to implement the Affordable Care Act . She has endorsed the impeachment of President Obama and opposes not only raising the minimum wage but also the very idea of a federally mandated minimum wage. One of her political ads shows her at a shooting range and states: “And once she sets her sights on Obamacare, Joni’s going to unload”; in 2012, she defended her right to carry a gun to defend herself against anyone, including the government. 

The Post’s readers deserve a balanced account of Ernst’s political views and those of her opponent, not a piece that depicted Ernst as warm and fuzzy, rather than the radical she is.

Grace Morsberger,
Chevy Chase 

As we've noted with depressing frequency, the "mainstream media" is heavily invested in the twin "Democrats face doom" and "Republicans aren't so mean" narratives in their mid-term reporting.  The once great Washington Post Bezos Bugle has played a not-insignificant part in plumping these narratives.  In recent weeks, it has run feature fluffers on Ernst, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz and others, either in the national news section or in "Style."  The point of all of these soft-focus features was apparently to humanize these demagogues.  While the editorial board generally goes with endorsing Democrats (with some foul exceptions), the national news staff seems to have been recruited right out of the "journalism" school at Regent University.  At least they're in step with the Bugle's Reaganite publisher.

"Liberal media" my ass.

Stop Cowering Quote of the Day

“You gave people health care, not herpes — own it.  Instead of chasing polls, move them.”-- Bill Maher last night, blasting the Dems for not having the sense to run on their accomplishments, while letting the Rethugs set the agenda, dishonestly of course.  They could have taken a hint from Sen. Elizabeth Warren and run on a populist, party-of-the-middle class approach, but by now, the lines are drawn.  Michael Tomasky adds that the Dems are also poor at describing what a disaster a Republican Congress would be (think repeal, regress, reject).

Vote next Tuesday.

Missy's Voter Suppression Move

Scary, official-looking mailers have been arriving in homes in Kentucky with "Election Violation Notice" printed in bold letters on the front, just days before next Tuesday's elections.  They're from the Kentucky Rethuglican Party, and authorized by human-turtle hybrid Sen. Mitch "Missy" McConnell, in a last ditch effort to fool enough voters into thinking that if they vote for his opponent, Alison Lundergan Grimes, they'd be guilty of "voter fraud."  The Grimes campaign has filed for an injunction in court to stop the attempt at misleading potential Grimes voters.

Missy's pulling every dirty trick out of the bag because his record is nothing to run on:  against equal pay for equal work, tax breaks for corporate interests, threats to take health insurance away from thousands of Kentuckians, etc.  Rethuglicans like to talk about non-existent "voter fraud" when in fact it's their attempts at suppressing the votes of their opponents that represent a threat to our democracy.