Thurgood Marshall was an Activist Loser!

At least according to Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama. He's the leading Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee that is currently holding hearings for Elena Kagan's nomination to the SCOTUS. Since Senator Sessions is the leading Republican it's important to note that he's both heading up the Republican opposition to Kagan's nomination (psst, it's all for show) and would be the chair of the Judiciary Committee if the Republicans do the unlikely and wrest control of the Senate from Democrats in November. And he thinks that Thurgood Marshall was bad for the country. As Rachel Maddow pointed out last night on her show he is one of a very small group of people who are pretty universally considered to be the gods of the Civil Rights Movement in this country. Though I guess that should come as no surprise for the man who has, among other gems, called a white civil rights attorney a traitor to his race.

To more important topics at hand, the Kagan nomination. I think I've already mentioned earlier that I don't like her as the nominee. I'm sure she's great as Solicitor General and an all around nice person. She even got good reviews from the campus veterans groups while she was the Dean at Harvard Law. But she has the (in my opinion fatal) flaw that all nominees have for the last twenty years or so. She's more conservative than the justice she's been nominated to replace! We've gone way downhill as far as SCOTUS is concerned since the Warren and Burger courts. Also worth noting, the last four Chief Justices have been chosen by Republican presidents. And we won't get to pick another one for years because Chief Justice Roberts is only 55. In short, Democratic presidents in general need to show some backbone and nominate some true liberals for the court. Yes, doing this means being willing to spend some political capital on the nomination fight rather than some pet legislation. But there is hardly a more important responsibility granted to the Executive. Most justices serve for twenty years or more. The choice of who a president nominates can have lasting effects on the country for years after a president has served their term and indeed beyond their lifetimes. As an example, Ronald Reagan nominated still serving Justices Kennedy and Scalia as well as recent retiree Sandra Day O'Connor. Justice Stevens is being replaced only now and he was nominated by President Ford. Chief Justice Rehnquist was a Nixon nomination from 1971! 

In short, is Elena Kagan qualified? Totally. More than qualified. Is she the right choice for the country right now when we already have a court handing down 5-4 decisions like Citizens United v. FEC? Definitely not.

Outmoded

An important man once said, "The most frightening nine words in the english language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'" That man was of course former President Ronald Reagan. It is, of course, this President than Republicans and conservatives have lauded since he left office in 1988 as THE American President. His ideas that government wasn't just a problem, but that it was THE problem have resounded throughout American politics and continue to this day.

Aside from my feeling that if you think government is such a problem, perhaps you shouldn't be in the business of governing I take other issues with this. But I'm going to borrow from President Reagan today and say that the most frightening eight words in the english language today are, "I'm from BP and I'm here to help."

Beyond any discussion of the Deepwater Horizon Spill as an environmental disaster or as something we can use to spur, as the President said last night a "clean energy future for America" I feel like we are seeing first hand the ways the deregulation beginning in the Reagan era from that deep-seated mistrust of government have left us as a people helpless. Sure, this has been the theme on the issue of Wall Street reform for a while now, but I don't think many Americans understand how deeply this deregulation has seeped into our corporate culture. Not only have the banks been freed to do what they please, but so have other major corporations, specifically in the energy industry. We saw it with the way Massey Energy was handling the Upper Big Branch Mine and we are seeing it, and reaping the rewards all along the Gulf Coast, in the response from BP, or lack thereof, to the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Mother Jones magazine has an article up right now that talks about the campaign BP is waging to make sure the public doesn't understand how poor a job they are doing. You can check the article here. Make sure you at least scroll through the whole thing. The bottom section has photos of what appear to be simple paper towels that they're placing on top of the oil. As if Brawny is going to get the job done! "It's super absorbant! Why not?" BP's board says. In general I've found very few national media outlets that are covering this in the way it should be. Rachel Maddow has been right on the ball. Most of her coverage has been of the lame ass job BP is doing of keeping oil already out of the riser pipe off shores and out of sensitive marshlands instead of focusing on "capping the well" like everybody else seems worried about. Mother Jones is the other outlet that seems to be on top of things. All the other good reporting is coming from local Gulf Coast TV and radio stations as well as newspapers! Those silly things printed on paper that no one reads anymore. Remember them? Publications like the Times Picayune. Congrats to you guys. We're all paying the price though for the poor reporting.

Signs of the Times

I've got two people that are new in the news that I want to go ahead and talk about for just a moment. They're names that you may have heard if you keep up with some political stuff on a daily basis. If not, they might be new to you. The first is Sharon Angle, the now GOP Senate candidate who is running against Senator and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. She has a pretty cooky resume that we'll get into in a second. The second person is Alvin Greene, the Democratic Senate candidate who is running against GOP Senator Jim DeMint. He has his own special story as well.

First up we have the esteemed Mrs. Angle. She has routinely supported and espoused what could be generously called crazy ideas. She's of the mind that flouride is an international commie plot, we should pull out of the UN, and that privatizing Social Security is the best plan ever. Since she won her primary her website has been gussied up so that it looks better and some of the craziness has been removed. Cached images are available however. Check out motherjones.com Watching as the more mainstream (I use that word loosely) of the GOP try and put a shine on Mrs. Angle's website and try to play down her statements by putting her in front of cameras on Fox and Friends and letting her interviews go to Rush Limbaugh.

On the other side of the aisle, we have Alvin Greene. He is a veteran and former service member in both the Army and Air Force who is now unemployed and living with his elderly father. There has been a lot of discussion about where Mr. Greene got the $10,400 filing fee for the primary. Personally, I believe that a filing fee that is so high is pretty un-American. Both parties have huge filing fees as standard although the GOP's is higher still than that of the Democrats. I share some of the general public skepticism that has been explained by several different people including fivethirtyeight.com in the previous link as well as Countdown and Rachel Maddow. At the same time, I want to show some caution. I'm afraid that we're all way to willing to assume that Mr. Greene has done something against the rules because he is a southern black man and, by the display of poor speaking skills on his Countdown interview from the other evening. It's true that the situation is fishy, but I feel like the truth will come out and the question really is how shocked people are once the investigation comes to its conclusion.

Wait Just a Minute!

There are a few things that have floated across my internets that I want to make sure you see and one big point I want to make.

First off, check out this post by Matt Davis, former Portland Mercury editor who's now living in New Orleans, on his personal blog. They held a mock funeral for the Gulf of Mexico. If the people who are at ground zero for this disaster are holding a funeral already, what do you think the odds of this turning out well are?

Second, the jobs numbers for May have come out and it's not too good. Five thirty eight has this post up explaining in great detail. But essentially, about 90% of the jobs added in May were temporary census worker jobs. The good news, even when you subtract the census workers at least we didn't LOSE jobs...

But the big point I really want to make here is that we're overlooking an opportunity. This is a horrible issue that's going on in the Gulf. It has business and environmental impacts. But we aren't using this (black) golden opportunity to push for true policy changes in our country! If there has ever been a better example of why we need to push, both as citizens, and as government policy, for a sustainable energy future with renewable sources of energy then I don't know what it is. This is it people!

I'm Back!

I must apologize for being so quiet as things have continued happening around the world. I have been moving. Across the country if you must know. And it takes a bit to get plugged back into the world. Let along knowing enough to begin making commentary again. Just as a summary:

The BP Oil Spill is continuing after more than a month. We've tried the containment dome, the cut and cap, the junk shot, the top kill, booms of all kinds, fire, and what I'm calling the Pull and Pray (which is just what it sounds like). Now it looks like we're just waiting until the relief wells can be finished. Near the end of August. And this is all as we are heading into what looks to be a very dangerous 2010 Hurricane Season.

Thailand has been facing civil unrest for several months which culminated in a shoot to kill order from the military government in Thailand and the deaths of several of the redshirt protesters. See here.

We are still moving forward with the primaries in many states in preparation for the November elections. Now former Pennsylvania Senator and former Republican Arlen Specter is over and done with. Elections took place in Alabama today as well as Mississippi and New Mexico with South Carolina and some others coming in next week.

Also, at the beginning of my move the President nominated Elena Kagan to fill Justice John Paul Stevens' seat on the court. She is the current US Solicitor General. Some of you probably want to know what I think of her and the truth is that I haven't had the time to do a thorough search and read up enough. But my gut instinct from what I've heard from national media sources is that she isn't liberal enough. She doesn't come close to the "liberal lion" that some have called Stevens. And anything less than Stevens moves the court to the right which is as unacceptable now under the Obama Administration as it was when he nominated Justice Sotomayor. I'm not saying she's not qualified although some have quibbled over her lack of time on the bench. Just that she's to middle of the road for my (admittedly lefty) tastes.

So. Let's start with BP and the oil spill. I shouldn't really call it a spill. I should be calling it a geyser, or a volcano, or a gush, or a spilling. Or something to indicate that there's really no end to this thing. But leaving that aside, it's a wonder to me that we've done as little as we have to try and head off another problem like this at the pass. The President has put 33 exploratory rigs on hold and we're no longer issuing new leases. We've discovered the amazing lack of sense in what is laughably called the Mineral Management Service or MMS. But there are still literally thousands of other rigs in the Gulf and all of the United States pumping away. I understand that taking America's oil production to zero barrels a day may potentially increase the price of gas at the pump. That's a price I am willing, and I hope you are willing, to pay to protect America's environmental treasures. We've already destroyed the Louisiana Marshlands. Do we want to kill the California Kelp Forests and other such aquamarine jewels as well?

BP has made it as clear as any multi-national corporation can (which is not very) that they are willing to pay. While trying to get off the hook for paying. But still. Even if they were willing to write a big, fat, multi-trillion dollar check to pay for everything that doesn't fix it. Everyone is acting like, as long as BP pays then it's fine. Eh. Who cares! And oil spill here or there. No biggie. They could write a check for the US GDP and it wouldn't automagically clean up the environmentally sensitive areas that have already been or will be destroyed. Nothing but time can undo that. And a lot of times even time can't. Just take a look at Prince William Sound 20+ years after the Exxon Valdez. This subject has been beat to death. And so I will stop now with full knowledge that I will be back on this horse sooner rather than later. The only thing we, the people, can do is to keep ourselves informed and pressure our elected government to do right by us, and take care of BP.