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Jay Bookman
Klezmer meets rock and roll? Oy vey
OK, see, this is why you can't lose faith in America. We keep coming up with creative cross-fertilizations like the Shondes (a Yiddish term for shame or scandal). They're a bunch of Jewish kids from Brooklyn, putting out what a Rolling Stone reviewer calls "a mix of riot-grrrl furor, arena ...
Fox News' hilarious redefining of 'equally fed up'
Hilarious. You really have to admire the effort, if not the results. Here's how Fox News describes the results of its own newly released poll: "WHILE CONGRESS CONTINUES to point fingers over who is to blame for the current budget impasse, Fox News polls show Americans appear equally fed up ...
'... know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em'
To pull off a manuever of this magnitude with control of just one chamber of just one branch of government, three things are essential for Republicans: 1.) A clear plan of action, with a clear goal; 2.) A party committed to and fully united in support of that plan. 3.) ...
Economic chaos may not be enough to force deal
UPDATE, as reported by the New York Times: "WASHINGTON — With a budget deal still elusive and a deadline approaching on raising the debt ceiling, Speaker John A. Boehner has told colleagues that he is determined to prevent a federal default and is willing to pass a measure through a ...
What's really at stake in the shutdown/debt ceiling fight
A helpful reminder from Erick Erickson at RedState: "Congressmen, this is about shutting down Obamacare. Democrats keep talking about our refusal to compromise. They don’t realize our compromise is defunding Obamacare. We actually want to repeal it. This is it. Our endgame is to leave the whole thing shut down ...
Boehner's stunning hypocrisy exposed, loud and proud
An angry House Speaker John Boehner strode to the floor of the House Monday night, the night of the shutdown, to insist that all he was fighting for was fairness for the American people. He focused particularly on the bogus "exemption" from ObamaCare that is supposedly being given to members ...
First-day surge on exchanges proves pent-up demand
When Apple launched its iTunes Match software, which allows users to store and access their music on one site for all Apple devices, it proved so popular that Apple's servers crashed when so many users rushed to activate it. This was not considered an embarrassing failure on Apple's part, but ...
With Iran, a last best chance at a sane resolution
While President Obama refuses to negotiate with House Republicans over the budget and debt ceiling, saying that he won't talk with people who are threatening to harm the country, talks with Iran over ending its nuclear program seem to be progressing. In the most recent development, the Iranian Parliament has ...
This would be one sleazy, cynical escape hatch
I find this hard to believe, but hard-to-believe things are happening right and left these days. Mainly right. Now, I may be reading this wrong, but House Republicans appear to be eying the so-called Vitter amendment as their escape hatch from this little problem that they've created for themselves. The ...
Who put the handcuffs on Boehner? These guys did
John Boehner could end this right now. He has the votes; he just doesn't have the guts to use them. If he put a "clean" bill before the House that funded the government at current levels, with no extraneous language about ObamaCare or other issues, it would pass with a ...
The shutdown is here, so now we wait. Right, Mr. Speaker?
Apparently, Mr. Speaker, the president isn't going to negotiate. So ... now what's your plan? Wait to see who cracks first under the pressure that will mount, hour after hour, day after day, even week after week if necessary? OK then. We'll wait.... While we're waiting, though, maybe we should ...
GOP insists it will shoot the hostage. Really, it will....
Marc Thiessen, a former Bush speechwriter and now a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, has an interesting column in the Washington Post on the Republicans' hostage-taking strategy. He writes: "Democrats are in such a panic over the prospect of a government shutdown that President Obama spent four hours on ...
'ObamaCare exemption' a case study in GOP dysfunction
One of the recurring right-wing gripes about ObamaCare is that members of Congress and their staff were somehow granted an "exemption" from the law when it was passed in 2009. The complaint has become a standard part of the right's email-chain, talk-radio recitation about the evils of ObamaCare, with some ...
Because you just can't do everything ... that's life!
Frank Sinatra was The Man. No, strike that. Frank IS and will always be The Man. Back in the early '80s, during my Vegas years, I used to drive down the Strip, past Caesars' Palace, and the billboard out front would read simply, "He's here!" Because really, what else need ...
Ted Cruz wins big by losing big
Twenty-five Senate Republicans -- a majority of the GOP Senate caucus -- voted this afternoon to invoke cloture on a budget resolution to keep the government funded, and by doing so cast a vote in favor of ObamaCare. At least, that's how Ted Cruz and his supporters see it. Within ...
The GOP has been trying to pick this fight for a long time
So this is it, huh? This is where we've been headed all along? This is where the path has been leading us, to default and/or shutdown and a political donnybrook for the ages? It makes sense. In fact, I guess it was almost inevitable. The tensions created by two decades ...
GOP leaks its list of demands for not killing the economy
The House GOP has leaked a tentative list of its demands in return for not wrecking the American economy and pushing the government into default on its debt. As reported by National Review, that list reads, and no, I'm not kidding: -------------------------------------------- One Year Debt Limit Increase Not a dollar ...
GOP cray-cray now focuses on debt default
Remember how we used to make fun of and sneer at politically unstable, incompetent countries such as Italy, with its dysfunctional Parliament that could never agree on anything and couldn't even perform its most basic functions, like passing a budget? Good times. The latest news out of Washington is that ...
Why we shouldn't trust our own NSA
Gen. Keith Alexander, the head of the National Security Agency, was on Capitol Hill today to complain about sensationalized media coverage and to try to justify his agency's immense data-collection efforts as necessary to fend off terrorism. He also promised that if and when his agency does something wrong, it ...
In GOP land, it's Lord of the Flies time
“Which is better -- to have rules and agree, or to hunt and kill? Which is better, law and rescue, or hunting and breaking things up?” ― William Golding, Lord of the Flies --------------------------- Ted Cruz has ended his speechifying, on time and on message to the end. His last ...
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