2015 American Politics Thread: The 114th Congress Is in the House!

I'm going by history and our not being kind to veeps wanting a second term of their own.

I'm with Doctor Casino on that one - threadbare sabermetrics over a few data points is likely to be less use than the specific circumstances.

Tonight on Counterfactual Theatre

^^^

education policy in general doesn't really line up neatly along party lines

Yeah. Probably needs its own thread, though there might not be enough education-policy geeks on here to sustain one. I've reported/written a lot about education over the past couple decades, and I think it's the most complicated and frustrating of yr major national/social/cultural issues. Even more than healthcare, which at least has some clear ideological faultlines -- single-payer vs. "private market." In education, you have liberal "reformers" and conservative "reformers," who sometimes seem to agree on some things but sometimes are very far apart. And then you have a bunch of more-or-less defenders of the status quo, who aren't ideological so much as institutional, and you have a massive amount of plain old inertia just making it very hard to ever change anything. There are the profiteers -- the people who make and market textbooks, technology, etc -- who aren't necessarily wedded to any one model, they just want to be first in the door. And there's also this very decentralized power structure, where the feds control some things, the states control others, and local school boards still have a huge amount of authority (because the biggest chunk of most school systems' funding is local). Anyway, it's a mess.

Weird all this talk of a spec Gore presidency and zero mention of kyoto protocol, climate change, energy policy etc

Can we talk for a second about an acquaintance of mine who is running against Sean Duffy in Wisconsin?

http://www.kirkbangstad.com/

guh i regret the conjecture now. i was more just (internally i guess) heading off 'didn't we almost have it all?' fantasies that spring up over hypothetical gore presidency so I could defend him against that dumb 'lol he invent internet - NOT' meme.

never allude to that Whitney song again, bro

don't be so emotional

where do broken hearts gore.

guess not

i wholeheartedly endorse anyone who wants to take down sean duffy and any means they choose to do so

I haven't actually talked to him in years but a common friend (who works in politics) alerted me to this, which I think is pretty awesome; he's a really great dude.

(Here's hoping there isn't some nightmarish surprise in his policy positions)

Does he have a chance? Any other Dems?

I'll be his baby tonight!

As far as I know, he is the Dem; I don't think anyone else is in the race.

I wanna dance wausau body.

didn't wisconsin have it all?

it's not right (but it's eau claire)

^ winner

beautiful

just gonna be watchin' football in my Mankato

just wanted to throw Minn in

ok i can't tell any of those states apart

also beautiful

grrr: https://wilderness.org/blog/few-members-congress-are-about-erase-50-year-old-promise

Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) - Aerial bombardments blew apart a Doctors Without Borders hospital in the battleground Afghan city of Kunduz about the time of a U.S. airstrike early Saturday, killing at least 19 people, officials said.

@billmon1
London 1940: Civilians throughout the city were killed at about the same time as a German air strike, @CNN reports...

Further investigation is needed to determine whether the Taliban has acquired a modern air force.

http://s22.postimg.org/cn78ql8hd/kochswarm.png
I know it's pronounced Koke but that's not how I read it

the ignorance of history recent enough to be journalism is getting a little hard to take. suffice it to drop these in re the "counterfactual" gore admin (he won btw)?

https://www.questia.com/newspaper/1G1-63954947/gore-criticizes-bush-foreign-policy-approach-gop-candidate
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/08/05/time.history/
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/juicy_bits/2004/03/could_we_have_prevented_911.single.html
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/12/15/how-bin-laden-escaped-in-2001-the-lessons-of-tora-bora.html
http://articles.latimes.com/2006/nov/12/opinion/op-kagan12
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2009/05/15/flashback_gore_calls_bush_policies_un-american_in_2002_speech.html
http://articles.latimes.com/2003/nov/10/nation/na-gore10
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,574809,00.html
http://money.cnn.com/2002/11/06/news/pitt/
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2002/12/snow_job.single.html
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aoM0mju1ARQo
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/19/AR2007121902177.html
http://www.monitor.net/monitor/0502a/gorebushwarming.html

Greenwald re the bombedy-bomb media tiptoeing

"The U.S. and its allies — in both the Afghan government and its own media — have now switched course from the 'it was a collateral damage mistake' cliché to the proud 'yes we did it and it was justified' boast (indeed, a large bulk of today’s NYT article, ostensibly about the effects of the hospital’s destruction, is actually devoted to giving voice to those who are justifying why the hospital was attacked, even as the framing of the article is designed to suppress the identity of the perpetrator). But from the start, not even the U.S. military had the audacity to try to obscure that they did this. They left that dirty work to their leading media outlets, which, as usual, are more than eager and happy to comply."

https://theintercept.com/2015/10/05/cnn-and-the-nyt-are-deliberately-obscuring-who-perpetrated-the-afghan-hospital-attack/

the latest news is that the Afghan forces requested the airstrike. see, they asked for it!

MSF/DWB:

“MSF is disgusted by the recent statements coming from some Afghanistan government authorities justifying the attack on its hospital in Kunduz. These statements imply that Afghan and US forces working together decided to raze to the ground a fully functioning hospital with more than 180 staff and patients inside because they claim that members of the Taliban were present.

“This amounts to an admission of a war crime. This utterly contradicts the initial attempts of the US government to minimize the attack as ‘collateral damage.’

“There can be no justification for this abhorrent attack on our hospital that resulted in the deaths of MSF staff as they worked and patients as they lay in their beds. MSF reiterates its demand for a full transparent and independent international investigation.”

https://theintercept.com/2015/10/05/the-radically-changing-story-of-the-u-s-airstrike-on-afghan-hospital-from-mistake-to-justification/

these doctors appear to be fucking furious. good for them.

MSF is probably the safest enemy of the Pentagon to donate to, tho i'd like to spread the love around today

whatta maroon
https://twitter.com/monicacrowley/status/651043858541879296

well, she was in Richard Nixon's company for several years.

Was that Simply Red billboard from East Berlin too?

She's since clarified that it was irony.

other things that work:
-asbestos
-thalidomide
-chemical weapons
-leaded gasoline

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/06/business/trans-pacific-partnership-trade-deal-is-reached.html

Its full 30-chapter text will not be available for perhaps a month, but labor unions, environmentalists and liberal activists are poised to argue that the agreement favors big business over workers and environmental protection. Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized the Pacific trade accord as “a bad deal,” injecting conservative populism into the debate and emboldening some congressional Republicans who fear for local interests like sugar and rice, and many conservatives who oppose Mr. Obama at every turn.

Good week for Obama! With TPP, he's guaranteed lots of dough for his library, board positions for Michelle, and lots more corporate thank you's! AND, he got to test how good he's gotten at killing people (as he himself said) by blowing up a hospital! Kids in burning beds! He's so...likable, isn't he?

shd give him another peace prize

firemccarthy.com

Cool logo Alan Keyes

Spencer Ackerman
‏@attackerman

4th time in 4 days US changed story on Kunduz strike.
1: dunno if hospital hit
2. hospital accid hit
3 Afghs call it in
4 US SOF call it in

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/06/doctors-without-borders-airstrike-afghanistan-us-account-changes-again

WASHINGTON — Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah admits he is not the best candidate to become speaker of the House. He fully expects to lose when his Republican colleagues pick their nominee on Thursday. But opportunity for Mr. Chaffetz is like the scent of an airport Cinnabon, and he has a habit of racing to its smell.