The Fireside chat for May 15, 2010 (VIDEO)

The President explains how Wall Street Reform will not only end bailouts and bring accountability for big banks, but empower consumers, shareholders and community banks.

"None of our challenges and difficulties are our own fault..."

From a Michael Kinsey piece in Atlantic, bagging on the Teabaggers (and rightly so). Still, this paragraph caught my attention (especially after Andrew Sullivan highlighted it as well).

Some people think that what unites the Tea Party Patriots is simple racism. I doubt that. But the Tea Party movement is not the solution to what ails America. It is an illustration of what ails America. Not because it is right-wing or because it is sometimes susceptible to crazed conspiracy theories, and not because of racism, but because of the movement’s self-indulgent premise that none of our challenges and difficulties are our own fault.

“Personal responsibility” has been a great conservative theme in recent decades, in response to the growth of the welfare state. It is a common theme among TPPs—even in response to health-care reform, as if losing your job and then getting cancer is something you shouldn’t have allowed to happen to yourself. But these days, conservatives far outdo liberals in excusing citizens from personal responsibility. To the TPPs, all of our problems are the fault of the government, and the government is a great “other,” a hideous monster over which we have no control. It spends our money and runs up vast deficits for mysterious reasons all its own. At bottom, this is a suspicion not of government but of democracy. After all, who elected this monster?

Eyjafjallajökull the Video...

Nothing to do with Politics, just...well, just look...

Iceland, Eyjafjallajökull - May 1st and 2nd, 2010 from Sean Stiegemeier on Vimeo.

Scolding B.P. (VIDEO)

It starts as a standard Presidential report on the state of the Gulf Oil Spill, along with usual plea for speedy passage of some legislation.

Then you hit the 3:17 mark...

The President, the Reporter and the Hovercraft (VIDEO)

I know, I know. We're in the middle of two wars, too many people can't get jobs, and the entirety of the Gulf of Mexico is about to be poisoned...

...but stuff like this is fun. It's fun to stop and take a moment, engage in some well-meaning silliness. This is the stuff that makes being President fun, and keeps him from having to "play" Barack Obama.



What do I mean by that? Check out Jonathan Alter's book on May 18th.

Hamsters (still) don't vote.

Caught this on Andrew Sullivan's blog. Worth remembering.

President Obama's commencement address at Hampton University (VIDEO)

Yes! To a historically Black University!

Yes! He did chip on the iPad, though the story's a tad overblown.

The Fireside chat for May 8, 2010 (VIDEO)

The President goes through the benefits in health insurance reform that are already kicking in for young adults, retirees, and families, and says more benefits are coming down the pike.

I agree...

...with Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) when he cracked on the President:

"Telling people we're not going to get a legislative solution this year, or to suggest maybe that it's not possible this year, is not in the best interests of the nation."

Not sure if "Machete" is going to help... (VIDEO)

Yes, this a trailer for an actual movie. This isn't Funny or Die stuff, this is coming out September 3rd, 2010. (Can't say much for its box office prospects).



Let's be honest, the trailer was cut to respond to/take advantage of the Arizona Law. As quick as Rodriguez works, this had to have been in the works for the last year at least. (I've been hearing about a Machete movie since the first Spy Kids movie came out, so...)

This is Duncan Hunter's Brother?!? (VIDEO)

Okay, basic story: there's a canal separating the U.S. and Mexico near San Diego. It 's also the most dangerous body of water in the U.S. as crossing it has cost 550 people, mostly illegal immigrants, their lives.

And...there is a avid right-winger out there, working overtime, risking arrest, to put in some semblance of safety features across this canal, to allow the illegals to at least arrive alive...

...and this right winger is Duncan Hunter's brother???

Great Gosh a'mighty...


Watch CBS News Videos Online

Comparitive Journalism 101

Mr. President, are you sure you want me reading the Huffington Post? I'm a Liberal, and I'm not sure.

Here's the headline on the front of their Politics page right now:

WHITE HOUSE NOT BUDGING ON DRILLING
Gibbs Says It's 'Premature' To Take Additional Offshore Drilling Off The Table

The Obama administration said on Monday that it remains "premature" to rule out including additional offshore drilling as part of comprehensive energy legislation, even as Senate Democrats warn that such a provision would make the bill "dead on arrival."

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that the president will determine whether to stay with or abandon his call for additional drilling off various parts of the coast once he gets the findings of an investigation into the massive oil spill in the Gulf.

Funny, because Greg Sargent at the Plum Line (and a TPM alum) has this headline off the same damn story:

Did Gibbs Open Door To Reinstating Drilling Ban?

President Obama has an opportunity on his hands: He could, if he so chose, seize on the Gulf oil spill to reverse his announcement of new offshore drilling and reinstate the ban on it. No idea if he’ll take this opportunity, but it’s there.

The left is redoubling its push for him to resinstate the ban, arguing that strong leaders aren’t afraid to change their minds when empirical evidence suggests they should do so. And Obama has repeatedly said he will base his administration’s decisions on “science” and “facts.”

This strong new MoveOn ad, for instance, argues that “sometimes great leaders are tested.” The ad calls for the ban to be revived, and asks: “President Obama: Will you lead our country into a clean energy future?”

At the press briefing just now, Robert Gibbs was pressed on whether this is a possibilty, and interestingly, he didn’t rule it out. Asked if the administration’s thinking had shifted, Gibbs noted that Interior Secretary Ken Salazar was probing the spill, adding:

“This is an administation that is going to take whatever we get from that and have that dicate our decision-making going forward. It would be premature to get to far ahead of where Secretary Salazar’s investigation is…

“The investigation is to determine what happened and to use that information going forward to dictate any changes in our policy.”

That seems to leave the door open to a possible policy change. Now, we don’t know what the investigation will find, and it’s very possible that the administration will ultimately argue that this one disaster is an exception and doesn’t undercut the case for more drilling.

But either way, Obama has an opening here to change direction. And if he were to reinstate the drilling ban, he would be in a better position to argue that the spill proves in vivid, horrifying detail that the cost of remaining addicted to oil, and the price of inaction on energy reform, are too great to risk any longer.

The President's busy-busy Sunday... (VIDEO)

Both New York City and the Gulf Coast in one brief statement. I'm sure more is to come...

President Obama's Commencement Address at...that University (VIDEO)

...that University being...Michigan.

Can you tell I'm an Ohio State Fan? (What, the President couldn't have gone to Columbus first? Michigan isn't in play. Ohio might be.)

Maybe I'm being too hard on Michigan after all. When your Football Program sucks, and your Basketball program sucks, you need something to justify your existence. Just don't go bringing down the Boss's Presidency, Big Blue!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Oh, and this may be my 1000th post. Enjoy!

The Fireside chat for May 1, 2010 (VIDEO)

As the President beats back lobbyists seeking to weaken Wall Street Reform, he talks about an even broader threat that would vastly expand the influence of massive industries and their lobbyists in Washington. A recent Supreme Court decision opened the floodgates for corporations, including foreign corporations, to spend endless money on political ads that would give them even more power at the expense of American families – the President pledges to fight for reforms to stem that influence.

What scares me about Arizona...

...is apparently what scares Ta-Neishi Coates of the Atlantic Monthly as well.

Carrying an illegal gun in New York is a crime, and it was a crime before New York City began searching people, stopped for another infraction, for illegal guns. Likewise, being an illegal alien was also, necessarily, a crime before Arizona's law. Both laws also place a burden of search on people who may well be innocent.

But whereas New York proving your innocence in New York means simply not having an illegal gun on your person, proving your innocence in Arizona means carrying around identification that you aren't an illegal alien. The right comparison isn't New York requiring you to submit to a search for illegal guns--it's New York requiring you to carry proof that you don't own an illegal gun.

Put differently, it was always a crime to carry an illegal gun in New York, but it was not always a (state) crime in Arizona for legal immigrants to leave their proof of residency at home. Now it is. Moreover, from what I can tell, this actually understates the law. Essentially, Arizona has made it a crime for anyone in the state to not have proof of citizenship on them at all times. Defenders of the law will say that police still have to stop you for something, and they still have to "suspect" that you did something.

Forgive, but I don't find that comforting. Amadou Diallo is dead because the police "suspected" he was drawing a gun. Oscar Grant is dead because the police "suspected" he needed to be tased. My old friend, Prince Jones, Howard University student and father of a baby girl, was murdered by the police in front of his daughter's home because police "suspected" he was a drug-dealer. (The cop was not kicked off the force.) Only a year ago, I was stopped in Chelsea, coming from an interview with NPR, because police "suspected" I was the Latino male who'd recently robbed someone.

This comes down to police power, and how comfortable you are with its extension. George Will, in a bit of populist demagoguery, implies that the critics of the Arizona law are people who only know illegal immigrants as cheap labor. But I suspect Will mostly has the exact same relationship with illegal immigrants. Moreover, I suspect that he only knows the police as the kind of Officer Friendlies who only arrest "the bad people."

I don't want to be cheap here, but it needs to said that when you actually know decent people who are dead because of our insane drug war, your perspective on police power changes. This is a multi-million dollar lawsuit waiting to happen. Someone is going to get killed. And the fact that "the vast majority of police are awesome" will not bring them back.

"I measure progress by a different pulse" (VIDEO)

3.2 GDP Growth is undeniably good news, but...

After the single biggest economic crisis in our lifetimes, we’re heading in the right direction. We’re moving forward. Our economy is stronger; that economic heartbeat is growing stronger.

But I measure progress by a different pulse -– the progress the American people feel in their own lives day in, day out. And this week, I spent a few days visiting with folks in small towns in the Midwest -– places where the damage done by the worst recession in our lifetimes is profound. They’re still trying to recover from a shockwave of lost homes, lost businesses, and more than eight million lost jobs. It’s a tragedy that has families and communities across America too often feeling like they’re on life support.

So while today’s GDP report is an important milepost on our road to recovery, it doesn’t mean much to an American who has lost his or her job and can’t find another. For millions of Americans -– our friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens ready and willing to get back to work -– “you’re hired” is the only economic news they’re waiting to hear. And they are why the work of moving this economy forward remains our focus every single day.

Now, government can’t replace every job that has been lost. That’s not government’s role. It is America’s business all across the country -- the private sector, businesses -- that have always been and will always be the engines of our job creation. Our task, then, is to create the conditions necessary for those businesses to open their doors, expand their operations, and ultimately hire more workers.

President Obama's eulogy for Dr. Dorothy Height (VIDEO)

The President talks Wall Street Reform back home in Quincy, IL (VIDEO)

The Washington Post's Proud Tradition of Racism Continues... (a follow up)

The Washington Post (wanting to feed the controversy fire, while at the same time wanting to avoid getting burned) put up a response to the column I mentioned earlier. Kevin Huffman is also the parent of bi-racial (non-black) children, but unlike Mrs. Chang seems to have a clue.

Let me start by suggesting this may slightly over-value the deep personal meaning of the Census form. I viewed the form as a seven-minute exercise in ensuring that the District of Columbia gets to count my whole family as residents. Maybe we can even get enough funding to fix the Metro escalators. I hadn’t realized the need to express solidarity with my relatives and ancestors, living and dead.

Anyway, like Chang, my kids are half Asian and half white, which led me to identify them on the Census as… Asian. My brother is half black and half white. He went with biracial. Somehow neither of these decisions has resulted in meaningfully different personal connections for my family.

The question of race as biological or sociological construct is complex. While Chang may wish Obama took a more literalist perspective and identified as biracial, I’m quite sure she doesn’t have the right to judge.

Exactly. Well said, Mr. Huffman.

I'm sorry that President Obama didn't fulfill Mrs. Chang's personal ambitions by making a personal choice on his own personal census form.

I'm equally sorry that the default position of too many Americans is that our fellow citizens of biracial ancestry should automatically want to set aside their African Heritage. Thus, I still think Mrs. Chang is a racist.