Peter Roff Yesterday

Republicans Refuse to Be Obama’s Health Reform Set-Dressing

By Peter Roff, Thomas Jefferson Street blog 

Congressional Republicans, while welcoming President Barack Obama's offer of a televised summit on healthcare, are refusing to be led around by the nose. House Minority Leader John Boehner and Minority Whip Eric Cantor are asking the president to agree to set aside the healthcare legislation pending in Congress and to start over again as a condition of their participation in the proposed February 25 meeting. 

"Assuming the President is sincere about moving forward on health care in a bipartisan way, does that mean he will agree to start over so that we can develop a bill that is truly worthy of the support and confidence of the American people?" the pair asked in a letter sent Monday to the White House. "If the starting point for this meeting is the job-killing bills the American people have already soundly rejected, Republicans would rightly be reluctant to participate." Indeed, the GOP upped the stakes by asking the president to include Democrats who voted against the bill in the summit as well as governors and state legislators and, in fact, daring him to have a truly national dialogue on this volatile issue. 

Robert Schlesinger Yesterday

Sarah Palin Sends Out Fundraising Appeal With Grammatical Error

By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

Sarah Palin's official PAC has pulled in more than $2.1 million this election cycle and spent $1.2 million (almost none of it on federal candidates for office, of which more in a moment), so you'd think she could afford to hire someone who can write her fundraising letters in grammatically correct English. Or at least she could get a competent proofreader. Apparently not: Here, in part, is an E-mailed fundraising appeal from the former Alaska governor on behalf of Sarah PAC (emphasis mine):

John Aloysius Farrell Yesterday

Republican Stimulus Hypocrisy: They Knew it Would Work

By John Aloysius Farrell, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

According to this morning's exposé in the Washington Times, those very same Republican members of Congress who publicly condemned the 2009 stimulus bill--insisting to us all that it would neither stimulate the economy nor create jobs--privately believed just the opposite. These GOP representatives and senators were so sure that the stimulus bill would be effective, in fact, that they could not get to their desks fast enough to start peppering the federal government with requests for projects in their districts.

After using the Freedom of Information Act to acquire the congressional correspondence to just one federal agency--the Department of Agriculture--the Times discovered more than a dozen two-faced GOP members, including Rep. Joe "You Lie" Wilson, the South Carolina Republican who interrupted President Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress last year.

Bonnie Erbe Yesterday

Palin Defenders Need to Check Their Facts

By Bonnie Erbe, Thomas Jefferson Street blog 

I agree with my colleague Mary Kate Cary and commend her for taking on the female star of her party. In her most recent blog entry, Mary Kate discussed the discovery that Sarah Palin had scribbled notes on her palm while speaking to the Tea Party Convention this past weekend. 

The notes, which say, "energy, cuts and lift American spirits" display in bold print, Sarah Palin's inability to speak off the cuff. Mary Kate generously noted that many of use have trouble remembering every point we wish to make, especially in front of a crowd. Nonetheless, Mary Kate notes:

Unfortunately, Mrs. Palin didn't write down a reminder for an everyday errand. Instead she felt she had to write down basic political priorities, core issues for the GOP. That's the problem. Imagine if President Obama were at a similar Q&A session and the camera caught the words "Hope ... Change" on his hand. 

Mary Kate Cary February 08, 2010

Palin Hand Notes Are Alarming, Embarrassing

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

Take a look at Sarah Palin's hand here, on which she apparently wrote notes on in anticipation of being asked at the Tea Party convention what the priorities of a Republican congress should be. Her hand read: "Energy ... Tax cuts ... Lift American spirit." A few thoughts:

If she had written "bread ... milk ... eggs" on her hand, or even a phone number, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation. And if, say, a congressman had written "pay the electric bill," we would have thought it was charming, like Uncle Billy in It's a Wonderful Life tying strings on his fingers to remember to make the bank deposit. We're all forgetful, we all have a million things to do, and sometimes we write reminders on our hands. I understand that.

Unfortunately, Mrs. Palin didn't write down a reminder for an everyday errand. Instead she felt she had to write down basic political priorities, core issues for the GOP. That's the problem. Imagine if President Obama were at a similar Q&A session and the camera caught the words "Hope ... Change" on his hand.

Peter Roff February 08, 2010

Republicans Should Beware Televised Healthcare Negotiations

It may be that the Republicans are on the verge of showing President Barack Obama a way out of the healthcare mess he has made for himself.

Up until the election of Republican Scott Brown to a seat in the United States Senate, the Democrats on Capitol Hill had largely been negotiating with themselves over what the final version of the healthcare bill would look like. They had the votes to pass it without the GOP but they didn't have the will--so the legislation was left to linger while the president talked tough about not running away from it.

All that changed after Obama, who was back to calling it "health insurance reform"--a phrase which polls better than healthcare reform--turned in a better than expected performance during the question and answer session that followed his remarks to the House Republicans, meeting in Baltimore.

John Aloysius Farrell February 08, 2010

Best Political Nonfiction Books

By John Aloysius Farrell, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

I wrote last week about Chris Cillizza's poll of Washington political junkies, and how their rankings of American political fiction were so way, way wrong.

Now, it's on to the non-fiction category, where the Fix fans did a little better, as one might expect of readers of The Washington Post. Yet there are glaring omissions--most notably the work of Post stars Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein and David Maraniss.

How does any list of significant books on contemporary politics not include All the President's Men, or The Final Days or The Brethren and other Woodward books, or Maraniss's biography of Bill Clinton, First in His Class, or his collaboration with Michael Weiskopf on that little classic, Tell Newt to Shut Up!

I call it the Woodward School, though the New Yorker's Elizabeth Drew gave us more high falutin' versions for many years, and probably ranks as a co-founder of the academy.

The latest entry, secure atop the best-selling lists, is Game Change, a guilty pleasure from John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, about the 2008 campaign.

Mary Kate Cary February 05, 2010

Why the Tea Party Convention Hurts the Tea Party Movement

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

The tea party movement is not being very well served by the "Tea Party Convention" being held in Nashville this weekend, for a number of reasons. First, the tea partiers I know who gathered last summer barely had enough money to pay for a microphone and a sound system, much less afford tickets to a fancy hotel with a lobster-and-steak dinner. But they cared deeply about where our country is heading, the tax-and-spend massive federal budget, and the growing nanny state, and so they made home-made signs and stood on the steps of their State Capitol. I think the organizers of this expensive convention misjudged the audience.

Bonnie Erbe February 05, 2010

Scott Brown For President? Only If Republicans Don’t Mess It Up

By Bonnie Erbe, ThomasJefferson Street blog 

Scott Brown will have a lot of "'splainin'" to do (in the infamous words of Ricky Ricardo) now that he's been sworn into the U.S. Senate. He's a moderate Republican, an almost-dead wing of the GOP, my hope is party leaders won't crush him, pulverize him and stuff him into the right wing mold. 

He's already announced to the world he's pro-choice, and carefully campaigned as a non-partisan Republican. In that respect, and one or two others, he's kind of like President Obama's GOP twin. The difference is, however, President Obama is the leader of his party and Sen. Brown is a very junior member of his.