A Friedman Unit For DADT

Gen. James Jones, the President's national security advisor, wants to wait to overturn the military's policy on gay soldiers until "the right time."

KING: You're national security adviser at a time of two wars, in Afghanistan and in Iraq. And there's a big question about a promise the president made in the campaign, ending the "don't ask, don't tell" policy about homosexuals serving openly in the military.

The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, sent the president a letter this past week in which he says, "At a time when we are fighting two wars, I do not believe we can afford to discharge any qualified individual who is willing to serve our country. Many members of Congress, like me, support the repeal of 'don't ask, don't tell.' As Congress considers future legislative action, we believe it would be helpful to hear your views on policy."

They want the president to get involved. Is it time now, as soon as possible, to change that policy?

JONES: The -- the president has an awful lot on -- on his desk. I know this is an issue that he intends to take on at the appropriate time. And he has already signaled that to the Defense Department. The Defense Department is doing the things it has to do to prepare, but at the right time, I'm sure the president will take it on.

KING: No idea when the right time is?

JONES: I don't think it's going to be -- it's not years, but I think -- I think it will be teed up appropriately.

I don't think this is as bad as John Aravosis makes it out to be, but it's not great. Jones could just as easily taken the same approach as Harry Reid, saying that the fact that we're in two wars is an argument FOR ending a bad policy as quickly as possible. Instead, Jones argued that things must be done at the appropriate time. In other words, wait a Friedman Unit or two, and we'll see then.

If anything else was happening to expand gay rights consistent with Obama's promises for more equality in America, maybe this could be excused. But he's not.

The Friedman Unit Strategy For Perpetual Minority Rule

The deadline for filing an initiative that would make the November 2010 ballot is Friday. The initial measures to repeal the 2/3 ballot initiatives filed by Maurice Read failed at the end of July. There is currently an initiative to lower the threshold from 2/3 to 3/5 in circulation, but it does not have any backing.

And that's it. There is no pending initiative regarding any two-thirds rule, with the institutional support needed to get on the ballot, and the deadline is Friday.

As has been mentioned in a Contra Costa Times article, the political leadership in the CDP appears to be moving away from it.

A split between Democratic activists and the political pros who run the party may be growing over how to approach the issue that has bedeviled the party for years: the two-thirds vote required to pass taxes and budgets in the Legislature.

Most Democrats in the upper echelons of the party apparatus are convinced it's a fool's errand to try to persuade voters to hand the majority party unchecked power to raise taxes. Instead, they're gearing up for a campaign next year to lower the threshold — from two-thirds of both legislative bodies to a simple majority — on budget votes only, a path they believe voters can embrace.

But some grass roots liberals say they're frustrated with the caution of party leaders and believe, if sold right, voters would hand over both taxing and budgeting powers to the majority party.

"This is a doable thing, but it requires getting Democrats together and deciding to really do it," said George Lakoff, a UC Berkeley linguistics professor who has become a de facto leader of the cause and is preparing to submit by next week a ballot measure for the November 2010 election that would drop the two-thirds requirement on both taxes and budgets. "Either they want to give the state a future or they can let Republicans continue pushing it into disaster." [...]

But party leaders see him as quixotic, and dismiss his position as misplaced and uninformed.

"People are not ready to pass it," said John Burton, the Democratic party chairman and a former Senate leader. "He's got a theory. Good luck to him."

Mind you, that another guy had a theory before he entered the CDP Chairmanship: John Burton. At the time he committed himself to repealing the 2/3 majority for the budget and taxes, and listed it as a top priority. But I don't even know that the Burton fallback position is being considered; as of now, they have a little over 48 hours to file a 2/3 repeal on the budget. And of course, this would immediately put half of what a budget is - revenues - off-limits, while taking responsibility for bad budgets that cannot be fixed.

What I have heard now is that, with statewide offices being decided in 2010, party leaders don't want to put revenue on the ballot and increase GOP turnout against it, threatening their statewide officer candidates.

This is nothing more than a Friedman Unit strategy. We cannot put such a proposal on the ballot in 2010 because it might hurt candidates, so we move it to the next election. Which has candidates in it as well, so we have to just hold off past 2012. But our Governor's up for re-election/trying to defeat the Republican in 2014, so we have to hold off then, too. As a result, nothing proceeds.

And it's worse than that. We hear constantly that the public is not ready for a conversation about changing the rule, but in the meantime nothing is being done to prepare the ground for that shift in public opinion. It's not that we have to give the war a few more months to succeed, as in the Friedman Unit; it's that we have to give NOTHING more time for voters to, I guess, come up with their own ideas about state government.

The inescapable conclusion you must come to is that everyone in the system actually likes the system as it is. For Democrats, they personally prosper by getting elected and re-elected, and they can always blame the 2/3 rule for whatever failures occur. It's accountability-free government complete with a scapegoat, and it rocks their world.

We can talk about how Democratic leaders tend to view the electorate as static and unchangeable, rather than the starting point from where opinion can be shaped. We can talk about how small-bore goals or a major crisis can provide the spark for the change the state so desperately needs. But this isn't a failure of imagination. It's a general contentment with the status quo.

Which is why change will have to be imposed upon the system from the outside. The most intriguing initiatives to date are the one pushed by Lenny Goldberg to repeal the $2 billion dollar a year corporate tax breaks, and the proposal for a Constitutional convention (though that has also not gone into circulation by the Bay Area Council, but only through an independent effort from Paul Currier). This obviously cannot be left to anyone in Sacramento - they will always find a convenient excuse for delay.

Rachel Maddow on Friedman Units

Rachel Maddow basically just namechecked Atrios on MSNBC and called the race a series of Friedman Units, where pundits and media types say "the next primary will be over!" and then nothing happens. This was the ultimate inconclusive result, the most annoying result, in Pennsylvania, 30-40 million to get a 10-point win with probably less than ten delegates in Clinton's favor. The media has a real desire to keep this thing going and hype up the "this is it!" nature of the next primary, and then nothing happens. I'm with Matt Yglesias - this has to end. There really isn't a whole lot more information that superdelegates are going to get. There's a saturation level that has been reached. We know the strengths and weaknesses of these candidates. We know what demographics they win against one another and what demos they lose. About half the Democrats in the country like Clinton and half like Obama. She's from the Northeast and he's from the Midwest, and they get a tilt in their favor in each of those regions. He can't knock her out because she's really good at campaigning, and she was swamped by him early because he's really good at campaigning. The level of competition is far higher here than it will be in the fall against John McCain, actually. So the superdelegates can make their choice. They could make it today.

And I agree with Stoller, we're going to be fine. Democrats forced a runoff, and came within a hair's breadth of winning, in a seat in the middle of Mississippi (MS-01) tonight, an R+10 seat. The "Clinton/Obama voters will vote for McCain if their guy doesn't win" polling is about as relevant in the middle of a hotly contested primary as a national Giuliani-Richardson head-to-head. There were high numbers for disafffected McCain supporters voting for Gore over Bush at the time. This is essentially a Parliamentary country among core party members, the kind who vote in primaries.

Obama lost the plot in the last several weeks, and Clinton capitalized with a fairly divisive campaign. He needs to get back on his feet in two favorable states. Obama has not lost a single state that shares a significant border with his home state of Illinois (Iowa, Wisconsin, Missouri). His speech tonight was pretty much a replay of his 2004 DNC keynote, and he's trying to return to the themes on which he won early. If he wins those two states it will be very significant. But the superdelegates need to come out from under the rocks where they're hiding and end this.

For What Noble Cause

Three years on from Cindy Sheehan, we're still asking the same questions.

And if I will, when Mr. Burton asks for a definition of what is failure, we get a litany of items. But when Mr. Ackerman asks what’s the definition of victory, we get little. Please tell us, general, what is winning?

This isn't a question that Petraeus or Crocker should have to answer. It's a question for George Bush and Dick Cheney and John McCain. It's the fundamental question that lies at the heart of this occupation. And the only answer they've had so far is to just wait six more months.



We never get a serious assessment of the consequences of staying, just wait and trust us and give us some more time. There is no strategy for the endgame in Iraq except for procrastination. And in the interim, Americans and Iraqis die while the policymakers in the White House muddle through.

We can talk about how the idea of progress in political reconciliation becomes less clear when you actually look at the laws passed and how they're implemented. We can talk about how the mess in Basra proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Iran's power was greatly strengthened by the war and occupation. And we can talk about how these ridiculous analogies and parallels mean nothing when you look at the facts. But the real question is very simple. Why are we in Iraq, and what does winning mean? This is what Barack Obama asked yesterday. It's what Hillary Clinton asked yesterday. It's what Robert Wexler asked today. Saying that Iraq is in the national interest is meaningless and not enough. Saying that Iraq can be a peaceful and democratic republic as a result of a surge that hasn't realized its goals is completely pie-in-the-sky. But there needs to be a direct answer. And the person who can provide one will be given the keys to the White House.

Just Six More Months, Please!

David Petraeus is bucking for a column in the New York Times.

We think we won’t know that we’ve reached a turning point until we’re six months past it. We have repeatedly said that there is no lights at the end of the tunnel that we’re seeing. We’re certainly not dancing in the end zone or anything like that.

As Andrew Bacevich said the other day, this was actually the real goal of the surge - to keep our troops stuck in Iraq for as long as possible, so the occupation could be passed off to the next President. The idea was to create enough security success in the short-term by flooding the zone with troops to offer a propaganda victory, to allow the neocon wags to sputter "We're winning!" and forestall the inevtiable drawdown. Now, death tolls are actually rising again, and the Shiite militia cease-fire could be ending. But Iraq has moved off the front page, and the endless shouts of victory from the right have dampened any effect of this new data. And the warhawks are essentially running interference for those like Bush and Petraeus who are simply trying to prolong matters.

As for St. Petraeus, he has his own reasons for setting this trap for the next President.

Indeed, Petraeus can basically write his next round of orders. But wherever he goes, his next important campaign probably won't be on any battlefield. It'll be political. For the past year, the GOP has laid the groundwork to enlist Petraeus as its standard-bearer in the fairly likely event that the party loses in November to Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. You read it here first. Plant your lawn signs now. Petraeus 2012: Surging to the White House.

We're also starting to hear about Petraeus being shifted over to NATO Commander, where he could serve under the next President, as they would be unlikely or even unable to uninstall the Hero of the Surge. Like that wouldn't be just a minefield, right? Remember when Colin Powell blocked Clinton's effort to allow gays in the military, deeply embarrassing the President at the beginning of his term? Powell doesn't have 1/10th the ambition of Petraeus.

This is just one of the dozens of landmines that Bush is going to put in place to make himself look better and to trip up his successor. He doesn't much care about the future of the country, only saving his own skin.

Ike Skelton's One Question

Paraphrase:

"It appears to this country lawyer that the leaders of Iraq have been sitting on their thumbs while our men and women have been dying for their security. The surge began in February and the political leaders have done nothing. Why should we expect the next six months to be any different?"

He could broaden that out to the security situation as well. It's the fundamental question. Why one more Friedman Unit, after all of these Friedman units have done practically nothing? Furthermore, if we're making all this progress throughout the country, why are deaths so high and why must we stay?

Crocker really can't answer that question, other than to say "the surge really started in June."

Here Are The Recommendations

Essentially, he's buying the John Warner strategy of letting a brigade go by Christmas, and then a reduction of the surge (which has to happen anyway) by next summer. We shouldn't make any other changes for another Friedman Unit (next March).

By the way, Warner's recommendation was met with howls from the Right; now that St. Petraeus is agreeing with it, do you expect a change in tone there?

Petraeus lets his slip show here. Defending the need to wait another six months, he claims that we couldn't have known what would have happened in Anbar Province, or in other tribal areas, or with repsect to Iran (another push for the drumbeat), just six months ago. That's pretty much because WE'RE NOT DRIVING IT. The "Anbar miracle" started without us, and we've had no impact on the political situation. We're similarly going to have no impact on the future of Iraq, whether we stay for 6 months or 60 years.

UPDATE: Also, Petraeus himself predicted the "Anbar Miracle" at his confirmation hearing, before the surge even began, suggesting that we had nothing to do with said "miracle," not will we be able to meaningfully impact it in the future.

UPDATE 2: The actual plan.



It's a graphical representation of Friedman Units.