Late-In-The-Game Czar Pushback

I'm happy to see some Administration pushback on the bogus czar issue. Anita Dunn penned this blog post debunking some of the Beck-inspired myths about "czars," which is basically a title for an adviser to the White House. This is a media creation, encouraged by past Presidencies who want to be seen as proactive, to label someone with oversight over a particular issue a "czar" to prove attentiveness. The czars have almost always been ineffectual, the most famous example being the head of the ONDCP, or "drug czar". I'd prefer the media didn't use the term for hires who are coordinating various policies, in the same manner as has been done for many, many years.

Still, it's good to see this kind of spirit:

But of course, it’s really the hypocrisy here that is noteworthy. Just earlier today, Darrell Issa, a Republican from California and one of the leaders in calling for an investigation into the Obama Administration’s use of "czars", had to admit to Fox News that he had never raised any objections to the Bush Administration’s use of "czars". Many of these members who now decry the practice have called on Presidents in the past to appoint "czars" to coordinate activities within the government to address immediate challenges. What is clear is that all of this energy going into these attacks could be used to have a constructive conversation about bringing this country together to address our challenges moving forward – and it doesn’t take a "czar" to bring that about! Just some folks willing to act in good faith [...]

Many of the same critics who are decrying these roles have applauded or even pushed for them in the past. Sen. Robert Bennett has criticized czars as "undermining the Constitution," but reportedly prodded President Clinton to appoint a Y2K Czar. In a 1999 CNN appearance, Sen. Bennett said "I think John Koskinen has been superb. I wrote the president six months before John was appointed, recommending that he appoint a Y2K czar." At a 1999 National Press Club luncheon, Bennett told reporters the Koskinen was "there to help, prod, give information, and make analyses and reports" and said he spoke with the czar to ensure "we maintain the kind of bipartisan and across-the-government sort of communication that this never becomes a political issue."

Senator Lamar Alexander has also criticized President Obama’s "czars," calling them "an affront to the Constitution." But during remarks delivered on the Senate floor in 2003, Sen. Alexander said "I would welcome" President Bush’s "manufacturing job czar." That same day in the Senate, he also expressed support for President Bush’s AIDS czar Randall Tobias.

Robert Gibbs followed up on this in the White House briefing room today, even noting that the aforementioned Randall Tobias showed up on the D.C. madam's list, to little comment from the Republican side of the aisle.

All this is fine, but the Beck/Fox News crowd has been riling up their folks about czars for months now. One czar, Van Jones, was already picked off and forced to resign. Uber-wingnut Jack Kingston has a bill with 99 co-sponsors to cut off funding for advisers unconfirmed by the Senate. "Czar" is part of the teabagger lexicon (go about 6:22 in):



The time to go on the offense against this was about four months ago. There is no such thing as "not giving the claims oxygen" by responding. This is a fight, and the opponents don't play fair. The Administration is finally coming around to getting in the arena, but it's way late in the game.

Poor People Can Just Go To Free Clinics

I'm sure that the right thinks there's no need for health care reform because the system works great right now. If you get sick you go to the emergency room, and Bob's your uncle. Here's GoOPer Jack Kingston saying basically that. And here's Connecticut for Lieberman's own Joe Lieberman saying how great the current system working, meaning there's no need for a public option.

On Planet Reality, the only reason that the American system doesn't look like a total nightmare, I mean a people-dying-in-the-streets nightmare, is because of numerous local efforts to keep things afloat. The "just go to the ER" approach adds tens of billions to health care costs. But even that isn't being used to the extent it could, because of the existence of free community clinics. Which will cease to exist before long, on the current trajectory.

The Mission of Mercy, a group of traveling clinics that circulate through towns in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Texas and Arizona, is one of more than 1,200 free clinics across the nation that are feeling the effects of the economic downturn.

Their patient lists are growing as Americans lose their jobs and their health insurance, but as demand grows with rising unemployment, their donations are dwindling. This year, Mission of Mercy has $350,000 less than it did last year; it takes no government funds for its services.

"People are so afraid to give now, because they're thinking they could lose their job next," said Linda Ryan, the executive director of Mission of Mercy. "We're squished because we have more people in need; we need to grow now more than ever — who knows what will happen with health care?"

Over the past year, free clinics across the country have seen a 20 percent decrease in donations and a 40 percent to 50 percent increase in patients, said Nicole D. Lamoureux, the executive director of the National Association of Free Clinics. Last year, the clinics the association represents — which largely have been excluded from the health care debate — treated 4 million people. This year, Lamoureux expects, they'll serve some 8 million, 83 percent of whom come from homes in which at least one person works full time.

"Quite frankly, the need is so great at some point in time we'll hit a place where we have to say we need to start cutting," Lamoureux said. "We'd like to be a part of those discussions (on health care.) We really need to make sure that this legislation gives the people we serve access to quality health care."

The New York Times did a good story on one of these clinics, in Milwaukee, which is doing its best but cannot hope to survive given the increase in demand.

The current system forces many of the nation's poor, even people who have jobs, EVEN PEOPLE WHO HAVE COVERAGE through Medicaid or Medicare, to visit these community clinics, which just don't have the funds to survive. There are often no other options for primary care. These clinics are the last line of defense and they're failing. They're staffed by good people who selflessly seek to protect and care for everyone regardless of ability to pay. They won't exist in a decade.

And then everyone will TRULY see the consequences of a for-profit health care system, if no reform is accomplished.

Jack Kingston Lapel Pin Watch

It's a tough matchup with Patrick McHenry, but Jack Kingston can be credibly said to be the biggest dumbfuck in Congress. For some reason he's also a regular on Bill Maher's show, and his most recent appearance has given us hours of hysterical laughter that will define him for the rest of his career.

See, he's all bent out of shape because Barack Obama refuses to wear an American flag lapel pin because it's a completely empty gesture devoid of meaning. To Kingston the role of Congress is to wear the proper pins and to make symbolic displays so everyone understands you're acting like a patriot. And Kingston then went on Dan Abrams' show to further the point. But he wasn't wearing a lapel pin on the show, while he was lambasting Obama for... not wearing a lapel pin. He didn't see the irony in this.

Now some activists in Georgia who are working for his Democratic opponent in the upcoming election are on a full-on lapel pin watch.



This is going to be a fun year once this primary is dispensed with.

Tweety Loses It

Chris Matthews went off on right-wing Rep. Jack Kingston on Hardball today. Crooks and Liars has the video. I've been confronted with this particularly ludicrous talking point, that we were in South Korea and Germany for 60 years, so what's wrong with being in Iraq a little while? The difference is that those weren't hot shooting wars where multiple bomb attacks kill dozens, and photographers have to be banned from violent areas lest they actually report on what's happening. Matthews unloaded on Kingston:

Matthews: Will the people of Georgia support ten more years of American involvement, military involvement in Iraq?

Kingston: Well, people know we're still in Germany and in South Korea…

Matthews: Yea, but..no no no no no. I won't let you get away with that. That's not a fair comparison. We do not have a war in South Korea. There's no German that's fired on an American since 1945. That's not a fair comparison…That is not an acceptable argument! These comparisons to previous eras…it's lazy thinking, Congressman. It's the kind of propaganda that does not help this country understand the situation. You stepped into a dishonest comparison. Some people come on this show over and over again saying things that-JUST-aren't-true.

The only thing I disagree with there are the words "some people."

And as long as we're chronicling talking-head shouting matches, I just saw Sean Hannity go after Christopher Hitchens because Hitch refused to say that he was sorry for Jerry Falwell and his family. I don't understand why we make a fetish out of that "I'm sorry for his family" phrase, even if it is to be directed at someone as contemptible and hateful as Jerry Falwell. Steve Benen has the goods on who this man really was. I wonder, would he have been sorry for, say, Isaac Mizrahi's family? Harvey Firestein? Matthew Shepard? Maybe in words, but certainly not in deed. So what do the words really matter? Also, NOBODY needs a lesson in courtesy from Sean "some things are worth dying for, like keeping Nancy Pelosi out of the Speaker's chair" Hannity.