It's safe to say that former President Reagan has actually been gone for quite some time. My mother died of Alzheimer's last year, but in truth the person she was had been gone for a long time before. The ex-President lived a full life. I didn't think much of his presidency, but it retrospect it was brilliant compared to the Bonzo in the White House now.

 

That being said, I feel worse about the horse.

 

Update:  Every Picture Tells a Story

 

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Management. The process of getting activities done efficiently with and though others. Management functions include planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. Management roles include interpersonal, informational, and decisional (negotiators) roles.

Bruce Buchanan, a University of Texas government professor who has studied Bush throughout his political career, said the administration's slow response to indications of trouble in military prisons reflects "the tendency for everybody to take signals from the president that this is what we need to do and we're not going to let irritants of a lesser nature divert us from our course." [Mike Allen, Washington Post, June 2, 2004]

Aides say the President gets “hung up on minor details,” micromanaging to the extreme while ignoring the bigger picture. He will spend hours personally reviewing and approving every attack ad against his Democratic opponent and then kiss off a meeting on economic issues.

Election campaigning is something he understands, and power is what he lives for. I have no doubt he is micromanaging his campaign to death. That's his style.

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I'll say it, at risk of being branded a sexist: there aren't as many women bloggers becuase there aren't as many young, computer-savvy women who are interested in politics.

Not just a sexist, my dear, but an ageist as well. I am slightly past the point that I can get away with "young." I realized when the AARP card showed up in the mail that it was time to admit to being "middle age." Also, the fact that you are reading this shows you don't have to be all that computer savvy to run a blog.

This same fellow goes on:

Women, even those who stay home all day and have more free time, generally watch the Today show instead of Chirs Matthews or Bill O'Reilly.

Proof of superior intelligence, say I. Although I prefer Animal Planet and reruns of Law and Order.

Female subscribers to Newsweek, the Wall Street Journal, the American Spectator, and the Washington Monthly are undoubtedly vastly outnumbered by male subscribers.

Does the commenter know this for sure, or is he speculating? And if a subscription is in a man's name, does that mean his wife isn't reading the magazine, too? 

Given this, is there any surprise that there aren't as many female political bloggers? I don't think so.

And if there were, would a D***head like this guy read them?

A commenter responds to another commenter:

SSJPabs: Here's a tip for you - most women bloggers could care less whether some random stranger on the 'net think we're hot and/or have a "nice rack".

Yeah, some of us already know we are hot.  A little overripe, I admit, but still hot.

This writer asks a truly vexing question,

There is a question, I think, as to why none of the exceptional women bloggers mentioned here rank very high on the traffic standings or ever get mentioned in mainstream journalism reviews of the blogging phenomenon. Is it a self-fulfilling prophecy - blogreaders don't think there are good women bloggers out there, so don't seek them out, so don't increase their traffic, etc. etc?

Or is it really a testosterone-fueled conspiracy to dominate the next generation of political discourse? ;)

Seems to me that what makes a really outstanding politics blog is (a) insight into issues, and (b) frequency of updating.

Most of the bloggers I turn to for insight are guys -- Josh Marshall, Billmon, Steve at No More Mister Nice Blog, the abovementioned Kevin Drum, etc. I do not think women are less insightful than men (if anything, the reverse is true). However, men may be more insightful about what's going on with other men.

And highest political power in the U.S. is a male-dominated place that is foreign to many women, including me. I tend to write less about political power than about political psychology--the underlying pathologies that make people believe and act as they do. I have some insight into people, I think, but I have little personal acquaintance with power.

As far as frequency goes -- as one commenter pointed out, if Kos were a new mother instead of a new father, he wouldn't be blogging now. And don't forget the Second Shift.

Also, for reasons that are partly social conditioning and partly physiological, men and women generally see the world from slightly different angles. For this reason, it is probably the case that male bloggers resonate better with other male bloggers, so that male bloggers are more likely to admire and promote other male bloggers. Also, as another commentor writes,

Too often, our voices are dismissed if we are identifiable as women.

I think there's some truth to that, even among liberal guys who are respectful of women. It's a subconscious thing. In a similar manner, issues identified as "women's issues" such as child care, education, and reproductive health are not always seen as political, but social, issues.

And finally, this charming fellow writes,

HAHAHA That's the end of feminism. Let's be honest. The blogosphere is blind. You can pretend to be anybody you like. If women can not make it on the blogosphere it is because the [sic] don't have the capacities. Period! Wonkette is pretty good because she went the gossip tooth way. Maybe that's all women can do.

Now, I would very much like to have a face-to-face discussion with this fellow concerning gender capabilities, but not right away. I want about six months of intensive weight training first, and then I could probably take him on. Even if I am an old lady.

 

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Whatever the real reason, a team player is now a free agent, and those left on the bench must be nervous about that. All presidents learn quickly that spy chiefs are dangerous creatures if let loose or treated harshly. John F. Kennedy was held in constant check by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover's knowledge of his sexual peccadilloes. Lyndon B. Johnson kept Hoover on, telling a friend, "I'd rather have him inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in." No FBI or CIA director has wielded his leverage as brashly as Hoover did; still, the shrewd ones keep the crowbar in the closet, and Tenet couldn't have lasted as long as he did—through the Clinton and Bush presidencies—if he weren't shrewd.

So, what would happen if the 9/11 commission or any of the other boards of inquiry dealing with the various intelligence scandals were to re-call Private Citizen Tenet to testify? Would he suddenly remember meetings and conversations that had earlier slipped his mind? Years ago, Tenet worked as a staff member for Sen. John Heinz, whose widow is now married to John Kerry. Do they keep in touch? (Just asking.)

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Another report expected next month from the national commission investigating the September 11 attacks is expected to roundly criticize the agency’s failure to develop sources inside Al Qaeda and piece together evidence—including information in its files on two of the hijackers—that might have helped uncover the plot.

The question regarding Tenet is, which fall is he taking? Is it the

a)  “I screwed up on 9/11” fall?

b)  "I made up that stuff about WMD” fall?

c)  “I also made up that stuff about Iraq and Al-Qaida” fall?

d)  “And yeah, that stuff about the nukes, I made that up, too” fall?

e)  “I shoulda taken a look at that “State of the Union” thingy” fall?

f)  “Ahmad Chalabi is a bery, bery, good friend of mine” fall?

g)  “And so is Robert Novak” fall?

h)  “And what ever did happen to that bin Laden fellow?” fall?

i)  “Um, we could probably get some better info out of those prisoners if we roughed ‘em up a bit” fall?

j)  And don’t forget, the "We’re wasting billions on a useless star wars program while ignoring homeland security for our nuclear and chemical plants” fall.

We have only time constraints to keep us from going through the entire alphabet.

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The voters of the conservative base have no use for ''no child left behind,'' but what acutely torments these voters is the prescription drug bill. Republicans fear the plan will take away benefits they have now and replace them with something they don't want.

It was common for Republican congressmen during this recess to be approached by a voter asking: Isn't it true that if we had John Kerry as president and a Republican majority in Congress opposing him, we never would have had this prescription drug bill? The implication is that conservatives in Congress could be real conservatives with an ineffective Democrat in the White House.

Actually, Bush's defeat more likely would trigger an enormous internal explosion inside the Republican Party between forces temporarily held together in an effort to elect a president. Nor are Republicans still confident that in the wake of Bush's defeat, they would hold the Senate or even the House.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) said she spent the recess meeting seniors who were “volcanic” about the program, which the Senate approved in November and the GOP expected to prove a big winner.

Mikulski said seniors “feel like day traders and they’re ready to get on a bus and go to Canada” where prescription drugs are cheaper.

Medicare's chief actuary, Richard S. Foster, recalls sharing figures on the drug plan with his former boss, Thomas Scully, Medicare's then-administrator. Last November, Foster's numbers far exceeded the $395 billion, ten-year cost at which the Congressional Budget Office appraised the drug bill. Foster says Scully replied: "We can't let that get out."

Scully's alleged comment epitomized the Bush administration's evident desire to keep Congress and taxpayers ignorant of figures that showed this already controversial legislation might cost far more than CBO's $395 billion valuation that the administration publicly touted. Fiscally responsible members of Congress, mainly Republicans, had little interest in a brand-new entitlement with a price tag higher than the $400 billion reserved for it in last year's federal budget.

On June 1 Medicare recipients could begin using a prescription drug discount card that could save them as much as 15 to 20 percent on drugs costs. Not as many seniors have signed up for this card as anticipated, possibly because the seniors are confused. It may be that by November seniors will be less confused and not so angry about Medicare. But don't count on it; it's still cheaper to smuggle drugs from Canada.

Also,

Tenet Resigns

Can't wait to hear the dish on this!

Timothy Noah: Did the Pretzel Cause Brain Damage?

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The White House meeting in late April opened with the presentation of a seven-page, single-spaced memo titled "Marginalizing Chalabi." Drafted by the National Security Council (NSC), the document detailed three options for sidelining the controversial Iraqi political figure Ahmad Chalabi — methods ranging from gently pushing him offstage to cutting off U.S. funds for his intelligence-gathering operation. Once a Pentagon favorite to lead Iraq, Chalabi had been criticizing Washington for dragging out the transfer of power to Iraqis. It was time for Chalabi to go.

 

The April memo marked the beginning of the White House's strategy to cut its ties to Chalabi — a campaign that reached its climax late last month when Iraqi police, backed by U.S. forces, raided the former exile's house and office in Baghdad. But that move hardly came out of the blue. New details of the relationship between the U.S. and Chalabi, provided to TIME by senior Administration and intelligence officials, reveal that after a decade of lobbying Washington, Chalabi began to lose his footing early this year after he ran afoul of President Bush and L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator in Iraq. ...

...The beginning of the end came in February when Chalabi was quoted in a London Daily Telegraph article saying that even if the intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons programs that Chalabi passed to the U.S. before the war was faulty, it was "not important," compared to the end result of toppling Saddam. "We were heroes in error," he said in the article. Chalabi insists he was misquoted, but the damage was done. "That set the President off," a senior Administration official told TIME. The general feeling among top officials was "We gotta do something about this guy." [Brian Bennett and Michael Weisskopf, Time, June 7, 2004, issue; emphasis added]

Providing false intelligence and ripping off the U.S. generally is one thing, but you don't dare piss off the Shrub.

Joel Mowbray, a columnist at Townhall who must not have gotten the White House memo, still thinks Chalabi is a swell guy who is being persecuted by those weenies in the State Department. If Time is right, however, Chalabi is actually being persecuted by those weenies in the White House. Whatever. Mowbray has a point, which is that journalists should not be taking the information the feds are giving it at face value.

The ever savvy Buzzflash is calling for regime change at the New York Times. Buzzflash points out,

... the NYT posted an editor's note acknowledging the highly flawed reporting only after the White House, for reasons still not fully clear, decided to brand Chalabi, their erstwhile puppet, as a man who betrayed them. Whether this charge is true or not – or whether it is just a way that the Bush Cartel is setting Chalabi up to appear not to be a puppet of the White House or whether it is all just Neo-Con/CIA infighting – is irrelevant as far as the NYT admission of "flawed" journalistic standards.

In another interesting twist, Editor and Publisher reports that a niece of Chalabi's worked for the New York Times as their office manager in Kuwait for five months in 2003.

At least the Times still has a great op ed page ... well, except for David Brooks, who's an idiot, and William Safire, who today brings forth a hard-hitting demand to abolish the penny. Paul Krugman alone more than makes up for the minuses.

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Despite President Bush's sagging approval ratings at a national level, strategists have long maintained he would make up the difference by working the Electoral College system in targeted battleground states -- the 18 or fewer states where the 2004 presidential race is likely to be decided.

 

But in recent weeks, Bush has slipped in key polls in individual states, including Ohio and Pennsylvania. That has forced party stalwarts to acknowledge a longstanding truism of presidential politics: It is nearly impossible to patch together the 270 electoral votes needed to win without building broad support nationwide, despite the mathematical quirks of the Electoral College system.

Republicans, who have touted the Bush/Cheney campaign as assembling the greatest grass-roots political operation in history, with an e-mail list of 6 million supporters and an intricate network of volunteers, acknowledge its limits.

You can have the best ground game in history," said Bill McInturff, the Republican pollster, "but a fabulous ground game doesn't make up for the fact you're down 5 points."

Kerry makes bid to sway Virginia for Democrats. A5

After Bush's razor-thin victory four years ago, Republicans put extensive time and money into building a grass-roots machine that could help sew up swing states, confident that tactical maneuvers -- such as working with religious groups to boost the turnout among conservative Christians, targeting specific groups such as Cuban-Americans in South Florida, and registering new voters -- would put Bush over the top in a closely divided electorate.

Grass roots PLURAL NOUN: (used with a sing. or pl. verb) 1. People or society at a local level rather than at the center of major political activity. Often used with the. 2. The groundwork or source of something.

If the "machine" is organized by the national party, how can it be "grass roots"? Sounds more like the GOP's been putting down sod.

Also in today's Boston Globe, Thomas Oliphant writes that Kerry's proposed Mideast policy is miles away from Bush's. Also, don't miss "Making Hay Out of Straw Men" by Dana Milbank in today's Washington Post.

The Responsible Warrior 

The Saudis Who Got Away

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Presidential campaigns had drifted out of alignment with most Americans. The ritual no longer seemed like something the country did for itself every four years, but what a professional cadre did, and sold back to the country as “politics.” ...

What Theodore White in 1960 called the “making of the President,” and Joe McGinnis in 1968 called the “selling of the President” had become the making and selling of a public narrative about politics, the outstanding feature of which was its “remoteness from the actual life of the country," as Joan Didion wrote.

Certainly you could volunteer. You could send money, lots of it. You could watch the debates and read news reports of the campaign. You could take in the pundits at play. You could chart the horse race. You could view the ads and critique them like the pros did.

But could you participate as the rightful owners of politics, in a campaign that requested your talents, needed your energies, tapped some of your ideas, and even gave you a sense of voice? Savvy observers, and the insiders they chronicled, had taken that possibility—robust participation by ordinary Americans--out of the script, even as they spoke nonstop of “grassroots” this, and “populist” that.

And here's the clincher:

Well before the chaos in Florida, the contest between Al Gore and George W. Bush had reached one of its logical ends— ideological dead center, where two almost identical campaigns, reading from the same data about the same issues, shouting at the same undecided voters in the same toss up-states, tried to ride slightly different catchwords into the White House.

...conventional wisdom says that Dems should campaign for voters who have voted in the past. This means Democratic candidates must package themselves to be attractive to "swing" voters who may have gone for Bush last time. This means moving to the right.

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