Stuff to Read

The GOP is trying to take itself back from the Koch Brothers.

Interviews with more than three dozen people, including top decision-makers in both camps, have revealed that the Kochs’ i360 platform for managing voter contacts — which is viewed by many as a superior, easier-to-use interface than what’s on offer from the RNC — is becoming increasingly popular among Republican campaigns.

The RNC is now openly arguing, however, that the Kochs’ political operation is trying to control the Republican Party’s master voter file, and to gain influence over — some even say control of — the GOP.

“I think it’s very dangerous and wrong to allow a group of very strong, well-financed individuals who have no accountability to anyone to have control over who gets access to the data when, why and how,” said Katie Walsh, the RNC’s chief of staff. …

The fight between the RNC’s chairman and the political operatives affiliated with Charles and David Koch over who controls the rich treasury of data on likely Republican voters has raised fundamental questions about what role the party’s central committee — even under the best management — can hope to play in the age of super-PACs. And it raises an even more fundamental question of how you define a political party.

The Kochs haven’t just purchased some politicians; they are buying the entire party.

But I can’t say I’m all that happy about the Democrats, either. We’re being told the candidate will be Hillary Clinton, who to me is a big meh. Certainly I will vote for her if she’s the nominee, because the alternative will be worse. She’s good on some domestic issues, especially women’s issues. But the hearts of the Dem base are with people like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, not Hillary Clinton, and conventional wisdom says Sanders can’t be elected, and Warren isn’t running.

See also Bernie Sanders masterfully trolls the GOP: 2016 hopeful unveils a real “family values” agenda .

To be reminded of what Republicans would do to America if they had unchecked power, see Kansas Reduced to Rubble.

Mostly for fun, and also to generate more traffic, I put together a slide show of gorgeous photographs of Buddhist festivals. Some of them may surprise you.

Let’s talk about mysterious things that never come to light. UFOs. Bigfoot. The Loch Ness Monster.

The Republican Health Care Plan.

Having failed for years to generate a health care plan, now the Republicans are saying they have one but that it’s a secret. Let me guess — they’re planning to bomb Cambodia?

Update: One more — How Scott Walker is killing the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

24 thoughts on “Stuff to Read

  1. If Chuck and Dave take over the party, will its members have to change their moniker from “Republicans” to “Kochheads”?

  2. “who have no accountability to anyone to have control over who gets access to the data when, why and how,” said Katie Walsh, the RNC’s chief of staff. …”

    Oh once the Koch’s offer her a job she’ll get right on board. This whole republican show is nothing more than money laundering wing-nut welfare. Thanks to the supreme’s they have billions to play with so it’s gonna take a while. In the meantime how about some music now?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTu4cXW9H_Q

  3. I find the third picture 3. Magha Puja, Thailand, frightening. Talk about crowd control.

  4. “conventional wisdom says Sanders can’t be elected…”

    Conventional wisdom said a black man could not be elected president, just 8 years ago. Ten years ago it was virtually gospel. That doesn’t mean I’m putting any money on Berine, though in a year or so, I may wish I had when the odds were long.

  5. Koch Brother’s POV:
    Ok, Republicans, despite your protestations, we know what you are.
    Now, we’re just haggling over the price.

  6. I had read about the scarlet letter law elsewhere and it makes me sick to my stomach. They don’t want abortion, they want adoption but they’ve got to shame the woman in the process. And all in the pretext of protecting the father. Disgusting!!!!

  7. I’m underwhelmed by Clinton too, but I also think there’s way too much emphasis on who the next president is going to be. Not that it isn’t important, but there’s also the question of what the next Congress is going to be like. If we get, say, a Democratic president, a Democratic Senate, and a Republican House, it’s just going to mean more obstruction.
    But supposing the Democrats by some miracle could take the House, and win a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, would we rather have Elizabeth Warren in the White House or in the Senate? It seems to me that we’ve all gotten so used to the do-nothing Congress that we don’t even think about what Elizabeth Warren could accomplish if she could actually pass some bills into law.
    Of course a lot of people assume that the Republicans will still hold the House no matter what, because gerrymandering and Citizens United and they always win because they’re the Republicans. But if that’s your attitude, you might as well give up and go home. As long as they control they House they will continue to throttle the government.

  8. Here’s a weird story:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/12/naacp-rachel-dolezal-faked-being-black_n_7568856.html

    I totally understand why many African Americans are outraged at this woman, but I get the impression that, psychologically, she first convinced herself of her “black identity.” So… question: can a person transition to a different race, like they can with gender? In my mind, I keep coming back to parallels between Rachel Dolezal and Caitlyn Jenner. Perhaps I am way off base in doing so? Discuss.

  9. Well, Clarence Thomas could change his name to Osborne White and I wouldn’t question it if his actions and attitudes were any indication of a race transition. But as far a gender goes, he’s all male. His actions prove that.

  10. I read Gulag’s link and I also read this one:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/12/rachel-dolezal-caitlyn-jenner_n_7569160.html

    but essentially both pieces raise more questions in my mind than they answer. For instance, in Steve M’s piece there is this paragraph:

    But black people’s problems in this society are external — if you’re black, what you’re dealing with is how a majority-white culture treats you based on skin color.

    Which is, also, exactly the situation for women in our still-male-dominated culture, so… huh?

    In the HuffPo piece, the author refers to Dolezal’s behavior as “delusion,” which was my reaction at first, as well. I wondered if there is a silent history of whites passing as black, out of a sincere desire to be black, and if such behavior is listed in textbooks somewhere a psychological disorder. Then, after a bit of reflection, it occurred to me that 40 or 50 years ago, compassionate people would have assigned psychological disorders to Caitlyn Jenner’s experience.

    There is an element of conscious and unnecessary deception in Dolezal’s case (well-articulated in the HuffPo piece) that really infurates people, and Steve M. suggests that ignorami of the Huckabee ilk are making Dolezal/Jenner comparisons purely to denigrate one or both according to their personal hatred. So it’s a touchy subject, but so far I don’t see that anyone has thought about it very deeply.

    Bottom line, I don’t want to see arguments of “It’s harder to be black!” versus “It’s harder to be a woman!” which is what both anti-comparison pieces seem to boil down to, and what the ignorami would love to see.

  11. joan: if there were medical procedures to permanently darken skin, then racial reassignment would be a thing. I foresee a future in which genetic racial reassignment will be a thing (your kids have a skin color of your choice), which people will freak out about, revealingly.

    The real lesson, I think, is that identity is an illusion, and so therefore are identity politics. No doubt maha has a Buddhist take on this.

  12. Maybe what I have to say is relevant and maybe not. The Native Americans always described themselves as caretakers of the earth. What is not widely known is that they knew of the other races somehow and stated that the yellow race is caretakers of the wind (or breath) the white race caretakers of fire and the black race caretakers of water. With this view, each race is more than just the color of the skin. If we can look at it metaphysically, we can see that the white race (fire) conquered the red race (earth), overran and destroyed much of the earth of this continent.They wanted to control nature so they cut down trees and erected concrete and decided they didn’t want to deal with the animals so prevalent so they either killed them off or drove them further into the wilderness. Now we have an imbalance and I will leave it to y’all to imagine what has to happen to restore balance.

  13. If, as Dickens is supposed to have said, “The law is an ass,” then “Silent Cal” Thomas is the asses hole. 😉

    With Rehnquist as the Chief Justice, and a conservative majority, I knew what the SC would decide when they first decided to take that case.

  14. “But supposing the Democrats by some miracle could take the House, and win a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, would we rather have Elizabeth Warren in the White House or in the Senate?”

    Man, we’ve really gone off the deep end with the “Congress matters” pushback if we’re seriously asking questions like this.

    ” We’re being told the candidate will be Hillary Clinton, who to me is a big meh. Certainly I will vote for her if she’s the nominee, because the alternative will be worse. She’s good on some domestic issues, especially women’s issues. But the hearts of the Dem base are with people like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, not Hillary Clinton, and conventional wisdom says Sanders can’t be elected, and Warren isn’t running.”

    Hillary Clinton is consistently polling at around 60% among likely Democratic primary voters. How exactly do you end up defining the small number of Democrats supporting Sanders as “the base” of the party

    • //Hillary Clinton is consistently polling at around 60% among likely Democratic primary voters. How exactly do you end up defining the small number of Democrats supporting Sanders as “the base” of the party//

      Polls right now don’t mean squat. Clinton has a huge advantage in name recognition, so she’s going to run away with people who tend to vote Democratic but who aren’t really focused on issues or know that much about Sanders (or Liz Warren or Martin O’Malley, for that matter). Progressive / Dem activists and politics junkies are lukewarm about Clinton, IMO, but will vote for her if she’s the nominee. Their hearts are with the Warren/Sanders faction of the party, and I expect the race for the nomination to tighten up once there are debates and the unfocused start to focus. The odds are that Clinton will be the nominee, but I’m not entirely persuaded she’s as electable in the general as she’s being marketed to be.

      See article from about a year ago, Dem base: Fine with Hillary Clinton, pining for Elizabeth Warren. Progressive/liberal activists see Clinton has too centrist, too corporatist, too cautious. However, the good news appears to be that she’s worried enough about being clobbered during the debates she may be moving more to the left than she had planned to move.

  15. “Polls right now don’t mean squat. Clinton has a huge advantage in name recognition, so she’s going to run away with people who tend to vote Democratic but who aren’t really focused on issues or know that much about Sanders (or Liz Warren or Martin O’Malley, for that matter).”

    Generally this is true, but in Clinton’s case she has historically strong numbers for a non-incumbent. In addition, a) she was generally polling around 40% back in 2008, with the same levels of name recognition and sense that she was the early frontrunner, b) given that “undecided” is an option in these polls, she’s not just winning by default. She’s getting affirmative support from some 60% of the party’s likely primary voters.

    “See article from about a year ago, Dem base: Fine with Hillary Clinton, pining for Elizabeth Warren. Progressive/liberal activists see Clinton has too centrist, too corporatist, too cautious. ”

    Well yes, this is the rub: “Progressive/liberal activists” who want Warren to run because they don’t particularly want to nominate Hillary are a clear minority of Democratic voters right now. Calling them “the base” doesn’t give them any particularly special value, and is not even true on the merits. And even if they were, the Netroots anecdotes don’t seem to have much value as data, as Clinton has favorable ratings over 80% amongst self-identified “very liberal” voters according to PPP.

    http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPP_Release_National_51315.pdf

  16. Are you equating the legitimacy of the Koch’s buying the Republican Party apparatus and a large number of voters professing support for a particular candidate?

    • //Are you equating the legitimacy of the Koch’s buying the Republican Party apparatus and a large number of voters professing support for a particular candidate?//

      No. Are you being paid by the Hillary Clinton organization to troll bloggers who are not on board? BTW, I’ve met HRC a couple of times and thought she was charming; I have no personal animus toward her, and my comment really isn’t about the best candidate. It’s a comment that says what progressive/liberal voters really want and what the Democratic Party seems able to deliver are two different things.

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