President Obama Holds a Press Conference – YouTube.

Luke Russert is the youngest Capitol Hill House of Representatives correspondent and he got his job, covering the most powerful legislature in the world, right out of college with an intern’s experience. Many suspect it’s because his departed father was dean of NBC News and I am part of that many. His colleagues at MSNBC won’t say this, but in reality, no one of his experience gets hired for that job. No one. His offensive, wasteful and meandering question today was a wasted opportunity to get better insight from Speaker Pelosi on Democratic strategy toward budget talks or foreign policy or infrastructure (Sandy and beyond). We did get a better understanding of how ill suited Russert currently is for that job:

Luke Russert: “Some of your colleagues privately say that your staying on will prohibit the party from having younger leadership and will be..hurts the party in the long term…what’s your response?”*

Nancy Pelosi:“Some of my male colleagues came when they were 30…You have to take off of that 14 years for me because I was home raising a family”

I just highlighted two parts of the Minority Leader’s answer. Watch the whole exchange:

The best is Russert declines to accept that he just said some offensive garbage and to Pelosi’s answer and continues to filibuster her and insist on an answer to his question. Then he gets taken school.

Not even really actualized in Luke’s silver spoon fed brain before he opened his mouth and asked that question is that Nancy Pelosi is really good at her job. Really good. We know Tip O’Neill, we should also know Nancy Pelosi as someone who is literally changing the face of politics.

That job (Minority leader of the House of Representatives) includes: representing her district, negotiating compromises with the Republicans in the House of representatives, raise money for House Democrats and Democratic candidates, organizing the Democrats to oppose or support the platform through legislation, getting Democrats elected in districts around the country that represent the party platform and cultivating Democratic leadership (committee ranking members, house caucus chairs, leading legislative strategy among Democrats, official leadership positions and campaign committee leadership) from the House of Representatives to further those goals. All of that takes years of experience, knowledge of the legislative environment, a fine strategic mind, patience, allies and know how. In addition,leadership of your caucus is usually someone who is in a safe seat: one that won’t be gerrymandered away from them (because they have clout built from years of alliance building and deal making) and their delegation isn’t hostile to them. So from the deepest blue districts (preferably in blue states or in Clyburn’s case a blue area e.g. African American, non Cuban latino, Asian) with Democratic house legislators, that is where you’ll get candidates who make sense as leadership. All of Obama’s legislative successes have gone through Pelosi as majority leader or minority leader. Along with Harry Reid, that historic first term of legislative successes was made possible by their legislative prowess. She has been a winner. No reason she should step aside. McConnell and Boehner have steadily made their party older, whiter and more male. The Democratic party has continued to find young, diverse candidates. The record breaking 20 women in the US Senate, a lot of that started with Pelosi getting some of those women elected to the US House of Representatives. Let alone the additional women, black, latino and asian members of the House of Representatives.

To be short, this is the most diverse and probably youngest congress you’ve ever seen. Ever. But to Luke Russert it’s legitimate to ask Minority Leader Pelosi if should be asked to step aside so someone like Heath Shuler (who took his ball and went home) (or whoever confided with Russert) should be given a turn.*

Some new guidelines for Russert’s next presser:

• Women running for the House of Representatives don’t get the same opportunity as you baby Luke! So whereas you’ll have 30 years of experience reporting national news at 50, a female US rep may be 10 to 15 years in to her role. Pelosi first won her House seat at 47 years old in 1987.
• Anyone that whispers sweet politic nothings in your ear probably wants to launder their bullshit opinions through your stupid questions at a presser so they don’t have to take responsibility for being sexist, ageist or white male & priveleged. If you start any press conference question with “someone somewhere, privately told me”, start over and ask a different question

Note: Love the imagery of Nancy Pelosi’s boss a$$ platoon comprised of the House Democratic Women’s Working Group. It’s a small tight stage, but it’s the feeling that there isn’t enough room for them and they are going to make more.

*I would bet money that the Democratic colleague(s) Russert cites who privately say to him that Pelosi is too old and needs to step aside would be a male Blue Dog Democrat whose idea of compromise is capitulation to the Tea Party controlled Republican caucus on tax cuts and entitlement cuts so they can be re-elected in 2013.

“The President is a nigger” is something she feels everyone should read, but it’s not racist.

President Obama: “Im Really Proud of All of You.” – YouTube.

One style thing I like about this President is how he shows up at his campaign HQ, talking to kids mostly right out of or in college and he gives them this kind of treatment and respect. The effusive gratitude is from the President of the United States. This kind of treatment keeps people believing in the good fight. Something they won’t forget and won’t betray.

Meanwhile: Mitt Romney cut off his campaign staff’s expense cards in the middle of the night.

Gary Hart makes a great point:

How many non-African nations have elected a man or woman of African heritage to the presidency?

source: Reflections on Election Day 2012 | Matters of Principle.

Re-elected for actually doing liberal things for the American people. This is a big day. Props to the people who stood in line in FL until hours past the polls were closed, early voters in states all over the country and to those who refused to show their ID when they weren’t required to in PA. Voting is a right and it’s being threatened. We elected a President that will appoint a DOJ to protect that right. Anyway, we got to see some damn history again.

 

Showing disappointment is fine, but when you have on air talent openly doubting their own network’s factual reporting of election results, they shouldn’t be anywhere near your election coverage. I’m talking about Karl Rove:

They sent a host to go talk to the poll trolls in the back office at Fox News to just say we’re right, OH is for Obama.
and Maddow goes in:

Karl Rove got money, a lot of money, through Crossroads GPS to get Mitt Romney and down ticket Republicans elected. He is a consultant for Republican politicians and he was a dismal failure this election. Basically, Republicans looking to run for office in 2014 and 2016 should be able to point to the money given to Rove this election and say: why would we go through you?

Isn’t Mitt Romney running as an R from Massachusetts? His campaign office is in Boston, Massachusetts. Romney built Bain and his life out of Massachusetts. And it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as New Jersey and New York (or even Pennsylvania), but it is the state he’s coming from.

Sandy hit Massachusetts too. He, Scott Brown and any other Republican up for election in that state could have toured the damage to the Bay State and he could even have pitched in with his telegenic family. Romney, Brown, the Romney boys in their home state their wives and families touring some damage in Massachusetts would be seen in Ohio, Virginia and even FEMA friendly Florida and North Carolina by voters who respond to presidential candidates that seem that they believe in competent disaster recovery (even if he really doesn’t). Instead, Romney and his campaign executed a political move more befitting a fraternity social chair’s purview: “bring a canned good to the party. get a discount on the cover. this goes to the uh, food bank in New Jersey or Virginia or somwhere”. Then he told that awful story about cleaning up a high school football field after a rally. Srsly. Watch this awful b.s.

I remember once we had a football field at my high school. The field was covered with rubbish and paper goods from people who’d had a big celebration there at the game. And there was a group of us there assigned to clean it up. And I thought, ‘how are we going to clean up all the mess on this football field?’ There were just a few of us. And the person responsible for organizing the effort said, ‘Just line up along the yard lines. You go between the goal line and the 10-yard line, and the next person between the 10 and 20, and just walk down and do your lane. And if everybody cleans their lanes, we’ll get it done.’ And so today, we’re cleaning one lane if you will.

The Church of Latter Day Saints (aka Mormons) has this massive operation called LDS humanitarian services: basically, if an LDS church member needs help (food stuffs, cpr training, refugee acclimation, clothes, wheelchairs) they go talk to their a Bishop designated to hear their requests (and Mitt Romney was an LDS Bishop for 14 years and was the top clergyman in Boston) and they are sent a bunch of supplies or given cash from the Wal-Mart sized distribution warehouses. They also have “helping hands” where LDS members descend upon disasters and dig in. For all my problems with the LDS’s practices, these charities are impressive and he should have told a story about one of these experiences.

Instead he told this bullshit story about cleaning up streamers to people in Ohio (who know it’s easy to clean up a damned football field) and collected canned goods no one wants. Senator Obama, in June 2008 went to Quincy Illinois to help his constituents bag sand in preparation for the floods that summer. Candidate Obama then entreated people to come down to Quincy or a few other river towns and help bag sand themselves (by e-mail to his supporter list serve and through news outlets):

See, how hard was that?

Chris Christie is a governor. He’s a Republican state official in a Democratic state. He’s a skilled politician. He knows Mitt Romney was a governor of the Bay State. Massachusetts. I would bet Chris Christie loves New Jersey and wonders how a former governor couldn’t get his ass to Massachusetts to actually tour or help with actual storm relief. Just being a good person, a shrewd cynical political move, both or neither, it should be simple moral and/or political calculation for a guy who is or was a governor and is running for President. So maybe Chris Christie’s effusive praise of Barack Obama and dismissal of a Romney walk about is because Chris Christie saw the real Mitt Romney contrasted with a real natural disaster and decided that propping up Romney with a time consuming photo-op was way less important than helping his constituents repair their communities.

Note: I hate the faux concept of “being presidential”.

Note: Check the stagecraft. Air Force One in the back, on the leather jacket: Commander in Chief name tag.

After the Massachusetts Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in 2003, then-governor Romney thwarted efforts to change the birth certificate entry for “father” to “father or second parent,” requiring his lawyers to sign off on each individual birth certificate. Murray Waas reports on Romney’s “extraordinary effort” to this effect – at the expense of gay parents and, especially their children, denied by Romney himself from having two parents on their birth certificates.

source: Romney’s Relentless Hostility To Gay Parents – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast

Romney’s FEMA cuts..

It’s good to see a funded and responsive FEMA led by civil servants who are disaster recovery experts.

First, props to Larry King for jumping in and moderating, RT for broadcasting and all the journalists who participated. It’s important to have people lend their weight to this. And I post this so that everyone who says “we just need a third party” knows there are third, fourth, fifth and more parties.

My Rant on People who think third Parties:
When people, especially pundits but also fellow voters I talk to, angrily or urgently say there’s a need (not just room, but a need) for a third party, they mean not these third parties…they mean third parties that agree with them almost fully and will win the election. Continue reading

wtf.