The Whole Delivery

Every Republican strategist probably wants to scream at her at every second of their days : "We needed to have the press be our friend." "We want them to ask the questions we want to answer." Harry Reid is currently the luckiest man in America. For it helps what seemed to be a non-win election shaping out to be another November celebration, thanks to a resident All Star of.....

Joe Sestak has an interesting story that sure made the White House angry yesterday. Via TPM , the Philadelphia Inquirer has a story that Sestak was offered a job by the Obama Administration to get out of challenging Arlen Specter for his Senate seat, only to decline. Unsurprisingly, the White House declined this vehemently. But I clearly believe Sestak and his office on this one. The Administration didn't want to deal with the headache of Sestak running against their "Welcome back" buddy on the road to becoming the next conservative headache in this party if he gets re-elected. Even though the headache will be more Specter acting like a Lieberman, Nelson, Lincoln, Landrieu, Bayh any other conservadem whenever he wanted (unless they don't mind the headache of the corporatists in the Senate). Regardless of all of this, it is a little "meh" for Sestak to say this in the midst of the fire of this forthcoming primary. But deep in his heart, the retired Nav...

As you have all heard by now (or read by now) the news of Alabama Republican knucklehead Senator Richard Shelby providing another reason why the Senate is broken by holding "Up or Down" votes on President Obama nominees, "Thee" emptywheel points to the key reason why Shelby is being an annoying jerk as usual The key issue is that Shelby wants the Air Force to tweak an RFP for refueling tankers so that Airbus (partnered with Northrup Grumman) would win the bid again over Boeing. The contract had been awarded in 2008, but the GAO found that the Air Force had erred in calculating the award. After the Air Force wrote a new RFP ( TWD note: RFP means "Request For Protocol" ) in preparation to rebid the contract, Airbus calculated that it would not win the new bid, and started complaining. Now, Airbus is threatening to withdraw from the competition unless the specs in the RFP are revised. Essentially, then, Shelby’s threat is primarily about gaming this b...

The post-game town hall TV analysts obviously overlooked this important detail from today's Obama town hall in New Hampshire. Looking like the big scary Senate does will do it again : The only thing I would say about it is this. We may be able to separate these things out, and it-it's conceivable that that's where the Senate ends up, but the concept of incentivizing clean energy so that it's the cheaper more effective kind of energy is one that is proven to work and is actually a market-based approach." Now the House bill had some of its problems , but they got it through last summer. Some commenters over at TPM say that this indicates that the EPA should be the ones to handle this instead of regulate the polluters. And state governments will have to play a big part in that too. If the momentum from today is what leads to the end result of it being off, not only will the environmentalists be pissed off, and not only will the House Democrats be as well (ano...

Protecting your predecessor continues(AP Photo/Ron Edmonds, File) May you not spit out anything at your computer screen after you read this. One of the few pieces of good news yesterday has now turned so damn laughable, it should be given its own half hour show on HBO. But if you think the news means we're finally about to get the full story on the Valerie Plame leak, or the deliberations that took us to war in Iraq, think again. Many of the roughly 22 million emails secured through the deal likely won't be made public until 2022. And even the ones that can be released sooner won't see the light of day for around three years. The emails will be turned over to the National Archives, where they'll be treated, initially at least, as presidential records, Anne Weismann, a senior lawyer for CREW, one of the groups that had sued over the emails, explained to TPMmuckraker. That means that, under the Presidential Records Act , they won't be made public for five years. But...

And I wish Obama would say or either say you want the Senate bill coming to the floor to have a public option or not : "They're skeptical of opt out and are generally deferential to the Snowe strategy that involves the trigger," said one source close to negotiations between the Senate and the White House. "they're certainly not calming moderate's concerns on opt out." It all wouldn't be the case if they just showed courage and say "If they REALLY want it or not." It's great that you support it all , but do you really want the public option at day's end president Obama? Do you? And these sources, again, make the well respected great outlets like TPM look as knee-jerky as the idiot ones like Politico look the same. This source said this, so we'll report it! Knee-jerk reactions that would not be happening at all if Obama just came out and said whether he wants it or not. Update : Marc Ambinder gets a White House official on record ...

The daily case of Republican stupidity like no other stupidity Let this be an object lesson that if you want to mobilize against somebody, having a real opponent for them to face is a good thing. In the wake of Rep. Alan Grayson's (D-FL) attacks against the Republicans, money began flowing in from liberals who appreciated his no-holds-barred tirades against the opposition. The Republicans, however, didn't have a candidate yet, but instead set up a special fund to benefit the eventual nominee. And get the answer Kleefeld got from John Randall, the NRCC spokesman "Money is not going to determine the outcome of this race. There is a reason that even without a clear opponent Grayson's seat was moved to toss-up after his outrageous and distasteful outburst." That said, things should probably get better for them once they have a real challenger. For their sake, let's hope so. But Grayson sure won't back down. And neither will Republican stupidity.

And probably , the year Just before the Senate Finance Committee wrapped up for the long weekend, members debated one of Sen. Jon Kyl's (R-AZ) amendments, which would strike language defining which benefits employers are required to cover. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) argued that insurers must be required to cover basic maternity care. (In several states there are no such requirements.) "I don't need maternity care," Kyl said. "So requiring that on my insurance policy is something that I don't need and will make the policy more expensive." Stabenow interrupted: "I think your mom probably did." More important though is what happened to the amendment.......it thankfully failed The amendment was defeated, nine to 14. For a hissy fitter like Kyl , he sure would have looked even dumber providing us with another hissy fit after getting slapped down like he did there.

The legend of Iowa Republican Congressman Steve King continues to grow. The nutty legend that is. After bragging about how his best vote ever was against Katrina funding , and then coming back with his unbelievably memorable " same-sex marriage is a socialist concept " yesterday, King has outdone himself yet again today with this one . In a lengthy speech on the House floor today, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) declared that President Obama is "the star of ACORN, the lead, chief organizer." Railing against ACORN, King mentioned Obama's comment on Sunday that he hasn't paid much attention to the scandal. "Really, Mr. President?" King said, revealing the poster of Obama you see at left. "He's not interested in ACORN? He's ambivalent about it?" King asked. "Curious." King went on about Obama's involvement with the housing group, saying it was part of the "genesis" of Obama's political life. "He walks with th...

Kudos to Brian Beutler and the TPMDC staff As Senate leaders begin work on a Democrat-only health care bill, they're finding themselves confronted with an unexpected irony: Though the caucus has reached an uneasy consensus around a public option that's modeled in many ways after a private insurer, it may be necessary to make the public option more liberal, and thus, more politically radioactive, if it's to overcome a number of unique procedural hurdles. This is the needle Democrats may have to thread if they want a public option, and at the same time, want to bypass a Republican filibuster. And the key for them will be keeping conservative Democrats on board. "A very robust public option that scores significant savings would presumably be easy to justify doing through reconciliation," says a Senate Democratic aide. "But it is still being studied whether other, more moderate versions of a public option could pass parliamentary muster." It is a must read ...

TPM's current headline It's explains the whole thing of craziness that transpired at that Lebanon, Pennsylvania just this morning. And so does this thread at the Kos.

TPM's current headline has an important story about how the coal industry lobbyists are trying to affect their slimy ways in the climate change debate. The stupid has this headline...... .....Which links to a Republican. Who's not even known that well in general! Hahaha Fudge also put this crap up just to put it up What a contrast indeed.

They are just so sad.

Yup, another C-streeter outed for screwing around , when does it stop? I guess only when an FBI raid happens.

TPM's 100 Seconds On Jackson Coverage And the Jackson 5 cartoon!!!!!!! A lot of people don't know about it! Goodnight to all..........til the morning

Thank you for C-SPAN indeed. Well, O'Lielly can you know what on this. I'll let you guess of course.

Lots of stuff is going on, so the reason for a third open third of the day: But it's a good one. Be back in a few.

Mr. Marshall, continue on with your bad self.

FDL blogmistress and TPMCreator, this ad gets in the way sometimes.