Ask The Field (+ Live Commentary on the President's Speech to Congress)

But what about the blog junkies like myself who rely on your sane commentary to get cut through the cable chatter?   You've definitely been missed Al!    I understand your point however that you shouldn't write just to fill up space.    I'm looking forward to your reaction to President Obama's address.

Hi Al! You're right (as usual)...people right about now seem to be "just makin' up stuff..."

However, after tonight's speech, I would love for you to comment on how our POTUS has gotten more done in 4 weeks than most Prez's get done in 4 years! (I'm still trying to catch my breath just watching him!)

I'd love to hear some thoughts from you because I know that you won't put yourself into the "progressive bloggers' gutter" of everything O's "doing wrong"!

Thanks! I'll be following you tonight, tonight...during The Speech!

Pam

 

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

 

Hi Al,

I'm feeling the same way about the news cycles lately - and therefore I'm getting so much work done at work!! 

I was hoping you might be inspired to do an accomplishments summary of the President so far - perhaps in a ranking order to create all kinds of disagreements amongst us!!  I would like your perspective on them and then perhaps list what you would like to see next. 

Also, since it's right up your alley as a journalist, what are your thoughts about filming or photographing our fallen soldiers?  I think the lack of any photographic images of either the Iraq or Aghanistanwar is tragic as it allows us all to imagine that it is not really happening.  So not only the caskets but the actual carnage of the wars?

I would be interested in your view about the best strategy for making significant advances towards universal health care.  More specifically, I wonder whether you agree that Obama should pursue the biggest goals at the outset of his administration.  Those who make such an argument place weight on FDR's first 100 days, and assume that a president's political capital is greatest at the beginning.

But I wonder whether this assumption is historically true, and even if so, whether it is likely to be true now, particularly when most forecasts have the Democrats picking more senate seats in 2010.

Hi Al,

It appears that Hilda Solis is going to be confirmed pretty soon which appears to be very good news for labor in general, I was wondering if you had any ideas about that.

Secondly, with our SoS first trip under her belt, have you felt that she has met/surpassed your expectations? Obviously it's early especially with this, but any preliminary thoughts would be appreciated.

Lastly, I don't know if you saw that an assemblyman in California introduced a bill calling for the legalization and taxation of marijuana, now it has nearly no chance of passing because of 2/3 rule, but the fact that it is even considered seems positive to me.

 

Thanks for your comments.

I know that those in colder climes don't want to hear it, but I've got a case of spring fever right now.  We finally started getting some good rain here in Northern California, and today it's warm, sunny and clear, the hills are a rich green, trees are budding and blooming, and I am walking away from the monitor and out into the great outdoors again.

 

I'm happy that Hilda Solis was finally confirmed by the Senate this afternoon and is now Secretary of Labor. Onward to the EFCA...!

Hi Al,

Like Pam and Catherine, it seems like the media is working overtime to fill up the 24-hour news cycle with...whatever, whether or not it's 'newsworthy'.

I like the idea of outlining O-man's accomplishments and you might consider including some of the cultural-social changes that he and Michelle are implementing and its significance:  things like getting involved in D.C. community, having light jazz as the backdrop at WH events, the emphasis on 'American', healthy food -- I haven't even heard 'Hail to the Chief' which has been the fanfare staple for many previous presidents.

It might also be interesting to revisit Alinsky and his rules as it relates to O-man's emerging governing style. Which rules is he using, how effective have they been, has he modified any or added any?  Or maybe you could just republish the original post? (I don't remember all the rules but doesn't the recent McCain and Cantor smackdowns illustrate one of Alinsky's tenets?)

I'm also curious about the Dean-Obama 'situation'.  It seems like Dean would have been 'rewarded' in some way and yet...

You said there hasn't been much authentic news lately but anything you comment on is authentic to me!

Hi Catherine! Hi Pam!   

Cheryl, NJ

 

@Allan:

Don't gloat, Allan! It's gonna be 41 degrees here in Michigan tomorrow! We are Hap-py!  Spring IS here--it's above freezing!

BTW: What did you think about the Oscar speeches by the screenwriting winner and Sean Penn?

 

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

 

In honor of Obama's big speech tonight, George Lakoff (professor of linguistics and cognitive science,) wrote a rather long essay about Obama's communications style and the motives behind it that he titled "The Obama Code" which Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com posted earlier today.

Highly recommended. For those of us trying to understand Obama's brand of "bipartisanship" and just trying to figure out what makes his words so appealing to people like us, you may learn quite a bit. I know I did. It's definitely worth the read.

Al, apparently Latvia has collapsed from political/economic strain, much as happened in Iceland. Any thoughts about where we are heading globally?

Latvia's Government Collapses

Al,

 

I too am most concerned about health care.  I believe it is a now or never proposition (in that we have a unique opportunity with House, Senate and WH) to get it done.  Also, the Republicans will most likely fight it tooth and nail and the health care lobby will spare no expense to derail a universal health care bill.  Despite the media's focus on the economic crisis and the war, I believe this was one of the most galvanizing issues in the grassroots.  What can WE do to help the administration get health care passed?  (Organize, of course), but how can we put pressure on fence-sitting Senators (when the time comes) to forgo a filibuster?  Anyway, it's been on my mind these past months.....hoping that it happens and willing to pitch in.

I'm watching on MSNBC, with blue and red insta-reaction lines of mccain voters and obama voters.  shockingly, both lines are peaked into the positive nearly constantly.  sometimes the red line is slightly higher than the blue.  i wonder what bobby jindal thinks when he sees this blue/red near unanimity.

Such a pleasure to listen to this intelligent, logical speech and to feel like he actually gets it and have hope that he will be able to achieve what he is setting out to do. 

Watched clips from yesterday's summit on C-Span.  Came away with a "wow" moment similar to what Al described above.  "Wow.  We did it.  We may actually have elected a great leader this time."  

 

 

wait.... i have to clap for tax cuts, but these tax cuts are for the *working* class. what do i do?

he completely boxed them in every step of the way.

i hate to say it but for every person who said, 'why be so bi-partisan?' check and fucking mate. they *have* to go with his agenda now. he's running the table,with applause on both sides of the aisle.

 

'living our values doesn't make us weaker it makes us stronger'.

let's all clap for the capitalist who gave his money away. Repubs did it because they had to. Hes running the table here. the terms of the debate have changed. my god i'm happy i put in those hours...

 It has been a long time, I miss the time I have spent here,  I have been lurking a few times a week. Just wanted to say, I am inspired and feel proud tonight for doing my part to help our President get elected. I hope he can do at least half of what he laid out tonight.

your quote: if you make exorbitant profits that others labored to build, you, too, shouldn't feel right about getting the money yourself."

 

sums it up. obama's plan to me, is a huge restructuring of wealth. tax cuts to the poor, to be paid for by the rich. and to me, that's it. he has us doing this, without realizing thats what we're doing.

 

This was an amazing speech.

as someone with an interest in rhetoric this was a complete overhaul of the genre. brilliant. he took the personal story and reframed it as 'why you should rethink capitalism'. it's amazing.

just reveal the repubs for the hypocracy that it is. he had them to the point where they had to stand up to applaud the very ideas they've been railing against because he took their values and redirected it toward his policies and framed it in a patriotic context that made it the only logical course of action.

hope to talk to you more soon... have to pack for DC

You're so-o-o-o right Al...what can Bobby Jindal say now?

And thanks for the best laugh of the day...the Repubs ARE Effed!!!!

 

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

 

Hey Christie!

 

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

 

Oh my goodness.

Al, I hope you're watching Jindal's response.  For a second, I thought it was Saturday Night Live.   He started by reiterating a 'it's so great to have the first African American President' moment and then told us that he's a person of color too!  And then something about his mother being pregnant with him when they came to the US.

Ok, I'll stop laughing now and try to really listen to what he's saying...

 

Cheryl, NJ 

 

Half of what you're saying is exactly what the President said and stands for; the other half just isn't true!

 

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

 

I'm watching CNN and after the Governor's speach they essentially just said. "well, that's fine and we might talk about it later. Let's talk about Barack Obama again!"

 

I love it!!!

@ Kurt  ----your line "my god i'm happy i put in those hours...".  You said it for me.  Perfect.

Hi Cheryl! Hi Pam! So good to see you in The Field!

Other than having to close my right eye to block out Nancy P. I thoroughly enjoyed EVERY word of what he said and particularly the resulting squirming by Republicans. "Damn, I have to stand and clap for him again or I will never win another election".

And on the COMPLETE other end of the scale, Jindal sounded like he was reading a children's book to us. God, they are all so awful thinking any minority person is as good as the next one.  (And throw in bad tie, bad suit guy Michael Steele in that category too). But I'm not going to let them be a buzz kill. 

I really liked his line about not graduating is not only quitting on yourself, it's quitting on your country.  Pretty damn original, right?

OT - people are parsing his 12 months in Iraq campaign versus 16 months as is supposedly now the plan. Please. Really?  Like he didn't always wisely qualify it with "conditions on the ground"?  Of course.

 

 

 

He's coming up on Keith now.  I've been wondering the same as you and kind of hoping that Obama would find a good position for him.

Dean was also on earlier tonight and nothing he says gives a hint to why he's not more connected to the administration.  Al did a post on this a few weeks ago but I still don't 'get it'.  Both O-man and Dean say there's no hard feelings but....

Be sure and catch Jon Stewart tonight - they're doing a piece on O-man as the anti-Christ.  I missed the beginning but what I've seen is very very funny.

 

Cheryl, NJ

 

Had to finish listening to the speech on NPR after watching it while in line at Kaiser pharmacy... people in line were transfixed. Couldn't stop the tears when Pelosi said "the president of the United States..." Catherine, I also loved the line about not graduating; but the moment that really got me while driving down I880 was the unequivocal... the United States does. not. torture. period.

You guys have quoted some of them already:

* the three priorities - unchanged from his campaign

* not graduating is not only quitting on yourself, it's quitting on your country.  Then upped the ante by setting a goal for the college graduation rate

* investment in science

* no torture

* cuts for big agriculture! (wonderful - and a complete surprise for me)

* must reform health care to balance the budget

* the benevolent banker

* "We're not quitters" from the little girl's letter

Was great.

I've seen people saying it was better than the inauguration speech - but that one had a different purpose, and set this one up.

If I could change two things, I would wish that he had left out clean coal and social security - but that's for another day. BTW, anyone else notice that Biden's head was moving at the clean coal mention, so it looked like Biden was rolling his eyes?

On the whole, I loved it and am so relieved this man is president.

But I also know that in a time of crisis, we cannot afford to govern out of anger, or yield to the politics of the moment.  My job – our job – is to solve the problem.  Our job is to govern with a sense of responsibility.

This isn't about getting emotional satisfaction or revenge for the last eight years, it's about fixing things.

Tonight I watched the speech with a group of folks here in Maine who are organizing around health care reform. This is a serious campaign and our work will be critical in helping the President pass healthcare reform legislation. I could kiss him for framing comprehensive healthcare reform as an essential step towards dealing with medicare.

Of course we cheered for his discussion of healthcare, but this speech was masterful. And how funny were the cutaways to the Republicans, especially the moment when they were all on their feet cheering for defecit reduction---and then the next line was "the defecit I inherited". Snap!! Did you see the Republicans awkwardly looking around wondering whether to stand or sit? Beautiful.

And now I have to put out a request for fieldhands who are interested in working on healthcare reform. Maine's Senators will be critical to the success of healthcare legislation. If you want to help, please contact me over at fieldhands. Here is a link to a new discussion thread. http://fieldhands.ning.com/forum/topics/organizing-in-maine-for

this was what I was waiting for, Al. This was the speech. he might not get it, but nobody will say that he didn't reach for it.

Can't say much more than has already been said.  It was a masterful speech.  It was so BIG.  I've been thinking along these lines....that it's in times of crisis that real change emerges.  I mean, we thought we were getting change already but now this could be really big change...good change.  I am soooo grateful that wasn't McCain getting up there to give a speech.  Chances are good he is too.

Jindal was a disaster.  I always keep my eye out for possible Republicans I could get behind...I mean ones that if a Republican had to win, who would I want that to be?  And who can lead the Republicans to be the kind of opposition that constructively helps this country rather than divides it.  (Governor Huntsman comes to mind.)  Anyway, this is most definitely NOT the guy.  We just got 8 years of folksy and Catherine was right...it's like he was reading a children's book.  My seven year old, after the second or third "Americans can do anything" started counting and insisted there were 14 instances although you know how kids exaggerate.  And the content was crazy.  Katrina??  You gotta be shittin' me.  Or we need a leader who tells us America's best days are ahead of us??  Did you even bother to rework your speech at all after you listened to the President?  Government is not the answer?  Do you really believe average hard working Americans can actually deal with the crisis we're in right now?  Lack of good government is largely how we got here in the first place.  Idiotic...

Here is a comment from MyDD on the Jindal speech that had me rolling on the floor. "Remember when Brian Schweitzer gave that speech at the Democratic Convention and he started off all folksy about being a rancher and then he launched into energy policy and he had all the people hooting and hollering and clapping and jumping to their feet and it was a huge hit?  Jindal's speech was like that, only the exact opposite."

Nice to see so many folks back this evening.

I too saw the proposal from the CA assembyman.  Why does it need a 2/3 majority?  It may be too soon but with CA letting people out of jail with no money to hold them, this will get more of a good listen than in previous times.  I heard a billion a year in estimated tax revenue not to mention what you would save in not fighting it.

Morning Field Hands!

I've sure missed everyone!

By the end of Jindal's speech, I was crying...half from tears of laughter and half because it was that pitiful!

I'm like Tara, don't the Repubs have ANYONE of quality, intelligence, and class? Geez, this is supposed to be a "two-party" system...it's kinda hard to dance by yourself!

Rachel was speechless...literally...what can you say when Jindal puts up Katrina as a model?

A funny line from Twitter last night...(after SlumDog Millionaire)..."India was having a good week, until Jindal opened his mouth!

Pitiful, just pitiful...and then Michael Steele who doesn't think having a job is the still as working...and Jindal lying about a train from Disneyland to Las Vegas...even if that were true...which it's not...wouldn't it have to have people to build it and run it? Oh, I forgot, people building things is not the same as people having jobs according to Michael Steele...

 

waterprise2 AKA Pam

Liberal with a Capital L!

 

Al, you've written some great lines, but it's gonna be hard to beat this one:

Lord, Tom Lehrer was right. Parody is dead.

Welcome home Christi, Pam -feels good to know someone was laughing as hard as I was- and Allan, thanks for the sunshine!

We have a President.

For anyone interested in reveling in some schadenfreude per the smarmy and rhythm-less Jindal, see David Brooks on Charlie Rose last night. Brooks called Jindal disastrous, catastrophic, a complete joke and evidence of how the Goldwaterites have won the battle for the direction of the minority party, assuring, in Brooks's view, it would seem, regional rump status for many more years than they could imagine even in their worst nightmares.  Jindal was absolutely delicious as far as wrecks go.  He looked too old for his youth and sounded to juvenile for his age: he was/is "a pre-existing condition"! What a gamble: to read a speech seemingly written by committee a week ago and then to just cut and paste it into a paper cut-out of Republican "hope"--gulping down his artless lines ruptured every new seconds by a bad mic after the triumph of Obama forcing Jindal's co-religionists in Congress to cheer against their stated positions. Now, I just want to sit back and watch the minority party eat its own. Hah!

Oh, and Obama's speech: masterful. He's only getting better. What a notion!

Ross Douthat, a conservative writer with The Atlantic, nails it:

 

Obama was fantastic - worlds better than his inaugural. He laid out the most ambitious and expensive domestic agenda of any Democratic President since LBJ, and did it so smoothly that you'd think he was just selling an incremental center-left pragmatism. I think that he has an acute sense - more acute than most people in Washington, probably - of just how much running room is open in front of him at the moment, and he intends to make the absolute most of it. Burkean temperament or no, this was not a Burkean speech by any stretch: It was the speech of a man seeking to turn a moment of crisis into a domestic-policy revolution, and oozing confidence from every pore along the way. Now all he has to do is find a way to pay for it ...

 

Al always talks about Obama playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers. I like how Douhat puts into football terms - Obama is like a highly skilled running back, who sees openings being created in the line and downfield where everyone else just sees big, heavy and rapidly moving obstacles intent on flattening him. The inept Jindal/GOP response shows just how bad of a situation they are in (Volcanic Monitoring?? Does the man not realize that half of the Pacific Northwest is built on top of fairly recent mudflows caused by eruptions from Mt. Ranier and the like, and we saved far more than that $300 million at Clark Air Force base alone from monitoring Mt. Pinatubo prior to it erupting? This would be like the governor of Washington calling the NOAA monitoring of hurricanes 'wasteful pork'.)

 

I can't believe he made me cry again! The story about the young woman who wrote about her school just got me. And, of course, I was balling when Michelle Obama was introduced and walked in. Jindal was so embarrasing. And when Stephanopolous commented after his "response" that there are 2 different arguments and we will see which one is wins or is right I couldn't help screaming: What argument??? Where did Jindal even respond to anything Obama actually said? Isn't Jindal's pablum the "argument" of the last 8 years? Why bother with evidence when we can create this faux relativistic universe and pretend like the Republicans are actually engaging according to the rules of public discourse and rational argument? But, no, we should lower our standards of evidence and logic for them because they are victims and there is a "liberal media" after all.

Nate Silver had a fun quote about Jindal's speech:

If it sounds like Jindal is targeting his speech to a room full of fourth graders, that's because he is. They might be the next people to actually vote for Republicans again

It does make me feel like doing a Ted Kennedy style chuckle:  heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh

An inspiring speech by our Commander-in-Chief, who effortlessly dominated the room and made the Republicans dance to his tune, followed by the implosion of one of the opposition's "next big things" on national TV.  The best thing of all was reading the comments about Jindal's speech on conservative sites.  One of my favorites at Little Green Footballs:

I told everyone at work to watch Jindal.

I'm an idiot.

 

was when he reiterated his stance against torture. It is my deepest concern. I am not sure I knew that until the tears came.

The entire speech--which I watched on c-span and saw the overview: who stood, when, who sat down, etc--was breathtaking.

It is almost a miracle that this man has come along at a time when he is so desperately needed, and that he has the gift of incredible steel toughness, empathy, stunning foresight and brilliance, physical ease and warmth with people, and the ability to listen. He is a true leader, who inspires others not just to follow, but to be leaders themselves.

I read several blogs, but this is the only place I also read the comments. Thanks Al, for creating this space.