Another Link Dump: Political News

Since it’s obviously my day to blow through a pant-load of links, let’s move on to politics, shall we?

1. Other than the spinmeisters and poo-flinging political bloggers, does anyone even remotely care that John McCain may or may not have shtupped a hot blonde lobbyist who bears an uncanny resemblance to his wife?  Have we not gotten so accustomed to these stories that they no longer matter?  I should think everybody would just be glad that it was a woman, since the “G” in “GOP” seems to stand for “Gay”.  To me the only points of interest here are these:  that it might have been the Republican Party itself which gave the story to the Times, since the Bush crowd does not like McCain; that the Times has been sitting on this story since December at the request of the McCain people and probably has more dirt that they left out for fear of lawsuits; and that McCain did political favors for a contributor who was represented by said hottie’s lobbying firm.  The sex part is the LEAST of the story.

2. This blog post is supposed to be a letter from a Wellesley classmate to Hillary Clinton about why she’s not supporting her fellow alum.  It’s more of a litany of the various crimes against humanity that Monsanto is accused of and then a “guilt-by-association” argument because Clinton’s law firm represented Monsanto and Bill Clinton’s administration had a cozy relationship with them.  It is a very good explanation of the way corporations influence politics and politicians, but I didn’t see anything in it that was more than what you could smear any elected official in Washington with.  Which is really sad, when you think about it, but it doesn’t justify singling her out.  By contrast, read this post at Daily Kos written by a woman who decided to take it upon herself to compare the actual records of Clinton and Obama in the Senate and concluded that Obama had done more in terms of introducing good legislation than Clinton.  She is quick to admit that for the most part, there’s very little difference between the two and her decision to become an Obama supporter is based on her perception that he did a better job getting his legislative issues through the Congress than she did.  That is probably the first realistic assessment of the Clinton-Obama paradox I have read yet.

3. Also WRT HRC, this blogger suggests that maybe the solution is for President Obama to appoint Hillary Clinton to the Supreme Court.  Many people have already suggested that Hillary should appoint Bill to the Supreme Court if she’s elected, but I don’t think I’ve seen this suggestion before.  If you read the post, the reasoning is actually pretty good — removed from the burden of having to “triangulate” her position as an elected politician, HRC could more boldly embrace a progressive agenda on the court and push back many of the draconian decisions the Roberts Court has been willing to hand over to the Bush Administration.  This would leave Bill to continue to pursue his other pet projects and not draw continuous political fire for his “kitchen cabinet” position.

4.  You may have read the news last week that long-time Republican congressman Tom Lantos died.  Now, legal scholar and privacy advocate Larry Lessig has announced that he is considering running for that seat in November.  I hope that this is a sign that real grass-roots progressive politics are beginning to take hold and will pay off by putting some people in Congress who really CAN bring about change.  In the same vein, this piece in The Nation is a fine reminder of Dennis Kucinich’s committment to progressive issues and what his real impact has been on this election season in terms of pushing Clinton and Obama on those issues.  Now that he’s back running for re-election in his district, he’s facing a serious challenge to retain his seat.  I didn’t get around to donating to his presidential campaign, but I will donate to his re-election campaign for sure.