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If you can't win the vote fairly, suppress voters. This has been a Republican tactic for years, and it's running rampant in Wisconsin. While polls are showing Russ Feingold at a shocking disadvantage to his teabagger opponent Ron Johnson, the GOP and Americans for Prosperity are working behind the scenes on a voter suppression scam that is on a far wider scale, but no different than Republicans have used for years.

Here's how it works: A mailer is sent to registered voters. Any mailers returned by the post office are put in a database and those voters are submitted to be purged from voting rolls. Of course, the targets are never Republican voters. They're Democrats, and generally minority voters in particular. Here's a better explanation from the Brennan Center for Justice:

Voter caging is the practice of sending mail to addresses on the voter rolls, compiling a list of the mail that is returned undelivered, and using that list to purge or challenge voters registrations on the grounds that the voters on the list do not legally reside at their registered addresses. Supporters of voter caging defend the practice as a means of preventing votes cast by ineligible voters. Voter caging, however, is notoriously unreliable. If it is treated (unjustifiably) as the sole basis for determining that a voter is ineligible or does not live at the address at which he or she registered, it can lead to the unwarranted purge or challenge of eligible voters. …Moreover, the practice has often been targeted at minority voters, making the effects even more pernicious. [Brennan Center, “A Guide to Voter Caging,” 6/29/07]

That audio file at the top is a recording obtained by One Wisconsin Now of a meeting of Wisconsin Tea Party leaders. Here's the plot:

According to the statements made on the recordings, Dake lays out the plans, detailing contact between himself and Reince Preibus, the Republican Party of Wisconsin Chair and Mark Block, state director of Americans for Prosperity-Wisconsin:

1. The Republican Party of Wisconsin will use its “Voter Vault” state-wide voter file to compile a list of minority and student voters in targeted Wisconsin communities.
2. Americans for Prosperity will use this list to send mail to these voters indicating the voter must call and confirm their registration information, and telling them if they do not call the number provided they could be removed from the voter lists.
3. The Tea Party organizations will recruit and place individuals as official poll workers in selected municipalities in order to be able to make the challenges as official poll workers.
4. On Election Day, these organizations will then “make use” of any postcards that are returned as undeliverable to challenge voters at the polls, utilizing law enforcement, as well as attorneys trained and provided by the RPW, to support their challenges.

In the case of students, this is particularly insidious, since a student may indeed be a registered voter in Wisconsin but not have the same address, given their tendency to move at the end of a semester. But you can see what's going on here -- it is a concerted effort, funded and pushed by Americans for Prosperity -- to suppress minority and young voters, and in so doing to win an election by strongarm rather than by votes.

One Wisconsin Now has uncovered this plot with evidence, but don't assume this is limited to Wisconsin. I guarantee you it isn't. They are targeting as many states as they can, but particularly swing states. Expect Ohio, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Colorado, Arizona just to name a few to have the exact same operations afoot.

Voter suppression undermines democracy. It is a bully tactic to disenfranchise minority and young voters. If you're as angry about this as I am, consider visiting Save Wisconsin's Vote and taking action.

What makes me saddest of all things in the world is this: the vast majority of the time the right thing to do morally is the right thing to do in terms of broad self-interest, and yet we don’t believe that and we do the wrong thing, thinking we must, thinking that we’re making the “hard decisions”.

This spans the spectrum of issues. It doesn’t matter whether you’re talking about foreign affairs, where the money used on Iraq and Afghanistan could have rebuilt America and made it more prosperous. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about health care, where everyone knew that the right thing to do was single payer or some other form of comprehensive healthcare, which would have reduced bankruptcies massively, saved 6% of GDP and massive numbers of lives. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about the financial crisis, where criminally prosecuting those who engaged in fraud (the entire executive class of virtually ever major financial firm) and nationalizing the major banks, wiping out the shareholders and making the bondholders eat their losses was the right thing to do, and didn’t happen. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about drug policy, where the “war on drugs” has accomplished nothing except destabilizing multiple countries and giving the US the largest prison population proportional to population in the entire world and where legalizing marijuana, soft opiates and coca leaves would save billions of dollars, reduce violence, help stabilize Mexico and would help tax receipts. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about food, where we subsidize the most unhealthy foods possible and engage in practices which have reduced the nutritional content of food by 40% in the last half century. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about environmental pollutants, which have contributed to a massive rise in chronic diseases so great it amounts to an epidemic.

And on, and on, and on.

Now the fact is that there is no free lunch. When you spend money on war, you can’t spend it on education or health or crumbling infrasture or civilian technology. When you allow oligopolies to control the marketplace and buy up politicians, the cost of that is a decreased standard of living. When you refuse to deal effective with externalized health pollution, whether from soda pop or carcinogens, you pay for that with the death of people you care for from heart disease, cancer and other illnesses.

The response is “we have to do this to protect ourselves/to make a profit”.

No, you don’t.

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I know this is vacation time when everyone plays old shows to fill in the slots on cable TV. Still, it was kinda weird, here in August, to see Fox replaying one of the year's weirder moments -- from early April, when Jon Voight went on Mike Huckabee's show and read the following letter:

In one year, the American people are witnessing the greatest lie that is cleverly orchestrated by President Obama and his whole administration.

The lie is a potent aggression that feeds the needs of people who either have not educated themselves enough to understand the assault upon us all or the very poor and needy who live to be taken care of.

President Obama feeds these people poison, giving them the idea that they are entitled to take from the wealthier who have lived and worked in a democracy that understands that capitalism is the only truth that keeps a nation healthy and fed.

Now the lie goes very deep and President Obama has been cleverly trained in the Alinsky method and it would be very important that every American knows what that method is. It is a socialistic, Marxist teaching and with it, little by little, he rapes this nation, taking down our defenses, making new language for the Islamic extremists.

The world looked up to us as a symbol of hope and prosperity now wonders what will become of the entire world if America is losing its power.

The American people who understand exactly what is taking place have come together in the thousands, vowing to try to stay together as a unit of love and freedom for all men and women, from all walks of life, shivering to think that this once great nation will be a third world country.

This will be the first president to ever weaken the United States of America. President Obama uses his aggression and arrogance for his own agenda, against the will of the American people when he should be using his will and aggression against our enemies.

Every loving American for peace and truth and the security of our nation must come out and join the Tea Parties in their states. The opposition will continue their tactics; they will lie and plant their own bullies amongst us. Everyone must pay close attention to who stands next to them. We can weed out the liars and agitators. Let us all stay in God's light. Let no man put asunder. We can and we will prevail. God bless us all!"

Usually when we get summer reruns, the shows selected tend to be somewhat current. And indeed, given that this is now the Republicans' summer of racial resentment, replaying Voight's extraordinarily vicious and paranoid rant -- one that talks about a black president "raping" the nation -- in the current context gains a particular edge. A truly ugly and disturbing one.

I was also struck by Huckabee's reaction: He obviously was just fine with Voight's language. It tells you a lot about what we can expect from Candidate Huckabee in the 2012 race, doesn't it?

Economics 101: Healthy economies include low unemployment rates. Low unemployment rates mean consumers are consuming/buying goods. Consumers buying goods stimulates the economy, creates growth.

Economics 101 corollary: Sluggish economies include high unemployment rates, tight credit. In sluggish economies, consumers buy less, pay down debt, and the economy remains sluggish.

Until the unemployment rates drop, at which time more consumers have more money with which to consume.

Makes sense, right? Well, yes, until you read this Washington Post article where they interview corporate CEOs about why it might be that they're sitting on piles of cash and not hiring. Then it just gets really, really weird.

According to these CEOs, it's not really the national debt, the deficit or a need for more stimulus that's keeping them from hiring and allowing them to hoard cash. No, it's the consumer, who sparks a big no-confidence vote in them.

They blame their profound caution on their view that U.S. consumers are destined to disappoint for many years. As a result, they say, the economy is unlikely to see the kind of almost unbroken prosperity of the quarter-century that preceded the financial crisis.

They really don't address the question of why they're hoarding trillions in cash instead of reinvesting in their business or {gasp} hiring again. They have some vague objections to legislation that's passed in this Congress, but nothing specific.

But when Speer and other executives were pressed on the role that tax and regulatory policies play in hiring, they drew only vague connections. Speer said his decision whether to hire is driven primarily by demand for his products. Orders are coming in strong enough that he is running about 20 hours a week of overtime. So he is weighing whether to hire two or three additional manufacturing workers.

None of the executives interviewed linked a specific new government initiative with a specific decision to refrain from hiring.

What we have here is the corporate Catch-22 boogie. We know it and they know it. We, the consumers, cannot and will not be spending anything until we're employed again. They the businesses, can, but will not, hire until we spend again. They would prefer to pay existing employees overtime than to hire new employees to fill the ranks of the employed.

I don't buy it. It sounds like the kind of political gobbledegook that gets spit out when the answer is right there in front of everyone like a pink elephant in a tutu. These guys are holding out for a Congress that they believe will give them the tax breaks and regulatory relief they expect and have been used to receiving in the past.

I called it a Catch-22, but really, it's a siege. They are mounting a siege against the middle class in this country -- their own customers, by the way -- in order to get leverage and the right to rewrite rules, including union contracts and pay rates that are below those of the past.

This is why small businesses really do need Congress' intervention. If they can get credit, they'll hire and we'll get some creative new industries going instead of just caving into the fat cats with trillions waiting to be sent off to Haley Barbour or some other teabag organization to defeat progress.

Paul Krugman explains how the nation's elites are defining prosperity downward, and says our only real hope is public outrage. See any? Nope, me neither. Seems like the only people who really give a damn about the unemployed are... the unemployed:

Yes, growth is slowing, and the odds are that unemployment will rise, not fall, in the months ahead. That’s bad. But what’s worse is the growing evidence that our governing elite just doesn’t care — that a once-unthinkable level of economic distress is in the process of becoming the new normal.

And I worry that those in power, rather than taking responsibility for job creation, will soon declare that high unemployment is “structural,” a permanent part of the economic landscape — and that by condemning large numbers of Americans to long-term joblessness, they’ll turn that excuse into dismal reality.

Not long ago, anyone predicting that one in six American workers would soon be unemployed or underemployed, and that the average unemployed worker would have been jobless for 35 weeks, would have been dismissed as outlandishly pessimistic — in part because if anything like that happened, policy makers would surely be pulling out all the stops on behalf of job creation.

But now it has happened, and what do we see?

First, we see Congress sitting on its hands, with Republicans and conservative Democrats refusing to spend anything to create jobs, and unwilling even to mitigate the suffering of the jobless.

We’re told that we can’t afford to help the unemployed — that we must get budget deficits down immediately or the “bond vigilantes” will send U.S. borrowing costs sky-high. Some of us have tried to point out that those bond vigilantes are, as far as anyone can tell, figments of the deficit hawks’ imagination — far from fleeing U.S. debt, investors have been buying it eagerly, driving interest rates to historic lows. But the fearmongers are unmoved: fighting deficits, they insist, must take priority over everything else — everything else, that is, except tax cuts for the rich, which must be extended, no matter how much red ink they create.

The point is that a large part of Congress — large enough to block any action on jobs — cares a lot about taxes on the richest 1 percent of the population, but very little about the plight of Americans who can’t find work.

[...] In short, it’s all good. And I predict — having seen this movie before, in Japan — that if and when prices start falling, when below-target inflation becomes deflation, some Fed officials will explain that that’s O.K., too.

What lies down this path? Here’s what I consider all too likely: Two years from now unemployment will still be extremely high, quite possibly higher than it is now. But instead of taking responsibility for fixing the situation, politicians and Fed officials alike will declare that high unemployment is structural, beyond their control. And as I said, over time these excuses may turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy, as the long-term unemployed lose their skills and their connections with the work force, and become unemployable.

I’d like to imagine that public outrage will prevent this outcome. But while Americans are indeed angry, their anger is unfocused. And so I worry that our governing elite, which just isn’t all that into the unemployed, will allow the jobs slump to go on and on and on.

Corrente: Confusing "America" with "Goldman Sachs." Make the call...

Balloon Juice: What did you expect?

TalkLeft: Blago requests subpoena for Obama

Jesus' General: Leghorns for Lowden

The Washington Note: Has Chuck Schumer EVER criticized Israel or its leadership in the way he just unloaded on Obama?

Papamoka Straight Talk: Officer Down

Anyone who thinks Newt Gingrich isn't positioning himself for a run at the Republican nomination isn't paying attention. He's clearly doing exactly that, and with his usual Newt-like sense of the bizarre and insulting. While firing up Republicans by speech exhorting them to be the "Party of Yes", he's playing the "say outrageous things that make no sense but sound scary" game too:

“To win in 2010 and 2012, it's not enough to say no to the radical agenda of Obama, Pelosi, and Reid,” said Gingrich. “Tonight's speech will explain why real leadership requires Republicans to offer a compelling vision of safety, prosperity, and freedom that stands in vivid contrast to Obama's secular, socialist, machine now running Washington.”

That would be the secular, socialist machine that just dumped the public option or a Medicare expansion in favor of keeping health insurance private? The secular, socialist machine that paid homage to capitalism by expanding private insurance coverage provided by private insurance carriers? Alrighty, then.

In the past year, American Solutions for Winning the Future (Newt's 527), has banked 3 times what any other organization has. Granted, much of that money pays for Newt's private jet, chauffer, and PR consultants, but there is no question that he's a contender for 2012.

His new book will be out May 17th. Can you guess the title? Bingo. "To Save America: Stopping Obama's Secular-Socialist Machine" I wonder how much he paid Frank Luntz for that.

Conservatives are desperate. They understand that health care reform is going to pass, perhaps even this week. To that end, their corporate sponsors are ramping up the pressure and trying to whip enthusiasm to oppose it.

Tonight, Americans for Prosperity sponsored a tele-town hall meeting with concerned conservatives looking to defeat the House vote on health care reform tonight. Their special guest was Indiana Representative Mike Pence, who called on listeners to "pray for the battle", to call their Congressman and remind them that "no one wants this monstrosity to pass."

Americans for Prosperity, you might remember, is the astroturf non-profit lobbying arm of the Scaife empire and Koch Industries. Director Art Pope is a champion of oil and tobacco interests. They partner with organizations like the 912 Project to defeat anything that might resemble the will of the people. Rachel Maddow did a terrific takedown of their operation and the bankruptcy of their campaign against health care last summer.

Some highlights:

Tearful caller Pam is frustrated because her representative, Brad Ellsworth (D-Indiana), sent her a response indicating that he had decided how he would vote. Frustrated that her representative doesn't listen to her, she appeals to Rep. Pence for ideas. His response: "Write a letter to the editor."

Beverly in Nevada wanted to know "what it is this President does not understand? The American people do NOT want this health care bill." Hmm. Beverly might want to read this AP-GfK poll, where only 4% oppose any health care reform, and the largest number of respondents believe the system needs drastic changes.

The best moment might have been toward the end, when Pence rallied the troops for what he knows is a lost cause, and used this talking point:

"Once the American public becomes dependent on the federal government during that most vulnerable moment of illness of a loved one, a spouse, a parent, a child, a grandchild, those on the elite leadership of the left know...they’ll never let it [public healthcare] go."

Damn right.

As a final note, he calls for women to pray for the battle, those in the battle, wisdom for the Democrats. If the bill passes, will they see it as a sign from God?

I somehow doubt it.

An audio clip of the call's end is below. The full audio is here.

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Taibbi responds to the recent David Brooks column that's clearly aimed in his direction, and pretty much eviscerates him. Fine with me, since I can't stand Brooks' "rational centrist" schtick:

What’s so ironic about this is that Brooks, in arguing against class warfare, and trying to present himself as someone who is above making class distinctions, is making an argument based entirely on the notion that there is an lower class and an upper class and that the one should go easy on the other because the best hope for collective prosperity is the rich creating wealth for all. This is the same Randian bullshit that we’ve been hearing from people like Brooks for ages and its entire premise is really revolting and insulting — this idea that the way society works is that the productive ” rich” feed the needy “poor,” and that any attempt by the latter to punish the former for “excesses” might inspire Atlas to Shrug his way out of town and leave the helpless poor on their own to starve.

That’s basically Brooks’s entire argument here. Yes, the rich and powerful do rig the game in their own favor, and yes, they are guilty of “excesses” — but fucking deal with it, if you want to eat.....

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The Post has an in-depth look at how the Fed was oblivious to the nation's looming major banking crisis, and the political maneuvering that will determine its future operation:

The keynote speaker, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, assured the bankers and businessmen gathered at the Westin Hotel on Michigan Avenue that their prosperity was not threatened by the plight of borrowers struggling to repay high-cost subprime loans.

Bernanke, who was in charge of regulating the nation's largest banks, told the audience that these firms were not at risk. He said most were not even involved in subprime lending. And the broader economy, he concluded, would be fine.

"Importantly, we see no serious broad spillover to banks or thrift institutions from the problems in the subprime market," Bernanke said. "The troubled lenders, for the most part, have not been institutions with federally insured deposits."

He was wrong. Five of the 10 largest subprime lenders during the previous year were banks regulated by the Fed. Even as Bernanke spoke, the spillover from subprime lending was driving the banking industry into a historic crisis that some firms would not survive. And the upheaval would shove the economy into recession.

Just as the Fed had failed to protect borrowers from the consequences of subprime lending, so too had it failed to protect banks.

The central bank's performance has sparked a great debate about its future as a regulator, pitting those who want to expand its role against those who want to strip its powers. It also has come under pressure from politicians seeking greater oversight of its primary job, adjusting interest rates to moderate economic growth. The battles have complicated Bernanke's bid for a second term as chairman. The Senate Banking Committee voted to approve Bernanke 16 to 7 on Thursday, setting the stage for a January battle on the Senate floor.

The Fed's failure to foresee the crisis or to require adequate safeguards happened in part because it did not understand the risks that banks were taking, according to documents and interviews with more than three dozen current and former government officials, bank executives and regulatory experts.

Regulatory agencies exist to lean against the wind. But rather than looking for warning signs, the Fed had joined -- and at times defined -- the mainstream consensus among policymakers that financial innovations had made banking safer. Bernanke said the economy had entered an era of smaller and less frequent downturns, which he and others called "the great moderation."