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(James Roosevelt - selling dad's plan in 1937)

When FDR suggested changes be made in the Supreme Court, appointing as many as six additional justices instead of the usual nine, it was a hard sell. In fact it went down to a stinging 70-20 Senate defeat by July. But FDR did a huge sales pitch for the plan, including enlisting his son James to stump for its passage.

James Roosevelt: “ I believe you will come to the conclusion that the President’s proposal if the most effective way to make constitutional democracy work. It confers no new powers. It takes away no previously existing authority. It is unquestionably constitutional. It will enable the Chief Executive to carry out with quickness and dispatch all those measures which meet the cry for repair and restoration. To you and to me and to millions of others throughout our country, it will bring comfort in the thought that those evil years of eight, yes of even twenty years ago will not come back.”

I'm sure at the time most Republicans had coronaries over the thought of six additional judges, all appointed by FDR setting the laws of the land. No doubt the wave of fear and calls of Dictatorship ran up and down the ranks of the right wing like a flu epidemic. But I can only imagine what it would have been like, had those fifteen judges been in place around the time of Bush, or even Nixon for that matter.

The mind fairly reels.

Perhaps some things were best not to have happened after all.

Paul Krugman hits the nail right on the head. Now what are we going to do about it?

The truth is that given the state of American politics, the way the Senate works is no longer consistent with a functioning government. Senators themselves should recognize this fact and push through changes in those rules, including eliminating or at least limiting the filibuster. This is something they could and should do, by majority vote, on the first day of the next Senate session.

Don’t hold your breath. As it is, Democrats don’t even seem able to score political points by highlighting their opponents’ obstructionism.

It should be a simple message (and it should have been the central message in Massachusetts): a vote for a Republican, no matter what you think of him as a person, is a vote for paralysis. But by now, we know how the Obama administration deals with those who would destroy it: it goes straight for the capillaries. Sure enough, Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, accused Mr. Shelby of “silliness.” Yep, that will really resonate with voters.

After the dissolution of Poland, a Polish officer serving under Napoleon penned a song that eventually — after the country’s post-World War I resurrection — became the country’s national anthem. It begins, “Poland is not yet lost.”

Well, America is not yet lost. But the Senate is working on it.

I suppose the president is doing this as political cover for the eventual use of reconciliation. But I suspect he really thinks he's going to change the way things work in Congress -- either he's crazy, or a genius. Personally, I wish he'd give up trying to be the Great Mediator and just ram through his agenda - the same way George Bush did with much less public support:

President Obama moved to jump-start the stalled health-care debate Sunday, inviting Republicans in Congress to participate in a bipartisan, half-day televised summit on the subject this month.

The president made the offer in an interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric hours before the network televised the Super Bowl.

Obama challenged Republicans, who have been largely unified in opposing his proposals, to bring their best ideas for how to cover more Americans and fix the health insurance system to the public discussion.

"I want to consult closely with our Republican colleagues," Obama said. "What I want to do is to ask them to put their ideas on the table. . . . I want to come back and have a large meeting, Republicans and Democrats, to go through, systematically, all the best ideas that are out there and move it forward."

The invitation to meet together on Feb. 25 -- and to do so live in front of the American public -- represents an effort by Obama to hit the reset button on the top domestic priority of his first year in office. It also reflects a recognition that he must have at least some Republican support if he hopes to see health-care reform pass.

[...] GOP leaders on Sunday said they welcomed the outreach but called it evidence that Obama knows he must start over if he wants to earn their support going forward.

Representatives Paul Ryan (R-Wis) and Devin Nunes (R-CA) introduce "A Roadmap to America's Future" which advocates the privatization of Social Security.

Funny thing about Republicans. They seem determined to NEVER learn lessons from the past. Which can be the only reason why Rep. Paul Ryan has reintroduced legislation to eliminate Medicare and privatize Social Security--a GOP pet project that spent all the political capital that Bush felt he earned with his re-election. His "Social Security-palooza" tour, designed to drum up populist support, actually had the opposite affect and set the administration back on its heels and backing off--a rare defeat for the destructive neo-con plans of the Bushies.

Say it with me now: THIRD RAIL. Seriously, you nimrods, you don't go after the well-being of Grandma and Grandpa without some serious negative political ramifications, no matter what the lunatic fringe teabagging set says.

Not content to let Ryan & Co. merely self-immolate on this, Representatives John Larson (D-CT) and Linda Sanchez (D-CA) have introduced a resolution clearly stating their opposition to this "roadmap" guaranteed to get Americans lost:

Today, Democratic Caucus Chair John Larson (D-CT), Rep. Linda Sánchez (D-CA) and more than 20 original co-sponsors introduced a resolution in opposition to the Republican proposal to privatize Social Security. Rep. John Larson:

Republicans are dusting off their old playbook and re-hashing old ideas like the privatization of Social Security that the American people have already rejected. Their ideas would end the program as we know it and put the retirement security of millions of America’s seniors and workers at risk.

Rep. Linda Sánchez:

When the stock market crashed in 2008, it was apparent that the Republican’s push to privatize Social Security was a bad idea. Americans have not forgotten the dangers of tying their retirement security to the whims of Wall Street. It was a bad idea then, and it is a bad idea now. This resolution supports Americans who contribute all their working life to a retirement and want income security in their golden years.

From Think Progress:

Tonight, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin spoke to the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville, TN, an event that was ditched by other high-profile Republicans who disliked its for-profit model. After her speech, organizer Judson Phillips asked Palin several questions. One of them was about what needs to be done when there is a “conservative House and a conservative Senate.” Palin jumped right in and said, “We’ve got to rein in the spending, obviously.” However, she then seemed to forget her next talking point and glanced down at her left hand, as if there were notes she had scribbled down. She went on to talk about “energy projects.”

Oliver Willis points out that during this same speech, she referred to Obama as "the guy with the teleprompter."

Really, I don't care that Sarah Palin read notes off her hand. So her ideas aren't logical, consistent and coherent enough to answer a question without prompting - is this news to anyone who's paying attention?

And will it affect her popularity one bit? No, it will not.

But it's the continued hypocrisy of conservative figures that irks me. I mean, she's disparaging Obama's teleprompter use in the same speech in which she's using cheat notes? Does her brain even have the function that would note that as a contradiction?

The real problem isn't that conservatives are hypocrites. It's that they're such shameless, proud hypocrites - and that they're so willing to exploit worried Americans who can't figure that out.

While supporters are trying desperately to figure out how to pass health-care reform, I have to wonder: What planet is Obama on? He acts as if being a cheerleader on the sidelines is going to get health-care reform passed, seemingly oblivious to the very real problems that are holding it up:

In his rallying cry to a crowd of cheering supporters on Thursday, Mr. Obama described, in the clearest terms yet, his vision of how to enact comprehensive health legislation: House and Senate Democrats would resolve their differences and decide on a “final bill.” They would then invite “our Republican friends to present their ideas.” The president would convene a meeting of Democrats, Republicans and health care experts to debate the proposals, in plain-spoken terms, for the benefit of the American people.

Then, Mr. Obama said, “we have got to move forward on a vote.”

The president did not say how he would resolve the knotty questions of policy, procedure and politics facing Congress.

A senior Democrat aide who has worked intensely on the legislation described party leaders as circling a traffic rotary, over and over, looking for a road forward but unable so far to pick a path.

“We’re still going around the circle,” said this aide, who asked not to be identified while discussing the Democrats’ internal debate. “You run out of gas at some point.”

In other news, Chris Bowers writes about a conference call with Health Care for America Now director Richard Kirsch yesterday afternoon. Kirsch unveiled plans to get supporters to take part in one final push on healthcare reform, noting there were no longer enough votes to pass the public option through reconciliation:

1. House should pass Senate bill with a pledge from the Senate to fix it in reconciliation. Senator Franken talked of "pledge and pass," which means the House needs to pass the Senate bill with a pledge from the Senate that it will be fixed in reconciliation. This is somewhat in conflict with Speaker Pelosi's statement that the Senate must actually pass a reconciliation bill before the House acts at all. A pledge alone isn't good enough for the House. Franken stated that he also thought the Senate bill needed to be improved, but that "the perfect--and we all have different ideas of what perfect is--shouldn't be the enemy of the very good."

2. Into the streets to create political will. The second part of the strategy is to make enough noise through protests, rallies, letters to the editor, and calls to Congress to create enough pressure for Congress to pass health care.

So please don't stop. If we want any movement at all, we need to get behind this bill.

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Bill Moyers smacks the Democrats and Republicans for sucking up to corporate lobbyists at their retreats and Mitch McConnell for the hypocrisy of his statement on the Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court ruling.

BILL MOYERS: Everybody's been talking about that Republican retreat last weekend, where President Obama engaged his opponents in a give and take. But what you may not know is that it was organized by something called the Congressional Institute. Nice highfalutin civic bunch, you might deduce from its name. Turns out the Congressional Institute is funded by corporate contributions and run by top Republican lobbyists. There are fourteen members on its board--twelve are registered lobbyists. And the contributors to the Congressional Institute read like a who's who of corporate America. Among its benefactors have been General Motors, Lockheed Martin, Time Warner, UPS. The institute's chairman lobbies for among others, Goldman Sachs, B.P., Health Net and AHIP. That's the trade group for the health insurance industry that fought tooth and nail against the public option and brought the White House to its knees.

Now if any Democrats out there are gloating over this, I'm not finished. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee also had a cozy little retreat last weekend at a Ritz-Carlton resort in Miami Beach, which boasts "sumptuous marble baths," a spa, and a two million dollar art collection. The website Politico.com reports that in addition to prominent Democratic senators there were plenty of representatives from industries the Democrats regularly attack when they wear their populist hat: the American Bankers Association, the tobacco giant Altria, the oil company Marathon, several drug manufacturers, and the defense contractor Lockheed Martin, as well as Heather and Tony Podesta -- two of the biggest corporate spear carriers on K Street and two of the biggest Democrats in town. Very, very intimate. And very, very politically incestuous.

One final note: after the Supreme Court handed down its decision two weeks ago, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the leader of Senate Republicans, praised it from the senate floor. He dismissed the notion that the decision might allow a flood of foreign money to influence our elections. Now we learn from TalkingPointsMemo.com that Senator McConnell has received substantial funds from a subsidiary of a big foreign defense contractor that's currently being investigated by the Justice Department for bribery. Senator McConnell has been quite good to that subsidiary -- this year alone he's requested seventeen million dollars in earmarks for its Louisville facility. Yes, the sun, and the dollar signs, shine bright in Senator McConnell's old Kentucky home.

Let's face it, two political parties; equal opportunity hypocrites.

That's it for the Journal. Go to our website at PBS.org and click on Bill Moyers Journal. You can read Dr. Margaret Flowers' letter. You'll also learn how your state's laws will be affected by the recent Supreme Court decision. We'll also link you to websites where the debate rages on.

That's all at PBS.org.

I'm Bill Moyers. And I'll see you next time.

Golly, I'm so shocked! Who knew that the Tea Party members were really just another group of fringe Republicans? (Via Digby):

In a bid to advance the tea party movement from holding rallies to holding office, the leaders of the anti-establishment groups announced a new political organization Friday that they say will “endorse, support and elect” conservatives across the country.

Mark Skoda, chairman of The Memphis TEA Party, made the announcement at a news conference in the middle of the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville. Though he said the group -- Ensuring Liberty Corporation and an affiliated political action committee -- is "distinct and separate" from other parts of the tea party movement, including convention organizer Tea Party Nation, the announcement was the closest thing so far to a national organizing strategy for the upcoming 2010 midterm elections.

"Let us not be naive here. The notion of us holding up signs ... does not get people elected," said Skoda, who is poised to become president of the new group. Skoda said the organization would take in small donations as well as corporate donations.

According to a written statement, the group would work to build a "sustainable coalition of elected officials" on the national level and in state and local races that might not be getting the attention of the Republican Party establishment.

The announcement came with an official platform that could help define what the multi-faceted tea party movement stands for and expects from the candidates it supports. The group's leaders plan to support candidates who stand for a set of "First Principles."

Those principles are: fiscal responsibility, lower taxes, less government, states' rights and national security. Prospective political candidates will be expected to support the Republican National Committee platform. If a particular candidate meets the proposed criteria he or she would be eligible for fundraising and grassroots support.

Once elected to office, members would be expected to join a congressional caucus of "like-minded representatives" who attend regular meetings and are held accountable for the votes they cast. Those who stray from the tea party path would risk losing the new organization's support and a possible re-election challenge.

Paul Ryan is trying to actually say he and the GOP have ideas. Soon, the media will pick up on this and also say that the GOP and Ryan have really cool ideas to take care of that nasty federal deficit and curb health care costs by 2080. Yes, I'm not kidding. 2080 I guess it is an idea even if it's batshit crazy.

The Economist lays it out for you.

Barack Obama's visit with the Republicans last week, some members of the opposition were deeply upset. They bristled at the idea that they have not proposed any serious ideas and are simply the "Party of No". In fact, the accusation is not true: Republicans have proposed some serious ideas recently. I'm going to post on two of them. The first, put forward by Paul Ryan, the ranking Republican member of the budget committee, is the "Roadmap for America's Future" budget proposal and it credibly claims to put America's federal budget in surplus by 2080. The CBO agrees. How does it do that?Simple, it slashes Medicare...top_paying_them">read on

He's shilling for Wall Street yet again as he usually does. He wants to privatize medicare and social security although he uses words like "vouchers" to mask what he's saying.

Crying John Boehner is running from it as fast as he can.

House Republicans are at pains to point out that a far-reaching budget roadmap unveiled by their top budget guy, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), isn't their budget, but when asked today at a press conference what about Ryan's budget he disagreed with, Minority Leader John Boehner couldn't name anything.

"Off the top of my head, I couldn't tell you," Boehner said.

And as Howie Klein points out, he reminds teabaggers why they aren't going to like him.

And Paul Ryan's is one of Wall Street's most devoted partisans on Capitol Hill, a veritable lobbyist inside Congress for all of their interests. Teabaggers don't like politicians who voted for the irresponsible Bush bank bailouts? Ryan didn't only vote for it-- twice-- as a high ranking member of Ways and Means and Banking Committee, the he persuaded dozens of reluctant GOP colleagues to vote for it and after it failed the first time, is said to have been the key figure in passing it the second time a week later!

Blue America just set up a page called Stop Paul Ryan. While he's a spectacular conservative hack, he's still very dangerous. If you can throw a few bucks our way. We plan to target him. Remember, he is a conservative and Wall Street golden boy.

Oh no he didn't! What happened to "every day we delay, Americans are dying"?

What the hell is wrong with Obama? Why does he always choose accommodation over moral action?

And his lack of leadership is getting downright scary. Congress is fumbling through a game of charades, trying to figure out the clues, while it becomes increasingly clear: There's no game plan.

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama says "we should take our time" getting to a final health care bill.

He said Thursday he wants to go through the legislation in detail with Republicans to examine their ideas and Democratic ideas to see whether there are better ways to improve the nation's health care system than have already been proposed.

Sure. Because those dying people? They're not going anywhere!

Obama said that letting some time pass before calling for a vote also will allow "everybody to get the real facts."

Or, as is more likely, it will give the insurance industry time to gather their forces for one final game-winning attack.

The president spoke to donors and supporters of his political organization, Organizing for America, one of a handful of fundraisers he was headlining Thursday for Democrats.

Obama said it is most urgent to focus now on a jobs package, but that health care must be addressed afterward.

But a fed-up Sen. Al Franken (who's getting a reputation for being "difficult," bless his heart) took David Axelrod to task at a "tense" closed-door meeting with the Democratic caucus today:

Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration’s failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact.

The sources said Franken was the most outspoken senator in the meeting, which followed President Barack Obama’s question-and-answer session with Senate Democrats at the Newseum on Wednesday. But they also said the Minnesotan wasn’t the only angry Democrat in the room.

“There was a lot of frustration in there,” said a Democratic senator who declined to be identified.

“People were hot,” another Democratic senator said.

Democratic senators are frustrated that the White House hasn’t done more to win over the public on health care reform and other aspects of its ambitious agenda — and angry that, in the wake of Scott Brown’s win in the Massachusetts Senate race, the White House hasn’t done more to chart a course for getting a health care bill to the president’s desk.

In his public session with the senators Wednesday, Obama urged them to “finish the job” on health care but did not lay out a path for doing so. That uncertainty appeared to trigger Franken’s wrath, and the sources in the room said he laid out his concerns much more directly than any senator did in the earlier public session.

Barney Frank took the gloves off on the floor and called John Fund out for making up a story about a phony bill and then he outlined how the right wing noise machine works as a propaganda arm of the republicans to push that narrative into the mainstream.

Frank: You are entirely wrong about me and in the absence of your being able to show any basis which you made such a statement to ask you to acknowledge that fact. He's not only a liar, he's a coward. He wouldn't do it. My staff member asked him, called him up and said, what was this based on? Well, I made a mistake. Well, have you made a retraction? Oh, yeah, he said. Can we see it? "I told a couple of people." Mr. Fund makes it up. It's a lie, it's a myth. There was nothing there and it's to discredit all democrats.

His right-wing cohorts echo it and echo it. The next thing is it will be on the floor in the next two weeks. This is the democrat disregard for the electoral process. And when we call Mr. Fund's attention to the fact that this was a lie, what does he say? Whoops. but he's not going to tell anybody about it. Mr. Speaker, this is not the only case of this and I know this has happened before. But because I was directly involved here, I was in position to document this. It begins with a lie from this editorial writer from "the Wall street journal." it is then a lie repeated by his right-ring colleagues. He refuses to do anything about.

It doesn't get any clearer than that. Frank posted the entire story on the web.

Frank responded to fabricated accounts of his supposed plans to introduce a bill on “universal voter registration.” The story began in November at the conservative Restoration Weekend conference in Palm Beach, Florida, where for $1,700 per person activists were able to hear talks by conservative opinion leaders on the theme, “Defending our Country and Culture.” At one session, John Fund, a writer for the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, claimed that Congressman Barney Frank and Senator Chuck Schumer had hatched a plan to game the election system by registering felons, illegal aliens and others to vote:

Democrats were very rattled by the November 3rd election results. What do liberals do when they lose elections? They change the rules. In January, Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank will propose universal voter registration.

What is universal voter registration? It means all of the state laws on elections will be overridden by a federal mandate. The feds will tell the states, “Take everyone on every list of welfare recipients you have, take everyone on every list of unemployed you have, take everyone on every list of property owners, take everyone on every list of driver’s license holders, and register them to vote regardless of whether they want to be.”

The allegation against Congressman Frank is absolutely false and has no basis in reality. The Congressman in fact heard about it for the first time after the story was launched in the conservative media.

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There's a reason Blue America PAC targeted Blanche Lincoln over the summer: She's a ConservaDem who is up for reelection and was standing with the health-insurance industry over average working Americans. Our Campaign For Health Care Choice action raised enough money to blanket the state of Arkansas with ads that demanded she vote for change in our health care system. If you can, please continue to donate.

During Obama's conference with Senate Democrats yesterday, Lincoln whined to the president like a good little neo-Republican and asked him to moderate and bow down to Republicans. Have you ever heard of such a thing being said from a party member to its own president?

In one key exchange this morning, Obama rebuked pleas from Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) that he moderate his agenda and work with Republicans to ease the current state of economic uncertainty.

Lincoln described a constituent who she said was "extremely frustrated because there was a lack of certainty and predictability from his government for him to be able to run his businesses."

She asked: "Are we willing, as Democrats, not only to reach out to Republicans, but to push back in our own party for people who want extremes, and look for the common ground that's going to get us the success that we need not only for our constituents, but for our country, in this global community, in this global economy?"

Wow, I didn't know trying to fight for the public option and the best possible health care system is considered extreme in her mind. See, we're the bad guys and not the idiots who littered the town-hall meetings flinging racial insults and bizarre conspiracy theories around like they were candy. Rahm uttered his stupid remark behind closed doors, but conservatives are out front with their lunacy. President Obama then calls out Blanche.

From there, Obama turned to a more pointed critique of Lincoln's argument. "If the price of certainty is essentially for us to adopt the exact same proposals that were in place for eight years leading up to the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression -- we don't tinker with health care, let the insurance companies do what they want, we don't put in place any insurance reforms, we don't mess with the banks, let them keep on doing what they're doing now because we don't want to stir up Wall Street -- the result is going to be the same," he said. "I don't know why we would expect a different outcome pursuing the exact same policy that got us into this fix in the first place."

Middle class Americans, Obama said, "are more and more vulnerable, and they have been for the last decade, treading water. And if our response ends up being, you know, because we don't want to -- we don't want to stir things up here, we're just going to do the same thing that was being done before, then I don't know what differentiates us from the other guys. And I don't know why people would say, boy, we really want to make sure that those Democrats are in Washington fighting for us."

It's doubtful that Obama has really learned his lesson about these Senate "moderates". But it's good to see him finally drawing a line.

This is the type of argument from Obama that a lot of Democrats, and not just progressives, have longed to hear. While a united Republican opposition has clearly slowed down his legislative agenda, it has been the conservative Democrats in the Senate who have punctured enormous holes in it.

The White House has largely coddled these four or five Senators, at least in public, in hopes of gradually winning over their support. The White House declined to criticize Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) for holding up health-care reform over a public option --- even while lashing out at former Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean when he said the bill should be stopped because it lacked the public plan.

Dan Coats on The Young Turks from the 2008 Republican National Convention

I'm not sure if it's possible to get a more Republican candidate for Indiana than Evan Bayh, but the GOP isn't going to go down without trying. Former Senator Dan Coats has announced this morning that he will challenge Bayh for the Senate seat in the 2010 Election.

But for all of his high profile--and Dan Coats certainly does have that within the Republican Party--I'm not sure the GOP is really learning the lessons of the tea baggers distrusting the incumbents and politicians when opting to promote Coats for the Senate seat.

To wit, Coats is a member of the C-Street Family, responsible for the failed ushering of Harriet Miers through the Supreme Court confirmation process. I think his quote on Miers, who failed to capture even Republican support shows his contempt for Americans:

She certainly has the capability to be an excellent Supreme Court justice. If great intellectual powerhouse is a qualification to be a member of the court and represent the American people and the wishes of the American people and to interpret the Constitution, then I think we have a court so skewed on the intellectual side that we may not be getting representation of America as a whole.

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President Obama met with the Senate Democrats today, just like he did last week with House Republicans, and he made a point about the media and the influence they are having on the members of the Democratic party.

President: Last point I would make about this. You know what I think would actually make a difference, Michael -- I think if everybody here -- excuse all the members of the press who are here -- if everybody here turned off your CNN, your Fox, your -- just turn off the TV -- MSNBC, blogs -- and just go talk to folks out there, instead of being in this echo chamber where the topic is constantly politics -- the topic is politics. It is much more difficult to get a conversation focused on how are we going to help people than a conversation about how is this going to help or hurt somebody politically.

And that's part of what the American people are just sick of -- because they don't care, frankly, about majority and minorities and process and this and that. They just want to know, are you delivering for me? And we've got to, I think, get out of the echo chamber. That was a mistake that I think I made last year, was just not getting out of here enough. And it's helpful when you do. (Applause.)

It's a little late with this recommendation, Mr. President. The time to have spoken up was long before the August recess. Your strategy basically allowed conservatives to take over the messaging and make the debate exactly what political operatives like Frank Luntz and Newt Gingrich had hoped for. Hell, Luntz told Samantha Bee that not being able to control a town hall meeting in 2005 could produce disastrous results for Bush. Well, that came true. The town halls became an exhibition of hatred, insanity and ignorance.

And as usual Fox News ignored this event, as they usually do.

The president also told Senate Dems to stop being afraid and get health-care reform done.

The president's appeal on health care was especially noteworthy, given the initiative's precarious future. As has been the case of late, Obama didn't give lawmakers specific instructions -- at least not publicly -- but he made clear they must take advantage of this opportunity and deliver on the promise of reform.

"So many of us campaigned on the idea that we were going to change this health care system," the president reminded the senators. "So many of us looked people in the eye who had been denied because of a pre-existing condition, or just didn't have health insurance at all ... and we said we were going to change it. Well, here we are with a chance to change it.... I hope we don't lose sight of why we're here. We've got to finish the job on health care." Here's hoping Democrats take the advice to heart.

And Obama made the point that they still have a huge majority in the Senate, which is something they don't know how to use. I understand that the GOP is using the filibuster at an insane level, but for those of us who worked hard to help get Dems elected, this has been incredibly frustrating.

And just as an aside, it was also interesting to see that the president apparently keeps up fairly well on media developments: "There was apparently a headline after the Massachusetts election. The Village Voice announced that Republicans win a 41-59 majority. It's worth thinking about. We still have to lead."

If the majorities change hands, you can be sure that if the Democratic Party obstructed like conservatives have, and turned the filibuster into a potent weapon for saying "no", the Villagers would be screaming for the Dems to not be obstructionists, with David Broder leading the way.

The rule is that conservatives can do NO wrong.

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Dylan Ratigan allows Marsha Blackburn to come on his show and play populist with her concerns for transparency and the national debt. This woman is about as far to the right as you can get with her voting record but he's going to allow her to come out and paint herself as some politician that's just concerned for the average working person out there.

BLACKBURN: Dylan one of the things you have to do is regain their trust. You do that by transparency, by moving these discussions out in the open where the American people can see and hear what is being done and said and I think that's an important step in this process. Certainly you mentioned the Tea Party movement and Enough is Enough. That is what people are saying. They've had it. Enough is enough. They are looking at a budget that the President has brought forward today that is focused on debt. It is not focused on jobs and creating jobs. And I think that's why so many people have said look, we're frustrated with this.

One of the things I'm going to do is immediately file the bills I file every year that call for 1%, 2% and 5% across the board spending reducations. Let's actually begin to cut what the Federal government spends.

The Republicans are all suddenly worried about the debt now that a Democrat is in charge when we never heard this kind of carping out of them while Bush was running the show. Blackburn goes on to claim that she "doesn't do earmarks". From Media Matters -- Rep. Blackburn Blasts Earmarks, Forgetting Her Own:

In a December 2, 2009 op-ed in the Washington Times, Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) urged Republicans to campaign on earmark reform, noting she had "sworn off" earmarks herself. During the preceding year, Congresswoman Blackburn requested nearly $12 million in earmarks. As Blackburn has no doubt realized, it's easy to fast immediately after a $12 million meal.

She then goes on to cite Rep. Paul Ryan's "Roadmap to Recovery" as a solution to America's financial problems.

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