“Please Proceed Senator”: Ted Cruz Wants To Fight Obama Over Immigration, But He Forgot About One Thing
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is calling for congressional Republicans to fight back against President Barack Obama’s executive action on immigration, saying they should refuse to confirm the president’s nominees until he reverses course.
“If the president announces executive amnesty, the new Senate majority leader who takes over in January should announce that the 114th Congress will not confirm a single nominee — executive or judicial — outside of vital national security positions, so long as the illegal amnesty persists,” Cruz wrote in a recent Politico Magazine op-ed.
There is obviously some political risk in Republicans pursuing such a strategy, given the presidential election in two years and a Senate landscape that looks more favorable for Democrats to regain control in that election.
But during an interview with Cruz on “Fox News Sunday,” host Chris Wallace pointed out another potential downside to blocking Obama’s nominations: Attorney General Eric Holder, a constant source of irritation for Republicans, would get to stay in his job longer. Holder announced in late September that he planned to retire, and earlier this month, Obama nominated Loretta Lynch, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, to take his place. Holder has stated that he will remain in his position until his successor’s nomination is confirmed by Congress.
“Are you saying that the Senate should refuse to confirm Loretta Lynch, the president’s new nominee for attorney general, and thereby leave Eric Holder, who you don’t like very much, in that position even longer?” asked Wallace.
Cruz largely avoided Wallace’s question, simply saying that Republicans “should use the constitutional checks and balances we have to rein in the executive.”
Wallace, however, persisted, and asked the question again. This time, Cruz still did not state directly that the Senate should block Lynch, but implied as much by saying that only positions of “vital national security” should get to the floor for a vote.
“In my view, the majority leader should decline to bring to the floor of the Senate any nomination other than vital national security positions,” the senator said. “Now, that is a serious and major step.”
In a prime-time address Thursday night, Obama announced that because Congress had failed to pass immigration reform, he would use his executive authority to bring deportation relief to 4 million or more undocumented immigrants.
The president’s executive action will protect undocumented parents whose children are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents, as well as immigrants who came to America as children and others with long-standing ties to the country, from being deported.
Obama defended his actions in an interview with George Stephanopoulos, host of ABC’s “This Week,” that aired Sunday morning. “The history is that I have issued fewer executive actions than most of my predecessors, by a long shot,” he said. “The difference is the response of Congress, and specifically the response of some of the Republicans.”
“But if you ask historians, take a look at the track records of the modern presidency, I’ve actually been very restrained, and I’ve been very restrained with respect to immigration,” Obama added. “I bent over backwards and will continue to do everything I can to get Congress to work because that’s my preference.”
By: Amanda Terkel, The Huffington Post, November 23, 2014
“Wanted; Less Terrible Political Coverage On TV”: An Increasingly Tiresome Model Of Political And Current Events Coverage
Jon Stewart is nothing if not America’s foremost cable news critic. On Sunday, he couldn’t help telling CNN what he thinks of them—and he did it on their network. “I want more of good CNN,” Stewart said. “CNN is very similar to the doll Chucky. Sometimes it’s good Chucky, but you really got to watch out for bad Chucky.”
It’s not just CNN. Much of what passes for political coverage these days is (to borrow a phrase) “bad Chucky.” What Stewart admires are the “brave correspondents” who cover things like the Arab Spring. What he doesn’t like, though—the breathless and feigned “BREAKING NEWS” time fillers and pearl clutching—is what cable news relies on the majority of the time spent between revolutions and natural disasters. It’s an increasingly tiresome model of political and current events coverage.
Aside from Fox News (as evidenced by the ratings), MSNBC’s Morning Joe (as evidenced by its status as a tastemaker), and comedy shows like the Daily Show and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver and HBO’s Real Time (by virtue of their place in the cultural zeitgeist), politics on TV doesn’t seem to be as good anymore. Maybe it’s just me. Then again, cable news ratings are down more or less across the board, and Americans find much of the media untrustworthy.
There are other exceptions, no doubt. But whether it’s cable news or the Sunday morning talk shows, something just doesn’t seem right. One gets the sense that they’re flailing, that the world has changed, but they haven’t. That they’re trying to figure out how to make it work, but so far it’s not coming together.
And I think it’s worth noting that among the shows that I believe to be “working” include several examples that are, ostensibly, comedy. And that makes me wonder if maybe the networks and shows might not want to look to them for guidance? And, of course, they already are: Jon Stewart was seriously considered as host for Meet The Press, a move that would have either changed the whole damn paradigm—or failed spectacularly. But the larger question lingers: Why do these shows work, while much of what passes for straight political commentary and analysis (not to be confused with straight news) seem so stale?
A theory: As our political system—not to mention our coverage of it—becomes more absurd, there’s a natural yearning to point out that absurdity in a way a show like Meet the Press is not equipped to handle. MTP and shows like it are all about how serious this is. These are senators, don’t ya know—statesmen. It’s like the whole format is left over from the Washington that existed in an Allen Drury novel, a time before the message was controlled and you rose in the ranks on your ability to avoid gaffes and raise cash.
Our politics—our culture at large, really—now disincentivizes loose informality when it comes to political coverage. It’s really quite schizophrenic: we urge you to be loose and fun and interesting, but we’ll crucify you if you trip up. ‘It’s all absurd, yes, but don’t take it lightly!’ seems to be the mantra, and there’s a million tripwires to look out for if you’re a senator talking on a set. So we settle on this arrangement that has this sort of bloodless/uber-serious political coverage on the one hand, and Jon Stewart absurdity on the other. A politician or pundit screws up on one, and is made fun of on the other.
But there’s a missing middle ground here—a warm wit, a little mischievous but not cynical—that Sunday shows kind of miss now.
I’m not advocating that we dumb down political analysis and chase the lowest common denominator. Quite the opposite. The irony is that shows that are meant to be funny are often also the smarter shows. There is a long tradition of Swiftian satire, and in this regard, the comedy shows are selling themselves short when they cast themselves as mere “entertainment.” One could argue that they are providing a service—and a service that could be replicated by other outlets and media.
But as faking sincerity is difficult, replicating insouciance is a challenge. It helps to have fun, smart hosts who don’t have an ideological ax to grind. That’s not to say Stewart and Oliver and Maher (just to mention three) don’t have a point of view; they tend to universally lean leftward. But they are probably more intellectually honest—more willing to call their own team for BS—than most political commentators.
They’re also funny. For them, the rule has to be to “be funny first.” You can have an agenda, but it’s always second fiddle to being funny. Or, if your show is about ideas, then I think it has to be intellectually stimulating first. My point here is that scoring political points probably can’t come first, at least if believe this is the model that works best.
Here, talent is important, too. There were a lot of things about that infamous Jon Stewart rant on Crossfire that I thought were unfair, but one thing he got completely right is that being funny is harder than doing political commentary. On the other hand, Stewart and Oliver and Maher have some huge advantages over their political interlocutors, such as a team of writers helping them come up with one-liners. They’re also held to a lower standard, partly at their own insistence, allowing them to quickly move back and forth between serious public-service style journalism and “we’re all just having fun” irreverence.
So I leave you with this: Could a cable network—tasked with providing content 24/7 replicate the quality of these shows, day in and day out? There’s probably no way that would happen. It’s so much easier and cheaper to book guests to gab about the news of the day. There’s little time or money for flying the perfect guest—maybe a smart author—across the country to have an elevated discussion. But it could work as a model for the Sunday shows which, let’s face it, would benefit from a little more levity.
Political commentary will slowly evolve, and what I think we’re witnessing right now is a kind of transitional period—an adolescence, if you will, and that’s rarely an attractive stage. The current formula for TV news isn’t working, and the networks know it, but they haven’t quite figured out what will replace it. Yes, there will always be a place for serious discussion about policy, but this much seems obvious: A decade from now, political punditry will look very different. And I’m betting on the funny guys.
By: Matt Lewis, The Daily Beast, November 19, 2014
“Get A Grip”: GOP Senator Warns Of ‘Anarchy’ And ‘Violence’
Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele appeared on msnbc yesterday, and when host Alex Wagner asked what kind of advice he’d give his party’s leaders in Congress, Steele offered some sound advice. “The first would be, ‘Get a grip,’” he said.
Steele’s comments came to mind after reading this report published last night by USA Today.
Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn warns there could be not only a political firestorm but acts of civil disobedience and even violence in reaction to President Obama’s executive order on immigration Thursday.
“The country’s going to go nuts, because they’re going to see it as a move outside the authority of the president, and it’s going to be a very serious situation,” Coburn said on Capital Download. “You’re going to see – hopefully not – but you could see instances of anarchy. … You could see violence.”
The far-right senator went on to say, “Here’s how people think: Well, if the law doesn’t apply to the president … then why should it apply to me?”
It’s hard to know what to make of such an odd perspective. If Coburn is correct, why weren’t there similar outbursts of anarchy and violence when Presidents Reagan and Bush took very similar executive actions? If the masses are so deeply concerned about separation of powers and the often-ambiguous lines surrounding executive authority, wouldn’t we have seen instances of pandemonium before?
As a practical matter, I’m not even sure how this would work. The Obama administration has limited resources, so it appears likely to prioritize deportations for criminals who entered the country illegally. So, in Coburn’s vision, anti-immigrant activists will become violent, perhaps literally rioting in the street, until more unobtrusive families are broken up?
Brian Beutler reminded Republicans overnight that “just because right-wingers are blind with rage doesn’t mean Obama’s immigration action is illegal.”
It turns out that the laws on the books actually don’t say what you might think they say. Other presidents have discovered this, too. And since nobody wants to write a “maybe I should’ve asked some lawyers first” mea culpa column, they shifted the debate from the terrain of laws to the murkier terrain of political precedent, norms, and procedure. […]
What’s new is that Republicans have perfected a strategy of rejectionism with the help of a media amplification infrastructure—Fox News, Drudge, Limbaugh—that the left hasn’t adopted and doesn’t yet enjoy. Rather than simply fight to reverse the policy in Congress and on the campaign trail—as liberals do when Republicans weaken environmental enforcement—the right can also now scream “Caesar!” without reference to any objective standards, and get a full hearing.
“Get a grip,” indeed.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, November 20, 2014
“Television Media Played Into Republicans’ Hands”: TV News Does A Complete 180 On Ebola Coverage After Midterms
Network news coverage of the Ebola virus abruptly and dramatically fell off following the midterm elections earlier this month, according to a new study by Media Matters.
After reviewing transcripts from Oct. 7 to Nov. 17 in the 5-11 p.m. time slot, Media Matters discovered that evening broadcast and cable news programs aired close to 1,000 segments on Ebola in the four weeks leading up to the elections, and only 49 segments in the two weeks that followed.
“In early October, the GOP developed a plan to make the federal government’s response to Ebola a central part of its midterm elections strategy,” the study reads. “Television media played into Republicans’ hands, helping to foment panic about the disease.”
CNN showed the most significant decrease in Ebola coverage following the midterms, airing 335 segments in the weeks leading up to Election Day and just 10 in the period after. Fox News’ coverage fell from 281 segments to 10, and MSNBC recorded a disparity of 222 segments to 13.
Broadcast networks showed a pronounced dip in their Ebola coverage as well.
“CBS’ 54 segments dropped to six, NBC’s 44 segments dropped to five, and ABC’s 39 segments dropped to four,” according to the study.
But even before the compilation of this data — before the correlation between Ebola and the midterm elections became so clear — the media faced harsh criticism for the fervor and panic with which it reported on a virus that had only infected, at most, a handful of U.S. citizens.
In October, Fox News’ Shepard Smith scolded his colleagues in the press for their “irresponsible” and “hysterical” handling of the story.
USA Today columnist Rem Rieder, notes Media Matters, called the “breathless, alarmist reports” on Ebola “the antithesis of what responsible journalists should be doing,” in a piece published a week prior to the midterms.
And despite all the reports and panels, and the hours upon hours of segments leading up to Election Day, the coverage was still rife with misinformation and largely incomplete. News outlets obsessively scrutinized the handling of few isolated cases of Ebola within the U.S. while all but ignoring the thousands dying from the disease at the source of the outbreak.
“If poor media coverage can create an atmosphere of anxiety and misinformation, then the right kind of coverage can lead to a more active and productive public response,” Jason Linkins wrote for The Huffington Post in October. “To achieve this, the media needs to recognize that the true center of gravity in the Ebola story is the crisis in West Africa.”
By: Jackson Connor, The Huffington Post Blog, November 19, 2014
“Beware Of Voting Based On Fears Stoked By Politicians”: Ebola, ISIS, The Border; So Much To Fear, So Little Time!
If there’s a pandemic or crisis that we should really be worried about, it’s this relentless election-time fear-mongering.
If you’re not afraid, you are clearly not paying attention. So much to be fearful of, so little time!
If there is a pandemic to be actually worried about, it’s the pandemic of fear as we approach the midterm elections. Election time almost always is a time for fear-mongering, but this particular season seems to be more so than in the past.
Ebola, a horrific disease for sure, is surely threatening all the people of the United States, despite the tiny number of people who have contracted it while treating people who actually have it. However, the fear of Ebola has infected vast numbers of Americans who will never have the opportunity to come into contact with someone who actually has it. But be afraid!
ISIS, the more common name for the so-called Islamic State, is a threat to everyday Americans. After all, I heard it on Fox News! Although this group of barbaric and inhumane humans is having a tough time conquering the geography they actually inhabit, their real goal is to come after us. And they will do so by simply walking across our Southern border with Mexico, because, you know, that border is so porous and unprotected.
Which brings us to undocumented people in this country. You should be afraid of them too! They’ll take your jobs (never mind that you don’t want to do the burdensome and humble jobs they are willing to do)! They are only here to reap the rewards of the American safety net (such as it is) and thereby raise your taxes.
And in a sleight of hand mindboggling in its absurdity, politicians are combining these three fears into one by getting you exercised over ISIS terrorists coming into the United States from Mexico, infected with Ebola. All because this president (who has presided over more deportations in his first term than George W. Bush did in his entire presidency) refuses to take these fears seriously, as does the entire Democratic Party.
And just for good measure, why don’t we add on our fears about race? It’s interesting, isn’t it, that these Ebola-infected ISIS terrorists are only a threat from our brown-skinned Southern border, not from the white-skinned northern border with Canada? White people, after all, just couldn’t be this bad. The tragic death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and the subsequent reaction to it, only underscores the threat of a non-white population that is seething with anger and ready to get back at the white population that oppresses them. So much to be afraid of here.
Religion is not immune from fear-mongering either. The famous New England preacher Jonathan Edwards is perhaps most noted for his “sinners in the hands of an angry God” sermon, in which he had people collapsing out of fear of a God who dangles them over the burning fires of hell, held by a spider web-thin strand of hope. One gets the impression that God would take great delight in letting them go. Modern religion is no different. Many conservative religionists believe that “they” are coming to get us, to force their secular beliefs on us, and win the so-called War on Religion. Much of the evangelical church seems bent on raising their members’ paranoia and anxiety about the culture that is hostile to them. And it sure does fill the coffers on Sunday morning.
Fear is not necessarily a bad thing. It is indeed the human being’s natural and appropriate response to danger. Jews were right to fear the Nazis. Bicycle riders are prudent to fear being clipped by a passing car. The unemployed have a right to be anxious about the ravages on their families exacted by their unemployment. Americans have a right to fear over-zealous and unwarranted surveillance by the NSA.
Oddly, though, Americans are not fearful enough when it comes to real threats. Humans seem to be the only species that fouls our own nest, perfectly willing not to fear the environmental calamity our present course of inaction will surely wreak on the entire world, unless we reduce our carbon emissions, or entirely deny the science that foretells it. Smokers (I am one) seem entirely willing to live with the danger of self destructive behavior, in hopes of escaping its devastating consequences. Racism, income inequality, and a rising political and financial oligarchy threaten the very existence of American democracy, yet we are paralyzed when it comes to talking honestly about these issues.
But fear of something that is not actually a threat is not rightful fear, but rather paranoia. Feeling under attack may be a great way to raise money in churches and political races, but it’s a terrible way to solve the problems that actually face us. But in order to discern the difference between things that rightly should be feared, and those that shouldn’t, we need to be willing to talk about our fears and face into them. Which brings us to FDR’s first inaugural speech assertion that “we have nothing to fear but fear itself.” Indeed. Nothing may actually threaten America more than our own fears.
Perhaps the worst fallout from all this is that when we are gripped by fear, we usually make terrible decisions. Like in elections. All of us should be going to the polls to vote this week. It is the most important civic duty we have as citizens, and in some ways, it’s the our only shot at changing things for good. But beware of voting based on the fears stoked by politicians for their own political gain — on both sides. It’s a terrible way to make the important decisions about whom to vote for.
And know this: No politician is going to take away your fear and anxiety. If you’re already fearful about contracting Ebola, finding an ISIS terrorist at your door, or the anxiety you feel when you encounter a person of color, you won’t find any relief on the day after the election. That’s work you and I have to do for ourselves, every day. We need to separate trumped-up fears from the legitimate ones. The state of the nation and the state of humankind may depend on it. Now that’s something to be fearful about.
By: Gene Robinson, The Daily Beast, November 2, 2014
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