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Kudos to Up with Chris Hayes for having not one but TWO actual Syrians on his show to talk about Syria. Like hurricanes in Hartford, Hereford, and Hampshire, that hardly ever happens.

But watch the body language on the former Syrian Brigadier General Akil Hashem as Amy Goodman interrupts him. Yes, she's making a well-informed point about international negotiations and eliminating a military option.

But one could hardly notice what she was saying given the general's eye rolls and folded arms. This isn't an Arab problem. John McCain makes the exact same face. :D

On topic, I have to wonder: what is a former Brigadier General doing meeting with John McCain about Syria and what real-world results might come from such a meeting? Given Senator McCain's perpetual presence on the other Sunday shows, I expect it's all about pushing the interventionist narrative that has failed us so many times before.

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I've been arguing this for weeks on The Professional Left Podcast, and want it to be in writing, on the record:

I don't think Mitt Romney wants to win this election.

It's not just that an obviously competent businessman (in terms of making capitalism work for him) is having such a hard time managing a staff of incompetents. Your own spokesman claims your message is like an etch-a-sketch and goes completely off message on whether Obamacare is a tax. You claim you like firing people, but this guy is still on your staff.

Another staffer misspells "America" and "Reagan" and more on campaign projects. You claim you like firing people who don't provide good service. Even Rupert Murdoch can't figure out why you're holding on to these staffers. The elephant in the car elevator is, you don't want to be President.

And really, Mitt, who can blame you? You're a billionaire who has a newly renovated house in California (one of six) and a great life ahead of you as a grandfather, dressage horse investor, and glad-handing board room man about town. Being the Republican nominee against Barack Obama in 2012 puts you in the history books without inconveniencing you into having to, you know, govern.

And trust me, Mitt, Fox News and Rush Limbaugh don't want you to win, either. Their bottom line is only secured with four more years of Obama bashing. And betcha ten thousand dollars Michelle Malkin already has a book contract for Spring 2013 to write some lie-fest entitled "Eric Holder, Worse than Seven Hitlers." You'll ruin all her plans if you actually win.

In the meantime, we can't wait to watch the horse ballet that is called the Romney 2012 campaign. Hint: make Bachmann your running mate. And put her in charge of messaging.

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You know, back in 1983, there was this show called Manimal on NBC. It was so bad that I swore I would never miss a single episode, because I was sure it would be cancelled before Christmas. And it was.

I feel a similar temporal urgency about MSNBC's latest offering for their 3 pm timeslot, "The Cycle." It's clearly a show with training wheels for up and coming possible anchor talent, and it has all the markings of a summer replacement series. Remember back in 1977 when Starland Vocal Band (Afternoon Delight) had their own summer TV variety show? Neither do any of the anchors for "The Cycle." They weren't born yet.

Given a brand new show with a relatively inexperienced and young cast, there are bound to be clumsy moments. But S.E. Cupp's revelation today that the well-researched months long investigation of Fast and Furious by Fortune Magazine had been debunked, was something special.

Touré: Who did the debunking?

S.E. Cupp: Oh, you can read about it at Townhall.

Touré: Ooooooooh.

I love how he just about fell out of his chair on that. And you can tell that as she's saying it, depending on a right wing opinion blog for her argument, she knows she's just climbed way out on a limb. Way out.

But full disclosure: I am a liberal blogger. I am all for treating blogs that do any amount of serious fact-based reporting (such as Crooks and Liars) as serious news sources, except when, like my own smaller blog, they have no pretense of doing any reporting. At my blog, Blue Gal, I do not investigate using primary sources or report on anything, I merely comment as a partisan on my opinion of events. S.E. Cupp just threw a Townhall blog post in the air as somehow debunking a six-month fact infused investigation of the real story behind a right wing witch hunt from a real reporter at a real magazine. I would be just as appalled if Crystal Ball had held up my own photoshop of Andrew Breitbart in heaven as some sort of proof of a political and theological point. There is no "there" there, Ms. Cupp. And you opened your mouth before you realized that you were at the big people's table.

Open Thread below...

In a discussion of whether Republicans actually believe their anti-debt at all costs rhetoric, Ezra Klein reminds the panel that if Romney wins the Presidential Election, that indicates a toppling of the electorate that assumes a Republican House and Senate as well. Klein asserts that with both houses of Congress and the White House under their control, the Republicans have too much invested in the Ryan Budget not to pass it.

Transcript via Lexis-Nexis:

Here`s a provocative idea that Joe Wiesenthal at "Business Insider" wrote about. He basically said, "Look, we have a jobs deficit in this country. We`re mired in sluggish growth. We need expansionary fiscal policy. The Fed isn`t providing what they should be providing."
Karl you`ve written eloquently on that point.
If you believe an expansionary policy, if you think that`s the way out of the mess, if that`s what you`re voting on, you have a better chance of getting expansionary policy, out of Mitt Romney, despite the noises he`s making about austerity, than you do out of President Barack Obama. The reason being all of a sudden the Republican House would be willing to engage in expansionary policy as soon as they had a Republican president. Do you think that`s true?
SMITH: I don`t know. Like I was just saying before --
HAYES: You can`t say that, we`re on cable news.
SMITH: If I firmly believe they were lying and cynical, I would go for that and I would be happy with that. People say all sorts of things to get elected. But what matters in the end is what happens to real people.
I would support Romney and support the House by thinking they would do expansionary policy. But more and more, I get slightly convinced they`re believing their own B.S. and that worries me, right? Once you really start to believe that we need to cut the debt, then you`re dangerous. I mean, as long as it`s just a lie, you`re OK.
HAYES: Yes, this is a great question. Are they bad -- how bad is the faith on this conversation? Because it actually really does matter. Is this completely disingenuous? Or do they now believe it?
KLEIN: Not only do I think they believe it. I think it`s important to, we have a problem. We say Mitt Romney will get elected. What happens if Mitt Romney gets elected, is a Republican Senate and a Republican House. What they`re going to do, I firmly believe this for better or worse --
HAYES: Wait, stop right there, you say if Mitt Romney is elected, Republican Senate and Republican House, you`re saying because the conditions --
(CROSSTALK)
KLEIN: Yes, it tips that way. I think through budget reconciliation there will not be a filibuster, because it will just be a budget bill. They`re going to pass the Paul Ryan budget. I means, the House and the Senate spent two years taking vote after vote preparing to pass the Paul Ryan budget, dealing with the political consequences. He`s not going to come in and saying, oh, ha, ha, we`re going Keynesian.
SMITH: Right.
KLEIN: Conversely with Obama, I do know they think about this when we come to the sort of the tax-megadon, the debt ceiling and tax cut expiration, they do think a lot about how to get the infrastructure into that package. They do think about how to get tax cuts in there.
There is a Keynesian divide in American politics today. And while in another world you might see Romney go to short-term tax hits. I do think that congressional Republicans truly believe that the key think they need to do, the one thing to expend political capital on is the Ryan budget. And they will.
HAYES: They`ve convinced themselves that the political case they`ve been making is that debt stands for a symbolic token of the way we`ve lost our way, the way we lost our virtue, the thing that`s accelerating our decline --
KLEIN: They don`t think it`s symbolic.
HAYES: No, no, I know. But they now believe what they`ve been saying.

Anyone who thinks the Tea Party Caucus will walk back their rhetoric to save the economy (or the Republic) isn't paying attention. The House Republicans voted to a person in favor of ending Medicare and turning it into a voucher program. This election is a referendum on whether that should happen.

This short clip (starting at 3:20) from last night's Daily Show with Jon Stewart is so telling. David Gregory gets Ron Paul on the hotseat, and instead of questioning him on his insane policy proposals (privatizing the Transportation Safety Administration and cutting food programs for children, not to mention huge cuts in Social Security and Medicare) Gregory pushes the beltway frontrunner narrative.

It's close to "Well, enough about Gingrich and Romney, what do YOU think of Gingrich and Romney?"

Or, as Stewart puts it, "Would you like to go out Saturday night? I know this quiet little place where I can tell you which one of your friends I'd like to [expletive]."

I'm absolutely no fan of Ron Paul or his Libertarianism, but it would serve everyone in the beltway media right if he won in Iowa.

Of course, if Gingrich comes in second, he'll still be the frontrunner for David Gregory. Douche.

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Reading recent articles about people shopping at WalMart at midnight on the first (which has been going on for several years) and at exactly the same time the noon people on MSNBC were talking about Newt Gingrich as if his candidacy is a real thing in the world? I broke down and cried for ten minutes. I have a real hate-love-hate thing with Chris Matthews, but I owe Chris a thank you for saying what needs to be said at least in this clip. I still expect Chris Matthews to fail us -- he'll cover this like a horse race no matter how awful the horses are, for ratings. He'd devote another hour to Sarah Palin if she facebooked an endorsement.

That said, I agree with Chris Matthews: I, too, am very very sad for our Republic. Transcript below the fold; h/t Heather for it and the video:

Continue reading »

She's either running for President or she's a crazy person? To quote Jon Stewart, "I know the answer to that one!"

Open thread below....