A mixed month

First, a program note is in order. This column is woefully late, I realize. I was on vacation for the first week of the month, and then the backlog of important issues demanded my attention earlier this week. Also, since September is already one-third over, I am not going to offer up many predictions at the end of the column, since I feel it would be cheating when I've got data to look at that I normally wouldn't. Also, because I am feeling lazy. All in all, what this means is that it's going to be a very short column this month, so my apologies. We'll be back on our normal schedule next month, I promise.

OK, with that out of the way, let's take a look at how President Obama did in job approval polling last month. The results were mixed, but overall fairly positive. Here's the new chart:

[Click on graph to see larger-scale version.]

August, 2014

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President Barack Obama has always been a reluctant warrior. It is, in fact, one of the big reasons he was elected, since America had turned away from the cowboy swagger of Bush and Cheney by 2008. Tonight, President Obama laid out the case for escalating a war we've already begun, in Iraq and Syria. He presented his plan to the public, and gave his reasons for why America should become more involved in the fight against the Islamic State (or, variously, ISIS or ISIL), and explained what America would and would not be doing in the coming months.

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By the time I post this article, the election returns may have already been announced in New York state's Democratic gubernatorial primary. I state this up front to let readers know that I'm writing this before knowing how big a margin of victory the current governor, Andrew Cuomo, manages to gain over his Progressive challenger, Zephyr Teachout. Cuomo's victory is pretty much a foregone conclusion, but the size of his victory may be an important gauge of the growth of the Progressives, or what has previously been called "the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party." If Teachout does better than expected, it could have reverberations in the next few years, as the 2016 presidential contest gets underway.

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[Note: You'll have to forgive my somewhat-belated commentary on the shakeup in the Kansas Senate race, but I was on vacation all of last week.]

Last week, a political tornado of sorts happened in Kansas (of all places), raising the possibility of this Senate race becoming the tipping point which could decide partisan control of the Senate for the next two years. Democratic candidate Chad Taylor attempted to drop out of the race completely, clearing the field for Independent Greg Orman to take on sitting Senator Pat Roberts. Orman, however, is being coy by refusing to announce which party he'll caucus with on the all-important vote for Senate Majority Leader, should Orman win his race. If he does beat Roberts, Orman will become the third sitting Independent in the Senate.

While Democrats are usually said to have a 55-45 advantage in the current Senate, their actual number is technically "53+2," since both Vermont's Bernie Sanders and Maine's Angus King do not call themselves Democrats, while generally caucusing with Democrats (at least, for leadership votes). In addition, before he retired, Connecticut's Joe Lieberman was forced to run as an Independent when he lost his Democratic primary. Added together, that would be four senators in the past few years who were (or are) not formally members of the Democratic or Republican parties. That's not an overwhelming amount of senators, so it'd be premature to declare it any sort of general trend, but it is nonetheless interesting in a wonky sort of way. Added to the mix was the recent news from the Alaska governor's race, where the Democratic candidate formed a fusion ticket with the Independent in the race (putting the Independent on top of the ticket, with the Democrat running for lieutenant governor).

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Because I didn't know what I was getting into, this article's original title was "Memo To Democrats: Talking Points" -- it wasn't until I had done a few weeks' worth that I settled on the column series' current label.

Also because I was unaware that I was starting a long-running series, the format is rather crude and the talking points were of a more general or generic nature (rather than being specifically targeted to individual issues). It was more advice on how to craft your own talking points, in essence. The awards didn't occur to me until I had done over a month of these columns, and the snazzy graphics were also added later, by our in-house cartoonist. So you'll have to forgive the raw and unfinished look of this column. As I said, I didn't know what I was starting -- who knows, if the original had run on a Wednesday, maybe I never would have followed up with the "let's wrap up the week" concept. About the only thing I kept consistent was to limit the list to only seven items, really.

This column was written over a year later than the other ones I've run this week, right around the time I launched my own blog. But, being the first of its kind, I thought it was a good capstone to this week of looking back to the very start of my blogging career. Have a great weekend everyone, and remember that fresh new columns will start up once again on Monday. Thanks for your patience in reading this week's re-runs, as well.

Originally published September 14, 2007, titled:
"Memo To Democrats: Talking Points"

So Petraeus and Crocker have reported, President Bush has spoken to the nation, and the congressional war debate is slated to begin in earnest next week. Since the Democrats seem to be incapable of staying "on message" the way Republicans so effortlessly manage to do, I'd like to steal a page from the Republican playbook. It's an idea whose time has come: Democratic talking points.

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I knew I had written about this subject previously (which still annoys me no end, whenever I see it on my television screen), but I was kind of surprised to see how far back this piece was dated. This was the seventh blog post I ever wrote for the Huffington Post.

Originally published July 20, 2006

Where are all the "Ban Video Game Violence" crusaders when you need them?

There has been a trend in the television news media over the last decade which needs to be stopped. This trend is to show animated mockups while reporting war stories. These seldom enhance the news value of the story, instead merely giving viewers something to watch while the anchor reads the story.

This reduction of war to the level of a video game is disrespectful and demeaning for all concerned: soldiers who fight and die on the battlefield; relatives of soldiers who watch their loved ones' deaths reduced to a cartoon; the news media for sanitizing the brutality and reality of war to the level of a bloodless video game; and finally the viewing public for being essentially told they are children who can't handle adult images of combat wounds and death.

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You'll note, when reading this article, that since it was written, a minimum wage hike did actually pass Congress. You'll also note that they did not add a COLA provision to the bill. While the issue has come up again recently (with proposals to raise minimum wage to $9.00 or $10.00 an hour), this time around there does seem to be a serious push towards adding in a COLA, so that this will never again have to be such an enormous partisan battle in Congress. This is progress, and is good news (or, at least, it will be if-and-when it becomes law). This was the third blog post I ever wrote.

Originally published June 14, 2006

At least Congress appreciates irony. The following two AP stories appeared within hours of each other, both written by Andrew Taylor:

"House Panel Recommends Minimum Wage Hike"

"House Lawmakers Accept $3,300 Pay Hike"

The first article details how the House Appropriations Committee voted 32-27 to approve an amendment to a health and education bill to raise the minimum wage from $5.15 an hour to $7.25. The author of the amendment, Rep. George Miller [D-CA], is quoted saying, "The minimum wage is lower than it has been at any time since 1956. Congress' refusal to raise the minimum wage shows an utter disrespect for millions of Americans who work hard every day and still struggle to meet even the most basic needs." He obviously feels strongly about it, but unfortunately the minimum wage raise will probably not survive when it gets to the House floor since the Appropriations Committee doesn't even have jurisdiction over the issue. In other words, there's virtually no chance the Republican-dominated House is going to pass it any time soon. The article should really have a sub-head reading: "But It Ain't Going To Happen".

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Again, if you missed it, please see the Program Note I wrote on Monday about this week's columns. Oh, I should also mention that I didn't have time to check all the links from these ancient articles, so I cannot guarantee that some of them haven't gone dark in the meantime -- if so, my apologies.

This was the second column I wrote for the Huffington Post, and even though Bernie Sanders is now a United States Senator (not to mention Elizabeth Warren), this issue has, to the best of my knowledge, never been addressed or pushed in the intervening eight years. Democrats should embrace real Populism, because it is the only way to fight the massive disparities in income and wealth in this country. The issue below, in my opinion, would be a dandy place to start.

Originally published June 12, 2006

Continuing the theme of picking real and tangible issues for Democratic campaigns: imagine a candidate running on the issue of lowering credit card costs. How many voters in Red State America would strongly consider electing a Democrat if it meant the cost of their credit cards would go down? How many swing voters would be swung by such an appeal? Most importantly, how many economically-struggling disenfranchised citizens would take the time to register and vote if they were promised an end to 28% or 29% interest rates? These are questions the Democratic party needs to seriously consider as it wonders how to motivate voters to get to the polls.

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Note: In case you missed it, please see the separate Program Note I just posted, for an explanation of what to expect in this week's columns.

This was the first column I ever wrote, for the Huffington Post (I didn't start my own blog until a year later, in the summer of 2007). Democrats were the "out" party in both the House and Senate, and I thought it was worth the attempt to get them to focus a little better. In it, you can also see the germination of the idea which later became my weekly "Friday Talking Points" columns.

Originally published June 9, 2006

You've got to hand it to Republicans, they sure know how to demagogue. The Senate spent this week forcing votes on GOP lost causes. First up was the gay marriage amendment, then came repealing the estate tax. and waiting in the wings is a flag-burning amendment. Lefties everywhere have decried these as cheap political stunts designed to generate campaign fodder for the fall midterms. They're missing the point. Sure, these forced votes are cynical political hackery. The real question is: why can't Democrats manage to do the same?

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Just to inform everyone: I will be on vacation all week long. There's an off chance that I might write something new on Thursday or Friday, but it is unlikely, so please don't be disappointed if I don't manage to.

Instead of new columns this week, I dug way back into the misty shrouds of time to re-run some of my earliest columns. These are all (except maybe Friday's) from my first two months of blogging, in June and July of 2006. Some of the points made in these early columns are just as relevant (and demanding of attention) now as they were back then -- a sad commentary on our elected officials, in a way. To set the stage: back then, Democrats were in the minority in both houses of Congress, George W. Bush was president, and midterm elections were approaching. Of course, we all now know that the 2006 midterms were a victorious "wave" election for Democrats in Congress, but that was in no way assured when I wrote these columns.

Anyway, sorry for the week of repeats, but even I've got to get away from politics every so often. New columns (starting, hopefully, with the "Obama Poll Watch" column which really should have run today) will resume next Monday. Hope everyone had a happy Labor Day!

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant