Do as I say, not as I do! Obama has signed the Family Smoking Prevention Act into law which allows the FDA to regulate smoking thereby putting America further on the path to utter uncoolness. This is great news for large tobacco companies, because no competing companies will be able to invent new refreshingly, smooth products for the 21st-century. Reason explains:Also, Gallup polling shows that a record-high number of Americans (17%) can't mind their own goddamn business and want smoking to be made "illegal", even though the percentage of smokers is at an all-time low since Jamestown was founded in 1607. They must be getting their anti-smoking paranoia from the Thugocracy in Iran which has been getting a lot of press lately.Today President Obama plans to sign the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, which authorizes the Food and Drug Administration to regulate cigarettes and other tobacco products. In Friday's New York Times, business columnist Joe Nocera blows kisses at former FDA chief David Kessler, anti-smoking activist Matthew Myers, and former Philip Morris executive Steven Parrish for their roles in producing the law. Calling it "a demonstrably good thing," Nocera tells this trio of "unlikely partners" to "take a bow, fellas."
Although Nocera acknowledges "critics" who say FDA regulation will serve mainly to protect Philip Morris' market share, he assures readers they are a "small minority." Yet he does not bother to address their arguments, and his case for the law supported by Kessler, Myers, and Parrish is based almost entirely on the unexamined assumption that more regulation is always better.
The Pentagon tends to shy away from this type of polling, since keeping the military apolitical in the public's eye has been US policy ever since the days of the George Washington administration. But, up until now the only thing connecting the dots between military members voting Republican was an unscientific Military Times poll and a lot of empirical evidence garnered from gabbing it up with others in uniform. But, Gallup has released the results of an extensive poll involving 138,000 interviews of veterans, who they define as anyone who is serving on active-duty or who has ever been in the service.
Although the GOP has been sucking ass lately, they still have a lock on those in uniform, even with those youngsters who are supposedly all Obamatrons. Gallup provides a very thorough analysis, but even a bonehead could probably understand the logic that 1) The GOP has tried for decades to brand itself as the party of national security, and 2) People in the military probably give a shit about national security.
Zombie Jefferson Sez "I Was a Libertarian Before It Was Cool, Bitches!!"If gay bashing is becoming less in vogue among Republicans, it's unclear which other cultural issues -- areas where Republicans sometimes favor bigger, more statist government -- might take its place. Yes, there's always abortion. But I'm surprised there hasn't been more anti-immigrant sentiment, as often happens when jobs are scarce; perhaps the Republicans' poor performance among Latino voters on November 4th might have scared them away from that issue. Marijuana legalization seems to be gaining some traction (although more among pundits than policymakers), but about half the conservative commentariat (see Glenn Beck, for instance, who calls himself a libertarian) seems to embrace it.Matt Welch snarks that the GOP "miraculously relocated some of its alleged principles at the precise moment it lost power", and seeing how damaging the Bush years were to the GOP's fiscal conservative image, he's pretty much on the spot. But, hey, when your party is less popular than Hugo Chavez by polling data, you can only improve.
Maybe you see a pattern there and maybe you don't. But of the roughly four different pathways the Republicans could take in the post-Obama universe -- toward Ron Paulesque libertarianism, toward Sarah Palinesque cultural populism, toward Mike Huckabeesque big-government conservatism, or toward Olympia Snowesque moderation/ good-governmentism -- the libertarian side would seem to have had the best go of things in the First 100 Days.
We Wants Gulags!The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 20% disagree and say socialism is better. Twenty-seven percent (27%) are not sure which is better.I blame the early 80s advocacy of communist plots masquerading as cartoon shows such as The Smurfs for warping impressionable minds. There's an interesting analysis at ePinion about Papa Smurf being Karl Marx while Brainy is met to symbolize Trotsky because he's always getting kicked out of the Smurf Village. If that sounds a bit too teh crazy for ya, then the negative view of capitalism probably has to do with the current economic malaise.
Adults under 30 are essentially evenly divided: 37% prefer capitalism, 33% socialism, and 30% are undecided.
Corporate Fat Cats Cramping Mr. Cool's StyleMr. Obama’s advisers argued that to at least some extent, this was a sentiment they could tap to push through his measures in Congress, including raising taxes on the wealthy. They pointed out that in his speech to Congress, Mr. Obama denounced corporations that “use taxpayer money to pad their paychecks or buy fancy drapes or disappear on a private jet.”Regarding AIG paying out $1B in bonuses for gross incompetence, the President would have had a better leg to stand on with the criticism if the feds hadn't just given them another $30B in loans two weeks ago. Obama likes to slam the fat cat culture, but why does he keep dumping more and more taxpayer dollars into their coffers? It should also be noted that AIG gave billions of bailout money to European banks, which has only recently been disclosed...I'm sure that'll stimulate job growth for Americans out of work! So while our newfound economic system based upon running up our debt to fund politically-connected zombie banks collapses around us, the Obama media strategy will be to distance himself from the inevitable fallout. At least he'll still be Mr. Cool in the public's eye.
“The president has been very clear about this,” Mr. Axelrod said. “There is reason for anger, but we also have to solve the problem. We need a functioning credit system. That’s our responsibility, and he intends to meet it.”
Still, aides acknowledged the risks of a backlash as Mr. Obama tries to signal that he shares American anger but pushes for more bail-out money for banks and Wall Street.
As you can see above from the Gallup poll, 65% of Americans approve of Obama's strategy in Afghanistan of plussing up the boots on ground by about 17K. This along with military cooperation with Pakistan and improved intelligence sharing is certainly a good start. With Pakistan's government cutting deals with the Tehrik-i-Taliban, an aggressive policy is needed sooner rather than later for a spring that could be ugly. Ironically, more Republicans support the President's foreign policy strategy than Democrats, which goes to show that most conservatives aren't morans who want Obama to fail. Failure in Afghanistan means more of our troops and allies getting killed and reverting back to a radical Islamic state to breed terrorists. Who the fuck wants that? So, in that case, yeah, I support the Commander-in-Chief. I suspect most conservatives who rail against Obama think the stimulus bill is a big pile of dog shit rather than his foreign policy, and polling supports that hypothesis.
The economic malaise has everything to do with dissatisfaction
