David Corn

Like Sarah Palin, I'm outta here. Well, not exactly. I am moving this blog from CQPolitics.com to AOL's PoliticsDaily.com.

I've had a great ride at CQ, and I am quite grateful to Robert Merry and Bruce Drake, who created and built this site, for inviting me to be part of a team that produces high-quality journalism and analysis. Now that CQ is being absorbed by Roll Call, Merry and Drake are leaving CQ and off to new challenges. I wish them both much success.

The media world we reporters, commentators, bloggers and Twitterers now live in is ever-changing and ever-churning. Many of us need to tap-dance on multiple platforms simultaneously. It can be exciting--but also tiring. I long for those summers when I worked for a weekly magazine that went biweekly--and there was no website beast to feed. But that was then.

These days, journalists are like many other Americans: you never know where the cliff's edge is. Security is ephemeral. And outlets are declining, even as the digital revolution allows for a greater and freer (in all meanings of the word) flow of information. Still, within this uncertain environment, great work is being done by professionals who care about the business of creating and disseminating important news and commentary. I've been fortunate to be part of one of these experiments: CQPolitics.com. I hope it continues to thrive under the new management. Please keep it bookmarked. (I'm a fan especially of Jonathan Allen  Craig Crawford  Taegan Goddard,  and Jeff Stein.)

I also feel lucky to be joining PoliticsDaily.com, which began this spring. It has recruited some of the best political journalists in the business and some of my favorites, including Lynn Sweet, Jill Lawrence, Walter Shapiro, and Carl Cannon. Please check it out and follow me there. (For those of you who come to this blog via the davidcorn.com URL, it may take a day or so for the new web forwarding to kick in. In the meantime, once I start at PoliticsDaily--tomorrow or Friday--you can find my new spot directly here. And if you get lost along the way, look for directions in my tweets.)

The other day I had to write a fundraising appeal for my home base, Mother Jones. It's not that much fun to shake the can for money. But it's not so bad when you're hitting up people for an endeavor you believe in--and that covers your paycheck. I noted that even though Barack Obama has brought change to Washington, not enough in Washington has changed. Moreover, given the stakes these days--with an economy on its knees, trillions of dollars flowing to and fro in various bailouts, two wars being fought, the health care system in trouble, the climate imperiled--there's more of a need than ever for good journalism that explains the complex matters at hand and that brings transparency and accountability to the deciders of Washington. CQPolitics.com and PoliticsDaily.com both aim to do that. Long may they wave--and have a successful business model.

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Again, it's an on-the-run day for me. Partly because I've just posted a Mother Jones exclusive, in which I reveal that the National Archives is considering conducting forensic tests to obtain information that could help solve one of the greatest political mysteries of the 20th Century: what was said during the 18 and 1/2 minute gap in Nixon's Watergate tapes. These tests do not involve  trying to recapture the obliterated audio. The Archives has attempted that in the past--and failed. Instead, the Archives unit that handles the Watergate files, responding to a request from a Watergate hobbyist, has proposed using a CSI-ish procedure to recover what might be missing notes chronicling this infamous meeting between Nixon and his chief of staff, H.R. "Bob" Haldeman three days after the Watergate break-in.

David Paynter, the archivist in charge of the Watergate collection says, "Here's another avenue to shed light on an important episode in history. It's very exciting."

Read all about it here.

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Can it be true that the media now don't have Sarah Palin to kick around? At least not Governor Palin. She's officially outta there. Some of her final tweets were ridiculous.

Last state twitter. Thank you Alaska! I love you. God bless Alaska....

So it's, I love you, but it's best that I leave you. That's just like a bad break-up. ("It's not you, Alaska, the problem is me....") And there was this one:

W/ kids in camper...AK is BIG/WILD/GOOD LIFE;feel freedom here

As if Palin had gone Kerouac or Merry Prankster: drop out, work is for suckers.

In any event, it seems doubtful Plain will really be gone--as in silent. As she writes--or oversees the ghostwriting of--her book, she'll certainly make various pronouncements that can fuel cable chat about her and her possible presidential ambitions. She might campaign for GOP candidates, if she can find one or two who will accept her assistance.

I wonder if she will continue to be an anti-media crusader. Bashing the elite press used to have a lot of salience with the world of conservatives and Republicans. Jesse Helms went after CBS News (and Dan Rather) for years. These days, though, the elite media just ain't what they used to be. Can anyone argue with a straight face that the United States will lose the war in Afghanistan because of how CBS reports on the war? (Much of the conservative case against the media in the 1970s and 1980s flowed from the notion that the lilly-liver liberals in the media undermined the US military effort in Vietnam.) But suggesting today that CBS News's reports on Afghanistan will affect the outcome would probably get you laughs in most quarters. (Sorry, Walter Cronkite. RIP.)

The big media has lost power and influence, and it's not the foil it once was. Palin's anti-media rants will win over those conservatives who believe that Fox News is the only accurate depiction of reality. There are millions who fall into this category, but it's not an expanding slice of the population. And it's not likely sizeable enough to support a national political effort.

Meanwhile, there surely are Paliniacs who will stand by her. Look at this message put out by TeamSarah.org:

"Sarah Palin has always been an intensely independent woman-- always true to her faith, her family and call to public service. She has provided women with a new political role model, offering a positive example of grace and poise as she deflected the barrage of baseless personal attacks on her family," said Team Sarah Co-Founder Marjorie Dannenfelser. "Her entrance onto the public stage has attracted massive numbers of Americans new to the political process. We have every confidence she will have an equal and profound impact in whatever projects she undertakes as a private citizen."

True to her "call to public service." Didn't she just bail on public service? The statement continues:

"Team Sarah members anxiously await Palin's next decision on how she believes she can best serve our nation. Governor Sarah Palin is the real deal. She is smart; she is articulate; she is strong; she is compassionate and she walks the talk. I believe the ongoing personal attacks on both Governor Palin and her family indicate that she remains a real threat to the liberal feminist political establishment," said Team Sarah Co-Founder Jane Abraham. "Despite the criticism, Governor Palin's success will endure. Team Sarah's thousands of members remain as engaged as ever on TeamSarah.org. The Governor has inspired millions, and her audience of enthusiastic support will only grow in the future."

Yes, when the economy is on its knees, the climate is changing, two wars are waging, and the health care system is sick, the most important job for Palin is to destroy "the liberal feminist political establishment." If Palin plays to this political crowd, she'll make a ton of money--books, speeches, the like--but her political career will be deader than it is at the moment.

*****
THE COWBOYS OF KABUL. Reporter Dan Schulman, my colleague at Mother Jones, has a kick-ass story out about two Texan grandparents who went from bankruptcy to raking in millions as contractors in Afghanistan. There was one little problem, though. According to the US government, they did so by fraud, using phony receipts and ghost employees. This is a twisted tale (and a solid piece of journalism) detailing a vivid example of what can happen in the Wild West bonanza of private contracting in Afghanistan. Read it here

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It's time for a new episode of the PinkerCorn show on Bloggingheads.tv. Jim Pinkerton and I discussed President Barack Obama's recent news conference and the prospects for health care reform. When Pinkerton claimed that average Americans are growing skeptical of Obama, I accused him of projecting. We also gabbed about two matters that did not come up at that press conference: the Iraq war and the Afghanistan war. Since the Afghanistan war quickly became "the other war" after George W. Bush invaded Iraq, I opined, it remains insufficiently covered by the media, even though thisis an expanding conflict. (The monthly death toll of US and NATO soldiers is up in Afghanistan.) But you can hear and watch for yourself:

 

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Time magazine posted a marvelous piece of journalism Thursday on the final days of the Bush-Cheney administration--and the final drama of their administration: Dick Cheney pressuring George W. Bush to pardon Scooter Libby, and Bush, with the backing of most of his aides, resisting Cheney. This was a conflict that threatened to ruin the relationship between Cheney, who wanted to protect the guy who took a bullet for him, and Bush, who didn't want to pardon Libby (after having commuted his prison sentence) because he believed that Libby had indeed lied to the FBI during the investigation of the Valerie Plame leak and feared that a last-minute pardon would taint his presidency (as did President Bill Clinton's out-the-door pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich). It's a telling tale, and it shows that Cheney, by the end of the administration, was isolated and off in a world of his own.

In response to the Time article, Cheney released a statement declaring Libby "an innocent man" and noting that Libby was not the source of the leak that outed Valerie Plame Wilson as a CIA officer. But Cheney had it wrong: Libby was convicted not for leaking but for lying to the FBI agents. That lie came when Libby did not tell the agents that he had learned about Valerie Wilson's CIA position from Cheney. Instead, Libby had told the investigators that the late Tim Russert was the person who first informed him about Valerie Wilson's CIA connection; Russert testified at the trial that he could not have told Libby any such thing because he hadn''t known about Valerie Wilson's CIA position until after it became public knowledge. Even Bush acknowledged the validity of the jury's verdict when he wiped out Libby's jail time, arguing that this particular sentence (30 months) was excessive. The Cheney statement seemed to indicate the ex-veep doesn't understand the Libby case--or that he's willing to obfuscate facts to defend his former chief of staff.

Cheney is good for business--my businesss, at least. I was invited to go on Hardball to discuss the Time article and Cheney's response. And Chris Matthews does enjoy talking about Cheney. Here's what happened:

 

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Barack Obama certainly knows how to play the press to his advantage. On Wednesday night, he turned a presidential press coverage into an informercial for his leadership on health care reform. As question after question regarding his effort to remake the country's health care system was posed, the president turned each into an ongoing tutorial that demonstrated he's in command of the policy details and the big picture.

Which is crucial. Ultimately--and maybe very soon--Obama is going to have to sell a health care reform package as his plan. Let's face it: for most Americans, it's going to be difficult to understand the specifics of this complicated piece of legislation. And Republicans and industry groups yearning to defeat whatever is produced by Congress will look to whip up opposition and skepticism by focusing on a few details that can be made to seem unappealing or frightening (in or out of context). They will also rely on debate points that sound reasonable: Shouldn't we take our time when it comes to changing the entire health care system? Why rush through a program that could add costs or cause more problems when the economy is already on its knees?

To prevent such rhetoric and arguments--demagogic or not--from scuttling health care reform, Obama will essentially have to say, Take it from me, this is good legislation that the country needs now. And to do so, he will have to have a boatload of credibility. That's what he displayed in the East Room of the White House.

He began with opening remarks in which he tried to present an easy-to-fathom bottom line: "I realize that, with all the charges and criticisms that are being thrown around in Washington, a lot of Americans may be wondering, 'What’s in this for me? How does my family stand to benefit from health insurance reform?'"

No surprise, he had an answer ready:

If you have health insurance, the reform we’re proposing will provide you with more security and more stability. It will keep government out of health care decisions, giving you the option to keep your insurance if you’re happy with it. It will prevent insurance companies from dropping your coverage if you get too sick. It will give you the security of knowing that, if you lose your job, if you move, or if change your job, you’ll still be able to have coverage.

It will limit the amount your insurance company can force you to pay for your medical costs out of your own pocket. And it will cover preventive care like check-ups and mammograms that save lives and money....And, finally, no insurance company will be allowed to deny you coverage because of a pre-existing medical condition.

This is nothing he hasn't said before. But perhaps more Americans are listening now that the sausage-grinding is under way. And all this sure appears to be a good deal for many.

When the questions came, they were the obvious ones. How would you pay for this? How can you control costs? What are you expecting Americans to sacrifice--tests, referrals, end-of-life care? (An aside: why do mainstream reporters so often focus on the need for Americans to sacrifice?)

Each of Obama's replies was drenched with facts and figures--but each was accessible and easy to absorb. He claimed that two-thirds of the tab of health care reform will be covered by cutting costs and increasing efficiencies (and pushing wellness). He noted that he had wanted to reduce tax deductions for wealthy people to pay for the last one-third, but that Congress will probably come up with another funding mechanism--which he will only support if it doesn't place more tax burdens on middle class families. He explained that he has called for quick passage because "if you don't set deadlines in this town, things don't happen." He spoke favorably about a Republican-instigated plan to lower Medicare and Medicaid costs. He maintained that Americans will have to give up care that is driven by fee rates not best practices. He acknowledged that people were right to feel "queasy" about all the trillions of dollars being tossed about in Washington, while repeatedly contending that investing in health care reform was vital to the well-being and competitiveness of the economy.

Policy wonks and legislators can--and will--argue about Obama's assertions. But he uttered everyone with confidence. Those Americans who want to believe in him and whatever health care package he eventually okays--he's still not favoring particular legislative specifics--will have cause to do so.

But what Obama didn't say was also interested. Not once did he call upon Americans to get involved in the legislative process. He didn't pull a Reagan.

In Ronald Reagan's first months as president, he delivered several speeches urging Americans to support his ambitious economic plan, which involved tax cuts for the wealthy and severe reductions in social programs. Many Americans responded by flooding the House and Senate offices with phone calls demanding that the legislators support Reagan's initiative. Even though the Democrats controlled the House, this scared enough moderate and conservative Democrats into bucking Speaker Tip O'Neill and voting for Reagan's package. It passed.

During the Wednesday night press conference, Obama asked for understanding and support, but not participation. The off-shoot of his campaign, Organizing for America, which is part of the Democratic Party, has been powering up a nationwide organizing effort to support health care reform in general (since there's not one bill yet that the White House has embraced). This operation could do a lot with the list of 13 million Obama supporters it inherited from the presidential campaign. Still, Obama did not attempt to fire up his followers. His remarks on Wednesday evening were more about what he wants to do for you, not what he wants you to do for him. There was no Jerry Maguire-like call: help me to help you.

Perhaps that will come. It's hard to imagine legislative success for a decent overhaul of the health care system without pressure from the public. And given that it seems as if Congress will not finish the job by August 7, when the congressional recess starts, Obama, for good or bad, will have time to shift from eloquent explainer to power-politics leader.

******

Did Obama make a mistake at the end of his press conference when he blasted the Cambridge, Massachusetts, police for acting "stupidly" when they arrested Skip Gates outside his house for disorderly conduct the other night? No doubt, this will become fodder for talk radio, maybe even cable news. (An hour-long special on Fox News?) What happened at Gates' home is somewhat in dispute. And even though the charges against the Harvard professor were dropped, the police might feel compelled to reply to Obama's blast, creating a dust-up that Obama doesn't need. After all, it doesn't take much to stir a controversy when an episode involves race and law enforcement.

This was first posted at MotherJones.com. You can follow David Corn's postings and media appearances via Twitter.

On the run--again--today. And I'm prepping for President Barack Obama's press conference tonight. There are usually two hundred or so reporters in the room, and he tends to pick about a dozen (from a prepared list) for questions. Thus, the odds are not good. Nevertheless, you have to have something in your notebook--in fact, a few queries, in case someone chosen before you are asks that pearl you had spent days composing.

I'm certain many of the questions tonight will focus on health care. And on NPR this morning, Julie Rovner, the public radio network's reporter covering health care, made an intriguing point about the legislation now being produced (or processed?) on Capitol Hill. She cited what she calls the 80/20 rule: every stakeholder (that is, interest group) may like or tolerate 80 percent of the health care reform legislation under construction, but also cannot abide by 20 percent of the bill. The problem is that this 20 percent is different for each group. Example: the insurance industry may support mandates but absolutely despise the public option. Business groups, though, hate mandates. And so on. Which means that each of the key components of the package enrages a powerful player. Total up all those 20-percents, Rovner says, and it adds up to 100 percent. Maybe more! So how to navigate all this?

Hey, maybe that's a good question for Obama.

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Frank McCourt  died on Sunday.

He was best known as the author of Angela's Ashes. But in everything that he did--teaching, writing, reciting limericks--he was a wonderfully delightful entertainer. I was fortunate to spend a week on a cruise ship with him a few years ago. I don't think I ever laughed so hard. It was a pleasure to listen to him tell tales for as long as he could. One amusing anecdote involved the time he met the Pope. Despite his best efforts to not be overwhelmed, McCourt reverted to a slobbering Catholic schoolboy and kissed the ring. He told me that he had a whole collection of obscene lullabies but said he had stopped reciting them ever since he had given up drinking. (Darn, I thought.)

But the funniest story was about the time McCourt, who had been a much-celebrated creative writing teacher at Stuyvesant High School in New York City, ran into a past student of his. I'm blanking on the student's name (so I'll make one up), and it went something like this:

One day I was walking down Second Avenue, and this young man stopped me. "Mr. McCourt, Mr. McCourt," he said excitedly. "It's me, Rocky Malone."

"Yes, hello, Rocky."

"Rocky Malone. Do you remember me, Mr. McCourt?"

"I do, Rocky. I do."

"Do you remember I was in your class, Mr. McCourt?"

"I do, Rocky, I do."

"Do you remember I was in your class?"

"Yes, Yes, Rocky. I remember."

"Do you remember that I wrote poetry in that class? Do you, Mr. McCourt?

"Yes, I do, Rocky."

"And you liked the poetry, Mr. McCourt. You liked it."

"Yes, I remember that, Rocky. It was very good."

"And you told me I'd make a good poet. Do you remember that, Mr. McCourt?"

"I do, Rocky. Yes, I do."

"Well, because of you I went on to become a poet, Mr. McCourt....And now I have no money, Mr. McCourt. No money. So, fuck you, Mr. McCourt! Fuck you!"

And Rocky stormed off.

McCourt laughed deeply when he told that anecdote, and he flashed his mischievous smile. He loved his stories. He really did.

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When director of national intelligence Dennis Blair, defending the CIA's not informing Congress of an anti-al Qaeda assassination program, told The Washington Post, "It was a judgment call" and that "we believe in erring on the side of working with the Hill as a partner," was he creating a new precedent for the intelligence community? For decades, the CIA and other intelligence agencies have often taken the less-said-the-better road when it comes to keeping Congress posted on its doings.This hasn't always been an ideological or partisan matter. Washington geezers should recall that back in the 1980s, Senator Barry Goldwater, the die-hard conservative Republican chair of the Senate intelligence committee, often decried Bill Casey, Ronald Reagan's CIA chief, for not being forthcoming with the committee.

So when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says the CIA has lied to her or when it turns out that an assassination program--operational or not--has not been briefed to Congress, it really ought not to be a big surprise. There are plenty of hard-working, diligent folks at the CIA,and I imagine some might have argued that the assassination program ought to have been shared with the agency's congressional overseers. Yet institutionally, the CIA has frequently been more tight-lipped than it should have--which is, of course, a natural tendency for spies and covert operators.

And when you throw into the mix Dick Cheney, who reportedly urged that this program be kept secret from Capitol Hill, the inclination to keep legislators out of the loop probably increases by a factor of 10--or 100.

There's still a lot not known about this kill-al-Qaeda program, as Slate points out. But that Post article reports that it was dormant but about to be reactivated. Thus, it was brought to CIA director Leon Panetta's attention--but months after he had taken the job. He then quickly notified Congress that Congress had never been notified about it. And since then, the rest of us have been left to puzzle over what really went on with this project.

Which brings me to this point: it would not be too hard for a congressional intelligence committee to mount a quick probe to determine what did happen and to produce a report safe for public consumption. WIthout disclosing all the details of the program--some of which might have to remain classified--the House or Senate intelligence panel certainly could tell the public what Cheney's role was in keeping the program from Congress and examine whether the CIA violated any laws (or just good Washington manners) by doing so.

This dust-up has generated a lot of smoke this past week. The public deserves some light. Will Congress deliver?

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I've been wondering if the Sonia Sotomayor confirmation hearings, like Barack Obama's victory last November, signal an end to the culture wars--and a strategic setback for the right. Then I received this email from Ruy Teixeira:

So why are all these culture wars attacks on Sonia Sotomayor going nowhere?  Here's what I argue in my new report, The Coming End of the Culture Wars.
 
Looking back on Barack Obama's historic victory in 2008, culture wars issues not only had a very low profile in the campaign, but where conservatives did attempt to raise them, these issues did them little good. Indeed, conservatives were probably more hurt than helped by such attempts—witness the effect of the Sarah Palin nomination.
 
Attempts to revive the culture wars have been similarly unsuccessful since the election. Sarah Palin's bizarre trajectory, culminating in her surprise resignation from the Alaska governorship, has only made culture war politics appear even more out of touch. And culture warriors' shrill attacks on Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor have conspicuously failed to turn public opinion against her.
 
Is this just a temporary breathing spell in the culture wars due to the sudden spike in concern about other issues, first Iraq, then the economy, or is a fundamental shift in our politics taking place? I believe the latter is the case since, as this report establishes, ongoing demographic shifts have seriously eroded the mass base for culture wars politics and will continue to erode this base in the future. That means that the advantage conservatives can gain from culture wars politics will steadily diminish and, consequently, so will conservatives' incentive to engage in such politics.

In other words, there are fewer folks these days obsessing about gay marriage and abortion and feeling threatened by the legacies of 1960s. Rick Perlstein has a similar take on this, but from a different angle. He notes that conservative elites, gazing upon the unwashed anti-intellectuals who were at the center of the Republican campaign last fall--Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber--feel, well, embarrassed. And they're sick of these folks and their followers, perhaps realizing that this group is, as Teixeira contends, a declining population slice.

In politics, it's always perilous to pronounce a last hurrah. But as the Senate GOPers question Sotomayor about guns, gay marriage and other issues dear to their hearts and their shrinking base, their lukewarm efforts do have a retro feel to them. (Talk about retro: Senator Tom Coburn at one point said to Sotomayor, "You have lots of 'splaining to do".) It seems that time--and politics--is passing them by.

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