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HARD-WON REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS ARE UNDER SIEGE AGAIN

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 21:15:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Success in any long-running campaign breeds complacency; first euphoria, then relief, later forgetfulness. Whether the campaign for universal suffrage or the crusade to curb childhood disease through immunizations, success leads to historical amnesia.

That's certainly true of the decades-long battle for reproductive rights, another chapter in women's never-ending struggle to achieve full personhood. Because the U.S. Supreme Court granted women the right to control their own reproduction in a 1973 ruling, Roe v. Wade, 40-something Americans have no firsthand knowledge of back-alley abortions. It's likely they haven't even heard secondhand stories of women who died from infections caused by coat-hanger terminations.

That helps explain why advocates for reproductive rights weren't prepared for an all-out battle just to allow women to retain their health insurance coverage. It also helps explain why pro-choice Democrats found themselves outmaneuvered by U.S. Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., who sponsored an amendment to health care reform legislation that would sharply limit abortions.

SARAH PALIN: RICHARD NIXON UPDATED FOR THE CELEBRITY AGE

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:59:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Poor, put-upon Sarah Palin.

She's been misrepresented by the left-leaning media, repressed and mishandled by Team McCain, betrayed by an ungrateful almost-son-in-law and falsely accused by political opponents back home in Alaska.

It's a wonder the woman survives to, ah, make so much money on that book of hers, "Going Rogue," given all the forces arrayed against her. But the former Alaska governor is a formidable personality, with a strong faith in her own righteousness.

Her capacity for self-delusion is undimmed, despite her experiences on the campaign trail. In Monday's interview with Oprah Winfrey, the formal kickoff of Palin's book tour, she rejected any blame for the loss of the McCain-Palin ticket.

FORT HOOD BACKLASH UNFAIRLY TARGETS MUSLIM SERVICE MEMBERS

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 19:22:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

During last year's presidential campaign, it was Colin Powell who spoke most eloquently of the brave service of Muslim soldiers and sailors, not Barack Obama. Cowed by a widespread belief that he was Muslim, Obama was virtually silent on the subject, craven in the face of the demands of electoral politics.

Powell filled the void. Endorsing Obama on NBC's "Meet the Press" last October, he chastised his fellow Republicans for a right-wing heterodoxy (which has only grown more pronounced since then) and an exclusionary narrow-mindedness.

"I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion that (Obama) is a Muslim and might have an association with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America," Powell said.

CREATING JOBS IS TOP JOB FOR WASHINGTON

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:10:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

It's the economy, stupid.

James Carville's old mantra rings as true now as it did when he tacked it to the wall of the Clinton war room in 1992. The results of last week's gubernatorial contests in Virginia and New Jersey can be largely explained by three words: jobs, jobs and jobs. Exit polls from both contests show that voters rated the economy as their top concern.

Health care reform is a vital issue, as is climate change. (Carville's sign also had a third bullet point: "Don't forget health care.") President Obama was right to press ahead with legislation to improve the dysfunctional health care system and to regulate carbon emissions.

But nothing is more central to the immediate anxieties of voters than the economy, which is still raining pink slips. Job-seekers outnumber job openings six to one, and the official unemployment rate hovers just under 10 percent. According to some economists, the government jobless rate minimizes actual unemployment, which may be closer to 15 or 18 percent. For the White House and Congress, then, creating jobs is Job One.

THE NEW ROBBER BARONS COULD DEEPEN THIS ECONOMIC HOLE

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:58:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Wall Street's masters of the universe are a shameless bunch, their egos swelled with a sense of entitlement that would make the old railroad robber barons blush. Their predations are largely responsible for the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, but they don't get it.

They are in denial about the damage they've caused worldwide. That's why Kenneth Feinberg, the so-called pay czar, had no choice but to cut compensation for executives at seven companies that received government bailouts: The companies were prepared to reward abysmal performance with huge paychecks.

But pay cuts won't tame the excesses on Wall Street. If the White House doesn't insist on strict regulatory reform, the nation will see another banking crisis, perhaps worse than this one, within a decade, many experts say.

RECENT HISTORY HAS SHOWN THE COST OF 'HANDS-OFF' GOVERNMENT

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 23:00:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Even after years of a laissez-faire ideology that allowed businesses to pillage the economy, the idea of government intervention makes a lot of Americans nervous. In a recent Gallup Poll, a majority of respondents agreed with the statement that the government currently is "trying to do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses."

That response is partly due to essential elements of the American character, which celebrates independence, self-reliance and the pioneering spirit. It reveals a healthy strain that encourages creativity and overcome-the-odds resilience.

But the distrust of government is also due to a less healthy phenomenon -- 30 years of government-bashing by conservative politicians and media personalities. Ronald Reagan's mantra -- government is the problem, not the answer -- has become an all-serving ideology in certain precincts on the right.

TODAY'S MILITARY DOESN'T NEED 'DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL'

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 21:15:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

It hasn't been that long ago -- about 16 1/2 years -- since Bill Clinton's relationship with the Pentagon was permanently warped by his effort to keep a campaign pledge to allow gay men and women to serve openly in the United States Armed Forces. The outcry from the military and its supporters was such that you'd have thought Clinton had promised to make Hillary a four-star general.

Looking back on all that, it's nothing short of remarkable that the current issue of Joint Force Quarterly, a scholarly publication put out by the Pentagon, includes an essay that calls for ending the ban on allowing gays to serve openly. Written by Air Force Col. Om Prakash, the treatise, which analyzes the odious keep-them-in-the-closet compromise, won the 2009 Secretary of Defense National Security Essay Competition.

That doesn't mean every military officer supports his point of view. Indeed, inclusion of the essay in a Pentagon publication is hardly a stirring endorsement of gay soldiers by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Nor does it suggest that the discriminatory and destructive "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy can be dropped without controversy. Already, certain mossbacks are gearing up for another tirade against gay soldiers, despite Prakash's conclusion that dropping the ban wouldn't have a negative effect on combat readiness.

OBAMA LOOKING FOR THE RIGHT STRATEGY, FOR THE RIGHT REASONS

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 23:00:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Given the outrage from certain precincts of the conservative establishment, you'd think President Obama had signed a peace treaty with Osama bin Laden. The armchair generals are apoplectic over the president's decision to have a series of serious and thoughtful discussions with his national security team about sending more troops to Afghanistan.

"Al-Qaida's propaganda machine is quickly seizing on this weakness," military affairs pundit Bill Roggio blogged at The Weekly Standard, the neocon house organ. Ultra-conservative pundit Michelle Malkin denounced Obama's "waffle" on Afghanistan. House Minority Whip Eric Cantor claimed that Obama's delay "puts in jeopardy, I believe, our men and women."

And what would a hasty and ill-conceived strategy do, Rep. Cantor? Wouldn't that be more likely to put our fighting men and women in jeopardy?

Doesn't Cantor remember "Mission Accomplished," President Bush's premature celebration of victory in Iraq? More than 4,300 U.S. troops have died in Iraq, most of them killed after Bush pronounced the job done.

POLANSKI SHOULD FACE THE MUSIC HE'S NEVER WANTED TO HEAR

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 19:36:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Sometimes it's easier to get your head around a distant controversy if you personalize it. So engage in a little thought experiment with me: You have a daughter or niece or sister who was raped by a wealthy, powerful and glamorous 43-year-old man when she was just 13.

He says the sex was "consensual," but he had plied her with champagne and drugs before he took advantage of her. In any event, she was a child whom the law regards as too immature to "consent" to sexual intercourse. Would you want that man to be held to account for his crimes, although the episode occurred some three decades ago?

You'd want justice. Indeed, it shouldn't matter whether the child was someone you knew. Criminals should be forced to pay for their crimes, especially those as ugly and predatory as this.

FINALLY, A HEALTH CARE BILL TO TALK ABOUT

Cynthia Tucker — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 08:25:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Cheers for Sen. Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who spent months keeping his "Gang of Six" together, negotiating with Republican senators over health care reform, no matter how insincere, cowardly or irritating they were. Even when Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, caved in to the lie about "death panels," giving it credence in a town hall forum, Baucus, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, kept Grassley and the others at the table.

The result is a health care reform bill that is hardly perfect -- it needs several refinements -- but which can jump-start the debate over final legislation among Democrats in the House and Senate. And, after a long summer of circuses and freak shows, Democrats are the only members whose views ought to matter. Republicans have taken themselves out of negotiations, choosing to sell their souls to the unhinged fringe led by Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh.

PRESIDENT'S SKIN COLOR IS ENOUGH TO MOTIVATE SOME CRITICS

Cynthia Tucker — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 01:21:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

David Scott is hardly a racial rabble-rouser.

A veteran Georgia lawmaker before he won a Congressional seat six years ago, he represents a working-class district in the Atlanta suburbs, where he has established himself as a cautious legislator who works hard to hew to his district's moderate values. But Scott, who is a black Democrat, is convinced that racism plays a part in the hysterical opposition to President Obama's health care reform proposals.

"Racism is playing an extraordinarily unfortunate role in this," he said in an interview Monday.

Many commentators, political analysts and fellow Democrats share Scott's view that some part -- perhaps just a sliver, perhaps more -- of the right-wing assault on President Obama's health care reform plans stems from a deep-seated racial antagonism toward the president. Count me among them

WHITE HOUSE AND CONGRESS SHOULD PUSH AHEAD WITH REFORMS

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 23:00:00 CDT

CYNTHIA TUCKER

It's still the economy, stupid.

The aphorism from Bill Clinton's first presidential campaign, conjured up by the inimitable James Carville, is as apt today as it was when Carville plastered it to the wall of the campaign war room in 1992. President Obama and his aides ought to keep that in mind as they work to get health care reform back on track.

A summer of discontent has fed a conventional wisdom that suggests voters have turned against radical changes to the health care system. Obama should be skeptical of that conclusion.

It's quite likely that the public's general crankiness is fueled by growing unemployment, continuing tight credit and unabated foreclosures. If the economy were in better shape -- specifically, if unemployment were going down instead of up -- it's likely voters would be more willing to trust Obama to make radical changes to the dysfunctional health care system.

THERE IS NO BIPARTISAN SOLUTION TO HEALTH CARE REFORM

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 23:51:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Most Americans are confused about the health care reform proposals before Congress. That's good news.

I had feared that August -- featuring some town hall protesters who seemed to believe President Obama was the spawn of the devil -- had revealed a nation returned to the Dark Ages, willing to believe in witches, evil spells and the perversity of black cats. Anybody who sincerely believed that the president wanted to kill off the frail elderly might believe anything. (After all, the president was devoted to his grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, who died, at the age of 86, just hours before his election as president.)

If Americans are merely confused about health care reform, as a new CBS News poll shows, that's a relief. Confusion usually can be cleared up with a simple yet persuasive public relations campaign. Indeed, last month, NBC's Chuck Todd noted: "After being read a statement that includes actual details of the Obama health care plan, a majority -- 53 percent -- say they are in favor of it."

GAY MARRIAGE OPPONENTS WATCH AS THEIR RANKS DWINDLE

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 23:00:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Washington -- While President Obama campaigned on a pledge to repeal a noxious and divisive law called the Defense of Marriage Act, his Justice Department submitted a pro forma defense of the law earlier this summer. That upset many gay-rights activists, since DOMA, as it's called, is nothing but a bit of homophobic nonsense.

Just last week, though, the Obama administration made clear that it's still committed to getting rid of DOMA. (By longstanding tradition, Justice is obligated to defend laws when they draw legal challenge, a spokesman said.) Repealing it probably won't be as controversial as some Democrats may fear.

The culture has changed considerably since 1996, when a few state legislatures were beginning to seriously debate the concept of extending full marriage equality to gays and lesbians. That's when the GOP rushed to stoke its base of religious conservatives with a law that blocked that full equality. Where tradition (and law) had dictated that a marriage in New York or Hawaii must be recognized in Alabama or Wyoming, the Defense of Marriage Act allowed any state to deny the legitimacy of a same-sex marriage that had taken place elsewhere.

AMERICANS ARE STARTING TO SEE A LESS-PROSPEROUS FUTURE

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 21:32:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Those chaotic town-hall meetings make for dramatic TV reports, but they don't say much about the mood of the country. Most Americans are not angry.

We're worried. While polls can't quite capture it, the dog days of August have drained many of us of enthusiasm for "change," energy for civic activism and even hope for the future.

Obama spent much of the past fall and early winter reminding constituents that the economy had fallen into a savage recession "years in the making," and even enacting his policies wouldn't create instant nirvana. Polls taken at the time suggested that Americans were aware that the "Great Recession" was the worst economic crisis since the 1930s and wouldn't be cured quickly.

SHOUTING AND STOMPING WON'T OBSCURE THE NEED FOR REFORM

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 22:58:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

WASHINGTON -- Why are the so-called tea-baggers so angry and frightened by the prospect of health care reform? Why would any ordinary citizen be upset by proposals to modernize and rationalize what we generously call a "health care system"? For most health care consumers, little is more frightening than the "health care system" that currently exists.

Let's leave aside, for a moment, the estimated 47 million or so Americans who have no health insurance. It's easy to understand their predicament. A young, healthy construction worker falls off a ladder and ends up with hundreds of thousands in bills he cannot pay. Or a middle-aged diabetic is laid off and finds herself skimping on doctor's visits because she can no longer afford to go. We hear stories like that often enough to enable us to empathize with the plight of the uninsured.

SOME CONSERVATIVES STILL WON'T EMBRACE OUR DIVERSITY

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 23:00:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Many Americans like Judge Sonia Sotomayor because she represents the quintessential American success story. By dint of hard work, determination and sacrifice, she overcame poverty and personal tragedy to rise to the top of the legal profession.

If she is confirmed by the U.S. Senate, as seems likely, she would become the first Latino and the first woman of color to serve on that storied bench. And, for many of us, her ancestry makes her rise all the more appealing.

Her parents left Puerto Rico during World War II; her mother, then Celina Baez, enlisted in the Women's Army Corps at the age of 17. The elder Sotomayor raised her children alone after her husband died of heart ailments at the age of 42. Her daughter's accomplishments -- as well as those of her son, Juan, a physician -- reinforce our favorite national myth: In this country, anyone can succeed.

'GREEN SHOOTS' OF ECONOMIC RECOVERY CAN'T GROW FAST ENOUGH

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 23:00:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

For the first time since his swearing-in ceremony, President Obama's overseas travel, with his photogenic family in tow, seemed jarring and discordant -- out-of-touch with the everyday woes of constituents back home. As news reports flashed pictures of the First Family abroad -- Michelle radiant, the girls lovely as ever -- analysts were poring over the depressing economic news of continuing job losses. Somehow, photos of the Obamas in resplendent, gold-bedecked palaces smacked of Marie Antoinette.

It's not the president's fault that the gathering of the G-8, the world's biggest economies, was held overseas just as second-quarter economic reports revealed that unemployment in the U.S. had jumped to 9.5 percent. But now that he's back, it will be Obama's failure if he doesn't grab the microphone immediately to remind the nation that he has a plan to revive the economy and produce jobs.

MEDIA FRENZY SHOULD NOT HAVE COME AS A SURPRISE TO PALIN

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 22:13:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

Not much was clear after Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's rambling and petulant press conference, least of all whether she was bidding farewell to politics. But this much was obvious: She's angry that so many -- TV comedians, feuding political consultants, unnamed media "sources" -- have taken aim at her and her family. How dare they?

How, indeed? Where was the governor when conservatives spent eight years ripping Hillary Clinton to shreds, even making foul jokes about her young daughter? Where was she when the right-wing attack machine went after Michelle Obama, blasting her as angry, unpatriotic and anti-white? Indeed, didn't Palin notice that the first woman to be named to a spot on a major party's presidential ticket -- Geraldine Ferraro -- wasn't exactly celebrated in a national lovefest?

Are women more likely to endure harsh personal attacks than men? You betcha. Are families immune? No way.

'FOLLOW THE MONEY' APPLIES TO HEALTH CARE REFORM, TOO

Cynthia Tucker — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:44:00 CDT

By Cynthia Tucker

As any good politician would, President Obama is trying to persuade skeptics to support his proposals for health care reform. On Monday, he spoke to the annual meeting of the American Medical Association, which has already made clear its reluctance to endorse one of the most critical components of the president's plan -- government-sponsored health insurance.

Obama believes a public health insurance option is a necessary alternative to private health insurance, which, as a profit-driven mechanism, can be both costly to consumers and stingy in its coverage. The president says a public insurance option can be paid for with premiums (rather than tax dollars) while still offering consumers the coverage they need.