TV SoundOff: Sunday Talking Heads
So, last week? Pretty momentous, right? And historical, as well. So historical that we say it was "an" historical week, even when we say those words out loud! And we only do that for extra special weeks! "An" historical is like our best rhetorical china. But it was historical, and not just because we've elected our nation's first black president. Apparently, according to various conservative pundits, we've also elected our first radical socialist centrist redistributionist Maoist-Reaganite Center Right liberal. America is awesome!
But, sadly, some things do not Change. And among those things that do not Change is the fact that every Sunday morning, these terrible shows come on. What will happen, now that the next election is about one thousand, four hundred and sixty days away? Hopefully something worth liveblogging about! Anyway, as usual, leave a comment or send an email.
FOX NEWS SUNDAY
Wow. So, we settle in for a life without Battles of the Surrogates, and awesome gotcha journalism. Instead, we get John Podesta, talking about the Obama Transition, and playing nice with President Bush, who is now in his Lame Duck session. How will Obama take over the Great Nationalization Of Everything? Podesta says that he will pick out a team, along with some sort of liaison between he and Hank Paulson. Podesta says that Obama will set new records in assembling his team--the fastest team put together, the tallest team, the most sexually potent team, the Transportation Secretary will be the first Transportation Secretary with Heat Vision...et cetera.
Also, there's going to be this hilarious game where the Bush administration tries to rattle off about a million billion Executive Orders, even though, Podesta says, Obama totally notices this, and will repeal them.
Is there a danger at doing too many Change ideas at once? Podesta agrees, but says that "top-tier issues" need to get hit right off the bat. "He's a transformational figure," Podesta says, like Apache Chief. And, Podesta says, he does have something of a mandate, "across the board, across the country." But did the progressive philosophy win? Podesta says yes. Wow. Now that's some refreshing rhetoric right there! I'll tell you what, whatever philosophy is on the rise, it sure isn't what Bush and McCain have sold over the past year. Via Matt Yglesias, here's a map that indicates where you have to travel to in order to find people who aren't moving in a more progressive direction:
Podesta describes the process of transition, including the pre-clearing of personnel to receive security briefings for a seamless transition of national security. Sounds pretty important to be ahead of the game, even before you get elected! Maybe Dana Milbank will never write an article in which he pretends a whole, fictitious set of principles govern presidential transitions. Probably not, though!
As far as the connection to the Center For American Progress goes, Podesta says that what they do, they do in public, George Soros is a funder, you can read about what they think on their website, and NO HE WON'T BE JOINING THE ADMINISTRATION. Moreover, CAP will retain the right to criticize the Obama administration where they see fit.
What about the future of the GOP? Eric Cantor and Mike Pence will be throwing down. Cantor disagrees with Podesta on the whole "realignment of the electorate" idea, instead suggesting that...I guess....the world make the GOP look bad? Pence agrees, saying that "this was a victory for Barack Obama" not progressivism. And Rich Lowry has some buggered up poll to prove it, so there! "That McCain came away with 46% of the vote indicates the durability of common sense conservative ideas," says Pence. So there you have it, John McCain! At last you are a "common sense conservative!"
Speaking of socialism, it's pretty remarkable that after all the talk of "wealth redistribution" and taxation, nearly half of those making $100,000 or more pulled the lever for Obama. In fact, seven percent MORE did for Obama than for Kerry.
"I don't this this was all about the charm of Barack Obama," Wallace says, "I think there were some issues in this election." Pence wants to talk about "traditional marriage" as his flashpoint for the future of conservatism. Egads. All I hear out of these two, honestly, is a vain defibrillation of identity politics, 50%+1 triangulation, and denial. Cantor seems to hope that the pendulum between the two parties continues to speed up, throwing one out and the other in in every four year cycle. But Cantor at least allows that the GOP will have to develop some sort of "plan" to win back the legistlature.
Panel time! And honestly, they need to just sit there and force Bill Kristol to apologize for Sarah Palin. They should drag him onto the table and burn him with cigarettes until he finally comes clean and begs America for forgiveness. That's probably not going to happen. Brit Hume is still here, too! When's he going to retire? Hume highlights the decision to bring Clintonites into the Obama White House, and says that it's not some cyncial ran away from "Change," but a commitment to getting people on the team who know the lay of the land.
Hume seems bullish on the choices. Liasson says the same thing about the speed. Even Kristol seems a little impressed with the choice of Emanuel - "an effective partisan" that will keep the Obama administration from "running off the rails." I think that he overstates the rivalry between Obama and Pelosi/Reed.
Williams runs through a litany of lefty things that probably won't be tended to in the first 100 days of the Obama administration. I can see Williams' point, but why can't we undo the global gag rule right off the bat? I sort of hope it's among the first things Obama does! Totally mainstream thing to do! Imposing it was a radical, political decision with no practical benefit to anyone!
I don't know how reassuring it is, as Liasson suggests, to have Paul Volcker looming behind you, but it sure is terrifying! That guy is tall! He's the Manute Bol of economists.
Are Republicans in trouble? Probably! If they plan to double down on Sarah Palin, they are! Williams says, "the problem is, it's a shrinking party" that needs to learn to "respond to kitchen table concerns of the average American." Hume thinks that governing from the left "won't work" and that it's a "center-right" country...the same melange of remarkable denial that you wouldn't think possible less than a week after the country basically said that governing from the right didn't work.
Meanwhile, Sarah Palin. Kristol says that certain people in the McCain camp are total cowards and "purely malicious" and so Sarah Palin got thrown under the bus. Kristol sits there on the panel and pretends that it's only natural to need to clarify what countries are in North America. And anyway, Kristol says, Sarah Palin is awesome. Juan Williams also defends Palin, saying that "you can learn all that stuff." Well, she's got four years, right?
THIS WEEK, WITH GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
OK. Joining George and Rahm in the middle of their interview as I experience some TiVo problems. GS asks about whether or not Obama supports using the $700 billion bailout package to help the auto industry. Emanuel says that the auto industry is important, and they've already given them $25 billion, maybe they should get to using that. GS asks him a different question, and Emanuel basically gives him the same answer, only instead of enumerating his points "1,2,3,4" he does it "A,B,C,D." Then GS asks again, and Emanuel says that he already answered the question. GOD THIS WILL BE FUN WITH THIS GUY IN THE WHITE HOUSE.
Emanuel says that the two major goals of economic stimulus will be infrastructure growth and middle class tax cuts, but it seems clear that it won't be the focus of the lame duck session. Will Obama "postpone" the tax increase on the upper five percent until the recession is over? Emanuel says that the tax plan is a "net tax reduction," so no, and then reiterates his previous answer, AGAIN. And then he reanswers it again. SO, here is the Emanuel method for answering teevee talking heads:
1. THESIS.
2. I SAID, "THESIS," DUMBASS.
3. SYNTHESIS, LIKE A LEAD PIPE TO THE DOME.
Again. This is awesome. I hope Rahm Emanuel can train these people, like dogs.
Is Obama's choice for his replacement in Illinois Valerie Jarrett? Emanuel says that she is very important to Obama, but he doesn't answer the question.
Meanwhile, panel time! Will says that voters rejected the incompetence of government, and that the GOP needs to deal with the fact that their party is getting whiter, older, and a more regional party. But the good news is BLAHHHGHHH CENTER-RIGHT ZOMBIES ARE COMING FOR YOUR BRAINS. Cynthia Tucker says that it's a generational realignment, and that if Obama is "seen as a successful President," that the emerging young voters will stay at home for the Democrats. Zakaria says that the potential realignment is possible, given the collision of political transition and cultural transition.
Zakaria notes the massive swing in the Hispanic vote and suggests that the immigration issue is where the GOp has done them the most harm. It's an interesting premise. Certainly, the swing was HUGE within hispanic voters, and many contended that rivalries between blacks and Hispanics might drive those votes away from Obama. But the immigration issue was just a non-entity during the latter months of the campaign. I don't think there was a single question on immigration in any of the debates. But, all the same, I don't doubt that immigration played a major role in the way their votes came down. To be honest with you, I think that the power of this swinging demographic (and the Hispanic population continues to boom in America), coupled with the relative inattention to issues that matter to them, indicates that the media is chronically underserving them.
I don't know how many of you all are watching this show in the DC market, but that commercial that just ran on teevee, about the chimney sweeps? MY EARS WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO UNHEAR THAT.
I agree with GS that Obama's first news conference wasn't very newsy. I think it's pretty hilarious, though, that he didn't call on the Washington Post. No offense, of course. I read the Post every day! But, hey, yeah, screw protocol. Let Lynn Sweet ask a question and talk about her broken arm or separated shoulder.
The economy will offer, as Tucker says, trouble along with opportunity. Zakaria notes that with the whole world facing large, structural deficits, there's no fear that the global market will respond negatively toward spending. Gergen says that the best thing Obama can do is to get everyone out of the mindset where the first 100 days become the first critical measure, suggesting that affecting some change will take 200-300 days.
What about housing? Gergen wonders where the issue's gone? Zakaria says that Obama's people are working through 25 separate ideas, in a process of weeding.
Here's the big conflict coming up. Larry Summers versus Tim Geithner versus maybe Paul Volcker. Summers has two strikes against him. First, he's not going to win the Jezebel.com vote because of his crazy comment on women in science. I think that's not the key strike against Summers, though. This panel is all about praising his brilliance, but he's also a big time proponent of the deregulation that created all these problems in the first place. On the standard of "don't hire the people who cause the problem to fix the problem," Summers is, to my mind, out. But you watch! This town loves the people they've deemed brilliant-by-tautology more than anything.
Potential Secretaries of State include everyone whose ever run on the Democratic ticket, including Hillary Clinton, Bill Richardson, John Kerry, and Tom Daschle. Will thinks that Kerry's earned the nod, and suggests that the lack of a Republican on the shortlist indicates that Gates may be offered the job at Defense. Gates, by the way, may be an exception to the whole "don't hire the people who cause the problem to fix the problem," and I'[m uneasy with that. I'm also uneasy with the continuance of the illusion that there are no worthy Democrats to place at Defense. But, the arguments to keep Gates on temporarily, or at least make him the offer, are pretty strong, in that it would send an overt message to Pentagon brass that the incoming administration isn't interested in pointless cage-rattling or personal agendae.
Wow. These have been some serious conversations. Is humor really dead in an Obama Administration? Let's see if Chris Matthews can help, with a show filled with multiple, set-drenching Obamagasms.
THE CHRIS MATTHEWS SHOW
Wow! So Chris Matthews has redone his opening montage, so that it's not JFK, Reagan, Bush, and Obama. And it's A NEW AMERICA AND A WINNING FORMULA AND A LEG TINGLE. He's running for office in Pennsylvania! It's Chris Matthews! With Elizabeth Bumiller, Dan Rather, Cynthia Tucker...AGAIN, and David Brooks.
Will Obama be a "course correction" from Bush? Can America tolerate it not happening overnight? The answers are probably yes and no. But Dan Rather says Obama can "absolutely" bring change. And he seems pretty confident about that! Really confident! He may grab the mike and yell "COURAGE!" at us! Drop some bayou metaphorage on us!
Meanwhile David Brooks is all happy about how Obama is POST-everything. He's post-racial. He's post-boomer. He's post-rock, like Tortoise. MILLIONS NOW LIVING WILL NEVER DIE. He's IL POSTINO, but not THE POSTMAN, with Kevin Costner. He's got a tight circle of aides, but he reads newspapers.
But is he a socialist, lurching to the left, with lines for heart transplants? What if Obama messes up this great nation, with its heart transplants on demand and no healthcare problems? Rather says he'll govern from the middle. Do you try to push all the change through, like in one big frittata of change? Or do you sequence it? Brooks says you take it step by step, and build trust. But you do it fast! As Tucker points out, if there's no improvement in two years, America will get that rabid gleam for more change in their eye and toss out the bums.
Brooks says that one of the great things about Obama is that the people around him are "nice." I think to myself, WOW: he's obviously never been on the trail with the Obama campaign and their caravan of mostly miserable reporters, left to wallow in the stink of their own filth. Bumiller laughs and points this out. She's just back from the trail herself, and OH THE HARDSHIP. "What planet are you on?" she asks Brooks. The answer, of course is one where his ego got fed in advance of criticism. That NEWSWEEK series put it best: reporters hate Obama, editors love him.
Obama is going to meet with President Bush, which will be a terrifying moment because what if he gets infected with the Cheney virus and starts shooting our nation's beloved lawyers in the face? Bumiller says that he should ask what Bush's biggest mistake was, but doesn't she know that Bush doesn't ever answer that question? Not even with one of those job interview answers, like: "Bob, I think my greatest weakness is that I am just TOO PASSIONATE FOR EXCEL SPREADSHEETS." You really expect Bush to say, "Well, I think that I've proven that governing through a series of inept decisions and appointments of leprous, kleptocratic cronies just didn't pay off in the big dividends for America that I expected?"
Rather bluntly states that Obama doesn't need anything from Bush. "Just say goodbye to the president, it's a new day...adios." Tucker says Obama will "seem to be interested," in what the President has to say. This means that Barack Obama is about to face the first, and hardest, of the Herculean tasks ahead of him.
Then we get a montage of Politics in Grant Park, from the 1968 riots and Dan Rather getting shoved around on the floor of the convention, to this past week, with everyone cried tears of joy because HOPE IS THE NEW TEAR GAS. My wife walks out and says, "Well, that's a hackneyed metaphor to wake up to."
A commenter writes:
"To be honest with you, I think that the power of this swinging demographic (and the Hispanic population continues to boom in America), coupled with the relative inattention to issues that matter to them, indicates that the media is chronically underserving them."As a Latino I have to admit, the first time I've seen this idea presented is in this morning's TV Soundoff. I would probably want to limit the scope to national media, save for Lou Dobbs' rants, but wonder if you think it has anything to do with the enormity of other issues currently or a systemic indifference?
Well, obviously, the financial crisis took center stage toward the end of the campaign, but I was still surprised to see the immigration issue disappear entirely. Immigration, legal and illegal, has a structural impact on the economy. Any "solution" will as well. They are intertwined both nationally, and internationally, as imbalances in global trade agreements create incentives to migrate and move.
But beyond that, there is, I think, a huge systemic indifference, both in the media, and in culture, to the large, booming Hispanic population in the country. And hey! I guess that the Sunday Morning Liveblog is no different! I think that their imprint is going to felt, dramatically - and just so you know, I think it's going to be a really positive one: with all the talk about cultural-pollination - east to west, "Old Country" to "New Country," how often do we look south of the border, and beyond, to Latin America? I think that one of the significant dilemmas is how when people think "illegal alien," they aren't thinking about the million or so people from Western Europe who are here illegally. And this systemic indifference is what keeps Hispanic and Latino culture "alien." I'd like to see that change! I think this pointless, paranoid fear of other people paralyzes communities and constricts cultures.
Back to the show. Can McCain and Obama get along and work together? I'm surprised that's really that important. Who really cares? I see McCain as a soon-to-retire Senator. I think it's purely sentimental natterings to worry and wonder about the future of the Obama/McCain relationship. What sort of relationship did Bush and Kerry have?
The panel decrees that Rahm Emanuel is tough, tough, abrasive, tough, and probably liquid sex. Everyone in DC wants to sex Rahm! I can tell you that this is very true!
Prediction time! Hopefully we'll get something dire! Bumiller says that everyone is angry at Randy Scheunemann and that Randy Scheunemann is angry at everyone else and that I'm just glad I won't have to write "Randy Scheunemann" that often anymore. Rather finally says something that's been unspoken this whole week: RAHM EMANUEL IS A MITZVAH FOR OBAMA, who needs to have good relations with the Jews. I guess there won't be a Second Holocaust after all. Bigger questions: what to with Bill Richardson? Maybe a big appointment would help to get rid of a systemic indifference to Hispanics! Tucker notes that there's still a race in Georgia, but that enthusiasm in Georgia centered around voting for Obama, and that it will be very hard to get those voters back to vote against Chambliss. (I sort of think that the Get Obama Elected Team should head to Georgia for One Last Gig.) Brooks says that the one "cultural rift" that's emerging in the Obama administration finds the Clinton administration as its fault line, but that it's a small rift.
Side note: Are the Washington Wizards just going to be terrible this season? Please tell me no.
More important question: Will Obama's election help race relations in the U.S.? Bumiller says yes, but there will be stories in four years about how EVERYTHING ISN'T TOTALLY PERFECT. (In a rare moment of precision, Matthews notes, "That's because those stories have already been assigned.") Rather says yes, but we have deep racial problems remaining. Cynthia Tucker says, yes, Dan Rather's right, but that the Obama family will showcase the black American upper class. Brooks says we aren't post racial, but we aren't racist either. And he's obviously seen the map above, and basically says that the red parts, are probably the racist parts.
Left unsaid? The way the African-American vote may have affected the turnout in California where Proposition 8 is concerned. (I think that people have basically agreed to overlook all that and blame the Mormons who poured kabillions of dollars into the defeat of gay marriage.)
MEET THE PRESS
So, Tom Brokaw continues at MTP. He'll talk about how Barack Obama became president. He;ll talk to Valerie Jarrett, who might be the next Senator of Illinois. And James Clyburn and Mel Martinez will fight with each other. Then Doris Kearns Goodwin will be nice and make everyone feel better.
And now I have to pause, because my family just showed up at my apartment unexpectedly!
But first, Valerie Jarrett gets introduced to America. She's in charge of the transition team, and is capable of wielding the term "hit the ground running." Has there ever been a presidential transition in which the president-elect said, "Yeah...we're basically going to lollygag our way through it?" No. Just as every election is THE MOST IMPORTANT. Anyway, the Obama team-in-transition will not be a "shadow government." Dick Cheney remains the shadow government until January 20, when he becomes, simply, the Shadow, that Passes Over our Graves, and our Souls.
Can you just give Tom Brokaw a new Treasury Secretary? No, Jarrett says, but there are a lot of excellent candidates. Brokaw goes down his list of names, and asks if there are others. Jarrett is all: "Yeah, I'm not going to share that with you." Obama will not "telecast" his decisions. Neither will he "stratocast." This will be a Rickenbacker, or a Gibson administration, instead of a Fender one. Expect no surf tones!
Who from the Bush administration will stay, Brokaw wonders. Like, GATES, maybe? Jarrett says, "Everything is a possibility." So, cross your fingers that I don't end up at Defense, because we will all die.
John Boehner thinks that the choice of Rahm Emanuel was "ironic" because Rahm is mean and everyone wants to SEX HIM. Jarrett says that Emanuel is all about speed and efficiency. But what about the Clinton connection? Jarrett says that the Clintons are key advisors, and that Hillary has been talking to Michelle about what to expect, like sniper fire. I think that maybe suggesting that Senator Clinton is a critical advisor on First Ladyism might be damnation with faint praise. I'll call the Clinton office at 3am tonight to get a reaction. Jarrett says, by the way, that Michelle Obama has no desire to be a co-president, but will continue to distrinbute fist-bumps to deserving Americans.
You know, people say that politics is addictive. And also that drugs are addictive. And it's hard to give up drugs. But there's all sorts of things that are finished now, because the election is over, that I don't miss and do not need to experience withdrawal over. Oppo research emails, for example! And certain campaign surrogates. And robo-calls and political ads. I was just able to wean myself off of those things in an instant. I'm not sure I've done a thorough job, explicating all the distinctions, but I'm left with the weird idea that Tucker Bounds might be the new methadone.
Of course, we'll never miss partisans, yelling at each other on these shows, so now we'll have James Clyburn and Mel Martinez get shoutyfaced at each other, maybe.
Clyburn says that while everyone in the country is so optimistic, it's time to give people job growth and health care and that you can maintain the excitement and optimistic by giving the voters what they want, and that includes an economic stimulus program. Martinez says that you need to find "common ground agenda items." Martinez talks about helping homeowners and extending unemployment insurance, which is something that didn't make it into the previous stimulus package, and should have.
Brokaw of course, wants to capture the tiny portion of the population who'll have a tax increase as a net tax increase overall, and he asks Clyburn if that will be put off in the event of a recession. The correct answer, of course, is that the plan is a net tax reduction, so there's no worry about the equation (TAX INCREASE + RECESSION = DOOM).
HAHAHA. Mel Martinez thinks that the government can "loan" money to the auto industry. Who thinks the auto industry can pay back a loan. Do not piss on my leg and tell me that it's raining, Mel!
Clyburn insists that Obama will govern from the center, with the subtle recognition that the center has moved - up with S/CHIP, health care for seniors, linking up community health care programs as a means to bring more preventive care to the uninsured. Martinez doesn't want S/CHIP coming up again, but why not? The biggest problem that S/CHIP faced was the President! Clyburn notes this, incredulous at Martinez's suggestion that it's a divisive issue. Martinez ends up caving a little, "Perhaps we can have it."
Martinez says that he's been telling his colleagues for a long time to tamp down the divisive tone on the immigration issue, and that the GOP paid the price for it. "Senator McCain did not deserve what he got." He also suggests that the future stars of the GOP are coming from governors who tap into populism rather than partisan-identification.
Giving his reaction to Obama's win, Clyburn says something interesting, "They weren't just tears of hope, they were tears of vindication...for those of us who stayed within the system, worked within the system, they were tears of vindication." Not much gets said about this, but the roots of what we're calling "post-racial" were planted long before Obama.
Panel time! With the delightful Doris Kearns Goodwin, Mary Mitchell of the Sun-Times, and Jon Meacham of Newsweek. An altogether pleasant panel! Thank you, Meet The Press!
A great comment from "Halminbar":
Did anyone catch Frank Rich's column in The New York Times today? What an amazing quotation:"The festive scenes of liberation that Dick Cheney had once imagined for Iraq were finally taking place " in cities all over America."
I love it. Too bad there were no statues of Bush that we could tear down.
I say, it speaks to our great credit that we've erected none. Consider it a teardown in advance!
As far as the future of MEET THE PRESS, goes, there's some resistance to the idea of Chuck Todd: one commenter says, "He's about as deep as a puddle. Good with all the gadgets and numbers and such though." I think that what Todd has going against him is a thin resume of going one-on-one with newsmakers, but I think that if you're left with the impression he's not a deep guy, it's through no fault of his own, it's the way he's been deployed. I had the occasion to sit next to Todd at a panel discussion this year, and frankly, I'd think you'd be amazed at the way he responds and reacts to political issues. I came away with the distinct impression that he's having many of the same reactions to the political discussion that you all are.
Commenter "Padfoot" says:
Chris Matthews just said blacks should feel good about the fact that so many whites voted for Obama secretly. As if I should feel good about the fact that white Americans were ashamed of voting for Obama. John McCain wanted more war and more tax cuts for rich people and almost foisted Sarah Palin on the American people. If some of these guys had stood up to their friends and family maybe McCain wouldn"t have received 56 million votes. That is scary. That many people living in Bushland 24/7 still wanting to take a chance on more?
All of that is food for thought, of course. Lots of people signed up for four years of McCain. I can only suggest that with McCain...despite the ignobility of the campaign he just ran...like it or not, stuff is still complicated. Lot's of people voted for the guy from his books, paying no attention to the race at all. I'd bet you'd find some folks who voted for McCain, hoping that the 2000 version of McCain would emerge from the shell on Inauguration Day. Lots of people, of course, cast their vote on the basis of the politics of Bushland. That politics isn't going away entirely, but in this election, it can be said that the potency of a politics that spawned - for example - the Swift Boat Scumbags, was vastly diminished. Every kitchen sink in the Greater Province of Nixonland was hurled at Obama, still he prevailed. We haven't dropped the ring in the fires of Mordor quite yet, but I'd say the Fellowship is on the move.
Anyway, to the panel! Mitchell wrote a column that dealt with the positive impact the Obama family will have on people. Goodwin says that it's potentially an exciting time for the nation. Meacham also has a book to plug. Hooray for our heroic columnists and authors and their historic, or historical, connections. Let us eat AN hamburger at AN historic moment!
What if Obama and Rahm Emanuel, instead of building a cabinet that is a Team of Rivals, build a cabinet that can FORM VOLTRON? Do you think Doris Kearns Goodwin would throw her panties at THAT! I know I would lose my mind! SUCK IT ENEMIES, WE ARE VOLTRON!
Of course, chances are, Voltron would be a huge violation of posse comitatis.
Krauthammer is feeling me! Obama will be CLINTON + PUTIN (!?!) X REAGAN. That has to violate many laws of man. That sounds like a Start Trek villain!
Oy, Meacham. "I think that McCain, ran I think, in all, a noble campaign, and I think we should mark that. It could have been a lot worse." HOW COULD IT HAVE BEEN WORSE? McCain could have ended a rally, I suppose, with the admonition, "GO FORTH, MY FRIENDS, and ASSASSINATE THE AY-RAB!" He could have had Todd Palin run Obama supporters down in the road, on snow machines. He could have found someone even dumber than Palin to be vice-president. There are a few ways it could have been worse, but it would have taken a massive amount of effort to make that last month of McCain-Palin "noble."
Mitchell leaves the viewer with the admonition that people who want to attend the inauguration to "avoid internet scams." As someone who had nearly worked through a really good inauguration-related internet scam, I'm disappointed.
That does it for this Sunday's liveblog! The first post-election liveblog! It's almost hard to believe it's over, but it is, and you can already feel the change! Don't believe me? Well, here in Washington, DC, the venerable institution Ben's Chili Bowl has updated one of their company policies. It's a brave new day, of chili dog redistribution! Don't worry. Joe the Plumber can still afford 'em.
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First Posted: 11- 9-08 08:47 AM | Updated: 12-10-08 05:12 AM