TeresaCentric

Join Ted, Maegan and I as we discuss who won the political battle on the stimulus, the revelation that Roland Burris raised money for Blago, and our picks for this Sunday's Academy Awards.

Buried in last week's talk about the near-universal GOP opposition to Obama's stimulus was perhaps a much better example of Obama's bipartisanship:

After offering something to teachers and school administrators by saying that "both sides are going to have to acknowledge we're going to need more money for new science labs, to pay teachers more effectively," he fired what some saw as a shot across the bow of teachers unions. "But we're also going to need more reform, which means that we've got to train teachers more effectively; bad teachers need to be fired after being given the opportunity to train effectively," he said, adding that "we should experiment with things like charter schools that are innovating in the classroom, [and] we should have high standards."

The education issue is a classic place where conservatives and liberals each have part of the answer and yet have refused to back off their entrenched positions in the interests of actually solving the problem. Schools need funding - tons of it - from anywhere they can get it. They also need to be held accountable - down to the individual teacher - for how students are performing. How to offer both pieces of the solution should be the subject of continued debate - but the gigantic debate over what needs to be put behind us. It's taken far too long and is actually costing us badly for the long run.

Frank Rich writes that the GOP's biggest problem right now is the Washington echo chamber that has them completely out of touch with what the country wants:

The stimulus battle was more of the same. “This town talks to itself and whips itself into a frenzy with its own theories that are completely at odds with what the rest of America is thinking,” [senior Obama advisor David Axelrod] says... Overdosing on this culture can be fatal. Because Republicans are isolated in that parallel universe and believe all the noise in its echo chamber, they are now as out of touch with reality as the “inevitable” Clinton campaign was before it got clobbered in Iowa... This G.O.P., a largely white Southern male party with talking points instead of ideas and talking heads instead of leaders, is not unlike those “zombie banks” that we’re being asked to bail out. It is in too much denial to acknowledge its own insolvency and toxic assets. Given the mess the country is in, it would be helpful to have an adult opposition that could pull its weight, but that’s not the hand America has been dealt.

I think Rich has put this last point better than anyone I've heard thus far. Opposition is critically important to our democracy, and to keeping the Democrats in check. As much as I like Obama and believe he'll do the right thing whenever he can, I do not believe that the same is true of the rest of the Democratic leadership in Washington. I'd love to hear principled conservative voices with some moral high ground left to stand on coming from our nation's power centers. There are a few notables, such as Arlen Specter and -- as Rich cites -- Charlie Crist. But for the most part, they've vanished. [Image credit: David Horsey.]

I was curious to see how the Republican party, no longer headed by an uninterested delusional fundamentalist and an out-of-touch war criminal, would be able to adjust to its new role as the minority party. Would it realize that it had grown out of touch with America, been too focused on ideology over reality, and stuck with the same ideas that it had almost 30 years ago? Would it come up with new ideas, recognize the need to place policy over politics, and rebuild itself in the wake of one our worst Presidents? Well, the answer has been a resounding, defiant, NO! Instead, the Republican party has decided that it will absolutely place politics over policy. That posturing is more important than success. And the only solution they have to a worldwide economic crisis is to lower taxes. In an economic climate where 50 million people worldwide have lost their jobs, the Republicans voted against a stimulus bill. In many cases, not because they were against it, but because they were worried of losing their seats in an upcoming primary election. Yes, this is a party now marked by political cowardice. After being one of only three Republicans in both the Senate and House to vote for the bill, Senator Arlen Specter said he "came back to the cloak room after coming to the agreement a week ago today," and "one of my colleagues said, 'Arlen, I'm proud of you.' My Republican colleague said, 'Arlen, I'm proud of you.' I said, 'Are you going to vote with me?' And he said, 'No, I might have a primary.' And I said, 'Well, you know very well I'm going to have a primary.'" Meanwhile, Senator Judd Gregg, a New Hampshire Republican, withdrew his nomination from Commerce Secretary in protest over the stimulus package, on the grounds that he was a fiscal conservative. This is a man, who of course, never once protested in 6 years as a nearly $200 billion surplus left by a Democrat was turned into a nearly $500 billion deficit, during a time when both Houses and the Presidency were controlled by his party. So now we have a party that is deliberately sabotaging a bill it secretly supports for political reasons, which refuses to work with the other party, that is opposed to spending on education, health care, and green jobs, and that calls Barack Obama a Socialist after their titular head effectively nationalized the finance and auto industries. After destroying the global economy, screwing up two wars, and shredding civil liberties, the Republican party should be adjusting their ideology, coming up with new ideas, and admonishing those voices who steered them on the wrong path. Instead they are groveling to the likes Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, and demanding that we cut taxes. I don't expect that they will be a major national party by the year 2016.

Join Ted Johnson, Maegan Carberry and I as we discuss the political news of the week and chat with our special guest Sarah Schacht founder of Knowledge as Power, about the Obama administration's pledge to take public feedback on legislation.

Those of you who have not read Orson Scott Card's classic novel Ender's Game should add it to your book list at once. Or better yet, listen to the audiobook (iTunes), as Card has often said that his work was meant to be enjoyed in spoken format. In brief, Ender's Game is the story of Ender Wiggin -- a six year-old whose military genius is the human race's only chance of escaping annihilation by aliens. Much of the book is devoted to Ender's experiences at Battle School -- a spaceport where child armies play against one another in a zero-gravity laser tag-style affair as preparation for combat against the alien menace. The training is brutal, and Ender's is especially so. His teachers intentionally isolate him from the other children by pointing out his extraordinary ability, exacerbating their jealousies. The school's military commanders create near-impossible battle situations, and yet Ender leads his army to victory again and again. Military strategy is not Ender's only great strength. His noteworthy leadership capabilities inspired me to revisit my notions of fairness, readiness and the ability to lead. Here's what I learned:

• The world is not fair. You will be thrown into the deep end before you're ready. You'll face long odds, unpredictable situations, and grueling experiences. Take a deep breath and lead anyway.
• Trust your instincts, and give those around you the freedom to trust theirs.
• Get comfortable with reality. Don't live in denial of the truth just because it is frightening or inconvenient.
• Don't let outdated perspectives limit your creativity.
• Laugh with your people, and give them time to laugh with one another without you around.
• Acknowledge when things are difficult and be compassionate, but never coddle your people. They will be as strong or as dependent as you let them be.
• Don't re-enact your baggage with your people.
• When you are a leader, your life doesn't belong to you anymore.

That last point was actually imparted to me by a very wise leader that I have the good fortune to work with at T-Mobile, but never have I understood it better than after reading Ender's Game.

After repeated crashes and relentless pop-up windows in Chrome, Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari, I was forced to download and try out Opera just so I could watch a whole episode of The Office without having to kill my web browser with the Task Manager. But I'm glad that Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, and Chrome sucked so bad as to leave me no choice. Because Opera is awesome. Fast, secure, and a great UI. Download it, and you won't be sorry.

In this economy, not even the "jobs of tomorrow" are safe. Even tech companies still running deeply in the black are making job cuts. But despite the brutality of those tech layoffs, the government still needs to focus on spending stimulus money in a way that benefits those companies. The economic stimulus bill that the Senate should be voting on in the next 24 hours should aim to create jobs immediately while bolstering our economy for the long term. And what better way to do that than with education? After all, as Daniel Lyons put it in his very prescient Newsweek piece last week:

Detroit failed because it ignored or dismissed the threat from foreign rivals and kept on making the wrong kind of cars. In contrast, companies in the ever-paranoid [Silicon] Valley are fully aware of the danger they face. They're not pleading with the government for a handout; they're pleading for more investment in education. They're not making excuses for inferior products or asking for protection from competition through limits on imports; they're making the best products in the world and are happy to compete, but need more brainpower to stay ahead.

He goes on to mention that immigration will not continue to solve our brain gap. I was shocked to learn that many educated people around the world are choosing to stay in their countries of origin (read: India) rather than move to the United States, because they see the opportunities for their children as better there than here. But some stubborn folks disagree that something needs to change. They see the education spending provisioned in the stimulus as an overreach on the part of the Federal government:

But Republicans strongly criticized some of the proposals as wasteful spending and an ill-considered expansion of the federal government’s role, traditionally centered on aid to needy students, into new realms like local school construction.

Look, I hate wasteful government spending as much as the next conservative, but these are extraordinary times. Our economy is in a complete tailspin and the only way we can get out is with hefty, intelligent spending by the government. That's right, I said it. And the smartest investment we could possibly make right now is in getting our kids ready to compete in the scientific and mathematic disciplines that will drive our future economy. So...can we please stop blathering about ideology and just pass the damn stimulus?

No, that's not PhotoShop. That is an ACTUAL photo of Michael Phelps, 14-time Olympic gold medal winner. "I engaged in behavior which was regrettable and demonstrated bad judgment," Phelps said in the statement released by one of his agents. "I'm 23 years old and despite the successes I've had in the pool, I acted in a youthful and inappropriate way, not in a manner people have come to expect from me. For this, I am sorry. I promise my fans and the public it will not happen again." Now, obviously Michael Phelps shouldn't be sending the message to his 14-year-old fans that marijuana is cool. But at the same time, can we get over the ridiculousness in this country that says marijuana is a dangerous drug which should be illegal. It has myriad health benefits, and, if used properly (filtered), it's only negative side-effect is a decrease in motivation. However, as is demonstrated by Michael Phelps, that decrease in motivation varies from person to person, and generally won't make someone who is naturally hard-working into a lazy slob. It just makes being lazy easier, because TV becomes so much more interesting. So can we stop spending billions of dollars a year enforcing a law that the even world's greatest athlete* breaks. If we legalize marijuana, and tax it, the tax revenues could bring in as much as $50 billion a year. And it would go a long way to decreasing the incredible amount of violence in northern Mexico, which is on its way to becoming a failed state as a direct result of America's drug policy. We're no longer hampered with a delusional President. Plus, Obama has even admitted to smoking marijuana in his younger days. So please, can we legalize marijuana. After all, we need something to keep us distracted from the fact that all of Obama's nominees don't know how to pay taxes. *After Lebron James, Lance Armstrong, Tom Brady, and Larry Fitzgerald. But I'd be willing to bet dollars to dimes that at least three of those four guys also smoke pot.

Those of you who have read this blog for a while know that I am a huge fan of columnist and gay rights activist Dan Savage, whose raucously funny and honest sex advice has simultaneously informed and amused many a reader for nearly 20 years. A few years back, then-Pennsylvania Republican Senator Rick Santorum compared two gay men making love to one another to "man on dog" sex just after a landmark Supreme Court decision banning anti-sodomy laws in many states. Savage's readers were deeply incensed, and one suggested that he run a contest to name a sex act that Rick Santorum would be sure to disapprove of after Rick Santorum. The result can be found here. (WARNING: Not safe for work.) Now, Savage has run another contest to give new meaning to the word "Saddleback." For those of you who don't know the origin, Saddleback is the name of Rick Warren's Orange County church, where he runs "ex-gay" ministries and until recently would not accept an openly gay or lesbian person as a member of his congregation. After Warren was given the opportunity to give the invocation at the inauguration of our new president, the gay and lesbian community erupted in protest, and once more, the race was on to define a sex act that Rick Warren would never approve of with the word "Saddleback." The result, in Savage's own words:

"Saddlebacking: the phenomenon of Christian teens engaging in unprotected anal sex in order to preserve their virginities."... Here's why this definition is perfect: Saddlebacking, like barebacking, involves one person riding up on another's backside...the person being ridden has been saddled—thanks to the efforts of the Rick Warrens of this world—with religious hang-ups and serious misconceptions about sex.

For more on this new definition, read Savage's column, or check out the new Saddleback website. (Not Safe for Work). [For those of you who wonder why I linked every reference to Saddleback or Rick Warren in this entire piece to the Saddlebacking.com website, please reference this Wikipedia article on Google Bombing.]