The Republic of T.

OK. In the 80s, Gwen Guthrie made it clear, “Ain’t Nothin’ Going On But The Rent.”

Well, times have changed. Now, it’s all about the benefits.

I thought for a minute, it’d be funny to have a gay version, but if you’re gay you wouldn’t necessarily benefit from having a “Boyfriend with Health Benefits.” Since you can’t marry him, and all…

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for March 30th through April 1st:

• Who’s Afraid of New Media? –
• Barone defines 'normal' –
• Cars, Banks and the Future of the Clean Economy –
• Democrats Sabotage Obama’s Agenda –
• Seymour Hersh: Secret US Forces Carried Out Assassinations in a Dozen Counties, Including in Latin America –
• Where’s the Outrage Over Workers Getting the Shaft? –
• Detroit Dissonance – Tough Love for Carmakers, Pillows for Wall St. –
• Obama’s Tough Love for Detroit –
• Officials: Torture Confessions Not Proven Useful –
• Fear vs. Hope –

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for March 27th through March 30th:

• Michele Bachmann = Treason Against the United States –
• Sick Around America: Half-Assed Health Insurance Doesn’t Work –
• Why Not Bank CEOs? –
• Op-Ed Contributor: Feeling Too Down to Rise Up –
• That’s No Angry Mob, It’s a Movement –
• 6 Important Real World Skills You Learned From Videogames –
• South Carolina Unemployment Surges to 11 Percent –
• Geithner Gets a Taste of the Peasants’ Anger –
• Gary Younge | The Bonus Outrage –
• When People Aren’t Angry, Politicians Aren’t Responsive –

Given the slowdown in my blogging in the past year — and the accompanying slide down “the long tail” — I don’t look to be included in many “top blog” lists or “can’t miss” blog lists. I’ve stopped checking. So, I couldn’t have been more surprised when a neighbor clued me in that this blog was recently included on just such a list.

I’ve never an anonymous as a blogger. (I figured, I’d either be found out or give myself away eventually.) But I’m not exactly “out” in our neighborhood as a blogger. Unless it comes up in conversation, I don’t usually bring it up. Besides, anyone who Google’s my name will figure it out pretty quickly.

This weekend, one of our neighbors babysat while we had a night out at a fundraiser for Parker’s school. When we returned, she asked me, “Do you write a blog, by any chance?”

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Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for March 25th through March 27th:

• The Intellectual Crash of 2009: Where Have All the Smart People Gone? –
• Bachmann keeps pushing the envelope –
• AIG Exec Whines About Public Anger, and Now We’re Supposed to Pity Him? Yeah, Right –
• Mitchell Bard: Why I Have No Sympathy for Jake DeSantis –
• Bob Franken: The Best Anger Management is Change –
• Bush Official: Administration Knew Gitmo Had Innocents –

I missed president Obama’s press conference. Probably because it took place during the 2.5 hours of family time we have (including dinner) before the kids go to bed, and because afterwards I was either too busy catching up on reading and/or writing, or too tired to remember to turn it on. (To give you an idea how busy, it took a full 24 hours or more to get from the idea for this post to actually writing it.)

Thankfully, the blogosphere brought me up to speed this morning, so I know what I missed. And, thanks to Steve Benen at Washington Monthly, I know I missed a moment that would surely have had me yelling, “Are you kidding me!?” at the television screen.

The strangest question from President Obama’s press conference last night came by way of NBC News’ Chuck Todd. Twelve hours later, I’m still not sure what he was thinking.

“Some have compared this financial crisis to a war, and in times of war, past presidents have called for some form of sacrifice. [...]

“Why, given this new era of responsibility that you’re asking for, why haven’t you asked for something specific that the public should be sacrificing to participate in this economic recovery?”

When the president responded by pointing all of the many ways in which Americans are alreadysacrificing in the midst of an economic crisis, Todd wasn’t satisfied. In a follow up, the NBC White House correspondent asked why Obama has called on “specific” sacrifices from Americans. And again, the president explained, “[T]he American people are making a host of sacrifices in their individual lives.”

The transcript doesn’t quite do it justice, though. Let’s go to video. shall we?

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I don’t know whether to praise the Republicans or pity them.

On one hand, they’ve been given chance after chance to “bring it,” in term of ideas to address the crises we face — an act of astounding generosity, if you ask me, extended to a party that worked very hard for a very long time to bring us to this point — and they’ve consistently shown up empty-handed. I muster some admiration for someone who brings a knife to a gun fight, because at least he brought something. But to show up empty-handed is, well, pitiful.

On the other hand,I have to give them credit. In the face of current political and economic realities, it takes work — hard, grueling work — to not “get it.” Their “(Dead End) Road to Recovery” shows that when it comes to not “getting it,” Republicans are not afraid to roll up their sleeves and plunge in.

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Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for March 24th through March 25th:

• Begala: GOP means ‘Got 0 Plans’ –
• Sacrifice –
• The Growing Case Against Red Meat –
• “This Is About the Law” –
• When Bachman has the mic –
• Outrage Works –
• US Tax Dollars Funding African Anti-Gay Extremists –
• Commentary: Cancel the bonuses? No, the bailouts –

[Source.]

Couldn’t resist. Click on the thumbnail to see the original.

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for March 22nd through March 24th:

• Laissez Unfair –
• Wanted: A Perp Walk For Plutocrats –
• Exxon Valdez: The Killing Did Not Stop in 1989 –
• No More ‘Too Big to Fail’ –
• When O'Reilly sends stalkers –
• A Second 9/11 in Slow Motion –
• I Was Followed, Harassed, and Ambushed By Bill O’Reilly’s Hooligans –
• Congress Should Challenge Cheney –
• Give CEO Pay the Pink Slip –
• America Is in Need of a Moral Bailout –
• Why Should Madoff Go to Jail and Forfeit His Wealth? –

(Crossposted from the day job.)

Last week, when the fury over AIG bonuses was just peaking, I read something that jolted me out of own anger and into a realization:

After a transformational election and at the beginning of a transformational presidency, progressives need to remember: the real transformation hasn’t happened yet. People don’t yet have a tangible vision of something better than the past eight years or the current crisis. They have hope, but hope wears thin if people have nothing that they can see with their own eyes, hold in their hands, or experience in their own lives as evidence of the possibility of something better.

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Apparently Josef Fritzl is on suicide watch. Good. They should definitely stop him from committing suicide. The man who imprisoned (enslaved, actually) for 24 years, raped and impregnated his daughter, and killed one of the seven children he fathered by her is experiencing some “deterioration” in his mental state after sitting through her 11-hour taped testimony.

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This has been in the back of my mind for a while now, so I’m just gonna go ahead and say it: If the California Supreme Court upholds proposition 8, it will signify nothing less than the death of civil rights in this country.

Think I’m wrong? Well, which of these folks do you want voting on your civil rights?

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Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for March 19th through March 22nd:

• Op-Ed Columnist: Has a ‘Katrina Moment’ Arrived? –
• Why Do Conservatives Hate Your Children? –
• Reagan: The Great American Socialist –
• Tax havens exist because of larger states’ hypocrisy –
• Health Reform’s Moment –
• Prop. 8: Tyranny of the Majority –
• Reckoning on the Iraq War –
• Obama Bests Bush on International LGBT Rights –
• Sally Kohn: Blue Dogs? Bring On The Purple Cats! –

And, Frankly, that frightens me.

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Like I said, there are too many people like me — with more a voice and an outlet that was possible before — for “The Daily Me” to ever really cease publication.

Not that there haven’t been attempts along those lines. One of the most chilling was last year when the Associated Press filed 7 takedowns against a blog under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The offense, linking to AP content with quotes of less that 100 words. Linking and quoting is, or was, a copyright violation.

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It’s not exactly news what’s happening to newspapers. Or haven’t you heard? Well, when was the last time you picked up a newspaper? Don’t remember? Soon, depending on where you are, you may find there are no newspapers to pick up anymore.

At least one city — possibly San Francisco, Miami, Minneapolis or Cleveland — likely will soon lose its last daily newspaper, analysts say. And it “could be a lot more widespread than people have been predicting,” says Mike Simonton, who tracks media debt for Fitch Ratings.

It’s hard to ignore that possibility as the pace of newspaper closings accelerates.

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I’ve heard why taxing bonuses handed out by banks that accept bailout funds — as the House just voted to do — is a bad idea.What I haven’t heard is a better one.

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