College Dems Eat Scrapple
I have a feeling this will end badly.
Today the College Democrats of America (CDA) announced the schedule for the 2009 CDA National Convention to be held at The George Washington University in Washington, DC from Thursday, July 23- Sunday, July 26.
Over 300 CDA members from colleges and universities across the country will attend this year’s convention. Students will participate in trainings, community service events, and will hear from elected officials and top Democratic activists.
"College Democrats have had an amazing few years. The youth vote has surged in recent elections and we don’t plan on slowing down," said Katie Naranjo, President of College Democrats of America. "At this year’s convention we’ll strategize on how to build on the last few years’ electoral successes and work to organize in support of President Obama’s agenda for change. Getting President Obama and Democrats elected to Congress was just the start, now we have to roll up our sleeves and begin the hard work to bring lasting change to Washington."
Speakers at the CDA Convention include DNC Chairman Tim Kaine, DNC Vice Chair and Florida Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter.
Below is a list of events that are open to the press. To attend any of these events, please RSVP to Joanna Roshlom at [email protected]. A valid press credential is required.
Thursday, July 23
Gavel in Convention and Opening Ceremonies
U.S. Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA)
DNC Vice Chair, Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL)
7:00 P.M. – 8:00 P.M. [my emphasis]
I mean, I get it. Arlen "Used to be Haggis but is now Scrapple" Specter has lost much of his lead against Joe Sestak in a still-hypothetical primary. So to boost Scrapple’s Dem cred–and help him recruit campaign workers–the party has convinced the CDA to give Scrapple a prominent role at today’s events.
Aside from the (lack of wisdom) of big-footing Scrapple in such a prominent way, though, do the powers that be really think Scrapple is the kind of guy who ought to serve as a model for young Dems? A guy whose top legislative moment involved harassing a victim of sexual harassment? A guy who represents, above all, the principle that in politics the only principle is self-promotion? A guy who spent the last eight years veering further and further right, largely endorsing the policies that got Republicans shellacked last year?
That’s the guy the party wants to push onto the future of the party?
The Apple Scrapple Festival in Bridgeville, DE (fall timeframe) is an event not to be missed.
Do ya think someone in DeeCee is equating Arlen’s “number of years lifetime spent as a Democrat” to his age? Thus making him perfect for ‘College Dems?’
“College Dems Eat Scrapple”
In his dreams, maybe. I don’t think he’ll be so lucky in real life.
How dumb and clueless to highlight Specter. Are these people, the College Dems, planning to be tomorrow’s leaders? Where’s SDS when you need them? Oh, that’s right.
No, they’re planning on getting jobs with tomorrows leaders. And considering a) Obama really really really didn’t come through with any kind of new CCC or spoils system(not that he ever promised it) and b)even in the fattest years Dem labor is supposed to live purely on fervor and whatever food they can sneak out of lobbyist receptions, toadying up to a man who just brought millions of dollars in campaign funds into the Democratic universe is not just smart but necessary.
Make no mistake, Specter’s not well-loved by the incoming generation, but there’s probably going to be $10 million spent in PA this cycle on Dem staff/consultants that no one was expecting. Of the 300 attendees, expect that half of them already have a resume in with Sestak or Specter, and a third with both.
Hopefully the light bulbs will go off in the college Dems head about “Scrapple” and they will look more closely at Sestak.
Seems like we should contact the “party” and demand that they stop choosing the candidates for us. Chris Matthews has pounded on this one
During the Bush/Gore run there were absolutely no students out on this campus encouraging students to register (several older folks focused on registration) This year there must have been four different groups registering etc. We have come a long way
Was on four different college campuses this last fall that I have spent a great deal of time on over numerous elections (one selection) and these campuses were on fire.
Hopefully they will do their homework on Sestak
Do you really think that how well Scrapple will play with this audience is something Rahm and Co. deems relevant? The Specter is an incumbent, a senior “insider”, and he needed a forum. The power [sic] that be wants him re-elected. College Dems presumably rely on that power for funds and “access” nearly as much as does the press, so they play along. This is a form of “centrist” wing welfare, not rational staging of exemplary Democrats who are models around which the party will build its future.
Wasn’t it a White House adviser who said the WH invents its own reality? That seems to be another one of those bipartisan bons mots that will survive Karl Rove.
I think CDA is going to wake up the morning after and feel, well, *used*.
But what were we to expect when they put Kaine in charge of the DNC?
Obama is really wasting their youth platoons, squandering what was one of their best assets. This is really pathetic.
Bob in HI
That’s the biggest cost of this sort of cynical promotion of incumbents, regardless of their behavior or depth of support.
The problem is that the cynicism this promotion of insiders engenders empowers the powers that be, because it de-energizes true grass roots efforts. Heads I win, tails I win.
You are spot on – Kaine is a puny follow for Dr. Dean at DNC and this proves the point. A complete waste of fired-up young Dem time and enthusiasm.
I live in PA, and I think it’s a crappy idea. [sigh…]
Otoh, maybe the CDA will light a fire under these DINOs?
Why, what more shining model could be held up before the youth than the creator of the magic bullet theory in the official Warren Commission investigation of the JFK assassination?? Come on, people, we must give credit where it is due. /extreme snark
I was gonna mention the magic bullet. BUt that’s non-partisan stupid. So it stuck with Anita Hill, which our collective leadership seems to forgive and forget.
Wow, a triple-squishy
Harass has only one ‘r’. Not to harass you…
Perhaps this is an attempt to persuade Senator Specter that if he wants to get CDA support for getting out the vote for his sorry ass, he better change his sorry-ass positions on a heckuva lot of things.
Jeebus. I KNOW that and still managed to spell it wrong twice in a row.
Thanks for the har
rassment.So does Joe Sestak have a valid press credential?
Can someone point out to me what it is that the CDA does? Do they have chapters on most college campuses? How do they make themselves known? Were DWS and Rahm once members? Only asking because I don’t see the CDA fulfilling the same kind of functions as the Young Republicans.
The CDA is what the Young Republicans would be without wingnut welfare internships.
yeah, I figured. But at least college Republicans get hired somewhere(and in Congresscritters offices I assume). Do CDA’s get hired by Democratic Congressmen/women?
Sometimes. Mostly they have to work with a campaign first and then they get to go to a state legislative office for a few years with time out of that for a few more campaigns. Basically they get to skip the ‘run for town council/school board’ stage of having a political career and consequently are tracked more toward PR/Fundraising/Organizing/Staffer gigs, although there’s no solid line dividing the electeds from the unelecteds in terms of looking for the next job.
Good god, these poor kids get both Haggis AND Kaine?? What did they do to deserve such treatment?
Apparently the Nelsons were tied up.
One of them by fellow C-street members, to an elephant, for the March of
HannibalCoe, across the Appalachian Trail.Steele is sending out the RNC promotional video for how the College Republicans should be responding. Apparently it involves getting inebriated, biting ankles, and charging.
I can’t imagine how that will compete with the excitement of Kaine and Spectre.
That charging is going to be a problem. For their parents when they get the Amex bill.
Surely in your spare time you write for The Daily Show.
Harrass may only properly have one r, but Haggis has two g’s.
OT-Congratulations to our Canadian Wheelers. Your recession is offically OVER! (Check the map.)
Don’t believe it. We don’t have Geithner et al, but we have Harper as PM, Flaherty as Finance Minister, and Ignatieff as leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition. Ignatieff can’t define what liberalism means, except “Conservatives are to the right of us”.
Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney said
Oh, and Stockwell Day as Minister of International Trade. bwahaha
Snoozefest.
At least they got DWS to spark up the joint; can you imagine if Sebelius was in this mix?
OT – but a peripheral blessing from our war in Afghanistan –
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07…..yrgyz.html
We’re pretty much captive to whatever Kyrgyztan wants to do these days, bc we have to have our base there. So to win hearts and minds in Afghanistan, by making sure we can use IT as a platfrom for bombing Pakistan, we pretty much cede the human rights field in Kyrgyz.
These kids are also being fed Debbie Wasserman Schultz. She’s not stupid, but she fits on the menu with scrapple.
BTW, Tweety is now fulminating about the “war” between Bush and Cheney. Methinks the Bush family has decided the best way to preserve their options is to blame everything on Cheney. Maybe the Time article is the opening salvo.
Bob in HI
Cheney always had less power than the Bush family. That makes him the weak point, and likely somewhat foolish if he ever thought he’d be able to push ‘em around. Especially after leaving office.
Cheney may have had less power than the collective Bush family, but individually he had more than Shrub or Poppa, though perhaps over a shorter span of time. He usurped the presidential crown from Junior and held forth as king for nearly eight years. Until the close of the Libby trial, his word and fear of his retribution allowed him to rule as a constitutional nullity without consequence or question.
In “retirement, a few tee shots away from the center of power in Washington, he remains as hidden as he was in office. He can appear on whatever national “news” show he desires. His policies regarding torture and state secrets and at the DoJ remain largely intact, as does his diminished but still fearsome network across the federal bureaucracy.
He hasn’t the Bush family’s reach, nor likely its longevity – they’ve been power brokers since they shared private rail cars with John D. Rockefeller. But Big Dick is grooming Liz to carry the flame and wife Lynn exerts considerable influence over Texas elementary and secondary schools. Which means textbooks she approves will likely be in your schools, too.
Expect Liz to be on a Congressional ticket in 2010, and pray she’s not on the national ticket in 2016.
she’s got the personal charm of a pile of dog shit
I don’t see it happening
She could run for Tom Davis’ old seat VA-11. That sorta describes his personality as well.
I think she might be too creepy even for Davis’s old district. Which did go for Obama 57-42. But that’s not to say she wouldn’t try.
I believe the only possible reply to that would be: So?
Scott Horton seems to think that the Dark Lord’s influence over policy at the DoJ continues. Those giving orders may differ, and their rationales may vary, but the policies remain Cheney’s:
You mean 43 will get completely cleaned up after again? I keep thinking Cheney will flip on the boy
I understand what you’re saying. Personally I would give those two outcomes even odds.
I kind of think it was this, whose apparent failure maybe helped to window-dress the importance of this changeover, or maybe just gave its chairman some legitimate reason to be poking around for a few months.
Rachel Maddow was talking about the Bush-Cheney “war,” too. In fact, she did her own review of the occasions on which Bush and Cheney have feuded in public over the past 4 years or so.
Bob in HI
A Good Question Posed and i have an answer
http://www.tomdispatch.com/pos…..n%2520Hell
After all, can you honestly tell me that you think often about the CIA torture flap, the CIA-destruction-of-interrogation-video-tapes flap, the what-did-Congress/Nancy Pelosi-really-know-about-torture-methods flap, the Bush-administration-officials-(like-Condi-Rice)-signed-off-on-torture-methods-in-2002-even-before-the-Justice-Department-justified-them flap, the National-Security-Agency-(it-was-far-more-widespread-than-anyone-imagined)-electronic-surveillance flap, the should-the-NSA’s-telecom-spies-be-investigated-and-prosecuted-for-engaging-in-illegal-warrantless-wiretapping flap, the should-CIA-torturers-be-investigated-and-prosecuted-for-using-enhanced-interrogation-techniques flap, the Abu-Ghraib-photos-(round-two)-suppression flap, or various versions of the can-they-close-Guantanamo, will-they-keep-detainees-in-prison-forever flaps, among others that have already disappeared into my own personal oblivion file? Every flap it’s day, evidently.
why yes, yes i can honestly tell you that yes, yes i do think often about these very topics and issues, especially since i am an avid reader of this blog, where these topics and issues are brought to our attention and are then discussed by many many people.
this has been another edition of simple answers to simple questions.
a press release dated thursday july 23rd.
hey, wait a minute, today IS july 23rd.
wow! talk about slipping one in at the last minute.
someone was VERY keen to avoid protest.
but wouldn’t it be (have been by now) cool if the young dems just walked out on snarlin’ arlen?
this is great news for john mcstain
it sure the fuck can’t help scrapple
Is this being run by the DLC or by the DNC?
Mmmm…. appetizing.
I’d love to hear that some significant percentage of the college Dems made their unhappiness known, but suspect that too many of them are careerist strivers of the kind Endymion describes with such approval.
Certainly they’re not the kind of rabble who do this. After all, Lanny Davis is a funder, an untouchable part of the permanent campaign; sure, he’s a corporate whore whose hands drip with blood, but he’s our corporate whore whose hands drip with blood. That ten million’s not gonna raise itself!
Do I really sound approving? I’ll admit, if some random candidate called me up and offered me a job, I’d probably take it; who can afford to turn down work these days? Still, I don’t really like the College Dems, at least not the ones who are into it enough in an off year to travel to a conference. From an activists standpoint they make passable volunteers, but they’re easily distracted by their careerist instincts and ultimately they monopolize the lower-tier campaign and government positions–driving down staff wages and otherwise making it difficult for people to move into politics from other careers.
The permanent campaign may or may not be a good thing (I think of it as a potential positive), but it is objective reality. A permanent campaign is best when it means permanent persuasion, and persuasion is not a CDA strong suit. Even so, I’ve never been involved in a winning campaign where the CDs didn’t make a crucial difference, and I’ve never been involved in a losing campaign where the CDs didn’t flake out to go do something more in their own personal immediate career interests (I’m looking at you ************)
Thanks for clarifying, E.
I don’t really disagree wrt college Dem participation in campaigns. But a contentless party-for-its-own-sake organization seems particularly unsuited to attracting real student talent these days. That’s Tim Kaine for you…
OT: For anyone who cares to learn what’s up with the coup in Honduras, the one that this administration is managing to oppose while at the same time declining to do much to hurt the Honduran elites who ordered it, this RealNews video is worth umpty-ump stories in the press.
So does Dick; his career proves that personality matters as much as deficits, non?
That represents most of those that join these campus “political” clubs, IMHO. The real activists with particular social goals are members of campus groups devoted to those ends. The “Partisan” clubs are merely ways of getting to hobnob with local politicians, and if one “self-promotes” oneself enough, a politician on the “national stage”.
At least those that are involved in a “candidates” political campaign may be interested in the issues that candidate is raising. But this is all watered down at the partisan-club level.
I’m starting to get that not so fresh feeling.
And actually I’m getting it from Tim Kaine as well as Scrapple.
Scrapple is a wonderfull thing. It dissapoints me that you associate it with the Evil Specter.
Ick, I just noticed the editors of Politico were on Charlie Rose 2 nights ago. Did anyone happen to catch that?
I don’t know where to put this, so I’ll just park it here
O/T (Old Topic), or back to torture. This, too, is sickening.
Hussam Mohammed Amin: Former Iraqi Weapons Monitor Describes U.S. Abuse For First Time
Michael Bronner | Huffington Post Investigative Fund First Posted: 07-23-09 03:25 PM | Updated: 07-23-09 06:49 PM
“Major General Hussam Mohammed Amin, named the “Six of Clubs” on the Bush Administration’s card deck of “Iraq’s Most Wanted,” had, perhaps, the most impossible job in pre-war Iraq.
“Reporting to Saddam Hussein’s powerful deputy prime minister, Tariq Aziz, Amin was the man in the middle through 12 years of fractious international weapons inspections between the two American wars — Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Freedom — charged with managing the cat-and-mouse between Saddam and the aggressive teams of United Nations weapons inspectors.
. . .
“As war rolled over the Iraqi regime, Amin disappeared from view. The only public information about him since was the announcement by U.S. Central Command that he was captured “on or around” April 27, 2003.
[And then the torture began. . . ]
“His senses swimming in the suffocating blackout bag, Amin couldn’t anticipate where the next blow was coming from, he said — or whether it would be a punch, a kick or a whack with “some kind of special metal stick” as unseen interrogators demanded the location of nonexistent weapons. He lost track of time, unsure whether he’d been there hours or days. At some point amid the fusillade, he was told that he would be executed. He believed it. He felt blood running down his face and neck — three jagged gashes across his forehead that would require stitches. “Every day, I thought, ‘Now, I will die,’” he said — which was precisely the point: He was in “Purgatory,” the task force’s nickname for the initial interrogation/disorientation ordeal.”
[And it gets worse from there.]
Link.
Wow, fatster, thanks for linking Hussam Mohammed Amin: Former Iraqi Weapons Monitor Describes U.S. Abuse For First Time
Regarding Major General Amin, why was uniformed military being treated like a terrorist?
We heard that the Geneva conventions did not apply to terrorists because they were non-state actors. But why did the conventions not apply to Amin?
Could there be a clearer distinction between the old-line professional military and the new thuggish element for whom torture is standard operating procedure? Amin surrendered voluntarily!
Why was Amin even being held prisoner?
The article makes clear that Iraqi POWs were not treated according to the Geneva conventions. Why was Amin, an Iraqi POW, treated worse than the Japanese and German POWs were during World War 2?
Since Amin was Iraq’s WMD program guy who maintained that “Iraq is clean of weapons of mass destruction”, this may be the clearest example yet of the use of torture in support of political goals.
When all the underlings sympathized with the detainee but were powerless to change anything, it’s clear that the policy came from the top.
Sickening stuff, all right. And it keeps on coming. Arrrrrrrgh.
OT: Marcy, did you sneak off somewhere & do an interview mentioning “blowjob”?
‘Cause the contributions to the Marcy Fund seems to be on an increase.
More torture: The Lancet speaks! FInally.
Physicians at Guantanamo violate medical ethics: study
“The use of physicians at the US prison camp in Guantanamo Bay has forced medical professionals to violate their ethics codes, according to findings published Thursday in the UK journal Lancet.
“The roles that medical professionals have been called on to play at the controversial detention facility “has damaged the integrity of the physicians working for the military and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA),” the study said.”
Link.
JAMA next?
That explains why the gummint doesn’t want the UN observers/investigators to visit it.
beg pardon
I forgot that for repuglitards taking personality tests, scoring as high as a pile of dog shit is quite an accomplishment
and I’d like to point out an error in tonight’s “Daily Show”:
Jon Stewart said that Ken Burns did not mention the counter-rebellion in Jones County Mississippi
John Stewart was wrong
Ken Burns devoted a titled segment to “The Kingdom Of Jones”
I never heard anything more about it until tonight’s episode
still don’t get Jon Stewart a pass …
(wink)
This is interesting.
Poll details: Majority in US oppose both wars
By The Associated Press
Thursday, July 23, 2009
“OVERALL RESULTS: 34 percent favor the war in Iraq and 63 percent are opposed; 44 percent favor the war in Afghanistan and 53 percent are opposed.”
Link.
While Marcy’s away, perhaps some creative devil could get her a cameo in this video. That’d teach her to give bmaz the keys.
Europe inherits one of our monsters (the-corporation-as-person). This is one of my favorite hobby horses. Fingers crossed that someday bmaz will write about Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Intel Says Its Human Rights Were Violated
by Dollars and Sense
by Charles Forelle
BRUSSELS–”Intel COrp. appealed a billion-euro antitrust fine Wednesday. That was expected. But among the chip giant’s arguments is an unlikely complaint: Its human rights were violated.
“Intel isn’t alone. A growing list of companies are raising the charge that the EU’s vigorous antitrust watchdog is running afoul of protections afforded by European human-rights law.”
Link.