Spin, Or Worse?

By the way, yesterday I made a tongue-in-cheek crack about Nancy Pelosi being against Jack Murtha's pullout proposal before she was for it. A spokesman for the House minority leader says she never opposed it, she just declined to endorse it at the time. (Isn't declining to endorse something the same as being against it?) At any rate, says the spokesman, Pelosi was actually for Murtha's plan at the time but decided, as a matter of strategy, to wait to announce her support. To the outside world, though, it looked like a change of position. And I still think it deserved more media coverage as a significant shift in the Iraq debate.

Meanwhile, the deal has been cut on the Patriot Act:

"House and Senate negotiators reached agreement today to extend key provisions of the USA Patriot Act, the controversial anti-terrorism law passed in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks that were due to expire Dec. 31," says the LAT .

"The agreement would make permanent 14 of 16 provisions. Two provisions -- the so-called 'library' provision, which allows the FBI broad leeway to subpoena business records in intelligence and terrorism cases, and a 'roving' wiretap provision that allows law enforcement to tap any phone a suspected terrorist uses -- would expire in four years."

Congress has a hard time cutting even a little spending, and Katrina legislation remains stalled, but House Republicans can move quickly when it comes to helping certain constituents:

"The House voted yesterday to extend a series of tax cuts from President Bush's first term, arguing that the lower rates were crucial to sustain a rebounding economy, and shrugging off concern that the cuts would swell the federal deficit," says the Philadelphia Inquirer .

"The House voted 234-197 for tax cuts that would benefit mainly businesses and investors and cost the Treasury $56.1 billion over five years."

From the right, David Brooks offers one of the most unflinching critiques of conservatism I've seen:

"A lot of the energy that used to go into ideas is now devoted to defending Republican politicians. Many former conservative activists have become Republican lobbyists. (When conservatism was a movement of ideas, it attracted oddballs; now that it's a movement with power, it attracts sleazeballs.)

"Most important, there is greater social pressure to conform to the party's needs. Even writers and wonks are supposed to stay on message. In the 1970's, supply-siders mounted an insurgency against the Republican House leadership and against some sitting G.O.P. senators. If any group tried that today, it would be crushed by the party establishment . . .

"Conservative media success means intellectual flabbiness. Conservatives used to live in a media world created by people who thought differently than they did. Reading certain publications and watching the evening news was like intellectual calisthenics. Now conservatives can be just as insular as liberals, retreating to their own media sources to be told how right they are."

Former Democratic Hill aide David Sirota must not have been a big fan of the No. 2 House Democrat, because in this HuffPost screed he really lets the man have it: