Posts by Delaware Dem

It's even more clear now that the battle for the principle of marriage equality is genuinely over. Not just in blue states, which we knew, but even in many of the most conservative states in the country. (Nate Silver argued last year that Mississippi and Alabama are likely to be the final same sex marriage hold outs.) What we have now isn't so much a battle as a vast moping up operation, a race between legislatures and the courts to catch up with galloping public opinion. Since last month we know have this most recent federal court decision in Oklahoma, another state with some claim to being the most conservative state in the country, tossing out the state's ban on same sex marriage. To play the devil's advocate, we can note that the judges in the Utah and Oklahoma cases were Clinton and Obama appointees. (The Judge with the narrower ruling in Ohio is another Obama appointee.) We've yet to see a judge appointee by Republican president make a similar ruling. But judges don't generally like to get overruled or get too far out in front of higher court rulings. One judge going off on his or her own is one thing. Three making such a finding in short order suggests that Justice Scalia was right in stating what most others recognized: that the Court's decision in Windsor leaves virtually no constitutional ground for states to reject same sex marriage.

[A] recent extensive report in the NY Times found no organized attempt by Al Qaeda to attack the consulate. And now we have this, from the latest budget deal:

Despite the concern over security after the 2012 attack on the United States Mission in Benghazi, Libya, the spending bill earmarks less to embassy security, construction and maintenance than it allotted for fiscal 2013 — $2.67 billion, down by $224 million.

I mean, if the neoconservatives are so concerned about the safety of U.S. diplomats, why don’t they put their money where their mouths are?

[W]hy would his aides think it would be okay to screw some small-town mayor (and everyone else on that bridge) over a meaningless irrelevant endorsement? I mean, who expects endorsements from the rival party, and then gets so upset when they don't get it to go to such great lengths as this in retribution? And who gets excited at the idea of schoolchildren getting stuck on that bridge? They thought it was fine because of the culture that Christie has created, one of intimidation and bullying. Remember that bullying incident where he screamed at the school teacher? That wasn't caught by a rival campaign tracker. That was caught on camera by a Christie staffer, and they put that stuff online. They're proud of that! So given that Christie once boasted that "for better or for worse, this staff will reflect my personal style of leadership and decision-making," it shouldn't be surprising that it reflected the worst of his personality. Or put another way, his staff didn't go rogue. Now, his "I didn't know a thing" schtick, however implausible, at best paints him as a clueless dolt who can't handle his staff—completely counter to the persona he's built over the last several years as a hands-on in-the-trenches roll-up-your-sleeves-and-get-it-done governor. You can't be blissfully unaware of what your top staff is doing and then claim you are deeply involved in the governing business. But worse for him, the "bully" narrative is now set in stone. It was his greatest source of strength but now it's been neutered. I doubt his staff will be posting any other YouTubes of him being a dick to ordinary people. Good luck with that.