Matt Yglesias

24 Responses to “BHTV: The Return”

1. Peter K. Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 12:13 pm

   Since we’re in the middle of major economic crisis, I’d cut Obama some slack. As he said, there’s no time for a learning curve. I shudder at the thought of McCain actually having won the election.

2. joe from Lowell Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 12:28 pm

   Barack Obama will be sworn into officein 56 days. A month or two after that, it might be possible to write something intelligent about the ideological direction of his administration.

   Let’s look at what we knew about some of George Bush’s appointments before he was sworn in:

   Dick Cheney was Secretary of Defense when we decided not to march to Baghdad, and had never made a peep about that being a mistake. He subsequently became head of a major oil-extraction/construction firm, and lobbied for the repeal of laws limiting the industry’s ability to work with dictatorial regimes in the Middle East.

   Colin Powell was a centrist, and notably more dovish than many of the figures in the Clinton administration. He had opposed the war in Kosovo and was against nation building and limited war.

   Andy Card was a harworking wonk respected on both sides of the aisle.

   Condoleeza Rice was an academic pragmatist Sovietologist.

   Donald Rumsefeld had led the Reagan administration’s rapproachment with Saddam Hussein.

   A pretty clear picture can be drawn here, but not one that resembled the foreign policy of the next few years.

3. dne Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 12:34 pm

   The link to the full bloggingheads is broken.

4. Brent Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 12:55 pm

   Didn’t realize the facial hair has returned. Guess you gotta have gravitas when you’re the 9th most important person in America.

5. Sean Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 1:55 pm

   Brent – the beard is to prevent people from discovering Matt is the Numa Numa kid

6. Susan from NC Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 2:14 pm

   Why do we so often feel the need to say that disagreement is betrayal? It’s a pouty, childish, all or nothing, and ultimately impossible position.

7. Don Williams Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 2:48 pm

   Re Susan’s comment “Why do we so often feel the need to say that disagreement is betrayal? It’s a pouty, childish, all or nothing, and ultimately impossible position.”
   —————
   1) I would say that a $7.8 Trillion Bailout of the Rich is something to pout about — given the deprivation many people in this country endure.

   2) That, of course, is on top of the the $5 Trillion pissed away from 2001 to Aug 2008 — $2 Trillion for the Superrich’s Tax Cut, another Trillion or so to hand the oil deposits of IRaq to Big Oil,etc.

   $3 Trillion of which was stolen out of Social Security/Medicare Trust Funds — without the Fucking Democratic Leadership raising the slightest squeak of protest. In fact, I recall the leadership deliberately LYING to the people of this country –telling them that future delivery of Social Security benefits was NOT a problem — even though Social Security has a funding shortfall of $8 Trillion. PLus Medicare has a funding shortfall of $32 Trillion.

   3) Those of us who give our time and money to trying to get Democrats elected have some right to ask that our leaders stop betraying us — stop Enabling this massive whoring for the Rich.

8. Alex Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 3:40 pm

   That was a great BHTV episode!

   Well at least for the first half until Matthew insisted on rehashing the whole “Republican civil war” thing. Ross was right. That is so two weeks ago! Topics move quickly in BHTV. It has been covered to DEATH.

   What a wasted opportunity. What about talking about the 500 to 700 billion dollar infrastructure figure that is floating out there? Since Matt is a big fan of public transit, I was looking forward to hearing a debate about subject.

9. Loyal Reader Since Back in the Eponymous Dayz Says:
   November 25th, 2008 at 3:56 pm

   I really enjoy it when you do these.

10. strasmangelo jones Says:
    November 25th, 2008 at 4:10 pm

    Barack Obama will be sworn into officein 56 days. A month or two after that, it might be possible to write something intelligent about the ideological direction of his administration.

    This is incredibly dense. We already have plenty of information on Obama’s ideological direction, from the kinds of advisers he surrounds himself with to the kind of legislation he’s supported to the kinds of promises he’s made, and all the evidence points toward a moderate conservative Democrat, firmly entrenched in the Beltway foreign policy and economic consensus, who isn’t going to ruffle feathers on Wall Street or in Israel. We know that when it comes to energy and the environment he’s in the pocket of the coal industry, like most Illinois politicians, and in fact he’s proud of that – he used his support for coal throughout the general election to show his “independence” from big bad environmentalists. We also know that foreign policywise, he’s surrounded himself with hawks – some of those hawks opposed the Iraq War, but all of them seem to salivate at the prospect of war in general, and a lot of them have written about how America should be starting more wars, whether it’s in Sudan or Pakistan or elsewhere.

    The bottom line is that we’ve got a good idea where the Obama team is headed, and it’s headed for a reprise of the hawkish, deregulatory fervor of the Clinton years. Liberals could have been pressuring Obama this entire time to move to the left, but instead they’ve let all the pressure get applied by Wall Street (on economic policy) and AIPAC (on foreign policy). While liberals are sitting back and letting their Obama honeymoon run its course, Obama’s filling his administration with conservatives, hawks and right-wingers. The perverse ineptitude of the netroots never ceases to amaze me.

11. Klug Says:
    November 25th, 2008 at 9:05 pm

    Probability of Matt Yglesias upspeak? High.

12. knoh Says:
    November 27th, 2008 at 2:34 pm

    Wouldn’t it be great if you drank out of a reusable glass container instead of an environmentally unfriendly disposable plastic bottle?

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