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The power produced by engine thrust is the product of thrust and flight velocity (V). The ratio of this useful power to the increment in kinetic energy given to the flow in passing through the engine is the propulsive efficiency (hp); a good approximation of this variable may written in the form hp = 2V/(V + Vj), where Vj is the jet velocity.
High levels of thermal efficiency require the T4/T2 ratio to be as high as possible with appropriate pressure ratio and component efficiencies. In the case of a simple turbojet gas turbine engine, this requirement would mean that the jet velocities are also relatively high. For example, for a ratio of T4/T2 = 5.6 together with an engine pressure ratio of 40, the jet velocity Vj would be about 817 ms-1, (Cumpsty, 1997). At Mach 0.85 at 10.7 km, when the flight velocity V is 252 ms-1, the relationship shown above gives a propulsive efficiency of only about 47%. Thermal efficiency at this condition is about 48%, so ho= hp x htherm = 0.48 x 0.47 = 23% for the assumptions of this simplified example. For typical aircraft, overall efficiency ranges between 20 and 40%.
The most practical method of raising overall efficiency is to lower the jet velocity and thereby increase propulsive efficiency; this approach has been adopted in the bypass engine used so widely today. In this engine design, hot gases leaving the core turbine expand through further turbine stages, which drive the fan mounted in front of the core compressor. In most modern engines, the pressure ratio across the fan at cruise condition is about 1.6, giving a bypass ratio of about 6 and a jet velocity of about 400 ms-1. At this jet velocity, propulsive efficiency is about 77% at a cruise speed of Mach 0.85 at 10.7 km. Unfortunately, losses associated with the inefficiency of the fan and the turbine driving it inevitably reduce these benefits somewhat, so a typical value for the overall efficiency of such an engine is currently about 30 to 37% at cruise. Increasing the bypass ratio clearly offers the prospect of further increases in propulsive efficiency, but this approach has to be weighed against the penalties of increased size and weight of the installed engine and associated changes in drag (see Section 7.2 for further discussion of airframe efficiency and installation effects). Other prospects for increasing propulsive efficiency (e.g., propellers and unducted fans) are discussed in Section 7.4.3.
Figure 7-11: Combustor exit temperature trend with time.
This brief review of theoretical considerations summarizes thermodynamic and aerodynamic constraints for engine designers in the continuing drive toward more efficient engines for current and future requirements. Although today's most advanced engines have bypass ratios in the range 5 to 9, there will be efforts to continue to try to increase them. Despite their attractions, however, bypass ratios much in excess of 9 are likely to require a gear box between the power turbine and the fan, or a novel configuration (a topic taken up further in Section 7.4.3), as well as imposing installation and weight problems.
Figure 7-12: Evolution of aircraft gas turbine efficiency
The foregoing discussion briefly reviewed the ways in which basic engine cycle considerations can influence design trends of gas turbines. Practical confirmation of such trends may be obtained by looking at historical trends of principal parameters affecting the performance of gas turbines since they were first introduced. Economic and aircraft range considerations have been uppermost in engine designers' minds. Figure 7-9 clearly shows the impressive progress made in reducing thrust-specific fuel consumption (mass flow rate of fuel burned per unit of thrust) with time. The engines of 1960 to 1970 vintage were either turbojets or first-generation low bypass ratio turbofans (Figure 7-7) with relatively high levels of fuel consumption. The period from 1970 to the mid-1980s saw the introduction of second-generation turbofan engines, which are generally referred to as high bypass ratio engines, which had significantly better fuel consumption than the earlier engines. Improvements in fuel consumption for third generation engines were smaller.
Important improvements in the understanding of complex aerodynamic flows within turbomachinery have been achieved over the past 25 years through mathematical modeling and parallel advances in experimental techniques. Figure 7-10 provides clear evidence of the benefits of that work in the rising trend of overall pressure ratio with time. In line with the fundamental relationships presented in Section 7.4.1, this trend has contributed significantly to the reduced fuel consumption shown in Figure 7-9.
Parallel work in the fields of combustion technology and materials have contributed to increasing levels of peak cycle temperatures-as shown in Figure 7-11, in which the trend of combustor exit temperature is plotted against the same time scale. (Note that this is the maximum temperature, which occurs at take-off. Temperatures are generally lower at cruise.) This increasing temperature trend has contributed not only to the improved fuel consumption trend shown in Figure 7-9-by virtue of improved thermal efficiency-but also to the rise in thrust-to-weight ratio, leading to higher payload for the same overall aircraft weight. The impact of increasing temperatures on various pollutant emissions is described in Section 7.5.
Other reports in this collection


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However, at least one local jihadist leader said the suspect was not a member of the radical groups who ruled the region for nearly 10 months until a French-led military operation was launched in January to oust them from power.
Abda Ag Kazina, the deputy mayor of nearby Kidal, said the attack took place Saturday in the village of Ikadiwane, north of Menaka, where an attempted suicide bombing had taken place on Friday. The jihadist group MUJAO or Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, claimed responsibility for that attack.
?The man cried ?Allah Akbar, Allahou Akbar? and opened fire on the crowd, killing three people and seriously wounding another,? he told The Associated Press.
A former member of the national police who was at the scene shot and wounded the suspect, who then was taken to Kidal.
?We don?t know for the time being whether it?s an Islamist or even what his motive was,? the deputy mayor said.
Alghabass Ag Intalla, who heads the recently-created Islamic Movement of the Azawad, denied that the attacker who opened fire was a member of the radical groups who ruled the region for nearly 10 months until a French-led military operation was launched in January to oust them from power.
The attack on civilians could mark a change in strategy for the extremists who previously have only targeted military checkpoints and installations in suicide bombings, causing military casualties. So far civilians have not been directly targeted.
?It?s not an Islamist ? he doesn?t belong to MUJAO or to any other group,? Intalla told the AP by telephone. ?It?s a criminal and we are going to try him. Everyone can cry ?Allahou Akbar? but that doesn?t make them an Islamist.?
While the French-led military offensive ousted radical jihadists from the major towns of the region, they have regrouped in outlying areas and launched a number of attacks. The unrest has raised fears about how secure northern Mali will be once France reduces its presence, as it plans to have only 1,000 troops left by year-end from a peak deployment of about 4,000.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Send your news stories to [email protected] and via WhatsApp on +1-508-812-0505

subset: commoncrawl


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STRANGEBUTTRUE- Trash tip: A cleaner hood can help clean life
Q. What's the classic tip about "degraded surroundings" that we should all keep in mind regarding our own neighborhoods? –J. Tolbert
A. That degraded surroundings all too easily lead to degraded behavior, called the "broken window effect," says Constance Holden in Science magazine. Disorder in the environment has a generalized effect where people who see one norm being broken become more likely to violate other norms. So all it takes is graffiti on building walls or trash on the sidewalk, fliers littering the street or firecrackers being set off to trigger illegal parking of vehicles, mail theft, or worse.
The flip side– and the hope for humankind– is that pro-social acts are contagious as well: Social psychologist Robert Cialdini suggests that because of this, government agencies can expect a big payoff for relatively minor efforts such as keeping the streets clean.
Moral: Do good and you can more justifiably expect good to come back to you and your neighbors.
Q. Sometimes even everyday eco-dilemmas can raise pretty offbeat questions, like "Why can't the machines in my gym be used to generate electricity?" or "Can I save the planet by staying slim?" or "What's the single most effective thing I can do for the environment?" –P. Wendel
A. Answer #1: The Green Microgym in Portland, Oregon, converts the efforts of gym bunnies using specially adapted bikes which combine cycles and hand cranks to generate up to 1,000 watts, says New Scientist magazine.
You can do this at home with a Pedal-A-Watt that when hooked up to a normal bicycle on a stand allows a cyclist to generate up to 200 watts of electricity– enough to power a large TV. Or if directed into a battery, an hour's cycling could run a low-energy light bulb for eight hours.
Answer #2: Not likely, though two writers argued in The Lancet that the obese consume around 18 percent more calories than average, and that their greater mass means more auto fuel burned. So policies to encourage walking and cycling would not only improve people's health but also be good for Planet Earth.
Still, those are short-term benefits and more than offset by the added longevity of those who, staying in shape, emit tonnes of carbon dioxide for every extra year they live.
Answer #3: Draconian as this may sound, the single most effective thing you can do for the planet is to refrain from having children. Over a 75-year lifespan, the average European will be responsible for about 900 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, 1,500 tons for an American!
Q. An energy guzzler's puzzler: Suppose we had a 100- year supply (100 units) of petroleum at our current rate of consumption, and we couldn't find any more. If we reduced our annual use by just 1 percent each year, now how long would the supply last? a) about 150 years b) 300 years c) 700 years d) forever –P. Faisal
A. Use would go like this: one unit (a current year's worth) of oil the first year, then .99 units the second year, then .99 x .99 units (or .9801 units) the third year, etc. At this rate, in the 10th year we'd consume .914 units, and our total use for the 10 years would be about 9.6 units (out of the 100 units total supply). Over the next 10 years we'd go through only 8.6 more units, for a total of about 18.2 units over the 20 years.
If you continued to crunch these numbers, you'd see an amazing thing: By the 700th year we'd have only about 0.1 units left (one-thousandth of the original 100-unit supply), but we'd be consuming at the rate of only 0.001 units per year. So a 100-year supply of oil would still remain at the consumption rate for that year!
This can go on forever at the 1 percent reduction per year, so the answer is d), we'd never run out.
Could people in 2700 A.D. get by on such a tiny usage of petroleum? You'd probably be amazed at what they could do. What would someone from 1300 A.D. think of cell phones, computers and microwave ovens?
Send Strange questions to brothers Bill and Rich at email@example.com.


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Hello Everyone this is the Cryptkeeper. I am the Director of ODPI (Old Dominion Paranormal Investigators. My team is actively searching for team members who have some experience in the Paranormal Field.
You do not have to be fully experienced as we provide full training at no cost. We have our own team shirts that are presented to our Team Members upon Successful Completion of Training.
Please by all means pay our Website a visit. The link is http://www.virginiaparanormal.com So if you are located in the Virginia Area or close by it and do not mind traveling for training and Investigations, please contact me or fill out an application on my website.
Hope to hear from some interested people real soon.
Virginia Based Team looking for Members
Started by cryptkeeper , Oct 09 2003 07:53 PM
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Energy Policy
NAM's McKinney, Apollo Alliance's Hendricks debate natural gas costs
Would passage of the energy bill really lower the high cost of fuel -- notably natural gas -- for industrial users? Will it make manufacturers more competitive? Darren McKinney with the National Association of Manufacturers and Bracken Hendricks, director of the energy policy coalition called Apollo Alliance, join OnPoint to debate these critical topics.


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Nearly a quarter of Americans say their biggest obstacle in planning for retirement is that they don't have enough time, according to the 2013 Planning and Progress study released Tuesday by Northwestern Mutual.
Harris Interactive polled nearly 1,550 Americans over 25 in January for the survey, which Northwestern Mutual will release in several parts over the next few weeks.
"There's an interesting parallel that exists between managing your finances and managing your day-to-day life in that it's so easy to let short-term needs and wants overshadow the more critical long-term goals," Greg Oberland, Northwestern Mutual executive vice president, said in a statement. "We're all susceptible, particularly today, as we're often overloaded with information and overscheduled."
For most people surveyed by Northwestern Mutual, a financial plan is nothing more than a "general sense" of their goals and how they will achieve them. About a third have precise goals and plans to achieve them (down from 38% in 2012), but admit they don't always stick to those plans. Just 16% of respondents said they rarely deviated from their established financial plan.
However, the study found that among the highly disciplined planners, nearly a quarter were under age 32 and 14% were between 33 and 46. Just 14% of boomers were considered highly disciplined in their financial plan, even though younger respondents were more likely to say that their constant connection to personal networks through email, instant messaging or mobile devices distracts them from their long-term goals. Most respondents were able to manage those connections, but 31% of all respondents said they were distracting.
Even though most respondents reported having a handle on their personal connections, the overall pace of society makes it difficult for 69% of respondents to focus on long-term goals. While boomers showed they were better able to avoid distraction from their connections (30% said they were distracted by email and mobile devices), they struggled more than younger age groups when it came to sticking to their goals (74% versus 61% among Gen Y and 63% for Gen X).
Read Live (Not Too) Long and Prosper: Bankers Life on AdvisorOne.


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Best of CCTV | CCTV English - October 3, 2017
Smash hit: Ping pong robot takes on Olympian at Tokyo tech fair - October 3, 2017
Trump says Las Vegas shooting an 'act of pure evil' - October 3, 2017
Witnesses described the gunman Stephen Paddock opened fire - October 3, 2017
White House calls Dem demands for action on guns 'premature' - October 3, 2017
Las Vegas shooter perplexes law enforcement - October 3, 2017
Las Vegas shooting: At least 59 dead at Mandalay Bay Hotel - October 3, 2017
Exclusive interview with Dr. Jing Yin – What is the biggest challenge for Buddhist today? - October 3, 2017
How a novel was adapted into a movie : Interview with Yan Geling - October 3, 2017
Red Flowers All Over The Hills - October 3, 2017
What do protesting JNU students really want & how do they plan to get it? | Times Now i – Report
What do protesting JNU students really want? And how do they plan to get it? Listen in to what protesting students from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) want.
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Simply click "download file" to download the current issue of The Newark Christian to your computer to be able to read it.
Leave a Reply.
The Newark Christian
For almost 75 years we've printed, mimeographed, photocopied, and now e-mailed, but it's still all about getting information about what the fellowship is doing to everyone we can, as soon as we can, as far ahead as we can. The technology changed, but the importance of information in the right hands at the right time stays the same!
September 2019
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Hello Seawinger's
I am trying to find more information on the Romano R-15 amphibious floatplane from 1933. I have a copy of the notes in Jean Liron's Album du Spotter article and a short note from Aviation Magazine #352. I have seen only two photographs, a 3/4 front view of the aircraft sitting on it's wheels on a beach and a side view (in the AviMag #352 notes), presumably taken at the same time
Did Les Ailes ever publish some notes on the R-15 - I haven't come across any in my searches (but I could easily have missed something).
Does anybody have access to a print of either photo and is able to obtain a high-res scan ?
Aquila Audax


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Who among us has not gotten upset by an argument, an unsettling talk with our boss, or a bad grade?
And have you noticed that some of us get over these troubling encounters quickly, while others sulk or fume for a long time?
Just why people some people are better at recovery than others, and what that says about their brain function, was explained to me by Richard Davidson, the director of the Laboratory for Affective Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin. Richie, as I've known him for years, was a graduate student with me long ago, and I've often written about his groundbreaking neuroscience research in my books. This time I chatted with him for an audio CD, "Training the Brain: Cultivating Emotional Skills."
To be sure, there's nothing wrong with being upset by life's setbacks or troubles; we're wired for that. But some of us flip out at the smallest provocation, or hang on to the distress long after. And those differences, Davidson believes, represent underlying brain function.
When it comes to having a hair trigger or to staying preoccupied by an upset long afterward, the circuits around the amygdala, the brain's alarm for threat, danger and fear, are at play. As Davidson told me, when his lab use brain imaging with such people, he finds a distinctive pattern in the mechanisms that release cortisol, a key stress hormone.
As I've described in Social Intelligence cortisol can be helpful at loswer levels; it's crucial for mobilizing us to meet the demands of the day. But when cortisol surges through the body at high levels and stays there, we get stuck in emotional overdrive. This, Davidson tells me, impacts our health. David Spiegel at Stanford Medical School found that among women with metastatic breast cancer, those whose cortisol failed to go down at the end of the day ended up dying of cancer sooner.
People with phobias, Davidson finds, don't have the problem of a prolonged stress response. Instead they have a super-quick amygdala response to what frightens them. That response trips with a wide range of innocuous things, too. It doesn't take people phobic of spiders, say, any longer to recover than it does other people. But their initial surge of fear is so great that are apprehensive of that response itself – and go to great lengths to avoid whatever might trigger it (hence the phobia).
Then there are people who have very strong emotional responses, but who may or may not recover quickly or have a hair trigger. Davidson says that a strong response with a quick recovery may be quite adaptive emotionally.
Davidson's intuition, he told me, is that people may gravitate to mates who have similar emotional styles – or perhaps drop partners whose style does not fit with their own. On the other hand, he conjectures, it would probably do well for someone prone to fits of anxiety to find an unflappable partner who might help them calm down.
And, he adds, whatever our emotional style, the very circuitry of the brain that determines it also happens to be the most plastic – that is, able to change with experience.
In our conversation he describes the good news: how mindfulness practice can help us modify these brain styles for the better.


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Snappy Pumpkin Cheesecake
Total TimePrep: 35 min. Bake: 50 min. + chilling
Makes12 servings
It was so awesome that when I was cooking it, it made my stomach growl in hunger
I found this recipe several years ago on a different site and it's absolutly amazing. I love it for Thanksgiving!
Excellent recipe. I live in the UK and it's pretty hard to get canned pumpkin here so instead I cook a butternut squash and then mash that up and add it once cooled. It's less fibrous than pumpkin so it works well.
I made this cheesecake for a friend's party. It went great, everyone loved it. I didn't have any leftovers to bring home to my husband. It was a very pretty cheesecake as well. It was very tasty.
Made this cheesecake for our annual Pumpkin Carving Fest . It was a sure winner and will become part of our recipe collection for the holidays. Didn't have gingersnaps, so made it with graham crackers. Next time will try with gingersnaps. The swirl on top made it look so appetizing...and professional! Yum !
It was my first time making a cheesecake period. It was a little challenging for me, but came out so good!! It was delicious.... A must for the holidays!
I've been making the Pumpkin-Swirl Cheesecake for Thanksgiving for years now as it is one of our favorites. However, I never wrapped my pan in foil. I just place a baking dish, half filled with water, on a lower rack in the oven to add moisture to the oven to prevent the cheesecake from cracking, as you do with any cheesecake baked in the oven. Also, I just use regular vanilla extract and it is fine. Hopes this helps, and enjoy.
The foil gets wrapped around the bottom and up the sides of the OUTSIDE of the pan - I assume it is to keep out any water from the water bath you set the pan in when cooking.
I hate to sound like an idiot but can you please clarify... "Place a greased 9-in. springform pan on a double thickness of heavy-duty foil (about 18 in. square). Securely wrap foil around pan; set aside" Am I to wrap around the outside or cover the inside or both???
This was just delicious!!


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Whether filled with breastmilk or formula, your child's devoted attachment to his beloved ba-ba can make you dread the process of weaning. But there are some good reasons why, at a certain age, you should start weaning your baby off of her bottle.
If your baby's more than six months old, it's time to start backing away from the bottle. "When toddlers use bottles for something other than feeding—like chewing or gnawing—it could change the shape of the mouth, the palate, and the teeth," says Robert Ruderman, M.D., a pediatrician at Highland Park Pediatrics in Illinois.
That's why the American Academy of Pediatrics says you should wean your baby off the bottle before 18 months.
Here's how to wean your baby—and make the process as painless as possible for your tot and you.
Introduce cups early
The sooner you start weaning your baby, the easier it'll be. Which is good news, considering cup feeding can begin as early as 6 months (provided your baby can sit up and has good head and gag control).
Start by giving your baby a cup (sippy or regular cups both work) during mealtime and cutting back on bottles at bedtime—that way, he'll stop needing it to fall asleep. And of course, use lots of encouragement!
Distinguish hunger from something else
Remember, Bottles are for feeding—not for meeting your baby's emotional needs. "It's common for parents to respond to crying by giving their baby a bottle without trying to solve the actual cause for crying," Ruderman says.
But doing so not only gives your child calories he probably doesn't need—it also prolongs the weaning process. If your gets fussy outside of mealtime, change his diaper, sing a song, or cuddle instead.
We recommend Little Bundle, a formula for every baby's need. Is your baby sensitive to dairy? Constipated? Gassy? They carry organic and hypoallergenic formulas designed specifically for babies with constipation, gassiness and dairy sensitivity. Free and fast shipping from US on orders over $50.
Utilize play
Dolls and toys are a fun, lighthearted way to give you baby examples of model behavior that can encourage weaning. For instance, show him how the mommy doll wants the baby doll to start drinking out of a cup instead of a bottle.
Book therapy
Reading a book about giving up the bottle helps your child see an abstract concept like weaning in a concrete, easy to understand format. We love No More Bottle for Bunny! by Bernette Ford.


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Content recommendation service Taboola tells Web surfers where to go, 1.5 billion times a day. And it thinks that activity could turn into a really big business one day.
Hence the company's new $15 million round, led by Pitango Venture Capital; earlier investors Evergreen Venture Partners, WGI Group and Marker are back as well.
That gives New York-based and Israeli-run Taboola a total of $40 million raised to date — which isn't as much as its primary competitor, Outbrain. That New York-based and Israeli-run content-recommendation service (which works with All Things Digital) has raised $64 million so far.
Capitalization aside, both Taboola and Outbrain do essentially the same thing: They direct traffic from one website to another by suggesting stories and videos to surfers, based on what they're reading, what they've read, etc. They get paid by the website they refer traffic to, on a cost-per-click basis, and share some of that revenue with the publisher that provided the eyeball.
Here's what both of them look like in action, at the bottom of the same Time.com page (Time Warner's websites need as many money-generating clicks as they can get. Then again, all of us do.). Taboola generates the four thumbnail photos and links at the top of this screenshot; Outbrain gets paid if you click on any of the "From Around the Web" links on the bottom-right:
There is a great deal of chatter in "native ads" right now — ads that don't really seem like ads, because they're "content" — and both Taboola and Outbrain fit nicely in that conversation. Because the recommendations they get money for look pretty much exactly like "real" recommendations the publisher makes itself, for its own content.
On the other hand, you don't really need a new set of terms to describe what Taboola and Outbrain do. Charging someone a fee to bring an eyeball to their page is something Google mastered a long time ago.


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- Font:
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Guests: Mark Penn, Sen. Kent Conrad, Jeanne Cummings, Todd Harris, Steve
McMahon, Dan Choi, Alex Nicholson
CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Travelin' man.
Let's play HARDBALL.
Good evening. I'm Chris Matthews in Washington. Leading off tonight:
Where in the world is Barack Obama? Last Friday, the same week the president lost control of Congress, he left the country for Asia. First from India, then from Indonesia, we got pictures of him and the first lady dancing with the local people. It was all in traditional costume, all very festive.
The question today, Is this any way to treat an American electorate, an angry electorate, to hold a press conference, announce no new changes, then leave town the same day that Speaker Pelosi says she's staying? What's the message here, that the message of the voter lies in the inbox at the White House, We'll get to it when we get time, We'll get to it when we get back in the country? OK, he had the G-20 meeting, but that was tomorrow. Why did he leave last Friday, a full week ahead of that meeting?
And what's more, it looks like the White House may give in to Republican demands to extend all the Bush era tax cuts, including for the rich, at least temporarily. How does the president deal with those crosswinds?
Plus, tempestuous Tea Partiers are piping hot to knock off the next crop of Republican senators up for reelection in 2012. Here's the big question. Can Olympia Snowe and Orrin Hatch avoid the fates of some of their Republican colleagues? Can they outlive the right?
Also, the majority of those surveyed for the military say gay service members can serve openly without significant risk on the battlefield, and Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he'd like to see the repeal of "Don't ask, don't tell" by year's end. So there's just one big obstacle to ending "Don't ask, don't tell," the Republican Party.
And let me finish with some thoughts about why the government needs to take control of its debt, just as it—well, as our country needs to take control properly of our borders. Is that asking too much, that they do the basics?
Let's start with President Obama over there. Mark Penn's a Democratic strategist and The HuffingtonPost's Howard Fineman is an MSNBC political analyst. We talk a lot about optics, about what seems to be the way people convey. They're tired of listening to the president's words, words, words, but how he acts to the voters last Tuesday is important, I think, to the voters. My surmise—they don't like the fact he left town. Your thoughts, Mark.
MARK PENN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, I think it's—it's perfectly typical after a mid-terms for the president to focus some on international travel and agenda because he's obviously had to push that off while he worked on the mid-terms. So I think it's a good thing to take the trip. The real question people have, and I think he needs some time to think about it, is how is he really going to answer what the voters said on election day? He hasn't really given them a clear answer yet. It took Bill Clinton months to really formulate that answer. Don't expect things overnight. Maybe today, with the tax cut discussion—maybe we've begun to see a real answer.
MATTHEWS: Howard, we'll get to that in a minute, but the whole—there was a great comment by one of those Republicans that were in office after the Civil War who said (INAUDIBLE) political boss, sort of like Mark Hanna (ph). Isn't there something we should look like we're doing?
MATTHEWS: I mean, aren't there things that presidents should appear to be doing—shaking up the cabinet, shaking up the White House, doing things that show, I got it. I got the message. You're upset about the economy. I'm going to try to upgrade my effort. I'm going to enhance the effort that I've got here to fix the problems.
HOWARD FINEMAN, HUFFINGTONPOST.COM, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I spent a good bit of time over at the White House yesterday, and I got the sense that they're operating on their own schedule. I think they've always operated that way. I think that's how they ran the presidential campaign. They have a certain imperturbability about them. They're going to stick with their schedule. This was the only chance that the president would have to make a trip like this before things really heated up in the next Congress, and by golly, he was going to go do it. Meanwhile, around the White House, they've literally taken all the carpets out and they're redoing stuff. But I don't...
MATTHEWS: Oh, that'll make us feel better!
FINEMAN: But I don't sense among the people there, who were left behind...
MATTHEWS: See, you make my point.
FINEMAN: ... including David Axelrod—
MATTHEWS: Mark...
FINEMAN: No, wait! That they're thinking of changing things in any dramatic way.
MATTHEWS: Well, that's my point. We have elections...
FINEMAN: They're in a defensive posture.
MATTHEWS: Look, you're a political expert. You're a political expert. It seems to me that elections always accomplish two goals. They decide who runs the country and they send a message. The message of the voters this time was, We want change. Is he going to give it to them, Mark Penn?
PENN: I think that if he agrees to extend the tax cuts for everybody, that will be a real sign that, A, he's going to change, but B, don't be fooled by whatever people are thinking or doing in the White House today. When President Clinton made changes, the White House didn't know about it until he was well along in those changes.
MATTHEWS: But he went around and pushed people like the brains that got him in there, Carville and Begala, to some extent, although (INAUDIBLE) Texas, George Stephanopoulos, and brought in the wonderful Dick Morris. I mean, he was doing that pretty quickly, wasn't he?
PENN: People didn't really know that until sort of...
MATTHEWS: But wasn't he doing it?
PENN: ... March...
MATTHEWS: Didn't he hit the panic button before we knew about it?
PENN: (INAUDIBLE) State of the Union. Look, the real event here is going to be what's going to happen between now and the State of the Union? What's going to happen to the tax cuts? The president's going to spend, I think, the holidays thinking, how is he going to respond. They looked at a truck that has been hitting them and aiming towards the Democrats since the Scott Brown election. It hit, and now they have to swerve. They know they have to swerve. I can't believe they don't know that.
MATTHEWS: ... have to respond in an active way, not just say, yes, we'll try (INAUDIBLE) It seems to me that every government that gets rocked like this does a change to show we're paying attention. The voters—I don't know how many times I have to say this tonight—the voters are angry. They want to see you get it.
FINEMAN: Yes, I think that's right. I can just report to you what the sense that I have is of them. And they are—I agree with what Mark's saying. They're going to take their time. They're going to see what cards the Republicans are going to lay on the table. And they're going to—they're in a defensive posture, where they're going to cede ground...
FINEMAN: ... on various points until they figure out what to do. And frankly, they haven't figured out what the response is going to be yet. They have not figured it out. But I do not sense—and Mark may be right, things are going on on the plane in Asia that we don't know about—that they're going to make wholesale changes.
MATTHEWS: No big executive...
MATTHEWS: No big chief executive coming in like the...
MATTHEWS: No chief of staff coming, no heavyweight.
PENN: We don't know.
FINEMAN: We don't know. But they're already looking. Some of the top people are going to leave in the early spring, go back to plan the reelect. I get the sense that they're eager to get back to Chicago, some of these people, to begin thinking how to run a campaign again because they don't know what to do with the Congress yet. They have...
MATTHEWS: In other words, they'd rather not be the incumbent.
FINEMAN: Yes. That's...
MATTHEWS: They'd rather start all over again.
FINEMAN: Yes. Exactly.
MATTHEWS: Well, they don't get that deal.
FINEMAN: I know.
MATTHEWS: They're running...
MATTHEWS: Let's take a look at the report today. Quote, "We have to deal with the world as it is," Axelrod said, "the world of what it takes to get this done. There are concerns," he added, "that Congress will continue to kick the can down the road in the future, like passing temporary extensions for the wealthy time and time again. But I don't want to trade away security for the middle class in order to make that point."
I read in that what I think you read in that new reporting that the White House is basically saying, If we've got to give tax cuts to the rich to get them to the regular people, we'll do it.
FINEMAN: Yes. And I think that—I think that David Axelrod, with whom we had a 90-minute interview late yesterday afternoon, was clearly moving the thing a little farther down the road and conceding what most people—not most, but a lot of people in town think is obvious, that because of the political situation in the lame duck Congress and because of the procedural situation, the White House has no choice or doesn't want to take the risk of trying to veto a bill...
FINEMAN: ... that has the tax cuts for the rich in it.
MATTHEWS: Let's look at David Letterman on the point I started with tonight, this sense that the president's not listening, not paying attention. You say he is in the sense of substance. He is looking at a tax cut for everybody, to respond, like you say, to show real change...
FINEMAN: Well, there's no choice.
MATTHEWS: OK. Well...
FINEMAN: That's not a plan. That's a lack of choice.
MATTHEWS: Well, it may have the impact of suggesting...
FINEMAN: Right.
MATTHEWS: ... moving to the middle.
FINEMAN: Right.
MATTHEWS: Here he is, David Letterman last night, taking a chop at the president in his monologue. Let's listen.
DAVID LETTERMAN, HOST, "LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN": President Obama's in India right now. He's over there visiting our jobs.
MATTHEWS: Mark Penn, I think about states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin that all bit back at the president last Tuesday. I keep asking myself, Don't you think the working guy thinks that's not really a chuckle? The fact is, they do think their jobs have gone overseas because of U.S. policy.
PENN: That's the single toughest job for the president in the next two years. The devastation politically of Democrats in the Midwest and the South is really where this election's going to be. And that's going to be about jobs and how you use trade policy to open markets in the right way to create jobs. And if he can't make that case and do that right, he cannot get reelected.
FINEMAN: Well, it is true, Chris, that going abroad in this way at this time isn't helping him reverse the image that a lot of people have about him that voted against him this time, which is that he just doesn't really understand the urgency of the situation of people who've lost their jobs, whose houses...
MATTHEWS: Yes, he's out there getting another Nobel Prize somewhere.
FINEMAN: And he's giving a speech about how we have to understand the rest of the world and all that. And it plays into that perception that really influenced a lot of independent voters in this election because the polls show that a lot of people thought that he didn't have the sense of urgency that they wanted him to have.
MATTHEWS: And basic economic nationalism. You know, we watched Pat Buchanan all those years, and we think he's a bit of a zealot when he comes out against trade and against any kind of trade. Where are the voters on that right now?
PENN: Well, look, right now...
MATTHEWS: Are they with Pat now?
PENN: ... the voters are in both directions. They want to make sure that America's is not taken advantage of in the global economy, but they realize America has to be a piece of it. You see, it's a fine line. Notice the president took trade policy and he pushed it until after the mid-terms. He thought that would be a more hospitable time to talk trade. He didn't realize it would be maybe a less hospitable time. So he needs a comprehensive economic strategy, and that means opening markets the right way. If he can't win that, he can't...
FINEMAN: They sort of pasted the jobs label on this trip...
MATTHEWS: Yes.
FINEMAN: ... once they realized the poor timing of it. I mean, they
suddenly, it became a trip all about jobs, which if they had a ton of jobs to bring back and to crow about, a long, long list of them...
FINEMAN: ... that would be different from what (INAUDIBLE)
MATTHEWS: So what we've got today is it looks like they're changing policy on taxes. It looks like they're going to go along with a big tax cut for everybody, or maintaining the lower taxes of Bush. That'll look like a move to the center. You say that's a positive sign of change.
PENN: Absolutely.
MATTHEWS: Still open to question whether they're going to change the administration itself. They're going to bring new people in or they're going to really show the kind of shake-up that Bill Clinton did. And you said it took how many months for them to show that shake-up?
PENN: It's going to take a few months.
MATTHEWS: A few months anyway. I think—State of the Union?
PENN: Yes.
MATTHEWS: Thanks. We've learned a lot today. Mark Penn, thank you for joining us. Howard Fineman, we're with you on this story.
Coming up: Reining in the national debt. We've got preliminary recommendations from the two chairmen of the president's bipartisan deficit commission, and the pressure groups on both sides are trying to puncture it. But doesn't a tough problem mean tough solutions? We're going to talk to the Senate Budget chairman, Kent Conrad.
You're watching HARDBALL, only on MSNBC.
MATTHEWS: Well, here's the latest from Alaska, where they're into the second day of counting write-in ballots in that Senate race up there. So far, more than 97 percent of the write-in ballots went to Lisa Murkowski. Nearly 90 percent of those write-in ballots went unchallenged by Joe Miller's campaign. And only 276 ballots challenged by the Miller campaign were tossed out. That's bad news for the Miller campaign, which trails in the write-in ballots by about 11,000 votes. The count's expected to last three more days. We'll be right back. Looks like Murkowski is getting reelected up there. Be right back.
MATTHEWS: Welcome back to HARDBALL. Former Republican senator Alan Simpson and former Clinton White House chief of staff Erskine Bowles, the two chairmen of President Obama's bipartisan deficit commission, gave pressure groups on all sides a chance to complain yesterday when they released a draft of recommendations to fix the country's fiscal mess. They made recommendations in big five areas—cut discretionary spending, overhaul the tax code, cut health care costs, cut entitlement spending, including an overhaul of Social Security. Those are big ideas that will run into big opposition—have already.
Democratic senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota is a member of the commission and chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. You know, Senator, years and years ago, I worked on the Senate Budget Committee, and all this sounds familiar. The minute you try to cut the debt, or the deficit in this case, and you have a wide-ranging, balanced program—at least the way I look at it—that hurts everybody, everybody complains. They don't say, Hey, you hit the other guy harder than you did me. All they complain about their issue. What's going to happen?
SEN. KENT CONRAD (D-ND), DEFICIT COMMISSION MEMBER: You know, these groups once again have revealed what they care about is themselves. They don't apparently care about the country because we are spending much more than we can afford. We are borrowing 40 cents of every dollar that we spend. Clearly, that can't continue much longer, and yet their answer is do nothing. That cannot be the answer.
And what the two chairmen have come forward and have said is, Look, we've got the get the debt and deficits under control. We got to reduce the projected shortfall by $4 trillion over the next 10 years. And they have proposed a comprehensive program to do it. Well, they deserve our support. You know, we can argue about the specifics. Hopefully, we'll have a chance to improve the package. But at the end of the day, we need something of this magnitude to get the country back on track.
MATTHEWS: You know, I hear there are 90-year-old people out there complaining about this requirement that you don't get Social Security until 69 in 2050! In 2050! This is not an extreme proposal. And the fact is, if liberals complain, I would point to the fact that this extends the coverage of the payroll tax all the way up to $190,000 a year. Well, you're not going to get benefits up to that level. You're going a lot pay more taxes if you make more money. It seems—getting rid of the capital gains preference for income taxation—boy, that's going to drive business crazy. It just seems balanced to me. Does it help that it's balanced, or will the liberals complain about liberal programs, the conservatives about business programs?
CONRAD: You know, I always think it helps if it's balanced. Look, here's the situation. Spending is the highest it has been in 60 years as share of our economy. Revenue is the lowest it's been in 60 years as a share of our economy. So obviously, you've got to work both sides of the equation. What the two chairmen came out with was a proposal to do away—one option. They had three options on revenue. One was do away with all the tax expenditures. That will raise over a trillion dollars over the next 10 years.
MATTHEWS: Those are what we call loopholes.
CONRAD: Yes. They dedicate 90 percent of that to lowering income tax rates, a dramatic reduction in income tax rates in exchange for doing away with all the tax preferences, all the tax loopholes, all the tax favoritism that's in the system. Now, you know, I would prefer not to go that far. I would prefer to retain some of the mortgage deductions, some of the child care credit. But do need thoroughgoing tax reform to put this country on a more competitive basis going forward and to reduce our deficit.
And they have combined it with major spending cuts. Seventy-five percent of this plan is spending cuts. Twenty-five percent is revenue. And yet we see some of these groups howling. Well, you can't raise any new revenue.
MATTHEWS: Yes, that's Grover Norquist.
CONRAD: If you can't raise any—yes, Grover Norquist, the same old song from him. Look, he's just a special pleader. All he cares about is a narrow group who finances his efforts. Apparently, he doesn't care about the country, he just cares about a narrow group that finances his efforts. And look, the left has got the same problem. They are so focused just on themselves that they forget about our country. And our country requires us to be bold and brave and to get something done.
MATTHEWS: Well, H.L. Mencken once said, Never argue with someone whose job depends on not being convinced. They're paid by their people, so they're not going to (INAUDIBLE) Let me ask you this, just so the people who are watching right now understand. Is this going to be like the base closing commission report, where it comes out with a big—if they get the 14 votes of you commission members out of 18 -- if that goes to the president's desk, has he committed to backing this deficit reduction effort? Is he committed?
CONRAD: No, he's not. And you know, I—that's understandable. He's got to see the product first. This is just the beginning. This is the proposal of the two chairmen, bipartisan. But the commission itself has now got to render a judgment. If we can get 14 of 18 members to agree on a proposal, then it advances. If we can't, it dies.
MATTHEWS: Do you think it'll happen in the next Congress or this Congress?
CONRAD: It's very hard for me to see how it would happen in this Congress, although that was the plan that Senator Gregg and I proposed...
MATTHEWS: Yes.
CONRAD: ... when we proposed this commission some three years ago. But we had, as you recall, one that was enforced by law. We didn't get a supermajority vote in the Senate for that proposal.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
CONRAD: So, the president did the next best thing. He put it in place by executive order, which means that we don't have an assurance of a vote.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
CONRAD: We have the prospect of getting one, but not the assurance.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
OK. I wish the guys who were defeated could vote for it as their last good act for the country and leave, but, anyway, just a thought.
Thank you, Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota, chairman of the Budget Committee. Thanks for joining us.
We're joined now by Politico's assistant managing editor, Jeanne Cummings.
Your thoughts about it. You have been covering this, like I have, for a while, involved in it. Do you think there's any chance this country can get serious about reducing its debt? We talk about it. It's up to $14 trillion. It's really going to be all we do is raise money from the taxpayer to pay interest payments. It's almost reached that point, just a transfer payment now from hardworking people to T-bond holders in China.
Your thoughts.
Well, I tell you, Chris, this might be—it's possible that there is an opportunity here.
And—and hear me out, because I know these things usually collapse, and, frankly, the odds still are that this will collapse. But one of the key messages out of this election is a great deal of concern about the size of government spending and deficit.
And so you have these Tea Party candidates or these very conservative candidates coming to Washington who embrace those concerns and who are under a whole lot of pressure to demonstrate...
MATTHEWS: Yes.
CUMMINGS: ... that they're going to do something about it.
On the other hand, you have a group of—a large group of Democrats in the Senate who are going to be up for reelection in two years who have just seen what happened to their colleagues, especially on this issue.
And, so, I think there's an incentive for Democrats and the president to put some deficit reduction credentials on their resumes as well. So, it's possible we could see some deals smaller than this big package that are worked out, so that both sides can say that they did do something.
MATTHEWS: Let's take a look at the tax issue, which affects a lot of people directly. Here it is. People want their tax cuts. Here's the president last week, the day after the midterms, last Wednesday, eight days ago, talking about what he might do on the tax cut. Let's listen.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: my goal is to make sure that we don't have a huge spike in taxes for middle-class families.
My goal is to sit down with speaker-elect Boehner and Mitch McConnell, Harry and Nancy some time in the next few weeks and see where we can move forward in a way that, first of all, does no harm, that extends those tax cuts that are very important for middle-class families.
And how that negotiation works itself out, I think it's too early to say.
QUESTION: So you're willing to negotiate?
OBAMA: Absolutely.
MATTHEWS: It seemed to be a key point he was making there, do no
harm. In other words, his primary goal, it seems to me, Jeanne, is to cut
make sure the middle class don't get hit with a higher tax rate come January, even at the expense of letting the rich have the same deal.
That's the way I read it.
Then, Howard Fineman has been reporting today that they're going forward with Axelrod's comments that clearly suggests that they're willing to talk about a continuation for everybody's tax cuts.
CUMMINGS: Well, that's definitely the signal that both the president and Axelrod delivered over the last few days. I think Axelrod was a little more explicit than the president. His was a subtle signal, and Axelrod's wasn't.
And I think what this is, Chris, you and I both know, this is reality politics.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
CUMMINGS: I mean, what can they really get through in the Senate, when you have moderate to conservative Democrats who are saying that they are not prepared to increase taxes on the wealthy during this economy? The votes aren't there. And I think that's...
MATTHEWS: And the worst thing that could happen—it seems to be, just try—I want to try this by as the last question. It seems to me the worst thing that could happen is the Democratic-led Congress this year, this fall, doesn't pass the tax cut, that people face higher taxes next January.
In come the Republican-dominated House and more Republicans in the Senate, like the cavalry coming to save the taxpayer. They do go ahead and cut taxes for everybody, and the president is forced to sign it. The Republicans are the big heroes. The Democrats really look like the bad guys. That's my thought about what they must be afraid of.
Your thoughts.
CUMMINGS: I agree with you completely.
And, in that scenario, President Obama breaks one of his biggest campaign pledges, and that's not to increase taxes on anybody who makes $250,000 -- any families making $250,000 or under.
MATTHEWS: Ah. Powerful point.
Thank you so much, Jeanne Cummings, for joining us.
Up next: What does Christine O'Donnell think of Bill Maher, after Maher released all those wacky old clips of her? You will be surprised. The "Sideshow" always has surprises.
You're watching HARDBALL, only on MSNBC.
MATTHEWS: Back to HARDBALL, and time for the "Sideshow."
First up: life after politics. Christine O'Donnell turned on the charm with Jay Leno last night. She even had nice things to say about Bill Maher, who was, of course, the guy who put up those infamous clips of O'Donnell talking about evolution, Hare Krishnas, and, lest we all forget, witchcraft.
CHRISTINE O'DONNELL ®, FORMER DELAWARE SENATORIAL CANDIDATE: My sister and I were watching the show when—when Bill, you know, made his threat. And I just thought, you know, whether it's comedians...
JAY LENO, HOST, "THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH JAY LENO": And what was the threat?
O'DONNELL: Well, that he was going to keep airing the clips until I went on the show. And whether it's a comedian or a terrorist, you shouldn't respond to threats.
O'DONNELL: So, it's a shame. But I do—I do like Bill Maher, and I was grateful for the time that he gave me on his show, but...
LENO: You are single, right?
O'DONNELL: Yes.
LENO: Could you date a Democrat? Like, I see Carville and Matalin there.
O'DONNELL: If that Democrat doesn't mind being wrong a lot, then sure.
LENO: oh.
O'DONNELL: Sure I could.
MATTHEWS: O'Donnell's talking about a book deal. Who actually writes these things, anyway? A reality show, I could see that. And you guessed it, another run for political office.
Speaking of, outgoing Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty's gearing up to start his book tour and campaign for president. The problem, this year's Minnesota governor's race isn't resolved yet. In fact, an automatic recount is set to start later this month. Remember that state's 2008 recount in the Al Franken Senate race took eight months to get done.
Pawlenty is currently scheduled to leave office January 3. His book "Courage to Stand" comes out January 11. Aides say to "The New York Times" -- told "The New York Times" that the book tour will happen, one way or the other.
I thought his book should be called "Good and Pawlenty."
Next: tempest in a teapot. Earlier this week, Florida congressman-elect Allen West, a Tea Partier, tapped conservative radio host Joyce Kaufman to be his new chief of staff. Among Ms. Kaufman's greatest hits, well, she called Speaker Pelosi garbage. She said illegal immigrants who commit crimes in this country should be hanged and their bodies shipped out of the country. Oh, yes, and this: If ballots don't work, bullets will.
God, sounds like Sharron Angle. Congressman-elect West announced today, with deep regret, that Kaufman declined his offer to be his new chief of staff. West added, however, that he will always seek Joyce's counsel, so he can be what he calls a good representative of his congressional district.
Time now for tonight's "Big Number."
President George W. Bush made his comeback this week. How did it go? Well, on its first day, the book sold 220,000 copies. It was Random House's highest nonfiction opening day sale since President Clinton's autobiography, which sold twice that many, 400,000 books. Altogether, the Bush book gets a strong start -- 220,000 sold, tonight's "Big Number."
Up next: The Tea Party's looking for a few more scalps in 2012, and it has its eyes on Senators Orrin Hatch of Utah and Olympia Snowe up in Maine. How worried should they be? I would say a lot. Our strategists join us next.
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HAMPTON PEARSON, CNBC CORRESPONDENT: I'm Hampton Pearson with your CNBC "Market Wrap."
Disappointing blue-chip earnings and a stronger dollar dragging stocks lower today, the Dow Jones industrials slipping 74 points, the S&P off five, the Nasdaq falling 23 points.
Networking giant Cisco Systems enduring its biggest declines ever after an earnings release, plunging more than 16 percent on a disappointing revenue outlook, despite topping expectations on profits. And Disney also moving lower, after missing expectations on the top and bottom lines. Shares had been trading near 52-week highs ahead of those results.
Viacom enjoying a bump on strong earnings, boosted by solid results at its MTV unit. Bellwether Boeing still on the ropes after suspending tests of its new 787 Dreamliner. And European banks took a hit, as the cost of debt in Ireland soared, pushing the euro to record lows.
But material stocks one of the few bright spots today on a report showing stronger demand for metals in overseas markets.
That's it from CNBC, first in business worldwide—now back to
MATTHEWS: Welcome back to behind.
The Republicans may have just fought successfully in the 2010 midterms, but there are already possibly fights coming up in the next election. Long time senators like Utah's Orrin Hatch and Maine's Olympia Snowe may be at risk of a Tea Party challenge and being defeated.
Joining me now is our strategists, Republican Todd Harris, who's in the middle of all this, and Democrat Steve McMahon.
You can enjoy this fight for a second, Steve.
STEVE MCMAHON, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: I'm going to love it. I'm going to love it.
MATTHEWS: I'm talking to you, brother.
It seems to me that Orrin Hatch voted against health care. One reason he pulled himself off that, even during the Finance Committee coverage, is he saw what was happening to his partner, Robert Bennett. Bennett had like a 90 percent or 88 percent conservative voting record. Wasn't good enough for the Tea Party. They blew him out in a convention.
Does Olympia Snowe face defeat at the hands of a far right up in Maine, Orrin Hatch of a far right in Utah?
TODD HARRIS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: I think both of them are going to
the one thing that benefits both of them is that they have the benefit now of hindsight, because they watched what happened to Bennett.
And the fact is that...
MATTHEWS: Yes, but the Democrats saw this crap coming for a year and couldn't do anything about it.
HARRIS: But wasn't just that Bennett wasn't...
MATTHEWS: Yes.
HARRIS: ... that they didn't view him as being conservative enough. It was also he wasn't working his base. And that's what happens when you're in Washington for too long.
Let me be totally clear about something. If I lived in Delaware, I would have voted for Mike Castle in the Republican primary. But, having said that, the fact that a guy who's been in Washington for this long couldn't get 30,000 people to vote for him in a Republican—that's all you need in Delaware to win a Republican primary. And he couldn't do it.
He ran on being...
MATTHEWS: Yes.
HARRIS: He ran as being part of the establishment, as having experience. And he was a little tone-deaf.
MATTHEWS: Let's take a look at these.
Steve, I want you to look at these Republicans who are going to face the heat of the right if conditions continue with the bad economy and the anger against anything that looks like centrism from the right -- 10 Senate seats are up in 2012. That's coming rather quickly, if you're one of those guys or women.
Here's one. Here the people are whose terms are coming to an end, Wyoming's John Barrasso, Massachusetts' Scott Brown, of course. He just had a two-year term. Tennessee's Bob Corker, who beat Harold Brown—
Howard—Ford, and Nevada's John Ensign, Utah's Orrin Hatch, Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, Arizona's Jon Kyl, Indiana's Dick Lugar, Maine's Olympia Snowe, and Mississippi's Roger Wicker, who took Trent Lott's place.
You know, a lot of those guys are fairly new members of Congress, like Scott Brown. Your thoughts. Are you happy to see them being knocked off by crazies on the right, to put it bluntly?
MCMAHON: Well, to put it bluntly and to put it honestly, yes, I am, actually, because they're going to get knocked off by crazies on the right.
And if you look at the Tea Party's record with their crazies on the right, starting with Christine O'Donnell, then going to Alaska with Joe Miller, in Nevada with Sharron Angle, even Colorado with Ken Buck...
MATTHEWS: He looks like he's got a short 15 minutes. He's looks like his Andy Warhol 15 minutes are about up, that guy.
MCMAHON: But, for the most part, they have done one of two things. They have either produced nominees who couldn't win or they have produced nominees who made it possible for Democratic candidates who were severely vulnerable to win, or they have put Democrats in play where they shouldn't be in play.
If Olympia Snowe gets primaried by a Tea Party candidate, and that Tea Party candidate wins, that seat is going to a Democratic candidate. Any place where it's a purple or a blue state represented by a Republican, if the Tea Party nominee comes out, I would be willing to bet that the Tea Party candidate loses.
And I think in red states where—you know, like Orrin Hatch, if he stepped out and did what Lisa Murkowski did right now, he probably would win. So, I think you're probably going to see some temptations on some of these senators' parts to not participate in the Tea Party process and to step out and do it on their own.
MATTHEWS: Just to be my inconveniently honest self, if you were right, then Orrin Hatch would—I mean, Joe Sestak would have been better off running up against Orrin Hatch—I mean Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania.
The fact is that Arlen Specter was probably not as strong a candidate as the Tea Party-backed Pat Toomey. So, you're wrong, Steve.
MCMAHON: Well, no, I mean, it depends on the state. So, Pennsylvania is a blue state.
MATTHEWS: Well, of course. Everything depends on the state.
MATTHEWS: Here's a blue state with a winger. The winger did better than Arlen would have done.
MCMAHON: Chris, each one of these states is going to have its own unique circumstances.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
MCMAHON: In a Republican red state, a Tea Party candidate who gets nominated could actually win. But in a Republican red state like Lisa Murkowski's, the Republican senator can step out, run as an independent, where there's not a very competitive Democrat, and can be elected away.
MCMAHON: So, in Maine, for instance, that wouldn't work, but, in Utah, it might.
MATTHEWS: Look at what's happening in Utah. You make the point, a good point there. According to a recent Mason-Dixon poll, among registered voters, that's always a tricky number, but it is a presidential year. So, registered voters polls make sense. A lot of people vote.
If Orrin Hatch's re-election were held now, 40 percent said they'd vote to reelect him. Forty-eight percent said they'd him for somebody else and 12 said they don't know. That's not a great re-elect number, 40.
TODD HARRIS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: I mean, it's not a great number. But it's also an irrelevant number. A poll of registers voters two years out from the election doesn't mean a whole lot. You've already seen signs—
MATTHEWS: It means something.
HARRIS: It means nothing.
MATTHEWS: Oh, yes?
HARRIS: It's not worth the paper it's written on.
MATTHEWS: Oh, OK. You don't think he's a little scared.
HARRIS: Listen. Hold on.
MATTHEWS: Probably the mentality Robert Bennett had, don't worry about polls, you're out.
HARRIS: But, no, my point is that I think that Hatch, Snowe and some of these other members have learned from watching what happened to Bennett. You already see Hatch taking steps in Utah, to solidify of his base of support.
MATTHEWS: Let's talk about a guy who I once voted for, that's Michael Steele—and I will continue for any African-American candidate so we have at least in the United States Senate. That will be a principle of mine. It is an absolute embarrassment in this country that a country like ours has no African-American senators starting now because Burris is now out and, you know, Kirk is in.
Does it bother you, no black senators in the United States? Just a principle.
HARRIS: Yes, we just elected two new African-American Republicans to Congress.
MATTHEWS: The House.
Does it bother you, Steve, we have no black senators?
MCMAHON: Yes, it does. And, listen, I think Michael Steele would be glad to know that you support him. And I think he probably wishes that you are an RNC member right now because he needs you vote—
MATTHEWS: OK. Tell me about, not that you've stepped on my shoulders to make a brilliant point, go for it.
MCMAHON: Well, listen, for Michael Steele, I mean, the first African-American chairman of the Republican Party is now being run out by the usual crowd that doesn't think he did a sufficiently good job whatever it was he was supposed to do. I don't know if Michael Steele was supposed to win 80 seats or 90 seats or 100 seats, what it would have taken to make them happy, but, obviously, they're unhappy with Michael Steele. They want to run him out. They've got all kinds of candidates.
MATTHEWS: Why? That's what I got to ask the question to the Republican. I'm sorry, you were good on that, but I want to talk to Republican. Why knock a guy who's got a winning record like Babe Ruth? I mean, this guy, from the time he got in there, you won New Jersey, you on Virginia, you won Scott Brown in Massachusetts, and then you took the House of Representatives with a 60-some vote victory. You almost took the Senate. What do want? And the governor's chairs, six of them.
HARRIS: Well, here's the bottom line for the chairman's race. You can't beat somebody with nobody.
MATTHEWS: Why should you?
HARRIS: Every king's court got barons and dukes who think they do a better job, and they love to talk about it, but until somebody steps forward and says I'm going to challenge Michael Steele, it's all—
MATTHEWS: I love the way Republicans talk. They say, barons and duke.
MATTHEWS: Anyway, we talk, you know, Democratic politics here, Republican politics, I mean, lower R.
Anyway, thank you, Todd Harris and Steve McMahon. I love those medieval references.
Up next: today is Veterans Day, of course, and the Pentagon has concluded there would be little rest to getting—well, at least among majority voter, the people over there, in the report that's gotten leaked. They don't think there'd be a big problem with letting gays serve openly in the military. That's a big development and that's ahead.
This is HARDBALL, only on MSNBC.
MATTHEWS: President Obama commemorated Veterans Day in South Korea. There he is today. The president laid a wreath at the War Memorial at the Yongsan Garrison alongside U.S. troops and veterans, of course, of the Korean War. The Yongsan Garrison is home to 25,000 American military personnel who make United States forces there. They're still based over there guarding the DMZ.
HARDBALL will be right back.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I've been a strong believer in the notion that if somebody is willing to serve in our military, in uniform, putting their lives on the line for our security, that they should not be prevented from doing so because of their sexual orientation. I think it's worth noting that the overwhelming majority of Americans feel the same way. It's the right thing to do.
MATTHEWS: We're back. That was President Obama in last week's news conference.
According to "Washington Post," a Pentagon study group on the "don't ask, don't tell" policy has concluded that lifting the ban on gays in the military would not seriously harm the war effort. And the military survey shows that a majority of active duty and reserve forces do not care if gays are allowed to serve openly now. But the findings still may not be enough for Republicans to support a repeal of the policy.
Dan Choi is an Iraq war veteran—thank you for your service—who was discharged from the Army National Guard this year after coming out.
And Alex Nicholson was also discharged under the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. He's executive director of Service Members United, an advocacy organization for gay and lesbian military members and veterans.
So, let's try to try about the unusual situation. Politicians tend to try to be ahead of the curve usually. They try to be smarter than people because they want to get reelected and reelected and reelected. They like their jobs.
Here we have a case where about 70 percent of the American people believe in open service. No more "don't ask, don't tell." If you're gay, you say. You serve, no problem.
They're for that. And that's really moved up over the last several years, right? How come the politicians haven't kept up with the people? Why do we still have a problem getting this passed to the Senate?
LT. DAN CHOI (RET.), IRAQ WAR VETERAN: I think it's a political issue. It's that simple.
MATTHEWS: Why is it a problem? If the majority want it, why do—why do majority or at least half the Senate not want it?
CHOI: Well, I think when I talk about what my military service was and when I talk about wanting to serve, there are certainly many benefits of serving. Many fringe things on the other side of the idea of service.
I think politicians think in very different ways from the people at times. They think the gay issues sometimes are difficult political issue. And I think for anybody to make promises like President Obama did and not take action—
MATTHEWS: Look, you're going in your direction. Go in my direction. Why is it a problem getting it through the Congress? Because I just read the Constitution. On this point, the Congress has the right to raise and support armies. Congress has the fundamental power of the Army, according to the Constitution.
CHOI: OK. So, the direction you want—
MATTHEWS: No, I'm asking you is why can't the Congress go with the American people on this issue politically? What's holding them up? Why are no Republicans aboard this thing? Getting rid of the "don't ask, don't tell"? Why don't they wave their hands and say, of course, I'm for open service. The American people are for it overwhelming. Why don't the Republicans join the Democrats on this?
CHOI: Well, I don't speak for any political party. I think you know that.
MATTHEWS: But I'm asking you as an ally.
CHOI: But on my analysis I don't need to exactly understand why a certain politician votes a certain way, I just need to know that currently under the law, I'm not allowed to tell the truth.
MATTHEWS: Right.
CHOI: And I'm not an equal citizen. I come back from war in Iraq and I'm treated as a second-class citizen. People take polls about whether I'm popular or not.
MATTHEWS: I know—
CHOI: And I think that's an insult and what I'm focused on. That might not be your direction, but I think that it's very clear.
MATTHEWS: My question is to try to understand why—
CHOI: Whether it's Congress or it's the president, these people are leaders who are elected.
MATTHEWS: Right.
CHOI: And we all know that politics is war with no blood. War is politics with the blood.
MATTHEWS: Right.
CHOI: Why is it that in politics we realize that there are consequences but we don't act on them?
MATTHEWS: But my question is, why wouldn't a politician who is self-interested, why wouldn't he or she obey the will of the people? It would be in their self interest to do it.
CHOI: Well, there's a lack of courage, and I think that's one thing that especially on this day, we can take—
MATTHEWS: Why is there courage in the Democratic Party and not the Republican Party?
CHOI: Well, I don't think that there's courage when you talk about politicians who are simply politicians. I think that when you talk about courage—
MATTHEWS: Well, 58 -- just a minute. We have 58 Democrats now in the Senate. They're counting in almost all of them going in that direction, but it ain't 60.
I'm going to go to you, Alex, on this question. What's the problem?
ALEX NICHOLSON, IRAQ WAR VETERAN: I think, to go back to your larger point here, I think we've really lost part of our principle of civilian control in military. It doesn't matter if you look at Congress, the courts—
MATTHEWS: -- the commandant of Marines, he says something it's out on the public record. They hang their hat on that.
NICHOLSON: They defer way too much to the military judgment on this. You're right, Congress has the power to raise and support armies, majority of the American people are going to support of repealing this law. Congress has to act to do it.
MATTHEWS: It seems like they're hiding behind—I understand your passion, you served your country. I wasn't over there. You did.
Let me ask you this: why are they hanging their hat on—whether they'd be a report, you see the reports leaked. That's not good enough. They want to have hearings now on the report and they want to make sure that they run out of clock and they're going to run out the clock this year. Next year, it's a Republican Congress.
You say politics, this is something that you get into—it's going to be a lot harder for a Republican Congress to do it. What do you think? You first.
CHOI: It's not about whether a mission is difficult.
MATTHEWS: Why don't they do it?
CHOI: It doesn't matter whether it's considered difficult or hard.
It's a matter of doing the right thing.
MATTHEWS: But when you talk like this to members of the Senate, if
you get into a room with them, what do they say? What do Republicans say -
CHOI: It doesn't matter what they say to me.
MATTHEWS: Well, they get to vote.
CHOI: I know that when you talk about the gay community and the disappointment that we have, it's not just the disappointment in one party. I know that equality, if it is—
MATTHEWS: Well, how do you blame the Democrats and every single one of them if Senate voted your way? How do you blame them?
CHOI: I don't get what you're saying.
MATTHEWS: If every single one of them votes to get rid of "don't ask, don't tell," isn't that enough for you?
CHOI: Well, if you think about the people who have made promises to us—
MATTHEWS: What more can they do?
CHOI: -- I think that there's a lot more that the president can do.
MATTHEWS: OK. What can he do?
CHOI: I think on the day for the cloture vote, I think that it would had been wonderful if he called a single senator rather than just calling a sports team in Seattle. I think if the president is going to make these promises, he needs to put his money where his mouth.
MATTHEWS: OK. How does he get a Republican to vote your way?
CHOI: I think that he's the president of the United States and he has more power than I do.
MATTHEWS: Well, let me tell you how the country works, you sure uphold the Constitution, you know it as well as I do, that Congress gets to decide these issues. They pass the "don't ask, don't tell" law. They got to repeal it.
CHOI: I think it really helps if the president did stop the discharges.
MATTHEWS: Can he do that legally?
CHOI: I think he can. In addition to—
MATTHEWS: How does the president ignore the will of Congress?
CHOI: When you talk about what is unconstitutional, and the courts say that "don't ask, don't tell" is unconstitutional. Number one, I don't think that president should repeal.
CHOI: Is it unconstitutional is the question, and why can't the president not just say what he knows is true, that it is unconstitutional.
MATTHEWS: Because he took the same oath you did to observe the Constitution as determined by the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court hasn't ruled yet.
CHOI: The oath to support to what?
MATTHEWS: Pardon me.
CHOI: The oath is to what, the oath is to defend the Constitution
MATTHEWS: To support the Constitution.
CHOI: -- against all foreign and domestic enemies.
MATTHEWS: That's right.
CHOI: And I think when you talk about discrimination that's unjust in the military—
MATTHEWS: That's your opinion. But this is—we have to get the courts to rule on that.
CHOI: And they have.
MATTHEWS: I mean the only—
CHOI: There's no reason to not repeal it.
MATTHEWS: But it's not going to solve the problem. And by the way I'm with your passion because you've been there. I haven't been there.
Your thoughts, Alex. He's a pretty strong minded guy on this. Are you that strong minded? Do you think that the president can just do this willfully, just say it?
NICHOLSON: I think Dan's larger point is the president needs to get more actively involved advocacy on this issue.
MATTHEWS: I do. A good point.
NICHOLSON: But you know, we do have a couple of Republicans, Chris.
MATTHEWS: Who are they?
NICHOLSON: Susan Collins.
MATTHEWS: You don't have her—you don't have her yet.
NICHOLSON: We do her to go if it's structured right. Senator Reid has got to bring it up.
MATTHEWS: I know, I know.
MATTHEWS: When I see them vote for it, those two Republicans, Voinovich and her—
MATTHEWS: Voinovich said today he's not going to do it. Anyway, he said he's not going to do it. We got the statement. It's a tough fight.
Dan Choi, Alex Nicholson.
When we return, let me finish with some thoughts about—well, about this budget process.
We'll be right back.
MATTHEWS: Let me finish tonight with two of my fixed positions on the role of government in this country.
One, if you can't protect your border, you're not a country. Two, if you can't control your budget, you're not a government.
On the border, yes, you have to guard it humanely, and given our history with the reasonable liberality, we are after all, the land of immigrants. But countries have a right to decide how other people enter it. If they don't take that responsibility seriously, they have failed their own nationhood. I want people living here, right now, to stay and be given legitimate documents, but I want all employers who hire people in the future to see those documents or face charges.
My second fixed position is: if you can't control the budget, you're not a government. The president assembled a commission to try to deal with the debt raising past $14 trillion. The commission chairman had recommended a set of actions that will cut it in half, the projected debt growth over the next decade.
As a guy who once worked on the Senate budget committee at the time of its creation, I know how hard this is going to be. Every pressure group in the country will want to blast its recommendations one at a time, and will bristle with outrage to get media attention.
But ask anyone who complains about the proposals, what they would do instead? When I asked politicians to a program, they would cut, I get generalizations and procedures. I don't get the name of a program, one costing up there where it would cut and make a difference.
If we only report on those who yell out the loudest, we are, in effect, defending the deficits. I think that the chairmen of the commission are doing the job President Obama asked him to do, spreading the pain. The pressure groups will do what they do. The question is whether the people will do together what needs to be done.
We need a border. We need a government budget. The question is whether our politicians have the stuff to protect either.
That's HARDBALL for now. Thanks for being with us.
Right now, it's time for "THE ED SHOW" with Ed Schultz.
Copyright 2010 CQ-Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.>
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text:
One Dead in Cairo Clashes as Political Turmoil Escalates
[An Nahar] One person was killed in Cairo Monday as
between police and protesters raged into a fifth day, and President Mohammed Morsi scrambled to contain deepening divisions with calls for national dialogue.
The unidentified man was killed by birdshot to the head, a police official told AFP, as demonstrators and police lobbed rocks at each other on a bridge and in an underpass leading to Tahrir Square and tear gas hung heavily in the air.
Morsi late on Sunday sought to crack down on violence which has swept Egypt since Friday in which more than 45 people have died, declaring a month-long state of emergency in the provinces of Port Said, Suez and Ismailiya.
In a televised address he also slapped the three provinces with night-time curfews, while calling the opposition -- which accuses him of betraying the revolution that brought him to power -- to a national dialogue at the presidential palace at 6:00 pm (1600 GMT) Monday.
Specifically included in the invitation for talks are the three leaders of National Salvation Front (NSF) opposition coalition, leading dissident and founder of Al-Dustur party
Mohamed ElBaradei
Egyptian law scholar and Iranian catspaw. He was head of the IAEA from December 1997 to November 2009. At some point during his tenure he was purchased by the Iranians. ElBaradei and the IAEA were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for something in 2005. After stepping down from his IAEA position ElBaradei attempted to horn in on the 2011 Egyptian protests which culminated in the collapse of the Mubarak regime. ElBaradei served on the Board of Trustees of the International Crisis Group, a lefty NGO that is bankrolled by the Carnegie Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, as well as George Soros' Open Society Institute. Soros himself serves as a member of the organization's Executive Committee.
, former
Arab League
...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing...
Jerry Lewis doppelgänger Amr Moussa
... who was head of the Arab League for approximately two normal lifespans, accomplishing nothing that was obvious to the casual observer ...
and presidential candidate Hamdeen Sabbahi.
The NSF was to meet in the early afternoon to consider a response to Morsi's call, Hussein Gohar of the Egyptian Social Democratic Party told AFP.
In a statement late Sunday, Sabbahi's movement expressed its "refusal to participate amid the continuing bloodshed and continuing crimes by the regime against demonstrators".
It said it believes that "any serious call for dialogue needs real guarantees for success, the most important being that the president offers political solutions and security."
ElBaradei said on Twitter that "if the president does not assume responsibility for the bloody events, does not commit to the formation of a salvation government and a committee to amend the constitution, all dialogue is a waste of time."
Posted by: Fred 2013-01-29


text:
Each year, HONOLULU Magazine readers vote for their favorite restaurants in the Islands. Categories include Best New Restaurant, Best Service, Best Value, Best Wine Program, Little Restaurant You Love and many more.
The winning restaurants were announced at a gala reception held November 7 at the Royal Hawaiian's Monarch Ballroom.
See the list of participating restaurats, sponsors and other event details from this year's event.
See our upcoming January 2011 issue for more on the Hale Aina Awards.


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Pride and Prejudice and Zombies will probably never come together. But don't worry, Hollywood will never stop making different versions of Pride and Prejudice. According to Variety the next one, Lost in Austen, will be directed by Nora Ephron. The modern take is based on the BBC miniseries of the same name written by Guy Andrews: "The story follows a modern New York girl transported into the middle of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice."
Andrea Giannetti and Hannah Minghella will oversee the project for Sony, who are excited to get back in business with Ephron after their last collaboration Julia & Julia grossed $130 million worldwide. Ephron is also attached to a Peggy Lee biopic with Reese Witherspoon at the lead. Watch the trailer for the original Lost in Austen after the jump.
When Amanda Price (Jemima Rooper) discovers a secret passage in her bathroom, she enters the fictional world of her favorite novel, Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice in this comedy from director Dan Zeff. Soon her presence changes the story that she knows so well, and Amanda must correct everything before it's too late. [Fandango]


text:
Why the New York Times Took Carlos Slim Over David Geffen
The New York Times turned down a chance to borrow money from Hollywood mogul David Geffen last winter, and went with Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim instead.
So says he New Yorker, which has an extensive profile of Slim in this issue. Writer Lawrence Wright says that when Geffen learned that the Times was working on a deal to borrow $250 million from Slim, he offered to make the loan on the same terms, but was rebuffed by Arthur Sulzberger Jr.
The Times chairman, Wright says, told Geffen's people he preferred to work with Slim because the telco billionaire already owned Times shares and because "he was reportedly also worried about Geffen's ambition to take over the company."
Where would Sulzberger have gotten that idea? From Geffen, of course.
Wright also reports that Geffen offered to buy the publisher outright last September; he says Geffen made the offer via Steve Rattner, the media banker turned Obama adviser who is one of Sulzberger's closest confidants.
The pitch: Sulzberger would oversee the New York Times's (NYT) editorial operations, Geffen would handle the business side, and eventually the entire business would be handed over to a nonprofit foundation. Obviously, Sulzberger turned that one down.
Wright's piece–which is behind a pay wall, so it will be interesting to see how much of the story gets circulated via the Web–is first and foremost a profile of Slim, and secondarily about the Times. So it doesn't spend much more time on Geffen or the notion of other white knights for the paper, a la Google (GOOG).
But in just a few paragraphs, the article does seem to sketch out Geffen's desire to associate himself with the Times in whatever way he can: Buying it outright, lending it much-needed money or buying some of its stock (via Harbinger Capital).
For now, the Times is controlled by Sulzberger and his extended family, who have repeatedly insisted that they're not interested in parting with it. Then again, that's what the Bancroft family always said about Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal. And those properties are now a part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. (NWS)–as is this Web site.
If the Times ever does need a deep-pocketed buyer, Geffen has made it very clear he's available.


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WE'RE a little overwrought now.
The N.R.A. understands that. It's as patient with us as a husband with a tremulous pregnant wife prone to crying jags.
This is just a passing meltdown. We'll get ourselves back under control soon and things will return to normal.
For decades, when the public has grown more sympathetic to gun control after an attempted assassination or a spike in gun murders or a harrowing school shooting, Wayne LaPierre and his fellow N.R.A. officials have hunkered down to wait for the "emotional period" or "hysteria," as they call it, to pass.
They rule in the back rooms on Capitol Hill and rein in panicked senators and congressmen who fret that they should support some measly legislation to pretend they are not pawns of the gun lobby.
They defend anyone owning anything with a trigger, reiterating that military-style semiautomatics are just uglier hunting guns.
While there were more heartbreaking funerals in Newtown, Conn., with long hearses carrying small bodies, LaPierre stepped to the microphone in Washington on Friday to present the latest variation of his Orwellian creed: Guns don't kill people. Media kill people.
"Rather than face their own moral failings," he said in high dudgeon, "the media demonize gun owners, amplify their cries for more laws, and fill the national media with misinformation and dishonest thinking that only delay meaningful action, and all but guarantee that the next atrocity is only a news cycle away."
So it's our fault.
LaPierre, who literally trembles when the omnipotent gun lobby is under siege, went ballistic painting a threatening picture of the dystopia that awaits if we don't protect our schools from guns by putting guns in schools.
"The truth is that our society is populated by an unknown number of genuine monsters," he said. "People that are so deranged, so evil, so possessed by voices and driven by demons that no sane person can ever possibly comprehend them. They walk among us every single day, and does anybody really believe that the next Adam Lanza isn't planning his attack on a school he's already identified at this very moment?"
How many more copycat killers, he asked ominously, are waiting in the wings for their moment of fame?
On the day that 6-year-old Olivia Engel, who was going to play an angel in her church's Nativity play, was buried, LaPierre heinously cloaked his refusal to consider any remedies to gun violence — not even better background checks — as tender concern for the 20 "little kids" shot in cold blood.
He kicked around the old whipping boy, violent video games, even though plenty of his four million members no doubt play violent video games. And he repeated his old saw: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." Guns don't kill people. Guns save people.
The press conference, where the press was not allowed to ask questions, played like an insane parody: a tightly wound lobbyist who earns a million or so a year by refusing to make the slightest concession on gun safety, despite repeated slaughters by deranged shooters with jaw-droppingly easy access to firearms.
LaPierre makes Charlton Heston look like Michael Moore. The N.R.A. vice president, who once called federal agents "jackbooted government thugs," insists the solution to gun violence is putting police officers, or "armed good guys," in every one of the nation's 98,817 K-12 schools.
His logic is spurious. Hunters can have their guns without leaving Americans so vulnerable to being hunted by demented souls with assault rifles that can fire 45 rounds per minute.
And consider that in 1999 an armed sheriff's deputy policing Columbine High School exchanged fire with the shooters, and still they killed 12 other students and a teacher. Mayor Michael Bloomberg accused LaPierre of "a shameful evasion."
It's hard to believe that the N.R.A. needed to go dark for a week after the Newtown shootings to cook up such a chuckleheaded arms race. And LaPierre made a worse case against himself than the media ever could. It's shocking that the N.R.A. can't even fake it better.
It didn't try to mask its obdurate stance by putting forth a less harsh official — a woman who's a mother and a hunter, for instance. Maybe it could have prompted a serious discussion about armed guards at schools if it had a less crazed presentation and less of an absolute vision that "guns are cool," as David Keene, its president, says.
The 63-year-old LaPierre and the 67-year-old Keene, a cantankerous former Bob Dole adviser whose son went to prison for shooting at another driver in a road-rage fit, seemed as out-of-touch as Mitt Romney's campaign and the rest of the white, macho Republican Party.
President Obama, who should have been alarmed that his re-election inspired a boom in gun sales, seems daunted at the prospect of taking on gun lovers, having handed the matter off to Joe Biden to study. The president seems to be setting the table for defeat. If only he had the visceral outrage of a Bloomberg. Who knows what could happen?


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What problems do you face in taking care of your skin?: I have bags and discolouration under my eyes.
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