Oh. That was interesting.

So, they aren't required to include a .... disclaimer, or something? Informing us in small print these are actually hookers, hired by the show to pretend to want to get married? This was exposed last November, and no one has to admit it?

I guess the "reality" part is meant to be taken as if in quotes, it's actually just a drama, with hired actors.

Okay then. That's actually slightly better, except that even thinking that they imagine that these would seem like real people is depressing.

On the other hand, just suppose Geithner had followed the Krugman plan, and announced the immediate nationalization of Citigroup and Bank of America on Monday morning. It's hardly a stretch to imagine an ensuing market crash as bad or even worse than what we have already witnessed. And market crashes don't just hurt the pocket-books of the rich. They wipe out pensions and have an undeniable effect on consumer psychology.

So, in other words, whatever you do, don't make the traders on Wall Street unhappy. Because, you know, keeping them in a position to be able to make lots of money is the one thing to focus on, at the sacrifice of all else, i.e. any regulations or so on that we could have put in place years ago.

Because that's worked out so well, following that plan.

What we have to learn eventually is that "the right will go nuts" is not a good reason to refrain from doing things. They were nuts to start with.

What this analysis misses is that the market can go up and things can still end in disaster, which is the big, monstrous, mega-lesson we just learned.

Besides, as someone else wrote, Krugman so far has been right and the others dead wrong.

The mega-crash we just witnessed, by the way? That lesson we just learned, or should have, anyway? That wiped out lots of things that weren't on Wall Street also. So much for keeping Wall Street happy as the way to not hurt others.

Obama would not be hireable as CEO of a large multi-national corporation, yet his is leading the largest nation through the most challenging economic conditions we have seen in decades. That's scary.

Here we go, back to the Salon PUMA days. And what, Hillary Clinton would be qualified as a CEO because of all that experience in running large corporations, or a government of any sort?

Unless of course you mean John McCain and Sarah Palin as the ones with all the CEO experience compared to Barack Obama, I'm not sure which candidate you mean you prefered over Obama but I assume Hillary. That, (McCain/Palin) would of course be only more absurd.

I'm nervous about the choices being made right now but in my case because they're too based on keeping the right happy. The idea however that a succesful lawyer, succesful law professor, State Senator, then US Senator, has "no experience" is ridiculousness from the past that's been debunked a million times.

What you have to realize about your very good example from the earlier Howie Kurtz is that this was about Iraq , which has now become, and had already at the time Kurtz wrote that, seen as a mistake.

The way it works is that conservatives actually pretty much always come around to changing their beliefs to more prgressive ones, for example racism is now a very bad thing among conservatives, at least in their rhetoric, but there was a time that open racism was actually a badge of honor among the moderate right.

Once this shift happens (Racism? Oh that's bad, we agree!) then the entire history of having had exactly the opposite view is forgotten, at least by those who've reversed themselves.

The results is that someone like Kurtz can now spout the accepted wisdom that "Iraq was a hasty decision which turned out to be a massive error or even deception" but can absolutely refuse to see the similar examples taking place right now, and certainly will never bring himself to actually oppose them.

A comment from Malkin's blog about this "revelation":

Simply Amazing. And people still wonder how Germany was suckered in the thirties?

Yes, that's a straight cut and paste. No, I didn't invent it.

So you see, the fact that someone took a job canvassing for this voter registration group when he was just out of college, and is now being appointed as a judge, for pity's sake--- why it's just like Nazi Germany! Why can't you all see the basic truth of that?

It's loony tunes, I tells ya. We live in a cartoon.

I think Monsieur Pachyderm is a perfect spokeselephant for the right as it's become these days.

So ACORN is as good as anything in terms of political payback.

he writes, and this fits perfectly with the image that the GOP has been projecting.

As you point out, Bush may have been opposed for the very real follies that even most Republicans now shun him for, but that doesn't stop the remaining 29% diehards from wanting "payback" for that opposition. Whether there's anything to actually object to is, in the Elephant's own words, beside the point.

This has succeeded in giving the GOP the image it currently has, obstructionists without a cause, the party of just say no, and so on. The good news for the rest of us is that's going to be awfully hard to undo, once they realize what they've done.

Common wisdom is like concrete in Washington, they say, and once it hardens nothing will change it. The GOP has stepped in the wet concrete this time in a way that will leave those large, obstructionist, wishing-for-failure footprints for a lonnng time to come.