He's talking about the GOP Primary, people, so just relax...

An interesting, brief analysis of a possible (not, mind you, probable) path to the GOP nod for the curious woman from Minnesota. It still strikes us as inconceivable that all these pieces would fall into place, but one cannot deny: a) she's out-raised Mitt Romney in the first quarter, b) she has Huckabee's very capable former political director, Wes Enos, to head up her team, and c) she is THE Tea Party Candidate, i.e. she has the most motivated and energetic political, grassroots semi-organization on the ground at the moment in the U.S.

And, lest we forget, at one time it was a given that a) Howard Dean stood no chance outside VT, b) there was no way G.W. Bush would beat Gore in '00, and c) there was no was no way G.W. Bush would beat ANYONE in '04.

Still, for Bachmann to bag the nomination, it means she and her pitchfork-partisans would need to successfully storm the GOP convention in Tampa next year. We think there are still enough moderate/sane Republicans out there who wouldn't let that happen as they realize, while the disaffected and disillusioned Tea Partiers would be dancing down the Main Streets of America, the Democrats would be dancing right alongside them.

How Michele Bachmann Could Win
by Jonathan Chait
April 5, 2011
article and photo courtesy of The New Republic

Michelle Bachmann is starting to make a move in the GOP primary. She's drawing strong reviews for her public appearances. She out-raised Mitt Romney in the first quarter. She's hired Mike Huckabee's well-regarded political director. And yet most reporters still believe she has no chance to win the nomination. The most bullish assessment I've seen, by Ed Kilgore, concedes, "it’s hard to imagine someone as radical as her actually winning the nomination." But I think Bachmann is a legitimate dark-horse possibility to win the nomination.

Now, my model of how the nomination works presumes the nominee will probably be someone who's acceptable to both the activist base and the party elites. That argument took me, by process of elimination, to Tim Pawlenty, the only candidate who 1) the base won't disqualify, 2) the elites won't disqualify, and 3) actually seems to want to run. But, as Josh Marshall points out, if Bachmann wins in Iowa, she could knock Pawlenty out of the race.

Then what happens? Well, you'd see the GOP establishment scrambling to unify behind a non-insane alternative. But as I've argued ad nauseum, I don't think that will be Mitt Romney. Or, if it is Romney, I think Bachmann could probably beat him. She'd carve him to pieces over health care, not to mention general inauthenticity issues. Haley Barbour? Perhaps. I could also very well envision some kind of effort to draft a young right-wing heartthrob like Paul Ryan or Marco Rubio into the race.

The best parallel I think consider is Howard Dean. No, Dean is not anywhere near as crazy as Bachmann. That's not the point. Both tap deeply into a well of activist anger against a sitting president that is not being fully satisfied by other candidates. Both inspire passionate activist volunteers, and make their rivals look phony by comparison. And both inspire terror among the party leadership -- Democrats in 2003 considered Dean just as unelectable as Republicans now consider Bachmann.

Of course, Dean imploded right before the Iowa caucus. But he could have won, and he was on the verge of sweeping right through the primaries, as he picked up steam through 2003 and the opposition fractured. Republican elites will mount a determined opposition to Bachmann. While the effort may be successful -- the way GOP leaders rallied around Bob Dole to fend off Pat Buchanan in 1996 -- it may be a failure, like the effort to draft Wes Clark.

I think Bachmann has a genuine outside shot to win the nomination.

More on AG Holder and the 9/11 Trial from our friends at the NYT

Cowardice Blocks the 9/11 Trial

Last year, Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. described a federal court trial for the self-professed mastermind of Sept. 11 attacks, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, as “the defining event of my time as attorney general.” On Monday, Mr. Holder’s dream for demonstrating the power of the American court system crumbled when he announced that the trial would take place not in New York City or anywhere in the United States but before a military commission at the Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, prison camp.

That retreat was a victory for Congressional pandering and an embarrassment for the Obama administration, which failed to stand up to it.

The wound inflicted on New York City from Mr. Mohammed’s plot nearly a decade ago will not heal for many lifetimes, yet the city, while still grieving, has thrived. How fitting it would have been to put the plot’s architect on trial a few blocks from the site of the World Trade Center, to force him to submit to the justice of a dozen chosen New Yorkers, to demonstrate to the world that we will not allow fear of terrorism to alter our rule of law.

But, apparently, there are many who continue to cower, who view terrorists as much more fearsome than homegrown American mass murderers and the American civilian jury system as too “soft” to impose needed justice. The administration of George W. Bush encouraged this view for more than seven years, spreading a notion that terror suspects only could be safely held and tried far from our shores at Guantánamo and brought nowhere near an American courthouse. The federal courts have, in fact, convicted hundreds of terrorists since 9/11. And federal prisons safely hold more than 350 of them.

The pandering toward this mentality began as soon as Mr. Holder announced his plan in 2009 to try Mr. Mohammed in Lower Manhattan. A group of senators, including Joseph Lieberman, an independent of Connecticut, complained that it would give terrorists a platform to rally others to their cause. Senator Charles Schumer, Democrat of New York, said the trial should be moved elsewhere because New Yorkers didn’t want it, as if prosecutors needed opinion polls to determine where to seek justice.

The final blow came from Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who originally accepted the trial but then gave in to downtown business interests that opposed it for reasons of inconvenience. His office promulgated the absurd notion that security would cost $1 billion. Congress then made the trial impossible last year with a measure prohibiting any spending to move prisoners from Guantánamo to the United States.

Mr. Holder was right to sound bitter about the decision at his news conference on Monday. But the Obama administration must shoulder some of the blame. As The New Yorker reported last year, it did little to prepare the political groundwork for a local trial and barely defended the idea after the unfounded attacks began.

Given the circumstances, Mr. Holder is right to push for a military trial for Mr. Mohammed, rather than let him linger in indefinite limbo. His decision will test whether reforms to the military commission system will allow for both a fair prosecution and a vigorous defense. But Monday’s announcement represents a huge missed opportunity to prove the fairness of the federal court system and restore the nation’s reputation for providing justice for all.

Four More Years?

It is both fitting and ironic that the President doesn't really appear in his video released yesterday officially launching his 2012 campaign. The man who ran for president in 2008, Candidate Obama, has similarly not appeared in public or the oval office since his inauguration.

The video is intended to reach out to the grassroots network of progressives that handed him victory last time around. The trouble is that network is presently consumed fighting for collective bargaining rights for unions, fighting for equal rights for the GLTB community, fighting for a responsible tax policy, fighting for clean elections and stricter revolving door lobbying policies, and a whole host of issues we thought we'd have the President's back on. Instead, it is us out on a limb, waiting for the President to show us some love. It has been a very lonely couple years as the man who we saw leading a dawning of a new day, instead, stepped back and allowed for a twilight of the Bush Administration by extending the bulk of his predecessor's domestic and foreign policies.

The same day the video was released, AG Eric Holder announced Khalid Shaikh Mohammed would be tried before a military tribunal at the prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, allowing the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks to have yet another, more profound victory over the American people: the resignation of our civil liberties in the face of fear and intolerance.

Progressives are locked in heated discussion and have been for some time now. Where do we go? What do we do? What is our role in the current environment? As would be typical for Democrats, there is no consensus to be had. Some froth at the mouth at the slightest rebuke of their knight in shining armor. Some have pledged hard and fast to "Draft Dean" and "Draft Kucinich" campaigns, while the majority, presently entrenched fighting the battles they never expected to fight, let alone lead, are waiting. Waiting for what, specifically, no one seems to know.

The President will not be re-elected without the fierce loyalty and 'get out the vote' of grassroots progressives.  In the end, we believe, he shall have them if only because of fear of the alternative. But it is far more effective to be fighting for a belief than fighting against one. So until then, progressives must continue to be, as AFL-CIO President, Richard Trumka put it, Obama's "troublesome ally."

Candidate Obama insisted his supporters call him out when he makes a mistake or wanders off the reservation. He has and we have. Repeatedly. Time and again with little to show for it. We may be ready to walk through hot coals for him as November '12 draws near. Until then, it is our responsibility to hold his feet to that fire. Our voices need to be as loud and compelling and more intelligent than the other side. Not a tall order? The voices must be as one. Unified and on message and on the streets. That is our challenge, our tall order. That is what will decide the next election for President of the United States.