The Rubio-Estrada Link

Jay Nordlinger makes a point that strikes home regarding the man who will likely be Florida's next Senator...

The Democrats seem especially determined to beat Marco Rubio, the Republican Senate nominee down in Florida. They have to beat him now: otherwise he could be president. You sense that they sense that. I’m reminded of what they did to Miguel Estrada, in 2001. Estrada was the brilliant and inspiring young attorney whom George W. Bush nominated for the D.C. Court of Appeals. Many said that he could be the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice. Democrats had to kill him at the appeals level: for he would be more difficult to block at the higher level. And kill him they did. Schumer & Co. accomplished that. And it was one of the most sickening political displays of the last decade.

I don't know if Rubio will someday be President, but count me among the people who knew Miguel Estrada back in the late 1990's and fully expected the guy was a Supreme Court possibility. He's flat-out brilliant (and not just because he correctly and repeatedly mocked my choice in ties), but that wasn't enough to win confirmation to the D.C. Circuit, or even a vote on his nomination. Keep in mind, his nomination came about at the same time as John Roberts' nomination to the D.C. Circuit. If the Dems don't filibuster Estrada, he may have been Chief Justice right now. And if Republicans ever wanted to play the race card, here is a prime example -- much of the reason Democrats filibustered Estrada was because he's a conservative who's also Hispanic.

The good news -- even with every attempt to stop Rubio, they can't filibuster him. And it also looks like they can't beat him.

Empathy... Not That There's Anything Wrong With That

A number of pundits have raised the question of whether Elena Kagen's sexual orientation will or should matter during the consideration of her Supreme Court nomination.  Andrew Sullivan raises the issue in an interesting way...

It is no more of an empirical question than whether she is Jewish. We know she is Jewish, and it is a fact simply and rightly put in the public square. If she were to hide her Jewishness, it would seem rightly odd, bizarre, anachronistic, even arguably self-critical or self-loathing. And yet we have been told by many that she is gay ... and no one will ask directly if this is true and no one in the administration will tell us definitively.


In a word, this is preposterous - a function of liberal cowardice and conservative discomfort. It should mean nothing either way. Since the issue of this tiny minority - and the right of the huge majority to determine its rights and equality - is a live issue for the court in the next generation, and since it would be bizarre to argue that a Justice's sexual orientation will not in some way affect his or her judgment of the issue, it is only logical that this question should be clarified. It's especially true with respect to Obama. He has, after all, told us that one of his criteria for a Supreme Court Justice is knowing what it feels like to be on the wrong side of legal discrimination. Well: does he view Kagan's possible life-experience as a gay woman relevant to this? Did Obama even ask about it?

(hat tip: Allahpundit at Hot Air) The White House so far is ignoring or pushing back on the questions about it. I actually think that's proper, but I think the door for these questions is opened by Obama's "empathy" standard for the justices he wants on the High Court. All of us expect justices to be impartial arbiters of the questions before them, but there's a question as to how much an individual's personal experiences will influence their decision in a case. Obama seems to want (and may well have selected) justices whose decision-making process involves more than just consulting the law -- he wants justices who consult the well of their own personal experience before coming to a final judgement.  Part of the problem with such an approach is that it leaves his nominees open to questions about their personal experiences, and about intensely personal decisions, such as whether to publicly acknowledge one's sexuality.  I don't think the questions should be asked, but I don't think the standard of "empathy" should be the basis for a judge's decision.

Politically, I doubt the question will be asked, because it's just not proper.  But Sullivan, who's a noted proponent of gay marriage, may have another reason for acknowledging this problem.  If the High Court later rules on the constitutionality of same-sex marriage, there may be doubts cast on whether Kagen's vote is based on the law, or based on how the decision impacts her own personal life.  That's what the empathy standard tees up as a problem.

No Animals Were Harmed In The Writing Of This Post

Remember this the next time someone complains about the Citizens United ruling -- the Supreme Court has decided that the First Amendment protects the ability to make films showing graphic violence against animals -- and has done so by a greater majority than the one than struck down McCain-Feingold's advertising restrictions.  I actually don't object to either ruling, although I'm more inclined to protect core political speech than puppy snuff films. 

And before you ask, all of the liberals on the Court sided with the majority, with the only dissent coming from Sam Alito.  Personally, I'd rather be defending Alito's position than theirs -- they seem happy to let people spend money making movies where animals are gravely maimed, but God forbid someone spend money trying to influence a political election!

Supreme Court Soap Opera

Oh, goody.  Washington's worst-kept secret is slowly leaking out -- Justice Stevens is finally going to call it quits.  As Byron York notes, Democrats are really hoping he does it this year instead of waiting until next year.

My personal view is that the GOP can still make this a useful election issue, and we can all see it as a teaching tool.  The confirmation hearings probably cannot include a series of questions as to how a nominee would vote on the constituionality of Obamacare's individual mandate (since a prospective justice would likely properly refuse to pre-judge such an issue), but there's plenty of room for discussion of precedent and the Commerce Clause.  On additional question -- if Elena Kagen (the current SG) is indeed named to the bench (and she is considered the front-runner), would there be an argument in favor of having her recuse herself from any eventual Supreme Court decision on Obamacare?

The Health Care Follies Continue

I think today's the big day for the health care reform bill.  I haven't seen the CBO estimate yet, but it's got be coming soon in order to enable a House vote before the end of the week.  The President has made his last public pitch.  And if Pelosi doesn't schedule a vote by tomorrow, then doubt starts to kick in as to whether she can actually get the votes.

Speaking of the President's last health care pitch, this is too funny...

Natoma Canfield, the cancer-stricken woman who has become a centerpiece of President Obama's push for health care reform, will not lose her home over her medical bills and will probably qualify for financial aid, a top official at the Cleveland medical center treating her told FoxNews.com.

Though Canfield's sister Connie Anderson said her sibling is afraid she'll lose her house and Obama warned at an Ohio rally Monday that the patient is "racked with worry" about the cost of tests and treatment, she is already being screened for financial help.

Lyman Sornberger, executive director of patient financial services at the Cleveland Clinic, said "all indications" at the outset are that she will be considered for assistance.

"She may be eligible for state Medicaid ... and/or she will be eligible for charity (care) of some form or type. ... In my personal opinion, she will be eligible for something," he said, adding that Canfield should not be worried about losing her home.

"Cleveland Clinic will not put a lien on her home," he said.

Cleveland Clinic offers personal guides to patients like Canfield who are concerned about payment to try to match them up with programs that can provide full or partial assistance. One option is state Medicaid coverage, which Canfield did not have when she was admitted. Another is charity care that is routinely provided by the hospital, which is a nonprofit. Cleveland Clinic reported providing $99 million in charity care in 2008.

...Anderson said her sister expects to spend at least 28 days in the hospital. She said Canfield has her own cleaning business but does not have any kind of health coverage, adding that for now nobody is paying for her stay at the Cleveland Clinic.

But Sornberger said that even if Canfield doesn't qualify for charity care or Medicaid, "there's probably eight to 10 options that a patient has" to find payment.

What I'm reading here is that Natoma Canfield seems to be a good argument for keeping the current system. Or that while she has problems, they're probably not worth blowing up the current system. And keep in mind, someone at the ever-competent White House thought this would be a good way to make the final sales pitch on health care. If the government runs health care the way the Obama campaign team has run the White House, I'm going to start investing the funeral home business. Heck, Obama even got some opposition among his pre-selected crowd.  Robert Samuelson also did a nice job of tearing down some of the substantive arguments in favor of the bill in his column, which is well worth a read.

Meanwhile, back in the alternate world of Capitol Hill, where Pelosi continues to try and pull in votes, Ramesh Ponnoru makes a good point about the Slaughter Solution, which makes less sense by the day (in addition to being sleazy and borderline unconstitutional)...

Any House Democrat who votes for the rule that allows the Senate bill to be deemed passed will be voting for the Senate bill. A foreseeable consequence of that vote is that the Senate bill may become law while some of the fixes the House votes for do not. It is entirely fair for Republican opponents of any House Democrat who votes for the Slaughter rule to tie him to the Senate bill. Republicans will be able to say, fairly, that such a House Democrat has voted for the Senate bill — kickbacks and all — and tried to hide the fact. Republicans may as well point out now that that's exactly what they're going to do.

That's about right -- and as much as I think former Judge Michael McConnell is right about the issue, I doubt the Supreme Court would invalidate healthcare reform because of Pelosi's gambit (although the awesomeness of such a moment in creating spectacular constitutional chaos almost makes me wish for it).  The real problem for the Democrats is that this looks awful politically -- they're racing to pass the bill, and using every technique possible to justify it.  Even Ezra Klein, who's the left wing blogger version of the Energizer Bunny on healthcare reform, thinks the Slaughter Solution is politically idiotic.  Other liberals are coming up with really bad analogies, like this one from Tim Noah...

As Slate's John Dickerson explained March 10, this would be achieved by a "self-executing rule" that would allow the House to "deem" the Senate bill already passed as it considers the clean-up reconciliation bill containing various corrections demanded by the House and the Obama White House. A sort of virgin birth, if you will, with the Senate cast as Mary, the House cast as Joseph, and health care reform cast as the baby Jesus.

...If this is what it takes to pass health care reform, maybe it's best to avert your gaze as you might do while attending certain rituals of far-flung premodern civilizations. Even better: Do as the Three Wise Men did. Skip labor and delivery and arrive two weeks later to appraise the newborn babe.

Since I'm not Christian, I can avoid being offended at the comparison of healthcare reform to that religion's savior (and even many Democrats should find this formulation problemaic, based on the deification of the President during his campaign... although maybe the bill is now the Son of Obama, which makes the President... my head hurts). As Jim Geraghty notes, the headline to the left isn't exactly what a supporter of the health care reform bill would like to read.  The GOP figured out how bad this looks and is trying to force the Democrats to vote on the gambit, as reported by Michelle Malkin, who also points out that Democrats have another problem -- they're losing support from normally reliable newspaper editorial boards.  That means Obamacare may be losing votes in the moderate-left of center, which is where they need support to pass the bill.

I'd rehash whip counts, but The Hill's running tab is fine for that. FireDogLake is here, and Jay Cost is here. Of course, whip counts don't matter when Dems seemingly flip for no reason at all, like Dan Maffei, although I'm guessing the "pro-village burning" line will find a way into a campaign ad this fall.  As to what's going on now with Pelosi's persuasion, Yuval Levin has a good point...

In their Politico piece noting that Pelosi has declared the reconciliation bill closed, Patrick O’Connor and Jonathan Allen suggest that Pelosi’s announcement means the wheeling and dealing for votes is over, and all that remains is an ideological appeal for votes. But members who were open to such appeals would have been on board with this bill long ago. In fact, what remains are deals outside of the health-care bill. What Pelosi is doing now is offering wavering members a variety of gifts and goodies that will be included in other bills (or in administration actions) between now and the November elections — and especially in this year’s appropriations bills. These deals will be much harder to discern than the crude buy-offs that Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, and others obtained for their states in the Senate health-care negotiations. They will no-doubt involve money and other favors for members’ districts or powerful constituents in unrelated bills — from transportation funds to Medicare payment decisions to an assortment of pet projects. And they will need to be delivered regardless of whether Pelosi gets enough members to switch their votes this way to actually pass the bill.

These special dispensations will present themselves in the course of the coming months, but we will probably never have a full picture of what they involve, and what it really took to get “no” votes from last time to switch (assuming any actually do so, of course.) We won’t know, that is, unless political reporters stop covering this week as though it involves a wonky substantive debate among House Democrats and started asking the Speaker and any members who change their votes about just what the “persuasion” process has involved.

I think the process for this bill will end up exposing a lot of those deals, whether the Speaker intended that or not. And the public will be even more offended by Congress' conduct, which should serve everyone well heading into the fall elections.  I'll give the last word to Megan McArdle...

So now I'm thinking about another political problem. Assume this passes; what happens afterward? I don't think that many people believe that the answer is "Nothing: the bill becomes law, and we sing happy smurf songs all the way to the longest life expectancy in the Western world!" Even the bill's proponents expect it will need some follow-up work. But what will that follow-up work look like?

Worst case scenario for Democrats: a wave of public outrage like the one that followed Cat Care, aka The Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act of 1988 (and its step-child, the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Repeal Act of 1989). This strikes me as quite likely, actually. If this passes, yes, you will have AARP support and a wave of positive coverage from 90% liberal media. These things did not save Cat Care from a wave of angry public protest. I mean, really angry.

...My nightmare is that they repeal everything except the really popular thing, which is to say the ban on rescission and exclusions for pre-existing conditions. These are basically free, and they're by far the most popular part of the legislation, as far as I can tell.

I'm not exactly a fan of rescission, and to the extent that it is being abused by insurance companies, they deserve whatever regulatory penalties they get. But without rescission, the natural thing to do is to wait until you get sick, and then lie on your insurance application. Like bans on pre-existing conditions, this leads to the classic "insurance death spiral" where the only people who want to buy the insurance are the people who expect to need more care than the cost of the premiums, causing the pool to shrink and the prices to rise.

...Would Obama dare veto it? When there's no longer an unpopular Democratic Congress to hide behind? One hopes, for the good of the country. But while so far the president has been enthusiastically urging members to lean into the strike zone and take one for the team, I've seen little indication that he's willing to risk his own job.

So what she's saying is... we're all screwed. Woo-hoo!

No Media Bias To See Here

Apparently, the L.A. Times is interested in the fact that Justice Clarence Thomas' wife is involved in the Tea Party movement.  But they seemed relatively uninterested in the fact that both Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor -- the Justices themselves, not their spouses -- were intimately involved in political causes prior to taking the bench.  And Eugene Volokh notes that several circuit court judges have spouses with political jobs, including one whose spouse is the current Governor of Pennsylvania (and the former head of the Democratic National Committee).  But hey, that would require reporting, rather than agenda-driven writing.

Next Year, They Should All Stay Home And Watch American Idol

I like the fact that Chief Justice Roberts finally commented on President Obama's call-out of the Justices over the Citizens United decision during the State of the Union address.  I'm of two minds baout the issue -- I think Obama's wrong on the substance, and I think his statements in the SOTU were actually incorrect as to the law.  But having thought about it for awhile, I think both he and the Court are wrong on the decorum issue.

The Supreme Court probably shouldn't attend the SOTU, because it is largely a partisan event.  And the President shouldn't directly call out the Court in this manner if they are in the chamber -- it's an insult to an invited guest, and in many ways an unnerving bit of political theater to have judges surrounded by partisan politicians raucously insulting their decision.  I do like Drew M.'s idea about having Obama debate Justice Roberts or Justice Scalia on Constitutional issues, but that's because I'm a dork.

A Brave New World

In the new media world, a law professor's prank sparks a huge fake retirement story.  I'd guess that the identity of the news outlet doing the reporting will (rightly) take a hit, and the folks who ran with the story will probably be more circumspect in trusting news published by news reporting organizations that don't have an established reputation for telling it like it is.  Of course, this won't excuse the media from ignoring the next rumor published by the National Enquirer.

On another front, you gotta love the potential for mass chaos.  If I were a physics professor, I'd open class by announcing that me and my colleagues would be announcing later that morning that we had successfully completed work on a time machine.  I would then look at two people sitting in the back row and say, "I don't want to give away a lot about the future, but you two should NOT get married."

So You Say You Want A Revolution

Apparently, this editorialist at the Philadelphia Inquirer really wants Obama to imitate FDR...

This may come as a surprise to some people, but the U.S. Constitution does not specify the size of the Supreme Court.

...So if nine justices is not writ in stone, the embattled President Obama should deal with this hostile conservative/reactionary court by adding three members.

The court's recent controversial decision equating corporations with individuals turned an already overly money-influenced campaign system into a veritable free-for-all of propaganda for corporate and vested interests. It was met with criticism by most legal scholars, praised only by corporate mouthpieces.

Even Barack "Can't We All Get Along?" Obama criticized the decision in his State of the Union speech. A lot of good that will do. The court has four hard-liners who are against what Obama strives for, and a so-called swing voter, Anthony Kennedy, who votes with them in the big cases.

As the court stands, it is reminiscent of the stonewall President Franklin Roosevelt faced in opposition to his New Deal legislation. Four entrenched reactionary justices, known as the "Four Horsemen," were not only anti-New Deal, but some demonstrated a personal dislike for FDR.

... In response, Roosevelt sought to appoint an additional justice for each incumbent justice who reached the age of 70 and refused retirement, with a maximum size of 15 justices. The phrase "packing the court" became the pejorative that turned the public against FDR's plan.

Trust me when I say this -- even Obama's not this tone-deaf politically. They may pass a healthcare reform bill via reconciliation (and reap a whirlwind of sheer electoral pain that may portend real "change"), but doing something like this might make politics permanently disfunctional in this country. And if FDR couldn't sell it, we doubt Obama could, based on his sale of his agenda thus far. Leave it to my hometown paper to publish an idea this dumb.

New Jersey Wants To Recall A Senator -- But Do They Really Want Him Back?

Speaking of people getting sick of Washington doing business like it always has, New Jersey has a movement afoot to recall one of its U.S. Senators. I couldn't begin to evaluate the arguments on each side, but this is an interesting Constitutional issue. I'm rooting for anything that makes Congress more chaotic, so here's hoping the case moves forward.

Hell Hath Frozen Over -- I Praise A Left-Wing Writer

It's not often I agree with Glenn Greenwald, but I admire his consistency on the First Amendment (and to be fair, he's also been pretty willing to call out President Obama on his unwillingness to live up to campaign promises). He's a well left-of-center liberal who thinks corporations have too great an influence on politics, but his column on the Citizens United decision is spot-on. I don't agree with his belief that public financing of campaigns would be a good idea (if anything, I think it would exacerbate the incumbent protection features of our current system), but it's good to see that the someone on the left understands that fiddling with the First Amendment is a very bad idea.

At the end of the day, it's worth remembering that President Bush signed McCain-Feingold into law, and Obama is outraged by the Supreme Court's decision to gut the bill. So the leaders of both parties signed onto and defended this attempt to limit free speech. Conservatives and liberals should be appropriately suspicious.

This Week Was Like Christmas All Over Again

As one of my friends noted in an email, this week just keeps getting better and better for folks on the right...

The Supreme Court has ruled that corporations may spend freely to support or oppose candidates for president and Congress, easing decades-old limits on their participation in federal campaigns.

By a 5-4 vote, the court on Thursday overturned a 20-year-old ruling that said corporations can be prohibited from using money from their general treasuries to pay for their own campaign ads. The decision, which almost certainly will also allow labor unions to participate more freely in campaigns, threatens similar limits imposed by 24 states.

It leaves in place a prohibition on direct contributions to candidates from corporations and unions.

Critics of the stricter limits have argued that they amount to an unconstitutional restraint of free speech, and the court majority apparently agreed.

"The censorship we now confront is vast in its reach," Justice Anthony Kennedy said in his majority opinion, joined by his four more conservative colleagues.

However, Justice John Paul Stevens, dissenting from the main holding, said, "The court's ruling threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions around the nation."

Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor joined Stevens' dissent, parts of which he read aloud in the courtroom.

The justices also struck down part of the landmark McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill that barred union- and corporate-paid issue ads in the closing days of election campaigns.

As many of my close friends know, I despise McCain-Feingold, and think most campaign finance laws are at best next to useless and at worst clear infringements on the most important form of free speech. But give credit where credit is due -- Justice Stevens dissent ran 90 friggin' pages or so. Of course, I'll probably agree more with Justice Scalia's 9 page concurrence. I also agree with this post by Tim Lee over at Cato...

While I regarded the decision as a victory for free speech, a large number of folks on the left — many of whom support free speech in other contexts — were aghast at the decision, arguing that it would vastly enhance the influence of large corporations in the political process.

Part of my disagreement with these guys is that I’m just a free speech zealot. The First Amendment says “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech,” and I don’t see how that language can be squared with a statute that limits the distribution of a political documentary. The best you can say, I think, is that limiting corporate influence is a “compelling state interest” sufficient to overcome the First Amendment’s ban on speech abridgment, but that’s just another way of saying that you don’t care about free speech very much.

Second, I think it’s important to remember that “corporations” encompass much more than large, for-profit businesses. They also include a wide variety of non-profit and advocacy groups, including the ACLU, the NRA, and NARAL, that are, by any reasonable definition, grassroots organizations advocating the views of large numbers of voters. Indeed, as the ACLU pointed out in its amicus brief, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) prohibited the ACLU from running ads criticizing members of Congress who voted for the awful FISA Amendments Act of 2008. Even if you think it’s appropriate for Congress to regulate the speech of Exxon-Mobil and Pfizer, I think it’s awfully hard to square the First Amendment with a law that limits the ability of NARAL or the NRA to advocate for its members’ views.

But more fundamentally, I don’t buy the idea that limiting corruption is a state interest sufficiently compelling to overcome the First Amendment interest in free speech. I think supporters of BCRA misunderstand how corporations wield influence and dramatically overestimate the power of television advertisements. It’s true, of course, that a corporation prepared to spend $1 million on ads criticizing a particular legislator will get that legislator’s attention. But there’s nothing unique about this. It can also get his attention by hiring a lobbying firm that employs a former staffer. It can get his attention by arranging $100,000 in bundled contributions from executives, clients, and friends of the company. It can get his attention by creating astroturf organizations. And there are probably lots of other mechanisms I haven’t thought of.

The key difference between independent expenditures and the other mechanisms is that independent expenditures are the most open and transparent. To run an effective “issue ad,” a corporation has to make an argument that is persuasive to voters. I don’t want to sugar coat the situation; sometimes independent expenditures finance ads that are sleazy and misleading. But given a choice between corporations spending their money on ads about how Senator Smith hates America or spending their money on K Street, I’ll take the ads, because at least voters still get the final decision.

Lee also makes some smart points about how the tubes of the Interweb and other forms of communication have made traditional ad campaigns less effective. I think he's right on this, and it's one more reason why the Supreme Court opinion makes sense. And as Anthony Kennedy pointed out in his opinion, it's somewhat hard to square limits on speech by corporations, when at the same time traditional news gathering and editorial analysis by media corporations were free from restrictions. Ed Whelan has some more good stuff from the Kennedy opinion...

The law before us is an outright ban, backed by criminal sanctions. Section 441b makes it a felony for all corporations—including nonprofit advocacy corporations—either to expressly advocate the election or defeat of candidates or to broadcast electioneering communications within 30 days of a primary election and 60 days of a general election. Thus, the following acts would all be felonies under §441b: The Sierra Club runs an ad, within the crucial phase of 60 days before the general election, that exhorts the public to disapprove of a Congressman who favors logging in national forests; the National Rifle Association publishes a book urging the public to vote for the challenger because the incumbent U. S. Senator supports a handgun ban; and the American Civil Liberties Union creates a Web site telling the public to vote for a Presidential candidate in light of that candidate’s defense of free speech. These prohibitions are classic examples of censorship.…

When word concerning the plot of the movie Mr. Smith Goes to Washington reached the circles of Government, some officials sought, by persuasion, to discourage its distribution. Under Austin, though, officials could have done more than discourage its distribution—they could have banned the film. After all, it, like Hillary, was speech funded by a corporation that was critical of Members of Congress. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington may be fiction and caricature; but fiction and caricature can be a powerful force.

Modern day movies, television comedies, or skits onYoutube.com might portray public officials or public policies in unflattering ways. Yet if a covered transmission during the blackout period creates the background for candidate endorsement or opposition, a felony occurs solely because a corporation, other than an exempt media corporation, has made the “purchase, payment, distribution, loan, advance, deposit, or gift of money or anything of value” in order to engage in political speech. Speech would be suppressed in the realm where its necessity is most evident: in the public dialogue preceding a real election. Governments are often hostile to speech, but under our law and our tradition it seems stranger than fiction for our Government to make this political speech a crime. Yet this is the statute’s purpose and design.

Now, I know some folks are already trying to cut down the opinion -- Brad Smith mentions a couple of likely unconstitutional bills introduced by Alan Grayson in Congress that would seek to effectively overturn the decision. The President's on board with trying to curtail the impact of the decision, although SCOTUSblog does a pretty good job outlining why Congress is unlikely to pass a bill with real impact, because the Court's opinion (and the First Amendment) will be difficult to navigate. The best option might end up being public financing of campaigns, but we're not sure the public will be on board with that -- and they certainly shouldn't be, since such an idea will probably end up being a huge incumbent-protection device.

At the end of the day, I'm pretty thrilled with any opinion that causes Keith Olbermann to go off the deep end. In fact, that may be a pretty good way of describing stuff from now on. If Olbermann thinks it's mildly upsetting, it's probably good; if he thinks it's the coming of the apocolypse, we should throw a party.