This just in!

By Jennifer J. Foster

The Obamas are bad gift-givers!

The British press has its knickers in a twist over the gifts exchanged by President and Mrs. Obama and Prime Minister and Mrs. Gordon Brown.

According to the Daily Mail, Brown’s gifts to Obama included an ornamental desk pen holder made from the oak timbers of Victorian anti-slaver HMS Gannet, once named HMS President; the framed commission for HMS Resolute; and a first-edition set of the seven-volume classic biography of Churchill by Sir Martin Gilbert.

“Mr Obama was so delighted he has already put it in pride of place in the Oval Office on the Resolute desk which was carved from timbers of Gannet’s sister ship, HMS Resolute,“ the Mail gushed.

Meanwhile, according to the Mail, Brown secreted away his gift from Obama “hidden in his luggage”—a collection of 25 classic American films on DVD.

“It is not known which DVDs were included, but one is thought to be the Dreamworks film Toy Story,“ the Mail reported with disdain.

As a result:

No 10 had tried to keep the present a secret, refusing to answer reporters who asked what President Obama had given to mark the reaffirmation of the special relationship.

Oh, the shame!!

Obama isn’t the only one in trouble with the press over his ill-conceived gifts to the British First Family. Michelle Obama is also taking a media beating across the pond for “a most uncharacteristic lapse of judgement,“ displayed through her choice of gifts for Mrs. Brown and the Brown children that “could not have been more solipsistic or more inherently dismissive of Mrs Brown.“

That’s a long way from the soaring rhetoric Brown delivered to a joint session of Congress about the unbreakable and special alliance between the U.K. and the U.S.A.

Well, no one said diplomacy was easy.

Rush v. Dems

By Jennifer J. Foster

If you’re interested in the ongoing showdown between conservative talk king Rush Limbaugh and the White House, start with the Politico story that started the buzz:

Top Democrats believe they have struck political gold by depicting Rush Limbaugh as the new face of the Republican Party, a full-scale effort first hatched by some of the most familiar names in politics and now being guided in part from inside the White House.

The strategy took shape after Democratic strategists Stanley Greenberg and James Carville included Limbaugh’s name in an October poll and learned their longtime tormentor was deeply unpopular with many Americans, especially younger voters. Then the conservative talk-radio host emerged as an unapologetic critic of Barack Obama shortly before his inauguration, when even many Republicans were showering him with praise.

Soon it clicked: Democrats realized they could roll out a new GOP bogeyman for the post-Bush era by turning to an old one in Limbaugh, a polarizing figure since he rose to prominence in the 1990s.

Full story here.

I heard James Carville and Paul Begala both on CNN today discussing this issue, though at different times. I will try to find the clip of Begala on Anderson Cooper’s show, because I think it’s the most telling in terms of whether this is a coordinated effort by the White House to Limbaugh-ize the Republican Party.

Their demurs might carry more weight if this Politico story about the Rush Wars hadn’t closely followed—by about five weeks—another Politico story about the extraordinary cooperation, coordination and communication among James Carville, Paul Begala, ABC News Washington bureau chief George Stephanopoulos and ... White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. The gist of the story is that the four, who served together in the Clinton White House, talk on the phone EVERY morning ... even after almost 20 years. Emanuel called it “the 17-year-long conference call.“

Hmm ... whose polling firm was it again that inserted Limbaugh’s name into that favorability survey last year?

Oh, yeah ... Carville’s.

Coincidence? Well, look at it this way—you think that really never came up in any early morning phone calls?

You be the judge.

The bottom line is this: Of course it’s a coordinated effort. Carville all but said this afternoon that it’s a no-brainer for everyone involved: It’s good for the White House and the Democratic Party because public opinion of Limbaugh is so low. It’s good for Limbaugh because in entertainment, the only bad publicity is no publicity. And make no mistake—Limbaugh is an entertainer first, and a pundit second.

And it’s made for some good entertainment. Let’s face it—the idea of President Obama squaring off with Rush Limbaugh on the radio is just too much fun in theory to ever become reality.

But as Carville pointed out, the only people for whom this arrangement is bad are congressional Republicans. They are left between a Rush—I mean, a rock and a hard place: Either they side with Limbaugh, the guy who wants Obama to “fail,“ or they side with President Obama, the man whose economic policies so far have made federal government expansion and deficit spending under President George W. Bush pale in comparison.

In other words, either they adopt—as Limbaugh so humbly said in an e-mail to Politico—“conservatism, as articulated by me,“ or they abandon conservatism altogether.

Talk about your impossible choices.

This is a perfect place to mention the mock apology web site the DCCC set up in the wake of RNC Chairman Michael Steele’s mea culpa to El Rushbo earlier this week. (By the way, notice whose quote appears at the top of the mock apology site.) I actually think apologies are in order, but not the kind Steele delivered and Democrats mock.

Lawmakers owe the American public an apology for playing politics with public policy. Yes, it is a Pollyanna statement to make, but it is true. These men and women were sent to Washington from cities and towns and farmland and urban streets all across the country by men and women who count on them to represent their interests. They were not sent there by Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity or Glenn Beck or MoveOn.org, Daily Kos or George Soros. Those lawmakers owe those pundits and organizations absolutely and exactly nothing. They were personally selected by voters who took time from their workdays to go to the polls. Those voters did their civic duty. The least they can expect of their elected representatives is that they will put policy above partisanship and do theirs.

Pundits owe lawmakers and the American public an apology that with very few exceptions, they are hacks masquerading as analysts. When is the last time you heard someone identified as a “Republican strategist” laud a good idea advanced by Democrats? When is the last time you heard a “Democratic strategist” acknowledge a positive contribution from a GOP lawmaker? It happens so infrequently, I bet you don’t even remember the last time you heard it. As I said to someone this afternoon, if either party had the corner on all the answers, we would have solved America’s problems by now, because both parties have had simultaneous control of Congress and the White House at some point in the last 20 years. Guess what? They don’t. The reality is that neither side has all the answers, but each side has something valuable to offer. The consequence of our “we’re-right-and-they’re-wrong” approach to political analysis in this country is that pundits give “analysis” that is more keyed toward achieving or maintaining power, not toward finding common ground and crafting public policy with the best that each side has to offer.

Americans themselves owe their children an apology that because of the above, it’s much easier to ignore what’s going on in Washington and what we hear on the news than to engage and demand responsive, responsible governance from our leaders. We are disgusted with politics and politicians because of the antics, because of the mudslinging, because of the earmarks, because of the corruption. But the antics and mudslinging and earmarks and corruption become self-fulfilling prophecies, because they can only occur when voters are disengaged, disinterested and resigned to politics as usual.

Want some real “change” in government? Let’s start with this: Reject the two-party system. Reject the idea that effective representation can only come from someone with an R or a D behind their name. Reject analysis from anyone who argues that his side never errs, but the other side always does.

Want change? How about demanding honesty and accountability—both of our lawmakers and ourselves?