So I’m not surprised Rand Paul thought he could use the Rachael Maddow show on MSNBC to mine the liberal base for new voters. What he didn’t count on, is that libertarianism itself got a fair hearing. Paul had 18 minutes to answer Maddow’s question about the public accommodations clause of the civil rights act, and he couldn’t, because he knows Americans don’t like “letting the marketplace decide” people’s rights.

So now Paul and his lukewarm supporter Sarah Palin are trying to float the theory that Paul somehow got ambushed, even though that question had become a major problem for Paul in previous newspaper and radio interviews where he tried to make his case.

Blaming MSNBC is not an avenue available to a libertarian. As the conservative media group AIM pointed out, he chose to go on Maddow’s show, it’s a privately owned channel on a non-scarce distribution system, which its viewers watch as an act of free-market capitalism.

The free market doesn’t always work, but it worked this time. It pointed out what’s wrong with libertarianism as a 21st Century political philosophy. If Rand Paul were truly committed to his belief system, he’d be happy that it worked so well in practice.

He should ace the primary;  two of  his opponents are wildly underfunded and the third is self-funded candidate Jeff Greene, a billionaire who cleaned up betting against the housing market through credit default swaps. If that’s not enough, he’s a former Republican who ran for a San Fernando Valley, California congressional seat in the 1980s.

Kendrick Meek in Delray

Meek’s chances were never good; though Florida went for Obama in 2008, it was an uphill battle helped by a tanking economy that beat this red state blue. But things got a whole lot better when Republican hopeful and current Governor Charlie Crist turned independent, unable to out-teaparty his Republican challenger Marco Rubio. So its a three-way race.

Kendrick had good logic for his campaign plans. He’ll tar Crist with all the nutjob stuff he said when trying to out-conservative Rubio and then finish him off by calling him out as a affiliation-changing opportunist. His lack of name-recognition will be solved by non-stop campaigning and some aggressive advertising. With all the self-funded candidates, the tea-party independents, and the three way race, it should be a good year for Florida TV stations.

But Meek is not fast on his feet on the stump, especially in the Q and A. Obama raised the bar. The first three sentences after a question should be a direct answer, and that’s what Meek should be emulating. Asked a question about Defense of Marriage Act and Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, Meek meandered and never directly answered the question, when he easily could have. His mother (who represented his district before he did) voted against DOMA. He could have said, “We tried to stop this before it started, and the next best thing to do is repeal it.”

Instead, Meek emulated Joe Biden. He just talked, until his words led him into the canned “I’m a supporter of gay people” predigested spiel. That isn’t going to fly against a seasoned campaigner like newly-independent Crist, who helped Meek greatly when he went independent, but helped himself far more.

Right wing and/or religious leaders whose anti-gay rhetoric belie their own bisexuality has become a meme. Craig Ferguson based a bit on it in his opening monologue Wednesday: “If you’re really, really anti-gay…you’re probably gay.” The unfunny Jay Leno even got a laugh out of it. Jimmy Kimmel piled on. Stephen Colbert gave Rekers his Alpha Dog of the Week award, Jon Stewart mocked him using a piece from CNN.

But now that the laughing is dying down, we’re starting to explain how this scandal is different, and why it represents a turning point in the struggle for gay equality. The affair of Ted Haggard was most like that of Rekers; a pay for sex/companionship arrangement that went bad when the sexworker exposed him.

It differed because the escort initiated the expose, and because Haggard had steered clear of anti-gay rhetoric except for a sermon which was his karmic moment: If you don’t want to be caught doing something, he preached, you shouldn’t do it.

But the media and much of the public, LGBT and otherwise, turned on Haggard’s accuser too, and a plea to not repeat that mistake this time: “Let’s Not Chew This One Up and Spit Him Out” by Dan Savage is one of the best thoughtful overviews. As is Rachael Maddow’s piece on Friday, on why the Rekers story is newsworthy beyond the titillating.

Throughout the scandal, the blog Joe My God has provided the best overall coverage linking blogs and news sites that carried all facets of the story. He also did one of the best interviews with the escort, even though CNN had better access but did a poorer job.

Now, the morning after the week long party, there is a sadness expressed on twitter and in the comments on the hundreds of blog pieces that covered this. The more one studies the Rekers/escort relationship and Rekers testimony, the more profound the sadness becomes.

When a 20-year old boy explains that his john appears to not understand his own sexuality, and when that john bases his “expert” testimony in a gay-adoption case on the higher levels of suicide, substance abuse, depression and affective disorder in the LGBT community, the closed loop becomes obvious.

George Alan Rekers is a victim of the very belief system he perpetuates through the self-fulfilling prophesy of using statistics that demonstrate oppression to justify continued oppression. That is why the specific facts of this scandal have lasting value when those before it do not. It shows the so-called “experts” of the anti-gay right have far less understanding of the psychology of LGBT people than the escorts who carry their luggage.

Its unfortunate for the iced tea folks, and it may not be fair, but its a historic problem with marketing a product or creating a brand that has other meanings. Ask anyone who marketed anything as “gay” in the early 1960s.

Or Japp’s Potato Chips, which since 1927 were made by Leonard Japp’s company on the south side of Chicago; at least until Pearl Harbor where they were quickly rechristened as Jay’s.  William Katt’s character in the Greatest American Hero was to premiere as Ralph Hinkley, until John Hinkley took a shot at Ronald Reagan just before showtime. A lot of quick editing obscured his name.

Or the Chevy Nova, which did well in the United States, but failed miserably in Spanish-speaking countries where the phrase “no va” means “[it] doesn’t go.”

So when I have my choice of iced teas, I won’t be picking Arizona brand. Sorry Arizona Beverage. I know there’s no rational reason for it. I just suddenly don’t like the name. But when it comes to anything Arizona, “no rational reason for it,” is going to be a big problem for at least several months to come.

But a few years ago, the interviews suddenly got longer for us. We were still randomly traveling back and forth to Las Vegas (where we lived part-time), usually at night, in a late-model American car clearly in road-trip mode. We were still in our “one drives while the other sleeps” days; my partner typically drove that section (he likes to drive at night), and I slept under a blanket.

For the longest time, we couldn’t figure out what changed, until we realized we’d bought a new blanket at a truck stop that replaced the red old red cotton one we used to travel with. The new blanket was a Mexican serape blanket, which with my then-darker curly hair was just enough of a tripwire to warrant a few more questions.

The governor of Arizona assures us Senate Bill 1070, which she signed into law over the protest of the president of the United States and the government of Mexico, will not racially profile, and will not exacerbate racial tensions.

Governor Brewer said specifically that she sought changes to make sure racial profiling and discrimination would be not tolerated, saying “That effort led to new language in the bill, language prohibiting law enforcement officers from ‘solely considering race, color, or national origin in implementing the requirements of this section…’”

Since the law hopes to curtail the presence of people with certain legal statuses based primarily on national origin, this has got to be the best example of doublespeak since the writings of George Orwell. She goes on to say that her state will do nothing more than what the Federal Government should be doing, and she cites federal enforcement as a kind of gold standard. But the federal enforcement has hardly been profiling-free.

There’s a good chance Governor Brewer knows this: “We must acknowledge the truth – people across America are watching Arizona, seeing how we implement this law, ready to jump on even the slightest misstep,” she said at the signing ceremony.

Enforcement of immigration law based on visual observation of people officers come into random contact with is a lousy methodology, and its not going to scale well. There are a lot of arguments that can protect blockades on interstate highways that won’t fare so well when immigration status is thrust as an important factor into virtually every state/individual contact.

The enactment of the law itself is a misstep, and it won’t take long for the egregious examples to populate the blogs and websites and pepper traditional media. It won’t help that Arizona pleads that they’re taking their lead from the Federal Government.

Fact is, Federal enforcement has long been based on racial profiling, and if you don’t believe that, buy a serape.

It’s possible she is so completely out of touch with the acrimony of last week’s Health Care protests that she doesn’t understand how this kind of imagery makes her look like a demagogue. Or maybe she’s just a demagogue.

I’m picking the latter, because when even folks like Elizabeth Hasselbeck called her out for it, she chose to counter it with a tortured piece of writing on her Facebook page that tried to claim it was all just one big metaphor, which could just as easily be hoops talk.

While Palin gets props for trying to walk back the rhetoric by claiming its just taken out of context, the whole misdirection attempt has the “dog ate my homework” feel of a 10th grader.

Most 10th graders grow up, and if their thoughts wander back to their immature lies and deceptions, they’re embarrassed. That hasn’t happened yet to Ms. Palin, so we’ll have to collectively be embarrassed for her.

It would be like me trying to argue that my headline is a reference to Ms. Palin doing her hair. Even if I could convince you that was my intent, it would leave you wondering why I chose something so meaningless when I could have found a thousand better ways to make my point.

Tom Dixon was also present when political history was made. In the early campaigns of Richard Nixon (the “pink right down to her underwear” campaign against Helen Gahagan Douglas, for instance), he was Nixon’s announcer.

It wasn’t that he had a political affinity for Nixon (unlike Adolphe Menjou and others), he was chosen by the man who would later become the 37th president because he liked the sound of, “I’m Tom Dixon for Richard Nixon.”

I had the pleasure to talk with Mr. Dixon on the phone several years ago about that period. He shared that he came to dislike Nixon because of the way Nixon treated his wife, Pat. One time in a radio studio after a broadcast speech, he launched into a tirade humiliating her for no reason. Dixon traveled California with the campaign. He told me many stories with great wit and charm.

We’ve lost not only an important man in LA radio history, but a part of political history as well.

1. The Former Media Monopoly — This includes the New York Times and MSNBC. You’ll find their exemption under U.S.C §431(9)(B)(i). Their howling has included some great moments in hypocrisy.

   The New York Times (whom you’ll recall as the petitioner who claimed the first amendment rights of its corporation had been violated in New York Times v Sullivan) opined: “Most wrongheaded of all is its insistence that corporations are just like people and entitled to the same First Amendment rights.” Since this was an unsigned editorial, this is a corporation complaining that corporations shouldn’t have first amendment rights. Of course, they’re exempted.

   Keith “You Sir” Olbermann, in a special comment assailed the decision with the personhood argument. His comment is actually a work for hire, the property of a corporation and disseminated by it; but of course, they’re exempted. If they weren’t exempted, they’d  be first in line with an amicus brief for Citizens United.

2. Those in Under The Wire — In 2005, the chilling effects to first amendment speech was clearly seen by the blogosphere. The Internet isn’t even mentioned in the media exceptions of BCRA, but the blogosphere wound up almost entirely exempted by an administrative decision of the FEC. As such, the FEC under another board, could change its mind. If it had decided otherwise in 2005, bloggers would have fought for first-in-line position to deliver amicus briefs along with legacy media.
3. The Exempted Political Idea Industry — This howling appears the loudest to those of us on a myriad of political action lists. This is another monopoly seeing itself lose power. Their exemption came through their ability to navigate the complicated work-arounds that resulted in the lawyered-up’s ability to express political opinions on behalf of the people paying them to do so. They’re the middlemen now cut out because anybody can go to a media distributor and buy time, or go to a computer store and buy DVD blanks and fill them with political commentary.

Poltitical contribution laws were out of step with the way media is changing. It resulted in Citizens United not being able to spew a load of crap, while Fox News does essentially the same thing every day.

It causes folks like Margaret McIntyre to be fined a hundred dollars for expressing her speech, while the Swiftboaters get awards.

The politically protected pundits can’t seem to agree what the effects of this will be. Perhaps we’ll hear nothing but corporate shills morn ’til night, perhaps we won’t.

But one thing it will do is change the game in a big way, because this decision gave a lot of freedom to a lot of people, and took away a lot of monopolies from a privileged few and its been those privileged few responsible for most of the noise that’s being made.

This is first and foremost a first amendment question. You see that clearly in the amicus brief from the American Civil Liberties Union:

This case involves core political speech protected by the First Amendment, long recognized as a fundamental foundation of our democracy. Such core political speech enjoys the maximum possible protection under our Constitution. Yet a federal agency claims the legal authority to prohibit the broadcast of such core political speech. We submit that this Court should redouble its vigilance in protecting the fundamental freedom in this case so essential to our very democracy and self-governance, and our very nature as a free people.

It’s very possible, listening to Common Cause, that you wouldn’t even know the First Amendment is involved. If you joined their webchat expecting to hear the facts in the case addressed, you’d discover the words “First Amendment” never appeared in the discussion, though they did receive questions about it.

Here’s the problem:

U. S. C. §431(9)(B)(i)

The term “expenditure” does not include—

(i) any news story, commentary, or editorial distributed through the facilities of any broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication, unless such facilities are owned or controlled by any political party, political committee, or candidate;

Every single day, special interests spend a staggering $1.4 million lobbying Congress to shut down the President’s agenda for health care reform.

Certainly he could afford the $5 the president was asking for. In fact, he gave $10. But the next morning, he found the account he uses for web purchases overdrawn. The DNC had not only authorized $10 twice, they had authorized $500.00 as well. For three days, despite scores of phone calls, the transaction had neither been reversed nor had anyone at the DNC or Blue State Digital acknowledged the error.

Blue State Digital, founded in 2004 by four former Dean staffers, at first denied any involvement or responsibility. But the emails and the donation page point to them, so they finally resorted to the claim that their involvement was none of our business.

The DNC at first claimed donor error, then flatly denied that no more than one transaction took place. The bank produced documents complete with Terminal IDs, sequence numbers and switch timestamps proving the DNC in fact made four transactions, but refuses to remove the hold unless the DNC advises it in writing to do so.

Its the ultimate Catch-22, with all the trappings of the kind of government bureaucracy the right tries to scare up as a bogeyman to keep health care private.  “Do you trust the government,” they ask, “to provide your medical care?”

Late this afternoon, the DNC did apologize, and tried a new story. It was an address mismatch that caused the transactions to fail. That never stopped Blue State during the campaign, and there were lots of donations with the same exact data.

Nor could they explain how an address issue turned $10 into five hundred but they attempted, without success, to reverse the charges; the charges that yesterday didn’t exist.  Because of their previous denial, Ray’s now canceled the card and faxed a flurry of dispute documents back and forth to the bank.  The DNC is still trying to decide whether or not it requested and received an auth code. Their spokespeople don’t seem to know.

Ray thinks the government needs to guarantee every American health care, and there should at least be a public option. He’s spent a lot of time in verbal gunplay on Facebook with our insurance industry friends, but his powder is no longer dry.

In frustration he finally wrote the White House (the BlueState-served webpages hide out behind a link to www.whitehouse.gov). Its not easy to argue that a group of people can tackle something as difficult as multi-billion dollar health care when they can’t figure out why a $500 charge attempt got made for a $10 donation, and claim its none of your damn business when you inquire about it.