...will he ever win?

GOP Takes Aim at First Responders

DOWNLOADS: (112) PLAYS: (925) As Karoli and I already posted, Rep. Anthony Weiner ripped into the Republicans for blocking the 9-11 Responders Bill. What neither of us had earlier was Rep. Peter King's hackery on the House floor that set him off. Since Countdown covered it, I thought I'd share it here. TPM also caught their exchange on Fox News the day after the dust up on the House floor where Anthony Weiner ripped into Pete King again. Peter King And Anthony Weiner Shout Their Way Through A Fox News Interview (VIDEO): Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) went on an apoplectic rant on the House floor last night, and apparently he hasn't cooled off much since then. Earlier this morning, Weiner and Rep. Peter King (R-NY) shouted and finger-pointed their way through a Fox News interview over a bill that would provide health care to rescue workers effected by the dust from the World Trade Center, which failed in the House last night. King accused the Democrats of orchestrating a "cruel hoax" with the bill, while Weiner called it "outrageous" that Republicans would vote against it. Weiner was furious last night that most of the "cowardly" Republicans voted against the bill and then blamed it on "procedure." Exclaimed Weiner: "You vote yes if you believe yes! You vote in favor of something if you believe it's the right thing! If you believe it's the wrong thing, you vote no!" On America's Newsroom today, King, who is the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Homeland Security, said that "the bottom line is the Democrats control the House, and they pulled a procedural gimmick starting ten days ago, and they lost the nerve to bring it to the floor on a real vote." He also called the whole situation a "cruel hoax," and accused the Democrats of "moral cowardice." "They control the House," said King. "They could have passed this." Weiner shot back: "You know for all the whining about the process, we had an up-or-down vote. Do you know what percentage of Republicans voted for it? Seven percent." Only twelve Republicans voted in favor of the bill. "Your rant last night about the process and how bad the process was gave cover for your colleagues," said Weiner adding, "Twelve Peter? That's all you could muster?"

July 31, 2010 05:00 PM

Beck lies about Oakland cop sniper, claims innocence in inspiring shooter who targeted Tides Foundation

We knew Glenn Beck was going to deny any culpability for his role in inciting a right-wing nutcase named Byron Williams, who got into a shootout with Oakland police officers last week when they pulled him over en route to his planned attack on the San Francisco offices of the Tides Foundation and the ACLU. After all, Beck always cries, like his conservative cohorts, that eeeeevil libruls are just trying to "silence" him whenever he incites acts of violence. Personal responsibility? That's for liberals and black people, we guess. But his denial yesterday on his Fox News show went beyond mere cries of "bloody shirt!" -- though it contained that, too. What he attempted to do was claim some kind of equivalence and another Oakland incident involving shots fired at the police -- even though the claim is just nakedly false: The next thing is, they're painting people into terrorists -- painting people into dangers. Um, you know, we had a sniper in, um, Oakland, California, trying to kill police. At the same time we have another guy who appears to be against the Tides Foundation, uh, and he goes down and he's going to try to kill people at the Tides Foundation. I'm tied to the Tides Foundation in this story because, quote, how scary is this? We have searched all the television records and Glenn Beck is the only host that spoke about the Tides Foundation in the past year. That's terrifying. But I'm tied to that. But nobody's even talking about the sniper from the left trying to shoot the police officer. So where do you stand on violence? Let's parse this carefully, because it's important to understand just how deep Beck's mendacity is here. First, let's be clear that no one is "painting" Glenn Beck as a terrorist -- and there should be no question, frankly, that Byron Williams fully intended to be a terrorist. More significant, though, is the fact that there is no evidence whatsoever that the sniper case in Oakland involved any political motive at all. As you can see from the Oakland Tribune report, this appeared to be largely a case of someone who was angered by a police drug bust, or simply hated cops. That stands in direct contrast to the Williams case, which was unmistakably motivated by political hatred. We know that particularly because of the information from Williams' mother about his motives: She said her son, who had been a carpenter and a cabinetmaker before his imprisonment, was angry about his unemployment and about "what's happening to our country." Williams watched the news on television and was upset by "the way Congress was railroading through all these left-wing agenda items," his mother said. ... She said she then checked the locked safe where she kept her guns, all legally purchased and owned, and found that they were also missing. Janice Williams said she kept the guns because "eventually, I think we're going to be caught up in a revolution." But she said she had told her son many times that "he didn't have to be on the front lines." And how did Byron Williams come to choose the Tides Foundation as a target? What television show did he watch that made him think the Tides Foundation was an evil entity worthy of being shot up and terrorized. Well, as Beck openly admits -- and as Media Matters explains in detail -- there was only one show that did so -- Glenn Beck's. Moreover, Beck is being disingenuous in the extreme to describe his role in this as merely "talking about" the Tides Foundation -- he viciously (and groundlessly) demonized them as an organization intended to "destroy capitalism", a "Trojan horse" engaged in "indoctrinating children" and "warping your children's brains" with the idea that "capitalism is evil", the "nastiest of the nasty," a bunch of "far left radicals" who are "infiltrating" and "failing capitalism" so they can "destroy it." These are all utterly false and base smears, of course. But if you were a violent and gullible right-winger prone to anger, you probably would be inspired by this kin

July 31, 2010 04:00 PM

(CO-Sen) How Bennet got rich and teachers lost their pension fund

From a Quick Hit early this week by counterspin:

(CO-Sen) How Bennet got rich and teachers lost their pension fund (counterspin)
From Cherry Creek News:
A young Bud Fox leaves Washington for Colorado, lands a job with Gordon Gekko, tycoon and corporate raider. Only in this case, young Bud is future United States Senator Michael Bennet, and Gekko, billionaire Phil Anschutz.

The job leaves Bennet wealthy, and allows him to take a giant pay cut and work for Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, then the Denver Public Schools. It gives him financial experience, which in turn leads to a complicated interest rate swap that may leave Denver taxpayers in a billion dollar hole, as the fund for Denver teachers' retirement looks in need of an AIG-style bailout.

Ironically, the details of the source of Bennet's wealth are revealed largely in a lawsuit by Louisiana teachers, whose investment in theater chain Regal Cinemas went south after Bennet and Anshutz gained control of the company through the purchase of debt, forced other debtors and shareholder into taking losses, then sped off with $1.4 billion in cash, while jobs were lost...

Unelected Freshman Senator Michael Bennet was the 8th highest recipient of Wall Street cash in the current election cycle. ?As Denver School Superintendent, he entered into a swap deal that provided $3 million in fees to JP Morgan and is now $78 million underwater, forcing teacher layoffs. ?
In Congress, Bennet voted against mortgage cramdown, which would have provided bankruptcy protection and relief for homeowners. ?He also opposed a 15% cap on credit card interest rates. To cement his pro-Wall Street stance, the appointed politician stood against breaking up the banks. ?In a Roll Call article yesterday, he was described as having been born 'with a silver spoon in his mouth'.

An appointed senator who never ran for office before, but instead rose the ranks of corporate raidership under a notoriously anti-union mentor. It makes perfect sense... for a Republican!

The appointment of Bennet was just one of a flurry of such moves by which the Democratic Party moved sharply to the right after the 2008 elections--a move with absolutely no credible foundations.

Today, Bennet's appointment stands out as part of a multi-front assault on public teachers and public education, which is about as inimical to traditonal Democratic Party values as it's possible to be.

Things happened so rapidly after the 2008 election that most folks simply had no idea what to make of it--much less how to react.

That is no longer the case. The battle lines now are clear.

July 31, 2010 04:00 PM

Donklephant

ACLU: If you liked the Bush/Cheney Unitary Executive, you’ll love the Obama Unitary Executive.

This week the ACLU released a disturbing report documenting the permanent enshrinement of the Bush/Cheney definition of the Unitary Executive by the Obama administration. With the tacit acceptance of the Democratic Congress, the balance of power continues to shift heavily to the executive branch. While distressing, the report is unsurprising as it became clear in the first few weeks of the new administration that Obama’s campaign rhetoric of rolling back the Bush/Cheney power grab was just that – empty campaign rhetoric.

The ACLU report “Establishing a New Normal” is summarized here, and the full report linked here [PDF]. The report assesses the record of the first 18 months of the Obama administration across several civil rights categories and is well worth the read.

Excerpted here – a few ACLU report ~~highlights~~ lowlights:

TRANSPARENCY
“…the administration has fought to keep secret hundreds of records relating to the Bush administration’s rendition, detention, and interrogation policies. To take just a few of many possible examples, it has fought to keep secret a directive in which President Bush authorized the CIA to establish secret prisons overseas; the Combatant Status Review Transcripts in which former CIA prisoners describe the abuse they suffered in the CIA’s secret prisons… the administration has also fought to withhold information about prisoners held at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Indeed, the Obama administration has released less information about prisoners held at Bagram Air Base than the Bush administration released about prisoners held at Guantánamo.”

TORTURE AND ACCOUNTABILITY
“The truth is that the Obama administration has gradually become an obstacle to accountability for torture. It is not simply that, as discussed above, the administration has fought to keep secret some of the documents that would allow the public to better understand how the torture program was conceived, developed, and implemented. It has also sought to extinguish lawsuits brought by torture survivors—denying them recognition as victims, compensation for their injuries, and even the opportunity to present their cases.”

DETENTION
“Of far greater significance than the administration’s failure to meet its own one-year deadline is its embrace of the theory underlying the Guantánamo detention regime: that the Executive Branch can detain militarily—without charge or trial—terrorism suspects captured far from a conventional battlefield… we fear that if a precedent is established that terrorism suspects can be held without trial within the United States, this administration and future administrations will be tempted to bypass routinely the constitutional restraints of the criminal justice system in favor of indefinite military detention. This is a danger that far exceeds the disappointment of seeing the Guantánamo prison stay open past the one-year deadline. To be sure, Guantánamo should be closed, but not at the cost of enshrining the principle of indefinite detention in a global war without end.”

TARGETED KILLING
“President Obama has authorized a program that contemplates the killing of suspected terrorists—including U.S. citizens —located far away from zones of actual armed conflict. If accurately described, this program violates international law and, at least insofar as it affects U.S. citizens, it is also unconstitutional… the government has failed to prove the lawfulness of imprisoning individual Guantánamo detainees in some three quarters of the cases cases that have been reviewed by the federal courts thus far, even though the government had years to gather and analyze evidence for those cases and had itself determined that those prisoners were detainable. This experience should lead the administration—and all Americans—to reject out of hand a program that would invest the CIA or the U.S. military with the unchecked authority to impose an extrajudicial death sentence on U.S. citizens and others found far from any actual battlefield.”

MILITARY COMMISSIONS
“The administration’s embrace of military commission trials at Guantánamo, albeit with procedural improvements, has been a major disappointment. Instead of calling a permanent halt to the failed effort to create an entirely new court system for Guantánamo detainees, President Obama encouraged an effort to redraft the legislation creating the commissions and signed that bill into law… the existence of a second-class system of justice with a poor track record and no international legitimacy undermines the entire enterprise of prosecuting terrorism suspects. So long as the federal government can choose between two systems of justice, one of which (the federal criminal courts) is fair and legitimate, while the other (the military commissions) tips the scales in favor of the prosecution, both systems will be tainted…”

SPEECH AND SURVEILLANCE
“…over the last eighteen months, President Obama’s administration has defended the FISA Amendments Act in the same way that the last administration did so: by insisting that the statute is effectively immune from judicial review. Individuals can challenge the statute’s statute’s constitutionality, the administration has proposed, only if they can prove that their own communications were monitored under the statute; since the administration refuses to disclose whose communications have been monitored, the statute cannot be challenged at all. In some ways, the administration’s defense of the statute is as troubling as the statute itself. The Obama administration has been reluctant to yield any of the expansive surveillance powers claimed by the last administration. It has pushed for the reauthorization of some of the Patriot Act’s most problematic surveillance provisions.”

WATCH LISTS
“…rather than reform the watch lists the Obama administration has expanded their use and resisted the introduction of minimal due process safeguards to prevent abuse and protect civil liberties. The Obama administration has added thousands of names to the No Fly List, sweeping up many innocent individuals. As a result, U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents have been stranded abroad, unable to return to the United States. Others are unable to visit family on the opposite end of the country or abroad. Individuals on the list are not told why they are on the list and thus have no meaningful opportunity to object or to rebut the government’s allegations. The result is an unconstitutional scheme under which an individual’s right to travel and, in some cases, a citizen’s ability to return to the United States, is under the complete control of entirely unaccountable bureaucrats relying on secret evidence and using secret standards.”

CONCLUSION
“…if the Obama administration does not effect a fundamental break with the Bush administration’s policies on detention, accountability, and other issues, but instead creates a lasting legal architecture in support of those policies, then it will have ratified, rather than rejected, the dangerous notion that America is in a permanent state of emergency and that core liberties must be surrendered forever.”

It is easy to point to the hypocrisy of liberals and Democrats who railed with righteous indignation about the Bush/Cheney expansion of executive power, only to be complicit in the continuing erosion of our liberty now. Their deafening silence, kid-glove criticism, and/or rationalizations of the Obama administration’s continued expansion of executive power and consequent institutionalization of the Bush/Cheney Unitary Executive speaks volumes about their prioritizing partisanship over principles.

To be sure – there are principled voices on the left who have consistently and clearly pointed to this administration failure – notably Glenn Greenwald and Jane Hamsher among others:

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These voices are too few. The first two years of the Obama administration represent a badly squandered opportunity to undo the damage done by the previous administration.

Worse than the routine partisan hypocrisy by administration apologists, is the complete abrogation of constitutional checks, balances, and executive oversight responsibilities by our Senators and Representatives in Congress.

Fro example, what happened to the soaring rhetoric of Senator Patrick Leahy – who campaigned passionately and relentlessly for the restoration of constitutional Habeas Corpus protections in 2006?

SEN. PATRICK LEAHY: “It grieves me to think that three decades in this body that I stand here in the Senate, knowing that we’re thinking of doing this. It is so wrong. It is unconstitutional. It is un-American. It is designed to ensure the Bush-Cheney administration will never again be embarrassed by a United States Supreme Court decision reviewing its unlawful abuses of power. The Supreme Court said, ‘You abused your power.’ He said, ‘Ha, we’ll fix that. We have a rubber stamp, a rubber stamp, Congress, that will just set that aside and give us power that nobody, no king or anybody else set foot in this land, ever thought of having.” – Senator Patrick Leahy

In 2007 I again supported the Leahy follow-on effort to restore Habeas Corpus:

“The gutting of the Great Writ of Habeas Corpus is the most notable outstanding assault on civil liberties. Senators Leahy and Spector have just introduced legislation to restore the right without ambiguity and DWSUWF recommends signing the petition to support their efforts. “

If you click on the petition linked in this quote you’ll note the referenced campaign on the Leahy website no longer exits, replaced with a milquetoast request to send a letter to your senator requesting support. I guess it is just not as high a priority for Leahy if a Democrat has “power that nobody, no king or anybody else set foot in this land, ever thought of having.” I expect Democrats will not be as sanguine about the expanded and institutionalized power of the Obama Unitary Executive when and if a Mitt Romney or Sarah Palin steps behind the wheel of this supercharged presidential machine.

The ACLU report focuses on civil liberties, but the accelerating accretion of executive power over our economic liberties has been equally egregious. I won’t belabor the point in this post, but will simply point out the obvious. Regardless of what one thinks of the merits or politics of the legislation, it is beyond argument that Obamacare and Financial Regulation as passed, dramatically increase the power held by the executive branch. With these laws, Congress granted vast power to faceless bureaucrats in the executive branch with unfettered latitude to set industrial policy, create and enforce broad new regulations over the healthcare and financial industries.

Even beyond these laws, even when operating without a firm legal foundation, this administration has repeatedly demonstrated an eager willingness to push the the boundaries of presidential power.

You’d think, even allowing for partisanship, there would be enough institutional loyalty among our legislators to try to maintain some semblance of balance between the supposedly co-equal legislative and executive branches of government. It is simply not happening. In times of Single Party Rule (as we’ve had for eight of the last ten years) it is Party Über Alles, and the constitutional checks and balances envisioned by the founders between the executive and legislative branch just fade away. This was true with Republicans in 2000-2006, and it is true with Democrats now.

At the rate that the Senate and House have ceded power to the executive branch over the last decade, combined with the lap dog deference most legislators offer to an executive of the same party, the legislature might as well vote itself out of existence. Perhaps they could be functionally replaced by a Legolist e-mail listserv.

The only remaining restraint on executive power today is the judiciary. This is why I have supported and will continue to support Obama nominations to the Supreme Court. My fervent hope is that the new justices will help form a SCOTUS majority that will pull hard on the reigns of the executive branch, declare many of the Bush/Obama administration actions (civil and economic) unconstitutional, and restore some semblance of the rule of law.

Regardless of what you may think of the political leanings of ACLU, they are fighting the good fight for our constitutional protections in the courts and they are doing it regardless of the party in power. They deserve our support. Beyond the courts, the only other way to restrain the extraordinary economic overreach and fiscal irresponsibility of this executive branch is to vote Republican in 2010 and divide this government. Congress only seems to remember their executive oversight responsibilities when the president is not of the same party as the majority in Congress.

^{Cross posted from “Divided We Stand United We Fall“}

July 31, 2010 03:30 PM

FBI Was Probing Howard Zinn For Criticizing Them

I've always admired Howard Zinn, but it seems the radical historian wasn't all that popular with the FBI. Via Raw Story: On Friday, the FBI released a 243-page file on Zinn, who died in January at age 87. The release describes the historian as "radical." The documents show the bureau taking an active interest in Zinn since the late 1940s, when he was a student at New York University. The interest continued through the 1950s, as Zinn worked on his PhD at Columbia University. When the FBI again took an interest in Zinn in the 1960s, documents show the bureau evidently tried to have the historian fired from his job as professor at Boston University.In a document from the Boston FBI office (see PDF file here), an FBI "source," whose name was redacted from the publicly released documents, was quoted as being outraged over Zinn's comment at a protest that the US had become a "police state" and that prosecutions of Black Panther Party members were creating "political prisoners." The bureau's Boston office then indicated it wanted to help the source in his or her campaign to unseat Zinn. "[The] Boston [office] proposes under captioned program with Bureau permission to furnish [name redacted] with public source data regarding Zinn's numerous anti-war activities ... in an effort to back [redacted] efforts for his removal." The bureau's response to the request does not appear to have been included in the released documents.(Raw Story reporters will continue to mine through the documents for more details. If you want to help, you can view the FBI files here, here and here (PDF). Send us what you find to tips@rawstory.com.) The FBI notes that its investigations of Zinn -- three in total, over 25 years -- "ended in 1974, and no further investigation into Zinn or his activities was made by the FBI."Zinn had harsh words for the FBI during his academic career. In a paper published not long before his death, Zinn said the best thing the public could do to curb the FBI's powers was to "continue exposing them." Of the FBI, he said, "They don’t like social movements. They work for the establishment and the corporations and the politicos to keep things as they are. And they want to frighten and chill the people who are trying to change things. So the best defense against them and resistance against them is simply to keep on fighting back, to keep on exposing them."

July 31, 2010 03:00 PM

Gaurdian Afghanistan War video

UK Guardian film-maker and photographer Sean Smith has just spent five weeks in Afghanistan, first with a US helicopter ambulance crew, and then with the US marines. This video summarizes what he saw. The diary of his trip can be found here.

This is an open thread.

July 31, 2010 03:00 PM

Ben Nelson (D-NE) Will Oppose Kagan Nomination

I would very much like to school Ben Nelson on what his responsibility is with regard to Supreme Court nominations. Whether he likes it or not, Elena Kagan has no disqualifying factor that should cause him to oppose her. But in Upside-Down Contrarian SenatorLand, Senator Nelson is doing exactly that. From his official statement:

July 30, 2010 – Today, Nebraska’s Senator Ben Nelson issued this statement on the president’s nomination of Elena Kagan for the U.S. Supreme Court to fill the seat of retired Justice John Paul Stevens:

“As a member of the bipartisan ‘Gang of 14,’ I will follow our agreement that judicial nominees should be filibustered only under extraordinary circumstances. If a cloture vote is held on the nomination of Elena Kagan to the U.S. Supreme Court, I am prepared to vote for cloture and oppose a filibuster because, in my view, this nominee deserves an up or down vote in the Senate.

“However, I have heard concerns from Nebraskans regarding Ms. Kagan, and her lack of a judicial record makes it difficult for me to discount the concerns raised by Nebraskans, or to reach a level of comfort that these concerns are unfounded. Therefore, I will not vote to confirm Ms. Kagan’s nomination.”

Supreme Court nominations are not a question of "Nebraskans' concerns". They are not a popularity contest. This is why, by the way, Alito and Roberts slithered onto the court. Despite their politics, they had nothing in their history to disqualify them.

As far as judicial experience goes, once again Nelson labors under the false impression that a Supreme Court Justice must be disgorged from our Federal Court system -- an impression which is false, harmful, and gave us Alito and Roberts.

It's pretty pathetic when Arlen Specter, Republican-turned-Democrat, has a stronger record of supporting judicial nominees than Ben Nelson. Or unemployment insurance extensions. Or just about any other initiative that isn't Republican.

And hey, Nebraska? I don't really give two whits about your 'concerns'. You and your conservative pals gave us ... Roberts and Alito.

July 31, 2010 02:00 PM

Bad Hair Day

ASW™ Logo (Fixed)

So, yesterday I put up a Shorter ridiculing Steve Spruiell, a blogger at America’s Shittiest Website.™ Steve had gotten all pissy over at ASW™ about Krugman limiting the length of comments on his NYT blog in order to deal with an influx of cut-and-paste trolls.

The point of my post, in addition to taking a jab at Spruiell’s David Cassidy-ish 70s do, was that Spruiell wasn’t fast enough on the uptake to realize that he looked like a complete idiot and a total hypocrite accusing Krugman of censoring blog comments given that Spruiell was doing this from a blog which doesn’t even allow comments in the first place. Sir, have you no sense of irony?

Unable to comment on Spruiell’s post itself, and learning that Spruiell was a Twitterer, Milou (“Snowy” for you Francophobes) and I rushed over to Twitter and set up an account and twittered this to Steve:

Spruiell mulled for quite some time over my shameless reference to his passé teen idol coiffure and finally manned up enough to fire off this limp riposte:

Well, as we say over here, Steve, “Sadly, No!” The post wasn’t “entirely” devoted to your physical appearance. It was mostly devoted to the hilarity of your dissing Krugman about his comments policy from the safety of comment-free blog.

Now, as to the physical appearance business, I do readily admit that commenting on the physical appearance of some of your colleagues is part of our comedy schtick. And I’ll also admit that in the case of say, Jonah Goldberg, this is perhaps a bit unfair because, after all, Jonah didn’t get to pick his mother. But you, dude, you picked that haircut. Voluntarily. You marched straight into some suburban Hair Cuttery of your own free will and accord and said “Make me look like this” while pointing to the cover of an ancient issue of Tiger Beat.

Of course, you got me on the anonymity charge. But sometimes anonymity is a good thing, as your son, whom you shamelessly hold up as some kind of human shield in your Twitter profile pic, would probably say if he could.

(Pixelation added by the Sadly, No! Graphics Studio)

UPDATE:

July 31, 2010 01:19 PM

Elisabeth Hasselbeck Repeats Right Wing Talking Points on "Jobs Saved" -- Gets Taken to School by Obama

DOWNLOADS: (269) PLAYS: (2704) I wonder if Sean Hannity fed Elisabeth Hasselbeck her talking points before President Obama appeared on The View this week? Hasselbeck got taken to school over jobs saved and unemployment by the President in this segment. Hasselbeck: I want to get to something that’s really important to so many Americans. You had promised that the stimulus bill would cap unemployment at 8 percent. We’re at near 10 percent across the country, 12 percent in my home state of Rhode Island. We are in a state of chronic joblessness. Yet, and we heard in the beginning of the show as well, you claimed that there’s "saved jobs", something, a standard that’s not been used before by any administration. [Sigh] It’s frustrating to hear that saved jobs boasting, because it doesn’t feel that way to Americans when they don’t have jobs and they’re losing jobs. How can you continue and your administration continue saying you’re saving jobs when in fact people are losing jobs? Obama: Well, actually Elisabeth what’s happened is that we’ve gained private sector jobs for the last five months. So, we were losing jobs when I was sworn in, as I said 750,000 jobs per month. We’ve now gained jobs for five consecutive months in the private sector. You’re absolutely right that it’s not enough. And if you don’t have a job right now, the only answer you want to hear is "I’m hired". Hasselbeck: Right. Obama: So, the frustration that people have is entirely justified. Now, I have to tell you though, this isn’t just my standard, Elisabeth, or my administration’s standard. There was a report that came out by a couple of economists just today, including John McCain’s former economist, that said had we not taken the steps that we had took, you would have actually seen millions of more jobs lost and we would be in a Great Depression. So, I know that’s not satisfying and it’s not good enough. But... Hasselbeck: I think it’s the word ‘saved’ is what’s troubling people cause they don’t feel it. Obama: Well, it makes a difference though if your job is one of the one that was one of the ones that was saved. Someone needs to ask Hannity in a skirt if she's seen Steve Benen's monthly jobs chart if she thinks that nothing's been done to improve things since President Obama came into office. Most on the left would argue that not enough has been done and we had a reversal in the trend last month but we're definitely moving away from the bottomless pit Bush was taking us into.

July 31, 2010 01:00 PM

Chattie Cathies: hotter than July edition

Babble on, Babylon! We're watching you!

It's that time of week, once again, and the question of the hour is: "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who can spot the most blathering idiot of them all?"

It COULD be you! But only if you participate by entering your nomination in the comments below.

Last week's winner was sb's picture-perfect nomination of Politico's Kiki Ryan:

From Politico's "50 Scenemakers" list:

http://www.politico.com/news/s...

"Absence may or may not make the heart grow fonder, but blogger Andrew Breitbart says it definitely boosts his buzz.
"The secret sauce and the added value is the inadvertent mystery that is born from being absent from the scene," Breitbart told POLITICO, explaining why his moments on the D.C. social scene become events to remember. The conservative writer and personality lives on the West Coast - a fact that gives him a certain mystique among Washingtonians accustomed to seeing the same faces again and again.
Breitbart says his political opposite, Arianna Huffington, has the same edge.
"Arianna and I have a similar dynamic," he began. "We both live in L.A., so when we come to town on social business terms, we use it as a chance to finally get the face to face with the people you know through your BlackBerry. Then we go back to our lives." For him, that includes being a husband and a father of four children.
Still, it's more than rarity that makes Breitbart a party get. He's an ideal guest.
"Andrew's fun, provocative and obviously not afraid to speak his mind," Huffington said about her conservative counterpart.
Raptor Strategies President David Bass, a Washington-based friend of Breitbart's, echoed Huffington.
"He's dead-on and witty at the same time," said Bass.
That opinion may not be widely shared as a result of Breitbart's posting of an edited - and misleading - video of Agriculture Dept. official Shirley Sherrod this week. While Breitbart seemed to revel in the ensuing controversy - "I am public enemy No. 1" he proclaimed in an interview with POLITICO - even some of his conservative allies said he had crossed a line.
Breitbart is in D.C. only sporadically, but every year he reliably shows up at one party: Tammy Haddad's brunch on the weekend of the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner.
"I remember missing it [twice]," he said, "and having that sick sense of 'I can't believe that everybody is over there having fun and I'm not.'"
Editor's note: The item on Andrew Breitbart was written before this week's controversy over his posting of a video of Agriculture Dept. official Shirley Sherrod. It has been updated to reflect that controversy."

- Kiki Ryan

Rules on the flip.
The Rules:

(A) We're looking for inane blather that is blissfully indifferent to the actual facts of the matter being commented on. ?These are the "Chatty Cathy" Awards, not the "Archie Bunkers." ?Of course, this doesn't exclude wingnut punditry, it's just that cluelessness is what we're looking for, more than hatefulness. ?If you can find examples that combine both, though... I think you've got a real winner.

(B) You may nominate any pundit from the M$M-print, broadcast tv/radio or cable-or from any online extension or associated outfit. ?(If this really catches on for some reason, I may decided to break the awards into separate categories at some point.) Nominations should include the name of the person nominated (preferably in the subject line), the outlet and date, an exact quote of what they said or wrote, and a link to where it can be found-original, transcript, or first-hand report (such as Media Matters).

(D) People vote for each nomination by giving recommendations. ?There is no limit on how many recommendations you can give.

July 31, 2010 12:00 PM

Do you ever wonder how other countries see our 2012 presidential selection process?

Mike's Blog Roundup

MAL Contends: U.S. Army Clears War of Wrongdoing

Obsidian Wings: WTF? ANTI-Defamation League? Really? Really?

Left in the West:Tester, Baucus obstruct Senate reform

The Center for Public Integrity: Five of the nation’s largest health insurers are in serious discussions about creating a new nonprofit group and bankrolling it to the tune of about $20 million to influence tight congressional races and boost the image of their industry. Wonder who they'll support?

OurFuture: Where are the prosecutions? SEC lets Citi execs go free after $ 40 billion subprime lie

Danger Room: U.S ducks as cluster bomb ban takes effect

July 31, 2010 12:00 PM

Donklephant

I’ve come to the conclusion that the future of all mainstream media news is Taiwanese animation. This piece from NMA News in Taiwan explains our 2012 presidential election prelims to a Chinese audience.

What is truly frightening (or sad) – Without understanding one word of Chinese, I completely understand every single frame in this story.

July 31, 2010 05:45 AM

C&L's Late Night Music Club With Pavement

Open Thread

Gladys from Austin, TX is hilarious. Especially at about the four-minute mark. Open thread below.

July 31, 2010 03:30 AM

Title: Range LifeArtist: Pavement The longer I was on the road as a touring sideman, the more I began to understand what Pavement were talking about in this song off of 1994's Crooked Rain Crooked Rain. I don't think Billy Corgan was too happy when he heard this though.

July 31, 2010 03:00 AM

BP By Any Other Name - The Anglo-Iranian Oil Dispute - 1951

(The leopards attempt at changing spots) DOWNLOADS: 284 PLAYS: 284 When Iran, under Mohammed Mossadegh nationalized Iran's oil production in March of 1951, it put a crimp in the relations between Iran and Britain, who had enjoyed massive profits from drilling operations going back to 1909 and who, by 1950 had come to rely (as did the U.S.) on Middle East oil for 70% of its consumption (even back then). After a hotly contested dispute, which brought in the League of Nations to re-negotiate in 1933, Iran got slightly more of a percentage and by 1946 had negotiated to get 30% profits to Britain's 70%. After Mossadegh took over and nationalized Iran's oil production, Britain quickly attempted to negotiate a 50/50 split, but Mossadegh would have none of it. The dispute between Britain and Iran went on for two years. So on August 22, 1953, with the help of our very own CIA the Mossadegh government was overthrown and The Shah was reinstated. Shortly after, Britain and Iran were negotiating oil. And shortly after, The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company became British Petroleum. And the rest, as they say, is history. This clip comes from a CBS newscast of August 21, 1951 when the negotiations had broken down.

July 31, 2010 02:00 AM

Lindsey Graham Leaps into Wingnut Land, Wants to Repeal Part of the 14th Amendment

DOWNLOADS: (320) PLAYS: (614) Looks like Lindsey Graham is worried about appeasing the nativists in his wingnut base. On Greta Van Susteren's show the other night he announced he might introduce a bill that would change the law granting citizenship to children of immigrants born in the United States. As Steve Benen noted: ...as far as much of the media is concerned, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is a reasonable, pragmatic Republican, with whom Democrats should have no trouble finding common ground. He's proving once again here he doesn't deserve that label. Lawmakers Consider Ending Citizenship for Children of Illegal Immigrants: Lawmakers since last year have been kicking around a proposal to bar U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants from becoming U.S. citizens. Such a move, which has been ridiculed by legal scholars, would be a drastic reinterpretation of the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment. But those supporting the move say it removes a key incentive luring illegal immigrants over the border. And with Arizona lawmakers now prohibited from requiring police to check immigration status, the option might be back on the table. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told Fox News after the Arizona ruling came down that "birthright citizenship" needs to be changed. "I'm a practical guy, but when you go forward I don't want 20 million more (illegal immigrants) 20 years from now," he said. "Let's have a system that doesn't reward people for cheating." Though other lawmakers have called for a change in U.S. or state law, Graham said he might introduce a constitutional amendment. "We should change our Constitution and say if you come here illegally and you have a child, that child's automatically not a citizen," he said Wednesday. "They come here to drop a child -- it's called 'drop and leave.' ... That attracts people here for all the wrong reasons." As Steve also noted, Jamelle Bouie at the American Prospect did a very good job of pointing out just how extreme Graham's position is -- What Ever Happened to the Maverick of South Carolina?: Of course, we should be careful not to confuse independence with moderation. Yes, Graham has been willing to work with Democrats, but he's consistently brought a conservative approach to the issues. And when working on his own, he doesn't hesitate to champion conservative causes. For instance, Graham isn't too fond of children born to illegal immigrants in the United States -- "anchor babies," as the right-wing describes them. Indeed, Graham is so incensed by this that he wants to amend the Constitution to end it. [...] It's genuinely difficult to overstate the radicalism necessary to seek a transformation of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was designed to ensure that slavery could never again happen in the United States and is now integral to keeping the United States free of a permanent underclass of immigrant workers. At its core, birthright citizenship gives immigrants a reason to stay and provide lasting contributions to the United States. In assaulting birthright citizenship, Graham is attacking an incredibly important part of the American social contract. If the media has any sense, this should kill the narrative that Lindsey Graham is a maverick or a reasonable Republican. Even the Fox article pointed out that this is not likely to happen and how crass this political game being played by the right wing is. The amendment process is drawn out, and success is almost always unlikely -- it would take a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress as well as ratification by three-fourths of the states. That's 38 states. Michael Wildes, an immigration lawyer and former federal prosecutor, called the push "pie in the sky" no matter how lawmakers go about it. He said any law altering the 14th amendment would never survive a court challenge and questioned the intent. "It's spiteful," he said. "These are U.S. citizens. ... They're babies that by the grace of God were born in one country instead of another.

July 31, 2010 01:00 AM

The Wikileaks Watusi

Shorter John Hayward, AKA Doctor Zero, AKA Jim Treacher Stand-In, The DC Trawler
Undocumented Brutality

If only modern democracies tortured, disappeared and extra-judicially executed leakers of classified information, then we’d be WAY better than despotic torture states!

‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard. We are aware of all Internet traditions.™

July 31, 2010 12:04 AM

Shorter Charles Krauthammer

Iran starts feeling heat

Whoa, whoa... I'm starting to get a funny feeling in my pants... I haven't felt this way since 2003... what could it be? Oh God! OOOOHHH GOD, YES!!! WE MIGHT HAVE ANOTHER WAR!!!! YESYESYES!!!! OOOOOOOHHHHH GOD!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!
*pant, pant*

So, Iran, was that as good for you as it was for me?

'Shorter' concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard. We are aware of all Internet traditions.™ Graphics and postscript shamelessly pilfered from my pals at Sadly, No!

July 31, 2010 12:00 AM

The Daily Show

Recap - Week of 7/26/10

Jon shows off his new wife and family and reminisces about tooling around the West Village on Liev Schreiber's motorcycle.

July 31, 2010 12:00 AM

Recap - Week of 7/26/10

Jon shows off his new wife and family and reminisces about tooling around the West Village on Liev Schreiber's motorcycle.

July 31, 2010 12:00 AM

July 30, 2010

"Worst Week in Washington" winner: Zoe Lofgren!

As Rep. Charlie Rangel continues to twist in the ethical wind, we named Rep. Zoe Logren, the California Democrat tasked with conducting the trial into alleged wrongdoings by the New York Congressman, as our "Worst Week in Washington" winner. We write in the dead-tree edition of the Post: "Like a narc (the Fix loved "21 Jump Street" back in the day) or a hall monitor, sometimes doing your job makes you the least popular kid in school. For the foreseeable future -- or until Rangel cuts a deal, thus ending the prospect of a congressional trial -- that role will be played by Lofgren." Thanks to everyone for their submissions. And, if your pick didn't win this week, there's always next week! Check out our past "Worst Week in Washington" winners here.

Washington - California - Democratic - Zoe Lofgren - New York City

July 30, 2010 11:30 PM

Self-funders on the rise in Florida

By Felicia Sonmez Unlike other large states, Florida does not have a long history of wealthy candidates successfully self-funding their pursuits for political office but this cycle may change that. Billionaire real estate developer Jeff Greene (D) and former health care executive Rick Scott (R) have surged to leads in their respective Senate and gubernatorial primaries, according to a new Quinnipiac poll. Both Greene and Scott entered their respective races at the 11th hour and have been propelled themselves to frontrunner status against more established politicians due to their willingness to spend of their own personal fortunes and voters more willing than in years past to consider candidates with unconventional resumes. (Greene has spent about $6 million, while Scott has spent a staggering $22 million). What's surprising about the rises of both Scott and Greene is not only how quickly they came about but that no one like them (ie,

Florida - Jeff Greene - Primary election - Rick Scott - United States Senate

July 30, 2010 10:26 PM

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July 30, 2010 10:26 PM

Slacktivist: Why Every Attorney General Should Sue Credit-Rating Agencies

Fred Clark of Slacktivist writes one of those blogs that I just love. He's smart, compassionate and very, very perceptive. This piece on the credit report industry is timely -- go read the rest: Kevin Drum makes a helpful comparison between your credit history and your medical history: In the same way that medical records are available only to people with a legitimate medical need, I think that credit records should be available only to those who actually extend credit. Beyond that, they're private. Employers don't get them, the FBI doesn't get them, journalists don't get them and my neighborhood association doesn't get them. I don't care how much each of these people really, reallythinks it would be handy to have a peek at them. Short of a subpoena or a court order, my financial records are my business. You can't have them.... The credit reporting agencies [have] been placed in a privileged position where they're allowed to collect sensitive private information — just as doctors and banks and census takers are. That privileged position means they have a heightened responsibility for maintaining privacy, not a license to use their databases for anything that can make them an extra buck or two. I think that's exactly right.It also seems to be exactly the opposite of the current relationship between citizens and credit reporting agencies. Right now, the credit reporting agencies are permitted to collect and evaluate sensitive private information about anyone and everyone. (Although, again, "evaluate" may be too elevated a term for the crude reductionist number-crunching of their secret "scoring" formulas.) Almost no information about you and your money and how it is spent is off-limits to them. They are further permitted to sell this information to anyone to whom they wish to sell it, repackaging and marketing your private financial information for sale to insurance companies, your boss or your prospective employer. Fred goes on to describe the carelessness with which those agencies treat your information, and why protecting consumers from the consequences is a political winner: There are at the moment Democratic attorneys general in 31 states. Of those, I'm guessing, about 31 are hoping some day to be governors or senators. Advocating for their constituents against the costly and predatory negligence of credit-reporting agencies seems like a promising step toward fulfilling such ambitions. (I forget who it was who first observed that some seek power in order to enact policies while others seek policies in order to attain power, but I think this should appeal to those in either category.) The Federal Trade Commission estimates that about 9 million Americans are victims of identity theft every year, so it's a safe bet that each of these AGs (or A's G) has thousands of constituents whose credit histories are scarred by such theft and who are therefore being forced to pay premium rates for everything from mortgages to consumer loans to insurance and utilities. Some of these constituents may have been denied employment or promotion on the basis of these lucratively inaccurate and uncorrected credit scores. These costs are real and therefore they can be measured and quantified and added up into a single Very Large Dollar Amount -- the amount that constituents have been inaccurately and unfairly overcharged due to the negligence and irresponsibility of others. That VLDA is the basis for the class-action lawsuits that these attorneys general ought to be filing on behalf of their constituents. Whether or not such lawsuits can succeed in achieving restitution for the millions of citizens who have paid dearly for the carelessness of the credit-reporting agencies, the lawsuits ought to be able to achieve at least a bit more of what is desperately needed and sorely lacking in the current system: accountability and transparency. Without transparency and accountability, the power that credit agencies have will be abused and expanded and exte

July 30, 2010 10:00 PM

Civil rights groups top mounting wave of criticism for Obama's education "reforms"

It's been one helluva week on the education front, and I'm sure Jeff will have plenty to say in his Left Ed column this Sunday (new time, for those not paying quite enough attention: 1 PM, EST). It began on Monday, when Jeff noted in a quick hit that a coalition of civil rights groups had issued a document critical of Obama's education policies. Although there would be a somewhat confusing walk-back of criticism afterwards--particularly as Arne Duncan and President Obama both addressed the Urban League--it seems clear that the cat's out of the bag, and it's going to be a whole lot harder going forward for Obama and Duncan to pretend there aren't problems. On Wednesday, data was released showing in the reform showcase NYC schools, the racial and ethnic achievement has shot back up to 2002 levels. Links to a number of related stories can be found here, including one by Democracy Now! co-host Juan Gonzales. And speaking of Democracy Now!, today its first half-hour was devoted to a renewed look at Obama's initiative and the mounting criticisms. To start things off, here's what Jeff wrote on Monday:

From Valerie Strauss at WaPo:
"a 17-page framework for education reform being released Monday by a coalition of civil rights groups amounts to a thrashing of President Obama's education policies and it offers a prescription for how to set things right"

Excerpts from the report highlighted by Strauss . . .
on Race to the Top:
"By emphasizing competitive incentives in this economic climate, the majority of low-income and minority students will be left behind and, as a result, the United States will be left behind as a global leader."

on charter schools:
"while some charter schools can and do work for some students, they are not a universal solution for systemic change for all students, especially those with the highest needs."

on so-called reform:
""Rather than addressing inequitable access to research-proven methodologies like high-quality early childhood education and a stable supply of experienced, highly effective teachers, recent education reform proposals have favored "stop gap" quick fixes that may look new on the surface but offer no real long-term strategy for effective systemic change."

Right on!

An update to the blog post that Jeff linked to explained the first shift of the week:

Now we know why civil rights leaders suddenly cancelled today's press conference at which they were going to talk about their new powerful framework for education reform, which includes a withering critique of the Obama administration's education policies.
They met instead with Education Secretary Arne Duncan.
Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., head of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, said in an interview that he and other leaders felt that meeting with Duncan to discuss policy differences was "a better use of our time" than holding a public press conference.
Considering that most press conferences are a waste of time, Jackson makes a point.
But in this case, the postponement -- or, perhaps, cancellation -- left the impression among some that the civil rights leaders chose not to publicly criticize President Obama's education policies any more than the framework already does.

Later, on Wednesday, Edweek coverage of Duncan's speech began:

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan defended the Obama administration's education reform agenda before the National Urban League today, declaring that some of the arguments being made to justify a new framework that several civil rights groups released on Monday were flat out wrong.
The Urban League, which joined at least six other civil rights groups in calling for Duncan to reverse course on Race to the Top, charter schools, and turnaround models for low-performing schools, welcomed him with open arms. They interrupted his 30-minute speech several times with applause. Hugh B. Price, the former president of the Urban League, even called the Obama-Duncan education agenda the "most muscular federal education policy I've ever seen," adding, "We've got your back."
This is a fairly dramatic about-face from the run-up to Monday's release of the highly critical framework, which was supposed to be unleashed with a public relations boom-complete with a press conference featuring prominent black leaders such as the Revs. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson calling for a new education direction. Instead, the whole thing fizzled, and left this blogger puzzled as to how strongly the groups still support their own framework.

After reporting on more confusion, particularly on the part of Al Sharpton, the account continued:

In answer to the group's call that he forgo competitions like Race to the Top and concentrate on increasing spending on all students, Duncan said: "Some people say that grant programs like Race to the Top are bad for low-income and minority students. ... But the fact is, Race to the Top has done more to dismantle the barriers to education reform ... than any federal law in history."
He said those who think the Education Department isn't investing heavily in formula programs, too, are either "intentionally misleading or profoundly misinformed."
And to answer their charge that he back off from his enthusiasm for charter schools, Duncan said: "Should we stifle the growth of high-quality public charter schools? ... Absolutely not. Tens of thousands of minority parents are on waiting lists for these schools. ... To suggest that charters are bad for low-income and minority students is absolutely wrong."

Readers of Open Left know very well who is "intentionally misleading or profoundly misinformed." And it's highly doubtful that this sort of empty bluster will prove successful over the long haul.

The Edweek report on Obama's speech began:

President Barack Obama offered a forceful defense today of his signature education initiative, the $4.35 billion Race to the Top program, which rewards states for making progress on raising standards, improving teacher quality, establishing data systems, and turning around low-performing schools.
The program-and Mr. Obama's prescription for turning around those low-performing schools-has come under sharp criticism lately from civil rights groups, who say distributing funds through competitive grants hinders poor and minority students, whose schools may not have the resources to compete for the dollars. His speech to the National Urban League this morning offered a rebuttal to such criticism and echoed much of what U.S. Secretary Arne Duncan said to the same group yesterday.
Mr. Obama argued that the steps that Race to the Top encourages states to take, including lifting the cap on charter schools and using student data to inform teacher evaluation, are the right ones.
"None of this should be controversial. There should be a fuss if we weren't doing these things," Mr. Obama said.

In an end-of-the-week roundup, Valerie Strauss wrote:

It's a little hard to make sense of what happened this week in the world of education, but, let's give it a fast try:
*President Obama gave a speech to the Urban League convention in which he joked about the Jersey Shore's Snooki and also said the following: "Now, over the past 18 months ... I think the single most important thing we've done is to launch an initiative called Race to the Top."
Yes, that's what he said: His terribly misguided $4.35 billion competitive grant program is, apparently, more important than health care reform, the economic recovery program, improving the student loan program, increasing Pell Grant payouts, and, well, anything else he has accomplished since becoming president.
Does he read this stuff carefully before he says it?

Yes, folks, I'm not the only one who talks like this by this point in time. The incoherence is getting to be positively Bushian.

She continues:

*The administration did its best to mute the power of a scathing critique of Obama's education policies issued by a coalition of civil rights organizations, who also offered presciptive ways out of the mess.
According to several sources involved in the drama, the "Framework for Providing All Students an Opportunity to Learn" was actually ready to be released about a month ago, but the administration has been holding meetings with civil rights leaders in an effort to ease the criticism.
A decision was made to finally release it on Monday, the same week as the Urban League convention, and a press conference was scheduled for leaders of the groups to discuss it publicly. The groups were: Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Rainbow PUSH Coalition, Schott Foundation for Public Education, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, National Coalition for Educating Black Children, National Urban League, and the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.
But pressure from the administration -- including, apparently, a threat that Obama would not speak, as scheduled, to the convention -- prompted the cancellation of the press conference and a hastily scheduled meeting between the civil rights leaders and Education Secretary Arne Duncan on Monday.
That became news in our education world, along with a few statements released by some of the civil rights groups that talked about working cooperatively with Duncan.
What was missed in the coverage is that none of the civil rights leaders walked away from the powerful framework, except, that is, Rev. Al Sharpton, who was expected to sign onto the framework, but then didn't at the last minute.

So, Obama intimidated his black critics, but only in the short run. (Sharpton is actually more of a booster when it comes to charter schools.) Forget what does or doesn't want to do. It's increasingly hard to see how this "no carrot, all stick" approach to his one-time base can be a winning strategy over any sort of long run. More and more I'm beginning to think that a primary challenge really could emerge. And it doesn't have to come anywhere close to winning in order to fatally wound the President. Two dates for him to look up: 1952 and 1968.

Finally, from Democracy Now!

JUAN GONZALEZ: .... In his address, Obama said his plan for education is working, but he acknowledged it has come under criticism.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: But I think the single most important thing we've done is to launch an initiative called Race to the Top. We said-we said to states, if you are committed to outstanding teaching, to successful schools, to higher standards, to better assessments, if you're committed to excellence for all children, you will be eligible for a grant to help you attain that goal. And so far the results have been promising, and they have been powerful.

I know there's also been some controversy about Race to the Top. Part of it, I believe, reflects a general resistance to change. We get comfortable with the status quo, even when the status quo isn't good. We make excuses for why things have to be the way they are. And when you try to shake things up, some people aren't happy.

That sounded pretty damn clueless, arrogant and out of touch to me. Downright Bushian, like I said before. One Edweek commentator put it this way:

I watched on TV President Obama's speech before the Urban League. As much as I still admire him, his defense of Arne Duncan and RttT was hard for me to take.
His dismisses legitimate concerns about his administration's agenda as resistance to change or defense of the status quo. He is so insultingly wrong. Critics of RttT want to improve education just as much or more as he and the tycoons who pull Duncan's strings.

Finally, here's an extended comment from Diane Ravitch on Democracy Now!

AMY GOODMAN: .... Let's begin with you, Diane Ravitch. Your response to President Obama's major address yesterday on education?
DIANE RAVITCH: Well, I think that what happened in New York City is-shows that the direction he's taking is wrong, because everything he is proposing in Race to the Top and also in his blueprint will rely on exactly the kinds of methods that led to a massive fraud in New York state-that is, that Race to the Top is requiring states to judge teachers by the student test scores, and we now know, based on this immense fraud in the city and in the state of New York, that the test scores are not reliable. So teachers will be judged by unreliable data, and we're going to dismantle the teaching profession in pursuit of this mechanical fix that won't work.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, Diane Ravitch, one of the reasons President Obama gave that particular speech was that he's coming under increasing fire even from civil rights organizations who are questioning not only the emphasis on testing, but the push for more and more charter schools regardless of the quality of those schools. And your sense of how the ground is shifting around the country, among parent groups, among civil rights groups, around the whole issue of school reform?
DIANE RAVITCH: Well, you know, I think this week, in the last week of July of 2010, turns out to be a pretty momentous week. First of all, six civil rights groups came together and issued a joint statement that blasted Race to the Top and also the blueprint, the Obama blueprint, because he is building-although he doesn't admit it, he's building his education agenda right on top of the Bush education agenda, which is to test and punish, to close schools, to evaluate teachers in ways that are unfair and unsound from a research point of view, to increase the number of privately managed charter schools. All this is going to be immensely destabilizing, and it's going to hit hardest on minority communities, because most of the schools that will be identified as the lowest-performing schools will be in poor Hispanic and black communities. And there will be massive-excuse me, massive destabilization. This is not good. And the civil rights groups recognize this.
There was a second report out that came out this week from a group of community-from an organization of community groups from across the country, echoing the same complaints: we don't want more community schools, we don't want more charter schools, we want better public schools-help our public schools get better, not by more testing, not by more charters, but by sensible approaches like more pre-kindergarten, smaller class size, more support for the people who are teaching in those schools-commonsense approaches, which this administration seems to be avoiding and looking for the quick fix that George Bush pursued and that Mayor Bloomberg pursued, and it didn't work. So I think there are immense implications here.
And we also saw in the Congress where Congressman Obey tried to strip money away from Race to the Top, away from merit pay and away from charter schools. And the administration's response was, "Don't take money from Race to the Top. Take it away from food stamps." And Joel Klein said to take it away from Title I. These are all programs that benefit the neediest families in our society, and there were prepared to harm people who are in need of help in order to preserve the President's favorite program.
So I think that the implications of this week, with the test score explosion, the blowup of the fraud in New York City, and these two grassroots groups saying, "This is not working, and take a more commonsense approach, and stop this destructive test and measurement and punishment approach," this is big, because up 'til now everybody seems to have gone along with the rhetoric of President Obama. But you have to separate his rhetoric, which is always very elegant, from what his administration is actually doing, which is just more Bush, more No Child Left Behind.

What we're seeing is still well below the radar of the braindead Versailles media. But the push-back against Obama's Bush-lite agenda is clearly growing at an ever-increasing rate, and things came to a sort of head this week. With the mid-terms looming, there's no telling what the short-term dynamic is going to be. But it seems virtually certain that opposition is only going to grow stronger and stronger.

Just like with Afghanistan, tweaking a fundamentally flawed policy that the Democratic base despises is simly not a viable strategy. And the more you think about it, the more you just have doubt whether Obama is really anywhere near ready for the office he now holds. He's a great campaigner, there's no doubting that. But when it comes to governing, he just doesn't seem to get it.

July 30, 2010 09:15 PM

Wingnuttery Debunk: Shirley Sherrod, Bill Ayers, and the New Black Panthers?

When Glenn Beck speaks, a little more truth dies. In usual right-wing echo chamber fashion, they just can't let go of Shirley Sherrod. They're milking her story so dry the cows are screaming.

The latest accusations, which I have seen repeated verbatim on the Illinois Review and the Washington Examiner so far, and which appear to be from a press release sent out for posting across all conservative blogs in an effort to game the Google, are nearly unintelligible. But I'll try. (h/t BillieGirlToo)

Oh noes! Shirley Sherrod's group, New Communities, was involved in the Pigford lawsuit against the USDA

Oh, seriously. They were, that's true. And who better to hire to actually make reparations than the person who actually understood the damages?

From the press release:

... Over the years, USDA refused to provide loans for farming or irrigation and would not allow New Communities to restructure its loans. Gradually, the group had to fight just to hold on to the land and finally had to wind down operations.

... The cash (settlement) award acknowledges racial discrimination on the part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the years 1981-85. ... New Communities is due to receive approximately $13 million ($8,247,560 for loss of land and $4,241,602 for loss of income; plus $150,000 each to Shirley and Charles for pain and suffering). There may also be an unspecified amount in forgiveness of debt. This is the largest award so far in the minority farmers law suit (Pigford vs Vilsack).

This particular round of crazy asks a series of questions that are irrelevant, not particularly interesting, and attempt to suggest that hiring her was the USDA's effort to "shut her up", and she was summarily fired so as to cover up the dastardly news that she was involved in the Pigford suit.

This question really takes the cake, though:

Given that New Communities wound down its operations so long ago (it appears that this occurred sometime during the late 1980s), what is really being done with that $13 million in settlement money?

Oh wow, wingnuts! She must have STOLEN IT. RIGHT?

The release then goes on to suggest that the USDA might be worried about possible waste, fraud and abuse (you know, that bill the Republicans all voted AGAINST?).

Step back, think. If a court-ordered settlement is to be made from the government to people who were wronged, how is that waste, fraud or abuse? It's only in the minds of the crazy folks like Breitbart, who is desperately trying to intimidate Sherrod out of suing him, as far as I can tell.

Meanwhile, over at the Illinois Review...

Writer Teri O'Brien manages to conflate the New Black Panthers, William Ayers, AND the Pigford case, citing the strength of character and discernment in Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck.

Somewhat breathlessly, Ms. O'Brien heaves forth the knowledge that Sherrod's husband...

...was a former honcho in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee back in the 1960’s. You can read more about it in Bill Ayers book “Fugitive Days.” Yes, that Bill Ayers. He was involved in SNCC as well.

Now see? That's how you take an apple and an orange and make it into a prune. You find out about a group, link up 'scary guy' Bill Ayers without any corresponding direct link between the two or between the SNCC and the Weather Underground and all of a sudden it's a story! Who needs journalists when we've got Breitbart and his merry minions to keep us stupid?

Media Matters has a thorough debunking of this story and all of the companion versions here.

Here's a newsflash for conservatives: Shirley Sherrod is not going to be your tea party wedge issue for August. You don't have health care reform to kick around anymore and your conduct in Congress should earn you a one-way ticket home. It might be time to quit milking dead stories and get on with life on the Planet Earth. Planet Teabag can't be reached by normal humans yet.

For a palate cleanser after this tripe, I highly recommend Joan Walsh's essay on the Shame of Right Wing Journalism, and especially, this brilliant essay from her about the wrong lessons of the Sherrod story.

July 30, 2010 09:00 PM

Pam Atlas Secret Muslim Shocker!

BREAKING — MUST CREDIT SADLY, NO!

Everybody knows that Pamela Geller is one of the bravest voices against Islamic jihad that we have. Blogging as ‘Pam Atlas’, the Long Island-based spitfire has for years defended Israel, America and freedom-loving people everywhere from the ululating hordes of deepest, evilest Islamistan.

It’s common knowledge, right? Not so fast.

First, some background. It goes without saying that anybody who has been as vocal in denouncing radical Islam as Pam has been over the years will necessarily have a fatwa, or Muslim call for assassination, placed on them. See Salman Rushdie for the positive proof of this fact, Barack Obama for the negative.

And lo and behold, Pam also has had a ‘fatwa’ placed on her — this very day, as it so happens. If we are to believe this development, as John Jay puts it:

If you think this threat is aimed just as [sic] Pamela Geller you simply do not understand the dimension of the problem. This death threat is aimed at all of you, and Islam means to impose this threat on all who do not submit to its dictates.

And if you think this threat is just a single, dumb-ass tweet by some asshole who finally rose to the bait after years of provocation from Geller, you also need to just shut up.

But what if there is more to all of this than just garden-variety fatwa-ing? How is it that Pamela Geller managed to stay fatwa-free for so very, very long in the first place? And how is it that she was conveniently fatwa’d just when questions were being raised in certain circles about the implausibility of her years-long fatwa-less run as a supposed she-man muslim hater?

These questions do not prove that Pamela Geller is secretly in cahoots with al-Qaeda to establish a New Global Caliphate stretching from Rangoon to Greater Teaneck, N.J. What these questions do do is raise questions. Questions like these:

- Was the real Pamela Geller replaced at birth by a deep sleeper agent of the Islamic Brotherhood so that her unsuspecting parents would raise her as an almost stereotypical JAP — the last person anyone would suspect of secretly preparing the world for sharia law?

- Was Pamela Geller recently seen secretly praying to Mecca five times a day for the last 40+ years and reciting the Hadith Qudsi in perfect Classical Arabic in accordance with the Ibn ‘Amir ad-Dimashqi school of Qira’at — suggesting a Yemeni origin for the ‘Pamela Geller’ sleeper agent that has been fomenting jihad in our midst lo these many years?

- Given that Muslims are forbidden to drink alcohol, does ‘Pamela Geller’ appear grossly intoxicated so often in order to throw off would-be discovers of her jihadist secret?

- Was ‘Pamela Geller’s’ very public split with erstwhile anti-Muslim ally Charles Johnson an elaborate charade? Is Johnson himself under a secret, time-delayed fatwa that will only go into effect if he reveals that he discovered that ‘Geller’ is in fact a deep-cover agent of global jihad?

- Did Geller’s — widely suspected — multiple plastic surgeries include anti-aging treatments that hide the fact that as a 35-year-old woman, she conspired with Malcolm X in the early 1960s to help him impregnate dozens of unsuspecting co-eds in the hopes of producing the ultimate prize — an eventual Black Muslim president in the first decade of the 21st century — as part of an Arab League-funded social engineering project codenamed Operation Horsecock Kill Infidels?

We do not claim to know with full certainty the answer to this question: ‘Is Pamela Geller really a female clone of Carlos the Jackal who was hidden in plain sight in our Judeo-Christian country in order to undermine reasonable arguments against radical Islamic practices by saying ridiculously stupid and insane shit all the time?’

But the answer is yes.

July 30, 2010 08:33 PM

AFL/CIO's Rich Trumka Speaks Out For the Strengthen Social Security Coalition

Rich Trumka, the current president of the AFL/CIO, has been fighting to protect Social Security for a very long time. (Take a look at this video from 1994, when he asks, "Where is the crisis?" and points out that Social Security is the target of "draconian" proposals while it was in surplus.) He is one of a very few voices standing up for working people in this country, and here's the speech he made this week at the National Press Club for the press conference announcing the Strengthen Social Security coalition: Good morning. Working people around the country know the value of Social Security, and the Labor Movement has long been one of its staunchest supporters. The American Federation of Labor was there in 1935, advocating for passage of the Social Security Act. In the decades following, the AFL-CIO played a lead role in designing the evolving Social Security system -- supporting efforts to strengthen and broaden the program, and opposing weakening of its protections. During the last Administration, we were key to defeating privatization. In a misplaced effort to reduce the deficit, Social Security is under attack again --this time by proposals to raise the retirement age. And the right wing spin machine has convinced many Americans that Social Security won’t be there for them, anyway. Working America, the community affiliate of the AFL-CIO, goes door to door every night talking to thousands of people a week. What they hear is that working families -- including young people -- are deeply worried about their retirement security. They are hearing that their Social Security benefits may be cut --- and they don’t see how they can possibly make up the difference. At a time when retirement is less secure for working Americans than it has been in many generations, only Social Security remains a defined and stable retirement benefit -- not to mention the important family protections it provides when a worker is injured or dies. Unions know exactly what is happening to retirement income in this country because we see it at the bargaining table. Fewer traditional pensions. More riskier 401(k) plans -- not a great benefit for workers with stagnant incomes who find it difficult or impossible to save. Now is the time, to strengthen, not weaken, Social Security. Raising the eligibility age for a full Social Security benefit would be disastrous for millions of Americans. It is a benefit cut, plain and simple. It is a cut that is unnecessary and one that Americans can ill-afford. For those born in 1960 or later, the retirement age for a full Social Security benefit is now 67, rather than 65. These younger workers have already been hit with a 13 percent benefit cut -- and some now want to impose another cut on top of that. A 62-year old worker who would receive $800 a month if the retirement age for a full benefit were 65, will get only $700 a month when that retirement age becomes 67. Further increasing the retirement age for a full benefit to 69 (and some are even saying 70) means another 13% cut in benefits -- for a total benefit cut of more than 25% for anyone who is now 50 or younger. That probably includes many of you in this room. An age increase is a particular hardship for workers in physically demanding jobs who don’t qualify for disability -- workers like my father who spent his life in the mines and couldn’t work another day by the time he qualified for Social Security -- and those older workers who may no longer be able to find work due to age discrimination. I know that America can do better than this. And that’s why the AFL-CIO, as part of a broad campaign, is mobilizing to protect Social Security. I look forward to working with our many coalition partners to create a secure retirement for our baby boomers, our children, and grandchildren. Thank you.

July 30, 2010 08:00 PM

The sensible center outraged by the "sensible center"

As I've said before, Brad DeLong is well to the right of me politically. Matt Miller, too. (Miller used to hold down the "center" in KCRW's "Left, Right and Center" back in the mid-90s when Arianna Huffington represented the "Right", before the "Left" Robert Scher completed the work begun by Al Franken... ah, but I digress....) Point is, Miller can actively participate in some pretty intense, creative, and ultimately mind-changing debates, and still not think anything terribly novel or surprising.

But what's now being done by Obama and his appointees in the name of "sensible centrism" is about to give poor Matt a heart attack. This is yet another, highly significant data point in the argument that Obama is not only not a progressive, but not even centrist or "third way" neoliberal as they were once understood. Of course, I would argue that the "third way" never actually had any sort of firm foundations, and so sharp rightward slippage under Obama is not really all that surprising.

But even without deep, firm intellectual foundations, it's possible to maintain some sort of pragmatic sense of direction, meaning and purpose. It's called "muddling through" and in some ways it's a very admirable tradition. But now--per Brad--it's at wit's end:

It Always Looked Like Alan Simpson Was a Mistake to Co-Chair a Deficit-Reduction Commission. Now It Looks Like Erskine Bowles Was an Even Bigger Mistake
Numerology is not a science. And there is no reason to think that 21% is a particularly auspicious number.
Matt Miller--like me, part of the sensible, technocratic bipartisan center--looks at what is coming out of the Obama deficit-reduction commission, and is as horrified as I am:
A spending goal too small for aging America: I don't want to overreact. I'd hate to prematurely diss President Obama's National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, which held its fourth public meeting Wednesday. But the commission's Democratic co-chair, Erskine Bowles, may have already blown it.... Bowles suggested that the long-term goal the commission should adopt for federal spending should be 21 percent of gross domestic product. This sounds like a bookkeeping matter. But... federal spending under Ronald Reagan averaged 22 percent of GDP. Under Bowles's view, therefore, the outer limits of the Democratic Party's 21st-century aspirations would be to run government at a size smaller than did a 20th-century conservative icon. What's more, Reagan ran government at this size at a time when 76 million baby boomers weren't about to hit their rocking chairs. In 1988, 32 million retirees received Social Security and 33 million were on Medicare, our two biggest domestic programs. By 2020, about 48 million elderly Americans will receive Social Security, and 62 million Americans will be on Medicare (then the numbers really soar).... [Total] health costs in the Reagan era were around 10 percent of GDP, while they're now 17 percent, headed toward 20. Obviously we need a national crusade to make health-care delivery more efficient. But until there's progress on this front, the 21 percent goal would be tantamount to Democrats agreeing that Uncle Sam should handle health care, pensions, defense and little else....

Bottom line: There isn't anything remotely sensible about any of this. And even sensible centrists are starting to notice that it's not just a here-and-there problem--it's utterly central to the new "third way" project under Obama.

I repeat my claim: The aim here is for an American version of the conservative welfare state, one whose overarching objective is to serves elites. 21% is more than enough to do that, provided nothing is "wasted" on anyone else.

July 30, 2010 07:30 PM

Colorado provides primary fireworks a-plenty

Colorado is single-handedly keeping political junkies from falling into the typical August doldrums with a trio of fascinating intraparty fights. The most compelling -- in the sense that a slow-motion political car crash can be described as compelling -- is the Colorado Republican primary for governor. Former Rep. Scott McInnis' campaign has been hamstrung by plagiarism allegations but, despite a number of his staffers jumping ship, he is refusing to leave the race. Which might be just as well given that the other GOP candidate -- Dan Maes -- has had to contend with campaign finance violations. Add former Rep. Tom Tancredo, who is running as a third party candidate this fall, and you have what amounts to a political soap opera. The two Senate primaries in Colorado are slightly less dramatic but are interesting nonetheless. On the Republican side, Weld County prosecutor Ken Buck's comments about Lt. Gov. Jane

Tom Tancredo - Colorado - Republican - Scott McInnis - Primary election

July 30, 2010 07:24 PM

MSNBC Does a Re-Do on Matthews Defending Breitbart and Saying He Didn't Edit the Sherrod Tape

DOWNLOADS: (325) PLAYS: (1599) This has to be one of the most bizarre things I've seen in a long time. Chris Matthews has Howard Dean and Joan Walsh on to discuss the Shirley Sherrod debacle and what Andrew Breitbart did to slime her and the Obama administration's response and when both Walsh and Dean point out to Matthews that despite his assertions to the contrary, Breitbart's video was highly edited, Matthews goes ballistic on them and claims that the nearly hour long video wasn't edited because Breitbart included this bit. Sherrod: That's when it was revealed to me that's it's about poor versus those who have. It's not so much about white... it is about white and black but it's not, you know... it opened my eyes. Because I took him to one of his own. Apparently in Tweety's mind, Breitbart including that somehow absolved him from the editing of the tape he did. The more Walsh and Dean tried to point out to Matthews that the tape was edited and that what he was saying wasn't true, the more agitated he got. Digby was kind enough to transcribe some of this nonsense for us and I've got a couple of theories for why Matthews acted the way he did. Her transcript along with what MSNBC aired in place of this along with part two of the segment they apparently didn't want anyone to watch below the fold. Here's part two of the segment from Hardball. DOWNLOADS: (30) PLAYS: (382) From Digby's place here's some of the transcript that I'm sure we won't see on MSNBC's site since the video isn't there either... Chris Matthews Is An idiot Part XXVII: Dean: I'm not a lawyer Chris, but there are two things about this first of all he cut off the tape he didn't show the whole story.... Matthew: He didn't? What did he cut out? Dean: No, he cut off the stuff about the redemption part Matthews: I thought that was in there Dean: No it was not on the tape that was aired on Fox News Mattews: yes it was Dean: It was not on what Fox news reported on their blog Joan Walsh: It was not on the Brietbart ... Matthews: Of course it was on Breitbart. He didn't edit it. Not that I know about. Joan Walsh: Chris, Chris. He did. He says he didn't edit it ... Matthews: Well he didn't edit it. What did he edit? Walsh: it's a 43 minute tape I'm sorry Governor Dean, you can do this ... Dean: No go ahead Joan Walsh: It's a 43 minute tape Chris. It walks through her whole racial history. He clipped about three minutes where she seems to be saying I didn't do my best for this white farmer because he was white. And that's where it ends. And then later Chris she goes on to tell this amazing ... Matthews: oh I thought that in the tape that he did put out that it did include that part in it. What he did that mischaracterized it was to suggest that it was in current time in her role as a federal official, not back when she was in the cooperative. Dean: No, he did that too Walsh: He did that too. There were two lies but he absolutely clipped, or someone clipped the tape before she could say that powerful message of redemption that Democrats believe in. Matthews: I am right and you're wrong. Do we have the tape that we can show this because I'm believe is this guys narration is the problem where he said that this is something that goes on in this administration and it suggested heavily that this was her point of view as an appointee of this administration... Dean: he did that but he also clipped the tape... Matthews: No it includes in the tape that she changed Walsh: No it doesn't Chris you have to trust me and the Governor on this.... it's not in the tape that Breitbart put out. Matthews: Yes it is! Yes it is! I've got to wonder if Tweety was pissed at the Obama administration for lumping in all cable news and his show with Fox and was going to put the blame on them for how they looked at this edited tape and then Walsh and Dean stepped all over his narrative for the segment and he lashed out, or if he just had someone on his staff tell him that he looked like an idiot for def

July 30, 2010 07:00 PM

The character assissination of Shirley Sherrod and its Whitewater media scandal roots

Gene Lyons at Salon ("Media fooled by right-wing propaganda -- again") and Eric Altermann at the Nation ("Journalism's Age of Shame") both make a simple point regarding the now-exposed Andrew Breitbart against former USDA official Shirley Sherrod. Lyon's subhead says it all: "Reporters and editors are too scared of the 'liberal media' label to fact-check the right." And Altermann's lede paragraph says much the same:

The black political art of "working the refs" with constant and vociferous complaints of "liberal bias" in the media has a long and distinguished history. Few of its practitioners, however, have succeeded so frequently-and nakedly-as the ex-Drudge drudge and Arianna acolyte Andrew Breitbart. The estimable E.J. Dionne terms Breitbart to be the MSM's virtual "assignment editor" and, indeed, it's hard not to be impressed. Breitbart has already been exposed as a provocateur who cares not a whit for honesty or accuracy in his self-declared war on all things liberal. Yet reporters, editors and producers remain so frightened by his accusations that they continue to trumpet them as they search their souls to purge themselves of the bias that prevented them from seeing the world from a Tea Party point of view.

The failure is so blatant and obvious that no one can possibly believe that the press as it is today will ever cure itself of this terminal illness. Nothing internal to the system will do. It is the power structure that is at fault. It's not a matter of writing or editing, or anything like that. It's a matter of ownership, groupthink, and brainwashing.

Lyons' takes an interesting tack, going back to the media scandal he knows best--Whitewater--having covered it on the ground, as well as writing a book on it, Fools For Scandal: How the Media Invented Whitewater and co-writing a second, The Hunting of the President: The Ten-Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton with Joe Conason. Lyon's writes:

I go back a long way on these politicized hoaxes. Courtesy of the Clinton administration, Arkansas journalists got an early introduction into the creepy methods of conservative political operatives and their ability to hoodwink the national press. The local version of the Shirley Sherrod story was an equally admirable public servant named Beverly Bassett Schaffer.
As long ago as 1992, Schaffer found herself implicitly accused of "Whitewater" corruption in the New York Times. Although she'd provided the reporter with documented evidence that she'd done everything in her power as Arkansas savings-and-loan regulator to close Jim McDougal's Madison Guaranty S&L years before federal regulators got around to it, once the Times committed its prestige to a bogus narrative there was no turning back. Schaffer soon found herself hounded through the streets of Fayetteville by "mainstream" TV crews with GOP oppo researchers openly riding shotgun.
Most surprising to me then was the national media's pack behavior. Even incontestable, dispositive facts could be ignored for years if it meant keeping the longest political shaggy-dog story in recent American history going. It wasn't that reporters were stupid, mainly cowardly and career-driven. Indeed, they always understood precisely which facts couldn't be admitted into the narrative if they wanted to keep feeding out of Kenneth Starr's hand. By the time Schaffer's vindication came, they'd lost interest in her.

While the parallel between Sherrod and Schaffer is compelling, what's even more informative is a wide-angled view of how the New York Times and the Washington Post basically created the "Whitewater" scandal. Oh, of course, they didn't originate it--it originated with Clinton's rightwing enemies. But those enemies could not have created the media scandal over a non-existent financial scandal, which in turn provided the scaffolding for Clinton's eventual impeachment--and, of course, the media's "revenge" on Al Gore for not playing along with them, which in turn brought us the unelected President G.W. Bush. For that, they needed the Post and the Times to do their dirty work for them. It takes a whole book for Lyon's to tell the story, but a key episode encapsulates the entire thing, so far as practical and moral lessons are concerned, and that is how the Post and the Times ignored the 1995 Pillsbury Report, clearing the Clintons of any wrongdoing. The report was commissioned by the Resolution Trust Corporation, and by all rights it should have halted the Whitewater investigation dead in its tracks. But because it totally contradicted their own scandal-monger, the Post and the Times chose to bury the report--a key turn of events in condemning American to more than decade-long nightmare.
Lyon's first told this story in Fools for Scandal, and repeated it in The Hunding of the President. The most expeditious way I can retell it now is to quote from a Daily Howler column from 2000, discussing a hacktackular NYT review of the latter book by Neil Lewis:

This book, like Lyons' Fools for Scandal, makes remarkable assertions about the mainstream press corps-assertions which are never mentioned, not one word, in the course of the Lewis review.
And some of these assertions involve Lewis' paper-its handling of the Pillsbury Report, let us say. L & C begin that discussion with an overview of the report:
CONASON AND LYONS (page 199): A moment of truth intruded in the midst of D'Amato's hearings on December 13, 1995 with the release of the second volume of the Resolution Trust Corporation's $3.6 million Pillsbury Report...[T]he San Francisco law firm of Pillsbury, Madison & Sutro was obligated to deliver its conclusions about the Clintons and Whitewater by December 31.

The RTC had commissioned the firm to investigate and report on the Whitewater matter. The authors describe the report's contents:
CONASON AND LYONS (page 199): The firm's findings could hardly have been more favorable to the White House. Based on the Clintons' sworn interrogatories, interviews with forty-five other witnesses, and some two hundred thousand documents, the report concluded that the president and first lady had told the truth about their Whitewater investment: The Clintons were passive investors who were misled about the actual status of the project by Jim McDougal from the start. The report failed to challenge their account on a single substantive point.

The writers quote from the text of the report:
CONASON AND LYONS (page 199): The Pillsbury Report found no evidence that Whitewater's losses had been subsidized by taxpayers in the savings and loan bailout. But even if they were, it concluded, the Clintons were not at fault: "There is no basis to assert that the Clintons knew anything of substance about the McDougals' advances to Whitewater, the source of the funds used to make those advances, or the sources of the funds used to make payments on the bank debt..."

The recitation of the report's text continued. The Clintons had no primary, secondary or derivative liability for misdeeds in the case, the report said. "There is evidence that the McDougals and others may have engaged in intentional misconduct." But "on the evidentiary record," the Pillsbury Report said, there was no sign that the Clintons were liable for that conduct.
Most American adults have never heard of the Pillsbury Report; have no idea what it pertained to or said; and would surely be surprised, more than four years later, to learn of its detailed findings. Lyons and Conason explain why the report is unknown; the press corps buried the info. Are Lyons and Conason mixed-up or delusional? If not, they have quite a story. Here is what their book says:
CONASON AND LYONS (page 200): On December 18, the Wall Street Journal ran a straight, clear summary of [the report's] findings, written by Viveca Novak and Ellen Joan Pollock. But other newspapers with a substantial investment in Whitewater virtually buried news of its contents. The Washington Post stuck a brief mention of the report's existence into a story devoted to the battle over William Kennedy's notes. The New York Times waited until Christmas Eve, then hid Stephen Labaton's perfunctory summary on page 12.

And what did Labaton say in his summary? Conason and Lyons
limn it:
CONASON AND LYONS (page 200): Judging by [Labaton's] dismissive tone, no reader could imagine that the Pillsbury Report answered every one of the accusatory rhetorical questions the Times had urged the president and first lady to come clean about for years. Labaton's story ignored the passages pointedly exonerating the ClintonsFor the great majority of the Washington press corps, and thus for their national audience, the Pillsbury Report and the facts and conclusions its authors had painstakingly assembled didn't exist.

Are Lyons and Conason deranged? Incompetent? If not, this is just one of the astonishing episodes contained in The Hunting of the President. (The episode takes up just two pages of a 373-page book.) For the record, this may be one of those familiar-old-stories about which the recumbent Peter Jay bitterly complained, because the burying of the Pillsbury Report also was described in Fools for Scandal, in substantial detail-in 1996! And how did the New York Times explain its odd coverage of the Pillsbury Report, back when Fools for Scandal first described it? What has the press corps come to believe about the report since that time? The answers: The Times didn't explain its conduct at all, and the press corps sent the Pillsbury Report down the memory hole, and never came to any conclusions about a report which it never discussed. In 1996, the Washington Post didn't review Fools for Scandal-didn't acknowledge the book at all-and the Times review scolded Lyons for his rude ideas, without citing a single example, not one, of errors in the books' actual presentations (see THE DAILY HOWLER, 9/1/99). Along with everything else in Fools for Scandal, Lyons' remarkable
account of the Pillsbury Report was completely ignored by the press-swept aside. So it goes when the national discourse is in the hands of a group like our press corps.

I quote this at length because it shows how deeply embedded and invested in the rightwing worldview both the Times and the Post were all the way back in 1995, before there even was such a thing as Fox News. That is to say, there is nothing new about the character assassination of Shirley Sherrod, or the hegemonic structures involved in representing her as her own exact opposite.

The only thing new here is the growing power that you and I and millions others like us have in supporting her in fighting back.

July 30, 2010 06:30 PM

Goldman bars employees from accurately describing its products

Here's your daily Wall Street-related laugh -- after getting busted for knowingly selling self-described "sh*tty deals" to clients, Goldman Sachs has now decided that it must stop employees from using naughty words in company emails:

The New York company is telling employees that they will no longer be able to get away with profanity in electronic messages. That means all 34,000 traders, investment bankers and other Goldman employees must restrain themselves from using a vast vocabulary of oft-used dirty words on Wall Street, including the six-letter expletive that came back to haunt the company at a Senate hearing in April.

"[B]oy, that timberwo[l]f was one s— deal," Thomas Montag, who helped run Goldman's securities business, wrote in a June 2007 email that was repeatedly referred to at the hearing.

Mr. Montag, who couldn't be reached for comment, wouldn't be allowed to send that email under Goldman's sanitized communications policy, which is being enforced by screening software. Even swear words spelled with asterisks are out.

Oh, now where's the fun in that! How can get an accurate picture of the Real Wall Street works if traders aren't allowed to email each other messages such as "LOL OMG I CANT BELIEVE THE DUMB-A** C***S***ER BOUGHT THAT S****Y M*****F***ING DEAL I CAN'T WAIT 2 SHORT THAT B***H ROFL!!!!1!"

Man, it's hard out here for a pimp these days. Continuing:

A Goldman spokeswoman said: "Of course we have policies about the use of appropriate language and we are always looking for ways to ensure that they are enforced."

"We always tell our f***ing traders not to mouth the f**k off about the s****y deals they make over email," he added. "That sort of talk must be reserved for company restrooms only."

The new edict—delivered verbally, of course—has left some employees wondering if the rule also applies to shorthand for expletives such as "WTF" or legitimate terms that sound similar to curses.

Traders are now banned from writing things like, "OMFG THAT MF HAS NO IDEA WTF IS ABOUT 2 HAPPEN LMAO! I PURCHASED CDS ON THOSE POS SECURITIES FIVE MINUTES AFTER HE BOUGHT THEM FROM ME -- NOW WHEN HE BLOWS UP I WILL BE EFFING RICH LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!!!"

This new Goldman policy is a classic example of what we professional philosophers call "Missing the damn point." No one is taking offense at the fact that they used four-letter words in company emails. The offensive thing is that they allegedly designed collateralized debt obligations filled with crappy mortgages and then sold them to unwitting clients and then shorting securities in the CDOs through credit default swaps.

This sort of behavior, needless to say, is much more offensive than using the s-word over and over again in emails.

July 30, 2010 06:00 PM

First Day in Steelers Camp - a Craig Wolfley Blog Post

July 30, 2010 Posted By - Frank Murgia Source Credits - Craig Wolfley --- Well here it is. The first day of the Pittsburgh Steelers training camp. First days are always interesting, whether it be like in the past, when Tunch Ilkin picked me up at my house and got stung by a bee, only to have his eye swell up like the "Elephant Man" which looked hilarious in his helmet (and quite painful too).

July 30, 2010 05:42 PM

Republicans to 9/11 Responders: Die, and Die Quickly

DOWNLOADS: (360) PLAYS: (3803) (h/t Heather) This clip of Anthony Weiner going ballistic on the House floor is one for the ages -- it should be watched again and again and again, and not only because he was angry and frustrated, but because he spoke a truth that all of us expect from our representatives. It's really quite simple: "If you believe that it's right, you vote yes. You don't hide behind procedure and give cover to your pals." It's really that simple, but here's the backstory. The House has been trying to re-open the 9/11 Victims Compensation Fund through 2031 for 9/11 responders whose health has been affected. When it became apparent that the Republicans were going to attach "poison pill" amendments to the bill that had nothing to do with 9/11 and everything to do with their political agenda, Democrats shut down the possibility of amending the bill by moving it to the suspension calendar, where a minimum 2/3rds vote is needed for it to pass. Republicans applied the same old talking points, calling it a "massive new entitlement program". Actually, that's not quite right. They called it a "massive job-killing new entitlement program", because that's the Frank Luntz mantra of the week. (I was monitoring the Senate at the same time, and somehow the Small Business Jobs bill also became another "massive job-killing new entitlement program.") Of course, that's nonsense too, given that it had been structured to be paid for by closing a tax loophole for foreign corporations. If you believe it's right, you vote yes. Republicans, for all their breast-pounding and glory-singing about patriotism, wouldn't know a patriot if it came up and bashed them between the eyes. Instead of standing for those people who gave no thought to their own safety but rushed forward to search for and rescue possible survivors of the attack, they defeated the measure. Because it took a 2/3rds vote to pass without any amendments attached, most of the Republican caucus stood firm, and it went down 255-159, short of the 276 votes needed to pass. There's only one reasonable conclusion to draw: Republicans don't believe it's right to care for 9/11 responders. They think it would be better for those responders to have to go to court, evidently because they might die before receiving a settlement to help them with their health problems. The ten minutes leading into Rep. Weiner's rant give a sense of how cynical these people truly are. As the time for the vote neared and it was clear the bill might not pass, Speaker Nancy Pelosi came to the floor to exhort everyone to do the right thing: The American people are looking to us to do the right thing for the men and women who answered the call of duty and continue to suffer from ill health effects on their service. It is my understanding that the people affected by this live in 433 of the 435 congressional districts, because people not only rushed in from New York and surrounding areas, they came and brought their expertise and their help from all over the country. And therefore, the consequences of their bravery are felt all over the country and the impact on their health is an important part of the challenge that they face and that we owe them for. This legislation fulfills our obligation to those Americans. And then Rep. Peter King (R-NY) stood and proved how craven Republicans really are: What we are doing tonight is a cruel hoax and a charade. Everyone knows this bill won't get the 2/3 majority required on the suspension calendar and everyone also knows that this bill would pass with a clear majority if the Democrat leadership would allow it to come to the floor under the regular procedures of the House. The reason HR 847 is not being brought up under regular order is the majority party is petrified of having its members face a potential vote on illegal immigration. You can blame the Republicans, and I've been strongly critical of the Republican position on this issue but the reality is, you could pass this

July 30, 2010 05:00 PM

Serious question

Does anyone here think that working to stop GOP from destroying the filibuster in 2005 was still a good idea?

Wasn't that a mistake? Shouldn't we have helped them instead?

Discuss.

Taking the bait: OK, fine, I'll bit at BTD's latest diatribe against me:

Chris Bowers asks "Does anyone here think that working to stop GOP from destroying the filibuster in 2005 was still a good idea?"
The first problem with this question is that the GOP did not try to destroy the filibuster - they tried to destroy the judicial filibuster, arguing that it violated the Constitution. They would not have touched the legislative filibuster.

Point! Which many have noted in the comments.

However:

The second problem with this question is Bowers not imagining what a GOP President and GOP Congress would have achieved with the elimination of the filibuster. You thought the actual Bush tax cuts were bad? They would be TWICE as bad without the filibuster.

Um, no. Both the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts under Bush were passed using budget reconciliation, not under normal order. In 2001, the final vote was 58-33. In 2003, the vote was 51-50, with Dick Cheney casting the tiebreaking.

Given that both of his major tax packages had 51 votes, hard to see how they would have been twice as bad if they only needed 51 votes.

Conservatives can get tax cuts through budget reconciliation without the filibuster. They can gut regulations by appointing regulators who refuse to enforce the regulations. Further, Dems didn't block any significant number of judges after the Gang of 14 compromise. They didn't even come close to stopping Alito or Roberts.

If the 60-vote threshold is done away with, there will undoubtedly be conservative legislation and nominations that will pass the Senate which otherwise would not have passed. But, that's democracy. And, on balance I do believe progressives will get the better end of the bargain.

July 30, 2010 05:00 PM

Ronnie Wood Coming To Ohio For Art Exhibition

July 29, 2010 Posted By - Emma Venezie Source Credits - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette --- Ronnie Wood's art will be displayed in the Butler Institute of American Art in Ohio; photo courtesy of emusic.tv If you're a fan of the Rolling Stones, a new form of entertainment is coming your way: guitarist, Ronnie Wood, is showing off his artistic skills in the form of paintings and other art that will be

July 30, 2010 04:33 PM

1st Annual "Guitars Over Cancer" a Huge Success

July 30, 2010 Posted By - Frank Murgia Source Credits - Mr. Lee, Shooting16 --- 1ST ANNUAL "GUITARS OVER CANCER" A HUGE SUCCESS PITTSBURGH -This past January, Mr Lee, a Pittsburgh concert and radio producer/DJ, said the success of the 1st annual "Guitars Over Cancer" concert, to raise money for cancer charities, would be measured in two ways; the amount of money raised and the quality of the

July 30, 2010 04:18 PM

5 Myths About Satellite TV Debunked

July 30, 2010 Posted By - Frank Murgia Source Credits - Sheryl Owen, http://www.satellitedish.org/blog --- 5 Myths About Satellite TV Debunked Satellite TV providers have done a reasonably good job trying to fight several of the common myths about satellite TV but they still have some ground to cover with consumers. For whatever reason there still is quite a bit of negative publicity

July 30, 2010 04:10 PM

EPA Whistleblower Hugh Kaufman: We've Now Poisoned Thousands of Square Miles of the Gulf

DOWNLOADS: (247) PLAYS: (691) Lawrence O'Donnell talks to EPA whistleblower Hugh Kaufman about the claims that the oil is now "disappearing" from the Gulf of Mexico. There's no way in hell that much oil just goes away. Digby's got more on this here The Good News Is The Poison: BP seems to have ably headed off the worst of the PR disaster by keeping the worst of the oil more or less off the shoreline. The actual disaster may have been made worse by the use of toxic chemicals. So it's all good. That's what they want us to believe anyway. We need more Hugh Kaufman's out there to counter this nonsense. O‘DONNELL: Today is day 100 of the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico, and a whistle-blower has come forth from the Environmental Protection Agency, charging the EPA with helping BP to downplay the environmental impact of its supposed cleanup efforts. You will meet him in a moment. But if the cleanup has been compared to letting the criminal clean up the crime scene—we begin our fourth story tonight with news about the cops. “The Washington Post” reports that federal agents who call themselves the BP squad are investigating whether BP, Transocean, or Halliburton, even before the blowout, lied to regulators, obstructed justice, or faked the test results for their equipment—including the blowout preventer that, needless to say, failed to prevent a blowout. Specifically, sources told “The Post,” investigators are asking whether inspectors at the Minerals Management Agency went easy on the rig and why. BP, yesterday, revealed that it is now the subject of an investigation by the SEC, Securities and Exchange Commission, into something—no word yet on exactly whether that is related to the spill. And while Jane Lubchenco, director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, says the oil is becoming harder to find, the Natural Resources Defense Council‘s annual report on beaches found no downturn in the number of beach closures or advisories since the spill was capped. The NRDC reports that the number of beach closures and advisories this year, 2,200, is roughly 10 times more than last year. And it predicts that the impact will last for years. And in a cable news exclusive, that whistle-blower we mentioned joins us now. EPA senior policy analyst, Hugh Kaufman, is a veteran and legend of the agency, having had a hand in Love Canal and the creation of the Superfund and helped expose the EPA cover-up of air quality at ground zero. Mr. Kaufman, what should we know about the dispersants used in the Gulf that the EPA isn‘t telling us? KAUFMAN: Well, first of all, the dispersants mixed with the oil and the water is extremely toxic. Sweden has done studies on this. Israel has done studies on this. And the only real purpose of using so many dispersants with the oil was to cover up the volume of oil that was released from that well. So, that and lying about how much is coming out was a mechanism to help BP save billions of dollars in fines. O‘DONNELL: Should they have not used dispersants at all? KAUFMAN: That‘s correct. If they did not use dispersants, they would have been able to get most of that oil off of the surface and would not have endangered all of the fish and ecosystem underneath the water that now will be affected for decades on down the line. I was listening to some of the, quote, “experts” who are being paid by BP at universities who are saying that the oil has disappeared. It hasn‘t disappeared. It‘s throughout thousands of square miles in the Gulf, mixed with dispersants, and because the temperatures down there are so cold, they‘re going to be around for decades. O‘DONNELL: Now, were you and others at the EPA making this case within the system, that—arguing that we shouldn‘t be using dispersants there? And what was the response? KAUFMAN: Well, the working level troops in research, some of the toxicologists who have experience and education, were trying to get management to pay attention to the data that EPA had and has had for

July 30, 2010 04:00 PM

Drilling down into the manufacturing consensus

Yesterday, in my diary, "The hidden manufacturing consensus", I said that one of most impressive things I ran into at Netroots Nation was a poll on manufacturing conducted for the Alliance for American Manufacturing by the Melman Group. I presented just one chart from the presentation of the poll results--delivered by Mark Melman--showing the strength of support for investing in manufacturing and prioritizing the creation of manufacturing jobs. I now want to drill down a bit deeper to discuss some of the other findings from the poll.

Let's begin with a couple questions that help set the stage, asking about people's perception of what's important for the nation's economy and for national security. Economy first:

Talk about a blindingly clear picture of how the Obama Administration has missed the boat in connecting with the American people's concerns. Under the spell of Geithner and Summers, Obama still thinks that Wall Street finance is the most important part of the American economy. It's a big part of the reason why he can't seem to focus on helping the real economy with anything more than token efforts. His virtual neglect of the industrial Midwest has been shocking, but these figures show that it's far more than a regional problem.

And for national security, the results are similar, if not quite so lop-sided:

The idea that other sectors of the economy can replace manufacturing is soundly and broadly rejected:

Support for the need for manufacturing holds up across all the groups looked at separately, with partisan differences almost non-existent:

Given the perceived need for manufacturing, it's hardly surprising that there's strong support for developing an integrated national manufacturing strategy:

And again, there's strong support across all the sub-groups, although the level of support does vary more between the two parties:

We start to see more significant divisions when we ask about the role of government, but those who want a more "limited" role still support some of the most effective measures that government can pursue:

The divide is perhaps most visible between Democrats and Republicans, but again, this divide is not likely to mean much in terms of effectiveness, if the policies are properly designed and integrated:

Finally, one of the main purposes of the neo-liberal "free trade" agreements was to use the "free-trade" ideology to trample on workers rights as well as the environment. It's significant to note that there's now a clear concensus that trade laws should be used to protect America as we seek to pursue a more environmentally responsible path for our manufacturing future:

Again, while there is some variation between sub-groups, it is relatively minor compared to the high levels of support for environmental tarrifs:

Conclusion

All the above shows strong and broad support for reviatilizing American manufacturing. And this support exists despite virtually no discussion of these issues in the Versailles media. The political potential for a pro-active manufacturing agenda is huge. The example of Germany shows how much there is to be gained economically. We call ourselves the "reality-based community". Will we live up to our name?

The choice is up to us.

July 30, 2010 04:00 PM

SEC Charges The 'Wyly Coyotes', Texas Brothers and Billionaire Funders of Right-Wing Campaigns

Unfortunately, this is a civil action and the most we can hope for are some SEC fines (which are ludicrously low). Too bad this isn't a criminal case, but at least it's some karmic return for the "Wyly Coyotes," who funded the Swift Boat attacks on John Kerry. (They also funded George W. Bush's attacks on John McCain in the 2000 Republican primaries.)

Oh, and by the way: The Manhattan district attorney's office referred this case to the SEC in 2005. Wonder what took them so long?

Samuel Wyly and Charles Wyly -- billionaire brothers in Texas who have spent millions funding political campaigns -- committed violations of federal securities laws and fraud by using offshore accounts to secretly trade the shares of public companies whose boards they sat on, reaping more than $550 million in profit, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission complaint filed Thursday.

The politically-active Wylys, who have been generous donors to Republican causes over the years, have faced questions in recent years -- including a Senate probe -- about whether they ran an extensive network of tax shelters.

"The cloak of secrecy has been lifted from the complex web of foreign structures used by the Wylys to evade the securities laws," said SEC deputy director of enforcement Lorin L. Reisner. "They used these structures to conceal hundreds of millions of dollars of gains in violation of the disclosure requirements for corporate insiders."

The SEC alleges that the brothers created an elaborate network of accounts and companies in the Isle of Man and the Cayman Islands that they used to trade more than $750 million in stock in four public companies they served as board members. The SEC charges that they also committed an insider trading violation concerning one of the companies, earning almost $32 million.

The Wyly's attorney and stockbroker were also charged.

They also own Michaels, the national arts and crafts chain. So we can blame them for scrapbooking, too!

July 30, 2010 03:00 PM

Newt Gingrich refuses to call for ban on Klingon, Cardassian & Romulan law!

When it comes to protecting America, Newt Gingrich is a pitiful wimp! Oh, sure he's posturing to protect us against Sharia law:

"And one of the things I'm going to suggest today is a federal law which says that no court in the United States under any circumstances is allowed to consider Sharia as a replacement for American law. Period."

But how many starships does the Muslim world command, anyway? What about the real threats to America and American law? What about the Kingons, Cardassians, and Romulans?

You think I'm joking? Does Cardassian law sound like a joke?:

Cardassian society had the most rigid and, to the Federation, incomprehensible of all legal systems. Every suspect was guilty before even appearing in court, their sentence already spelled out - almost always either death or imprisonment in a harsh labor camp. The criminal was given a Conservator, equivalent to a public defender, except that the Conservator was not supposed to win but to prepare the criminal for a moving confession of guilt on the floor of the court. The accused was also permitted an advocate, the Nestor, to advise them during the trial. The Chief Archon, or judge, of the court played to a televised audience, their duty not to judge the prisoner's innocence or guilt, but rather to give an emphatic display of the futility of crime on Cardassia and reinforce the public's trust in the judicial system. (DS9: "Tribunal", "The Die is Cast")

Or the Romulans:

By the 24th century, the government of Romulus was dependent upon the Tal Shiar, the Romulan secret police, to maintain order and stability among both civilians and the military. The Tal Shiar was known for its brutal tactics, which included routine kidnapping, torture, and assassination. Many Romulans fear even expressing dissenting opinions as not to spark the interest of the Tal Shiar.

And the Klingons? They simply fight to the death!

So what will Gingrich do to defend America from these brutal legal systems? Nothing at all! Worse still, he even denies the very existence of any threat!

This breathtaking disconnect from reality is typical of what we've come to expect from Republicans. Just look at the comparative Google hits results:

Sharia Law: About   878,000 results
Klingon:    About 3,120,000 results
Romulan:    About   702,000 results
Cardassian: About   294,000 results

I rest my case.

BREAKING! Gingrich has now come out in favor of replacing the US Constitution with the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition! Film at 11!

July 30, 2010 02:30 PM

Rand Paul Opens Mouth, Puts Coal-Covered Foot In

MTR aerial 2_58989_0.jpg

As if Rand Paul's flippant "No one will miss a hill or two" comment wasn't egregious enough, his latest PR effort on behalf of the coal industry is even worse. In an interview with Details magazine, he makes some of the dumbest and most offensive statements I've heard yet about mountaintop removal.

See, here's what Rand Paul thinks. Seriously.

Paul believes mountaintop removal just needs a little rebranding. "I think they should name it something better," he says. "The top ends up flatter, but we're not talking about Mount Everest. We're talking about these little knobby hills that are everywhere out here. And I've seen the reclaimed lands. One of them is 800 acres, with a sports complex on it, elk roaming, covered in grass." Most people, he continues, "would say the land is of enhanced value, because now you can build on it."

Forgive my skepticism, but the dual images of a sports complex and roaming elk just don't quite mash together well. Either the elk roam or there's a ton of kids, parents and cars up there on that mountain, but I tend to doubt there's both.

Of course, Rand defends his rebranding push with this argument:

Let's let you decide what to do with your land," he says. "Really, it's a private-property issue." This is a gentler, more academic variation on a line he used the evening before, during his speech at the Harlan Center: "If you don't live here, it's none of your business.

I'm getting awfully tired of this line of thinking. It presumes that each and every one of us live in this place called the United States with no responsibility to anyone but ourselves. It minimizes the whole idea of community, and presumes that one's actions have no impact on anyone else.

The picture at the top is what those "hills" look like after the coal industry gets their hooks in it. The picture below is what Harlan, Kentucky looks like before that happens.

But he doesn't stop with mountaintop removal, either. In Rand Paul's selfish myopic little universe, the Big Branch mine incident that killed 26 miners and could have been prevented had Massey Energy actually chosen to obey the law was just an "unfortunate thing."

"Is there a certain amount of accidents and unfortunate things that do happen, no matter what the regulations are?" Paul says at the Harlan Center, in response to a question about the Big Branch disaster. "The bottom line is I'm not an expert, so don't give me the power in Washington to be making rules. You live here, and you have to work in the mines. You'd try to make good rules to protect your people here. If you don't, I'm thinking that no one will apply for those jobs. I know that doesn't sound..." Here he stumbles, trying to parse his words properly but only presaging his campaign misstep. "I want to be compassionate," he concludes, "and I'm sorry for what happened, but I wonder: Was it just an accident?"

No, Rand. It wasn't "just an accident." When it's common practice to disable methane detectors when they get in the way of production goals, and when a rush of methane gas caused that explosion, it's not "just an accident." It's an intentional act that puts profit ahead of people. It isn't just an accident.

As for the "no one will apply for those jobs", I guess Rand has forgotten about the unemployment rate in this country? There will always be someone looking for jobs, willing to put themselves at risk to feed their families, particularly in economically depressed areas. Those areas, coincidentally, seem to be prevalent in coal-mining areas. Gosh, I wonder why...

Fact: Rand Paul is Big Coal's bitch, which squares with their promise to buy Congressional candidates in their states.

Profits mean far more than people. Profits mean more than everything in Rand Paul's world. And Big Coal will welcome their special bought-and-paid-for teabagger Rand, unless we can defeat him.

Jack Conway, Rand Paul's opposition, is endorsed by Blue America. More that almost any other candidate, I am hoping we can join together and send Jack to Washington while leaving Rand in the coal dust.

Please support Jack Conway over on our Blue America '10 page.

July 30, 2010 02:00 PM

No Comment

ABOVE (right to left, or left to right, you decide): David Cassidy, Stephen Spruiell

Stephen Spruiell, America’s Shittiest Website™*
Krugman’s New Comment Policy

What kind of dishonest, cowardly shithead publishes stuff on the Internet and doesn’t allow people to comment freely on it?

‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard. We are aware of all Internet traditions.™

*The redesign of America’s Shittiest Website™looks even worse than it did before the redesign, if you can believe it (and I certainly can). Pay special attention to the pathetic graphic of a corner — a poorly rendered image of a dark, lonely corner and perhaps an unintentionally accurate portrait of the souls of Jo-Dough and K-Lo. The graphic is so obviously lame that the site is begging for readers to submit something better in exchange for the princely recompense of nothing more than the eternal gratitude of Rich Lowry. The newly designed ASW™, of course, still doesn’t allow reader comments.

UPDATE: Commenter Angry Geometer pointed out that Spruiell can be tweeted. So Tintin now has a twitter account and sent this as his very first tweet.

July 30, 2010 01:59 PM

Pammycakes Wrote A Book!

It’s called ‘The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War On America and John Bolton’s Hawt Mustache’. Co-writer Robert Spencer gets bottom billing and Bolton himself is listed as ‘Forward’ … rowrr!

FrontPage in-house heavy Jamie Glazov interviews Pam Geller about the book here. Pam’s remarkably lucid throughout the interview, which makes us think it was conducted over email and Spencer probably answered the questions.

But we do get this nugget:

Apostasy is punishable by death in Islam. Yet there have been no calls for Obama’s death from the Islamic world. Why is this? Islam gives no free passes.

Ah, yes. Absence of a fatwa on Obama is evidence that he is a secret Muslim conspiring with the mullahs to visit sharia law on us all. Ipso motherfucking facto.

July 30, 2010 01:59 PM

Mike Pence Lies About the Number of Small Business Owners Being Harmed by Getting Rid of the Bush Tax Cuts

DOWNLOADS: (197) PLAYS: (385) Mike Pence repeats the Republican lie that getting rid of the Bush tax cuts is going to raise taxes on small businesses. As our own Jon Perr noted only about 2% are impacted by the return to higher rates for incomes over $250,000: Lie #1: President Obama will raise taxes on small businesses. John McCain introduced this fraud along with Joe the Plumber during the 2008 campaign. McCain proclaimed Obama's plan to restore 1990's tax rates for taxpayers making over $250,000 meant "the small businesses that we're talking about would receive an increase in their taxes right now." In February, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) regurgitated the long-debunked talking point: "I don't think raising taxes is a great idea, and when our good friends on the other side of the aisle say raising the taxes on the wealthy, what they are really talking about is small business." Of course, they're not talking about small business. As CNN concluded in October, "fewer than 2% of small business owners would pay more under Obama's plan." But in case there was any doubt about the Republicans' deception on the point, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center quickly put it to rest: Out of 34.7 million filers with business income on Schedules C, E or F, 479,000 filers fall into the top two brackets, according to an analysis of projected 2009 filings by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. The other 34.3 million - or 98.6% - would be unaffected by Obama's proposed rate hike. Somehow Mike Pence thinks that 2% equals "more than half". So either he's really bad at math, or he's lying. I'm in the camp of the latter. Jansing: You have said, I’m quoting you here, if Democrats get their way, every income tax bracket will rise on Jan. 1st, 2011, but PolitiFact says in fact Democrats want to keep tax cuts for people making less than $200,000 so is that really an honest interpretation of what the Democrats’ plan to do? Pence: Well, we’ll see. I know Democrats have been talking about trying to preserve some of the middle class tax cuts that were passed in 2001 and 2003 but Chris there’s no legislation, there’s been no bills considered in committees and while I’m encouraged by that my point was the American people deserve to know that if the Congress fails to act, every American will see a tax increase on Jan. 1, 2011 and for their part the Democrats stated position is that at the very least what they want to preserve are tax increases on job creators, on small business owners, on Americans who report income of over $200,000 a year and we just think that raising taxes in the midst of the worst recession in twenty five years if a profoundly bad idea. Jansing: And yet some people have argued that the Bush tax cuts have been in affect since 2001 and if they’re so beneficial to the economy why isn’t it in better shape? Pence: Well look, I was here in Congress in 2001. I was here on the Capitol grounds on 9-11. I mean it was a time of extraordinary anxiety for the American people and it was a time of extraordinary economic turmoil. I have no doubt that the tax relief in 2001 and 2003 helped to stave off what was poised to be a very difficult time in the life of our economy but right now we’re back in another difficult time and the very idea that when more than half the people that file tax returns, over $200,000 a year, actually small business owners filing as individuals, the idea that you would raise taxes on small businesses owners and job creators in the middle of this recession doesn’t make any sense. This is the same guy who just signed on to be part of Michele Bachmann's Tea Party caucus. The media keeps touting this wingnut as a potential 2012 Presidential candidate. All I can say is bring it on. He's about as bright as Palin not quite as mean spirited.

July 30, 2010 01:00 PM

CO-SEN: As Poll Shows Dem Primary Tight, Newspaper Links Bennet to Major Gordon Gekko-Esque Scam

NOTE: I will be interviewing Guerin Lee Green, publisher of the Cherry Creek News, about the Bennet report that his newspaper published on Friday at 8:15am Colorado time (10:15 ET). Tune in online or on your local radio dial.

The Colorado Senate Democratic primary is the latest contest that seems to be yet another proxy battle between an insulated Democratic Party Establishment and an increasingly restive Democratic Party base. If you believe a new poll this week, appointed Sen. Michael Bennet (D) has seen his lead all but evaporate, despite outspending former Colorado House Speaker Andrew Romanoff (D) by something like 8-to-1. Now comes a blockbuster new report from the Cherry Creek News suggesting that Bennet made millions off massive layoffs during his time as a corporate raider working for archconservative billionaire Philip Anschutz.

Undoubtedly, to some rank-and-file Democrats, the fact that Colorado's Democratic senator was a former top executive to Anschutz is all that needs to be said. After all, Anschutz is not just any old rich guy who happens to be conservative. He is a hard-core far-right-wing activist - one of the most important conservative movement funders who, as just one example, owns and underwrites The Weekly Standard.

However, even if progressive voters can get beyond their distaste for Bennet's tight relationship with Anschutz, they may be put off by the details of Bennet's particular behavior in his job with Anschutz. It sure seems like the stuff of Gordon Gekko. Here's an excerpt of The Cherry Creek News' report:

Regal (Cinema) was born when Anschutz joined three bankrupt movie companies, pulling them together in early 2002. In 2003, a relatively healthy Regal issued an "extraordinary cash dividend" of $5.05 per share to all shareholders, totaling approximately $715 million, including $373 million to Anschutz. To pay that dividend, the company took on over a half billion dollars in debt. The company went from healthy to imperiled, out of cash, and downgraded by analysts. In 2004, a second "extraordinary cash dividend" was issued, this time amounting to $710 million. The company went into an additional $930 million in debt to cover the dividend. Anschutz would get an additional $368 million from that transaction...
A Moody's VP said, "It's pretty mind-boggling to me that this company, recently out of bankruptcy, will pay out $1.6 billion." The Louisiana teachers pension fund went farther. "...(T)he real explanation for draining the Company of its cash is that the Board is looting Regal and its subsidiaries to pay the individual Board members hundreds of millions of dollars in dividends, which have no legitimate business purpose and provide absolutely no benefit to the company."
Bennet made more than $11.4 million during the years after the Regal Cinema deals. In 2001, Regal Cinemas closed 30% of its theaters, shuttering 128 theaters. With 30-50 full or part-time employees at the average theater, these closures eliminated an estimated 4,000 - 6,400 jobs...In the end, Bennet profited mightily from the same flavors of financial manipulations that destabilized Wall Street and led to the crash of 2008, and the loss of millions of jobs and billions in lost productivity.

Romanoff's campaign, which has sworn off all corporate and PAC money, has pounced on this report with a scathing new television ad tersely titled "Greed." You can watch it here.

Will the new report and the new ad change the course of the campaign? It's hard to say. However, between Romanoff just selling his house to put the proceeds into his campaign, and Bennet suddenly dropping his Rose Garden strategy to aggressively criticize Romanoff, my guess is both campaigns are showing that this is race incredibly tight. Unto itself, that would be a stunning sign of rank-and-file Democrats' anger at Washington, considering how massively Bennet has outspent Romanoff over the last many months.

July 30, 2010 01:00 PM

Sarah Palin chooses her next 'mama grizzly'

57); font-size: 20px; font-weight: normal;">1. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has endorsed Wyoming State Auditor Rita Meyer's campaign for governor as the 2008 vice presidential nominee continues to back a stable of women running in contested statewide primary races. "Voters know that Rita has a unique blend of steel magnolia and mama grizzly," Palin wrote on her Facebook page. "Her true grit has not escaped the eye of other Americans who know that at every level of political office we all benefit with commonsense constitutional conservatives in service." Meyer is running in a crowded Aug. 17 Republican primary that includes state House Speaker Colin Simpson, the son of former Sen. Alan Simpson, former U.S. Attorney Matt Mead and state Agriculture Commissioner Ron Micheli. The winner on the Republican side will be heavily favored in the fall as popular Gov. Dave Freudenthal (D) is retiring after two terms in office

Sarah Palin - Republican - United States - Matt Mead - Politics

July 30, 2010 12:43 PM

The Goldberg Masturbations

Mike's Blog Roundup

Unfogged: The ghouls at Prudential Financial Inc.

The Left Coaster: BP will take $9.9 billion tax credit

Mike Whitney: Trillions for Wall St., zilch for you know who

Buzzfeed: 10 Craziest Michele Bachman quotes. And speaking of crazy talk from Wingnuttia, there's always enough to go around

Open The Echo Chamber: Intellectual ambulance chasing: Mixing climate science and illegal immigration?

Mark Fiore's Animated Cartoon Site: News In A Nutshell

A belated Happy Blogiversary to Batocchio!

July 30, 2010 12:00 PM

World O' Crap

After the way the media gulped down Andrew Breitbart’s recent Capricorn One-style video hoax, I was feeling a bit depressed about the state of modern journalism. Fortunately Jonah Goldberg has devoted his latest LA Times column to setting me straight. Turns out, things are better than ever, now that those guys like Murrow and Cronkite are dead.

The new journalism

“The high standards and wise judgments of people like Walter Cronkite once acted as a national immune system, zapping scandal mongers and quashing wild rumors,” wrote former “green jobs czar” Van Jones in the Sunday New York Times.

This may be one of the most unintentionally hilarious lines in recent memory. Jones left the White House when his background — as an alleged 9/11 “truther” and as a self-confessed “communist” and “revolutionary” — became grist for the Fox News mill. Mainstream media mostly ignored the story until after he was fired.

How amusing that this Jones fellow — the hapless victim of a vendetta by Fox News — yearns for a day when the memory of McCarthyism was fresh enough that ordinary standards of professional judgment and editorial due diligence were sufficient to prevent newscasters and commentators from pillorying minor government officials as “avowed, self-avowed radical revolutionary communist[s],” and “convicted felon[s].” It’s almost like he thinks he didn’t deserve this kind of treatment, which is rib-tickling, because if the guy had a scrap of decency, Battered Wife Syndrome would have kicked in by now.

Now Jones, with billets at Princeton and the Center for American Progress, casts himself as yet another victim, just like Shirley Sherrod, the Department of Agriculture employee fired last week after website publisher Andrew Breitbart released a misleadingly edited video of her (Breitbart, a friend, insists to me that he did not edit the video himself).

Exactly. Who’re you gonna believe?

This guy, who’s involved with Princeton University and the Center for American Progress, groups which are probably on the Secretary of State’s list of known communist front organizations?

Or this guy, who “released a misleadingly edited video of [Sherrod]” after releasing a series of misleadingly edited videos (with soft core inserts) about ACORN, but who gave Jonah his word that he doesn’t know how to use iMovie? Well, if you’re a high profile pundit and author writing for one of the nation’s great newspapers, you’re faced with a profound moral and professional dilemma, unless you’re Jonah Goldberg, in which case you can just write whatever. Besides, Breitbart looks exactly like the guy who sold us pot in high school, so it’s probably wise to stay on his good side just in case the Marijuana Legalization Initiative doesn’t pass in November.

You’ve just got to love Jones — a former member of STORM (Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement), a Mao-influenced organization with a “commitment to the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism” — giving Cronkite, the dashboard saint of bourgeois America, his props as a linchpin of American democracy. Yes, yes, Jones says he’s no longer the Red radical he says he was, say, a decade ago. But still: Come on.

That’s like David Horowitz, a self-confessed “red diaper baby” saying he’s no longer a Red radical, when clearly, beneath his sober charcoal gray suit, he still has the diaper rash. Which is red. But still. Really. Clap on.

I must say, I find such nonsense exhilarating and exasperating.

Coming from Jonah, that sounds less like a critique of modern journalism and more like a report on his experiments in auto-erotic asphyxiation.

And while we’re saying things we must, I must say how unintentionally hilarious it is that right-wingers who go on about the vital importance of America’s Judeo-Christian heritage, hold the Judeo, are the same theologians who believe that it’s impossible for anyone — from Van Jones to Shirley Sherrod — to repent, or even just change their minds. Or maybe it’s just black people whose opinions are set in concrete and can never evolve, merely erode.

For generations, conservatives lamented the decline in “gatekeeping.”

When in fact it was their “keymastering” that was inadequate.

When Hollywood portrayed glandular instincts as the new moral compass of the secular age, conservatives waxed nostalgic over the lost decency of the “studio system.”

Remember those days? Thank goodness today’s conservatives have gotten beyond that kind of bluenosed pecksniffery.

When the education industry shelved the great books and hugged every self-esteem fad…

This from the author of a “history” book which reduced the great political struggle between fascism and liberal democracy to an episode of The Patty Duke Show.

…conservatives lamented the “closing of the American mind” and the demise of the three Rs. When the left became enamored with a “riot ideology” that mistook lawlessness for political protest, conservatives invoked “law and order.” Name a front in the political and culture wars, and conservatives defended the authority of authority and the tradition of tradition, while liberals and leftists defended sticking it to the man.

Okay, how about Women’s suffrage? Securing the rights of working people to collective bargaining? Civil rights? Generally speaking, it’s hard to think of a front in the political and culture wars where the “law and order” party wasn’t meeting legitimate, usually non-violent protests with axe-handles, police dogs, or other extrajudicial means. Unless you won some sort of Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes that entitles you to a visit from Ed McMahon and a sinecure at the Los Angeles Times, in which case history began and ended with the L.A. riots. During which, incidentally, Van Jones was arrested, and for which he did hard time, a fact which, incidentally, was revealed by Glenn Beck…

here is Van Jones. This is a convicted felon, a guy who spent, I think, six months in prison after the Rodney King beating.

…and which, even more incidentally, isn’t true and didn’t happen. But as this is incidental to Glenn’s point, that makes it an incident, and what is “news,” after all, but a series of incidents? Although I suppose, technically, you could say the same thing about fiction, but name a classic novel that’s as entertaining and arousing as Megyn Kelly’s fantasies about billy club-wielding black men.

Except all the other times. Teacher unions and tenured professors, now that they control their guilds, are near reactionary in their white-knuckled grip on the status quo. Liberal legal scholars are a cargo cult to stare decisis, because the precedents are all on their side.

This last sentence doesn’t make a great deal of sense until you remember that Jonah thinks a “cargo cult” is a group of people who are all devoted fans of this guy:

On these fronts, the conservatives serve as the stick-it-to-the-man brigades, while liberals like gatekeepers.

Jonah, I’m not a columnist for a major market newspaper, so maybe it’s not my place to offer advice, but perhaps you should bone up on the recent history of gay sex scandals in the conservative fold before you declare yourself a firm member of the stick-it-to-the-man brigade.

Jones’ nostalgia for Cronkite — truly one of the most overrated national icons of the 20th century — is ultimately so much self-serving bunkum.

Well, Cronkite was a war correspondent who flew in a B-17 during a bombing run over Germany; he landed in Holland in a goddamn glider during the ill-conceived Operation Market Garden. He reported on the Battle of the Bulge, on the Nuremberg Trials, and unlike Bill Kristol or Dick Cheney, he actually went to Vietnam. But despite a impressive record of lifelong professional and personal achievement, he’s now been called “overrated” by a war-flogging little phlegm gob who not only didn’t fight, or report from the scene of the war he flogged, he didn’t even pay up when he lost a bet on the flogged war’s success, and yet Cronkite has not risen from his grave to dispute the claim, which makes his corpse seem like kind of a doormat.

For instance, when the Climategate e-mails — between leading climate scientists — were released in 2009, a veteran New York Times environmental reporter refrained from posting the private e-mails, a standard he probably would not have taken with internal e-mails from, say, BP.

Of course, the scientists at East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit have been cleared of any wrongdoing in three separate investigations, but the fact that this unnamed New York Times reporter failed to immediately bite on a fake controversy ginned up right wing corporate toadies, and now, in retrospect, doesn’t look like an asshole, has made Jonah lonely and given him a sad.

The house Cronkite built did many fine things. It also locked out competing points of view, buried inconvenient bodies, spun the news and racked up a formidable list of Shirley Sherrods all its own.

This should be good…

The New York Times whitewashed Stalin’s genocide.

The New York Times in the 30s was not CBS in the 60s, but then Cronkite never worked for the Times anyway, which only strengthens Jonah’s point.

Cronkite misreported the significance of the Tet offensive to say the Vietnam War was unwinnable.

Our smashing and unconditional victory over Hanoi only a few months later proved just how befuddled poor Walter was.

The Rodney King video was misleadingly edited

Through cunning and deceptive video tricks, Cronkite — who was pretending to be retired to throw off his enemies — made it look like the cops were beating King with nightsticks, when it fact, they’d just seen a wasp on his shirt.

The media environment today is so dizzying because of two revolutions. On one front we have the upheaval of the Internet, of which the WikiLeaks story — the leaking of 92,000 government documents about the war in Afghanistan — is Exhibit A. (The leaks weren’t just private; they were official secrets! But who cares!)

It’s Tet all over again! Clearly, Cronkite faked his own death, and is now living in Sweden disguised as a møøse. If the media had any shame, they would have skipped the Afghan War documents and just printed those stolen East Anglia emails again.

On the other front there’s the consumer backlash — largely conservative, with Fox News as Exhibit A — against the old ideological media monopoly. This pincer movement can be scary. But it’s progress over the Cronkite era.

Feel the Progress.

July 30, 2010 06:35 AM

Poll: Obama’s Healthcare Reform Opposition Waning

Poop On The Cobb

Renew America really is on a roll, serving up new entrées this week from Don Cobb and Dan Poop. Cobb’s prix-fixe is pretty much standard Gnomes-of-Zurich fare, with only the added spice of a tortured ‘The Truman Show’ analogy. Poop’s table is where the real lumpen mess is served:

LeBron-onomics

By Dan Popp

LeBron James is, from what I can gather, a basketball player.

The moon is, from what I can gather, a satellite in near-Earth orbit.

A very good, and famous, and rich one. But this article is not about basketball. The only reason I even know about Mr. James is that he’s from my area, and he recently left to play for Miami.

Don’t worry, Mr. Poop — your secret is safe with us. We won’t tell anybody that you secretly know who world-famous black athletes are.

It isn’t just basketball fans that are loving or lamenting the Decision. It’s hotel maids and potato-chip-truck drivers and skycaps. It’s sign makers and sandwich makers and decision makers. It’s messengers and manufacturers and municipal governments. It’s hospitals and schools and charities.

It’s bakers and bellhops and billiard cue makers. It’s salesmen and sadists and sousaphone players. It’s hookers and haberdashers and hothouse horticulture nay-sayers.

Now, someone may object that the cause of this mania isn’t the rich men, but the economic activity surrounding them.

Perhaps Poop is correct and the average Cleveland Cavaliers fan is quietly calculating the annual hit to his or her bank account likely to result from LeBron’s exit for more pussy-filled shores. Alternatively, ‘the cause of this mania’ is legions of desperate people yearning for some fleeting, vicarious triumph — say, an NBA title — to fill the vacuum of their dull and increasingly uncertain lives. You say tomato, I say you’re dumb as a box of rocks.

It’s a short step from saying, ‘My life is better if LeBron James lives here,’ to recognizing that ‘Millionaires improve my life.’

Actually, it’s one-and-a-half long steps and a thunderous dunk, but why quibble. Poop’s on a roll!

If you were to ask a Cleveland cab driver whether LeBron James got rich by exploiting people (in other words, whether Karl Marx was right), the cabbie would probably laugh at you. ‘The only thing he exploited was his talent … and his opportunity to get out while the gettin’ was good,’ the driver might quip.

Made-up cab drivers always drop their ‘g’s. And take note Friedman — you don’t actually have to interview a real one to get the quote you want!

If you’re with me on this, please go to the nearest window, stick your head out, and shout:

Rich people, we’re sorry. We’ve committed the sin of envy, the sin of covetousness, and the sin of slander. We have believed the lie and borne false witness against you. Forgive us for the nasty things we said. Please don’t go. We want you here. We are all better off with mega-successful neighbors. We’re going to tear down the ‘Keep Out’ signs. We’re going to stop robbing you of the rewards you’ve earned, confiscating your wealth as if you were convicted criminals. Please come and do what you do: increase the quality of life for all of us.

We tried, we really did, but the nearest window has been boarded up by the millionaire bankers who served us an eviction notice last week. Will they take a check? Or better yet, an IOU on a hate fuck?

CORRECTION: The name of the author of ‘LeBron-onomics’ is in fact Don Papp.

July 30, 2010 06:01 AM

Donklephant

As this issue becomes less politicized, more folks seem to warm to the legislation.

Wait…what???

To me this is encouraging. Of course, we all know there are problems with the legislation that passed, but I think we can also collectively agree that the current system is completely unsustainable. So some type of fix had to be made, and Obama made his move.

Personally, I didn’t think it was smart politically, but I respect that he was able to at least draw some support from the other side of the aisle wit the compromises he made. After all, politics is the art of the possible, not the ideal.

Here’s more from Wash Post:

Opposition to the landmark health care overhaul declined over the past month, to 35 percent from 41 percent, according to the latest results of a tracking poll, reported Thursday.

Fifty percent of the public held a favorable view of the law, up slightly from 48 percent a month ago, while 14 percent expressed no opinion about the measure, according to the poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The approval level was the highest for the legislation since it was enacted in March, after a divisive year-long debate. In April, the poll found 46 percent in favor and 40 percent opposed.

But wait…what do independents think?

Well, they’re more in favor than they were…

Independents, who can tip the balance in elections, split 48 percent to 37 percent in favor, compared with 49 percent to 41 percent a month earlier.

However…

The intensity of opinion among this group showed little change; just less than a fifth expressed a very favorable view, and just more than a quarter expressed a very unfavorable view.

So some in the middle have switched to the undecided column. That’s net win for Obama and Dems, regardless of the unfavorable view.

And that begs the big question: do we really think that Republicans can run on “Repeal It!” this year or in 2012?

I think not.

What do you think?

July 30, 2010 04:53 AM

Gallup: How To Save Social Security? Remove The Cap!

If you’re lucky enough to earn a lot of income, you knew this was coming. After all, you only get taxed for Social Security on the first $106,800 of your income. Anything after that draws no SS tax.

So, basically, while the rest of us get taxed on our entire income, you all pay into the system for only a very small portion of your income.

Many on the right have suggested that this would amount to the largest tax increase in history. However, it’s a hollow argument.

Let’s just look at recent history. In 1992, the top tax bracket was 31%. That increased to 39.6% from 1993 to 2001. So that’s clearly an 8.6% hike. Know the percentage that’s taken out of your check for SS? 6.2%. Pretty simple math there.

And given that Americans value folks who’ve worked hard their entire lives and should have a social safety net, they want the rich to pay their fair share.

From Gallup:

My guess is that when Social Security reform rolls around in 2013, and if Obama is elected, he’ll propose two changes. First, no more cap. Second, raise the retirement age to 60. These solutions will keep this program solvent forever. If Romney is elected, there will be no reform because he’ll seek to privatize the system and nobody’s going to go for that given the volatility in the stock market, not only in this country but elsewhere.

So, if you’re rich you have to ask yourself…is this fair? Personally, I think the cap has always been unfair, but I’d love to hear your thoughts. But before you libertarians and conservatives serve up the same arguments, let’s please just take a deep breath and realize that folks who are rich will undoubtedly stay that way even with this tax increase. They’ll just have a little less disposable income. That is literally the net effect of this. Few would move out of the country as a result of this because every other prosperous nation that you’d want to live in has similar policies.

But yes, if somebody wants to become a resident of a weird island nation that has almost no taxes, go for it. And they can suffer the scorn of everybody and isolate themselves.

So, to me, this seems like a small price to pay to make sure the other 94% have the safety net we desperately need.

But wait, there’s more!

Another graph. This one shows the number of taxpayers who are above the cap and their earnings.

Basically, the rich have been gaining more and more income, as a percentage of the whole, than the rest of us. That’s not to demonize them and, by the way, well done! You’ve figured it out. *golf clap*

But the rest of us need a backup plan and you can give up some more to make sure we’re all safe and sound.

July 30, 2010 04:26 AM

C&L's Late Night Music Club With Old Crow Medicine Show

Open Thread

Amazing dancing in the rain! Via The Rumpus; h/t Nicole Belle. Open thread below....

July 30, 2010 03:30 AM

Title: Wagon WheelArtist: Old Crow Medicine Show Tonight's song originated from an unfinished outtake off of Bob Dylan's soundtrack to Sam Peckinpah's brilliant movie, Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid. Old Crow Medicine Show's Ketch Secor added verses to the Dylan refrain and included it on the band's eponymous debut, O.C.M.S.. Rock me.

July 30, 2010 03:00 AM

Hannity Cites Fox 'Democrats' Op-Ed Which Accuses Obama of Doing What Fox Does--Stoking Racial Tensions

DOWNLOADS: (337) PLAYS: (681) Fox News' favorite pair of 'Democrats' penned an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal trashing President Obama and surprise, surprise... Sean Hannity ends up quoting them on his show. Here's more on Cadell and Shoen from Salon's War Room and Media Matters. Fox Democrats accuse Obama of doing what Fox does--Pat Caddell and Doug Schoen pen a column about how the president is stoking racial tensions: Official Fox News Democrats-in-residence Pat Caddell and Doug Schoen got together to write one of their op-eds about how the Democrats are Bad and Wrong. As usual, the reasons given for the Badness and Wrongness of Democrats are exactly the same ones named by right-wing talk radio hosts and bloggers and Fox News hosts -- but because the authors of the op-ed are Democrats, it is newsworthy! [...] Who are Caddell and Schoen, exactly? And what kind of Democrats are they? Doug Schoen is pollster grifter Mark Penn's former right-hand man. He wrote a book about how independent Republican Mayor Mike Bloomberg should run for president, with Republican Senator Chuck Hagel as his running mate. (His Bloomberg worship is funny, considering that he and Penn proposed doing "market research" for Phillip Morris to help them fight smoking bans in the '90s.) Schoen's 2008 insistence that Hillary could win if she'd just attack Obama a little bit harder makes his bemoaning Obama's supposedly divisive racial politics even more risible. Pat Caddell is a much more interesting character. He's a brilliant former Democratic strategist for McGovern and Carter who angrily left the party in the late-1980s. He has more or less dedicated his career to trashing Democrats ever since. While he may still actually be a liberal, his intense hatred for the entire Democratic party tends to color his analysis and make him a willing useful idiot for far-right ideologues. (Caddell also used polling to invent the statistical ideal presidential candidate in 1983: "a moderate senator in his early 40's, bold, who breaks with party tradition and wins his generation's vote." While it didn't work with Gary Hart and Joe Biden, maybe he's just mad that he didn't get any credit when it did work.) But being a professional Democratic Concern Troll makes strange bedfellows. Caddell was one of the minds behind the 1992 Jerry Brown campaign, and he relentlessly trashed Bill Clinton, whom he deeply loathed. Schoen, meanwhile, is only invited to speak about national politics because Hillary Clinton brought in Dick Morris -- who brought in Schoen and Mark Penn -- to advise Clinton in his second term. Caddell and Schoen: the "Democratic" farce continues: Y'know the shtick, the two Obama-haters lash out at the president and the Left in the pages of the WSJ but do so under the guise of being "Democrats" so readers are supposed to take their cheap shots to heart because it really, really pains Caddell and Schoen to write these nasty things about Obama. Just like it really, really pains them to go on Fox News and trash Obama. Today's effort by the duo is particularly rancid: Obama constantly divides America by playing the race card. I'll let TNR's Jonathan Chait and Time's Joe Klein do the honors in terms of dismantling Caddell/Schoen's lazy fearmongering...read on...

July 30, 2010 02:00 AM

White House Wants To Make It Easier For The FBI To See Your Internet Contacts

So an anonymous "senior administration official" says that "most" internet and email providers already turn over this information. (Gee, I wonder why he didn't want to go on the record. And I wonder why the Post allowed it.)

See, here's the problem with these relentless expansions of executive power: I don't actually believe that the Obama administration is interested in putting me under surveillance for criticizing their policies. But they're sure as hell making it a lot easier for a paranoid Republican administration to do it -- not to mention loose cannon FBI agents who simply want to ignore the rules. In a democracy, the way it's supposed to work is, we have laws that will protect us even when the bad guys are in charge:

The Obama administration is seeking to make it easier for the FBI to compel companies to turn over records of an individual's Internet activity without a court order if agents deem the information relevant to a terrorism or intelligence investigation.

The administration wants to add just four words -- "electronic communication transactional records" -- to a list of items that the law says the FBI may demand without a judge's approval. Government lawyers say this category of information includes the addresses to which an Internet user sends e-mail; the times and dates e-mail was sent and received; and possibly a user's browser history. It does not include, the lawyers hasten to point out, the "content" of e-mail or other Internet communication.

But what officials portray as a technical clarification designed to remedy a legal ambiguity strikes industry lawyers and privacy advocates as an expansion of the power the government wields through so-called national security letters. These missives, which can be issued by an FBI field office on its own authority, require the recipient to provide the requested information and to keep the request secret. They are the mechanism the government would use to obtain the electronic records.

[...] Many Internet service providers have resisted the government's demands to turn over electronic records, arguing that surveillance law as written does not allow them to do so, industry lawyers say. One senior administration government official, who would discuss the proposed change only on condition of anonymity, countered that "most" Internet or e-mail providers do turn over such data.

To critics, the move is another example of an administration retreating from campaign pledges to enhance civil liberties in relation to national security. The proposal is "incredibly bold, given the amount of electronic data the government is already getting," said Michelle Richardson, American Civil Liberties Union legislative counsel.

July 30, 2010 01:00 AM

Rethinking Spending Targets

Settle in, because it looks like it will be a long hot summer debate about taxing and spending. We're already hearing the old saws from Republicans about how we spend too much, tax cuts don't increase the deficit, and we're saddling our children and grandchildren with enormous, horrible debt that will surely bankrupt them before they're even born.

It isn't like we haven't all heard this before, or like we don't hear it over and over, but this time perhaps we could start by shattering myths. One begging to be shattered is this idea that we must limit spending to a certain percentage of GDP in order to be "fiscally solvent".

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities explains:

Simply put, aiming to stabilize the budget at the recent historical spending average of 21 percent of GDP might be appropriate for the years ahead if the age distribution of the population remained the same as it was in recent decades; if health care costs grew no faster than the economy; if Medicare had no drug benefit; if we were willing to leave more than 30 million Americans without health coverage; if there were no terrorist threats and hence no need for homeland security spending; if no wounded veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan needed medical care and income support; and if decisions and events over the last decade had not nearly doubled the national debt as a share of GDP. But that’s not the world in which we live, and it’s not the target at which we should aim.

This report hits at the heart of why today's spending debate is such a non-starter: Historically, we have not had revenues that come close to what is needed to maintain public services and programs. (As an aside: the unspoken but clear message is that taxes should NEVER have been cut in the first place)

The historical record shows a persistent mismatch between revenues and the funding needed for public services. Revenues at the 40-year average — a little over 18 percent of GDP — would not have balanced the budget in any of the last 40 years. The only balanced budgets over this period occurred from 1998 through 2001, years in which revenues were markedly above the 40-year average. Revenues in these years were in the 20-to-21-percent-of-GDP range. As a result of this mismatch between revenues and funding needs, the government ran deficits that averaged 2.6 percent of GDP over the past 40 years.

In case that wasn't clear enough, let me make it clearer: Bill Clinton's budget put us on the path to fiscal solvency without cutting services, and George Bush's tax cuts derailed it. To further complicate the picture, the whole "Homeland Security" spending package along with a couple of wars finished the job.

Indeed, the CBPP report confirms this, and urges policymakers to rethink how they approach Federal debt and spending.

The bottom line is that arbitrary numerical targets for federal spending and revenues are misguided. Although history provides useful information and guidance, it should not be a straitjacket. What will be appropriate in 2020, 2030, or 2050 is not necessarily the same as in 1970 or 1980. Budgetary policies, like other policies, must respond to changing circumstances. “As our cause is new,” wrote Abraham Lincoln, “so we must think anew, and act anew.”

And this:

In our view, the aging of the population, the continued importance of Social Security and Medicare, the growth in federal responsibilities in recent years in areas such as homeland security, and rising health care costs justify higher levels of federal spending and revenues over the next 40 years than over the past four decades.

Let the Congress have ears to hear.

July 30, 2010 12:00 AM

Change comes to the comments section!

Regular -- and even not so regular readers -- of the Fix know that we have long struggled with a comments section that has grown unruly. A few loud voices -- on both sides of the political spectrum -- have aimed to shout down (and spam) the comments section, eliminating the possibility of a civil dialogue. So, after a brief launch delay, we are happy to announce that as of midnight tonight a new comments section will go into place. You will notice that your name will be displayed more prominently with your comments. You will be able to respond directly to individual comments by others rather than posting to a single discussion thread. Comments by regular Fix readers will continue to appear when you post them without pre-screening. We believe this is the best way to ensure that your views, arguments and experiences -- not ours -- drive the

Threaded discussion - Political spectrum - Spam - E-mail - Arts

July 30, 2010 12:00 AM

July 29, 2010

Tell White House Correspondents Assoc.: Don't Reward Fox "News" With Helen Thomas' WH Press Pool Seat

See that empty seat front and center? That was Helen Thomas' official seat in the White House press pool, the only such designation in the press room. It was given to her in honor of her 57 years of covering presidential press conferences.

In the wake of her resignation, three news services are vying to take Thomas' seat: Fox News Channel, Bloomberg and NPR.

But let's be honest: giving Fox News Channel--the same outlet that elevated Breitbart's ACORN and Sherrod scandals to national prominence, that continues to push the NBPP non-story, that employs that inciter of insanity, Glenn Beck--the seat is a slap in the face to any American who actually cares about news.

Credo Action is asking progressives to contact the White House Correspondents Association and ask them to not award Fox News Helen Thomas' seat. From an email sent to members:

We need help.

There's a new front where we can chip away at the perceived legitimacy of FOX as a news organization.

The White House Correspondents Association is scheduled to decide in a Monday meeting which news outlet will get the White House press briefing room front row seat vacated recently by Helen Thomas. (we're trying to confirm reports that this meeting has been moved up a day to Sunday. more on that when we get better info.)

Three organizations are vying for this seat: FOX, NPR and Bloomberg News. [..]

We need your help. CREDO launched a campaign yesterday morning to call attention to this and already 140,000 people have signed our petition. We are faxing and working on petition deliveries to the board members and executive director of the organization in advance of their meeting. The petition is here: http://www.credoaction.com/campaign/fox_or_npr/

"Joe the Voter" at OpEd News has a boilerplate letter that you may want to use to send in your name:

White House Correspondents' Association
600 New Hampshire Avenue, Suite 800
Washington, DC 20037
202-266-7453 (v)
202-266-7454 (f )
Julia Whiston, Executive Director.

Do not give Helen Thomas' seat to FOX !

They are NOT news...they are a politically motivated racist organization who lie, distort and deceive viewers to promote a specific political agenda. They have FCC complaints filed against them for using their "news" status contrary to federal rules against bias and distortion in the news. The recent scandals where Fox assisted in slander and personal attacks against blacks such as Shirley Sherrod, Van Jones and Acorn all indicate their inability to present news using accepted and honorable journalistic standards.

Putting FOX in that chair would be a black mark on your organization as it would amount to an acceptance of their extreme distortions as being the equal of your other distinguished members.

Respectfully,
[ Add your name and fax or email from their web site http://www.whca.net/contact.htm ]

July 29, 2010 11:00 PM

Breaking Down the 2009 DMCA Rulemaking, Part 1: Victory for Vidders

Now that the dust has settled on the long-awaited announcement of new DMCA circumvention exemptions, it’s time for an explanation of what these exemptions will (and will not) do for consumers and creators. We’ll start with a tremendously important exemption that we fear was somewhat overlooked in the excitement about jailbreaking and unlocking: breaking DVD encryption in order to take short clips for purposes of criticism and commentary for noncommercial use, educational use and documentary films.

This exemption represents many months of hard work by an array of public interest groups. EFF led the charge on behalf of vidders (with invaluable support from the Organization for Transformative Works, among others). The documentary films issue was pushed by the International Documentary Association, Kartemquin Films (a Chicago-based nonprofit) and the USC Gould School of Law Intellectual Property & Technology Law Clinic. The educational uses were championed by a group of educators from American University, the University of Pennsylvania, Temple University, and the University of Maryland, working with the Library Copyright Alliance.

In public comments and at numerous hearings, these groups called on the Librarian of Congress to bring copyright in line with its true purpose – promoting creativity and education – by removing the DMCA as a powerful legal impediment to fair use. Hollywood responded by suggesting that fair users should use “alternatives” to circumvention, such as pointing a camcorder at your television screen to “capture” a poor quality copy of a movie that is playing. In other words, fair users should pretend they are living and working in 1994. Happily, the rulemakers decided to let us live in the present, describing this suggestion as “specious.”

What this means.
Before this exemption was issued, the only people allowed to circumvent DVD encryption for fair use purposes were film and media studies professors. Now, that category has expanded to include all college and university professors and film and media studies students (as long as they are circumventing for educational purposes), documentary filmmakers, and noncommercial vidders. The user may take only a “short portion” of the original work for purposes of criticism and commentary, and she must reasonably believe she needs to break the DRM to accomplish that purpose.

What it doesn’t.
This exemption does not affect toolmakers – i.e., those that develop and provide the tools that make circumventing CSS possible. Nor can it stop Hollywood from attempting to impose other technical limits on the ability to copy, even for fair use purposes. Also, K-12 educators and students who aren’t in film and media studies classes have to keep using 20th century technology. Finally, even though the Register of copyrights has declared that using short portions of a movie for purposes of criticism or comment in a noncommercial video is a fair use (no surprise), Hollywood can still use tools like YouTube’s Content I.D. system to take down such videos with the flip of a switch.

What changed?
This exemption is long overdue, and therein lies a question: why now? After all, as the Register of Copyrights notes in the report that led to the rulemaking, it was clear back in 2000 that CSS could interfere with fair use in ways Congress didn’t anticipate when it passed the DMCA. The Register’s answer is that the factual record has changed: First, proponents submitted enough substantial evidence of hardship to support their cases. (Which points to a fundamental problem in the process – where it’s clear as a matter of pure logic that a given form of DRM is impeding fair use, it’s irrational to force fair users to suffer for years under legal threat until enough evidence of the harm is accrued.) Second, the market for DVDs has (supposedly) changed:

In past rulemakings, the MPAA has offered evidence that CSS protection was a critical factor in the decision to release motion pictures in digital format . . . [but] CSS-protected DVDs have continued to be the dominant form even though circumventions tools have long been widely available online. At this point in time, the suggestion that an exemption for certain noninfringing uses will cause the end of the digital distribution of motion pictures is without foundation.

We think the MPAA’s bluster that it would stop distributing DVD movies if an exception was granted for fair use circumvention should have never been credited by the Register, but it’s gratifying that the Register refuses to do so any longer.

Some Other Highlights
In the report that led to the rulemaking, the Register of Copyrights made a series of telling observations about encryption and fair use. For example, she implicitly acknowledged what we’ve been saying for years -- that DVD encryption is primarily designed not to restrict access, but to serve as a legal "hook" that forces technology companies to enter into license agreements before they build products that can play movies. As the Report puts it:

By design, the CSS encryption system serves as a link in a chain of legal and technological requirements that ultimately inhibit the possessor of a CSS-protected DVD from copying the work or works embodied in it.”

Of course, those license agreements do more than inhibit copying -- they define what the devices can and can't do, thereby protecting Hollywood business models from disruptive innovation.

Also notable is the Register’s fair use analysis, and particularly her conclusion that there was no evidence that taking short clips cause any harm to any actual market for the original works. Opponent of the exemption had argued, among other things, that they were experimenting with ways to get short clips to educators – in other words, a market might emerge. Not good enough, said the Register: “there was no evidence in the record that a viable or efficient mechanism for permissions or licensing exists or is likely to exist” for the next three years.

This exemption could go further -- for example, there's no sensible reason why literature students, or math students for that matter, should have been excluded. Nonetheless, it represents a big step in the right direction. Hopefully the next rulemaking will go further down the path.

July 29, 2010 10:43 PM

Do Democrats need to choose between George W. Bush and the Tea Party?

By Aaron Blake Democrats have made little secret in recent days that much of their 2010 strategy revolves around casting their Republican opponents as throwbacks to the unpopular administration of George W. Bush. But when Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine stepped in front of reporters at a press conference Wednesday, his goal was to attach the GOP to a decidedly post-Bush movement: the Tea Party. Can the two strategies co-exist? Can Republicans be tied to the policies of Bush when the party is, in the words of Democrats, being "taken over" by a new movement altogether in the form of the Tea Party? In a blog post this morning, Nate Silver makes the case that while the Tea Party might burden the GOP with candidates who may be too conservative for their states in some races (like the Senate races in Kentucky and Nevada), on the whole it has

George W. Bush - Republican - Democratic - Nevada - Kentucky

July 29, 2010 10:31 PM

Progressive online action round-up, week of July 26th

I've started doing a round-up of smart, useful progressive actions I've seen land in my inbox or elsewhere on the web. A lot of folks have told me they found it helpful, so I'll try and make this a regular series from here on in. This is the 4th installment.

Another great action from our friends at CREDO Action. Fox News is vying for a front row in the White House Press Briefing room (Helen Thomas' old seat, actually) against NPR and Bloomberg News. It's vitally important that NPR be awarded the seat in the front row, not Fox. This eventually comes down to the officers of the White House Correspondents' Association. CNN's Ed Henry has come out in favor over "gentlemanly reasons". Whether it's Shirley Sherrod, ACORN, Van Jones, or the latest smear of the day, we need to tell the White House Correspondents Association that a right-wing propaganda outlet shouldn't get to sit in Helen Thomas' seat.
Nearly 170,000 have already signed CREDO's action petition. They are faxing and delivering them to board members and the ED. Sign the petition here.
Special note Also, some colleagues working on this are looking for help with certain information. They know the Correspondents' Association meeting has been moved to Sunday, August 1st. We need to know where and when.
We also need suggestions on direct contact info for these members who have a vote and/or influence over the decision:
WHCA Officers 2010-2011
President: David Jackson, USA Today
Vice President: Caren Boah, Reuters
Secretary: Steve Scully, C-SPAN
Treasurer: Doug Mills, New York Times
WHCA Board Members 2010-2011
Carol Lee, Politico
Michale Scherer, Time Magazine
Julie Mason, DC Examiner
Don Gonyea, NPR
Ed Henry, CNN
WHCA Executive Director
Julia Whiston
If you have contact info or suggestions, please drop me an e-mail at adambink AT gmail DOT com.
This could be a really useful victory in efforts to delegitimize FOX. Thanks.
A small announcement- I've joined with Courage Campaign to take over managing their NOMTourTracker.com blog for the next few weeks. It's an outgrowth of Prop8TrialTracker.com to cover anti-gay National Organization for Marriage and their "Summer for Marriage" tour across country which ends in DC on August 15th. Courage Campaign has trackers on the ground exposing NOM and the company they keep with video, photos and audio of their rallies and the counter-protests (which, so far, have outnumbered nearly ever NOM rally in every location). My pieces the last few days can be found here, here, here, and here. This is an especially amazing video of a NOM supporter in Indianapolis, taken by two of our trackers:
Human Rights Campaign and Servicemembers Legal Defense Network are launching a campaign to finish the push on ENDA and DADT. Countdown 2010 is focusing on connecting LGBT Americans and allies to their representatives during the upcoming August recess, a critical period. Check it out.
If you attended Netroots Nation 2010 and loved it as much as I did, you can save money and register early for Netroots Nation 2011 in Minneapolis.
Dick Durbin is asking for votes on which Senate Dem challenger he should chip in towards. I went for Roxanne Conlin in Iowa, a friend of Mike Lux's who I met during Netroots Nation and found out she's been talking about same-sex marriage equality since 1979. Yes, 1979. And signed an amicus brief in favor of equality during the Iowa Supreme Court case. Mike will probably be writing more about her in the months to come.
NYS Senate homophobe majordomo Sen. Ruben Diaz called Fight Back NY, which is targeting Senators who voted against marriage equality, "Nazi-esque" and "the gay Gestapo". Classy. He's got a great challenger, Charlie Ramos. Chip in to FBNY to kick Diaz's rear.
In a fun case of progressive actions aimed at the progressive activists themselves, immigration activists staged a very enlightening action at Netroots Nation. I went through it myself. Watch here.
Several organizations are doing actions relating to getting Elizabeth Warren appointed as head of the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. This of course is another vital action. MoveOn (here and here), Credo Action, and PCCC all have actions on this.
Any additional good actions you've seen land in your inbox or around the web, leave them in the comments.

July 29, 2010 10:13 PM

Republicans fear George Bush's new book could influence the midterms

It's all coming into place. My hope that America would be reminded that the mess our country is in is a direct result of George W. Bush's administration is actually coming true. I know the grand poobahs of the GOP have kept George locked in the basement for almost two years. I was pushing for President Obama and Congress to make a point to tell America that they are trying to clean up the mess they were left with via Bush & Cheney, but they've been ineffective on that front. I've written about it and so have many other bloggers, but who would have thought that it would be Republicans and George Bush himself who would lead the charge? The Atlantic: "Monumentally bad timing." According to former Bush aide Matt Latimer, that's the Republican reaction to the news that former president George W. Bush will release his memoir, Decision Points, the week after the 2010 midterm elections. Yes, the races will be decided by the time the book hits stores, but as with any major print release, a slew of excerpts are sure to be leaked in the weeks prior to Nov. 2. Latimer gives his take on The Daily Beast, reporting on Democrats who are "gleeful" at the news, Republicans who are on the fence about it, and what Bush himself might be thinking: The former president, who I knew to be an often "misunderestimated" politician, may indeed think his book will help his party--by setting the record straight. (There are parts of that record that can use some plain old Texas clarifyin'.) Undoubtedly some people will look more kindly on the Bush years now than they did at the time, particularly on national security. But the problem is that Bush himself will not be able to make his case before the elections. As with most high-profile books, W. will likely be embargoed from talking until his book is released--far too late to change the minds of any voters. I love this reaction to the news that the Bush Memoirs are being released in November: One prominent conservative compared the Bushies' public-relations savvy to LeBron James. Last night a fan at a Cleveland/Yankee game had to be escorted out of the stadium because he wore a LeBron Miami Heat jersey in Cleveland. Here's the reaction. I hope this is the same reaction Americans will have to 'The Bush Book Bomb." In the meantime, if the Obama administration has their way in the media, the weeks before the election could be about revisiting issues the party still has nightmares about: Why didn't we find WMD in Iraq? Did the Bush administration drop the ball on Afghanistan? What did the administration do to stave off the collapse of our economy? Was Alan Greenspan right that the Bush-led Republicans "deserved to lose"? Not to mention Katrina and "Heckuva job, Brownie" and prisoner-abuse scandals and on and on—discussed by the same cast of characters from Rove to Perino to Gillespie who presided when Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Barack Obama came to power in the first place. How soon will it be before Rahm Emanuel and James Carville circulate excerpts of Decision Points to major media outlets to get that conversation started? Maybe they'll even co-host the former president's book party. My hope is that Meet The Press, Face The Nation, FAUX News Sunday, This Week and many others will have George Bush on for a lengthy interview so he can taut his book. Keep your fingers crossed.

July 29, 2010 10:00 PM

This week's progressive online action round-up

July 29, 2010 10:00 PM

House Ethics Committee Reaches a Deal With Charles Rangel -- Maybe

The news surrounding the pending congressional ethics trial of Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) is all quite confusing. Despite reports that he has reached a settlement in the case, the House Ethics committee moved forward with his trial. According to Reuters: People familiar with the talks say representatives of New York Democrat Charles Rangel and lawyers for the House ethics committee have reached a plea deal in his ethics case. However, committee members have not agreed to the settlement. It was not immediately clear how many of the 13 charges of ethical violations Rangel agreed to accept. The committee did meet, and the charges against Rep. Rangel were read. A full copy can be read here (PDF). There are some eyebrow-raising charges, including a failure to report $600,000 of income on his congressional disclosure statements, along with rental income from a Dominican Republic property he purchased in 2005. This sequence on pages 11-12 got my attention: 78. In April 2008, Respondent met with CCNY officials and AIG officials (the "AIG meeting"), including Edward "Ned" Cloonan, a federally-registered lobbyist, regarding the Rangel Center. The briefing memo prepared for Respondent by CCNY stated the objective of the meeting was to "close $10M gift for the Rangel Center to create AIG Hall." 79. At the AIG meeting, a potential donation to the Rangel Center was discussed. AIG raised concerns about a potential donation, including the potential headline risk. Respondent asked AIG, at least twice, what was necessary to get this done. Seriously? AIG? In 2008? As the ethics report points out, AIG lobbied members of the House of Representatives on income tax issues, free trade issues and treaty issues. As head of the Ways and Means Committee, Rangel stepped way out of line when he undertook dealings with Verizon, AIG, Nabors Industries and others. That should be enough right there. Will there be a trial? I'm guessing here, but I think the deal may involve a public release and reading of the charges, and his admission to the understatements of income on his disclosure statements. Ultimately, the charges are damning enough on their face to disgrace him. After all, if the Democrats want to point the finger at Newt Gingrich, Dick Armey, et al, then Charlie Rangel surely must also be a target, particularly with the evidence against him. Charlie Rangel is 80 years old. He's been in Congress since 1971. At some point, his desire for a "legacy" outweighed any sense of ethics he had. So much of these charges center around his apparent need to have the Rangel Center become reality that he used his stationery, his station and evidently traded his soul for it. It's not a day to celebrate, but I am glad to see it coming to light. If Democrats are smart, they'll point to the fact that at least they're cleaning out the rotten apples, whereas the Republicans double down and let the Vitters and Ensigns rot in the barrel along with everything else. It's about the best outcome there is, given that Charlie Rangel really doesn't have much of a defense for these charges.

July 29, 2010 09:00 PM

Proof positive: Unemployment benefits NOT a work disincentive

Ordinarily, a bad economy is bad for the party in power. This is far and away the greatest factor working against Democrats in the mid-terms. But the GOP's outright hostility to the unemployed may turn out to be a key factor in muting that effect.

It's a bit strange how things are suddenly moving quickly on this front after uninsurance benefits finally passed the Senate. This morning, Greg Sargent wrote a post, "The 'Let Them Eat Want Ads' Caucus", which began:

Let's call it the "Let Them Eat Want Ads" Caucus -- those candidates and public officials who argue that unemployment benefits are problematic because they discourage people from seeking jobs.
And let's add another Republican to that caucus: Candidate Michele Rollins, who's running for Mike Castle's open House seat in Delaware.
Rollins, who's running in a contested race against green technology exec John Carney, was asked by a constituent if she would have voted to extend unemployment benefits. She suggested she wouldn't, claiming that "for someone who hasn't worked in two years" it's "pretty hard to get energized to go back and look for a job."

In followup, Rollins denied blaming the unemployed for being lazy, but then did a 180 (probably without realizing it--these folks aren't terribly bright):

But Rollins did tell her constituent that giving people benefits risks ensuring that people "will continue to do nothing." And she's only the latest to make this claim. Sharron Angle suggested that the unemployed were getting "spoiled" by benefits, though she later backtracked. Senators Richard Burr and GOP Senate candidate Ron Johnson, who's challenging Russ Feingold, have also argued that unemployment benefits discourage job-seeking. If I've missed others, let me know

Then this afternoon, Greg posted another installment. But before getting into it, I want to share a video--which Greg linked to--of a presentation by economist Raj Chetty showing that unemployment benefits are not a disincentive to finding work. It's true that they look like a disincentive for low-wage workers, Chetty shows, but this effect goes away for those with more savings. The best explanation: it's not a disincentive effect, but a cash-on-hand effect, which moves people somewhat out of panic mode, so that they do things like spend more time with their kids. And to prove his point, he looks at foreign data showing that lump-sum cash payments (which by definition don't continue over time) have the same sort of effect:

Okay, so here's Greg's second post of the day on the subject, "GOP House candidate: Extending UI benefits is 'European'", which contained the linke to the video:

Okay, we have another Republican applying for membership in the "Let Them Eat Want Ads" Caucus.
GOPer Scott Bruun, a state representative in Oregon who's running to unseat Dem Rep. Kurt Schrader, told a local radio program that extending unemployment benefits beyond two years is "European," adding that an extension would bring "shame on our government" for "encouraging" joblessness.
Asked by KPAM radio host Victoria Taft whether he would have supported extending benefits, Bruun responded that he wouldn't have:
"When we're talking up over close to two years and longer with jobless benefits, I think we really start talking about a European style system and all the problems that that sort of system brings if you try to bring that sort of system to the United States."

A bit later, Bruun said that we have to adopt a new approach to those who have been receiving benefits for a long time:
"We need sort of a new game plan going forward, a new accountability. Shame on our government, if you will, if the government is in a position where we're encouraging people to stay out of the workplace longer."

This comes after Michele Rollins, a GOP Congressional candidate in Delaware, was caught on tape saying that if people get unemployment benefits extended, they "will continue to do nothing for a very long time."....

It should be noted that there's empirical evidence that economics students are more selfish and "economically rational" than those who haven't been exposed to economics as a "science". Given how much Republicans wallow in this sort of theory-heavy, data-poor kind of "scientific" worldview/fantasy, it might well be the case that hard-core Republicans do show some such effect. After all, we already know that they can't be bothered to come up with anything in way of solutions. So why wouldn't they be every bit as lazy and good-for-nothing as they imagine everyone else is?

July 29, 2010 09:00 PM

Swanks Two Of For Price The One

Good news, flock! Pastor J. Grant Swank, Jr. has recovered from his semi-annual stroke and is churning out aphasia-soaked columns again! We’ll midrash two of ‘em shortly, but first a word from our sponsor:

ABOVE: Delicious when served with White Deviled Eggs

Now then, first up is a bodice-ripping yarn from the good pastor:

I’m in love with Intelligent Design

By Grant Swank

I am in love with Intelligent Design.

Is that not a hoot?

And a holler, Pastor Swank! Let’s imagine how this boy-meets-debunked-Creationist-stealth-campaign story played out.

Swank catches Intelligent Design on the rebound after it was dumped by Ben Stein, who had decided to replace it with a younger trophy theory with more junk science in the trunk. Swank, gentleman that he is, doesn’t try to cop a feel until the third date. Intelligent Design, sensing its theological clock ticking and giving up hope on holding out for Kirk Cameron, consents to marriage just a few short weeks later. Swank is over the moon, but as the wedding date approaches, ID begins to sense that he’s too clingy and grows increasingly distant. It all ends rather badly when Intelligent Design has to resort to a restraining order against an increasingly unhinged Swank, whose angry, profanity-laced voice messages are leaked to Beliefnet and the world is stunned to hear the once-beloved pastor demanding that ID give him a blow job or he’ll burn down the Discovery Institute.

Those pro-God have to walk on eggs because they are considered dumb if they use the word ‘God’.

Also if they fuck up the phrase ‘walk on eggshells’.

Therefore, they have coined Intelligent Design in hopes of squeezing in various nitches.

‘Nitches’ are what you catch to win the game in Retarded Quidditch.

As for myself, I have fallen in love with Intelligent Design so that He has secreted to me His real name. It is ‘God’.

God secretions would get anybody hot under the collar. Oh yeah, baby! Felch the controversy!

Moving on, we are horrified to learn of an ‘atrocity’ that recently transpired at the Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine:

Muslims front row, Christians to the basement

By Grant Swank

Muslim mats available in the hospital chapel.

Torahs available for the Jews.

Christians could not find a Bible in the chapel. However, traditionally Bibles have been there on the back shelf.

(Clutches pearls, faints)

‘Well, Christians can walk across the hall to the chaplain’s office and ask for a Bible.’ That is what the chaplain’s secretary told me when I phoned about this intolerable situation.

Wait, that’s the payoff? Obama didn’t order the chapel stripped of Bibles or something? To get a Bible, you just had to walk across the freaking hall? Swank’s sputtered out some craaaaazy shit in his day, but freaking out about the book-shelving arrangement at a hospital chapel may be the craziest.

Muslims get front row seats. Christians are slid into the basement.

Technically, no. They have to walk across the hall, you see … oh, never mind.

‘This is not going to happen,’ I said. ‘Christians are demoted while Islamics are treated like royalty. Not.’

Pastor Swank watched Wayne’s World for the first time last week.

I phoned the religion editor at the Portland Press Herald and told him the discrimination against Christians and the elevating of Muslims at the hospital chapel.

I phone TV Channel Six with the same data.

The nervous giggling you heard on the other end of the line was them agreeing with you, Pastor.

Later that day I drove to the hospital, walked into the chapel and there were six Bibles of varying translations lying out in plain sight on the back shelf, per traditional usual.

There were several more Bible standing on their ends at the left hand of the shelf.

There was the pulpit Bible on the lectern.

In a silver framed picture frame was a letter from Jesus positioned neatly at the far right hand shelf. Many have read this letter from Jesus for it has become popular as a devotional read.

So not only was there an assload of Bibles in the chapel, but there were other Christian objects displayed prominently? We can see why you were so upset.

What had happened is that a friend of mine was admitted this week to the hospital for open heart surgery. He was rushed there and therefore had no time to get his personal Bible.

When in his room, an acquaintance of mine noted that the patient had no Bible. She went to the chapel to pick up a copy for his use in his room. No Bibles! But instead there were Muslim prayer mats and copies of the Torah. However, no Bibles!

Okay, this sort of explains what happened. Maybe next time you can put the bits of the story in proper chronological order — instead of doing this weird Pulp Fiction thing where the first thing we see is you harassing some poor secretary over the phone, then it cuts back to Jesus stabbing Mary Magdalene in the heart with an adrenaline shot the day before and then fast-forward to a scene where Yahweh walks in on Allah taking a shit and shoots him dead.

So she walked to the front of the chapel, lifted the huge copy from the lectern and exited the chapel. It ended up in the patient’s room — unwieldy copy but nevertheless a Bible. She was determined that the hospital provide the patient with God’s Word.

So the moral of the story is: If you ever get sick, steal the only Bible in the hospital chapel for your own use and sic a crazy pastor on local media.

When I learned about this atrocity I made a speedy phone call to the chaplain’s office per above conversation.

Do you not just love that this flap over literally nothing is characterized as an ‘atrocity’?

The end result was the hospital put out an all-hospital alarm for the missing chapel pulpit Bible, finally retrieving it.

Good Lord, man! Your friend STOLE the missing chapel pulpit Bible! Yet you write about it here as if it was an event of unknown provenance — and apparently you didn’t even have the decency to just tell them it was in your other friend’s room, instead making a bunch of people scurry around looking for it! Why, it’s almost as if the root cause of this whole ‘atrocity’ was you and your crazy pals!

One suspects that Pastor Swank won’t be satisfied until the Maine Medical Center is torn down and rebuilt entirely out of Bibles.

July 29, 2010 08:03 PM

Tea Partying 'patriots' ginning themselves up for a shooting war -- and GOP politicians are on board

DOWNLOADS: (361) PLAYS: (1716) Nicholas Phillips at the Riverfront Times takes note of this YouTube video from a Tea Party/Patriot movement outfit calling itself Don't Tread On Me, which apparently is planning a movie documenting the "Patriot uprising" against President Obama and the eeeeeeevil Marxist/socialist/fascist Democrats. Among the featured guests on the video are a couple of Missouri Republican House legislators: Rep. Cynthia Davis, who you may remember for her proclamation that "hunger can be a motivating force", which is why we shouldn't give kids school lunches; and Rep. Brian Nieves, who got some attention earlier this month for his goofy political demanding Obama and Muslims "leave us alone". The theme of the video is that eventually, "patriots" are going to have to take up arms against the eeeeeevil Democrats. Nieves, for instance, intones: Thirty years from now, somebody's going to ask you what you did during the patriot uprising. Davis adds: We're drawing the line in the sand and saying, 'This is our territory.' But hey, those Tea Partiers are just normal, sane people who only want to advocate for fiscal restraint. Right? Right? Digby has more.

July 29, 2010 08:00 PM

Biggest mistake of the Obama admin? Not getting rid of the filibuster

In a quick discussion of a New York Times article about a pending shift in Federal Reserve culture toward expansionary monetary policies, Matthew Yglesias states:

The President's failure to make these nominations and secure their confirmation in a timely manner will, in retrospect, prove to have been his biggest mistake.

This is certainly possible. The President's failure to change the culture at the Fed by filling these vacancies earlier may well prove to be his biggest mistake. The dire condition of the economy is by far the top political problem facing the Obama administration.

Taking more effective action to reduce, in the short-term, the economic grief facing most Americans would have resulted in a very different political environment than the one Democrats now face. This means a larger stimulus, a foreclosure reduction program that actually reduces foreclosures, tackling Wall Street reform in the Spring of 2009, or appointing a different set of economic advisors (ie, not Summers and Geithner), are all contenders for the biggest mistake, alongside the failure to change the culture of the Fed.

But really, going back further, not allowing Republicans to destroy the filibuster back in 2005 is the biggest mistake made by not only President Obama, but by the Democratic trifecta as a whole (and, I admit, my biggest mistake too). This would have resulted in a wide swatch of changes, including a larger stimulus, the Employee Free Choice Act, a better health bill (in all likelihood, one with a public option, and completed in December), an actual climate / energy bill, a second stimulus, and more. If Democrats had tacked on other changes to Senate rules that sped up the process, such as doing away with unanimous consent, ending debating time after cloture is achieved on nominations, eliminating the two days between filing for cloture and voting on cloture, and restricting quorum calls, then virtually every judicial and administration vacancy would already be filled, as well.

Playing the "what if" game can be painful, because there is no way to go back in time and change what happened. However, it is also useful in that it gives us a roadmap on how to do better in the future. In this case, that means focusing our efforts on changing Senate rules for the next Congress. Right now, it is hard to imagine any more important effort in order to achieve more effective governance.

July 29, 2010 08:00 PM

Jim DeMint endorses Dino Rossi in Washington State

South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint has endorsed former Washington state Sen. Dino Rossi. AP Photo South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint will throw his support to former Washington state Sen. Dino Rossi's Senate bid today, the latest in a series of endorsements in contested intraparty squabbles by the rising conservative icon. "When I met with Dino a couple months ago, he made it clear he was only interested in running if Republicans were serious about saving our country from fiscal collapse," DeMint will say in announcing the endorsement. "I've studied his record and his positions on the key issues, and it's clear that he will stand up to the establishment in both parties." The formal endorsement comes from DeMint's Senate Conservatives Fund, which collected better than $2 million in the first six months of the year. DeMint allies believe they can raise upwards of $500,000 for Rossi's candidacy. In backing

Dino Rossi - Washington - United States Senate - United States - Republican

July 29, 2010 07:24 PM

DOJ Pushing to Expand Warrantless Access to Internet Records

This morning's Washington Post reveals that the Department Of Justice has been pressuring Congress to expand its power to obtain records of Americans' private Internet activity through the use of National Security Letters (NSLs).

NSLs, you may remember, are one of the most powerful and frightening tools of government surveillance to be expanded by the Patriot Act. These letters allow the FBI to secretly demand data from phone companies and internet service providers about the private communications of ordinary citizens. The letters include a gag order, which forbids recipients from ever revealing the letters' existence to their coworkers, their friends, or even to their family members, much less the public.

The gag order and the lack of oversight make this power ripe for abuse. Indeed, the FBI's systemic abuse of this power was confirmed both by a Department Of Justice investigation and in documents obtained by EFF through Freedom of Information Act litigation. Yet, in the years since that abuse became publicly known, there has been no reform of the law governing NSLs.

Now, the DOJ is asking Congress to pass vague and broad new language meant to expand the kinds of data that can be acquired through NSLs. This morning's Washington Post article suggests that the new language could allow access to detailed web browsing history, search history, location information, or even Facebook friend requests.

Considering the FBI's dismal record on surveillance abuses, this is a stunning and brazen request. They're asking Congress to reward bad behavior by allowing even more bad behavior. We're hoping that Congress will have the courage and integrity to turn them down. Keep reading Deeplinks for more news on this as it develops.

July 29, 2010 07:13 PM

Walter Shapiro Yells At Those Blogger Kids To Get The Hell Off His Lawn

Longtime political reporter Walter Shapiro thinks it's time for another bloggers ethics panel. Because those horrible, horrible bloggers are posting erroneous stories just to beat the news cycle! (Bad, bad bloggers!)

Choosing bluster over blushing, Breitbart told Matt Lewis in a Politics Daily interview: "I couldn't wait to get this story. I knew from past experience that I had a news cycle to get this out." Later in the interview, Breitbart underscored his cavalier publish-or-perish approach to fact-checking: "It had to be done at the exact moment in time that the press would notice it." A new report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism details how the Sherrod charade migrated from conservative blogs taking their cues from Breitbart to Fox News and then to CNN.

Breitbart is just a symbol of a larger problem that transcends the poison-pen politics of ideological warriors (of both the right and left) and the slippery ethics of the blogosphere. We have collectively blundered into a P.T. Barnum media age when being first trumps being accurate. The economic rewards of the Internet flow to those who win the search-engine wars by being fast and furious rather than to those laggards who wait to be accurate and comprehensive. It is as if the motto of today's journalism has become: "He who dies with the most clicks wins."

Every second, we are mentally assaulted by hyperbolic cable TV "breaking news" alerts, data bursts and Twitter trivia. Meaning and context disappear amid the bite-sized news nuggets. In the world of politics, every new poll, TV ad and opposition-research press release is treated as a game changer on par with Newt Gingrich handing down the Contract With America from Mount Sinai. If everything is equally important, then simultaneously everything is equally unimportant.

I have to wonder: Did Walter Shapiro simply sleep through the Whitewater "scandal" that was freshly fueled every single day by the New York Times? Yeah, I get his point. I think the news cycle does drive inaccuracy. But bloggers didn't invent this "go-go" news mentality, they only learned to take advantage of it. Even the voracious cable networks didn't invent it - they only sped it up.

Clutching your pearls and pointing to "ideological warriors" isn't going to solve the problem. (I mean, you're pointing to Newt's Contract On America as a "game changer" when it was really a bunch of meaningless blather. What made it a "game changer" was the relentless repetition by the Beltway bobbleheads. They kept talking about it as if it were meaningful, and so people began to take it seriously.)

But the biggest factor is that the corporations that own and direct news organizations care only about the bottom line. It's to their benefit to hype news as much as possible. That gets more viewers, more viewers means higher ratings, and higher ratings mean more lucrative ad sales.

As much as I can't stand this amoral man, Andrew Breitbart isn't the problem. He's only a con man who's learned how to game this sick corporate culture. If the news business weren't so eager to chase every ad dollar (remember, once upon a time, network news operated at a loss and was considered to be a public service) and to curry favor with corporate conservatives, they wouldn't be so eager to bite at every juicy fabrication tossed their way by the likes of Breitbart.

Fox News? They're in a category by themselves. They jump at everything and don't care all that much if it's accurate -- just as long as it makes Democrats look bad. After all, that's why they exist.

Oh, and Walter? As a rule of thumb, liberal bloggers aren't the ones with the "slippery ethics." If you weren't using that lazy "he said, she said" tactic and throwing false equivalence into a story to appear "fair," you'd know that liberal bloggers, perhaps even more than the corporate journalists, actually try to get the facts straight. (Even though most of us aren't getting a paycheck to do so.) We don't manufacture stories out of whole cloth, nor do we knowingly twist and distort facts. (*cough* Judy Miller *cough*)

That's because the corporate news media has much higher standards for vetting anything liberals tell them. When a conservative blogger plants a "factual" smear, all he or she has to do to get it out there and then whine that the biased "liberal media" won't pick up their story! (See "New Black Panthers".)

Meanwhile, liberal bloggers get attacked simply for having opinions and sharing them with each other -- even though we are opinion writers. (See the difference?)

If you were doing your job, you wouldn't need me to tell you that. You'd already know. Instead, you sound like Grandpa Simpson, yelling at those damned blogger kids to get the hell off your lawn.

July 29, 2010 07:00 PM

The hidden manufacturing consensus

One of most impressive things I ran into at Netroots Nation was a poll on manufacturing conducted for the Alliance for American Manufacturing by the Melman Group. I'll have more to say about the poll tomorrow--and my link here is by way of a heads up for those who just don't want to wait. But right now, I just want to share one chart from the entire presentation, because it helps to illustrate a very important point: despite decades of neglect by our political leaders in Versailles, the issue of manufacturing jobs as a core national necessity has as much salience as any of the favorite Versaille issues of the moment. And here are the figures to prove it:

Of course there's no doubt that "Creating manufacturing jobs" gets a boost from the even more popular "Creating jobs". But look at "Strenghtening manufacturing in the country," which is lower down in the "most important", but second only to "Creating jobs" in the total of "most important" and "very important". Now some of the other top-rated issues are basically just long-time conservative issues, products of decades of hegemonic warfare, pushed forward in the absence of any coherent progressive counter-narratives.

But that's all the more reason to take note of the importance of manufacturing--not least because it strikes such a contrary note to the predeclictions of the neo-liberals, whose current dominance of the Obama Administration is proving so damaging for the Democrats, who really ought to be cementing their dominance for the next forty years right now.

As I said, I'll have more to say about manufacturing in light of this poll tomorrow. But let this serve as a clarion call--this is key to how we move forward in asserting an economic politics of inclusion, a politics that's bottom-up and works for everyone, not just for those who think they can talk such a good game.

July 29, 2010 07:00 PM

Welcome to the Republican Tea Party

How refreshing to see an effort to actually hold Republicans accountable for their nasty, selfish attitudes toward fellow citizens. The Democrats have an answer to the Republicans' effort to craft a new "Contract With America".

Behold, the Republican Tea Party Contract ON America, where Democrats are prepared to remind the country of what Republicans have been up to this year.

Contract high points include:

Repeal the Affordable Care Act (Health Insurance Reform)
Put insurance companies back in charge, repeal tax credits for small businesses, allow insurance companies to deny coverage based on preexisting conditions and to drop coverage when a person gets too sick and make prescription drugs for seniors less affordable.
Privatize Social Security or phase it out altogether

Turn the guaranteed retirement benefits of America's seniors over to Wall Street CEOs by putting Social Security at risk in the stock market or, as some Republicans have called for, phase out Social Security altogether and end a program millions of American seniors rely on for their survival.
End Medicare as it presently exists
Phase out and end Medicare as it presently exists for future generations of seniors -- ending Medicare's guaranteed healthcare benefits for more than 40 million American seniors -- and replace it with a voucher system which will result in higher premiums and fewer services for seniors.
Extend the Bush tax breaks for the wealthy and big oil
At a cost of nearly $700 billion, extend the Bush tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans and big oil, which are set to expire and which have and will continue to explode the federal budget deficit.
Repeal Wall Street Reform
Roll back the toughest consumer protections ever enacted, allow banks to continue to grow too big to fail, and ensure that predatory lenders continue to utilize their most abusive practices.
Protect those responsible for the oil spill and future environmental catastrophes

Cap liabilities for those responsible for environmental disasters like the Gulf oil spill and let companies like BP decide which victims deserve compensation for the disaster and what the timeline for relief should be.
Abolish the Department of Education
Put the big banks back in charge of student loans and put an end to federal assistance for public schools.
Abolish the Department of Energy
End America's investments in a clean-energy future and disband the organization responsible for oversight of nuclear materials.
Abolish the Environmental Protection Agency
Gut the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act -- which together protect our kids from air pollution and keep drinking water safe -- and disband the watchdog that holds polluters accountable.
Repeal the 17th Amendment
Take away your right to pick your U.S. Senator

That's what they've promised. Not just a walk back to the Bush years, a walk back to another century. Perhaps they could repeal the Emancipation Proclamation, too.

July 29, 2010 06:00 PM

Daily Fix Poll: President Obama on "The View"

President Barack Obama's appearance on "The View" today drew all sorts of reaction. Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell (D) compared the daily chat show -- featuring Barbara Walters, Whoopi Goldberg, Elizabeth Hasselbeck, Joy Behar and Sherri Shephard -- to "The Jerry Springer Show", adding: "I think the president of the United States has to go on serious shows." CBS News anchor Katie Couric took the opposite view; "Daytime television viewers may be exactly who President Obama needs to reach," she said. With opinion so divided over whether Obama should have appeared and why he did, it seemed like the perfect topic for our Daily Fix Poll. Vote below! (Yesterday's Daily Fix Poll winner? Forty four percent of you think five or six women will win governors races this fall.)

Barack Obama - View - Barbara Walters - Joy Behar - Whoopi Goldberg

July 29, 2010 06:00 PM

Countdown, Maddow show highlight more on Obama's self-inflicted wounds

Segments on Countown and The Rachel Maddow Show last night--guest hosts on both--highlighted significant self-inflicted wounds by the Obama Administration that serve to undermine the narrative of a "deeply progressive" president who only delivers so little because of intransigent GOP opposition in the Senate. On Countdown there was the revelation that EPA staffers had been politically over-ruled in their objections to letting BP use oil dispersents that actually do more harm than good. And The Rachel Maddow Show highlighted news from the Washington Post about a sharp increase in deportation rates under the Obama Administration.

First, the Countdown segment, with Larry O'Donnell interviewing EPA senior staffer Hugh Kaufman:

O`DONNELL: Today is day 100 of the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico, and a whistle-blower has come forth from the Environmental Protection Agency, charging the EPA with helping BP to downplay the environmental impact of its supposed cleanup efforts.... EPA senior policy analyst, Hugh Kaufman, is a veteran and legend of the agency, having had a hand in Love Canal and the creation of the Superfund and helped expose the EPA cover-up of air quality at ground zero. Mr. Kaufman, what should we know about the dispersants used in the Gulf that the EPA isn`t telling us?
KAUFMAN: Well, first of all, the dispersants mixed with the oil and the water is extremely toxic. Sweden has done studies on this. Israel has done studies on this. And the only real purpose of using so many dispersants with the oil was to cover up the volume of oil that was released from that well. So, that and lying about how much is coming out was a mechanism to help BP save billions of dollars in fines.
O`DONNELL: Should they have not used dispersants at all?
KAUFMAN: That`s correct. If they did not use dispersants, they would have been able to get most of that oil off of the surface and would not have endangered all of the fish and ecosystem underneath the water that now will be affected for decades on down the line. I was listening to some of the, quote, "experts" who are being paid by BP at universities who are saying that the oil has disappeared. It hasn`t disappeared. It`s throughout thousands of square miles in the Gulf, mixed with dispersants, and because the temperatures down there are so cold, they`re going to be around for decades.

This is not really surprising, since it was reported at the time that the dispersents were banned in Europe because of their toxicity. Put that together with the information we've reported from Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) about how staffers at a number of agencies continue fighting political battles similar to those during the Bush years, and this hardly comes as a surprise. But it's surely a disappointment. No matter what type of spin they try to put on it, the Obama Administration's closeness and deference to BP has clearly visible, and clearly damaging to the President politically--for absolutely no good reason. Now we're getting an even clearer picture of how much it has cost--and that cost will only grow larger and clearer in the years ahead.

The interview continued, on the subject of what went on within the EPA & the administration:

O`DONNELL: Now, were you and others at the EPA making this case within the system, that -- arguing that we shouldn`t be using dispersants there? And what was the response?
KAUFMAN: Well, the working level troops in research, some of the toxicologists who have experience and education, were trying to get management to pay attention to the data that EPA had and has had for decades, but to no avail. There was a political decision made to let BP take the lead as opposed to the government being proactive, as we used to be.
O`DONNELL: Now, when you say a political decision, are you saying that that decision was made by EPA administer, Lisa Jackson, a Barack Obama appointee? Or was it made outside of the EPA?
KAUFMAN: The decision was made outside of the EPA, by political appointees. But I don`t have the vision to see how high up that was made. My vision is limited, because I`m in the middle of the bureaucracy.

Openness? Transparency? Accountability? Reality-based policy-making? What happened to all that good stuff?

Note that none of that is--supposedly at least--inherently liberal or progressive. It's supposed to be just plain Civics 101 and common sense. Yet, here we are with an EPA acting more like Bush was still in office than a Democrat.

And speaking of Bush, in a segment called "Deporter in Chief", Chris Hayes, sitting in for Rachel Maddow, picked up on the Washington Post story "Deportation of illegal immigrants increases under Obama administration".

Here's Hayes, in one of the best on-air commentaries he's made to date:

The "papers, please" law in Arizona may be at the center of the national immigration debate, but there's another immigration story that you really need to know about. it's being obscured by all the screaming election year hyperbole surrounding this issue, but it's both politically significant and frankly pretty shocking. It's the story about the Obama Administration and deportation. the Obama Administration is deporting substantially more people than the Bush Administration did. they're actually changing immigration enforcement policy so they can kick more people out of the country. As a matter of fact, President Obama is expected to deport 10% more people this year than President Bush deported in 2008.
Now, officially, the Obama deportation policy is focused not on undocumented immigrants who are otherwise law-abiding citizens, but on those who commit crimes while they're here. But the Washington Post reports this week that President Obama has been presented with evidence that thousands of ordinary illegal immigrants continue to be targeted and deported often for minor violations. And an advocate for day laborers tells the Post that the Obama policy has created, quote, "a huge drag net and it's structural. basically, it's anyone they can get their hands on"....
Deportation is the most heavy-handed way of dealing with the immigration problem in this country. It has a massive potential for splitting up families and otherwise inflicting misery on people who don't have any good options in this world. And it's a way of treating the symptoms of illegal immigration rather than the causes. So that's why it's bad policy. But the politics are even worse. Because no amount of deportation short of 100% will satisfy the people the President appears to be pandering to with this policy shift. For one thing, most people vehemently opposed to current immigration levels haven't even noticed he's deporting more people than President Bush, because they don't get their news from the so-called "lame stream media". But even if they're aware of the change, they don't to be in a big hurry to admit it. It does not in any way involve giving the president credit for all that old-fashioned law enforcement. Let me read here from the script. Steve King said of the President, "The President doesn't want to enforce immigration law, because he's vehemently opposed to those laws." It goes on.
Now, here's the thing, not only is he alienating the people who are already -- not only has the President decided to pander to people who are not going to support him anyway, but he's alienating the crucial bloc that won him the 2008 election. It was Latino voter's twinge toward president Obama in 2008 that provided the margin of victory in many swing states. and if you're the White House right now looking at polling data about approval data for the president, you're very scared. just months ago, the president's approval rating among latinos was coming in at 79%. it's now down to 55%. When the midterms come this fall and the Latinos decide to stay home because they're seeing people deported every day, the White House is going to have no one to punish but itself.

Why does Obama to pander to people he can't possibly succeed with? What makes him such a terrible panderer? It's his ideology, stupid! He believes as a matter of faith that if he just panders long and hard enough, eventually "men of goodwill" on the other side will just have to see what a swell guy he is--even though such men do not actually exist. Verily, so strong is his faith that his pandering will single-handedly call them into being! And then they can sit down and make beautiful "grand bargain" music together.

You know he used to smoke pot. So did millions more of us. Used moderately, it's less problematic than alcohol.

But this sort of behavior suggests he sniffed glue, too. And that stuff really messes you up.

July 29, 2010 05:30 PM

BREAKING: Shirley Sherrod plans to sue Andrew Breitbart for defamation

That loud PLOP you just heard was Andrew Breitbart crapping a brick at this news: Ousted Agriculture Department employee Shirley Sherrod says she will sue a conservative blogger who posted an edited video of her making racially tinged remarks last week. Sherrod made the announcement Thursday in San Diego at the National Association of Black Journalists annual convention. This is long overdue; frankly, I always felt that both Van Jones and ACORN officials should have sued Fox and/or Breitbart after they were smeared, just so that they will think twice before smearing other people in the future. So Sherrod will be carrying the burden forward for many of us on the progressive left who have been victimized by these crooks and liars. Attoney Michael Yaki at City Brights thinks so too: Defamation law clearly puts Breitbart in a tough position. He deliberately aired a video that was edited in a way to put Sherrod in a very bad light. Breitbart even said on Fox News that the purpose of the tape was to show that racism existed in the NAACP, even though the speech Sherrod gave was precisely the opposite -- it was about overcoming prejudice and stereotypes. Before the tape, Sherrod was not a public figure for whom a higher legal threshold of "actual malice" would be required, though in this case it would be hard to say that malice or a reckless disregard to the truth wasn't present. Fox, by way of offering Breitbart a forum, may be similarly at risk. Under the "republication" doctrine, Fox may be as liable as Breitbart for recklessly running (and rerunning) the doctored footage. There is no excuse for those liberals who so quickly threw Sherrod under the bus without the benefit of hearing her side of the story. But while inexcusable, the fact remains that but for Andrew Breitbart, who deliberately manufactured this story and dressed it up with racist overtones, people today would have no idea who Shirley Sherrod is or what she does. And she'd still be at her old job. Sometimes in the law you get the perfect test case. Shirley Sherrod's high tech railroading by Breitbart offers an unprecedented opportunity to make an example of the right wing's repeated distortion and discoloration of the facts. At the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights I've watched my right-wing colleagues and their media friends misrepresent and inflame the paltry facts that constitute the New Black Panther Party investigation. But while my conservative colleagues flail around like psychotic berserkers in the Panther proceedings, they have yet to cause collateral damage to anything but the truth. That is not the case with Ms. Sherrod, who suffered public vilification, private harassment and humiliation, and who was pressured to leave her job.

July 29, 2010 05:00 PM

Fix Clip -N- Save: 'First families' of politics

When the Fix posse -- yes, we have "Fix" tattoos (or we may get them) -- started to ponder who the first family (aka the political dynasty) was in each of the 50 states, we came up with about 10 off the top of our heads. That's where the Fixistas came in. We asked for your suggestions on the first family (or families) in each state and boy did you respond. Our list, which includes at least one family from every state(!) and is culled from reader input, is below. Who did we miss? Send suggestions in via the comments section and we will keep updating our chart. Alabama The Wallaces: The late Gov. George Wallace (D) served as governor for four terms and ran for president four times. (His wife, Lurleen Burns Wallace, also served as governor from 1967 until her death from cancer in 1968.) George Wallace Jr.,

George Wallace - Politics - Alabama - United States - Cancer

July 29, 2010 04:30 PM

Defining Extremism: GOP Opposes Federal Fracking Regs REGARDLESS of Whether EPA Finds Poisoning

As natural gas exploration expands throughout our energy starved nation - from the West and now into the South and Northeast - many folks living in drilling country are rightfully expressing concern that their groundwater may be susceptible to pollution from the fracking fluids that are central to drilling operations. These are very legitimate fears, as HBO's critically acclaimed documentary "Gasland" so graphically shows. And yet, to date, the Republican Party has expressed a rather callous "drill first, never ask questions later" attitude - callous, even for the GOP.

During the Bush years, Republicans managed to legislate an exemption for fracking fluid into the Clean Water Act. Then, Republicans in Congress blocked the proposed FRAC Act, which wouldn't even ban fracking fluid - it would simply require drilling companies to disclose what's in the fluids they are pumping into the earth near critical groundwater supplies. And now, in perhaps the most extreme step yet, Republicans here in Colorado (a state with one of the biggest natural gas reserves in the world) are demanding the Environmental Protection Agency never regulate fracking, regardless of whether or not the agency discovers that fracking is poisoning people.
As the Colorado Independent reports, you just can't make this up:

Eighteen Republican members of the Colorado State Legislature Monday sent a letter (pdf) to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) demanding the federal agency refrain from regulating the natural gas drilling practice of hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," no matter what a two-year EPA study of the process reveals.

In a coincidence that highlights just how extreme the GOP position is, notice that the GOP letter was sent two days after this disturbing dispatch from the Grand Junction Sentinel:

Energy giant agrees to pay record fine
By Dennis Webb
Friday, July 23, 2010
Williams has agreed to pay a record $423,300 fine to resolve a state investigation into a spring-contamination case in which a De Beque man drank benzene-tainted water...
The fine would be the highest ever imposed by the commission for a single incident. The current record is a $390,000 fine handed down by the commission in April against Oxy USA for another case of spring contamination, also northwest of Parachute.

State regulators should be applauded for this catch, but with state budgets so strapped across the country, they clearly should not be the only regulators on the job. Do we really need more Civil Action-like tragedies to teach us that?

According to Republicans who know about the issue (which, incredibly, does not include one proudly ignorant leading Senate candidate), we do. And that cavalier attitude is both immoral and politically dangerous for the GOP. Though the national media has tended to portray debates over drilling as "liberal environmentalists" versus "pro-business conservatives," the fact is that these issues can cut in very unpredictable ways. As I reported back in 2008 for the New York Times magazine, someone living in drilling company may like the energy industry and be a cultural conservative - but that person probably doesn't like the thought of being able to light their tap water on fire, and might not want to vote for politicians who do.

July 29, 2010 04:19 PM

One More Bong Hit and You’ll Summon Bong Hitler

Doop-de-doop, mindin’ my own business.

SusanAnne Hiller, RedState Diaries:
Indeed, Fascism Is Happening in America

Nice try, Hitler. As if you wouldn’t disguise your name.

We’ll play along because what if it isn’t Hitler?

I was reading Michael Zak’s article on Big Government and found his observations rather poignant. Moreover, he reminded me of another book that lays out the plan we are seeing unfold in America. The book, written in 1942 by Stuart Chase, is called “The Road We Are Traveling” and outlines the step by step fascist/socialist plan for America.

I have the plan right here. I’ll unfold it on this table.

Step 16,814: Check and see if we have reached fascism/socialism yet.

Checking. Nope. No, it looks like just ordinary America out there still, without the bunting and the gibbets and the starving dogs with empty eyes hanging around and sometimes fighting viciously over an old shoe sole. There are still white people, or at least that one old white lady over there. People seem clean and well-groomed, as if soap were still legal and it weren’t yet fatal to stand out, e.g. with good hair.

Step 16,815: If we have reached reached fascism/socialism, skip to the final step.

Say, what is the final step, anyway? Let’s go look.

Step 21,109: Profit!

I like that. I’m looking forward to that.

But what if, as I see from looking outside, we have not reached fascism/socialism yet?

Step 16,816: If we have not reached reached fascism/socialism yet, outline the step-by-step plan in another book.

That’ll get them. They’ll never catch onto us that way.

With people coming to terms with Barack Obama’s socialism, this book is important to note.

Heh-heh. Not to read, but definitely to note, sure. Heh-heh. Hidden in books, our plan is safe.

Whoah, what’s that diagram she’s got there? Holy crap, that’s just full of explainy stuff, with the showing-you-things and explaining-how, and yeah, look at that yellow thing there, jeez, with the rate of increase.

Above: We definitely need more ‘Q.’

Chases’s book outlines the plan for the centralization of the US government, which has been succinctly categorized by blogger Republicae:

Let’s see.

Step 16,817: Make Chase’s name plural. Decent Americans will fear him if they think he has them outnumbered.

Check.

Step 16,818: Switch certain copies of Chases’s book with copies of War and Education by Porter Sargent.

In effect. See above link.

Step 16,819: Pluralize Fabian, the 1950s teen idol. Suppress the Frankie Avalons.

And this is ordered at the very moment the Captains and Tennilles have fallen into open war with the Tonies Orlando and Dawnses?

Step 16,820: You will learn fear, ignorant whelp.

Uh, we hear and obey.

In 1942, Stuart Chase, in his book “The Road We Are Traveling” spelled out the system of planning the Fabians had in mind; the interesting thing is to look at that plan in comparison to 2008 America.

1. Strong, centralized government.

2. Powerful Executive at the expense of Congress and the Judicial.

3. Government controlled banking, credit and securities exchange.

4. Government control over employment.

5. Unemployment insurance, old age pensions.

6. Universal medical care, food and housing programs.

7. Access to unlimited government borrowing.

8. A managed monetary system.

9. Government control over foreign trade.

10. Government control over natural energy sources, transportation and agricultural production.

11. Government regulation of labor.

12. Youth camps devoted to health discipline, community service and ideological teaching consistent with those of the authorities.

13. Heavy progressive taxation.

It should be evident that while Socialists no longer use the name that the plan is Socialism at its heart.

Yeah, like your puny 13-step plan can even compete with our 21,109-step one.

You cannot deny that most of these main ideological themes has been achieved by the Left…

We denies it or them.

…as they had 40 years of congressional rule (until 1994) to build the framework for all of this. And now, Obama has, for the most part, completed the list–and the most critical points like the government takeover of health care (which we now know is to control the people).

The question is: will it take another 40 or more years to undo the socialist snookering the Left has played out on the American public?

Since it’s taken them 16 years to start that countdown, we’d have to go with ‘or more.’ Also, what happened to all the New Deal technocrats named Stuart Chases, with their books from 1942? That’s not even counting the actual New…

Step 16,821: Alert! To advance the plot to drive conservatives loopy, you will now refer to Chairman Roosevelt’s landmark social welfare plan as The Nude Eel. Workers were organized through the W.P.U., whose emblem was a skunk grinning and holding its arms out in an apologetic gesture, with a clothespin on its nose. You will tell people to respect the Tennessee Valley Authori-taaah. You are looking for a Bold Nude Erection, and are fed up with Socialism due to all the Rushin’ and Stallin’. You will prepare to mess with Texas.

Who writes these? The Bold Nude Erection keeps getting reused as if no one will notice.

Is socialist snookering when players get tired of paying a petit-bourgeois bar owner for the use of a table, and organize a players’ collective to purchase one of their own? Can we have some socialist Optima Onlining? I’m tired of paying for that shit, thx. What about poloing? Do you need ponies for that, or just in the water kind? I’m tired of seeing those shirts with the little Ralph Lauren guy on them everywhere, thx. Hi, wait — what even is pinochle, okay? Card game? Is it like bridge, and if so, why do people make fun of it? The name is a little funny, but what’s really funny is ‘golf’ if you say the word ‘golf’ a few times.

No, pinochle: Did people in the ’50s and ’60s just get a kick out of saying ‘peen?’ Is that why it was funny for those people when Don Rickles called someone a ‘hockey puck?’ Was that secret early-’60s rhyming slang for ‘cocky fuck?’

Oh, never mind.

The American voter must beware of the guise of good will that the Democrats push–it’s like a drug and is intoxicating during elections.

Stop pushing that guise, you, uh, pushy guys. Say, you know what’s annoying? Golf, golf, golf, heh-heh. No, it’s trying to fold this socialist plan back up, and it’s accordioning nicely over here, but then the folds there are going in the other direction, and then you get it mostly packed in a rectangle except there’s a section sticking out from the middle, and it’s like, Hell with this, man. What I do with these, I just throw them in the glove compartment.

July 29, 2010 04:08 PM

'Worst Week in Washington': The nominations

It's Thursday and time for us to begin our look back at who had the "Worst Week in Washington." As compared to the past few weeks -- Robert Gibbs's comments on the battle for the House, the Shirley Sherrod incident -- the past few days have been relatively quiet. But we still must pick a, er, winner for the week. And we want your suggestions! So, in the comments section below, give us your nomination for the person, place or thing that had the absolute "Worst Week in Washington" and, just as importantly, why. We'll announce who we picked in this space tomorrow.

Washington - Robert Gibbs - House - United States - Shirley Sherrod

July 29, 2010 03:25 PM

Obama To Sign Tribal Law And Order Act Today

This is a significant step forward for justice on the tribal reservations, especially the women who are the victims of widespread domestic violence and sexual crimes: A measure designed to ease stubbornly high rates of violent crime, including rape and sexual assault, within Indian reservations will be signed into law by President Obama on Thursday. Advocates of the Tribal Law and Order Act, which took three years to put together and passed the Senate last week, say it will ensure that more crimes, including murders and serious assaults, are reported and prosecuted amid worries that many cases go unpunished. The measure gives tribal courts tougher sentencing powers and sets stricter rules to gather and collect more data on crimes. Special U.S. prosecutors will be appointed to tackle what advocates of the law describe as an epidemic of violence. The president is due to sign the bill into law during a ceremony at the White House on Thursday afternoon. Supporters said the current congressional session was the most active in decades in improving conditions for Indian reservations. Earlier this year, Obama signed a law that boosted health-care provisions for Indian communities. The reservations overall have violent-crime rates of more than twice the national average, according to a congressional investigation. Indian Country Today has more: Also, tribes prosecuting individuals for crimes that could land them in jail for more than a year must provide defendants with the same right to a lawyer that they would have in state or federal court. “The 1968 Indian Civil Rights Act notably did not include a right to counsel even though it is a constitutional (6th Amendment) right that also applies to the states,” said Navajo lawyer Chris Stearns. “My understanding is that this giant exception was made because back then no one thought that tribes would be able to pay for attorneys, or that there were even attorneys around at all on the reservation.” [...] Whitney Phillips, a spokeswoman for Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, D-S.D., a major champion of the bill in the House, said tribes that don’t have the resources to provide defense counsel or house inmates for longer sentences can continue to operate under the existing one-year sentencing provisions in the Indian Civil Rights Act, which does not require that defense counsel be provided. “Because the provision is optional, it will not place any additional costs on tribes who choose not to participate in the enhanced sentencing provision,” Phillips said. Hannah August, a spokeswoman for the Department of Justice, said the law will not cost tribes anything unless they choose to exercise the enhanced sentencing authority it provides. Of course, that places the cost burden on the tribes, and not all of them can afford it. So they'll be "allowed" to maintain a two-tiered system of justice if they can't pay for the better version -- which, come to think of it, makes them just like the rest of our country!

July 29, 2010 03:00 PM

Alberto Gonzales still working at DOJ???

Maybe the reason Alberto Gonzales can't land a prestige high-income gig is beacause he's still moonlighting at the Obama DOJ. How else to explain the latest news, as reported in the Washington Post?

White House proposal would ease FBI access to records of Internet activity
By Ellen Nakashima
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 29, 2010; A01
The Obama administration is seeking to make it easier for the FBI to compel companies to turn over records of an individual's Internet activity without a court order if agents deem the information relevant to a terrorism or intelligence investigation.
The administration wants to add just four words -- "electronic communication transactional records" -- to a list of items that the law says the FBI may demand without a judge's approval. Government lawyers say this category of information includes the addresses to which an Internet user sends e-mail; the times and dates e-mail was sent and received; and possibly a user's browser history. It does not include, the lawyers hasten to point out, the "content" of e-mail or other Internet communication.
But what officials portray as a technical clarification designed to remedy a legal ambiguity strikes industry lawyers and privacy advocates as an expansion of the power the government wields through so-called national security letters. These missives, which can be issued by an FBI field office on its own authority, require the recipient to provide the requested information and to keep the request secret. They are the mechanism the government would use to obtain the electronic records.
Stewart A. Baker, a former senior Bush administration Homeland Security official, said the proposed change would broaden the bureau's authority. "It'll be faster and easier to get the data," said Baker, who practices national security and surveillance law. "And for some Internet providers, it'll mean giving a lot more information to the FBI in response to an NSL."
....
To critics, the move is another example of an administration retreating from campaign pledges to enhance civil liberties in relation to national security. The proposal is "incredibly bold, given the amount of electronic data the government is already getting," said Michelle Richardson, American Civil Liberties Union legislative counsel.
The critics say its effect would be to greatly expand the amount and type of personal data the government can obtain without a court order. "You're bringing a big category of data -- records reflecting who someone is communicating with in the digital world, Web browsing history and potentially location information -- outside of judicial review," said Michael Sussmann, a Justice Department lawyer under President Bill Clinton who now represents Internet and other firms....

Remember when Senator Obama promised to fillibuster any bill that proposed this sort of thing?

Ah! Good times!

July 29, 2010 02:40 PM

UPDATED: Dance of the Tax Cut Fairies Redux, starring Kent Conrad and Joe Lieberman

Attention-whore Joe Lieberman is at it again, along with his sidekick, BlueDog Kent Conrad. At issue this time: Extending the Bush tax cuts to the wealthy. Their position should be viewed as a direct assault on President Obama's promise to maintain tax cuts for the middle class while allowing those cuts to expire for the small, tiny percentage of wage earners who make more than $250,000.00 per year. Here's how it works: If the Congress does nothing, all Bush tax cuts expire at the end of the year. But Congress could take the affirmative step of extending the cuts for anyone with income below the $250,000.00 level while expiring the cuts for anyone above. Of course, this would take action, which would be subject to the filibuster. In the video above, Conrad says the first priority should be an extension of the tax cuts on the middle class, but that the timing is wrong to increase taxes on the wealthy. While simultaneously arguing for the expiration of cuts on the wealthy while extending them, Conrad just about ties himself in knots trying to justify it. Oh, and then of course he hits on spending as the "real target". The whole argument is ridiculous. As Jon Perr points out, any argument for extending the cuts on the rich is playing right into the hands of Republican Tax Cut Fairies. Joe Lieberman leaps out from the wings in a dashing arabesque, pronouncing thus: We got a long term debt problem as Bernanke said and we gotta begin to bring our government back into balance. Probably in the long term that gonna mean we’re gonna have some more people in higher income levels. But I think that right now, as we’re trying to come out of a bad economy, that would be a mistake. I don’t know if its two years, six months, whether it’s a year, to just hold over these tax cuts so there's more money in the hands of these businesses, small businesses which create most of the jobs, a lot of people are in those upper brackets running those small businesses let’s make sure the economy’s stronger before we start raising taxes again. Would someone please put this chart in front of Joe and Kent and make them study it until they actually understand? So there's no misunderstanding here, let me state it outright: Kent Conrad and Joe Lieberman are arguing for the further erosion and obliteration of the middle class in order to give the rich folks a tax break for a few more years. Their twirly argument about it being "bad for the economy" to raise taxes in a recession presumes that the entire country is at the mercy of the elite 1% whose incomes exceed $250,000 per year. We're just the screaming rabble waiting for crumbs from the merciful elite, after all. It also presumes the same false argument Republicans make; namely that tax cuts are not a form of spending and should not be viewed as such. OF COURSE they are. Meanwhile, the rich are not spending and aren't signaling any particular desire to spend, so giving them some extra bucks won't stimulate the economy in any kind of good way anyway. Those of us who are still unemployed, or still earning a paycheck similar to the paycheck we earned 15 years or so ago, on the other hand, would welcome some extra money to pay the bills and maybe even buy a thing or two. As long as I'm on a rant here, let's deal with the myth of the tax cuts being good for small business. Most small business owners do not earn in excess of $250,000 per year. See this 2004 study for proof of that (PDF). They tend to earn less and plow more money back into their business. Along with that, many small business owners filing as sole proprietors also have employment income. That small business talking point sounds great, but it's another myth like the one about tax cuts not contributing to the national debt. This is not an issue of bolstering small business. This is one Democrat and one Independent-but-mostly-conservative-attention-whore trying to screw the middle class in favor of those who do not need, and will not use tax savings to b

July 29, 2010 02:00 PM

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July 29, 2010 01:45 PM

Hey, Bay Area C&Lers! We're in town this week ...

John and I have been doing our best to get out and promote Over the Cliff: How Obama's Election Drove the American Right Insane, but most of our appearances have been at progressive gatherings like America's Future Now and Netroots Nation. This week, we break out into the real world with a couple of events in the Bay Area.

Tonight, we'll be at Books Inc. in Berkeley at 7 p.m., giving a talk/reading and signing books.

Then, on Friday, we'll be at the Contra Costa United Democratic Campaign headquarters in Concord, also at 7 p.m. It's located at 2737 Clayton Road, Concord.

If you can come out and meet us, please do. Otherwise, we'll also be on the radio: This morning we have an interview on KVON Radio, 1440 AM, in Napa at 7:30 a.m. Then, on Friday morning, we'll be taping an interview with Philip Maldari and Aimee Allison at KPFA-FM in Berkeley, with airdate to be announced.

Hope any of you in the area can come out and catch us.

July 29, 2010 01:00 PM

Obama's tragic infatuation with meritocracy without merit

In Quick Hits, bystander quotes from Frank Rich in the New York Review of Books, reviewing The Promise: President Obama, Year One by Jonathan Alter. I've never been all that impressed by Alter. He's certainly better than most other insider DC journalists, but that's not saying very much. But Rich claims:

There has been some sniping from the left and right that The Promise is hagiography, as Alter's sunny accounting of Obama's achievements might suggest. But that's not the case. One may quibble with some of Alter's emphases, but his well-reported, judicious book is as mindful of Obama's failings as his successes and seems to be carrying water for no one in the White House or outside it.

and this is particularly evident with respect to Obama's economic team, which Rich discusses at some length, part of which bystander quoted:

...Even so, Alter's chronicle confirms that the biggest flaw in Obama's leadership has to do with his own team, not his opponents, and it's a flaw that's been visible from the start. He is simply too infatuated with the virtues of the American meritocracy that helped facilitate his own rise. "Obama's faith lay in cream rising to the top," Alter writes. "Because he himself was a product of the great American postwar meritocracy, he could never fully escape seeing the world from the status ladder he had ascended." This led Obama to hire "broad-gauged, integrative thinkers who could both absorb huge loads of complex material and apply it practically and lucidly without resorting to off-putting jargon"-and well, why not? Alter adds:
Almost all had advanced degrees from Ivy League schools, proof that they had aced standardized tests and knew the shortcuts to success exploited by American elites. A few were bombastic, but most had learned to cover their faith in their own powers of analysis with a thin veneer of humility; it made their arguments more effective. But their faith in the power of analysis remained unshaken.

This was a vast improvement over the ideologues and hacks favored by the Bush White House, but the potential for best-and-brightest arrogance was apparent as soon as Obama started assembling his team during the transition...

The very next sentence is even more telling, however, as it takes us right into the heart of the darkness of anosognosia:

The Promise leaves no doubt that his White House has not only fallen right into this trap but, for all its sophistication and smarts, was and apparently still is unaware that the trap exists. During the oil spill crisis, Obama and his surrogates kept reminding the public that the energy secretary, Steven Chu, was a Nobel laureate-as if that credential were so impressive in itself that it could override any debate about the administration's performance in the gulf.

Of course, such blindness more or less goes with the territory of infatuation, and the infatuation with meritocracy is no different from any other form of infatuation in this regard. Still, it bears underscoring that Obama has virtually ignored a couple of Noble Prize-winning economists--Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz--who've been quite outspoken in their criticism of his own Nobel-less team and its policies. Yes, this can be written off to yet more of the blindness of infatuation. But sooner or later one just has to start asking, exactly where is the "merit" in all this "meritocracy"?
This was brought up last night by Chris Hayes, sitting in for Rachel Maddow, when he framed a segment on Elizabeth Warren's candidacy to head the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection thus: "So just for a change, how about this? Rather than putting someone as a head of an agency who was wrong, we put somebody in charge who was right"

In fact, to drive the point home, it's worth quoting more of the passage this came from:

One of the most problematic trends we have seen is the cozy relationship between government agencies and the industries they`re supposed to regulate. What matters over and above the existence of a regulatory agency is the culture, its sense of mission and ethos. And that`s why the stakes are so high over who is going to head this new bureau. In the past, we`ve seen people running agencies who have come from the industry they`re supposed to regulate. And then they pass through the revolving door back into that industry. The most natural and qualified person for this agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is someone who has been looking out for consumers and writing about consumer finance for a long time, Harvard Law professor and chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel for the TARP Bailout Funds, Elizabeth Warren. In the summer of 2007, Professor Warren wrote, quote, "Clearly, it is time for a new model of financial regulation, one focused primarily on consumer safety rather than corporate profitability. Financial projects should be subject to the same routine safety screening that now governs the sale of every toaster, washing machine, and child`s car seat sold on the American market. So why not create a financial product safety commission?"
Professor Warren went on to describe the responsibilities of an agency to evaluate financial products and get rid of the tricks and traps for consumers. Now, contrast that with Ben Bernanke, who was totally wrong about the subprime housing crisis and awarded with an appointment to run the fed. And Larry Summers who was wrong on the wrong side of deregulating derivatives markets and became the president`s chief economic adviser. People in the establishment tend to fail upward. But here, we have the rare instance of someone who actually got it right, the rare situation with the person who came up with the idea could run the agency and imbue it with a consumer-first perspective it needs to be effective. So just for a change, how about this? Rather than putting someone as a head of an agency who was wrong, we put somebody in charge who was right.

As Hayes reminds us here, Obama's problem is not merely infatuation with meritocracy--it's something darker. If JFK got into trouble by relying on the so-called "best and brightest", at least he had an excuse: When he brought in Robert McNamara to run the Defense Department he hadn't yet failed spectacularly, the way that Bernanke and Summers had. Obama actually had three things going for him that JFK didn't. First, he had JFK's own example in Vietnam, growing far, far darker after his death. Second, there was the brilliant analysis of meritocratic failure in The Peter Principle (people rise to their level of incompetence--and then stay there), published several years after JFK's death. Third, there was the obvious set of mistakes his own hand-picked advisors had made.

Yes, I know, all this can be explained away by the blindness of infatuation. And yet, we draw a clear distinction between stories of infatuation, puppy love, as it were, and stories that merely start with infatuation, and end up somewhere much more sinister.

To get a better sense of that sinister turn, let's start by turning to Rich again:

Obama may have entered the White House with the intention of assembling a Lincolnesque "team of rivals," but Summers subverted that notion by making himself chief packager and gatekeeper for any dissenting arguments about economic policy-all, he claimed, to spare the President from meeting with "long-winded people." Lincoln's "team of rivals" reported directly to Lincoln, but, as one source told Alter, Summers so skewed the process in this White House that it was like "a team of rivals reporting to Edwin Stanton, Lincoln's prideful secretary of war." Even Warren Buffett, a supporter who had spoken to Obama weekly during the fall of 2008, "found himself mysteriously out of touch with the new president" once he took office.

The whole "team of rivals" meme was itself a piece of meritocratic piffle, a means for Obama to attach an ahistorical sense of gravitas to his own tendency toward groupthink, hiding behind others, and running away from earlier postures of principle. Rather than subverting the professed intent of the meme, Summers perfectly channeled the covert intent. And why, oh why did this work so well?

Well, bystander helps out here as well, pointing back to a comment in which he quotes a letter from Harpers:

Hoover Maneuver?
As a son of the postindustrial Pittsburgh proletariat who received induction into the nation's ruling class in Morningside Heights (and, later, on Capitol Hill) around the same time as Barack Obama did, I find Kevin Baker's musings on the psychohistory of our thirty-first and forty-fourth presidents entirely credible ["Barack Hoover Obama," Essay, July]. Those of us who "grew up as . . . outsider[s] and overcame formidable odds" to obtain an elite education and professional success did so at the cost of internalizing wholesale the values and worldview of our fellow "strivers and achievers." How else could we have come to believe that we belong in their ranks?
Surely, then, it should be no great surprise that our new president has, to date, politely declined to offer a serious challenge to the same corporate and institutional forces that decades ago admitted him to their ranks, with (as always) the proviso that he become one of them. Unlike Herbert Hoover, Bill Clinton, and Obama, the to-the-manor-and-manner-born FDR suffered from no such identity crisis and the personal insecurities it tends to engender. The surprise is not that Obama is on the fast road to betraying the radical reformist aspirations that his upbringing and racial background might suggest. It is that anyone who has been paying attention could expect Obama to do anything other than, in Baker's fine phrase, move the country "prudently, carefully, reasonably toward disaster"--in other words, to offer us more of the same.
David Osachy
Winter Park, Fla.
Harper's, Letters, September, 2009 (subscription required, I believe)

It is precisely this dynamic of drawing in the eager outsider achievers that works so well when the system is basically healthy, and works so well to protect the system against all else when it is not.

Failing upward. What could be more American than that in the ultra-Orwellian 21st Century?

July 29, 2010 01:00 PM

Take Two Shit Moats And Call Me In The Magnet

Like the famous Rodin sculpture that inspires its name, the American Thinker is open to interpretation. Does it represent a loose organization of thoughtful conservatives pondering the issues of the day … or is it just a bunch of whackjobs taking a collective bowel movement on the truth for all eternity?

Roy Edroso has highlighted for us Teh Tihnker’s odd habit of regarding itself as ‘a long-distance psychotherapy practice specializing in Barack Obama’. And lo and behold, here’s American Thinker M. Catherine Evans at it again:

Barack Obama, Adult Child of an Alcoholic

Shirley Sherrod’s hair trigger firing is merely the latest in a long line of dysfunctional responses by the President that may indicate that he’s out of control. How many incidents does it take to make a pattern? How many times does the President have to show his propensity for paranoia, projection, and blaming others before his team arranges for an intervention?

In 12-step recovery programs, Obama would be called an ACoA, an adult child of an alcoholic.

And in other programs, Obama would be called an ALCofMX, an adult love child of Malcolm X — but that’s not important. Pray continue, doctor.

His father, Barack Obama, Sr. was the typical garden-variety chronic alcoholic. But according to a 2008 article in the Boston Globe, as Barack Sr.’s disease progressed, he became a very dangerous man.

He began to drink more heavily and had a series of alcohol-related accidents, one of which resulted in the death of another driver.

Obama Sr. would die in a car accident at just 42, but before that he visited Obama Jr., then 10, in Hawaii for a month. Aside from Obama Jr.’s infancy, that turned out to be the only time spent between father and son in their lives. And if you think a month is a pretty short time for all of Senior’s dysfunction to seep through Junior’s pores and turn him into a monster — well, you’d be wrong, according to M. Catherine Evans:

In a July 23 interview with Good Morning America, correspondent Elisabeth Leamy asked the president about the Sherrod mess. Obama replied:

He [Tom Vilsack] jumped the gun partly because we now live in a media culture where something goes up on Youtube or a blog and everybody scrambles.

A typical response for an ACoA is to blame others. Obama calls everybody else out, but he’s the one that ‘scrambled’.

Obama and his team certainly didn’t acquit themselves well with Sherrod’s ‘hair trigger firing’, as Doc Evans put at the very start of her diagnosis. Rash action and shifting blame is proof positive that the President is ‘out of control’ and in need of an intervention.

So too, amazingly, is Obama’s penchant for moving slowly to act and accepting responsibility:

He waited six weeks after the Deepwater Horizon oil explosion to answer critics’ charges that he wasn’t doing anything. Obama stated:

I take responsibility. It is my job to make sure that everything is done to shut this thing down.

His words drip with the narcissism of adult children of alcoholics. Having been abandoned by both parents, Obama sees himself alone in the world. He doesn’t have to consult the experts; in his grandiose way of thinking, he’s the expert on everything.

Adult children of alcoholics — they just can’t win for losing!

At any rate, there’s more to the diagnosis, including some sobering words about how Obama is a raging ACoA because he noticed that Fox News doesn’t view his presidency favorably. You know, really lurid stuff that we probably ought not to repeat in a family establishment.

July 29, 2010 12:48 PM

Senate Democrats claim momentum in four states

57); font-size: 20px; font-weight: normal;">1. Senate Democrats will argue today that their electoral prospects have improved in four states -- Kentucky, Louisiana, Illinois and Nevada -- over recent weeks, developments that will limit their losses in the fall. "Despite the headwinds of history, Democratic Senate candidates in these states -- two of which would be pick-up opportunities -- have becoming increasingly competitive," writes Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee executive director J.B. Poersch in a memo set to be distributed today. Democrats' strongest argument is in Nevada where the struggles of former state Assemblywoman Sharron Angle since her Republican primary victory on June 8 have coincided with a drop in her standing in a head to head matchup with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D). A recent Las Vegas Review Journal poll showed Reid with a seven-point edge -- a margin unthinkable even a few weeks ago. In Illinois, too, Democratic

Nevada - Harry Reid - Sharron Angle - Las Vegas Review Journal - Democratic

July 29, 2010 12:37 PM

Mike's Blog Roundup

They gave us a republic: Conservative media has different aims and is held to different 'standards'

Wall St. Cheat Sheet: Exposing Top Secret America -INFOGRAPHIC

Informed Comment: British PM Cameron calls Gaza under Israeli blockade a 'prison camp'

The Rude Pundit: The anti-Moratorium rally ate our oily souls

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition: Head of pro-legalization police group praises congressional action against "War on Drugs."

The Opposition Rebuttal To Morning Joe: Here's what happens when the show and the Rebuttal run out of ideas on the same day

July 29, 2010 12:00 PM

There Is a Lot More to Be Determined By This Bong Hit Here

Above: Baked ham

Erick Erickson, RedState:
Did the Federal Government Cause the BP Oil Spill?

There is a lot more to be determined here, but the Coast Guard may not have followed its own procedures. [merry bubbling sound, throaty exhale ending in cough] Why has the White House withheld the fact that the Coast Guard did not follow its own procedures?

‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard. We are aware of all Internet traditions.™

July 29, 2010 11:57 AM

"Thursday's Bacon" - Episode 9 ("Warped Pittsburgh Memories" with the Seback's)

July 29, 2010 Host - Frank Murgia Source Credits - talent network, inc, Frank Murgia, JS, JB, TM --- Welcome to the first episode of "Thursday's Bacon" that does NOT include David Sedelmeier a key piece of bacon in the grease. David is out of the country eating healthy and lean same-day bacon. With David away, Frank holds down the griddle as he welcomes into the talent network studios Dick

July 29, 2010 04:30 AM

Senate Forecast, July 28th: Democrats reach 55 seats without Rasmussen

The difference between Rasmussen polling and non-Rasmussen polling has reached new heights in tonight's Senate forecast. For the first time, the non-Rasmussen forecast shows Democrats performing fully 3 seats better than in the forecast which includes Rasmussen polls.

Senate Picture, July 26th, with Rasmussen
Most likely outcome: Democrats 52 seats, Republicans 47 seats, Charlie Crist one seat

Of the 100 Senate seats, 86 are either not up for re-election, or have a polling average where one party has a 100% chance of victory (if the election were held today). Among those 86 seats, there are 48 Democrats, and 38 Republicans. Here is a chart featuring the other 14 campaigns:

Senate picture, competitive campaigns chart, July 28th, with Rasmussen

The 48 currently safe Democrats, plus the 3.79 wins projected in these 14 campaigns, comes out to 51.79 Democrats, or 52 seats. Charlie Crist is also projected to win one seat.

Senate Picture, July 28th, without Rasmussen
Most likely outcome: Democrats 55 seats, Republicans 44 seats, Charlie Crist one seat

Senate picture, competitive campaigns chart, July 28th, without Rasmussen

The 48 currently sage Democrats, plus the 6.69 wins projected in these 14 campaigns, comes out to 54.69 Democrats, or 55 seats. Charlie Crist is also projected to win one seat.

Notes:

* = Has primary challenger, but heavy favorite
Methodology can be found here . No Research 2000 polls were used.
The "current Dem winning %" column projects the chance of Democratic victory if the election were held today. It is not meant to predict the chance of the Democratic candidate winning in November.
Every seat not listed here currently has either a 0% or a 100% chance of a Democratic victory.

Democrats are showing a distinct improvement in non-Rasmussen polling over the past two months, even as there has been little overall change within Rasmussen polling. They are now at 55 seats for the first time in over six months.

As the gap between Rasmussen and non-Rasmussen polls increases, I become more inclined to believe the non-Rasmussen forecast. Outlying polls, both by definition and by empirical observation, have more error than non-outlying polls. So, the further away Rasmussen moves from the average of all other polls, the more I think something is wrong with Rasmussen polling.

It wouldn't be the first time. In the past, Rasmussen has received a significant source of right-wing funding, and then proven to be the least accurate pollster in an election by erring massively in favor of Republicans.

July 29, 2010 03:36 AM

C&L's Late Night Music Club With Neil Young (R.I.P. Ben Keith)

Open Thread

A gay child of a Tea Party candidate finds a way to cope. Hilarious video from the gang at BriteThorn.com. Open thread below...

July 29, 2010 03:30 AM

Title: Roll Another NumberArtist: Neil Young Yesterday brought sad news of the passing of long time Neil Young side man, Ben Keith. Young first met the steel guitarist during the Harvest sessions in 1971, and from there a partnership was forged that would last until Keith's death of a heart attack at Young's ranch on July 27th. Keith's first big break was playing on Patsy Cline's 'I Fall To Pieces', and his playing can be heard on records by everyone from Todd Rundgren to Waylon Jennings. He also produced Jewel's highly successful debut album, Pieces Of You. R.I.P. Our sister site Newstalgia features for its midweek concert, the Swedish Radio Symphony conducted by Daniel Harding, with pianist Alice Sara Ott, in a program of Tchaikovsky, Chopin and Mahler.

July 29, 2010 03:00 AM

On July 28, 1943 FDR Had A Few Words To Say

(North Africa 1943 - Slow progress - Sicily was next) DOWNLOADS: 292 PLAYS: 506 Taking a small breather from the news in Arizona, today (July 28th) in 1943 saw the allies making advances in North Africa and Sicily. World War 2 was slowly turning around as the fascist regime of Mussolini was on the verge of collapse. President Roosevelt made an address to the American people, giving a progress report. Even as the tide of war was turning in our favor, there was still partisan bickering going on at home. Pres. Roosevelt: “I am sorry if I step on the toes of those Americans who, playing party politics at home, call that kind of policy crazy altruism and starry-eyed dreaming.” The Party of No just never changes, even sixty-seven years ago.

July 29, 2010 02:30 AM

Shawna Forde and her killer Minutemen had scheduled other 'operations' when they were arrested for murders

DOWNLOADS: (2601) PLAYS: (10433) There have been some interesting developments in the bizarre and telling case of Shawna Forde, the Everett, WA, woman who led an offshoot unit of Minutemen who ran armed border patrols for patriotic "fun" and then decided to go "operational." They concocted a scheme to raid drug smugglers and take their money and drugs and use it to finance a border race war and "start a revolution against the government". They mistakenly chose the home of Raul Flores and his wife and two daughters, which had neither money nor drugs; first they shot the father in the head and wounded the mother, and then, while she pleaded for her life, they shot 9-year-old Brisenia in cold blood. (Her sister, fortunately, was sleeping over at a friend's.) It seems the FBI got a heads-up about Forde's plans -- and did nothing about it, since the information was sketchy. But it also seems that Forde and Co. had a whole slate of violent home invasions ready to roll. From Kim Smith at the Arizona Star: According to documents filed this week in Pima County Superior Court, two confidential informants for the FBI say they told agents in April 2009 that Forde was recruiting people to raid a house she believed was filled with illicit drugs, money and guns. ... The documents say Forde, 42, and others were on the verge of hitting additional targets when she, Jason Bush, 35, and Albert Gaxiola, 43, were arrested on June 12, 2009. ... Both men are described as active members of the border-defense movement who routinely camp on the border so they can spot illegal immigrants and report them to the U.S. Border Patrol. One of them told investigators that he met Forde in October 2007 while on a mission outside Arivaca. He said that in April 2009, Forde called him, saying the other men she knew in the border-defense movement were "sissies," and she was impressed with his courage. The informant says Forde knew rocket-propelled grenades, drugs and millions of dollars were being funneled into the U.S. through Arivaca and wanted him to help her protect the community. Not wanting to get involved, the man told Forde to call another man. The second man says Forde shared her intelligence with him several times in person, over the phone and by e-mail. Once Forde made arrangements to meet with him, the second man said he deemed her serious and contacted his FBI handler, who instructed him to keep gathering information. The two men say they and two other men met with Forde at an Aurora, Colo., truck stop in late April 2009, at which time Forde said she wanted them to force their way into an Arivaca house and get control of the occupants. They said she told them a second team would then come in and gather up the drugs, money and weapons, which would be sold to help the Minutemen American Defense, an organization based in the state of Washington. One of them relayed the information to the FBI a few days later. The other corroborated his account of the meeting. They were told to keep on gathering information. Forde later called one of the men to ask if he could be in Arivaca within 18 hours, but he said he made excuses about why he couldn't. About 10 days later, they learned of the slayings. The men said they immediately suspected Forde, suspicions they said were confirmed when Forde called an associate to help Bush, who had been shot in the leg. Forde told their associate that Bush was shot while patrolling the desert, but they suspected Bush had really been shot during the home invasion, they told authorities. On June 7, one of the informants told Forde in a conversation taped by the FBI that he and the other informant wouldn't be able to drive to Tucson for a few days. He also told her he didn't want to bring one of the other participants in their truck-stop meeting because he didn't trust him. Forde replied that she did trust him and went on to say: "We can train him. We can start him on soft targets. Our hands are already dirty. We've got to know he can

July 29, 2010 01:30 AM

House Committee to Examine Public Access to Federally-Funded Research

Tomorrow afternoon, legislators from the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will be holding a hearing on the topic of "Public Access to Federally-Funded Research." The hearing will be a perfect opportunity for key representatives to look into supporting public access policies — various requirements that scientific research funded by the federal government be made available on the Internet to the tax-paying public. EFF wrote about the benefits of public access policies earlier this year when the Office of Science and Technology Policy asked for input.

Tomorrow, members of the committee will no doubt hear about the excellent Federal Research Public Access Act, (FRPAA) a bill that would require a great deal of research funded by government agencies to be made publicly available through a digital database no later than six months after publication. The law is modeled after the National Institute of Health's Public Access policy, which on its own has granted millions of people access to critical, up-to-date medical research since it was implemented in 2008.

Public access policies essentially "close the loop" on tail end of the cycle of research funded by the government. Now, the public pays for scientific research through taxes, but in most cases, that same taxpayer-funded innovation and discovery gets locked up in journals, accessible only through expensive per-article fees or massively expensive institutional licenses. With the FRPAA, academic journals still get a critical window of time to be the first to publish important findings, but shortly thereafter, the public gets unprecedented access to the knowledge that they paid for.

You can catch the webcast of the hearing tomorrow at 2pm EDT (11am PDT) or attend the hearing in person if you're in Washington, D.C. Stay tuned to EFF for future updates on how to support the Federal Research Public Access Act and other public access efforts!

July 29, 2010 01:29 AM

The Magic Jacket

Hey, let’s join David Brooks on a fantastical tour where every Applebee’s has a salad bar, every tax cut creates three beeeellion jobs, and everybody, including Democrats, takes David’s advice. All you have to do is put on a magic green jacket. No, seriously.

I was a liberal Democrat when I was young.

Yeah, and I used to be Brad Pitt’s boyfriend when I was young. (Like every other pathetically insecure right-wing wanker, Brooks tries to lend extra credence to his nonsense by saying that now that he’s all smart and grown-up and stuff he has outgrown liberalism, much the way he’s outgrown sippy cups and, allegedly, bedwetting.)

I used to wear a green Army jacket with political buttons on it — for Hubert Humphrey, Birch Bayh, John F. Kennedy and Franklin Roosevelt. I even wore that jacket in my high school yearbook photo.

This guy is the worst liar ever, and if the New York Fookin’ Times had an ounce of integrity left they would make him show them that yearbook photo before printing such obvious hokum.

It’s a magic green jacket. I can put it on today and, suddenly, my mind shifts back to the left. I start thinking like a Democrat, feeling a strange accompanying hunger for brown rice.

Democrats apparently carry affirmative action so far that they won’t even eat white rice

But the magic jacket-wearing me is nervous about the next few years. I’m afraid my party is going to get stuck in the same old debates that we always lose. First, we’re going to have the same old tax debate. We’re going to not extend the Bush tax cuts on the rich. The Republicans will blast us for killing growth and raising taxes as they did in 2000 and 2004.

Apparently, the magic green jacket has made 2008 go away. Poof! The entire year never even happened. Or maybe the manteau magique created a new 2008 in David’s mind where Obama was crushed in the election because of his promise to only raise taxes on the rich. In fact, the central concern of most Americans clearly is to make sure that the rich, who are barely scraping by now, pay less taxes.

So I sit there in my magic green jacket and I wonder: What can my party do to avoid the big government tag that always leads to catastrophe?

Gee, I wonder what that would be?
SPOILER ALERT

Why Democrats can only save themselves BY ACTING LIKE REPUBLICANS AND NOT LIKE DEMOCRATS! (Who could have seen that coming from Bobo, huh?)

Not much is going to get passed in the next two years anyway, but the president could lay the groundwork for a whopping second-term agenda: tax simplification, entitlement reform, a new wave of regional innovation clusters, a new wave of marriage-friendly tax policies.

Ah, yes, the Democrats, if they want to succeed, should ditch Medicare, privatize social security, enact a flat-tax, and come up with tax breaks for opposite marriage. I’m surprised Bobo didn’t throw in, while he was at it, that the Democrats should repeal health care and financial reform, remove all federal regulations on gun dealers, re-criminalize sodomy, deport all illegal immigrants, eliminate the Department of Education and the EPA, withdraw from the United Nations and evict the U.N. from its headquarters in New York City, outlaw the fluoridation of municipal water supplies, and rename Washington, D.C., as St. Reagansburg.

Then I take off the magic green jacket and return to my old center-right self.

Liar.

July 29, 2010 12:39 AM

Matthews Follows Fox's Lead on New Black Panthers Story Now that GOP Senators Are Pushing Their Race Baiting as Well

DOWNLOADS: (307) PLAYS: (533) Now that Fox has been pushing this race baiting non-story on the New Black Panthers for the last month or so or longer and now that all seven Republicans on the Judiciary Committee have decided that ClusterFox witch hunting is now in season, Chris Matthews allows radio talk show host Michael Smerconish to come on his show and rant breathlessly about how he thinks there needs to be some investigations of this case even though he can't cite any proof that the Justice Department was wrong in not pursuing the it for lack of evidence. I still haven't decided what's more annoying about this interview; the fact that Matthews is basically repeating Fox's spin but putting a kinder, gentler face on it with Smerconish, or that every time he asks E. Steven Collins a question he talks over him before he's allowed to answer him and that he treats him like some hostile witness in a criminal trial with the manner in which he asks him to defend the decisions of the Attorney General's office, like he's responsible for them or might know the answers to his questions. If Matthews was doing his job he would not be hammering a radio host to explain things that his staff could find out for themselves by picking up the phone and making a few calls to the Attorney General's office. I also have to wonder if he even wanted to cover this story or if his producers forced him to cover it given he ends the segment with this. MATTHEWS: I hope we don`t have to revisit this. I hope something gets done. Well, maybe it shouldn`t get done, but I hope we don`t have to talk about this one again! I'll just say I agree with that sentiment completely. I hope you don't cover it again either since you seem to desperate to give some "balance" to the story that you're willing to overlook facts and talk over your guests that are attempting to give them to you. Transcript via LexisNexis below the fold. MATTHEWS: Let`s start with all seven Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee, who sent a letter to Democratic committee chairman Patrick Leahy of Vermont on Friday pushing for a hearing, a big public hearing, on a 2008 election day incident in Philadelphia involving two members of the New Black Panthers and whether they violated any voter intimidations laws. In their letter, the Republican senators write about their concern. Quote, "concern about the politicization of the Civil Rights Division within the Department of Justice." What`s this latest push about? Michael Smerconish is a syndicated radio host and MSNBC political analyst. And E. Steven Collins is a Philadelphia radio host. I want -- Michael, you`ve written about this. I want you to start, then E. Steven, jump in here. I want to try to get a thoroughgoing presentation of what happened two years ago, as best we can understand it. Give us a sense of the neighborhood involved, the voting division involved, what happened, Michael, on that day when we all voted, or most of Philadelphia, I should say, voted for -- and certainly that division voted for -- Barack Obama for president? MICHAEL SMERCONISH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, it`s the 14th ward. It`s the 4th division. It`s a public housing development. And as I wrote, it is a division where there didn`t need to be any voter intimidation in support of Barack Obama of any kind. In 2004, you`re talking John Kerry 501 votes and George W. Bush 24. So it was a foregone conclusion, because of the minority composition of that voting locale, that Obama was going to clean house. I have always said this was a case that was about TV and not about turnout. These are a couple of knuckleheads. They are well known to anybody who walks adjacent to City Hall in Philadelphia. They are always looking to create a spectacle. So therefore, I think that their mission was accomplished. They are on HARDBALL yet again tonight. (LAUGHTER) MATTHEWS: Yes. SMERCONISH: Having said that -- having said that, I still think you need an investig

July 29, 2010 12:30 AM

The Daily Show

7/29/10 in :60 Seconds

Obama appears on "The View," Goldman Sachs bans profanity, and Jon remembers tooling around with Liev Schreiber.

Moment of Zen - Obama Doesn't Know Snooki

President Obama admits he doesn't know who Snooki is, despite making a tanning joke about her at the Correspondents' Dinner.

Daily/Colbert - Jon's Beard

There are a lot of people saying pretty cruel things about Jon's beard, but Stephen thinks it's great.

Liev Schreiber

Jon remembers riding on the back of Liev Schreiber's motorcycle as they tooled around the West Village together.

Goldman S@#%$

Goldman Sachs addresses the systematic problem within its culture by announcing a zero-tolerance policy for profanity in employee e-mails.

Leader's Digest

President Obama makes an appearance on "The View" and shows Americans how to use the government's new health care website.

Intro - Not All Jews Are Tough

Jon believes Stephen Colbert would beat him in a fight because he's little and has osteoporosis.

July 28, 2010

World O' Crap

Dr. A: a Case Study

Greetings, esteemed colleagues. As a public service, it’s now time to perform a psychiatric diagnosis of somebody you’ve never treated. You know, like how Robin of Berkeley and all those other alleged mental health workers on the right do. Our subject is one Dr. Mike A. (To preserve his anonymity, we won’t use his whole name, but we do have to use his academic title or he has a hissy fit.)
Subject is a middle-aged, divorced college professor who has recently suffered a professional setback. He exhibits anger, a lack of empathy, problems interacting with others, and general jerkiness; his claims of superiority over others seem to be a fragile construct to protect him from his secret fears of his own lack of worth.

What follows are notes from his most recent session:

“The Eunuch Horn”
Dr. A. spends the whole session criticizing one Kate Bornstein, whose writings on transgendered issues are apparently frquently used in “Sociology of Gender” courses. Subject becomes incensed over the idea that one’s brain can reflect a different gender than that of the genitals that supposedly God gave one.

Subject readily accepts Bornstein’s assertion that there is a “gender pyramid,” and states that “the factors that help one climb to the top of the hierarchy include “Being white, being a citizen of the USA, being a Protestant-defined Christian, being heterosexual, [...] possessing a well-formed, above-average-length penis, a pair of reasonably-matched testicles, and at least an average sperm count.” What he strenuously objects to is the idea that one should “dismantle the pyramid altogether” by refusing to accept the idea that these factors make one superior. [Why is this idea so repugnant to Subject? Does he suspect that he doesn't possess some of the qualities that would raise him to the top of the pyramid but hates the idea that one can challenge these cultural preferences?]

Here are some of Subject’s words:

It’s not at all surprising that Bornstein’s readers are asked to contemplate what their God-given gender assignment does for them. In higher education, the focus is always on them. It is certainly never on God.

Dr, Mike’s point apparently being that if God gives one male genitalia, then one is flouting God’s will by changing this. Dr. Mike never addresses the issue of whether children born with cleft palates should just accept their God-given mouth without complaint, because resorting to surgery would show their lack of accord with God’s will.

In the past, I have offended some transgendered persons by asking these two questions: 1) Does the act of removing a man’s penis make him into a woman? 2) If your answer to #1 is “yes,” does re-attaching it to his forehead make him a unicorn?

Those two questions are my little way of asking the transgendered community whether there is any limit to their delusional belief that they can simply be whatever they perceive themselves to be. Their “reassignment” of mental illness – saying that others who oppose them suffer from “trans-phobia” – supplies the answer.

Dr. Mike’s emphatic declaration that the transgendered are mentally ill for not being content with the body they were born with seems too angry to simply be an intellectual critique of an idea that he doesn’t agree with. What else is going on here?

Clearly, today’s “intellectual” is unwilling to admit that a man who thinks he is a woman is mentally ill. But what about the man who thinks he is God?

And what about the man who is positive that he knows God’s will? Why does Subject feel that trying to match one’s self-perceived gender with one’s body is playing God? Why is the idea of sexual-reassignment so threatening to Subject?

Before long, “intellectuals” will side-step the issue. There will be no contradiction between being human and not-human. We will have rebelled against “God” as a perfect classification.

Dear colleagues, I suspect that there are many issues that we could address. So, below the fold you will find a very brief review of Subject’s previous 15 sessions.

Subject, Dr. A.

Here is a brief survey of the notes I took at Subject’s previous sessions (you can consult an idex of the complete notes here). Hopefully they will help you to make a diagnosis so that Dr. A. can get the help he needs.

Session 1 (4 May 2010) “Dude Talks Like a Lady”
Subject spent the session ranting about how his university was sponsoring a seminar on transgendered issues. For some reason this seminar made Dr. Mike very angry, even though he was in Colorado, and thus not even in the same state as the attendees. He concluded by advising all parents that they would “do well to keep their children as far away from UNC Gomorrah as possible.” [Dr. A. often wonders why he never gets full marks in the "Plays well with others" portion of his performance reviews, but seems to lack any awareness of why this might be.]

Session 2 “May How to Win Friends and Manipulate Hypocrites”
Dr. A. shares some self-initiated correspondence with the adviser to campus gay, lesbian, and transgendered group sponsoring the forum that so riled him. [Even though the missives are tedious and petty, the adviser may be one of the Subject's numerous imaginary foes.]

Session 3 “Chapter 639: Conclusion”
Subject quits his poorly-paying position as a columnist with a shoddy news service because he included his columns as part of his promotion application, and then didn’t promoted. Subject feels that this demonstrates that he his right to free speech has been infringed. He blames the transgendered.

Session 4: “Islamophobia is a Social Disease”
Subject says that “a few weeks ago” one of his liberal colleagues called the police because she was afraid he’d incite violence by picking fights with Muslims. Subject claims that this proves that liberals are hypocrites. [It's possible the whole incident is imaginary.] Dr. A. makes no mention of having resigned the week before.

Session 5: “UC Islam, I See Anti-Semitism”
Subject spends the session ranting about Moslems.

Session 6: “John 14:6 For Dummies”
Dr. A. becomes indignant over fellow Christians who believe that Jesus loves everyone, because Subject’s God.is an angry God who harshly punishes all failures to follow the rule. [Subject's family of origin needs to be explored, as father issues seem possible.]

Session 7: “Smiling for Dollars”
Subject spends another session bashing more popular, less divisive Christians. Dr. A. seems to believe that being liked means that one is going to hell.

Session 8: Get Back to Africa
Dr. A. bashes journalist Helen Thomas by “cleverly” changing anti-Semitism to prejudice against blacks. He seems angry at not just Thomas, but also Arabs, blacks, and other minority groups.

Session 9: “Who Knows Anything Anyway?”
Another session devoted to claiming that Jesus hates those who love others.

Session 10: “ODD Humanitarianism”
Dr. A. “proves” that there is no such thing as Oppositional Defiance Disorder, and claims that some kids are just evil. [The symptoms of ODD that Subject cites seem to mirror his own behavior quite closely. Is this why he is so insistent that ODD is just a liberal label for jerkiness?]

Session 11: “An Immodest Proposal”
Subject exclaims “I can’t stand atheists.” He comes up with a complex and fanciful plan to teach them all a lesson, but claims at the end that is was just a joke.

Session 12: “My Apology to the DAMNED”

Subject states that, ” Although they think they are smart, the atheists who read my columns constantly write with remarks showing their lack of comprehension of my arguments. ” [The feeling that others think they are smarter than he, thus evoking in him the need to show his superiority, is an ongoing issue with Subject. This need to best those whose existence makes Subject feel inferior is the cause of his frequent imaginary confrontations.]

Session 13: “Genocide Awareness Day”
Subject uses what he feels is humor to express his opinion on abortions and feminists. [His hostility towards women is apparent to the observer, but not to him.]

Session 14: “Intellectuals and Human Nature”
Subject claims that liberals are idiots because they believe that human beings are inherently good. [Dr. Mike cites religion as the basis of his claim that humanity is inherently evil, but investigation into his family of origin may reveal bad parenting as the real cause.]

Session 15: “Professors and Pharisees”
Dr. Mike claims that university professors are the modern day equivalent of the Pharisees that Jesus denounced. Subject seems to believe that this proves that his colleagues are going to hell. He apparently fails to realize that the Pharisees were a religious sect, and that university professors are not expected to model observant Jewish practices to their students.

So, there you have the data. Please use it to diagnose Subject, speculate about the issues that have contributed to his pathology, and suggest a treatment plan for him. Or, just make fun of him . . .in the name of therapy, of course.

July 28, 2010 11:46 PM

Hans Blix: "The Iraq War Was Illegal"

Dr. Hans Blix, former chief of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) between 1999 and 2003, was called to testify at the British Iraq War Inquiry board. He was discussing the findings of the inspection teams in Iraq before the US invasion in 2003 - findings that weren't released until June 2003, months after the invasion began.

Asked about the inspections he oversaw between November 2002 and 18 March 2003 - when his team was forced to pull out of Iraq on the eve of the war - he said he was "looking for smoking guns" but did not find any.

While his team discovered prohibited items such as missiles beyond the permitted range, missile engines and a stash of undeclared documents, he said these were "fragments" and not "very important" in the bigger picture.

"We carried out about six inspections per day over a long period of time.

"All in all, we carried out about 700 inspections at different 500 sites and, in no case, did we find any weapons of mass destruction."

Although Iraq failed to comply with some of its disarmament obligations, he added it "was very hard for them to declare any weapons when they did not have any".

It's a popular meme for the conservatives in our country to claim that Saddam didn't allow the inspectors back into the country prior to the 2003 invasion, but in fact he did. The teams had a little over three months before they withdrew, and they only withdrew because they were warned that Iraq was about to become a war zone. It's also a popular meme for the conservatives to even deny that WMDs were the principle justification for the US invasion. The record shows otherwise.

I'm not particularly thrilled by Blix's behavior in 2002-2003. I think he was extremely passive, that he could have done much more prior to the invasion to alert the media and other countries that Iraq really had no WMD program to either threaten Western interests or to arm terrorists. But, like many scientists, he preferred to wait until all the data were in and a full report could be staffed for the United Nations. Now he spends his time trying to make up for that lapse in judgment.

Interestingly, the New York Times covers the same Blix testimony without using the words "weapons of mass destruction" at all. The editors there must have forgotten the paper's history in that department. Or maybe they're just embarrassed by it all.

July 28, 2010 11:30 PM

DNC transfers $2.5 million to party committees

The Democratic National Committee transferred $2.5 million to its House and Senate campaign arms as well as a trio of contested governors races today, its latest financial investment in the party heading into the 2010 midterm elections. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee each received $833,000 while another $833,000 was doled out to gubernatorial contests in Florida ($400,000), Pennsylvania ($333,000) and Maryland ($100,000), according to a source familiar with the money maneuverings. Earlier this month, the DNC sent $2 million total to the DSCC ($667,000), DCCC ($667,000) and the state parties of Florida ($333,000) and Ohio ($333,000), and Chairman Tim Kaine has promised $20 million in direct investments to party committees and state parties. The DNC -- and, by extension, President Obama and his political inner circle -- have come under some criticism from congressional Democrats of late for being insufficiently focused on the coming

Democratic National Committee - Barack Obama - Tim Kaine - Democratic - Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee

July 28, 2010 10:32 PM

Jan Brewer's fearmongering is destroying Arizona's economy -- but hey, it wins votes

DOWNLOADS: (332) PLAYS: (1235) Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer and her misbegotten immigration law, SB1070, may be popular with Arizonans looking for a handy scapegoat right now, but they may not be so popular a little down the road, after they've completely destroyed what's left of the state's economy. KPHO-TV in Phoenix, for instance, found that her fearmongering about "headless corpses" was driving tourists away from the state in droves: Veronica and Richard Schultz have owned the guest ranch for the past 14 years. The operation’s close proximity to the border used to be a selling point for guests. Now, it’s more of a repellent. “We’ve definitely lost guests and we've had guests call us. We’ve had friends call us from all over the country and say, ‘Hey, are you safe?’” Richard Schultz said. Between the economy and boycotts related to Arizona’s tough new immigration law, SB 1070, tourism in the state is down 10 percent. The Shultzes said state politicians are not helping matters. Every day on cable news, anchors and reporters are discussing an invasion at the border, headless bodies in the desert or a rash of kidnappings. During this election cycle, Arizona politicians are touting the potential dangers of illegal immigration. Gov. Jan Brewer is one of the loudest voices. She has made several statements to the national media, the validity of which CBS 5 Investigates could not confirm. The governor told one media outlet that almost all illegal immigrants are bringing drugs across the border. U.S. Border Patrol officials said that statement is false. Brewer also said law enforcement officials have found decapitated bodies in the desert. Calls to all of Arizona’s border county medical examiners revealed no decapitated bodies have been reported to them. You've also gotta love how, when asked about her rhetoric in the segment above, Brewer simply fled. She must be getting her lessons in media relations from Sharron Angle. Then there was the LA Times piece reporting how Latinos are fleeing the state in droves -- and how it's killing businesses: No one has measured the effect of SB 1070 on businesses, or the number of immigrants it has prompted to leave Arizona. But merchants say the repercussions are clear — not just in how it's prompted many families to leave the state, but scared others enough to curtail their regular activities. "The economy's already bad, but on top of it [SB 1070] is like a bullet in the head to us," said Osameh Odeh, 35, whose Eden Wear clothing store was empty one recent afternoon. "People don't come out of their houses anymore." Of course, we not only predicted this outcome, we reported on its early manifestations already awhile back. You know the political price for this may be a steep one -- considering that wrecking the economy is not usually a popular outcome. Even Judge Bolton's ruling, staving off the law's enactment, can't prevent these outcomes. And it couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of people.

July 28, 2010 10:30 PM

Jeb Bush fundraises for Rand Paul on the anniversary of the ADA

A Bush is what a Bush does, even if his name is Jeb. How awkward would you feel if you have to stump for a candidate on the anniversary of the passing of a landmark piece of legislation signed into law by your father, knowing full well that your candidate would have voted against such an act, one that is all about common decency? Does Jeb Bush believe that handicapped people should forced to ride on the back of the bus? You may think I have two separate things mixed up, but not in Rand Paul Land, because he's all for businesses to be allowed to do whatever they like, including being racists, because that's how the free markets work in his mind. His beliefs extend to the handicapped as well. Sam Stein: Jeb Bush's Rand Paul Fundraiser Awkwardly Takes Place On Anniversary Of Disability Act When former Florida Governor Jeb Bush hosts a fundraiser on behalf of Senate candidate Rand Paul on Monday it will symbolize, in more ways than one, the uncomfortable union of opposite poles of Republican ideology. Bush's brand of pragmatic conservatism stands in contrast to Paul's Tea Party temperament. The Kentucky Republican, likewise, often touts his independence from the GOP, citing the antiquated Republicanism of the Bush clan as an example. And so it seems almost appropriate that the two would team up, of all days, on the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act. ADA, which made it illegal for employers to discriminate against the disabled, was a signature piece of domestic legislation for Jeb's father, former president George H.W. Bush, and not merely because Congress forced it down his throat. The 41st president pledged his commitment to the bill starting with his acceptance speech at the Republican Convention. "I am going to do whatever it takes to make sure the disabled are included in the mainstream," he said. Indeed, when the legislation was celebrating its 19th anniversary, last year, the elder Bush put out a statement, congratulating President Obama "for taking some time today" to commemorate its significance. We all remember what Rand Paul said to Rachel Maddow and anyone else that would listen. That was until they actually started to pay attention to his crackpot ideas. "I think a lot of things could be handled locally," Paul said. "For example, I think that we should try to do everything we can to allow for people with disabilities and handicaps... I think if you have a two-story office and you hire someone who's handicapped, it might be reasonable to let him have an office on the first floor rather than the government saying you have to have a $100,000 elevator. And I think when you get to solutions like that, the more local the better, and the more common sense the decisions are, rather than having a federal government make those decisions." After the Maddow interview he cancelled his 'Meet The Press' interview and is trying to stay off the national grid as much as possible. What an embarrassment. This fundraiser isn't helping him much. Here's what's being said about the Bush fundraiser in Kentucky. Jack Conway bashes Rand Paul, Jeb Bush at ADA celebration—Louisville Courier-Journal Conway blasts Paul, Jeb Bush at rally for disabled persons—Lexington Herald-Leader Jeb Bush chided for attending Rand Paul event—Associated Press Conway criticizes Paul, Jeb Bush at event honoring passage of ADA--CNHI ADA group protest Rand Paul, Paul's campaign blames Jack Conway—WHAS 11 Jeb inspires $100k haul for Paul, protests—WHAS 11 Jeb Bush's Rand Paul Fundraiser Awkwardly Takes Place On Anniversary Of Disability Act—Huffington Post Would the ADA pass today?—The Guardian One Bush is back on the campaign trail—The Hill Please support Jack Conway over on our Blue America '10 page.

July 28, 2010 09:30 PM

In Perfect 10 v. Google, Round 3 Goes to Google: No Sloppy DMCA Notices

Copyright owners, take note: If you're going to use the streamlined Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") process to require a service provider to remove allegedly infringing content, you'd better make sure you actually comply with the DMCA notice requirements. Otherwise a court may find, as occurred this week in Perfect 10 v. Google, that your "notice" didn't actually put anyone on "notice."

A quick recap: In 2004, porn company and frequent litigator Perfect 10 sued Google for direct and secondary copyright infringement. Perfect 10 claimed that Google violated its copyrights by linking to websites that hosted infringing material, caching websites that hosted infringing photos of nude models, and hosting infringing images uploaded by Blogger users. In 2007, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a preliminary injunction in favor of Perfect 10 on its direct infringement claims, and sent the case back to the district court for a determination of some of the secondary infringement claims. Google moved for summary judgment, asserting that it was protected from secondary liability by the DMCA safe harbors.

This week, Judge Howard Matz of the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles mostly agreed with Google, whittling Perfect 10's remaining case down to a small subset of allegedly infringing images. Why? Mainly because Perfect 10 didn't trouble itself to provide Google with the information Google needed to figure out what to take down in a form that Google could readily use.

The DMCA requires a proper takedown notice to identify the work claimed to be infringed, identify the reference (or link) to material claimed to be infringing, and provide enough information to permit the service provider to locate that reference or link. Even though providing this information should be pretty easy, Perfect 10 fell far short.

For example, many of its "notices" consisted of a cover letter, a spreadsheet with URLs (many of which linked only to a top-level URL for a website, as opposed to a specific infringing URL) and a hard drive or DVD containing Perfect 10's electronic files of its photos. Not good enough, said the court — the information required by the DMCA must be contained in a single written communication; forcing a service provider to cobble together adequate notice from a variety of sources is just too burdensome.

P10 evidently expected Google to comb through hundreds of nested electronic folders containing over 70,000 distinct files, including raw image files such as JPEG files and screen shots of Google search results, in order to find which link was allegedly infringing. [] In many cases, the file containing the allegedly infringing image does not even include a URL, or the URL was truncated. [] The spreadsheets also do not identify the copyrighted work that was allegedly infringed. . . . P10 then expected Google to search through a separate electronic folder—attached only to the June 28, 2007 DMCA notice—containing all of the more than 15,000 images that appeared on P10's website as of June 2007, in order to identify the copyrighted work that was infringed.

The court did find that a small subset of notices complied with the DMCA; for those few notices, Google must now show that it responded to those notices "expeditiously" under the circumstances.

The ruling is not unprecedented: numerous courts, including the Ninth Circuit have found that ISPs don't have to respond to deficient DMCA notices. But the issue of how much information about infringement providers need to have (and fail to act on) before they lose the protection of the safe harbors is being hotly contested in two other proceedings. Content owners are insisting that if ISPs have general knowledge of infringement on their services, they must take over the burden of stamping it out. We might think of Judge Matz's decision as one more vote in favor of keeping the burden of identifying copyright infringement where it has traditionally belonged — on the content owners themselves.

July 28, 2010 09:29 PM

Wikileaks founder Juliian Assange dismantles attacks against his work on Democracy Now!

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was interviewed for the entire show of Democracy Now! today. I've chosen a few key passages to highlight which, to me at least, present the most important counter-arguments to the White House and Versailles media narratives that try to minimize, dismiss and stigmatize what the documents reveal and Wikileaks' actions in releasing them. The clarity and straight-forward logic of Wikileaks' position stands in stark contrast to everything Versailles, including the increasingly contorted and self-contradictory Obama Administration:

The Most Important Revelations

It's not the individual facts, so much as it is the broad panaroma of them all, which in turn enables us to grasp the individual facts much more realistically by understanding the broader context in which they occur:

AMY GOODMAN [Introducing a pre-recorded clip]: I began by asking Julian Assange what he thought of the most important revelations in the 91,000 documents he published on Sunday, the biggest leak in US history.
JULIAN ASSANGE: So, everyone's asking for a specific revelation that is the most important-you know, a massacre of 500 people at one point in time. But, to me, what is most important is the vast sweep of abuses that have occurred during the past six years, the vast sweep of sort of the everyday squalor and carnage of war. If we add all that up, we see that in fact most civilian casualties occur in incidences where one, two, ten or twenty people are killed. And they really numerically dominate the list of events, so it's, of course, hard for us to imagine that. It's so much material. But that is the way to really understand this war, is by seeing that there is one sort of kill after another every day going on and on and on in all sorts of different circumstances.

War Crimes

There is evidence that warrants investigation. This should be taken very seriously:

AMY GOODMAN: You have said you feel there is evidence of war crimes here. Can you talk about that? And specifically, what are the examples that you feel are the most important?
JULIAN ASSANGE: Yeah. Yeah, well, these reports can be quite terse, so I wouldn't want to prejudge the issue and say for sure that a war crime has committed-been committed. But some are deeply suspicious, and there are examples which have been not mentioned in the Western press but, as we've discovered, have been mentioned elsewhere that are almost surely war crimes.
As an example, in the material, there's a Polish My Lai. Polish troops were hit by an IED and the next day went to the closest village, which I guess they felt had supported the IED attack, and shelled the village. Similarly, we see something like Task Force 373, a special forces assassination squad so secretive that it changes its military code name every six months, working its way down the JPEL, Joint Priority Effects List, kill or capture list, usually a kill list. And we have seen events where it has performed secret missile strikes on a house, from within close proximity, and ended up killing at least seven children, and a number of other incidences. The report itself about that says at the beginning that the information about 373 being involved in that event, together with the use of the HIMARS missile system, this ground-to-ground missile attack, is to be kept secret even from other people in the coalition of forces which equal ISAF, I-S-A-F.

Pentagon Starts Criminal Investigation of Leaks--NOT War Crimes

It's no longer news that the Obama Administration--like the Bush Administration before it--sees leaks as bad, and war crimes as... well, just not that important:

AMY GOODMAN: The Pentagon has announced it is starting a criminal investigation to find your sources. Your response to that?
JULIAN ASSANGE: Yes. We are concerned that the United States has not announced that it is going to conduct criminal investigations into the large number of previously undisclosed civilian casualty events that are revealed by this material. Why is it that an investigation is announced to go into the source, before an investigation is announced to deal with the potentially criminal conduct that is revealed by this material? The rest of the world is taking note. There's fourteen pages in Monday's Guardian newspaper, nearly-more than one-third of the entire paper dedicated to this issue; seventeen pages in Der Spiegel, the most influential publication in Germany. So, Europe is certainly taking note of the tenor that is coming out of the White House and to concrete reactions coming out of this material. It's clear what the European population wants to see, and hopefully that's also what the US population wants to see, which is a clear response to deal with the problems that are occurring in Afghanistan, not a clear response to try and stifle or cover up further allegations of abuse.

Old News? It's the "Old News" Meme That's Old News

Past changes in policy haven't made much difference on the ground, despite rhetoric to the contrary, and the one month overlap with Obama's "new policy" announced on Dec 1, 2009 shows no sign that it's any different this time around:

AMY GOODMAN: Julian Assange, I'd like you to respond quickly to the responses of the administration, of the Obama administration: one, that this is old news, that it goes until December '09, exactly when the Obama administration changed its policy with the surge.
JULIAN ASSANGE: Yeah, so, this is a bit of rhetorical trickery by the White House. The material goes to December 31, '09, so it's valid up to the beginning of 2010, for a six-year period. So it does cover a sweep of the war which hasn't yet turned around. Now, Obama's policy change came in on the 1st of December, so there is, in fact, an overlap. We can see some of what happens. But looking back through the data at successive policy changes-for example, the policy changes introduced by McChrystal-what we don't see is a real change to how things happen on the ground. So a policy change is just words, but what actually happens on the ground, well, we can see it from this data. Very little happens. The US military and the soldiers in Afghanistan are a very, very big ship to turn around. Their interaction with that environment and with the Taliban and with the local population has its own dynamic that is independent to the policies that are tried-that people try and push down from on high. We can see that, as an example, when McChrystal tried to introduce more metrics, more measurements, of how civilian casualties were occurring. Fields pop up in the database around that time. But we see that troops that are causing civilian casualties simply don't fill out that field, or they lie about whether the casualties have occurred, or they misrepresent whether it was a civilian casualty versus an insurgent casualty. That sort of-that culture and interaction between Taliban and US forces and other elements operating in Afghanistan is very difficult to change. And so, we don't expect that the situation, as it stands now, some seven months after this data stopped being collected, would be that different to the previous six years, which we can see in the material that has been released.

National Security Threat? "Nonsense" Says Assange

Assange patiently de-constructs the claim:

AMY GOODMAN: Julian Assange, the charge that WikiLeaks releasing these documents is a threat to national security and people on the ground in Afghanistan?
JULIAN ASSANGE: Well, this is a nonsense. First of all, whenever we hear this term, "threat to national security," what are we talking about? It's time people stop responding to that question, unless it's well phrased. Do we mean the national security, the security of the entire nation of the United States? It is clearly an obvious nonsense that-probably almost any kind of information could be a threat to the national security of the United States. Now, do we mean threats to a few soldiers in Afghanistan? That is a more reasonable question and a serious one. Well, the material is seven months old. It doesn't talk about particular movements of soldiers now or any ongoing sort of operation that's going to occur, so it's not of tactical significance. But it is of significance for investigators. It is of significance for understanding the broad sweep of what is happening in Afghanistan. Remember, it is this data that the US military uses internally to monitor the situation, that it uses to develop those aggregate figures about civilian casualties, Taliban, the ratio between killed and wounded, the ration between killed and detained over time. Now, all that original reporting, unmassaged by the Pentagon press office, is available to academics, historians and the general public to understand that war.

The whole thing is well worth listening to or reading. The title Democracy Now! gave to the story is most significant: "WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange: 'Transparent Government Tends to Produce Just Government.'"

Indeed. What could be simpler? Or more truly American?

July 28, 2010 09:00 PM

Our Racist President Is A Divider Not A Uniter Who Hates White And Black People And Also Mexicans

Everybody knows by now that liberals are the real racists and Barack Obama is the racistest of them all.* But did you know that Obama ‘has divided America’ not just ‘on the basis of race’ — but on ‘class and partisanship’ too?

Patrick H. Caddell and Douglas E. Schoen lay it all out in today’s Wall Street Journal:

Our Divisive President

… Rather than being a unifier, Mr. Obama has divided America on the basis of race, class and partisanship. Moreover, his cynical approach to governance has encouraged his allies to pursue a similar strategy of racially divisive politics on his behalf.

Messrs. Caddell and Schoen ‘say this with a heavy heart’, but the evidence they present is irrefutable. For example, did you know:

- That this one time, Obama said this one white cop ‘acted stupidly’ for arresting this one black guy for no good reason? And what’s more, that our ‘president’ had the nerve to say that there was a ‘long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately’?

- That this other guy said Obama told him in private that he hoped all the white people in Arizona would have their throats slit by migrant workers or that there should be comprehensive immigration reform or something?

- That Obama’s Justice Department hasn’t prosecuted some big, scary black men for standing near a polling place this one time, which is totally against the law?

- That Obama’s favoritism towards black people has resulted in a whopping 23.2 percent unemployment rate amongst young white people while just 39.9 percent of young black people are unemployed?

What’s more, ‘Mr. Obama has also cynically divided the country on class lines.’ Feast your brains on this smoking gun:

- Wall Street fat cats and insurance bigwigs keep giving Obama money even though he sometimes says bad stuff in public about their industries because the public totally hates those guys, but then doesn’t really do all that much to curb their worst excesses.

Finally, Obama is a partisan.** Horrifyingly, Obama and Democrats are probably going to try to appeal to certain voting constituencies in the run-up to this November’s elections, predict Caddell and Schoen.

We would all be wise to heed their warnings and drum this race-class-and-political hustler out of office before he mildly rebukes someone or something again (and then politely backs down and/or uses said rhetoric to mask the fact he isn’t really doing shit to change much of anything socially, economically or politically).

*It’s actually worse than this — Obama simultaneously picks the cotton, serves mint juleps in the big house and whips the slaves on the Democrat Plantation. Also, he runs a high-tech Underground Railroad on the Internets and is a Grand High Imperial Trouser Snake in the Ku Klux Klan.

**He is also the brains behind the birther movement. Think about it, have you ever seen Obama and Orly Taitz in a room together?

July 28, 2010 08:30 PM

CNN Thinks Racist Flame Thrower Erick Erickson is Qualified to Weigh in on Race Relations

DOWNLOADS: (337) PLAYS: (1277) Now that the media has decided to help whitewash Andrew Breitbart's hit piece on Shirley Sherrod by using what happened as an excuse to talk about race relations non-stop instead of the fact that this is not the first time Fox News and Breitbart have done hit pieces on organizations like ACORN and others that were patently false and the need for some accountability for their actions, we continually get treated to segments like this one. The big elephant in the room that is ignored is the real need for something to be done about the fact that six companies control our media and they need to be broken up. Until that happens we're going to be fed the stream of garbage that calls itself "news" like we have here. CNN's Anderson Cooper hosted a panel segment to discuss Howard Dean's statement on Fox News Sunday that Fox's coverage of Shirley Sherrod was racist. One one side we have the Reverend Michael Eric Dyson. And on the other side Red State blogger and now CNN contributor Erick Erickson. So CNN's idea of "fair and balanced" is to make a professor of sociology at Georgetown University have to debate a right wing flame throwing racist about race. Nice. Although now that he's part of their "Best Political Team on Television" what else should we expect from them? His hire ranks right up there with that of Republican operative Alex Castellanos. I'd like to know why CNN thinks that someone with Erickson's history should be brought in to discuss race...ever. He's the Pat Buchanan of CNN. This is a man who called Obama's Nobel Peace Prize" an affirmative action quota". He defended Rush Limbaugh and the racist "Barack the Magic Negro" song. He also defended President Obama being portrayed as the Joker. But here he is on CNN being asked to weigh in on race relations in the United States when he's part of the problem. Thankfully Dyson did point out just how dishonest Fox has been on the time line of when they ran with the Sherrod story but apparently Erickson doesn't want to let a little pesky thing like facts get in the way of his spin. Erickson also slammed Media Matters as "nothing but a left-wing hit job". Yeah, whatever you say Erick. That's some severe projection you've got going on there buddy. I'm sure Erickson has a lot of disdain for Media Matters since they do a good job of documenting his hackery day in and day out. I have little doubt that sunshine is not something Erickson appreciates very much. Transcript via CNN below the fold. COOPER: Well, the charges of racism have been, frankly, used on both sides of the political aisle over the last week. The question is, are they fair? Or have our conversations about race in this country become nothing more than partisan weapons? Joining me now, RedState.com blogger and CNN contributor Erick Erickson and Georgetown University professor Michael Eric Dyson. Professor Dyson, what do you make of this? I mean, is Howard Dean basically just using this just as the right has used this? Or is he -- is he correct? MICHAEL ERIC DYSON, PROFESSOR, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY: Well, clearly the history of racism in this country is not simply about individual bias. It's also about institutional power. And I think, if there's any validity in what Mr. Dean said, it is to point to the institutional matrix in which this whole thing unfolded. The reality is, is that FOX News has not been friendly toward the interests of or perspectives about African-American people or Latinos or a whole range of other minorities. And I think that when we begin to sling around the term racism, people get offended and think, well, the right says it. The left says it. Well, bias is one thing; racism is another. Racism is the ability to impose your viewpoints, biased as they are, as normative, and then have the power to reinforce them as necessary, and primarily exclusive. So I think in that sense the institutional power that's wielded by a place like FOX News certainly has to be called into questi

July 28, 2010 08:30 PM

Daily Fix Poll: How many women will win governors races this year?

The victories of Rep. Mary Fallin (R) and Lt. Gov. Jari Askins (D) in yesterday's Oklahoma gubernatorial primaries makes the Sooner State the latest state on track to elect a female governor this fall. Along with Oklahoma, New Mexico is ensured to elect a female governor too -- Doña Ana County District Attorney Susana Martinez (R) is facing off against Lt. Gov. Diane Denish (D). Women have also been nominated in gubernatorial races in four other states: state Rep. Nikki Haley (R) in South Carolina, former eBay CEO Meg Whitman (R) in California, state Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink (D) in Florida and state Senate President Libby Mitchell (D) in Maine. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer's (R) primary opposition has all but disappeared, while state House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher (D), state Auditor Rita Meyer (R) and former Secretary of State Karen Handel (R) are competing for their parties' nominations in

Mary Fallin - Oklahoma - New Mexico - Jari Askins - South Carolina

July 28, 2010 07:51 PM

Bipartisanship at last! The deficit chickenhawk/war chickenhawk convergence

After so many months of frustration in the elusive quest for bipartisanship, Barack Obama has finally succeeded in his Grail Quest! That's right folks, bi-partisanship! 148 Democrats and 160 Republicans in the House! Woopee!

Except, of course, for the substance: More money for an Afghanistan War supplemental (which Obama promised not to do any more), with all the domestic spending previously used to entice Democrats stripped out of the bill. HuffPo's Ryan Grimm does a very good job of hitting all the contradictions and disconnects involved (including Arne Duncan's fury at the prospect of more funding for teachers interfering with his Race-To-The-Top war on teachers--which Grimm doesn't explain, but Open Lefters will understand):

Back in early 2008, Glenn Greenwald put together a little list of Versailles bipartisanship on parade. I've referenced that list a number of times since then, starting with a diary the very same week, "Bipartisanship Vs. Reality: The Stimulus Package" (this was pint-sized Bush stimulus I was writing about). A shortened snippet of Glenn's piece, with my reformatted version of Glenn's list reads as follows:

"bipartisanship" is already rampant in Washington, not rare. And, in almost every significant case, what "bipartisanship" means in Washington is that enough Democrats join with all of the Republicans to endorse and enact into law Republican policies, with which most Democratic voters disagree. That's how so-called "bipartisanship" manifests in almost every case....
In almost every case, the proposals that are enacted are ones favored by the White House and supported by all GOP lawmakers, and then Democrats split and enough of them join with Republicans to ensure that the GOP gets what it wants. That's "bipartisanship" in Washington:
To support the new Bush-supported FISA law:
GOP - 48-0 / Dems - 12-36
To compel redeployment of troops from Iraq:
GOP - 0-49 / Dems - 24-21
To confirm Michael Mukasey as Attorney General:
GOP - 46-0 / Dems - 7-40
To confirm Leslie Southwick as Circuit Court Judge:
GOP - 49-0 / Dems - 8-38
Kyl-Lieberman Resolution on Iran:
GOP - 46-2 / Dems - 30-20
To condemn MoveOn.org:
GOP - 49-0 / Dems - 23-25
The Protect America Act:
GOP - 44-0 / Dems - 20-28
Declaring English to be the Government's official language:
GOP - 48-1 / Dems - 16-33
The Military Commissions Act:
GOP - 53-0 / Dems - 12-34
To renew the Patriot Act:
GOP - 54-0 / Dems - 34-10
Cloture Vote on Sam Alito's confirmation to the Supreme Court:
GOP - 54-0 / Dems - 18-25
Authorization to Use Military Force in Iraq:
GOP - 48-1 / Dems - 29-22
On virtually every major controversial issue -- particularly, though not only, ones involving national security and terrorism -- the Republicans (including their vaunted mythical moderates and mavericks) vote in almost complete lockstep in favor of the President, the Democratic caucus splits, and the Republicans then get their way on every issue thanks to "bipartisan" support. That's what "bipartisanship" in Washington means.

The President has changed. But the pattern remains remarkably constant. And the American people remain deeply at odds with the buy-partisan concensus in Versailles.

July 28, 2010 07:45 PM

Texas State Board of Education: Rewrite history, bankrupt the future

File this is in the "you can't make this stuff up" file, under Texas State Board of Education. After the utterly bizarre meeting in May where the term "free market" was substituted for "capitalism", Board members decided to take funds set aside since the beginning of Texas and make a market.

Well, not make a market so much as subsidize one that was floundering. As I've mentioned before, the Permanent School Fund was established to make sure that Texas schoolchildren get an education. Trustees of the fund are charged with making decisions according to the "prudent man" rule.

The prudent man rule is very specific, and very, very limited. It says that not only must investment decisions be made in a way that protects the interests of the beneficiaries of the fund (the schools), but it goes one step further. If a Trustee is bound by the prudent man rule, they must make decisions in a similar fashion as one who is familiar with such matters might.

That's a key concept right there. It's not enough for these Trustees to say they believe making a certain investment will preserve the principal, generate income, and not subject the fund to excessive risk. They must make that decision in a fashion as someone else familiar with such matters would make it.

In our current economic environment, investing $100 million of the Texas Permanent School Fund into facilities for charter schools would certainly not appear to meet the standards of the Prudent Man Rule. In fact, the Texas State Board of Education fired their investment advisor, who specifically advised against investing in charter schools.

SBOE Candidate Judy Jennings:

Last year the financial consultants hired to give advice to the SBOE were fired when some board members did not like the advice they paid for. That advice included not investing Permanent School funds in risky schemes, and one example was real estate for charter schools.

After an amazingly convoluted session of arm-twisting last weekend, it appears that the Texas SBOE has decided to toss prudence to the wind along with any appearance of propriety and buy real estate to lease back to Texas charter schools at a reduced rate.

After the first vote failed, a second vote was taken the following day, after two Democrats had left for some inexplicable reason.

The Texas Observer (with language edited to C&L post standards):

Among the lobby, there was clear perception that too few on the board understood the complexities of the plan. "Can you use 'clusterf*ck' in the Observer?" one lobbyist muttered to me as he walked by during the debate. (Guess that answers that.)

However, Bradley has argued that the specific plan is almost irrelevant to his efforts. "There are no details, there is no program," he told colleagues Thursday. Passing the plan, he said, "at least signals intent" to deal with the charter school problem.

No, see, here's the problem. You can't commit an investment of $100 million in something where there are no details, there is no plan, and claim to be making a prudent investment. That's not how investing works. The right way to make this investment, assuming it might be prudent, would be to have a written proposal with specific properties presented, outlining a specific plan and specific rates and specific locations, among other things.

The problem is significant. Many people who run charter schools have backgrounds in education and not business. They can't easily turn to bonds since, unlike traditional districts, they have no tax base and state gives charter schools $1,000 less per student than traditional schools. With little credit history, charters have trouble getting the funding they need. They can wind up teaching out of strip malls, churches and pretty much anywhere with an empty room or two. Last session, the legislature created the Intercept Program to help lower interest rates for charter schools that could show private funding sources using legitimate financial tools, but according to David Dunn, executive director of the Texas Charter School Association that alone won't solve the problem.

Well, yeah, there's that. And also the more interesting issue, which is that charter schools are public schools but not really public schools. Originally conceived as a public-private partnership, charter schools operate outside of traditional school systems, tend to be small, insular, and sometimes innovative. Charter schools are public schools in the sense that they receive state and federal funds on a per-student basis, but state funds are generally not provided for facilities.

And really, this is the heart of the matter on charter schools:

Hochberg says that while he supports charter schools, they get to choose how much they want to grow and which students to accept. "There are legitimate differences in the prioritization" between traditional and charter schools, he says.

Public schools should be available to everyone. A public fund established to ensure that Texas children receive a great public education should not be invested in risky enterprises intended to pick and choose students who benefit.

Beyond that, I have these questions for the Texas State Board of Education:

Who would decide which facilities to purchase?
Who would administer the day-to-day collection and maintenance of the facilities?
Why would leasing facilities to charter schools at below-market rates be of benefit to all beneficiaries -- present and future -- of the fund?
Who would sell the facilities to the fund? Are any of those SBOE members involved in real estate sales and investing? Are any of their families? Extended families?
On what basis is an investment of $100 million of the Fund's principal into real estate investments where occupancy is not guaranteed and rates will be below-market discount rental rates a prudent decision?

I'm not sure what I think is worse: Rewriting history or bankrupting the funds set aside to teach it.

Please go read Rebecca Bell-Metereau's and Judy Jennings' diaries and if you live in Texas, please help get some sane voices on that Board of Education.

What starts in Texas rarely stays there. If this type of risky, self-dealing investment is permitted to stand, it won't be long before other states will try it. Our kids deserve better than that.

July 28, 2010 07:30 PM

Abbreviated Blagojevich trial a boon for Illinois Democrats

By Felicia Sonmez For Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn (D), the silence of Rod Blagojevich may well be golden. Blagojevich, the former governor with whom Quinn served for six years, has been embroiled in a corruption trial that was expected to last well into the fall. A who's-who of Washington power players was expected to testify in the former governor's defense (not to mention the much-anticipated testimony of Blagojevich himself). Now, the case is nearing its conclusion a mere eight weeks after it began. Blagojevich and his team rested last Wednesday without so much as a word from the defendant (and without a single witness being called). Both sides delivered their closing arguments this week. While that spells disappointment for those looking forward to the spectacle of a Blagojevich trial, it could make Quinn breathe easier. "We think the state as a whole is looking forward to moving on and moving

Rod Blagojevich - Illinois - Washington - United States - Trial

July 28, 2010 07:11 PM

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July 28, 2010 07:11 PM

Arpaio threatens to jail immigration law protesters

DOWNLOADS: (386) PLAYS: (1071) Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio told ABC's George Stephanopoulos that he would not hesitate to arrest protesters that were blocking his jail. "It appears that there are groups, individuals that are gearing up for some civil disobedience if this law does take effect," Stephanopoulos noted Wednesday. "Are you prepared for that? What are you going to do about it?" "Yeah," replied Arpaio. "I'm ready for it. I hear a rumor they want to block my jails. So, if they want to block the jails, they can have a little trip in the jail." "So, we're not going to put up with any civil disobedience just because they want to show -- give a message through the media about this situation that is occurring here in Arizona."

July 28, 2010 06:30 PM

Redistricting: the most important under-appreciated aspect of the 2010 elections

I knew going into Netroots Nation that I had to attend the panel on redistricting. How could I not, considering the GOP's renegade raid on the Texas congressional delegation in 2003? The video of the event can be seen at the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) website, here. A preview press release from the DLCC explained:

"Redistricting and the Fate of Progressive Politics explains what the stakes are in this year's state legislative elections," Sargeant explained. "Right now, Republicans will control the drawing of 106 congressional seats. If Republicans were to pick up just 10 key state legislative seats this fall, they will gerrymander 134 congressional districts for themselves. If the GOP pick up 55 key state legislative seats, they will draw 178 of the 435 congressional districts-178 districts designed to elect Republicans.
"On the other hand, if Democrats were to win 10 key state legislative seats in this fall's elections, we will prevent the GOP from gerrymandering its way into an artificial majority that will affect congressional elections and politics for the next decade."

I can't possibly stress the importance of redistricting too much, and I plan to be blogging about it repeatedly through the elections and beyond. But I want to start things off fairly simply. My points are simple:

can

made

favors

extremely

finally

Now

Here are a few charts cribbed from the DLCC to help drive some of these points home. First, we see how Democrats have lost ground at the last two redistrictings, gaining ground in between:

As I said above, the current legislative landscape favors Democrats in redistricting:

But the shift of just a few key legislative seats could have enormous impacts. Taking the most crucial seats first, these are the impacts that Republican gains could have:

On the other hand, these are the potential impacts of Democratic gains:

Just to focus on how much impact only a handful of key seats could have, here's a pie-chart of view of what the 10 most crucial seat changes could mean for the GOP:

And here's a similar chart showing what the 10 most key Dem gains could mean:

As I said, this is only the briefest of introductions to what's at stake and the lay of the land. Whether you're enthusiastic or disgusted with national party and/or your local representatives, joining the battle to preserve and extend our control over state legislatures is key to creating further possibilities over the course of the next ten years... or, in the alternative, putting ourselves in a position of permanently playing defense.

This is the battlefield you should not miss!

July 28, 2010 06:15 PM

Live Chat: Rep. Raúl Grijalva Discusses The Right-To-Rent Bill With Blue America

On June 30th we hosted Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ) here at C&L for an open ended discussion that started with the immigration reform debate. Rep. Grijalva has graciously agreed to keep us up to date on what's going on in Congress and in the Progressive Caucus he chairs once a month. He'll be visiting with us again today (in the comments forum below) and I've asked him to talk with us about a new bill he and Marcy Kaptur introduced in April, the Right-To-Rent Act, H.R. 5028. The Obama Administration's somewhat tepid HAMP program isn't working and millions of families are still facing foreclosures by avaricious bankers. Rep. Grijalva's bill would let foreclosed families stay in their homes as renters at a fair market rate set by a judge. If banks don't want to become landlords, they would have incentives to renegotiate the terms of the mortgage. The foreclosure crisis needs exactly this kind of creative, common-sense solution, and the Congressman has been out in front on this issue from the beginning. Dean Baker's Center for Economic and Policy Research called the bill "one of the most efficient and simple ways to help millions of families facing foreclosure remain in their homes."

It would increase the bargaining power and security of homeowners by temporarily changing the rules on foreclosure and allowing homeowners to remain in their homes as renters for a substantial period or time. During this time, homeowners would pay the market rent for the home as determined by an independent assessment.

"Right to Rent immediately gives the homeowner security in their home. They will be allowed to stay there for a substantial period of time, allowing their children to stay in their schools and families to prepare for and plan their future moves," said Baker in his testimony on Wednesday. "Right to Rent also would make foreclosure much less attractive to investors. This gives investors more incentive to modify loans on their own, without the involvement of the government."

The GOP is going after Congressman Grijalva's seat like they never have before. They're trying to stir up divisiveness based on the immigration issue in his southern Arizona district. Blue America has a donation page specifically for his campaign One America and we're hoping you'll visit and leave a little token of your appreciation for his leadership and courage. There's an alternative though-- a memorabilia auction on eBay! We love all of these items, but are particularly fond of the “doodles.” No two are ever alike, and the two that we are auctioning are particularly exceptional, both for their intricate detail (look for the faces and eyes!), as well as for the setting in which they were drawn (Natural Resources Committee hearings concerning Deepwater Horizon).

Check them out!

Our favorites are the CLEAR Act Markup "Doodle” and the Deepwater Horizon & MMS Hearing "Doodle”. There's also a high quality, union made, perfectly tacky Grijalva bowling shirt and a couple of exceptionally cool bumper stickers.

July 28, 2010 05:30 PM

BREAKING: Judge blocks key portions of Arizona's anti-immigrant law, SB1070 UPDATED

DOWNLOADS: (360) PLAYS: (400) CNN, Fox News and MSNBC are reporting that Judge Susan Bolton has blocked key portions of SB1070, Arizona's police-state immigration, from taking effect tomorrow, when the law was due to be enacted. According to Fox's reporters, Bolton has issued an injunction blocking the state from enacting the portions of the bill that require police officers to request immigration papers and which make failure to possess immigration papers a crime. More details shortly. UPDATE 1: Details from AP: The law will still take effect Thursday, but without many of the provisions that angered opponents — including sections that required officers to check a person's immigration status while enforcing other laws. The judge also put on hold a part of the law that required immigrants to carry their papers at all times, and made it illegal for undocumented workers to solicit employment in public places. U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton put those controversial sections on hold until the courts resolve the issues. UPDATE 2: Here's the ruling itself. Plus: The New York Times has more.

July 28, 2010 05:24 PM

"Thursday's Bacon" - Episode 8 (b) (Quitting Facebook, Memento To-Do List)

July 23, 2010 Source Credits - talent network, inc, David Sedelmeier, Frank Murgia, --- Welcome to an EXTRA serving of bacon being served on Friday so this is even more crispy and brittle. A day later we review the fancy party we attended at the Pittsburgh Zoo Aquarium. Frank Explains why he is quitting Facebook, writes his to-do list on his hand and they compare Dave's vacations to Europe to

July 28, 2010 04:58 PM

Stewart cautions liberals not to trust Breitbart tapes

The Obama administration clearly deserves most of the blame for misinterpreting a video clip to mean that a black USDA worker withheld help from a white farmer, according to Comedy Central's Jon Stewart.

While Andrew Breitbart is responsible for posting the edited video of Shirley Sherrod on his BigGovernment.com website, the Obama administration did not take the time to obtain the full speech before calling for her resignation.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack essentially forced Sherrod to resign. Stewart joked that she had been "Vilsacked." The Agriculture Secretary apologized but at least one statement reflected a lack of contrition.

"It should have been done in a much more personal way. It should have been done with far more thought and it should have been done in far less haste," said Vilsack.

"I shouldn't have been done," Stewart said to cheers from his studio audience. "We're not angry about how you fired her. We're angry that you fired her."

"I'm sorry I hit your dog with my car. I should have smothered him with a pillow," Stewart joked.

The NAACP was also forced to backtrack after initially condemning Sherrod. "We were snookered by Fox News and Tea Party activist Andrew Breitbart into believing Sherrod harmed white farmers because of racial bias," the NAACP said in a statement.

"First of all, Fox News is too busy to busy with their Black Panther hard-on to bother with this and the guy who leaked this tape may be the most honest person in this entire story," said Stewart.

Only five months ago, Breitbart said, "I want it to be in the history books saying I took down the institutional left."

"He didn't say I want to be in the history books as a paragon of honesty," Stewart noted. "He didn't say I would like to be in the museum of broadcasting and be known by children around the world as Arnold B. Truthington of Accuracy Lane. No, he said out loud, 'I want to bring down the institutional left.' So, if you are on the institutional left and you receive a package from him, watch the whole f**king tape!"

July 28, 2010 04:30 PM