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The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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Saturday
Jul162016

The Commentariat -- July 17, 2016

Afternoonish Update:

President Obama addressed the Baton Rouge shootings Sunday at 4:30 pm ET:

     ... The President released this statement earlier. ...

... Jonathan Bullington of the New Orleans Times-Picayune: "Three police officers were killed, and more wounded, after being shot Sunday morning (July 17) in Baton Rouge, the city's mayor said.... The shooting comes in the midst of ongoing protests in Baton Rouge following the fatal officer-involved shooting of Alton Sterling...." -- CW ...

... CW: It appears the Baton Rouge Advocate has live updates here, but the page is crashed right now. ...

... The New York Times has live updates here. ...

... Peter Holley, et al., of the Washington Post: "The shooting unfolded early Sunday as police responded to reports of a man carrying a rifle in an area with grocery stores and other businesses, according to Colonel Michael D. Edmonson of the Louisiana State Police, the agency taking the lead on the investigation. Edmonson stressed that there was no active shooting situation and that police had killed the armed attacker, who died during a shootout with officers." -- CW ...

... Gregory Kreig of CNN: "The head of Cleveland's largest police union is calling on Ohio Gov. John Kasich to temporarily restrict the state's open carry gun laws during this week's Republican National Convention following Sunday's shooting in Louisiana that killed three officers and wounded at least three others." -- CW ...

     ... New York Times: "Gov. John Kasich of Ohio released a statement expressing grief at the attack in Baton Rouge, La., but a spokeswoman said he would not move to restrict the brandishing of guns around the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, which begins on Monday." -- CW ...

... Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: Donald Trump blamed the Baton Rouge shooting on "a lack of leadership in our country." "He followed up with a reminder of his '60 Minutes' appearance tonight with his running mate, Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana." -- CW 

Steve M. takes a look at some of the "soul-searching" among Republicans, along with a promised "rebellion" by some of the delegates to the Republican Convention. He concludes, "There isn't going to [be a] battle for the soul of the Republican Party after November. The party's just going to be what it was prior to Trump, which was already most of the way to Trumpism, except with a veneer of deniability. The only battle will be over how many coats of veneer should be reapplied now that Trump has stripped them off -- if any." -- CW  

Michael Grunwald in Politico Magazine: "In a head-to-head matchup with the ultimate wonk, Trump is betting voters will prefer his bravado to Clinton’s position papers." Thanks to Haley S. for the link. ...

     ... CW: Grunwald's piece is a good read. It reminds me of Stephen Colbert's recent comment to Ben Smith of BuzzFeed about Hillary Clinton: “She’s very serious — and when you’ve got a giant orange manatee to harpoon on the other side, you’re like — I don’t know if anybody [here] fishes, but fish go where the water is good, where you don’t have to work as hard.... [With Clinton,] you have to look for things to do, and when you find them, it’s a policy paper — you try making jokes about a fucking policy paper.” ...

     ... In the end, we have to hope that Hillary has an effective GOTV operation & that the majority of American voters actually care about the future of the country & will cast their votes for the boring wonkette instead of the insane carnival barker. Moreover, if Americans are half as fearful as Trump wants them to be, they almost have to vote for the stability of Clinton over the erraticism of Trump. Frankly, I think the Carnival Barker is hoping for that, too; he hasn't learned policy because he doesn't think he'll ever need to know it. His whole "presidential" campaign is just a rollout for the next series of Trump(TM) products. ...

... Alas, Driftglass interjects this reminder: "Of the Americans who can be bothered to haul their asses to the polls and vote, no matter what you or I say or do and no matter what Trump says or does, at least four in ten voters will affirmatively choose a fascist thug and a theocrat goon to lead this county." -- CW ...

... David Barstow in the New York Times: "... based on the mountain of court records churned out over the span of Mr. Trump’s career, it is hard to find a project he touched that did not produce allegations of broken promises, blatant lies or outright fraud.... Many of those allegations have already become familiar campaign fodder: the Trump University students and Trump condo buyers who say they were fleeced; the public servants from New Jersey to Scotland who now say they rue the zoning approvals, licenses or tax breaks they gave based on Mr. Trump’s promises; the small-time contractors who say Mr. Trump concocted complaints about their work to avoid paying them; the infuriated business partners who say Mr. Trump concealed profits or ignored contractual obligations; the business journalists and stock analysts who say Mr. Trump smeared them for critical coverage.... Taken as a whole, though, an examination of Mr. Trump’s business career reveals persistent patterns in the way Mr. Trump bends or breaks the truth...." -- CW 

*****

Patrick Kingsley of the Guardian: "Turkey’s hardline president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, unleashed a brutal purge of his enemies in the army and judiciary on Saturday after heading off an attempted military coup.... About 2,800 soldiers were arrested in a day of extraordinary drama that saw the putsch ruthlessly put down. More than 2,700 judges were summarily dismissed for their alleged links to the coup’s leaders, while warrants were issued for the arrest of 140 supreme court members." -- CW ...

Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post: "The defeat of a coup attempt launched by a faction of Turkey’s military has left relations between the United States and one of its most important allies in a state of uncertainty. President Obama called together his national security team for an unusual Saturday morning meeting to discuss events in Turkey and immediately followed it up with a conference call with foreign policy advisers." -- CW ...

... Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post: "The man that Turkey’s leaders have blamed for a failed coup attempt by a group of army officers is an Islamic scholar named Fethullah Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania and who has inspired a network said to include more than 160 charter schools in the United States. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says that the coup attempt Friday was the work of army officers who are followers of Gulen, who had once been an ally but whose movement has become critical of the increasingly authoritarian regime.... Secretary of State John F. Kerry on Saturday was quoted as saying the United States would support investigations to determine who instigated the attempted coup.... He said he anticipates questions will be raised about Gulen." -- CW ...

     ... Emily Cunningham, et al., of the Washington Post: Erdogan "called on the United States to extradite [Gulen].... The U.S. Embassy in Ankara meanwhile warned Americans to stay away from the Incirlik [NATO] base, which is in the city of Adana. It has been sealed off by local authorities, who also cut power to the base.... The U.S. Embassy warned citizens against heading to the airport amid reports of ongoing sporadic gunfire. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said it had barred American commercial aircraft from flying into or out of Turkey." -- CW ...

... Spencer Ackerman of the Guardian: "The coup attempt in Turkey has yielded its first tangible disruption to the war against Islamic State, as the Pentagon has temporarily lost access to the Turkish airfield it uses as its primary staging ground for its air campaign in Syria and Iraq." -- CW 

Martin Pengelly of the Guardian: "The western district of the United Methodist church (UMC) elected an openly gay bishop on Friday, despite its ban on same-sex relationships. The Rev Karen Oliveto was elected late in the evening at a meeting in Scottsdale, Arizona, of the church’s western jurisdiction." -- CW 

Presidential Race

Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "Hillary Clinton will call for a constitutional amendment to 'overturn Citizens United' in her first 30 days as president and plans to make that announcement today to progressive activists at the annual Netroots Nation conference. 'I will also appoint Supreme Court justices who understand that this decision was a disaster for our democracy,' Clinton will say in a video message, scheduled to run near the end of today's final keynote session.... Even though the case was fought over an anti-Hillary Clinton documentary, Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) became its most prominent critic in the 2016 primaries." CW News Flash: A Constitutional amendment ain't gonna happen.

Jonathan Swan & Harper Neidig of the Hill: "Donald Trump's campaign is still soliciting illegal donations from foreign individuals – including members of foreign governments at their official email addresses — weeks after the campaign was put on notice by watchdog groups. Foreign members of parliament from the United Kingdom and Australia confirmed to The Hill that they received fundraising solicitations from the Trump campaign as recently as July 12 — two weeks after a widely publicized FEC complaint issued on June 29 by non-partisan watchdogs...." CW: Chutzpah: (def.) calling your rival "criminal" & "crooked" even as you actively, openly & knowingly engage in criminal activities.

CW: You can take the boy out of Queens.... Trumpence sit down in Trump's New York apartment with Lesley Stahl for a "60 Minutes" interview in two of the more embarrassing chairs I've ever seen, although I had been thinking of hiding a boring toilet in a toned-down version -- as a joke:

Good Luck, Turkeys! So many friends in Turkey. Great people, amazing people. We wish them well. A lot of anguish last night, but hopefully it will all work out. -- Donald Trump, during his so-called "formal introduction of Mike Pence," in an example of how President Trump would help manage major crises around the world ...

... The Cheese Stands Alone. Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: Donald Trump's "introduction of Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana was a remarkable reminder that, ultimately, the Trump campaign is about one person.... Before the governor took the stage, Mr. Trump stood there alone and talked for 28 minutes, delivering a long and improvised riff that emulated his rallies instead of a traditional vice-presidential announcement.... After roughly 20 minutes, Mr. Trump reached for his notes. 'Back to Mike Pence!' he declared.... Then he used the reference to the Hoosier State to remind the 150 people in attendance that he trounced Mr. Pence’s endorsed candidate, Senator Ted Cruz, in the primary there." CW: Yeah, I may be using the pornologo a lot. ...

... (CW: Sadly, the campaign appears to have abandoned yesterday's logo for a new G-rated, non-penetration sign where TRUMP just hovers over pence. But I shall not be deterred.) ...

... Ezra Klein: "Trump emerged without Pence. He spoke, alone, at a podium adorned with Trump’s name, but not Pence’s. And then Trump proceeded to talk about himself for 28 minutes.... It was the single most bizarre, impulsive, narcissistic performance I have ever seen from a major politician.... Every five minutes or so, he seemed to remember, just for a moment...,  that he was there to introduce Mike Pence, and so he would say something like, 'now back to Mike Pence,' but then he would slip back again, and tell another anecdote about himself." -- CW 

... How Not to Choreograph a Major Media Event. Katy Tur, speaking on MSNBC: "This was a room not filled with Donald Trump supporters from rallies, but rather a number of GOP -- New York GOPers, some friends and family, and then just tourists who came in literally from off the street....That being said, it was typical in the way that Donald Trump spent a good portion of the time talking about, frankly, himself, relitigating the primaries, talking about all the deals he's made. Also, perpetuating this idea that he was against the Iraq war when he was not. He spent 29 minutes before he got to Governor Mike Pence [(R-IN)]. And he said part of the reason why he chose him -- and he admitted this -- was that he needed party unity, that he's an outsider and that he needed somebody who would smooth over relations in Washington." -- CW 

Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "... Mike Pence could make things even worse" for Donald Trump "with female, gay and minority voters.... Pence has endorsed controversial legislation on abortion, gay rights and immigration both in Indiana and while in Congress, where he was consistently ranked as one of the most right-leaning members of the House. He attempted to shut down the government over Planned Parenthood funding, supported a measure that made English the nation’s official language and signed one of the nation’s strictest abortion laws earlier this year." -- CW 

Comments Off

Reader Comments (11)

Several NYT commenters suggested that the Turkey coup was a set up by Ergogan. I think they may by right. Interesting how he turned up at the perfect moment. First move was to fire and arrest judges?

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterMarvin Schwalb

@Marvin Schwalb: Anything is possible with Erdogan, but this is a right-wing conspiracy theory pushed yesterday by super-Roman Catholic Andrew Bieszad and by some Turks opposed to Erdogan.

The U.S. State Department is committed to looking into the sources & causes of the attempted coup, so maybe we'll find out more eventually.

Marie

July 17, 2016 | Registered CommenterMarie Burns

Since it's Sunday, the day of rest, here's a little respite from the daily deluge of disasters. The famous bookstore in Greenwich Village, the Strand, gives a literary quiz to potential sales persons. Since we have here on R.C. book lovers and avid readers,why not take the quiz–– It's fun and will remind you how book savvy you really are––or not.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/17/nyregion/want-to-work-in-18-miles-of-books-first-the-quiz.html?ref=todayspaper

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe

Hillary's e-mail and classified information:

If you copied the text of this Post article

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/turkey-detains-about-6000-linked-to-failed-coup/2016/07/17/e77e0bb0-4baf-11e6-8dac-0c6e4accc5b1_story.html?hpid=hp_rhp-top-table-main_turkey-640am%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

and sent it to a friend, from the perspective of the Intelligence Community people who "found classified material" in HRC's e-mail, you would have sent classified information. This line from the story, alone, is categorically "Top Secret": "Some personnel at Incirlik, a major NATO air base that is home to the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons in Europe ..." Location of any nucs, anywhere, is TS.

This is a part of the "Hillary e-mail problem" that is almost impossible to deal with in the world of classified communications. Every USG employee who has ever dealt with any aspect of the US nuclear program knows that nuc location information is de facto "classified" whether or not it is so marked. Technically, when you send that text (the news article) to someone else, you are sending TS material in a non-classified channel. I suspect that this is the type of material that makes up much (not all) of what the FBI determined was improper handling by HRC and her correspondents.

Where did the Post reporters get that info? Who knows. And we don't even know if it is correct. But I can assure you (categorically) that it is TS.

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterPatrick

I'm having a hard time following the dots and making sense of who's on first...regarding Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Something seems off in all the stories, nothing provides a definitive picture of what is really happening in Turkey. My overall take is that if we are to believe: "...well he could be worse, but we're still supporting him because he is a transitional link between secular/Muslim politics."

Funnily, I know exactly where Erdogan's so-called nemesis is "exiled" in Pennsylvania. Not far from where I grew up...on a road that was my brothers and my favorite shortcut to a pizza place in Wind Gap! Odd, this cleric Fethullah Gulen ended up with a compound off a narrow two-lane country road (Mount Eaton Road). Why? Except, when I consider its location is within twenty minutes ENE to the Delaware Water Gap & I-80...or southward to Route 22 (and slightly further south to I-76). It's in a rather bucolic Blue Mountain area!

Agree with MarvinS. something is amiss in the coup story!

On a more frivolous note. Trump's furniture is the tackiest EVAH! Top interior designers around the world are giggling themselves silly over what the Donald perceives as 'klassy stuff."

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterMAG

MAG -- re the chairs -- I lived in Cairo in the mid-80's, and such chairs and other items were popular in hotels and wealthy homes. We referred to the style as "Louis Farouk" . And as DJT might say "Guess what? Lotsa people like 'em! I mean, whattaya want, they're gold and everything!"

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterPatrick

PD,

Thanks for the quiz. You're right. Such exercises do tell us something about ourselves.

Didn't do the multiple choice thing, but the five quizzes offered a total of seven titles whose authors I could not name from memory, and of those seven, five titles I didn't recognize at all.

Investigation would likely tell me more precisely when I stepped off the literary bus....no doubt confirming too many other evident signs of age.

Still, might conduct that search later. Old as I am, I'm still curious about what I might have missed; and I will step further out on the speculative limb this Sunday morning and guess that's one characteristic that distinguishes RC'ers from the typical TP adherent.

BTW, still haven't decided if my still mildly active curiosity, or--call it what it is--fascination with the grotesque, extends to next week's TP convention...

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterKen Winkes

To lighten up the mood during the dumpster fire GOP convention, I'm considering a drinking game of tracking every time Trump peddles his own business interests to the sheeple attending his clown show coronation of He, Trump.

Who wouldn't bet Trump squeezed a few Trump steaks onto the menu, served with Trump water, or some Trump wine for those who want to drink themselves into a stupor. How many "free" Trump golf course invitations will be dished out to fence-sitters, exchanging a free round of golf for your soul? How many behind-the-scenes schemes are they cooking up to filter major dollars into their own coffers? You can bet that Trump and his money-grubbing family have been huddling together atop their Tower for the last week strategizing day and night how to profit the Trump family during their dad's ultimate national reality show. A full week dedicated to our nation's greatest con artist. The audience is sure to be yuuuge, and there are obviously plenty of suckers and wanna-be political players to con.

Who better to take advantage than the Drumpfs? I'll need a few drinks while watching this pitiful spectacle of American democracy take an ever more giant step toward reality t.v. governance.

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered Commentersafari

@Patrick: Come to think of it, a friend of mine who was in the military had his photo taken in a chair that was very much like the ones Trumpence are sitting in -- in one of the palaces of Saddam Hussein. Maybe it turns out that Trump is suffering from Muslim envy.

Marie

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterMarie Burns

So the NYT made it official. It's actually Harold Hill running for POTUS.

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterMarvin Schwalb

It's Politico but all the same it is a good article comparing the Clinton campaign vs the Trump campaign and his idea of governing and what's most important to Americans. It draws a scary, but I think accurate, picture.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/07/donald-trump-policy-2016-hillary-clinton-214058

July 17, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterHaley Simon
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