The Commentariat -- Nov. 4, 2015
Internal links removed.
Julie Davis of the New York Times: "The White House on Tuesday said President Obama had no intention of bowing to a request from the company behind the Keystone XL oil pipeline to delay a decision on the project, saying he wanted to take action before his tenure ends. The State Department is reviewing a request made on Monday by the company, TransCanada, to pause its yearslong evaluation of the proposed 1,179-mile pipeline, which has become part of a broader debate over Mr. Obama's environmental agenda. Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, said on Tuesday that 'there's reason to suspect that there may be politics at play' in TransCanada's request. He strongly suggested that the review, which has been widely expected to result in a rejection of the pipeline as soon as this month, remained on track."
** Tommy Christopher of Mediaite demolishes Paul Ryan's repeated claim that Congress can't pass immigration reform because "President Obama is untrustworthy." While he's at it, Christopher takes down the Sunday showz, which every week "all feature the same exact press releases masquerading as interviews.... In every one of those [four] interviews, [when Ryan made the claim about President Obama,] the host elected to move on, rather than to challenge what Ryan had said, despite ample basis for such a challenge."
Aw, Shucks. Jonathan Swan & Kyle Plantz of the Hill: "The Koch brothers are on a publicity tour to change their image.... The brothers' appearance on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' continues something of a coming-out tour for the publicity-shy Kochs, who became bogeymen to the left following their early funding of the Tea Party movement, their expensive and ultimately failed efforts to defeat President Obama, and their plan to spend $250 million to elect Republicans to Congress and the presidency in 2016." Includes video.
CW: Should an 18-year-old boy who talks a reluctant 15-year-old girl into having sex with him, even if he's a despicable little prick, be branded a sex offender for life? Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post says no. What say you? ...
... Jeannie Suk, in the New Yorker: "What we are really talking about here is not rape, as we have until recently understood it, but rather sex that we strongly dislike. We are in the midst of a significant cultural shift, in which we are redescribing sex that we vehemently dislike as rape, and sexual attitudes that we strongly disapprove of as examples of rape culture."
David Rising of the AP: "Germany's Volkswagen, already reeling from the fallout of cheating on U.S. emissions tests for nitrogen oxide, said Tuesday that an internal investigation has revealed 'unexplained inconsistencies' in the carbon dioxide emissions from 800,000 of its vehicles -- a development it said could cost the company another 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion). The investigation was undertaken by the company after the revelations that many of its vehicles had software that allowed them to deceive U.S. nitrogen oxide tests. CEO Matthias Mueller promised Tuesday that Volkswagen 'will relentlessly and completely clarify what has happened.'"
AFP: "Michelle Obama called for an end to 'outdated laws and traditions' preventing millions of girls around the world from completing their education, in an impassioned speech Wednesday in Qatar. Obama spoke for almost 25 minutes at the Qatar National Convention Centre to a packed audience which included ... political and education leaders from around the world."
Elections Results
Horrible! Sheryl Gay Stolberg & Alan Blinder of the New York Times: "Matt Bevin, a Republican political novice, wealthy Louisville businessman and was elected Kentucky's next governor on Tuesday, a victory that could herald a new era in a state where Democrats have held the governor's mansion for all but four of the last 44 years. The Associated Press declared Mr. Bevin the winner shortly after 8 p.m. In beating his Democratic opponent, Attorney General Jack Conway, Mr. Bevin surprised many in his own party.... Mr. Bevin, a fierce opponent of the [Affordable Care Act], at first said he would reverse it, but has since softened his position and said he would stop enrolling new people but would not take coverage from people who had it." ...
favorite,... CW: We'll see if the Obama administration goes along with a plan to cut off new applicants while still providing assistance to current enrollees. Talk about unequal treatment under the law. ...
... Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "Bevin's win, and the Republican victories in neighboring Virginia, were body blows to Democratic hopes of enforcing the Affordable Care Act. Virginia voters rejected a chance to hand the state Senate back to a party that would expand Medicaid; some Kentucky voters who had benefited from the expansion surely voted against the candidate who'd keep it as is." ...
... Greg Sargent: "The news that Tea Party Republican Matt Bevin snatched the Kentucky governor's mansion away from Democrats is a particularly stark reminder of how deep a hole Democrats have dug for themselves on the level of the states, and of the consequences that could have for the long-term success of the liberal and Democratic agenda."
Laura Vozzella & Jenna Portnoy of the Washington Post: "Republicans held onto the Virginia Senate in fiercely contested elections Tuesday, leaving Gov. Terry McAuliffe without legislative leverage or political momentum as he works to deliver Virginia for his friend and ally Hillary Rodham Clinton in 2016."
Katherine Dreissen of the Houston Chronicle: "Houston's controversial equal rights ordinance failed by a wide margin Tuesday, with voters opting to repeal the law that offered broad non-discrimination protections, according to incomplete and unofficial returns."
AP: "In a single stroke, Ohio voters rejected a ballot proposal Tuesday to legalize marijuana for both recreational and medical use." The Cleveland.com story, by Jackie Borchardt, is here.
Susan Haigh of the AP: "An ex-convict who spent seven years in federal prison for corruption reclaimed the Bridgeport mayor's office Tuesday, completing a stunning comeback bid that tapped nostalgia for brighter days in Connecticut's largest city. Joe Ganim, who was released from prison only five years ago, declared victory in a race involving seven opponents."
Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Michael E. McMahon, a former congressman and New York City councilman, was chosen as the new district attorney of Staten Island on Tuesday, winning a contentious special election in the city's most conservative borough. In defeating Joan Illuzzi, a Republican, Mr. McMahon, a Democrat, takes over a position that drew national attention after a Staten Island grand jury decided not to indict a police officer in the death of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man."
Brent Johnson of NJ.com: "Democrats tightened their control of the [New Jersey] state Assembly in Tuesday's elections, wresting at least three seats away from a Republican party ruled by Gov. Chris Christie, a presidential candidate whose popularity has dropped at home. It means Democrats will control at least 51 of the 80 seats in the lower house of the state Legislature as of January -- their biggest majority since 1979."
Paul Egan of the Detroit Free Press: "Two former Republican state representatives who lost their seats in September amid a sex and cover-up scandal were soundly defeated Tuesday in their special primary bids to regain their seats. Cindy Gamrat of Plainwell was defeated Tuesday in her bid to regain her Allegan County state House seat by Mary Whiteford of South Haven. And former state representative Todd Courser, who admitted to having an extramarital affair with Gamrat and misusing state House resources in an attempt to cover it up, also lost his bid to win his seat back after resigning in September while facing expulsion from the House."
Ivan Moreno of the AP: "Suburban Denver voters on Tuesday ousted three conservative school board members who changed the way teachers are paid and briefly considered reviewing a U.S. history curriculum to promote patriotism. The high-profile political battle attracted a huge influx of cash from inside Jefferson County and from outside groups with an interest in what education reforms should look like. By overwhelming margins, voters agreed to recall Ken Witt, Julie Williams and John Newkirk, who were elected into office in 2013 and made up the majority in the five-member board of the second-largest school district in the state."
** Eitan Hersh of 538: "In the ongoing fight between Democrats and Republicans over election procedures like voter ID and early voting, the Democrats are supposedly the champions of higher turnout and reducing barriers to participation. But when it comes to scheduling off-cycle elections like those taking place today, the Democratic Party is the champion of voter suppression.... [Bills to consolidate elections], which were generally sponsored by Republicans, typically failed because of Democratic opposition.... Democrats opposed the bills at the urging of Democratic-aligned interest groups, namely teachers unions and municipal employee organizations.... For Democrats like [Hillary] Clinton who are apparently aghast at Republican efforts at voter suppression, today is a good day to take a look in the mirror." ...
... Zandar, in Balloon Juice, disagrees. ...
... CW: For what it's worth, I think Hersh is at least half-right. Whether or not it is the intention of Democrats to lower turnout, that is the effect of off-year elections. If you think I might be wrong, check out the results above. The only national-newsworthy election result that went liberals' way, at least up to what has been reported as of late last night, was a local school election. (I've since updated, so a few elections I've cited went the better way.)
Presidential Race
Un.Fucking.Believable. Mark Murray of NBC News: "One year out before the 2016 general election, Hillary Clinton and Ben Carson are tied in a hypothetical matchup, but Clinton leads three other major Republican candidates, according to brand-new numbers from the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll."
Scott Morgan of Reuters: "The U.S. Republican Party filed a formal complaint against one of Hillary Clinton's family charities with the Internal Revenue Service on Tuesday and is calling for an audit after the charity said this week it would not refile erroneous tax returns. The Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation's flagship health program conceded earlier this year it had misreported by millions of the dollars the money it was given by governments compared with non-government donors in its tax returns for 2012 and 2013."
Sabrina Siddiqui of the Guardian: Among Republican presidential candidates, only Marco Rubio has been marginally supportive of the goals of BlackLivesMatter.
Jenna Johnson & Sean Sullivan of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump and Ben Carson are still dominating the polls, but many in the crowded Republican presidential race are now launching attacks on the candidate who seems poised to be their next major threat: Marco Rubio.... During a news conference Tuesday in Manhattan, Trump called Rubio 'overrated,' accused him of being 'a disaster with his credit cards' and attacked him as 'very weak' on immigration. At the same time, Bush -- whose campaign has disparagingly labeled Rubio as a 'GOP Obama' -- doubled down on criticizing Rubio for missing more than a third of his Senate votes this year.... Two other GOP presidential candidates, Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas)...."
Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Ben Carson ... announced last week that he had shelved his plan to end ... [Medicare]. But the few components of a new plan he's revealed have only added to the confusion ... and his opponents are beginning to pounce.... Carson ... has struggled to define exactly what he'd like to see in its stead. Asked about his Medicare platform on two Sunday news shows last week, he left the hosts scratching their heads.... 'The liberal media -- and now one of my competitors -- is claiming I want to "abolish" Medicare. That is plain laughable,' Carson wrote to supporters, referring to the claim as 'slander.' He also told Wallace that it's a 'narrative that somebody's putting out there to scare people.'" ...
... CW: Uh, Doc, that "laughable" "somebody" who is "slandering" you & "scaring people" about abolishing Medicare would be -- you.
Even if all the media tries to shut you down -- which they have tried very much to do with me. But they can't because the good Lord has provided me with mechanisms like my syndicated column and like Fox News. We'd be Cuba if there were no Fox News. -- Ben Carson, conspiracy theorist, last year
Someone on that debate stage .. they're using National Review as their political tool [to attack me]. That's pretty obvious. -- Ben Carson, this week ...
... BTW, the core story Carson is claiming was the brainchild of one of his opponents ran in January of this year. It's author, Jim Geraghty, denies that any rival campaign contacted him about a follow-up he wrote after Carson lied during the last debate about his involvement with the dietary supplement company Mannatech. -- Constant Weader
... ** Grifter-in-Chief. Jonathan Chait: "Conservative politics are so closely intermingled with a lucrative entertainment complex that it is frequently impossible to distinguish between a political project (that is, something designed to result in policy change) and a money-making venture.... The notion that [Ben] Carson could be president is preposterous.... He has never run for elected office. He has never managed a large organization; he has not worked in and around public policy, and he lacks a competent grasp of issues. His stance on health care, the closest thing to an issue with which his professional experience has brought him into contact, is gibberish.... His campaign itself is structured much more like a scamming venture than a political one. An astronomical 69 percent of his fund-raising totals are spent on more fund-raising. (Bernie Sanders, by contrast, spends just 4 percent of his intake on fund-raising.)... He is a perfect con artist." ... BTW, Chait goes there, noting that Carson's manner is "subdued" "to the point of appearing medicated." ...
... Lie to Me. CW: Chait highlighted Carson's "chilling" ability to lie with a straight face by encouraging readers to watch the video where he lies to Carl Quintanilla bout his connection to Mannatech. So I did. Two things: when he's about to tell a lie, he closes his eyes. Maybe it's a little prayer where he asks god to forgive him for telling a whopper. Also, when he's pulled it off (or when he insults people & gets away with it), he laughs heartily. (See also his reaction to the audience response to his saying that "Many [Americans] are stupid.) ...
... Steve M.: "... it's ... a fallacy to imagine that a kook and a scammer can't also have a messiah complex. How many personality cults are there in which the guy robbing the flock blind actually believes he's the exalted figure he tells the follower he is?... Remember, conservative rhetoric values the untutored amateur over the professional. Society's real guarantors of personal safety are civilians with guns, not cops. College professors and Ivy League graduates are to be looked upon with suspicion; country musicians and the Duck Dynasty guys tell us the plain truth, even about science. The greatest man to ever occupy the Oval Office was an ex-movie actor regularly mocked as an unschooled dolt. Why wouldn't a guy who's imbibed this ideology of amateurism believe that he really can be president if lots of people are telling him he can?"
Caitlin MacNeal of TPM: "Fox News host Megyn Kelly on Monday night mocked the letter drafted by Republican presidential campaigns listing a series of rules and questions for networks hosting future debates. After listing some of the demands, including that networks not allow lightning rounds or candidate-to-candidate questioning, Kelly jokingly suggested, 'And then maybe the foot massage?'" ...
... Steve M.: "Fox News denounces Republican candidates for sounding like Fox News."
Peter Beinart of the Atlantic: "Jeb Bush fashions himself the thinking man's Republican candidate for president. Donald Trump, he declared late last month, is 'not serious.' When it comes to foreign policy, Trump hasn't 'thought these things through.' Trump is 'not taking the responsibility -- the possibility of becoming the president of the United States really seriously.' So what are Jeb's well-thought-out, serious foreign-policy views? He offered a few on Monday in what aides dubbed an important speech aimed at resetting his presidential campaign. And they were insane." ...
... Amy Davidson of the New Yorker on who counts as a "serious" presidential candidate. ...
<>... Zeke Miller of Time: Jeb Bush acknowledges he was wrong about the French workweek. "'I made the mistake of saying that the Congress operates on a French work week,' he deadpanned. 'I really did a disservice to the French,' Bush added with a chuckle Tuesday. 'My inbox was full of French journalists,' piped in campaign spokesman Tim Miller." ...
... Jeb? Nick Gass of Politico: Jeb Bush "apparently failed to secure the JebCanFixIt.com domain name when he rolled out the slogan as part of the relaunch of his sagging presidential campaign. In the meantime, Jimmy Flannigan, a former candidate for City Council in Austin, Texas, snapped it up and launched his own site, claiming Bush 'is trying to steal my slogan!' (Flannigan, in his failed bid for a council seat, ran with a 'Flannigan Can Fix It!' slogan.)... Flannigan told Politico that Bush's failure to secure it was an amateur move." CW: Looks as if the skeleton staff left after Jeb!'s purge is just not into the Internets. CW: Can Jeb! Fix It? Flannigan says the domain name is for sale.
I'm So Tough I Can Shoot Putin Without Even Looking Him in the Eye:
... Ted Gives New Meaning to "Tailgunner." Wes Siler of Gizmodo: "Staunch gun rights advocate Ted Cruz is here seen holding a shotgun" backwards [link fixed], with the muzzle pointed toward the people behind him, while he blathers on about "liberal moderators." "'He's either a poser who doesn't really hunt, or just a blindingly dangerous nincompoop,' concludes Scott [Nathan, a hunter & NRA member]. 'He's got moves like Cheney.'" CW: Hey, maybe Tailgunner Ted will strafe some of the unsuspecting locals with that ass-backward action, but at least he has his cap on frontwards -- unlike a certain Speaker of the House (see yesterday's Portrait of a Washington Homeless Man).
Beyond the Beltway
Lisa Black, et al., of the Chicago Tribune: "Authorities have called a news conference for Wednesday to announce 'significant new information' regarding the shooting death of a Fox Lake police officer, and multiple law enforcement sources with knowledge of the investigation have told the Tribune that authorities are expected to announce that he took his own life. The sources say that authorities believe Lt. Charles Joseph Gliniewicz, 52, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound Sept. 1. The new information comes two months after officers found Gliniewicz mortally wounded in a remote, marshy area of the village near the Wisconsin border." ...
... Michael Miller of the Washington Post: Officials will say Gliniewicz died in "an elaborately staged suicide.... The revelation could alter public perception of not only Gliniewicz but also the argument that cops are increasingly under attack in America. The death of the Fox Lake cop ... became a touchstone for law enforcement officials across the country who believe they are under increased threat amid growing scrutiny of police in the wake of a string of high-profile police-involved killings.... According to recently released FBI data, however, assaults on police officers dropped sharply in 2014 and are at their lowest point since 1996. In a case similar to Gliniewicz's disputed death, an Arkansas police officer was arrested Tuesday for allegedly lying about being shot during a traffic stop."
News Ledes
Washington Post: Canada's Liberal party leader Justin "Trudeau was sworn in [as the country's prime minister] on Wednesday. At 43, he becomes the second-youngest prime minister in Canadian history."
Al Jazeera: "Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta announced the resignation of his government Wednesday in a surprise move that followed huge protests in the wake of a nightclub fire that killed at least 32 people."
New York Times: "Honda Motor Company on Tuesday dropped the embattled manufacturer Takata as its airbag supplier, concluding that the company, its longtime partner, had 'misrepresented and manipulated test data.'"
New York Times: "China, the world's leading emitter of greenhouse gases from coal, has been burning up to 17 percent more coal a year than the government previously disclosed, according to newly released data. The finding could complicate the already difficult efforts to limit global warming. Even for a country of China's size, the scale of the correction is immense. The sharp upward revision in official figures means that China has released much more carbon dioxide -- almost a billion more tons a year according to initial calculations -- than previously estimated."