The Commentariat -- October 1, 2014
Internal links & graphic removed.
Scarier & Scarier. Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "A security contractor with a gun and three prior convictions for assault and battery was allowed on an elevator with President Obama during a Sept. 16 trip to Atlanta.... The private contractor first aroused the agents' concerns when he acted oddly and did not comply with their orders to stop using a cellphone camera to record the president in the elevator.... The Secret Service director, Julia Pierson, asked a top agency manager to look into the matter but did not refer it to an investigative unit that was created to review violations of protocol and standards...." In hearings Tuesday, Pierson told House members that she brief President Obama 100 percent of the time when his security is breached. But she didn't tell him about the Atlanta incident. ...
... AND Scarier. Carol Leonnig: "The man who jumped over the White House fence and sprinted through the main floor of the mansion could have gotten even farther had it not been for an off-duty Secret Service agent who was coincidentally in the house and leaving for the night. The agent who finally tackled Omar Gonzalez had been serving on the security detail for President Obama's daughters and had just seen the family depart via helicopter minutes earlier. He happened to be walking through the house when ... the intruder dashed through the main foyer.... [Julia] Pierson did not reveal during her testimony that the agent who tackled him was not actually assigned to the post where he confronted Gonzalez." ...
... Peter Baker of the New York Times: Democrats notice that Republicans are using "concern for the President's security" to undermine the President. No kidding.
... New York Times Editors: "... the Secret Service has revealed itself to be as bungling and dysfunctional as many other once-revered Washington institutions. It not only failed in its most fundamental task of protecting the White House premises, but it has failed to properly investigate threats after they occurred, and has not been forthcoming with the public about those lapses. The agency initially said [Omar] Gonzalez was subdued at the White House door, only admitting the truth about the extent of his intrusion after it was uncovered on Monday by Carol D. Leonnig of The Washington Post. 'I wish to God you protected the White House like you're protecting your reputation here today,' Representative Stephen Lynch, a Democrat of Massachusetts, told the Secret Service director, Julia Pierson, at a hearing Tuesday morning. Ms. Pierson was unimpressive in her testimony at the hearing on security breaches, delivering passive, pro forma answers and failing to persuade questioners of either party that she has either the strategy or the will to right an essential but troubled agency." ...
... Frank Bruni: "The guard dogs didn't guard. The alarm boxes didn't alarm. The front door couldn't be locked automatically as he sprinted toward it, because it wasn't rigged that way. We can fly drones over Pakistan, but we can't summon a proper locksmith to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?... In the end, it's people who make the difference. The Secret Service needs better ones." ...
... Dana Milbank: "... Julia Pierson "was brought in to change the frat-house culture seen in the Miami and Amsterdam. She claims to have improved that problem ('We've instituted an Office of Professional Integrity'), but she's now allowing an equally pernicious culture to flourish -- a culture of concealment and coverup." ...
... CW: Milbank doesn't mention that Pierson neglected to tell Congress that the agent who stopped Gonzalez was off-duty & just happened to be near the Green Room when he saw & tackled the intruder. It was after Pierson's testimony that the press revealed this relevant detail, which she chose not to share. Nor does Milbank note that Pierson lied to Congress when she said she informs the President "100 percent of the time" of security breaches: she didn't tell him about the Atlanta incident, according to Leonnig. So, more "concealment & coverup," including an outright lie to a Congressional committee. ...
... Update: Josh Voorhees of Slate: "Tuesday's hearing ... was an example of lawmakers doing a job only they could do, not in spite of their desire for political theater but because of it." CW: Voorhees makes all the same points I do above. ...
... Charles Pierce blames the attacks on President Obama on "a dark energy on the other side."
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Steve M. points out that the Washington Post editorial board thought it would be an excellent idea to publish an op-ed by a former Secret Service agent who suggests that the Allen West would be a "perfect" choice to head up he Secret Service. Steve mentions a couple of things to suggest West might not be the best person for the job....
... CW: It is hard to credit a newspaper as a serious journalistic enterprise when its editors make such decisions. The media not only fail to ID the "complete fking loons" as such, as Charles Pierce complained recently, but a major outlet like the Post is actually encouraging the looniest among them. I guess this is what we can expect from the Post's new publisher & former Reagan aide Fred Ryan. ...
... digby: "But if the fellow who wrote [the] op-ed for the Washington Post is indicative of the sort of people who are protecting the president, I am now truly afraid for him.
Jonathan Cohn: "The latest legal challenge to Obamacare just won a round in court. On Tuesday, a federal district judge ruled in favor of a lawsuit challenging the federal government's authority to provide millions of people with tax credits for buying private health insurance. The decision, in a case called Pruitt v. Burwell, came from a Republican-appointed judge in Oklahoma. His opinion was succinct, strongly worded and betrayed not a hint of self-doubt.... The judge stayed his ruling, pending the Obama Administration's likely appeal to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. The real question now is what effect (if any) Tuesday's announcement has on the justices of the Supreme Court, who are contemplating whether to hear a similar lawsuit and make a definitive ruling on the matter."
Jeff Toobin in the New Yorker: On Hobby Lobby, Justice Ginsburg "was right: the decision is opening the door for the religiously observant to claim privileges that are not available to anyone else." One example: "Just days after the decision, the Court's majority allowed Wheaton College, which is religiously oriented, to refuse to fill out a form asking for an exemption from the birth-control mandate -- while retaining the exemption.... If just filling out a form can count as a 'substantial burden,' it's hard to imagine any obligation that would not." CW: Also obvious, Sam Alito is a lying snake. If you didn't read Chermerinsky's piece, linked yesterday, on Our Crappy Supreme Court (possible not the actual title), read it soon.
CW: A couple of days ago, I said the trial of Hank Greenberg's case against the federal government should be entertaining. Here's John Cassidy of the New Yorker with the first installment: "Most news organizations are covering the trial straight, as if it were a deadly serious affair. It is, in fact, an absurdist comedy, rich in ironies, worthy of the Marx Brothers or Mel Brooks." Greenberg made in the neighborhood of $300MM on the bailout. "That's three hundred million dollars he wouldn’t have had if Ben Bernanke and Tim Geithner ... and Hank Paulson ... had allowed A.I.G. to go belly up. Rather than hauling those three musketeers into ... court..., Greenberg should be taking them out to dinner."
Beyond the Beltway
Patrick McGreevey of the Los Angeles Times: "Four months after a disturbed man killed six UC Santa Barbara students and wounded 13 others, Gov. Jerry Brown on Tuesday signed legislation allowing the temporary seizure of guns from people determined by the courts to be a threat to themselves or others. The Isla Vista massacre in May occurred even though the family of Elliot Rodger had sought help because of concerns about his strange behavior before the shootings."
American "Justice," New York City Edition, Ctd. The Anonymity of a Snitch. Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "For five years, Kenneth Creighton was held in jail, suspected of involvement in the killing of a bystander outside a bodega in the Bronx. In 2012, the charges were dropped. Mr. Creighton was released from Rikers Island. He has since filed a lawsuit against New York City for false arrest and malicious prosecution, and has sought the name of his accuser.... Criminal defendants, generally, have the right to know and confront their accusers. But when the accuser happens to be a confidential witness, the calculus can be more complicated."
Nathaniel Rich, in the New Republic: "Louisiana is disappearing. Since 1932, the Gulf of Mexico has swallowed 2,300 square miles of the state's wetlands, an area larger than Delaware.... The loss of the marshes has catastrophic implications, because they are the state's first, and strongest, defense against hurricanes. Two culprits are responsible for most of the destruction. The first is the Army Corps of Engineers, which over the past 130 years has built many of the levees that pin the modern Mississippi River in place to prevent flooding.... The other major destructive force in the region is the fossil fuel industry."
Presidential Election 2012 (& 2016??)
Charles Pierce assesses Mitt Romney's character. This is a short read.
News Lede
Jacksonville Times-Union: A Jacksonville jury today found Michael Dunn guilty of first-degree murder in the shooting death of 17-year-old Jordan Davis. "Under Florida law Dunn must be sentenced to prison for life with no possibility of parole for the murder of Davis. He also faces a minimum of 60 years for the attempted murders of Leland Brunson, Tommie Stornes and Tevin Thompson, friends of Davis who were in the Dodge Durango with Davis when he died.... A previous jury deadlocked on his guilt in Davis' death in February while convicting him of the second-degree attempted murders of Brunson, Stornes and Thompson."