The Commentariat -- October 23

The New York Times' "War Logs" page with links to stories on the newly-released Iraq documents & to the Afghanistan papers. The other English-language paper to get the new documents was the Guardian. Here's their "Iraq War Logs" page. ...

... Here's an ABC News report:

     ... ABC News' print report is here. ...

... Marc Ambinder of The Atlantic: "The big reveal from the hundreds of thousands of documents posted on Wikileaks today is probably going to be the incredibly awful reports of systematized detainee abuse by Iraqi soldiers and security forces right under the noses of the American-led coalition...."

... John Burns & Ravi Somaiya of the New York Times profile WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, a hunted & perhaps haunted man.

David Hoffman of Foreign Policy: "The former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, retired Gen. Hugh Shelton, says in his just-published memoir, Without Hesitation: the Odyssey of an American Warrior,   that President Bill Clinton’s White House lost the 'presidential authorization codes' for launching a nuclear strike, and they were missing 'for months.' Shelton writes, 'This is a big deal -- a gargantuan deal -- and we dodged a silver bullet.'” But Hoffman says Shelton's story "doesn't add up."

After spending weeks trashing all the loons, Gail Collins finally found a candidate to love -- Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin. 

Ashley Parker of the New York Times interviews Clarence Thomas's former girlfriend Lillian McEwen. McEwen believes Anita Hill was telling the truth about Thomas because the incidents Hill described are consistent with McEwen's experience with Thomas. See related stories in yesterday's Commentariat. ...

... McEwen speaks with ABC News reporter Rebecca Cooper:

... Phone Sex. Josh Gerstein of Politico: "The phone call Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife placed to Anita Hill earlier this month seeking an apology for Hill’s allegation 19 years ago that Thomas sexually harassed her may go down as a textbook lesson in unintended consequences. ...

... Heather at Crooks & Liars: "Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' wife Ginni makes a fool out of herself and [Sen. Orrin] Hatch goes on the air and attacks Anita Hill." According to Hatch, Hill is just delusional & the Thomases, Clarence & Ginni are pure as the driven snow. With video & transcript. Hatch warns us,

But don't smear Clarence Thomas and above all don't smear his wife, Ginni. She's a really good person.

... Here's a refresher course on the hearings from PBS. Thomas's likely perjury begins two minutes in:

... Ann Woolner of Bloomberg News: before she called Anita Hill, Ginni Thomas should have called all those witnesses who corroborated Hill's story to see if they would recant. ...

Racism is a lazy man's substitute for using good judgment ... Common sense becomes racism when skin color becomes a formula for figuring out who is a danger to me. -- Juan Williams, 1986, rebutting a racist Richard Cohen column, via Michael Moore

... Paul Farhi of the New York Times reports on the fallout from NPR's firing of Juan Williams. ...

... Michael Moore writes "an open letter to Juan Williams":

Now that you have a new $2 million contract with Fox, let me come on with you for some in-depth discussions about the terrorists' real motivations. We can't let another day go by letting the PC brigade stop us from telling the truth: Terrorists aren't trying to kill us because they hate our freedom. They're killing us because we're in their countries killing them.

Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times: in some races around the country, Democrats are playing dirty, financially supporting third-party candidates of the tea party persuasion whom they hope will siphon off votes from the Republican candidates.

"The Swift Boaters Are Back." Dan Eggen & T. W. Farnam of the Washington Post: "Funders of the stealth campaign against presidential candidate John Kerry have returned in force six years later, giving millions of dollars to independent groups targeting Democrats in the November midterm elections...."

Pat Garofalo of Think Progress: since Americans oppose privitization of Social Security, Republicans are just renaming it. Here's Oregon's senatorial nominee Jim Huffman in a debate with Sen. Ron Wyden simultaneously speaking out of both sides of his mouth:

I have argued for allowing newcomers to the Social Security system to have the option of private accounts. I have not argued for privatizing the Social Security system.

     ... Huffman is a law professor. He knows what he's doing. What "privitization" is is "having the option of private accounts." With video.

Merry Christmas! Chris Johnson of the Washington Blade: Daniel Alter, "a gay New York attorney whose nomination to the federal bench was rejected by the White House over anti-Christian comments he allegedly made, claims that media outlets mischaracterized his views."

Because Charles Murray is a right-wing ideologue, he reads data & draws loony conclusions. But the data he outlines in this Washington Post op-ed are interesting. Murray, who was co-author of the deservedly controversial book The Bell Curve, identifies a "New Elite" (caps his) who "live in a world that doesn't intersect with mainstream America in many important ways." Murray concludes that since the elite don't go to tractor pulls or watch "Dancing with the Stars," they are "ignorant" of & "isolated" from Real America. In fact, he says, "they are not of America."

Washington Post: "With his party's control of Congress hanging in the balance, President Obama touched down [in Las Vegas, Nevada] Friday night to help bail out Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D), an ally now locked in a dead heat with a heroine of the tea party movement." C-SPAN has the video; President Obama begins speaking about 15 min. in.

San Francisco Chronicle: "President Obama starred Friday at the largest political rally of California's 2010 election season [at USC's Alumni Park], imploring a raucous crowd of 32,000 to vote and telling them, 'You have the chance to set the direction of this state, and this country - just like you did in 2008.'" C-SPAN has the video; the President comes on stage about 10:15 min. in.

The Commentariat -- October 22

Something Else to Make You Appreciate President Obama. Becky Schlikeman of the Chicago Tribune: "in a rare public appearance, former President George W. Bush reflected on his presidency...." Two reflections: 'In terms of accomplishments, my biggest accomplishment is that I kept the country safe amid a real danger,' he said. The former president said his greatest failure in office was not passing Social Security reform." CW: he means he's sorry he failed to privatize Social Security. What a shame we didn't all get to lose our old age safety net in the Bush Crash of '08.

Michael Brick of the New York Times: an exhibit celebrating the George W. Bush Presidential Center is "set to open this weekend on the campus of Southern Methodist University, prominently features the handgun taken from Saddam Hussein and the loudspeaker used to address rescue workers at the World Trade Center in September 2001.... Antiwar groups have announced plans to protest the groundbreaking...":

It’s the approach they’ve taken all along; it fits their worldview. It’s a tragedy for S.M.U. to hitch its star to this. -- the Rev. William K. McElvaney, a professor emeritus at SMU ...

Mark Nesse of the AP: "With more than 1 in 8 Americans now on food stamps, participation in the program has jumped about 70 percent from 26 million in May 2007.... States that have relaxed food stamp eligibility did so by moving to a system where applicants could qualify based on their income, and their other assets such as real estate, vehicles and savings accounts could be ignored."

Paul Krugman: "... the British government seems determined to ignore the lessons of history. Both the new British budget announced on Wednesday and the rhetoric that accompanied the announcement might have come straight from the desk of Andrew Mellon, the Treasury secretary who told President Herbert Hoover to fight the Depression by liquidating the farmers, liquidating the workers, and driving down wages." ...

... Another Nobel laureate in economics, Joseph Stiglitz, discusses how we got into this economic mess, & where we are now, with Daily Finance reporters. The print story, with video of the full interview, is here. The transcript of the interview is here.

Another Reason to Hate Banks. CW: I missed Louise Story's October 17 New York Times article on how banks like JPMorgan make 40% profits from pension funds & other customers, but never take any losses if an investment goes bad. There's a great video that helps explain their nasty deals.

Lena Sun of the Washington Post: "The voluntary quality control system widely used in the nation's $1 trillion domestic food industry is rife with conflicts of interest, inexperienced auditors and cursory inspections that produce inflated ratings, according to food retail executives and other industry experts. Recent outbreaks of salmonella illness tied to contaminated eggs and peanuts have focused new attention on weaknesses in the decades-old system, which relies on private-sector auditors hired by foodmakers."

Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "Bill Clinton ... is deploying himself on a last-ditch, dawn-to-dusk sprint to rescue his beleaguered party. And as the only president in modern times who has balanced the federal budget, he is leveraging his credibility to become one of the most fierce defenders of President Obama's economic policies.

Melanie Mason of the Dallas Morning News: "Republican congressional candidate Stephen Broden stunned his party Thursday, saying he would not rule out violent overthrow of the government if elections did not produce a change in leadership. In a rambling exchange during a TV interview, Broden, a South Dallas pastor, said a violent uprising 'is not the first option,' but it is 'on the table.' That drew a quick denunciation from the head of the Dallas County GOP, who called the remarks 'inappropriate.' Broden, a first-time candidate, is challenging veteran incumbent Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson in Dallas' heavily Democratic 30th Congressional District." ...

     ... Update. Think Progress has the video:

Harry Reid talks to Ed Schultz. CW: I've never heard Reid speak with such force:

... Here's a transcript of John Harwood's CNBC interview of Reid.

He was always actively watching the women he worked with to see if they could be potential partners. It was a hobby of his.... He was obsessed with porn. He would talk about what he had seen in magazines and films, if there was something worth noting.
-- Lillian McEwen

Washington Post: Lillian McEwen, who was Clarence Thomas's girlfriend between about 1981 & 1986, breaks her silence about her former lover & says Anita Hill's sworn testimony was consistent with her (McEwen's) experience with Thomas. ...

... Adele Stan of AlterNet wonders if Ginni Thomas will demand an apology from Lillian McEwen, too.

Paul Farhi of the Washington Post: "NPR said it fired commentator Juan Williams because of a pattern of commentaries that violated the news organization's guidelines, and not solely because of Williams's statements about Muslims and terrorism on a Fox News program earlier this week. Williams, meanwhile, said he is 'outraged' and 'brokenhearted' that NPR cut him loose after more than a decade as a radio host, correspondent and analyst. He stood by his comments and said they were taken out of context by NPR." CW: see more links on the story in yesterday's Commentariat below, & in Infotainment near the bottom of the right column. ...

... Jay Newton-Small of Time asks, "Who knew that conservatives loved Juan Williams so much?" She details Republican Congressional plans to defund NPR in retaliation for Williams' firing. ...

... Hamilton Nolan of Gawker explains to Juan Williams that he's making a huge mistake by "swallowing the Fox New company line" and becoming a Fox "News" tool. ...

... "In the wake of NPR's decision to terminate Juan Williams' contract following controversial remarks he made about Muslims on Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, Media Matters provides a retrospective of the many anti-Muslim statements made on Fox News or by Fox News personalities." ...

Ashley Parker of the New York Times: "GOProud, a national gay conservative organization, released a 30-second television advertisement set to air in California, Hawaii, Massachusetts and New York that spoofs the popular Bravo 'Real Housewives' franchise:

Matt Yglesias studies the dynamics of public officials who get caught in sex scandals & advises, "Never resign."

The Commentariat -- October 21

Eric Lipton, Mike McIntire & Don Van Natta Jr. of the New York Times on how & where the national Chamber of Commerce gets its millions to run ads against the Obama Administration & other Democrats.

Matt Cooper of the National Journal: "Barack Obama and Mitch McConnell rarely agree, but this week, in separate interviews, both the president and the Senate minority leader called for humility as the two parties prepare for the election and its aftermath."

** John Judis of The National Review New Republic (oh crap!) how the Obama Administration blew management of the housing crisis from the beginning & how they remain clueless both actually & politically. CW: it's a short piece, packed with sensible analysis. As I've said before, fire Shaun Donovan. Fire Tim Geithner. ...

... Gretchen Morgenson & Andrew Martin of the New York Times: "... missing and possibly fraudulent documents are at the center of a potentially seismic legal clash that pits big lenders against homeowners and their advocates concerned that the lenders’ rush to foreclose flouts private property rights. That clash — expected to be played out in courtrooms across the country and scrutinized by law enforcement officials investigating possible wrongdoing by big lenders — leaped to the forefront of the mortgage crisis this week as big lenders began lifting their freezes on foreclosures and insisted the worst was behind them." ...

... Economist Simon Johnson: "The foreclosure morass clearly poses systemic risk, both through its general effects on uncertainty about losses and because any manifest weakness at one big bank could spread – in some obvious ways and in some unanticipated ways – through the rest of the system." Johnson recommends that the Financial Stability Oversight Council created under the Dodd-Frank Act perform bank stress tests now.

James Risen of the New York Times: "Nearly four years after the federal government began a string of investigations and criminal prosecutions against Blackwater Worldwide personnel accused of murder and other violent crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, the cases are beginning to fall apart.... Federal prosecutors have failed to overcome a series of legal hurdles, including the difficulties of obtaining evidence in war zones, of gaining proper jurisdiction for prosecutions in American civilian courts, and of overcoming immunity deals given to defendants by American officials on the scene."

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Brian Stelter of the New York Times: "NPR’s decision Wednesday to fire Juan Williams and Fox News Channel’s decision to give him a new contract on Thursday put into sharp relief the two versions of journalism that compete every day for Americans’ attention."...

... Glenn Greenwald welcomes NPR's firing of Juan Williams for expressing his anti-Muslim bigotry on Bill O'Reilly's Fox "News" show. (See Infotainment, in the lower right column, for the backstory.) ...

... Adam Serwer, writing in the Washington Post, takes a slightly more nuanced view.

The Backstory

Sheiks on a Plane! When I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous. -- Juan Williams

New York Times: "NPR has terminated its contract with Juan Williams, one of its senior news analysts, after he made comments about Muslims on the Fox News Channel." ...

... Here's the segment where Williams did himself in:

... Politico Update: "Fox News moved swiftly to turn the controversy over Juan Williams’ firing by NPR to its advantage, offering Williams an expanded role on the network and a new three-year contract Thursday in a deal that amounts to nearly $2 million.... NPR’s decision to fire Williams over comments he made about Muslims on Fox has prompted calls on the right for Congress to remove its funding. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) plans to introduce a bill to strip any federal money – which NPR says amounts to about 2 percent of its annual budget."

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"Three Things to Do When Clarence Thomas's Wife Calls You." Andy Borowitz in The New Yorker: "Like many Americans, over the past several years I have been the recipient of multiple unwelcome voicemails from the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas...."

... Lawrence O'Donnell, Jackie Calmes & Dahlia Lithwick discuss Ginni Thomas's strange call to Anita Hill:

     ... Here's Calmes' October 8/9 New York Times story about Ginni Thomas's secretly-funded tea party group. ...

... Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post, the exemplar of inside-the-beltway elitism, always annoys me, but her column today -- after she gets through talking about herself & her elite husband -- on the Thomas-Hill Affair provides a succinct history lesson for those who have forgot the details or were five years old during the Thomas confirmation hearings. The preponderance of the evidence, says Marcus who covered the hearings, is that Hill, not Thomas, was telling the truth.

You might call New York's Jimmy McMillan a single-issue candidate:

CW: I don't do polls, but.... Alexander Burns of Politico: "A new wave of polling shows virtually every close Senate race growing even more competitive, raising the pressure on both parties in the final days of the midterm campaign." Democrats are moving up.

Washington Post: Bob J. Perry of Houston, "a wealthy Texas homebuilder who helped finance the anti-John Kerry Swift Boat Veterans for Truth in 2004, contributed $7 million to American Crossroads, [the Karl Rove-Ed Gillespie outfit,] making him the top contributor to one of the main groups dedicated to helping Republicans win control of Congress." ...

... Keith Olbermann discusses the Chamber of Commerce's efforts to help American corporations move jobs overseas & elsewhere. And other stuff. Rep. Barney Frank joins him:

... Probably when tea partiers sent their hard-earned nickels & dimes to the Tea Party Express, they didn't realize their contributions would go to sending TPE staffers on cruises, but as Ken Vogel of Politico reported, that what happened. In fairness, it was a "working" cruise. And it only cost $103,000. So far. And one staffer didn't have fun.

Michael Shear of the New York Times: philanthropist George Soros gives Media Matters $1 million....

... Glenn Beck Goes Bonkers. Jeremy Holden of Media Matters: "Tonight [October 20], Glenn Beck responded to news that philanthropist George Soros had made his first donation to Media Matters by once again vilifying Soros, the Tides Foundation, and a host of progressive organizations, while portraying Beck as the target of a Soros-ordered hit."

Alan Schwarz of the New York Times: football "helmets both new and used are not — and have never been — formally tested against the forces believed to cause concussions. The industry, which receives no governmental or other independent oversight, requires helmets for players of all ages to withstand only the extremely high-level force that would otherwise fracture skulls. The standard has not changed meaningfully since it was written in 1973, despite rising concussion rates in youth football and the growing awareness of how the injury can cause significant short- and long-term problems with memory, depression and other cognitive functions, especially in children."

Mark Sherman of the AP explains why the DOJ defends laws the President says he opposes. "The tradition flows directly from the president's constitutional duty to take care that the laws are faithfully executed...." ...

... Devin Dwyer of ABC News: Ted Olson, a former U.S. Solicitor General who has challenged California's ban on same-sex marriage, disagrees. With video.