The Commentariat -- October 30, 2015

Internal links removed.

Afternoon Update:

If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. -- Harry Truman

-- 2016 Republican Presidential Candidate

Abby Phillip & Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "With GOP anger over CNBC's handling of Wednesday night's Republican presidential debate boiling over, the Republican National Committee announced Friday that it was suspending its partnership with NBC News for an upcoming debate in February.In a letter to NBC News Chairman Andrew Lack, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said that their relationship for the debate, scheduled for Feb. 26 at the University of Houston, was on hold 'pending further discussion.'" Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. ...

... Ashley Parker & Emily Steel of the New York Times: "The letter [from Priebus] seemed to be an attempt at damage control by the R.N.C., which many of the candidates felt had bungled its handling of the Republican debate process, after taking a more active role and 'sanctioning' debates' this year."

Helene Cooper & Peter Baker of the New York Times: "President Obama will deploy a small number of American Special Operations forces to Kurdish-controlled territory in northern Syria, a United States official said. The White House is expected to make the announcement on Friday...."

Ryan Felton of the Guardian: "St Louis police have arrested an individual in connection with a spate of arson cases at predominantly black churches. The suspect, a 35-year-old black male, was taken into custody on Thursday, said Schron Jackson, spokesperson for the St Louis police department."

Wesley Lowery of the Washington Post: "On Thursday night, just four days before the former Austin police officer was set to stand trial, a federal judge in Texas dismissed a manslaughter charge against Charles Kleinert in the 2013 shooting death of Larry Jackson Jr., an unarmed black man. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel cites a little known 1889 case that determined federal agents can be granted immunity from state criminal charges and undoes one of a handful of indictments handed down to police officers out of the thousands of fatal police shootings that have occurred in recent years." Kleinert "was a member of an FBI task force.... Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg said Thursday night that she has yet to determine if she will appeal the ruling."

*****

In the Middle of the Night. David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "The Senate approved a crucial bipartisan budget agreement early on Friday that would avert a government default and stands to end nearly five years of pitched battles between congressional Republicans and the Obama administration over fiscal policy. The measure, which was approved 64 to 35, now goes to the White House, where President Obama is ready to sign it.... While Congress must still adopt spending bills for the next two years, the bill would substantially reduce the risk of a government shutdown by setting spending targets for two years and allowing Congress to return to its regular appropriations process." ...

... CW: Huh, Herszenhorn doesn't mention Rand Paul's promised filibuster. ... Oh, here's why:

... Ali Weinberg & Jessica Hopper of ABC News: "Sen. Rand Paul's so-called 'filibuster' against the budget deal, a move his campaign hyped repeatedly and which the Kentucky senator used as a rallying cry at [Wednesday] night's debate, wasn't a filibuster at all. In fact, it wasn't even a long speech. The presidential hopeful took to the Senate floor at 2:46 p.m. and ended his remarks less than twenty minutes later.... 'I will stand firm. I will spend every ounce of energy to stop [the deal],' he said [at the debate]. 'I will begin tomorrow to filibuster it....." And his campaign sought to raise money off the filibuster." See also Paul Krugman's column on GOP grifters. ...

     ... Cheap Trick. "In one fundraising email with the subject line 'I'm going to filibuster,' Paul asked supporters to donate $20.16." CW: So in clocking less than 20 minutes, Paul gave the suckers his supporters less than a dollar a minute for their contributions.

Mike Dorning of Bloomberg: "The White House plans to aggressively deploy President Barack Obama to rally Democrats to the polls for the 2016 election, particularly minority and young voters who are his strongest supporters."

Linda Greenhouse: "... the Roberts Court, having worked assiduously over the last 10 years to elevate the First Amendment's Free Exercise Clause at the expense of its First Amendment twin, the Establishment Clause, is now approaching a moment of truth.

Alexander Burns of the New York Times: New York "Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo intends to take a lead role in a broad campaign pressing for a crackdown on the improper dealing of firearms.... Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, has pledged to throw his weight behind the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence ... in an as-yet-unannounced effort demanding that the Justice Department more closely scrutinize so-called bad apple gun merchants, according to people familiar with the campaign."

Reuters: "A rapid warming of the Gulf of Maine off the eastern United States has made the water too warm for cod, pushing stocks towards collapse despite deep reductions in the number of fish caught, a US study has shown. The Gulf of Maine had warmed faster than 99% of the rest of the world's oceans in the past decade, influenced by shifts in the Atlantic Gulf Stream, changes in the Pacific Ocean and a wider trend of climate change, it said."

Petula Dvorak of the Washington Post on that dancing D.C. cop. (See also yesterday's Commentariat.) CW: Here's what struck me: Aaliyah Taylor, the cop's "dance partner," said that "all seven of her siblings have been cuffed or arrested by police for nonviolent crimes, like breaking curfew.... And her brother and six sisters all told her that the police were rough on them."

David Sanger, et al., of the New York Times: Secretary of State John Kerry's biggest challenge during talks in Vienna to end the Syrian civil war "may well be reconciling the Saudis and the Iranians, longtime rivals who have turned Syria into the main battlefield in a broadening proxy war for dominance in the Middle East."

Carol Morello of the Washington Post: "Iran has arrested another American holding dual citizenship, bringing to four the number of Iranian Americans imprisoned in Tehran after they came under suspicion by hard-line security forces. Siamak Namazi, a businessman based in Dubai who is in his early 40s, was arrested earlier this month when he was visiting a friend in Tehran...."

Charlie Savage & Steven Erlanger of the New York Times: "Shaker Aamer, whose detention at the Guantánamo Bay prison in Cuba attracted the attention of human rights lawyers, political leaders and rock stars, was freed on Friday after more than 13 years in captivity, British officials announced. Mr. Aamer, a Saudi citizen and British resident, was en route to London.... His transfer came one day after the military repatriated a Mauritanian man, Ahmed Ould Abdel Aziz." According to the headline, Aamer was the last Guantanamo prisoner from Great Britain.

Presidential Race

... Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "Republican presidential front-runner Ben Carson told reporters Thursday that he was reaching out to every rival campaign to lobby for changes to future debate formats (linked fixed).'Debates are supposed to be established to help the people get to know the candidate,' Carson said at a news conference before a speech at Colorado Christian University. 'What it's turned into is "gotcha!" That's silly. That's not helpful to anybody.'" ...

... CW: Carson suggested appropriate questions should be along the lines of "How much do you love America?" "What is your favorite color?" and "Is Barack Obama more like Hitler, Stalin or Mao?" And of course, "What's your favorite Bible verse?"

** Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Thanks in part to CNBC's clumsy handling of the event and in part to the long-term and increasing rejection of traditional media on the right, presidential candidates were able to skate past legitimate critiques by claiming bias -- with the audience enthusiastically cheering them on." ...

** Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post: "The Republican presidential candidates are right. The media does suck. But not for the reasons the candidates complained about.... We in the media suck because we have rewarded their rampant dishonesty and buffoonery with nonstop news coverage. Which, of course, has encouraged more dishonesty and buffoonery." Read the whole column. ...

... Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "Wednesday's Republican presidential debate became as much about the journalists who moderated it as it was about the candidates who answered -- or batted away -- their questions." Zezima has a good outline of Ben Carson's whopper in which he claimed he had no involvement with a shady company called Mannatech that sells nutritional supplements & "a good way for people to 'improve their financial situation.'" ...

Erik Wemple of the Washington Post notes that Republicans didn't rise up en masse against Fox "News" when in the August 6 GOP debate its hosts asked questions similar to those the CNBC hosts asked. ...

... CW: Donald Trump of course did have his famous fits about Megyn Kelly's questions, but if you recall, other Republicans, including the presidential candidates, rose up as one to defend Kelly against Trump.

CW: What I wrote yesterday, in flow-chart form. Via Betty Cracker of Balloon Juice:

"The Moon Is Square." Kevin Drum: "I'm used to politicians fudging and tap dancing during debates. All part of the game. But the number of flat-out lies in [Wednesday]'s debate was pretty stunning. Here are the four that stood out." See also Paul Krugman's column, linked below. ...

... ** "The GOP's Grotesque Festival of Lies." Brian Beutler: Conservatives have "figured out that denying documented reality and attacking the messenger can completely snow over the truth. That creates a big problem for journalists, who should view the attacks against Harwood and the others as an affront to the profession. It creates a bigger problem as the primary gives way to the general election.... If [Hillary] Clinton becomes the Democratic nominee, and nobody figures out how to counter [these] debate tactics, the problem will grow."

Josh Barro, a conservative economics reporter for the New York Times, analyzes the GOP candidates' tax plans. Bottom line: pie-in-the-sky assumptions, big savings for the rich, huge deficits. Excellent! ...

     ... CW: Ted Cruz boasted Wednesday night that his tax plan has "the lowest personal rate any candidate up here has." Well, yeah, but what Tricky Teddy forgot to tell you was that on top of the 10 percent personal income tax, he would impose a 16 percent value-added tax (VAT). Barro: "Added up across the whole economy, Mr. Cruz's VAT would be equivalent to a very broadly based sales tax, applying even to services like health care that are ordinarily exempt from sales taxes. Like a sales tax, this tax would be built into prices and paid by consumers -- and for many lower-income households, it would be a far greater burden than the income tax." Rand Paul has a similar plan to add a hefty VAT tax (tho not as hefty as Ted's). what a slimy bunch of bastards. All. of. them. ...

... Dylan Matthews of Vox: Ted Cruz's tax "proposal, outlined in a Wall Street Journal op-ed..., is legitimately shocking -- it will cost trillions upon trillions of dollars and lead to an enormous tax cut for the richest Americans." ...

... Jon Cassidy of the New Yorker on GOP economic policy: "In a Republican primary, making tough policy choices and trying to be substantive doesn't necessarily pay off. Small wonder that the debates tend to be food fights, instead." ...

... "Republican Economics in 3 Words: Push Wealth Upwards." Charles Pierce: "The Republican party remains committed, root and branch, to plutocratic economics, to the fiction of the trickle-down, to the restorative powers of supply-side snake oil. On this, there is no room for debate. Which is why, among other things, it was hilarious to watch Tailgunner Ted Cruz and the rest of them try to turn CNBC (and the likes of Rick Santelli) into Pravda On Wall Street.... Right now, on my television set, the House of Representatives is wildly applauding the elevation to the Speakership of Paul Ryan, the zombie-eyed granny-starver from the state of Wisconsin, first runner-up in our most recent vice-presidential pageant, and the longtime respectable face for the economic policies of which Marco Rubio is the logical end, and as thoroughgoing a knave as ever has held that gavel. Things are looking up." See also David Brooks's column, linked below!

** ... The Grifters. Paul Krugman: "... Mr. Carson lied. He has indeed been deeply involved with Mannatech.... PolitiFact quickly rated his claim false, without qualification. But the Republican base doesn't want to hear about it, and the candidate apparently believes, probably correctly, that he can simply brazen it out. These days, in his party, being an obvious grifter isn't a liability, and may even be an asset.... Insider politicians like Marco Rubio are simply engaged in a different, classier kind of scam -- and they are empowered in part by the way the grifters have defined respectability down.... As the historian Rick Perlstein documents, a 'strategic alliance of snake-oil vendors and conservative true believers' goes back half a century." Krugman explains of why GOP candidates get away with these lies. ...

... CW: I am happy to see someone at the New York Times using the word "lied." I'm sick of euphemistic journalism that bowdlerizes & sanitizes lies as "misstatements" or "misspeaking." One can "misspeak" -- ask Jeb! -- but denying facts known to you is lying. ...

... And now for a word from the New York Times' Designated Grifter David Brooks: "... Republicans could wind up with two new leaders going into this election, Marco Rubio and Paul Ryan. That's a pretty excellent outcome.... Of all the candidates, Rubio has done the most to harvest the work of Reform Conservatism, which has been sweeping through the think tank world. In a year in which many candidates are all marketing, Rubio is a balance of marketing and product. If Ryan and Rubio do emerge as the party's two leaders, it will be the wonkiest leadership team in our lifetime. That's a good thing." ...

     ... CW: In describing Marco's tax policy in glowing terms, for some reason Brooks forgets to mention (a) it will be a boon for the super-rich, shift the tax burden to the middle class & balloon the deficit, and (b) lied about it on national teevee. But, hey, the Times allows its Designated Grifter only 800 words. Maybe he'll get to that next week. ..

    ... ** Update: Contributor Islander points to "a remarkable blog entry" by Paul Krugman, countering Brooks' assertion that "... it's probably not sensible to get too worked up about the details of any candidate's plans. They are all wildly unaffordable. What matters is how a candidate signals priorities." Remarkable, indeed. The content of Krugman's post, titled "Policy and Character," is essential reading. Aside from that, Krugman & Brooks have a longstanding feud on account of Brooks' wilful ignorance of economics. But because they must adhere to some degree to the Gray Lady's Book of Etiquette, the two seldom name each other when they take their potshots. Today, it seems, Krugman has decided that Brooks went a bridge too far in his joyful endorsement of Marco's "wildly unaffordable" plan.

American Dreamboat. Frank Rich: Marco Rubio "is nothing if not slick and glib. His response to every tough question is always the same. He invokes his father, a bartender, and his mother, a hotel maid. He sanctifies himself as the living proof of the power of the American dream.... As the debate once again demonstrated, [Ben Carson] babbles platitudes, generalities, and utter nonsense; lies about his own history (including as a peddler of a suspect patent medicine); and seems to regard his own ascent in politics as akin to the Second Coming.... Bush is finished.... History will look back at him, if it looks at all, as a world-class fool and the last exhausted gasp of a GOP that no longer exists." ...

... Steve Benen: "There's no denying that when Rubio sticks to his memorized talking points, he knows how to deliver them well. I'm not sure what this has to do with being an effective president, but it's a skill that seems to work on television. But when the same candidate in the same debate shows that he can't think quickly on his feet, and his understanding of the issues can charitably be described as superficial, perhaps that matters, too?" ...

... Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: "Rubio is about to go through a period of much more intensive media scrutiny [of his personal finances]. Complaining about media bias won't be enough to get him through it." See also David Catanase's story linked below; Jeb! is going to help with oppo research.

... Seung Min Kim, et al., of Politico: "Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid tore into Sen. Marco Rubio on Thursday, calling on the Florida Republican and 2016 presidential contender to resign his Senate seat as he racks up no-shows on his voting record while campaigning for the White House. 'Why shouldn't he [resign]? He hates the Senate,' Reid said in an interview with Politico on Thursday. 'Why should the taxpayers of this country and people of Florida put up with having only one senator? Doesn't seem fair to me.'"

Tim Egan: "... the fish stinks from the head down.... [Jeb] Bush owns this debacle, the third in a row. The debate broke him. And the only question remaining is whether he's deliberately managing a slow exit consisting of cringe-worthy moments, or if there's something deep in his subconscious driving him to quit." And other debate malfeasance. ...

... Janet Kasperkevic of the Guardian: "Not only did ... [Jeb Bush] have a disappointing showing in Wednesday's Republican debate, he has also managed to upset people who cannot even vote for him -- the French. While taking a jab at Florida senator Marco Rubio for missing Senate votes due to being on the campaign trail, Bush made a reference to the 'French work week'. 'You should be showing up to work. I mean, literally, the Senate, what is it, like a French work week? You get like three days where you have to show up?'... Gérard Araud, French ambassador to the US, pushed back on Twitter. 'The French work an average of 39.6 hours a week compared to 39.2 for the Germans,' he said."... A French newspaper the Local ran a piece with the headline, 'White House race stoops to French bashing, again'." ...

The Bush Family Problem. David Frum, one of Dubya's speechwriters, in the Atlantic: Jeb Bush "arrived at both the second and third debates with plans of attack against his chief rivals of the moment: Donald Trump last time, Marco Rubio this time. Both times, he failed to anticipate and prepare for the most obvious opponent reaction. What followed were humiliating climb-downs by Bush." ...

     ... CW: Frum's column is worth a read. He knows Jeb!, & his analysis of Jeb!'s shortcomings is right on. Of course Frum's critique is of debate performance, not of Jeb!'s ability to handle the presidency. Ay, there's the rub. The Bush boys never think past their own actions. It does not occur to them that their opponents may actually counter their attacks rather than thanking the boys for correcting them. Ergo, the debacle of the Iraq War & the "Bush Doctrine." ...

... David Catanese of US News: After meeting with top donors in Houston Monday, Jeb "Bush's team distributed a 45-page PowerPoint presentation to select reporters, summarizing an optimistic view of the race.... But in that leak to select media, the campaign purposely left out more than half of what was furnished behind closed doors. The full presentation, obtained exclusively by U.S. News, spans 112 pages and includes a trove of new details.... While the slides released to the media outlined Bush's overarching argument against Florida Sen. Marco Rubio -- that he's the GOP's Barack Obama -- the complete offering contains more biting, detailed slights, pointedly questioning the character and ethics of Bush's home state rival.... [One page is] titled 'Marco Is A Risky Bet,' and it bullet-points Rubio's 'misuse of state party credit cards, taxpayer funds and ties to scandal-tarred former Congressman David Rivera.'"

It is important to remember that amateurs built the Ark and it was the professionals that built the Titanic. -- Ben Carson, in a tweet, on why he is qualified to be president

Leaving aside the rip-tooting craziness of citing a popular Biblical myth as evidence of one's own competency, I have news for Dr. Bible Thumper. The architect of the ark in the Noah story was no amateur:

So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high. Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit high all around. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. -- God, to Noah (Genesis 6:14-16)

Ole Doc, who probably believes this Bible story was a real historical event, is either calling the Almighty an amateur (which sounds heretical to me), or -- more likely -- he is suggesting that he, Ben Carson, would make a good president because God will be his "architect." Either way, gob-smacking loony & bone-chilling scary.

Oh, & Ole Doc -- excellent historian that we know him to be -- gets the Titanic story mostly wrong, too. It is true that the ship had too few lifeboats (tho the number exceeded the legal requirement, suggesting regulatory lapse), & there is new speculation that its rivets may have been too weak. But the immediate causes of the ship's hitting an iceberg were the result of (a) unique natural phenomena (acts of, um, God!) & (b) multiple errors the captain & crew made, not mistakes in the design & build. -- Constant Weader

... digby uploads one of Ole Doc's "not-involved" videotaped endorsements of Mannatechs' snake oil. "... endorsement doesn't necessarily mean he was paid. In fact if he wasn't it raises the more important question as to whether he believes this snake oil cures diseases like Alzheimers. It sure sounds like he does.... Carson and his fellows are quick to call Obama's and Clinton's judgment into question. This seems like a good reason to call Carson's into question. Does he think this snake oil cures diseases? Or does he just not realize that when a renowned doctor endorses such a product as he does in that video that it might lead people to think so?" ...

... CW: In fact, Carson endorsed Mannatech's products during the debate. "Do I take the product? Yes. I think it's a good product." A retailer can't do much better than having a popular presidential candidate (who, because of his professional background, should also be an expert on the qualities of the product) endorse that product during a presidential debate that garnered 14 million viewers.

Beyond the Beltway

Jess Bidgood of the New York Times: "Owen Labrie, who was found guilty of having sex with an underage girl while the two were students at the elite St. Paul's School [in Concord, N.H.], was sentenced Thursday to a year in jail and five years of probation. Mr. Labrie, 20, stood straight as the sentence was read. 'You're going to do a year in the House of Corrections and probation,' the judge, Larry M. Smukler, told him.... Labrie must also register as a sex offender."

News Lede

New York Times: "A judge in Poland on Friday turned down a request by the United States for the extradition of the filmmaker Roman Polanski, who is wanted over a 1977 conviction for having sex with a 13-year-old girl. At a hearing in Krakow, Judge Dariusz Mazur ruled that turning over Mr. Polanski would be an 'obviously unlawful' deprivation of liberty, and he added that California was unlikely to be ready to humanely incarcerate the 82-year-old filmmaker, given his age."

The Commentariat -- October 29, 2015

Internal links removed.

Presidential Race

MAG is right. Driftglass has the best liveblog of the debate.

Philip Rucker & Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: "The leading Republican candidates for president tangled with the moderators and one another in a freewheeling and chaotic debate ... Wednesday night that swerved from one topic to another but featured a handful of notably sharp exchanges and breakout performances." ...

... Dan Balz of the Washington Post: "For most of this year, Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) have been lurking in the background of the Republican presidential campaign. On Wednesday night, they broke out into the open, delivering strong and forceful performances in a raucous and rambling Republican debate marked by squabbling and sharp elbows.... ...

     ... CW: Balz's commentary seems to reflect the consensus Beltway takeaway. I didn't watch all of the debate, but I did see some of Marco's & Ted's supposed "breakout moments." They were bullshit. Both of them are experts at not answering questions & blaming the media for their own failings. Admittedly, the audience of lemmings & ignoramuses applauded this crap, but it was crap. Marco was particularly galling, "answering" questions with pieces of his canned stump speech, the "answers" usually having little or nothing to do with the questions. Question: Why don't you show up for work, Sen. Rubio? Answer: I believe in the American dream, blah-blah. Question: Why do you oppose the budget & debt-ceiling deals, Sen. Cruz? Answer: Your questions suck, blah-blah. ...

... So say Patrick Healy & Jonathan Martin in the New York Times' lead story: "Mr. Rubio, a first-term senator, had the best night of his campaign, showing the political talent that many insiders had long seen in him.... Mr. Cruz also stood out far more than he had in the first two debates, reminding viewers of his fights against Republican leaders and blistering the news media in a fashion that delighted the crowd." ...

... AND John Dickerson of Slate & CBS was just wowed! "There were plenty of strong moments for almost all the candidates not named Jeb Bush, but what made Rubio's moments so useful for him was that they combined three things: They were well-timed, they shored up his weaknesses, and they came as his rising poll numbers and the vulnerabilities in his rivals' polling are creating a moment for him."

Here's what ABC News analysts call the "six moments that mattered" in the debate. CW: They don't matter to me; I do agree that Marco got the best of Jeb! tho not on tone. Cruz, Rubio, Christie & Trump don't sound like presidential candidates to me; they sound like high-school bullies. The best debater, Lindsey Graham (with whom I heartily disagree), played in the wrong show.

A Party United Against Reality. Jonathan Chait: "The debate allowed the candidates mostly to agree with each other and against the moderators, who they especially resented for their intrusions of reality. A recurring trope was for candidates, when presented with uncomfortable facts, to simply deny them.... Media-bashing provided the most popular subject for contemporaneous sermons, a foolproof way for candidates to bat down any inconvenient query and win wild applause from the partisan crowd." ...

... Amanda Marcotte in Salon: "The irony in all this is that CNBC leans pretty hard to the right and toward the CEO class, and while the moderators were trying to be tough, they buy into a surprising number of erroneous right-wing economic ideas.... Whenever journalists do their actual job, whether it's by pointing out that the Benghazi hearings are a farce or that Donald Trump's tax plan is unworkable, it's time to whip out the claim that the mainstream media is out to get you. Conservative audiences eat it up and it allows you to tell any lie you want without ever having to really deal with the facts." ...

... Ezra Klein of Vox: "The questions in the CNBC debate, though relentlessly tough, were easily the most substantive of the debates so far. And the problem for Republicans is that substantive questions about their policy proposals end up sounding like hostile attacks -- but that's because the policy proposals are ridiculous, not because the questions are actually unfair.... Republicans have boxed themselves into some truly bizarre policies -- including a set of tax cuts that give so much money to the rich, and blow such huge holes in the deficit, that simply asking about them in any serious way seems like a vicious attack. Assailing the media is a good way to try to dodge those questions for a little while, but it won't work over the course of a long campaign." Emphasis added. ...

... Christopher Rugaber & Stephen Ohlemacher of the AP: "Reality got twisted out of shape on a number of fronts in the fast-paced Republican presidential debate Wednesday night." ...

... Glenn Kessler & Michelle Lee of the Washington Post debunk quite a few whoppers. CW: It's easy to make mistakes or exaggerate in off-the-cuff remarks -- I'm sure I do it myself (tho I try not to) -- but these lying liars are often repeating stump-speech claims that have been repeatedly debunked. They just don't care. It's all part of Right Wing World's fantasy worldview.

Sean Sullivan of the Washington Post: Jeb Bush "entered Wednesday night's Republican presidential debate with little margin for error in a race that has spiraled out of his control. He needed to make things right. But time and again, he failed to capitalize on the opportunities he created for himself."

Alex Isenstadt of Politico: "Jeb Bush campaign manager Danny Diaz got into a heated confrontation with a CNBC producer outside the debate as it was happening.... 'I expressed my displeasure about the way the debate was managed and the amount of time [we got],' said Diaz, who declined to comment further." ...

... Steve M.: "If Jeb had a complaint, he should have voiced it on the air. He should have mingled it with a broader attack on the moderators and the media in general. GOP voters eat that kind of thing up. But no. Jeb has people to do the complaining for him. He's not going to get into it with the moderators. He's not going to scrap. He's above that sort of thing. And that's why he's losing so badly." ...

     ... CW: I dunno, Steve. It comes across as really whiney to say, "Call on me, call on me." Jim Webb received withering criticism when he tried that tack during the Democratic debate. To wit,

... ** Dana Milbank: "The Republicans seem to be testing a strategy of winning by whining. Certainly, voters are discontented and even angry. But do they want a leader who campaigns by kvetching? At the debate itself, the grievances tumbled forth in bulk." ...

... Josh Marshall of TPM gets it right: "I think the only clear takeaway is that the window is closing on the Bush campaign. And it may already have closed.... Carson was somewhat more coherent than in past debates.... The final thing is Marco Rubio. He seemed on the defensive and without terribly good answers to the senate absenteeism charges.... I didn't think he came off that well. But the audience didn't seem to agree with me. He kept getting ovations from the audience."

** Charles Pierce: "... the conservative fearscape ... is the place where Barack Obama actually is a 'socialist,' where Carly Fiorina can run on her dismal record at Hewlett-Packard 'all day,' where Chris Christie can talk about the rule of law while his lawyers back home are answering motions, and where anybody -- like, say John Harwood -- who brings up the empirical reality within which the rest of us live can be dismissed with an airy wave by ambitious young hacks like Marco Rubio and outright loons like Dr. Ben (The Blade) Carson. It is a place where you can get rousing applause by accusing a panel on CNBC that included not only nutty Jim Cramer, but also Tea Party ranter Rick Santelli, as just another hit squad from what Rubio called, 'the Democratic SuperPac -- the American mainstream media.'"

Gail Collins: "Jeb Bush is not going to be the Republican presidential nominee. Neither is, let's see -- [Chris] Christie, Rand Paul, Carly Fiorina or any of the other supporting cast members. Ted Cruz did have a big moment when he answered a question about raising the debt limit by attacking the questioner. That went over so well that by the end of the two-hour session, the left-wing media had overtaken government regulators as the greatest threat to the future of American democracy.... One of the theories on why [Ben] Carson can't win -- besides the fact that he's utterly loopy -- is that even a lot of Republican voters will be unnerved by his plans to undermine Social Security and Medicare. But his ideas aren't actually all that different from those of most of the other candidates, who want to raise retirement rates or cut out everybody under, say, 45. Somebody has got to be nominated. Happy Halloween."

"I am Hillary Clinton's worst nightmare." - Carly FiorinaTessa Stuart of Rolling Stone finds teensy bits of humor in the debate.

Elspeth Reeve of the New Republic: "As mean as he was to the media, [Ted] Cruz was nice to his opponents. It's all part of his sinister plot: The Texas senator hopes to steal the votes of his fellow Republicans by being nice to them -- and their fans -- while they self-destruct. We know this because he straight-up told Politico."

Andrew Prokop of Vox: "About a month ago, conservative commentator Erick Erickson wrote a post at Redstate headlined, 'Ted Cruz vs. Marco Rubio: This Is Where We Are Headed.' Erickson predicted that, eventually, 'the more conservative elements' of the party would fall behind Cruz, while 'the more establishment elements' would opt for Rubio. It was a bold statement, considering that both candidates were stuck in the single digits in the polls. After Wednesday night's third Republican debate, it's much easier to see how it could happen."

Will Oremus of Slate: "CNBC's Carl Quintanilla was lustily booed by the GOP debate audience Wednesday night for pressing Ben Carson on his relationship with a sketchy nutritional supplements firm. The jeers rained so loudly that Carson couldn't even finish his answer to the question. Which is good for him, because he was in the process of spinning one of the most convoluted, nonsensical, bald-faced lies of the entire campaign. And that's saying something." With video.

Dan Roberts of the Guardian: "While many of the candidates inside the wire fencing and security cordon [at the University of Colorado-Boulder] have roused their supporters with fierce anti-immigration rhetoric, a group of campaigners on the other side of campus are holding a rally to protest what they see as an alarmingly xenophobic tone to the Republican primary."

The New York Times is liveblogging the GOP presidential debates, & they're right on top of it. At the top of their liveblog of the kiddie debate, they also have a list of ways to watch the debates. ...

... The Washington Post's liveblog of the also-rans is here. The Post's liveblog of the big show is here.

Orlando Sun-Sentinel Editors: Marco Rubio, "You are paid $174,000 per year to represent us, to fight for us, to solve our problems. Plus you take a $10,000 federal subsidy -- declined by some in the Senate -- to participate in one of the Obamacare health plans, though you are a big critic of Obamacare. You are ripping us off, senator.... Two other candidates -- Sens. Rand Paul and Bernie Sanders -- have missed only 10 Senate votes during their campaigns for the White House. You, on the other hand, have missed 59.... And it is unconscionable that when it comes to intelligence matters, including briefings on the Iran nuclear deal, you said, 'we have a staffer that's assigned to intelligence who gets constant briefings.' And you want us to take you seriously as a presidential candidate?... Either do your job, Sen. Rubio, or resign it."

Norm Ornstein, in the Atlantic, assesses the state of the horse race. ...

... Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: "The overwhelming majority of Republican voters have repeatedly told pollsters this year that, whatever their choice in any given poll, they haven't made up their minds yet. Most won't think hard about their decision for at least another three months. At this point in 2008, Rudy Giuliani was the polling leader. In 2012, it was [Herman] Cain. Rather than tell us anything deep about voter sentiments, polls at this point generally reflect name recognition and which candidates are receiving the most media attention at any given time.... The most likely scenario remains that the G.O.P. will eventually coalesce around the most conservative candidate who is electable."

Liar, Liar, Liar. Russ Choma of Mother Jones: "As a presidential candidate, [Carly] Fiorina is selling herself as a no-nonsense former CEO who could manage and lead the federal government efficiently and effectively. Yet while she campaigns, she leaves behind a long trail of false assertions -- enough so that voters ought to wonder about anything she says regarding her own qualifications." Choma details a list of "false assertions" that Fiorina repeats again & again -- after factcheckers have debunked them. CW: I think she's profoundly immoral, which makes her every criticism of other people, whether Barack Obama or a woman who has an abortion, meaningless.

Colbert's retelling of Donald Trump's riches-to-richer story is a classic:

John Wagner & Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post: "... Bernie Sanders announced his support Wednesday for removing marijuana from a list of the most dangerous drugs outlawed by the federal government -- a move that would free states to legalize it without impediments from Washington."

Dan Merica & Ashley Killough of CNN: Hillary "Clinton's campaign on Tuesday backed away from the candidate's claim that issues at the VA were not 'widespread'" after veterans' groups & Republicans strongly criticized her for being clueless & facts-averse.

Real News

Carl Hulse of the New York Times: "After four and a half years as House speaker, [John] Boehner will close out an extraordinary tenure with a farewell speech Thursday morning before handing over the gavel to his successor, Representative Paul D. Ryan, to see what he can do with it." CW: I'm sure we can all imagine "what he can do with it." We'll probably look back fondly upon Boehner. ...

... Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "The test for Mr. Ryan will be whether he can manage, perhaps even blunt, [the conservative] wing of the House Republican conference, or if he too will fall to its members' intransigence. He had warned members that while he would take their concerns about process seriously, he would not brook dissent that would undermine his ability to lead them.... His problems are less with Democrats, who have deeply opposed his policy ideas for years, than in his own party, which controls 247 seats but is divided over tactics and to some degree ideology, with a sizable number of members often supporting government dysfunction over political compromise." ...

     ... UPDATE -- New Lede: "Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin was elected the 62nd speaker of the House on Thursday, taking the gavel that he never sought to wield from John A. Boehner, who relinquished it under fire.... Mr. Ryan received 236 votes, a comfortable margin that included several of the hardline conservatives who had worked to oust Mr. Boehner."

Kelsey Snell of the Washington Post: "Congress on Wednesday moved a step closer to clearing a bipartisan budget deal that would boost spending for domestic and defense programs over two years while suspending the debt limit into 2017. The House passed the bill on a 266 to 167 vote late Wednesday afternoon and Senate leaders have promised to quickly move it through the upper chamber. Senate leaders want to move the bill quickly.... Many House Republicans remained opposed to the deal and only 79 voted for it while 187 Democrats supported the bill."

David Hersenhorn of the New York Times: "House Republicans on Wednesday nominated Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin to be the 62nd speaker of the House.... Mr. Ryan ... won the overwhelming support of his colleagues in the nominating contest and is now set to be installed as speaker in a formal vote on the House floor on Thursday. Republicans said the vote was 200 to 43 over Representative Daniel Webster of Florida, Mr. Ryan's closest rival."

Charlie Savage of the New York Times: "Weeks before President Obama ordered the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound in May 2011, four administration lawyers developed rationales intended to overcome any legal obstacles -- and made it all but inevitable that Navy SEALs would kill the fugitive Qaeda leader, not capture him.

Binyamin Appelbaum of the New York Times: "The Federal Reserve announced Wednesday that it is not ready to raise interest rates, completing a seventh year in which it has held short-term rates near zero."

Quentin Hardy of the New York Times: IBM "announced on Wednesday that it had entered into a definitive agreement to acquire most of the assets of the Weather Company, including its Weather.com website, a large number of weather data collection points, consumer and business applications and a staff of over 900 people. IBM would not say how much it was paying for the business, but an earlier report in The Wall Street Journal put the deal at over $2 billion. The Weather Channel, a cable television outlet, was not part of the deal, but it would license weather forecast data from IBM.... If combined with [IBM's] Watson, a computing system skilled at parsing unusual types of data and making statistically based decisions across a range of industries, the data could be more valuable,'" Weather Company CEO David Kenny said.

Photo via the Washington Post.... Andrea Peterson, et al., of the Washington Post: "The U.S. military has two giant unmanned surveillance blimps it uses to watch the East coast from a base in Maryland. And one of them escaped its tethering Wednesday and floated aimlessly over Pennsylvania, downing power lines and cutting off electricity for tens of thousands of residents." ...

... Austin Wright of Politico: There have been "a series of mishaps for a $2.8 billion program that's suffered from cost increases and performance issues and is now a national laughingstock as Twitter users and cable-news outlets marvel over how one became untethered -- forcing the Pentagon to scramble two F-16 fighter jets and the FAA to reroute some airline flights before the large white dirigible came down in Pennsylvania farmland.... The program dates back to 1996, when the military decided to try to build blimps ... that could perform over-the-horizon surveillance and detect cruise missiles.... Raytheon won the contract to develop the system in 1998.... In 2010, according to an investigation by the Los Angeles Times, Army leaders sought to kill the program. But top Pentagon officials intervened -- including then-Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman James Cartwright, who's since made hundreds of thousands of dollars as a member of Raytheon's board of directors."

AP: "All five Gulf of Mexico states have reached a settlement with the owner of the offshore drilling rig involved in the 2010 BP oil spill. A court filing from Transocean and attorneys for Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas said all of the states had entered a settlement agreement. Alabama's governor announced that state's settlement with Transocean last week."

Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post: "New international negotiations on Syria that will start Friday follow weeks of intensive diplomacy, a significant amount of arm-twisting on all sides, and agreement between the United States and Russia that the future of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will not be on the table for now."

Reuters: "The United States is not keen on pursuing a separate free trade deal with Britain if it leaves the European Union, the US trade representative, Michael Froman, said -- the first public comments from a senior US official on the matter. Voters are due to decide by the end of 2017 whether the UK should remain in the EU, and opinion polls show rising support for leaving the bloc. Froman's comments on Wednesday undermine a key economic argument deployed by proponents of exit, who say Britain would prosper on its own and be able to secure bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) with trading partners."

Beyond the Beltway

Kim Chandler of the AP: "A federal judge on Wednesday ordered Alabama to restore Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood, money the state tried to cut off in the wake of undercover videos shot by abortion opponents. U.S District Judge Myron Thompson issued an order that temporarily bars Alabama from cutting off Medicaid contracts with the group's clinics in Alabama. Planned Parenthood Southeast and a patient filed suit in August, days after Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley announced he was ending the Medicaid agreements with the two clinics." ...

CW: Judge Thompson, who now has senior status, is a Carter appointee. "He was the first African American employee of the state of Alabama who was not a janitor or a teacher." -- Wikipedia

Craig Melvin & Erick Ortiz of NBC News: "The school resource officer who was caught on camera violently flipping a South Carolina high school student at her desk has been fired, authorities announced Wednesday. Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said an internal investigation over the Monday incident at Spring Valley High School in Columbia focused on whether Senior Deputy Ben Fields had violated the department's policies. He said at a news conference that the department looked at cellphone videos taken from the classroom and interviews with witnesses, and concluded that the maneuvers he used in the confrontation were 'not acceptable.'" CW: No kidding. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Jonathan Capehart of the Washington Post has a good response to the "defenses" Richmond County, South Carolina, Sheriff Leon Lott offered for Deputy Ben Fields -- before Lott fired him. ...

... Perry Stein of the Washington Post shows one way a cop can diffuse a confrontation with teenagers. Prior to the scene depicted in the video below, the "officer approached two groups of teenagers and told them to disperse." At least one of the young women chose not to comply. Requires skills not likely taught at the police academy. Thanks to D. C. Clark for the link:

... Richard Perez-Pena, et al., of the New York Times: "A deputy's rough takedown and arrest of an uncooperative 16-year-old girl in a high school classroom adds fuel to a debate over the proliferation and proper role of the police in schools, where officers are often called on to deal with student misbehavior that used to be handled by teachers and administrators. Since the early 1990s, thousands of school systems around the country have put officers in schools, most often armed and in uniform, while many schools have adopted 'zero tolerance' policies for misconduct. That has produced sharp increases in arrests, especially for minor offenses, giving criminal records to students who in the past might have faced nothing more serious than after-school detention."

News Ledes

Stars & Stripes: "The USS Ronald Reagan scrambled its fighter jets earlier this week after two Russian naval reconnaissance aircraft flew within one nautical mile of the U.S. aircraft carrier as it sailed in international waters east of the Korean Peninsula, according to 7th Fleet officials. In the latest in a series of incidents involving Russian aircraft, two Tupolev Tu-142 Bear aircraft flew as low as 500 feet Tuesday morning near the Reagan, which has been conducting scheduled maneuvers with South Korean navy ships."

Washington Post: "China announced on Thursday it had abandoned its 'one-child policy' and would allow all couples to have two children, according to state news agency Xinhua. The move, which came after a meeting of the Communist Party leadership in Beijing, reflected rising concerns over a rapidly aging population and potential labor shortages that would put immense strains on the economy in the years ahead."

The Commentariat -- October 28, 2015

Internal links & defunct video removed.

CW: If, like me, you want to watch (at least part of) the GOP debate tonight & you're not in the vicinity of your teevee, you can start at this CNBC page, click on "Watch Live" in the menu at the top of the page, click on the image of the key that comes up. pick your cable or dish service provider, then sign in thru the provider. For instructions to use other media & apps, this CNBC page will get you started.

Afternoon Update:

Craig Melvin & Erick Ortiz of NBC News: "The school resource officer who was caught on camera violently flipping a South Carolina high school student at her desk has been fired, authorities announced Wednesday. Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said an internal investigation over the Monday incident at Spring Valley High School in Columbia focused on whether Senior Deputy Ben Fields had violated the department's policies. He said at a news conference that the department looked at cellphone videos taken from the classroom and interviews with witnesses, and concluded that the maneuvers he used in the confrontation were 'not acceptable.'"

*****

Julie Davis of the New York Times: "The budget agreement struck late Monday between the White House and Congress hands President Obama a clear victory, vindicating his hard line this year against spending limits that he argued were a drag on the economy and buying him freedom for the final 14 months of his term from the fiscal dysfunction that has plagued his presidency. The deal is the policy equivalent of keeping the lights on -- hardly the stuff of a bold fiscal legacy. But it achieves the main objective of his 2016 budget: to break free of the spending shackles he agreed to when he signed the Budget Control Act of 2011, an outcome, the president allowed Tuesday, that he could be 'pretty happy' about." ...

... Phony Baloney. Paul Ryan Mad About Budget Bill His Staff Helped Write. Arthur Delaney of the Huffington Post: "Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Tuesday morning that he hadn't seen the new bipartisan budget deal and that the secretive process used to craft it 'stinks.'... 'Paul Ryan's staff was involved in crafting the [SSDI] provision for weeks,' a Democratic aide told HuffPost. 'His staff signed off on the provision, his staff also signed off on other key provisions' related to tax compliance and Medicare.... At 52 pages, the disability insurance provision comprises a significant portion of the 144 page bill." ...

... Kevin Drum: "This is so staged it makes Dame Edna look serious. Ryan has basically been given permission to blast the deal in order to verify his conservative bona fides, and everyone else understands this is just an act." ...

... digby: "We can now see why Ryan was willing to take the [speaker's] job. If Boehner can successfully take the basic requirements to keep the government running off the table Ryan can indulge his Freedom Caucus with endless witch hunts and crazy maneuvers for two whole years before any chickens come home to roost. If they ever do. Get ready for a very theatrical political freak show to try to appease the rubes. It's what they really want. Planned Parenthood is up next." ...

... UPDATE. This just in, via Jake Sherman of Politico: "After sharply criticizing how it came together, Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan announced he would support the budget deal Wednesday." CW: What a weasel. ...

     ... Greg Sargent: "Paul Ryan's transformation from safety-net-obliterating, Ayn Rand-worshipping conservative hero to RINO squish Obummer-enabling sellout is complete." ...

(... Oh, but there's this. Elaina Plott of the National Review: "Paul Ryan has signed off on a letter promising restless members of the House Freedom Caucus (HFC) that he won't bring immigration-reform legislation to the House floor while President Obama remains in office." CW: They've got it in writing. I promise not to do jack-shit for "those people" while "that person" is in office. They all make me sick. ...)

... Jake Sherman & John Bresnahan of Politico: "House Republicans are facing a last-minute uprising against Speaker John Boehner's budget deal, as dozens of GOP lawmakers are telling leadership they might vote against the package because of changes to crop insurance programs, and other concerns. Senior GOP lawmakers estimate that between 60 and 120 Republicans will vote for the package as is, leaving Democrats to supply the vast majority of votes, though the vote count is fluid at this time. Aides in both parties expect the bill to pass, but the number of GOP defections is a notable rebuke to Boehner and other top Republicans." ...

... Sophia Tesfaye of Salon: "The U.S. government just avoided economic calamity. Naturally, the extreme right is unhappy." ...

... Amy Goldstein of the Washington Post: "The tentative budget agreement forged by congressional leaders and the Obama administration will ward off a historic spike in Medicare premiums for the coming year, but it will nevertheless require nearly one in three older Americans to pay 17 percent more in monthly premiums for doctors' visits and other outpatient care." ...

... CW: If you want to understand what is really in the budget, Robert Greenstein of the Center on Budget & Policy Priorities is you man.

... Otherwise, you can turn to Steve Benen: "On the bottom of page 144, the budget agreement would designate the 'small House rotunda' on the first floor of the Capitol to serve as a 'Freedom Foyer.' I'm not making this up." CW: See? There's something in this budget to make everyone happy -- even for the loudest whiners. They get their very own foyer.

Lisa Rein of the Washington Post: "A group of House Republicans ... moved Tuesday to impeach [John Koskinen,] the head of the Internal Revenue Service, saying he violated the public trust and lied to Congress as it investigated the treatment of conservative groups. The announcement by Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform panel, came four days after the Justice Department formally closed its investigation of the targeting scandal without filing criminal charges.... Chaffetz was joined by 18 committee Republicans in sponsoring an impeachment resolution, which now goes to the House Judiciary Committee. House Democrats quickly denounced the move as political grandstanding."...

... CW: Those "fiscal conservatives" sure are wasting a lot of our taxpayer dollars in the service of grandstanding hoo-hah.

CW: I'm sure there will be plenty of waste here, too. Christian Davenport of the Washington Post: "Northrop Grumman on Tuesday won the Pentagon contract to build a fleet of stealthy planes known as the Long Range Strike Bomber, a new generation of aircraft designed to reach deep into enemy territory. Northrop beat out a team of Boeing and Lockheed Martin in the high-stakes competition for a project likely to be one of the Pentagon's most significant over the next decade. In announcing the award, valued at nearly $60 billion, Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter said the program represents a 'technological leap' that will allow the United States to 'remain dominant.'"

Juliet Eilperin & Wesley Lowery of the Washington Post: "President Obama said Tuesday that there is no evidence police officers in major cities have pulled back from enforcing the law out of concern they will come under fire for using harsh tactics. Twice in the past week, FBI Director James B. Comey suggested that exactly such a phenomenon was responsible for rising crime rates in many U.S. cities, as police officers worry that their behavior will be captured on video and go viral":

Richard Fausset, et al., of the New York Times: "... the Justice Department said Tuesday that it would investigate ... a white sheriff's deputy upending and dragging an uncooperative black girl in a high school classroom [in Columbia, South Carolina], follows a set of national studies showing that black students were far more likely than whites to be disciplined in public schools, even for comparable offenses."

... Elahe Izadi & Emma Brown of the Washington Post: "Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott, who requested the independent criminal probe [by the DOJ], said at a Tuesday news conference he was 'shocked and disturbed' by what the short video showed. Officials also have uncovered another video, recorded from a different angle, showing the student resisting, 'hitting the student resource officer with her fist and striking him,' Lott said. 'What she does is not what I'm looking at; what I'm looking at is what our student resource officer did.'" (Link missing.)

Ian Millhiser of Think Progress: "Justice Anthony Kennedy ... suggested during an event at Harvard Law School last Thursday that public officials who do not wish to follow the Court;s marriage equality decision should resign. Kennedy's remarks came in response to a question from a student who ... asked whether public officials who disagree with the Court's decisions on marriage equality or abortion have 'authority to act according to her own judgment' of whether the Court's legal reasoning was sound.... [He said] 'the rule of law is that, as a public official in performing your legal duties, you are bound to enforce the law.'... The justice did acknowledge the 'difficult moral questions' presented when a public official is asked to 'enforce a law that they believe is morally corrupt.'" ...

... CW: Looks as if Kim Davis would be making a big mistake to take her "religious freedom" claim to the Supreme Court.

Matt Zapotosky of the Washington Post: "Former House speaker J. Dennis Hastert pleaded guilty Wednesday to bank fraud charges connected to $1.7 million he paid to cover up what federal officials said was sexual misconduct dating back to his years as a high school teacher and coach. Prosecutors are recommending up to 6-month prison sentence." ...

... The Chicago Tribune story, by Jason Meisner & Jeff Coen, is here. (It is currently not firewalled.) "'Guilty, sir,' Hastert said during his hearing before a judge in Chicago federal court. Hastert admitted he knew his conduct was wrong.... Hastert faces probation or up to 6 months in prison.... Hastert read a brief statement saying that he didn't want officials to know how he intended to spend the money he withdrew."

Coral Davenport, et al., of the New York Times: "... scientific data [collection] ... could yield groundbreaking information on the rate at which the melting of Greenland ice sheet, one of the biggest and fastest-melting chunks of ice on Earth, will drive up sea levels in the coming decades. The full melting of Greenland's ice sheet could increase sea levels by about 20 feet.... Each year, the federal government spends about $1 billion to support Arctic and Antarctic research.... But the research is under increasing fire by some Republican leaders in Congress, who deny or question the scientific consensus that human activities contribute to climate change. Leading the Republican charge on Capitol Hill is Representative Lamar Smith of Texas, the chairman of the House science committee...."

Shannon Hall in Salon: "Exxon was aware of climate change, as early as 1977, 11 years before it became a public issue, according to a recent investigation from InsideClimate News. This knowledge did not prevent the company (now ExxonMobil and the world's largest oil and gas company) from spending decades refusing to publicly acknowledge climate change and even promoting climate misinformation -- an approach many have likened to the lies spread by the tobacco industry regarding the health risks of smoking."

Michael de la Merced & Hiroko Tabuchi of the New York Times: "Walgreens Boots Alliance said on Tuesday that it would buy Rite Aid for more than $9.4 billion in cash...." CW: Cash? Really? Bags of cash? Suitcases full of cash? What denominations? How many people will it take to carry $9.4 billion in cash.

Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post: "For the 24th year in a row, and by a wider margin than ever before, the U.N. General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to urge the United States to end its economic embargo on Cuba. Despite the Obama administration's professed eagerness to do precisely that, the United States was one of only two nations to vote no. Joined by Israel, against a 191-vote majority, the U.S. delegation dismissed the Cuban-sponsored resolution as failing to reflect the 'spirit of engagement President Obama has championed.'"

The folks at Fox "News" are as smart as ever. Allegra Kirkland of TPM: "Fox News host Harris Faulkner asked on Tuesday why guns should be regulated in the U.S. if 'we're not regulating the car.'"

Presidential Race

Nick Gass of Politico: "With Vice President Joe Biden officially out of the running and the Benghazi testimony behind her, Hillary Clinton has surged to a 41-point lead in the first caucus state of Iowa, according to results out Tuesday from the latest Monmouth University poll surveying likely Democratic caucus-goers." ...

... digby: Over there in Right Wing World, they are not too worried about the presidential race because they have a ringer in FBI Director James Comey. He's going to put Hillary Clinton in jail. And AG Loretta Lynch won't be able to stop him. digby finds the Hillary-Behind-Bars scenario pretty hilarious, BUT: "Using whatever means necessary whether it's calling bogus voter fraud, closing polling stations or indicting opposition politicians on flimsy charges is a legitimate democratic process in their eyes. If Comey and the FBI are good partisan Republicans they'll help out any way they can. And that means they may not be able to press charges but you can bet they'll leak misleading information to feed the hungry little birdies in the press and the wingnut mob." ...

Stephen Koff of Cleveland.com: "U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat, is endorsing Hillary Clinton for president. Brown's endorsement could matter among Ohio primary voters next March as Clinton vies with Bernie Sanders for the party's nomination. Brown has long embraced the progressive label, taking positions more often affiliated with colleagues such as Sanders, of Vermont, and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts than with moderates such as Clinton."

Do you know how crazy this election is?... I've about had it with these people. Let me tell you why. We got one candidate [Ben Carson] that says we ought to abolish Medicaid and Medicare. You ever heard anything so crazy as that...? We got one guy [Donald Trump] that says we ought to take 10 or 11 million people and pick them up, where the -- I don't know where, we're going to go in their homes, their apartments. We're going to pick them up and we're going to take them to the border and scream at them to get out of our country. Well that's just crazy. -- John Kasich, at a rally in Ohio Tuesday

Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: Second-place Donald held a rally in Sioux City, Iowa, last night. Second place, for Trump, "is terrible."

Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Ben Carson calls abortion murder but thinks states should decide whether it's legal. The retired neurosurgeon says it's wrong to accuse fellow Americans of treason, yet suggested President Barack Obama could be guilty of the crime. He advocates severe punishment as a deterrent for health care fraud, yet helped secure a lighter sentence for a convicted schemer. On issue after issue, Carson's positions conflict, a collection of statements, assertions and pronouncements that are often out of step with a conservative electorate.... Carson's contradictions continued this week, when he said he had junked his long-held plan to eliminate Medicare and Medicaid." ...

... Steve M. explains why Ben Carson's Seventh-day Adventist beliefs -- including the conviction that Sunday-worshipping Christians are "the devil's partners" -- will not hurt him with these supposedly-doomed evangelicals: "I don't believe religion is exclusively or even primarily about religion for these people -- it's about tribal identification and tribal solidarity. The tribe in this case isn't the members of a particular faith tradition, but rather the overall group of heartlanders who wear their Christianity on their sleeve." ...

     ... CW: I think Steve has this just right. BTW, every time Carson uses the word "secular," in whatever context -- & he uses it often -- that's a dogwhistle to evangelicals. (When Carson asked for Secret Service protection, for instance, he said the reason was that "I'm in great danger because I challenge the secular progressive movement to the very core.") ...

... Dr. Ben Still Doesn't Understand the Debt Ceiling. Jonathan Easley of the Hill: "In a new interview with The Hill, GOP presidential candidate Ben Carson said he would not sign any budget deal that raised the debt ceiling if he is elected president." CW: See, Doc, the budget sets expenditures for the coming year (actually the coming two years this time around, but let's not make this too complicated), & the debt ceiling covers expenditures in the current year & years gone by. Maybe somebody should buy Dr. Ben a calendar & explains years and things to him, although I suppose introducing the concept of fiscal years may be way beyond his ken. Or we could forget about all this & concentrate on the End of Days. Jeesh! ...

... Josh Marshall of TPM: "I genuinely wonder if this guy is all there."

Li'l Randy Still Doesn't Understand the Debt Ceiling. Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) has called [the agreement to raise the debt limit] a 'slap in the face to conservatives.' Likely speaker of the House Paul Ryan has said the process that created it 'stinks.' But Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is the first Republican to pledge outright that ... 'I will filibuster the new debt ceiling bill.'... Paul also called the bill a 'steaming pile of legislation,' and urged fellow Republicans to join him. But Paul made the same move in 2011...." (CW: Ted Cruz understands it, but he's a phony-outrage machine who likes to stay in character. Li'l Randy just isn't very bright.) ...

... Andrew Kaczynski & Megan Apper write an open letter to Rand Paul: "Stop using fake founding fathers quotes. Four months ago, we brought to your attention that your first two books contained several quotations incorrectly attributed to our founding fathers.... Speaking in Greenville, South Carolina earlier this year, we caught you using a fake Patrick Henry quotation.... Just this week you released a new book, Our President &Their Prayers: Proclamation of Faith by America's Leaders, with co-author James Robison who 'compiled and edited' the text. It too is full of fake quotations." CW: If Li'l Randy is not very bright, neither are his ghostwriters. ...

... there's a ridiculous cottage industry out there of people who think they're smarter than everyone else, and because certain quotes are disputed -- well, yeah! If you want to say something's not a Thomas Jefferson quote, you can get a whole book on whether it's a quote or not.... I mean, this idiot [Kaczynski] says the same thing about my speeches. Do I need to say in my speech, 'as many people attribute to Thomas Jefferson, but some people dispute,' before I give the quote? It's idiocy, it's pedantry -- it's ridiculous stuff from partisan hacks. And I'd say that guy's one of 'em. -- Rand Paul, defending his "scholarship"

Paul & Christie Campaigns Are Literally in the Toilet. Alex Isenstadt of Politico: "During a tense 30-minute meeting at the Coors Event Center [in Denver]..., several lower-polling campaigns lashed out at the RNC. They accused the committee of allotting them less-than-hospitable greenroom spaces while unfairly giving lavish ones to higher-polling candidates.... Trump was granted a spacious room, complete with plush chairs and a flat-screen TV. Marco Rubio got a theatre-type room, packed with leather seats for him and his team of aides. Carly Fiorina's room had a Jacuzzi. Then there was Chris Christie, whose small space was dominated by a toilet. So was Rand Paul's." ...

... CW: Now, boys. This is just the RNC's subtle way of telling you drop out of the race to make room for Jeb! I'm with Kasich & Graham. You can't take these people seriously. They're only worth our notice for the laughs. ...

... Noah Weiland of Politico writes a piece titled "Everything you need to know about Wednesday's GOP debate." CW: But that's not true. He doesn't write about toilets & Jacuzzis. ...

... Steve M.: "I think this will continue to be a two-man race, and Carson really might have a chance of winning it." ...

... CW: Nah. I realize the dynamics are different every cycle, but I think we're seeing in Carson's surge the 2012 effect: that is, one GOP candidate is on top for a while, then another, then another. We just don't know yet who that third guy (or gal, as Steve suggests) is. Carson's uptick is really bad news for Trump, not because it deprives him of his top talking point ("I'm No. 1"), but because it means that the flavor of the summer doesn't taste so good in the fall, & voters will be looking at other candidates. It's Carson today, maybe Cruz or Rubio tomorrow. The Iowa caucus results, BTW, are just as important as they were in 2012, President Santorum. ...

... Speaking of "gal," Abby Phillip of the Washington Post: Carly Fiorina has told a story, at least twice before, of taking a friend to an abortion clinic years ago; this, she said, "helped harden her antiabortion position." Now she has revised her story to say the facility she took her friend to was a Planned Parenthood clinic. How convenient. ...

... CW: Let's just say Fiorina's story is 100 percent true. Having a friend who later wished she had not had an abortion is not by any means a sound basis for opposing abortion for other women who who want to choose that option. And if her friend "never got over it," as Fiorina claims, the friend has a psychological problem that is probably unrelated to the abortion. We all make decisions we later regret, but we do get over our angst. Fiorina's argument is as sensible as "My friend wished he had not bought a Corvette, so Corvettes should be illegal." There's nothing wrong with personally opposing abortion (or Corvettes!), whatever the reason, but to impose that view upon other women & families is imperious.

Beyond the Beltway

Onward, Christian Smugglers. Candida Moss & Joel Baden of the Daily Beast: "In 2011, a shipment of somewhere between 200 to 300 small clay tablets on their way to Oklahoma City from Israel was seized by U.S. Customs agents in Memphis.... Their destination was the compound of the Hobby Lobby corporation, which became famous last year for winning a landmark Supreme Court case on religious freedom and government mandates.... Law enforcement sources tell The Daily Beast, the Greens [who own Hobby Lobby] have been under federal investigation for the illicit importation of cultural heritage from Iraq." Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. ...

... Charles Pierce: "Now, it appears, their truly appalling Museum Of The Bible may discuss only eight commandments -- hanging up those prohibitions against bearing false witness and coveting your neighbor's goods may strike some people as a little ironic.... I've checked. I don't think you can claim that you have the 'religious liberty' to be a smuggler. Who knows what John Roberts thinks, though." ...

... CW: I'm awfully disappointed the Greens got caught. As the Daily Beast reported, "The tablets were described on their FedEx shipping label as samples of 'hand-crafted clay tiles.'... The monetary value assigned to them -- around $300, we're told -- vastly underestimates their true worth...." The Greens' haul was 40,000 "tiles"! Surely, they would have sold most of the "hand-crafted tiles" at their Hobby Lobby stores throughout the nation, & I could have picked up one -- at a huge markup from their assigned value of .75 cents apiece. I'd have decorated it with Hobby Lobby glitter & craft paints & maybe some cute decals.

Daphne Duret & Lawrence Mower of the Palm Beach Post: "Corey Jones was on the phone with AT&T's roadside assistance -- and possibly recorded -- when a Palm Beach Gardens officer confronted him on an Interstate 95 off-ramp last week, triggering the events that led to his death." Jones is black. He had a gun & a concealed carry permit for it. The officer who shot him dead was not in uniform, was not wearing a badge, & drove an unmarked white van with tinted windows.

Way Beyond

Michael Gordon of the New York Times: "In interviews, four of the 69 Arab prisoners of the Islamic State freed in a military raid last week described life under the thumb of the Islamic State."

News Lede

New York Times: "Iran has accepted an invitation to join talks with the United States and Russia this week on a possible political resolution to the Syrian civil war, state news media reported on Wednesday. The talks would be Secretary of State John Kerry's first formal negotiations with Tehran on issues beyond the nuclear accord reached in July."