The Commentariat -- October 24, 2015

Internal links removed.

Michael Schmidt & Matt Apuzzo The F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, said on Friday that the additional scrutiny and criticism of police officers in the wake of highly publicized incidents of police brutality may have led to an increase in violent crime in some cities as officers have become less aggressive. With his remarks, Mr. Comey lent the prestige of the F.B.I. ... to a theory that is far from settled: that the increased attention on the police has made officers less aggressive and emboldened criminals. But Mr. Comey acknowledged that there is so far no data to back up his assertion and that it may be just one of many factors that are contributing to the rise in crime, like cheaper drugs and an increase in criminals who are being released from prison."

Richard Perez-Pena, et al., of the New York Times: In a successful mission to free ISIS hostages, "the only rescuer who died was Sergeant [Joshua] Wheeler, a veteran of 14 deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, with a chest full of medals. His honors included four Bronze Stars with the letter V, awarded for valor in combat; and seven Bronze Stars, awarded for heroic or meritorious service in a combat zone. His body will be returned to the United States on Saturday."

Carol Morello of the Washington Post: "Secretary of State John F. Kerry met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Jordan's King Abdullah Saturday as he continued his quest to defuse an escalating wave of violence between Israel and Palestinians."

Christian Davenport of the Washington Post: "Four years before Pentagon officials discovered potentially life-threatening problems with the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter's ejection seat, a top official warned in an urgent memo that the escape system should be more thoroughly vetted before pilots were trained on the plane.... [The] warnings were rejected by Pentagon brass, who pressed on with the controversial program, according to internal documents obtained by The Washington Post.... Lighter-weight pilots face a 'high' risk of danger, and the risk is deemed 'serious' for mid-weight pilots, according to an internal risk assessment of the problem.... Lighter-weight pilots, those weighing less than 136 pounds, are now prohibited from flying the aircraft, officials said, until the problem is fixed." ...

     ... CW: Now, I'm sure this has nothing to do with the Pentagon's careless decision, but who do you suppose most of those "lighter-weight" pilots are? Hint: think gender.

Amy Goldstein of the Washington Post: "When HealthCare.gov opens on Nov. 1 for a third open-enrollment season, the online insurance marketplace will be easier for consumers to use, Obama administration officials predict. But one main new tool to help consumers decide on health plans will not be finished."

White House: "In this week's address, the President laid out the importance of serving as good stewards of the environment and maintaining the planet for generations to come":

Sam Thielman of the Guardian: "A federal district court has dismissed a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union against the National Security Agency.... The judge in the case, TS Ellis III, said the suit relied on 'the subjective fear of surveillance', because the NSA did not admit to having collected any of the information it was alleged to have collected by the ACLU." ...

     ... CW: Ellis is a Reagan appointee. Ellis has hit upon an excellent means to reduce -- to almost nothing -- our courts' burdensome caseloads. By his logic, few lawsuits could survive judicial scrutiny because few defendants stipulate that they're guilty. Want to reduce government spending? Throw out all the cases where the defendant does not admit to the underlying crime or tort. Wow!

Another GOP Conspiracy Theory Bites the Dust. Evan Perez of CNN: "The Justice Department notified members of Congress on Friday that it is closing its two-year investigation into whether the IRS improperly targeted the tea party and other conservative groups. There will be no charges against former IRS official Lois Lerner or anyone else at the agency, the Justice Department said in a letter. The probe found 'substantial evidence of mismanagement, poor judgment and institutional inertia leading to the belief by many tax-exempt applicants that the IRS targeted them based on their political viewpoints. But poor management is not a crime,' Assistant Attorney General Peter Kadzik said in the letter." ...

We found no evidence that any IRS official acted based on political, discriminatory, corrupt, or other inappropriate motives that would support a criminal prosecution. We also found no evidence that any official involved in the handling of tax-exempt applications or IRS leadership attempted to obstruct justice. -- Assistant AG Peter Kadzik

... David Nir of Daily Kos: "There's an amazing irony in this. Conservatives have railed against the IRS from the moment it was born, and Republicans have done everything in their power to starve it of funds and undermine its very existence. As a result, the agency was unable to process applications for non-profits in an efficient manner, which those very same conservative haters decided was proof that the IRS was out to get them." CW: Yeah but. It was the Obama DOJ that let Lerner off the hook. This is absolute proof of a vast left-wing conspiracy! ...

... They Just Can't Help Themselves. Right on cue, Paul Ryan says the result was "predictable" & the House Ways & Means Committee will continue to investigate Lois Lerner for "depriv[ing] conservative organizations of their Constitutional rights." ...

... Winger Erick Erickson: "The Department of Justice has, for decades, been a stronghold of progressives. Both [I guess he means the DOJ & the IRS] are hotbeds of partisan Democrats and devoted socialists who use the coercive power of the regulatory state to advance their agenda regardless of who is in the White House. One of the first tasks of a Republican president, should we elect one, is to carry out a ruthless purge of the Civil Service in general and the Department of Justice in particular." ...

     ... CW: Socialists! Investigate Bernie Sanders! How about a House Select Committee with Louis Gohmert as chair. We know Bernie can stand on his feet & talk for 8+ hours straight, but can he stay calm in the face of an 11-hour Gohmert grilling? Since Paul Ryan is so keen on House investigations, he should make the establishment of a Sanders select committee his first order of business as speaker. Hillary got her 11 hours in the spotlight. Give Bernie equal time. ...

... Kevin Williamson of National Review: "DOJ won't lift a pinky against a friend of the Obama administration. This is banana-republic stuff." CW: So the conspiracy theory just gets broader.

John Harwood in the New York Times: "In 2004, when fewer people paid attention to him, Donald J. Trump gave CNN a bottom-line assessment of political parties: 'It just seems that the economy does better under the Democrats.' If that sounds awkward now for Mr. Trump..., it may be even more awkward for his party next year, because its ability to claim superior economic know-how over Democrats has grown weaker ever since he made that assertion." ...

... Simon Rosenberg has the charts to prove it. Via Paul Waldman.

Eric Lipton & Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "... calls to oust Republican leaders in Congress ... came from conservative websites and bloggers who have helped stoke a grass-roots rebellion to make Congress more conservative, a fevered continuation of the six-year Tea Party movement. But these politically charged appeals to conservatives around the country were often accompanied by a solicitation for money, and the ultimate beneficiaries, records suggest, are the consultants who created the campaigns rather than the causes they are promoting." ...

... Paul Krugman: "As Rick Perlstein pointed out several years ago, the modern conservative movement is in large part a 'strategic alliance of snake-oil vendors and conservative true believers' with 'a cast of mind that makes it hard for either them or us to discern where the ideological con ended and the money con began.'... I don't think you can understand the depth of Obama- and Hillary-hatred without understanding just how much of it is generated by scammers out to make a buck off the racism and misogyny of some -- sad to say, fairly many -- older white men."

Mike Lillis of the Hill: "Democratic leaders warned Friday that they won't negotiate with Republicans on legislation to raise the debt limit. Behind House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the lawmakers said the economic ramifications of a debt default -- both domestic and global -- are too severe to endanger the bill with additional riders. Siding squarely with President Obama, the Democrats said they won't support anything but a "clean" bill to extend the federal government's borrowing authority." ...

... They Just Can't Help Themselves. Kelsey Snell of the Washington Post: "House Conservatives moved one step closer to forcing President Obama to veto a bill that would repeal large portions of the Affordable Care act and defund Planned Parenthood, but the legislation could still be defeated in the Senate. The House voted 240 to 189 to pass a budget reconciliation bill that seeks to gut Obamacare by repealing key sections of the law, including the individual and employer mandate and the so-called 'cadillac' tax.... House leaders were forced to scale back the legislation in recent weeks to ensure that it conformed with parliamentary rules governing reconciliation bills. That frustrated conservatives who said they were promised a bill that would fully repeal Obamacare." ...

Romney ObamaCare. Without Tom pushing it, I don't think we have had RomneyCare. Without RomneyCare, I don't think we would have ObamaCare. So, without Tom a lot of people wouldn't have health insurance. -- Mitt Romney, commenting on the death of Tom Stemberg, cofounder of Staples

Oops! Looks like the Mittster realized his gaffe. Here's his Facebook retraction: Getting people health insurance is a good thing, and that's what Tom Stemberg fought for. I oppose Obamacare and believe it has failed. It drove up premiums, took insurance away from people who were promised otherwise, and usurped state programs. As I said in the campaign, I'd repeal it and replace it with state-crafted plans.

... They Just Can't Help Themselves. Caitlin Cruz of TPM: "House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) announced Friday the appointment of eight Republicans (four women and four men) to the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Select Investigative Panel focused on 'big abortion providers' -- namely Planned Parenthood. He appointed Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) as panel chair. Other members are Rep. Joe Pitts (PA), Rep. Diane Black (TN), Rep. Larry Bucshon (IN), Rep. Sean Duffy (WI), Rep. Andy Harris (MD), Rep. Vicky Hartzler (MO) and Rep. Mia Love (UT)." ...

... Paul Waldman: "... I guess because the Select Committee on Benghazi has been such a success. And John Boehner even appointed some women to sit on it, which was mighty generous of him." ...

... Charles Pierce: "... John Boehner, who may just be pranking the bastards at this point, on Friday announced the members of the next Special Committee For Expanded Ratfcking. This one will look into the fictitious sale of baby parts by Planned Parenthood. Here are your dogged GOP inquisitors tasked with 'investigating' 'evidence' produced by phony videotapes." CW: You will want to read Pierce's dive into the views of these excellent legislator-investigators, one of whom is a member of the "watch China caucus" on accounta she read an article -- I'm sure in a highly-regarded, peer-reviewed journal -- that China is spying on us through our appliances." ...

... CW: You think life imitates art? In Right Wing World, life is art. Every notion that passes through that thing between their ears is pure fiction, contrived by a vast crackpot conspiracy.

Julian Hattem of the Hill: "House Democrats have decided to stay put on the Select Committee on Benghazi, at least temporarily, despite mounting pressure for them to boycott its work.... Still, after a roughly hour-long meeting with House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) on Friday, the committee's five Democrats repeated their demand that Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) end the 'abusive, wasteful, and obviously partisan effort.' ...

... Dan Balz of the Washington Post: "Former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton's appearance before the House Benghazi committee provided one more example of the breakdown of a Republican Party torn by factionalism and heavily influenced by a cadre of supporters who are far less interested in governing than in expressing its anger." ...

It might as well have been an informercial for the Clinton campaign. Courtesy of the Benghazi Committee. -- Josh Marshall of TPM

Yup. And that's why Fox "News" dropped its coverage when the other cable news networks did not. -- Constant Weader

... Adele Stan of the American Prospect on "why Hillary makes right-wingers so crazy.... In the right-wing mind, there is nothing so ruinous to America as the liberation of women. The right's entire ideological structure is built on worship of the Great White Father and veneration of the stern, Caucasian, disciplinarian dad. It's a worldview centered on a jealous, blue-eyed Father God, a military dispatched to teach the world a lesson, and a president who serves as the national patriarch. A President Hillary Rodham Clinton poses the gravest threat to that worldview yet -- perhaps even graver than the threat to it posed by the nation's first black president, given that more than half of Americans are women."

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Paul Krugman: "The Republicans wanted to portray Hillary Clinton as a super-villain, and ended up making her look like a superhero. But the real losers here are the reporters and centrist pundits who let themselves be played, month after month, by Trey Gowdy and company. I mean, anyone who took these chumps seriously has proved himself an ever bigger chump than they are."

Presidential Race

Gail Collins: "Monday is Hillary Clinton's birthday. Don't bother sending a gift. This week has given her all the presents she needs."

Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "Throughout her political career, Hillary Rodham Clinton's greatest curse -- the reaction she provokes in her adversaries -- has also been her salvation. That was proved once again during her 11-hour inquisition by the House Select Committee on Benghazi, a Republican-engineered train wreck from which she emerged without a scratch....'She generally has been better with her back to the wall than when she is comfortably ahead,' said David Axelrod, who was Barack Obama's chief political strategist for both of his presidential campaigns...." ...

... Francis Wilkinson of Bloomberg: "... not only is Clinton back where she started, so is the GOP. The party is no closer to gaining Hispanic, Asian or black votes than it was in 2012. (Spanish media has been highlighting Republican anti-immigrant tirades for months.) Meanwhile, the elderly white share of the electorate -- the Republican base -- continues to shrink. Bernie, Biden and Benghazi have been fun, but they've done nothing to alter the demographic dynamic of 2016. And Republicans appear no more prepared to answer the challenge." ...

... Patrick Healy & Trip Gabriel of the New York Times: "With Hillary Rodham Clinton emerging as the unrivaled leader in the Democratic contest, the unruly Republican presidential field suddenly seemed to lack a center of political gravity on Friday, leaving party strategists and voters to fear a long nomination fight that could end with a damaged standard-bearer facing a more unified left. [Jeb] Bush cut salaries, fired consultants and laid off or reassigned many campaign workers. It was the latest sign that contenders vying for support from moderates and the party's establishment are all but running on fumes -- exhausting their cash, or the patience of their supporters, but barely moving in the polls. [Donald] Trump, for months a leading candidate, has now fallen behind in Iowa to [Ben] Carson ... a retired neurosurgeon, raising questions about how aggressively he will act to reverse his sagging poll numbers. And Mr. Carson, whose fund-raising has roughly kept pace with his climb in the polls, is moving to run television commercials in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina...." ...

... "Toasttoasttoasttoasttoast."* Philip Rucker, et al., of the Washington Post: "Jeb Bush acknowledged Friday what has been obvious for weeks: The rise of Donald Trump and other political outsiders has fundamentally reshaped the contours of the 2016 presidential race, forcing Bush to retrench with a major downsizing of his political operation and a reassessment of how and where he will campaign. A week after reporting third-quarter fundraising results that only the Bush staff claimed were adequate, the onetime Republican front-runner who now lags in the polls detailed a series of substantial cutbacks and changes to his strategy." ...

     * Thanks, Gail.

... Here's the Bush campaign staff memo outlining the cutbacks. Includes whiney snark: "We would be less than forthcoming if we said we predicted in June that a reality television star supporting Canadian-style single-payer health care and partial-birth abortion would be leading the G.O.P. primary." ...

... Not a Good sign, Jeb! Eliza Collins of Politico: Megyn Kelly of Fox "News" asks Jeb!, "What would it take to make you get out?" CW: Me, I wonder if his fatcat friends will still support him, as they've been doing, once he leaves the race & has zero prospects of ever becoming a purchasable pol. ...

... Justin Wolfers of the New York Times: "Jeb Bush is no longer the leading contender to become the Republican candidate for president. Instead, prediction markets now rate Marco Rubio as far more likely to get the nod. One broad measure of the betting markets puts Mr. Rubio's chances at 34 percent versus Mr. Bush's at 23 percent."

I don't believe those polls, by the way, because both of those pollsters don't like me. -- Donald Trump on two Iowa polls -- Quinnipiac & the Des Moines Register -- that show him 8 & 9 points respectively behind Ben Carson

Andrew Kaczynski of BuzzFeed: "Conflicting headlines -- such as one from Fox News -- said [Ben] Carson was already close to having Secret Service protection activated. Meanwhile, a Washington Post story threw cold water on the report citing an official saying the Department of Homeland Security was still debating the matter. 'I'd prefer not to talk about security issues but I have recognized -- and people have been telling me for many many months -- that I'm in great danger, because I challenge the secular progressive movement to the very core,' Carson told WABC radio's Rita Cosby Show on Thursday. 'You know, they see me as an existential threat but I also believe in the good lord and we take reasonable precautions.'"

News Ledes

New York Times: "Maureen O’Hara, the spirited Irish-born actress who played strong-willed, tempestuous beauties opposite all manner of adventurers in escapist movies of the 1940s and ’50s, died on Saturday at her home in Boise, Idaho. She was 95."

Weather Channel: "Hurricane Patricia became the strongest hurricane ever known to make landfall on the Pacific coast of Mexico after the center of its eye crossed the coast of Jalisco state early Friday evening. Its winds are rapidly losing strength as its center of circulation slices into the interior of southwest Mexico overnight." ...

... Washington Post: "Hurricane Patricia, packing the strongest hurricane winds ever recorded, weakened overnight to a Category 1 storm as it moved inland over southwestern Mexico, according to the National Hurricane Center. The hurricane is expected to become a tropic storm later today, but could still produce heavy rains that cause flash floods and mudslides, the center warned."

The Commentariat -- October 23, 2015

Internal links removed.

Word of the Day

 Gonfalon (or gonfalone): "(from the early Italian confalone) is a type of heraldic flag or banner, often pointed, swallow-tailed, or with several streamers, and suspended from a crossbar in an identical manner to the ancient Roman vexillum." -- Wikipedia

Use "gonfalon" in a sentence: There they were, "a roomful of pompous asses, each flying the Gonfalon of the Daft right behind their self-important persons." -- Akhilleus

*****

Uh, I think some of Jimmy Jordan’s questioning. Well, when you say new today, we knew some of that already, about the emails. In terms of her testimony? I don't know that she testified that much differently today than she has the previous times she's testified. -- Trey Gowdy, responding to questions about what new information the Hillary Clinton interrogation yielded ...

Uh, sounds like an admission that the whole exercise was a multi-million-dollar nothingburger. -- Constant Weader

Michael Shear & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "Republican lawmakers sharply questioned [link fixed] Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday, seeking to build a case that the former secretary of state had been derelict in her duty to secure the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, in the months before the 2012 terrorist attacks that resulted in the deaths of four Americans. Mrs. Clinton's long-awaited appearance, billed by Republicans leading a select House committee investigating the Benghazi attacks as a critical moment in a monthslong inquiry, served as a replay of contested arguments from a series of previous congressional hearings and Sunday-morning talk shows." ...

... David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "Nine hours after it began, a House committee's questioning of Hillary Rodham Clinton has provided few new details about the 2012 attacks on American installations in Benghazi, Libya -- and, so far, no clear victory for Republicans seeking to trap Clinton in an admission of bad judgment.... The Republicans -- including Gowdy -- seemed to hurt their own cause at times. Several spent their 10-minute periods on oddball lines of questioning: One pressed Clinton repeatedly about an e-mail exchange between two State Department staffers that Clinton said she did not know. Others loudly remarked that Clinton was reading notes passed from aides, a common practice at Washington hearings." ...

... Hillary listens to "questions":

... CW: 7:15 8:15 pm ET & the Benghaazi! interrogation is still ongoing. (The prosecution finally ended at 9 pm ET.) Hillary laughed when Rep. Martha Roby (R-Ala.) asked if "she was alone all night." The Congresslady said it wasn't funny. The whole thing was a shameful spectacle. Here's the New York Times' lowlights video ...

... If you missed seeing any of the inquisition, Charles Pierce provides an accurate synopsis of the morning session: "If it wasn't Congressman Jim Jordan finally getting around to Susan Rice and the talking-points and the offense against the Constitution inherent in getting something wrong on Meet The Press -- which is the only reason we aren't presently enjoying the leadership of President Romney pp then it was Congressman Mike Pompeo, fresh off getting dope-slapped by Andrea Mitchell on that very show last Sunday, intimating that American diplomats were meeting with al Qaeda operatives prior to the attacks on the compound in Benghazi on September 11, 2012. And that is not even to mention the efforts of Congresswomen Susan Brooks and Martha Roby, back-to-back, who didn't seem to wholly understand how you cannot judge a level of interest in something based on the aggregate number of e-mails that are written about it by various people. And then there was Congressman Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia, who said, 'In mah l'il opinion,' security wasn't that good around the Benghazi compound.'" ...

... Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post: "Republicans on the Benghazi Committee have repeatedly questioned why Sidney Blumenthal, a personal friend of former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton, had her private e-mail address while Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens did not. While one can certainly question Clinton;s judgment in paying attention to Blumenthal's musings, there is a simple reason that an ambassador would not have the secretary of state's private e-mail address. It's called the chain of command. With nearly 200 ambassadors in the field, it would invite chaos if each could directly write the secretary of state." ...

... New York Times Editors: "The pointless grilling of Mrs. Clinton, who fielded a barrage of questions that have long been answered and settled, served only to embarrass the Republican lawmakers who have spent millions of dollars on a political crusade.... In a flailing performance, the committee's chairman, Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, made it evident that he and his colleagues have squandered more than $4.6 million and countless hours poring over State Department records and Mrs. Clinton's email. They produced no damning evidence, elicited no confessions and didn't succeed in getting an angry reaction from Mrs. Clinton.... Now that the hearing, which was intended to be the climactic point of the Benghazi committee inquiry, is over, the Democrats who reluctantly agreed to join the panel when it was established in May 2014 should walk away." ...

... Washington Post Editors: "THE HOUSE Select Committee on Benghazi further discredited itself on Thursday as its Republican members attempted to fuel largely insubstantial suspicions about Hillary Clinton&'s role in the 2012 Benghazi attacks.... An astoundingly large portion of ... the hearing focused on petty questioning related to Clinton associate Sidney Blumenthal and other wastes of time.... If the hearing was useful at all, it was in filling out her larger vision for U.S. foreign policy." ...

... Amy Davidson of the New Yorker: "There were several ... rounds of questions, in which her interrogators manifested all of Washington's pathologies -- dysfunction, partisan squabbling, insularity -- in such extreme form that Clinton came across not only as a grownup, as her supporters had hoped, but as the most normal person in the room." CW: I don't think these guys have any idea how ridiculous they are. ...

... Josh Marshall of TPM (writing mid-inquisition): "Republican committee members just seemed pissed because this was supposed to be awesome - after all, a committee designed to bring down Hillary and circulate all those numskull conspiracy theories about Chris Stevens wearing a chest cam and how President Obama was watching everything happening live on his iPhone. Hillary's yet to get at all flustered and has even had the opportunity to gently explain to Republican members how the State Department works. She looks poised; they're radiating spittle. It all doesn't help that Chairman Gowdy is such a comical figure. But the real thing is that they're having their big moment - HILLARY ON THE STAND!!! - just as their credibility is collapsing. She's making them regret this is even happening." ...

... Sahil Kapur of Bloomberg: "During 8 hours and 20 minutes of testimony, Clinton deftly handled some hostile ... questioning from Republicans, keeping her cool and letting Democrats on the committee handle the political attacks. In the end, Republicans threw some red meat to their conservative base but failed to land a blow to Clinton's credibility.... Many conservative commentators were unimpressed, if not angry with the proceedings.... Another sign of the way political tides where turning: The Fox News Channel, which has taken a special interest in the issue of Benghazi in recent years, cut away from the hearing midway through while other networks continued to carry it live." ...

... Kevin Drum points to a moment in the proceedings where Peter Roskam (R-Ill.) imagines what Hillary was thinking. CW: This was one of several imaginary moments for the inquisitors where one or the other of them described what they supposed Hillary Clinton was really up to. It is not a "hearing" when the "testimony" comes from the fertile imaginations of the prosecutors rather than from the witness herself. ...

... Jonathan Bernstein of Bloomberg: The sole purpose of the Benghaazi! committee is to use "government funding to furnish content for conservative media. That's all.... None of [what the GOP members asked or said] is likely to have any effect on public opinion, except perhaps by dragging Congress's approval ratings even lower. But it will provide fodder for conservative talk radio." ...

... Shoulda, Coulda, Never Woulda. John Cassidy of the New Yorker: "... in the ... jousting between Roskam and Clinton about the wisdom of intervening in Libya in the first place, it was possible to glimpse an alternative path that congressional Republicans could have taken over the past three years -- a path that might have saved them from being accused (including by members of their own party) of conducting a witch hunt, and might even have served a public purpose. For ... the current reality in Libya calls into question U.S. policy decisions. The country is a divided, chaotic, and war-torn place, where rival militias are competing for power and jihadist groups, including the Islamic State, control substantial pieces of territory.... [There] are ... legitimate questions, and an old-school Republican authority on foreign policy -- someone like Richard Lugar -- would surely have been keen to gather answers to them.... Gowdy and his colleagues in the House were too small to go in this direction. They preferred to pursue a conspiracy theory that tarred the likely Democratic candidate in 2016, riled up the G.O.P.'s base, and helped the Party to raise money."

Steven Mufson of the Washington Post: "President Obama exercised his veto power Thursday for just the fifth time in his presidency, rejecting a defense authorization bill because of the way it would sidestep budget limitations for the military and because it would restrict the transfer of detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay. The White House said that the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) would tap an overseas contingency operations account designed for emergencies and war costs and use it as a 'slush fund' to avoid budget restrictions. Those restrictions -- known as sequestration -- would impose offsetting across-the-board cuts if spending passed certain levels."

A Fine Mess. John Bresnahan & Jake Sherman of Politico: "... the U.S. government is 12 days from reaching the debt limit without a clear plan of what to do. Boehner, McCarthy and other GOP leaders are refusing at this point to move ahead with a 'clean' debt ceiling bill insisted on by President Barack Obama. Senior leadership aides said they couldn't find the 30 Republican votes needed to join with all 188 Democrats to pass that proposal -- a bleak indication of the current state of play." ...

... CW: So there are not even 30 rational House Republicans. That's amazing. ...

... Keith Laing of the Hill: "Congress has less than a week to prevent a highway-funding shutdown, with federal transportation spending currently set to expire on Oct. 29. Lawmakers are scrambling to pass at least an extension of transportation funding by next Thursday to prevent an interruption. The Department of Transportation has warned that it will have to stop making payments to states and local governments for infrastructure projects in November if Congress does not reach an agreement. Lawmakers on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on Thursday approved a bipartisan bill to spend up to $325 billion on transportation projects over the next six years. But that approach differs from a six-year bill approved by the Senate over the summer. House lawmakers had rejected the Senate bill, which authorizes funding for six years but only pays for three years of spending." ...

... MEANWHILE, in the Senate. Peter Sullivan of the Hill: "Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) are vowing to oppose any fast-track bill repealing only parts of ObamaCare, narrowing the path for the legislation to pass the Senate. The House is set to vote on Friday on a bill under a fast-track process known as reconciliation that would repeal several parts of ObamaCare. The reconciliation process allows a measure to pass the Senate with 51 votes, instead of the usual 60, and get through to President Obama's desk, where it would face a veto.... Their opposition puts the bill's future in doubt. There are 54 Republican senators, so if Cruz, Rubio, and Lee vote no, Republicans could only afford to lose one more vote and still have a simple majority. Centrist Republicans such as Sens. Mark Kirk (Ill.) and Susan Collins (Maine) have indicated opposition to defunding Planned Parenthood, which is also part of the reconciliation bill."

Mike DeBonis of the Washington Post: "Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) said Thursday he will proceed with a run for House speaker, hours after major GOP factions pledged their support. 'After talking with so many of you, and hearing your words of encouragement, I believe we are ready to move forward as a one, united team,' he said in a letter to colleagues sent late Thursday. 'And I am ready and eager to be our speaker.'" ...

... Mike Lillis of the Hill: "Speaking to reporters Thursday in the Capitol, [Nancy] Pelosi said she's heartened that the discussions surrounding Ryan's candidacy have highlighted 'his respect for his family-work balance. That's very exciting because that's what we want for all of America's families,' she said. 'Members of Congress have paid sick leave -- it means a lot to the family-work balance,' she added. 'I hope that that respect for his particular situation would translate for a recognition of what that means to all of America's families.'" ...

... Lauren French & Jake Sherman of Politico: "Rep. Paul Ryan has agreed to delay a discussion about reforming the procedural motion used to remove a House speaker, a major concession to the House Freedom Caucus. The Wisconsin Republican, now the presumptive next speaker of the House, delivered the message to Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, the chairman of the Freedom Caucus, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussion.... Should he become House speaker, Ryan will set a deadline by which the House Republican Conference will change chamber and party rules."

** "Against Nature." Tim Egan: "... the most feckless Congress in history has just allowed ... the Land and Water Conservation Fund to die. With it could go thousands of projects nurtured along by people who had hoped that the chaos of a political party in a high fever would not reach into their favorite places.... Neighborhood playgrounds, walking trails bordering bustling cities, national parks, beaches, bridges, bike paths and birding sites are all imperiled by the imperious rigidity of a handful of congressional Republicans. For a half century, everything including the hugely popular Appalachian Trail and the memorial in Pennsylvania where Flight 93 went down on Sept. 11 has relied on money from this fund, generated by revenues from oil and gas leases.... Representative Rob Bishop of Utah, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee ... [is] the villain in this piece.... In a nutshell crammed with nutcases, this is your Congress. It's a place that doesn't work taking on something that does work, and killing it."

... CW: I'm no political strategist, but I think Democrats, for the most part, should quit running against their opponent Rep. Dick Neanderthal, & start running against the Republican party. There should be a unified, nationwide bumpersticker-style slogan that IDs all Republicans as rats to be thrown from the sinking ship Congress. Americans already have a low opinion of Congress, but I'll bet half of them don't really know why, what with the both-sides-do-it media standard. If Democrats vilified the Republican elephant the way confederates did the term "liberal," even low-information, i.e., most, voters would get it.

Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "A federal watchdog on Thursday sent the U.S. Secret Service a formal warning that its overworking of employees is jeopardizing security -- citing the discovery that two Secret Service officers were asleep at their posts, according to three government officials familiar with the findings. The inspector general who oversees the Secret Service issued a management alert, a formal designation that indicates investigators have found a problem so urgent or sweeping that it requires swift attention from senior management."

German Lopez & Soo Oh of Vox: "Corey Jones, Freddie Gray, and Jessica Hernandez are just three of at least 1,425 people killed by police since August 9, 2014, the day of the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson, Missouri."

Ishaan Tharoor of the Washington Post explains to Bibi Netanyahu the real reason Haj Amin al-Husseini, the grand mufti of Jerusalem, was palling around with Hitler: he wanted Hitler's support in securing a Palestinian state with himself as leader. Hitler nixed it. Tharoor cites numerous experts who debunk Netanyahu's claim. CW: And, you know, Bibi, 75 years later, the Palestinians are still seeking that state. Maybe you could do something about that. ...

... New York Times Editors: "The claim by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel that a Palestinian persuaded Adolf Hitler to exterminate the Jews of Europe is outrageous. It is outrageous because the Holocaust is far too terrible a crime to be exploited for political ends, especially in the state linked so closely to the tragedy of the Jewish people. It is outrageous because the only apparent purpose is to demonize the Palestinians and the current leader of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, and to give the impression that their resistance is based solely on a longstanding hatred of the Jews.... Mr. Netanyahu should have the decency to acknowledge that he was wrong and out of line."

O Canada! Paul Krugman: "On Monday, Canadian voters swept the ruling Conservatives out of power, delivering a stunning victory to the center-left Liberals. And while there are many interesting things about the Liberal platform, what strikes me most is its clear rejection of the deficit-obsessed austerity orthodoxy that has dominated political discourse across the Western world. The Liberals ran on a frankly, openly Keynesian vision, and won big.... [Justin] Trudeau ... has an opportunity to show the world what truly responsible fiscal policy looks like."

God News

Jack Healy of the New York Times: "Despite its deep opposition to same-sex marriage, the Mormon Church is setting itself apart from religious conservatives who rallied behind a Kentucky county clerk, Kim Davis, who cited her religious beliefs as justification for refusing to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples. In a speech this week about the boundaries between church and state, Dallin Oaks, a high-ranking apostle in the church, said that public officials like Ms. Davis, the clerk in Rowan County, Ky., had a duty to follow the law, despite their religious convictions.... Elder Oaks said. '... when acting as public officials, they are not free to apply personal convictions -- religious or other -- in place of the defined responsibilities of their public offices. All government officers should exercise their civil authority according to the principles and within the limits of civil government.'"

Benjamin Mueller of the New York Times: How a Bible study group in upstate New York became a church so punishing that it killed one of its members & severely injured another in a "counseling session."

Jane Omara of USA Today (October 21): "The Vatican vigorously denied a report in an Italian newspaper Wednesday that Pope Francis has a small, curable brain tumor, calling the rumors 'totally unfounded.' The report in the Quotidiano Nazionale newspaper was "seriously irresponsible and not worthy of attention,' Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said in a statement. 'As all can see, the pope continues to exercise his intense activity without interruption and in an absolutely normal way.'" ...

... Laurie Goodstein & Gaia Pianigiani of the New York Times: "The Vatican newspaper on Thursday called the report 'unfounded' and 'completely irresponsible,' suggesting a conspiracy was behind it. Italian newspapers had a feast, running a barrage of headlines further fueling suspicion. The center-right daily Il Giornale declared, 'Church in chaos: Who wants the pope dead?'... 'The timing of this reveals an intent to manipulate and create unnecessary uproar,' the Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, said."

Presidential Race

Annie Karni of Politico: "After a difficult summer slog, Hillary Clinton appears to be back on top. It began with Bernie Sanders, her chief Democratic rival, getting devastatingly lampooned on Saturday Night Live, the stage where Hillary Clinton had scored points just a few weeks earlier by gamely mocking herself. Then, the spectre of Joe Biden haunting Clinton's campaign disappeared, when the grieving vice president announced he would not compete in 2016. And on Thursday, sitting in the hot seat for a marathon 11-hour hearing, Clinton delivered a win by remaining calm and mostly unflappable as her Republican interlocutors on the House Benghazi committee became heated."

And Then There Were Three. Jonathan Swan of the Hill: "Former Rhode Island Sen. Lincoln Chafee is bowing out of the Democratic race for the White House." Includes Chafee's full statement.

Kyle Cheney & Jason Millman of Politico: "Republicans have fended off accusations for years that they'd gut Medicare for seniors and end the program 'as we know it.' Not Ben Carson. The former neurosurgeon acknowledges he would abolish the program altogether. Carson, who now leads the GOP field in Iowa according to the latest Quinnipiac Poll, would eliminate the program that provides health care to 49 million senior citizens, as well as Medicaid, and replace it with a system of cradle-to-grave savings accounts which would be funded with $2,000 a year in government contributions. While rivals have been pummeled for proposing less radical changes, Carson hasn't faced the same scrutiny -- and his continued traction in polls has left GOP strategists and conservative health care wonks scratching their heads." ...

... So What? The Crazier the Better: Eliza Collins of Politico: "Ben Carson has a nine percentage-point lead on Donald Trump in Iowa, according to a new Bloomberg Politics/Des Moines Register poll out Friday. In the poll -- the second this week to find the retired neurosurgeon moving ahead of the billionaire real estate mogul -- Carson leads with 28 percent of likely Republican caucus goers, followed by Trump at 19 percent."

Eli Stokols of Politico: "The main super PAC backing Donald Trump is shutting down amidst increasing scrutiny of its ties to Trump's campaign. Trump, who has made his independence from wealthy donors a cornerstone of his anti-establishment presidential campaign, never officially blessed the Make America Great super PAC." ...

... The Washington Post story, by Matea Gold is here: "After The Washington Post reported this week on multiple connections between Trump and the Make America Great Again PAC, Mike Ciletti, the Colorado-based operative running the group, said he had decided to close up shop."

Boo Hoo. Most Interesting Man in Politics Could End Up Out of Politics. Shane Goldmacher & Anna Palmer of Politico: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his allies are quietly ratcheting up pressure on Rand Paul to pay more attention to his Senate reelection next year -- and less to his flagging 2016 presidential candidacy. So far, those efforts have stopped short of urging the Kentucky senator, whose presidential bid McConnell has formally endorsed, to outright abandon his national campaign." CW Note to Mitch: The election is more than a year away. Li'l Randy has plenty of time, whenever he drops out of the presidential race, or is drummed from the debate stage, to run a Senate campaign.

Beyond the Beltway

Reuters: "One person has been killed and two others wounded by gunfire on the campus of Tennessee State University in Nashville, police have said. The shootings, which occurred just before 11 pm local time on Thursday, appeared to have stemmed from a dispute over a dice game in a courtyard, the Metropolitan Nashville police department said." ...

... The Tennessean story, by Jordan Buie, is here.

Jon Herskovitz of Reuters: "Texas sent agents to Planned Parenthood facilities on Thursday seeking documents, the group said, calling it a 'politically motivated' move that comes on the heels of the state's Republican leaders barring it from receiving Medicaid money. Members of the Texas Office of the Inspector General made unannounced visits at Planned Parenthood health centers in Houston, Dallas and San Antonio, staying in some cases for several hours and giving Planned Parenthood 24 hours to deliver thousands of pages of documents stored at its facilities across the state, the organization said." ...

... Danielle Paquette & Sandhya Somashekhar of the Washington Post: "Texas health investigators on Thursday served orders for hundreds of documents at Planned Parenthood offices across the state, including patient records and employee addresses. The move came three days after the state announced plans to pull public funding from the organization, energizing the national debate over the nonprofit's fetal tissue donation program."

News Ledes

Boston Globe: "Thomas G. Stemberg, who cofounded Staples Inc. and invented the office superstore, died Friday at his home in Chestnut Hill, two years after he was diagnosed with gastric cancer. He was 66. Intense and driven, he was credited with revolutionizing the way office products were sold, creating a chain that now has $22.5 billion in annual revenue and more than 2,000 stores, and at one point employed as many as 91,000 people."

New York Times: "The strongest hurricane to ever assault the Western Hemisphere slammed into Mexico's southwest Pacific Coast on Friday evening.... The storm, named Hurricane Patricia, was packing winds of about 165 miles per hour as it struck land, having slowed considerably from earlier speeds of about 200 miles per hour as it spun toward a coastline dotted with tiny fishing villages and five-star resorts...."

Washington Post: "Early Friday, the behemoth Hurricane Patricia became the strongest hurricane ever measured by the National Hurricane Center. Patricia is forecast to make landfall on Mexico's west central coast late Friday with destructive winds, torrents of rain, and a devastating storm surge." ...

... The Weather Channel's story is here.

New York Times: "Forty-two people were killed and eight others were injured on Friday morning when a bus and a truck collided on a road in southwestern France, according to local officials."

The Commentariat -- October 22, 2015

Internal links removed.

Afternoon Update:

Michael Shear & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "Hillary Rodham Clinton confronted Republican critics on the House Benghazi committee on Thursday with a challenge to 'reach for statesmanship' in their long-running inquiry into the 2012 attacks that killed four Americans." ...

... The Washington Post is liveblogging the hearing. They include video clips.

*****

David Herszenhorn & Emmarie Huetteman of the New York Times: "A strong majority of anti-establishment lawmakers in the House Freedom Caucus voted on Wednesday night to support [linked fixed] Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin for House speaker, effectively delivering the Republican Party unity that he had sought as a condition for accepting the post. While the vote fell short of the four-fifths majority required for the group's official endorsement, lawmakers said it nonetheless cleared the way for Mr. Ryan, 45, to be selected as the Republican nominee next Wednesday and affirmed as speaker in a floor vote the next day." ...

... Jake Sherman & Lauren French of Politico: "Rep. Paul Ryan will proceed with plans to run for House speaker despite not securing the formal endorsement of the House Freedom Caucus. Ryan's decision, which came after a high-stakes meeting with the group of hard-line conservatives earlier in the day, all but ensures that the Ways and Means Committee chairman will succeed John Boehner as Republican leader at the end of the month." ...

... Anna North of the New York Times: "The most time-consuming requirement of the speaker's job isn't running the House, it's fundraising. "... it's not running the government that would keep [Paul] Ryan from his kids -- it's raising the money to keep Republicans in office, many of whom actually oppose running the government.... 'Speaker John Boehner raised $50 million,' said Representative Tim Huelskamp, Republican of Kansas. 'The speaker has to work more than 40 hours a week.'" ...

... Scott Wong of the Hill: "Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) pushed back Wednesday on criticism from some conservative House colleagues who say he shouldn't take the Speaker's job if he isn't willing to work weekends and sacrifice time with his young family. 'Hey look, I'm here four days a week as it is,' Ryan said Wednesday when asked by The Hill whether he was surprised by the blowback. 'I'm not going to spend the other three days a week running around America.'... 'You've got to work on weekends,' Huelskamp added. 'John Boehner worked very hard ... and I'm very concerned if you're not going to work weekends in this job, which is primarily fundraising, then that could hurt the Republican majority.'" ...

... CW: Wow! Anna North of the Times noted in her post linked above that "Mr. Ryan has opposed policies that would help working parents." But, hey, now it turns out Ryan is passionate about the four-day work-week. Oh. Maybe that's only for himself. I suppose we common folk are expected to follow Jeb!'s plan & "work longer hours." Meanwhile, imagine my surprise to learn that the speaker's job "is primarily fundraising." Where exactly is that in the Constitution? ...

... Family Leave for Me But Not for Thee. Marianne Levine of Politico outlines Ryan's longstanding opposition to federally-mandated family leave laws that would allow workers flexibility in tending to sick family members. "Paul Ryan is talking about family time for fun, which we all want," [Ellen] Bravo[, executive director of Family Values @ Work,] said, "but the bare minimum is to have family time when a family member is in need." ...

... Eliza Collins & Nick Gass of Politico: "Conservative media pundits chafed at Paul Ryan's list of conditions upon which he would agree to the speakership, mocking him as 'Emperor Ryan' and 'King Paul.' Ryan, the reluctant draftee to one of the most powerful offices in the United States, on Tuesday night said fine, he'll do it, but only on his own terms. Among them: endorsements from all the major caucuses in the GOP conference, time with his family and tweaking a rule to make it harder to toss the speaker out of office." ...

... Adele Stan of the American Prospect: "... Paul Ryan ... is no moderate.... In 2005, at a meeting of an Ayn Rand fan club..., Ryan voiced his contempt for Social Security, decrying it as a 'collectivist system.' His idea for reforming Medicare is to voucherize it, leaving seniors with a fixed amount to apply to their medical bills, regardless of individual circumstances. Ryan is a no-exceptions anti-choicer, and an opponent of programs that help the poor, such as food stamps, whose funding he proposed cutting by $150 billion over the course of 10 years.... Most of all, Paul Ryan, for all his Catholic schoolboy (I once watched him mansplain Catholic doctrine to Sister Simone Campbell of Nuns on the Bus Fame), goody-two-shoes demeanor, is a liar of the pants-on-fire variety."

Alexander Bolton of the Hill: "House Republican leaders are whipping a bill to raise the debt limit and impose a slew of conservative reforms, but Senate Democrats say it will die in the upper chamber." CW: So nothing has changed in the "unity party." I sure hope there's a rider to repeal ObamaCare in there somewhere.

Mary Walsh, et al., of the New York Times: "The Obama administration has decided to take a political gamble on Puerto Rico, stopping short of a direct bailout of the debt-ridden island but proposing measures that backers say would keep the commonwealth from becoming America's Greece. Senior administration officials said the island had already run out of cash and was spending around 40 percent of its tax revenue meeting its bond payments.... The plan, much of which would have to be approved by Congress, would provide a form of bankruptcy protection not now available to American territories. It would give Puerto Rico a way to restructure all of its $72 billion in debt, which it says it cannot hope to repay." ...

... Martin Crutsinger of the AP: "The Obama administration on Thursday will take a blueprint for the economic rescue of Puerto Rico before a Republican controlled Congress.... The administration said that it needs the cooperation of Congress to prevent an economic disaster in the U.S. territory, which is mired in a years-long recession."

Sabrina Siddiqui of the Guardian: "Barack Obama has unveiled a new federal initiative to combat the opioid crisis that has ravaged communities across the United States, causing more annual deaths in some states than car accidents. The president traveled on Wednesday to West Virginia, an epicenter of the nation's opioid and heroin epidemic, to detail his plan to try and reverse some of the harrowing statistics that have recently created a sense of urgency around substance abuse. In 2013 alone, more than 37,000 Americans died of a drug overdose, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Protection, and prescription painkillers accounted for 16,000 of those deaths." ...

... Video of the President outlining his initiative is here.

"Carl Icahn Pledges $150 Million to Help Build Ginormous Megaphone for Carl Icahn." Jaime Fuller of New York: "Billionaire investor Carl Icahn announced this morning that he had a new plan to 'end the crippling dysfunction in Congress.' Like many people before him who have tried to vanquish dysfunction -- or just Washington writ large -- he had the novel idea of starting a super-pac. And he's flooding it with $150 million, far more than any of the presidential candidates' super-pacs have been able to raise so far. Icahn's first goal is fighting for one specific legislative change '' blocking 'corporate tax inversions' -- that would probably help at least one company he happens to invest in: Apple." ...

... CW: Sorry, Carl, I don't see where advocating for certain legislation -- that happens to accrue to your benefit -- has anything whatever to do with "ending the crippling dysfunction in Congress." As for your claim that you're getting into politics because you have more money than you can spend, why exactly is it that you're getting into politics so you can make more money? Why not propose, say, increasing taxes on the rich?

Julian Hattem of the Hill: "WikiLeaks began posting what it claims are the contents of CIA Director John Brennan's private email account on Wednesday, days after a teenager claimed to have hacked into his account. The six initial emails posted by the anti-secrecy organization date from 2007 and 2008, and include personal information as well as draft versions of advice and policy positions. Additional documents will be posted 'over the coming days,' WikiLeaks said, while claiming that Brennan used the account 'occasionally for several intelligence related projects.' In a statement, CIA spokesman Dean Boyd did not dispute the authenticity of the leaked emails. 'The hacking of the Brennan family account is a crime and the Brennan family is the victim,' Boyd said." ...

... If you care to read Brennan's e-mails, you can access them via this WikiLeaks page.

Carol Morello of the Washington Post: "Secretary of State John F. Kerry met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday to urge him to tone down his rhetoric as violence flared anew in Israel when a Palestinian stabbed a man at a bus stop near Jerusalem. Their meeting, which started shortly after Kerry arrived in the German capital, commenced with Netanyahu condemning Palestinian leaders, who he blamed for inciting an unrelenting series of stabbings and other attacks on Israelis over the past month."

Zeina Karam of the AP: "Russia's military intervention in Syria has deepened the sense that President Bashar Assad may survive the country's disastrous civil war, and his surprise visit to Moscow -- a first foray out in nearly five years -- underscores how emboldened the Syrian leader has become. The show of force by the two allies is a challenge to a U.S. administration whose response on Syria is widely seen in the region as inconsistent and chaotic."

Chris Mooney of the Washington Post: "In a sweeping new study published Wednesday in Nature, a team of researchers say there is a strong relationship between a region's average temperature and its economic productivity -- adding another potential cost to a warming climate." CW: Somebody should tell Marco Rubio (or really, any Republican politician) about this.

Anthony Faiola of the Washington Post: "At one point during a major summit of the Roman Catholic hierarchy that ends this weekend, a senior conservative bishop took the floor inside the Vatican's assembly hall and promptly charged his liberal peers with doing the devil's work. The three-week gathering, known as a synod, has erupted into a theological slugfest over Pope Francis's vision for a more inclusive church, displaying the most bitter and public infighting since the heady days of Catholic reform in the 1960s."

Presidential Race

** Peter Baker & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said Wednesday that he will not be a candidate in the 2016 presidential campaign, bringing to a close a three-month exploration that began shortly after the death of his eldest child and threatened to fracture the Democratic Party. Mr. Biden's decision, announced in the White House Rose Garden with President Obama looking on, ends one of the most public episodes of indecision about a political path since Gov. Mario Cuomo of New York left a plane bound for New Hampshire idling on a tarmac in 1991 as he fretted over whether to run for president." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.):

... E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post: "It was a withdrawal speech that sounded like an announcement speech, and it perfectly captured the aching ambivalence of Joe Biden. He wanted to run for president. He had his favored issues. He had President Obama's record and was proud to defend it. And the man who noted he's often called 'Middle-Class Joe' felt he had never been a better match for the historical moment. ...

... "Long Live Joe Biden." Greg Sargent: "Biden enjoys, and will continue to enjoy, a tremendous amount of good will among Democratic voters. And rightfully so. As I've written before, Biden's 'goofy ol' fun-loving Uncle Joe' persona is mostly a product of the camera, which is unfair to him -- it never did justice to how serious a public servant and policy thinker he has been over the decades.... Liberals have had major differences with Biden over the years, but this is a man who has devoted a good deal of his life to the idea that government can be a force of good in improving people's lives." ...

... Margaret Hartmann: "With Biden officially out of the running, sources close to him are revealing what's been going on behind the scenes. Here's what we've learned from the various post-mortems on the VP's shadow campaign." ...

... Paul Kane & Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "Vice President Biden's announcement Wednesday that he will not seek the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination has given a further boost to resurgent frontrunner Hillary Rodham Clinton and clarified her terms of engagement with Bernie Sanders, who is waging a challenge from her left." ...

... Nate Cohn of the New York Times: "For all her struggles with poll numbers and the email investigation this year, Hillary Rodham Clinton has done one thing really well: dissuade mainstream opponents by dominating the invisible primary, the behind-the-scenes competition for elite support that often decides the nomination. Today, her dominance in the invisible primary yielded another victory. Vice President Joe Biden's decision to stay out of the presidential race leaves Mrs. Clinton as the only viable mainstream candidate in the race. It gives her an opportunity to unite the coalition of moderate, nonwhite and older voters who traditionally have an edge over the white progressives who now support Bernie Sanders." ...

Josh Voorhees of Slate provides a refresher course on the facts surrounding the Benghaazi matter. ...

... Julian Hattem: "Going against the wishes of Republicans, Democrats on Wednesday released the full transcript of nine hours of closed-door testimony from a former top aide to Hillary Clinton, a day before Clinton's appearance in an open hearing on Capitol Hill. The 307-page transcript from Cheryl Mills's September testimony contains no evidence that Clinton mishandled the U.S.&'s response to the 2012 terror attack on a U.S. facility in Benghazi, Libya, according to Democrats on the select committee investigating the incident. Instead, Clinton was 'very engaged' in responding to the crisis, Mills said, according to the new transcript. In fact, her decision to go to a 'staff-level' meeting about the incident -- which would normally be below Clinton's level as secretary of State -- 'took some people aback,' she added." ...

... Gail Collins' column is titled "Hillary & Benghazi," but it's really about Trey Gowdy & Jeb Bush (& committee member Mike Pompeo). ...

... CW: By now we should have learned as a truism that any investigative committee run by confederates is a witch hunt, from the House Unamerican Activities Committeee to the Army McCarthy hearings to Whitewatergate to Fast & Furious to Planned Parenthood to Benghaazi! (and every committee in between). The media & the public should ignore these people & their fake investigations, except insofar as they wish to cite them as examples of fraud & abuse. ...

... So what's wrong with this sentence in Amy Chozick's NYT front-page piece on today's Benghaazi! grilling?

To succeed politically, [Clinton] must remain calm, take every question seriously and avoid outbursts during what is expected to be a daylong appearance, even amid her private frustration over what she sees as a Republican-led effort to hurt her presidential prospects.

     ... The words "what she sees as." It is what it is.

... Amanda Marcotte in Salon: "The spectacle is likely to be a repeat of last month's bizarre pseudo-hearing-cum-witch-hunt of Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards: A bunch of Republicans, making baseless accusations and insinuating conspiracy theories, for the purpose of riling up the conservative base while simultaneously impressing the rest of the country with how loony the GOP has become. And, like the Planned Parenthood hearings, the grilling of Clinton will be an opportunity for Republicans to engage is crass sexism while pretending that they're somehow being high and mighty." ...

... BUT. Brian Beutler: "... unlike the investigative committee that grilled Richards, the Benghazi Committee is in the midst of an existential crisis.... Under the circumstances, it stands to reason that Republicans won't bark and holler at Clinton but will instead be excessively genteel and restrained, while honing in on details designed to paint her in an unflattering light. If that's the tack they take it'll demonstrate uncharacteristic restraint. What it won't demonstrate is that long-debunked Benghazi conspiracy theories have genuine merit." ...

... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) took shots at the House Select Committee on Benghazi on Wednesday, a day before former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's appearance before the panel. In recent weeks, it's become absolutely clear that this committee is nothing more than a political hit job on Hillary Clinton,' the Democratic leader said. 'They're going to bring her in tomorrow. They said be ready for eight hours, eight hours of interrogation, and that's what this is, interrogation.' Reid added that Senate Democrats have sent a letter to the Republican National Committee (RNC) asking that it reimburse the American taxpayers for any money spent on the Benghazi committee. Reid said the request is 'only fair since the so-called committee is clearly a Republican political organization.'" ...

... Emily Atkin of Think Progress: "An analysis of Congressional attention to previous high-profile terror incidents suggests that significantly more emphasis has been placed on Benghazi than other terrorism acts. The 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, the 1998 embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, the 1996 Khobar Tower bombing, the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, and even the attacks of September 11, 2001 -- all received less Congressional attention than Benghazi in the form of formal hearings and investigations into their respective causes."

Bernie Sanders, in a Washington Post op-ed, makes a compelling case for free public college tuition.

Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "CNBC has set the stages for the Republican presidential debate next Wednesday. The 6 p.m. undercard will feature Rick Santorum, Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, George Pataki and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. They will be relegated to the early slot because their average national poll numbers in the last five weeks are below 2.5 percent. The main event, to begin shortly after 8 p.m., will have 10 candidates: Donald J. Trump, Ben Carson, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, Mike Huckabee, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, Gov. John Kasich of Ohio and Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. The lineups preserve the status quo of the previous two Republican debates in that none of the candidates were demoted from the prime-time event or banished from debating at all." ...

... Margaret Hartmann: "The network's cutoff for the main debate was an average of at least 3 percent in several recent polls, and there was concern that Mike Huckabee, Chris Christie, John Kasich, and Rand Paul wouldn't make it. On Wednesday CNBC revealed the debate lineup, and they all qualified -- though it looks Christie, Kasich, and Paul had to take advantage of the network's promise to round up averages above 2.5 percent. (Huckabee had a whopping 3.56 percent.)"

Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "One of the more unusual aspects of Donald Trump's three-plus months at the top of the Republican presidential field is that to so many, myself included, it still seems like it's only temporary.... But the real numbers, including those in a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, support the idea that Trump will continue to lead and that he could win the nomination.... His lead has actually been much more stable this year than Mitt Romney's was in the latter half of 2011.... But we'll see." ...

... MEANWHILE, presidential historian Mark Updegrove, in a Politico Magazine essay, is still betting Jeb! will be the GOP nominee. "... will GOP voters ... make Trump their candidate? No. In their heads, they'll know he's wrong." ...

... Ron Brownstein of the National Journal: "The blue-collar wing of the Republian primary electorate has consolidated around one candidate. The party's white-collar wing remains fragmented. That may be the most concise explanation of the dynamic that has propelled Donald Trump to a consistent and sometimes commanding lead in the early stages of the GOP presidential nomination contest."

Sabrina Siddiqui: "... Marco Rubio slammed the mainstream media on Tuesday for devoting more coverage to the killing of Cecil the lion than to so-called 'sanctuary cities' that shield individuals from federal immigration laws. In an interview with the conservative Newsmax TV, Rubio sharply criticized both the media and Democrats after a bill he co-sponsored that would crack down on sanctuary cities failed to advance in the US Senate."

Beyond the Beltway

Adam Nagourny of the New York Times: Kevin Johnson, the mayor of Sacramento, will not seek a third term after Deadspin released a video of a police interview of a then-16-year-old girl who describes sexual abuse by Johnson 20 years ago when he was a Phoenix Suns player. Police did not charge Johnson. He paid the girl, Mandi Koba, $230,000. Johnson is a Democrat. Married to Michelle Rhee, the controversial educator, Johnson too has battled the local teachers' union & blames union members for raising the issue. The videos are here. ...

... Johnson seems to be a professional groper. Via Charles Pierce.

Ellen Brait of the Guardian: "Police have arrested a man suspected in the killing a New York City police officer on Tuesday night in East Harlem. Tyrone Howard, who has had a warrant on a separate issue out for his arrest since 17 September, is expected to be charged with fatally shooting officer Randolph Holder during a gunfight Tuesday night on a pedestrian bridge after he allegedly stole a bike." The New York Times story, by Al Baker & David Goodman, is here.

News Ledes

New York Times: "An American soldier was fatally wounded on Thursday as American and Kurdish commandos raided an Islamic State prison in northern Iraq after learning that the prisoners faced imminent mass execution, the Pentagon said. The commando became the first American soldier killed in action in Iraq since the withdrawal in 2011."

AP: "A masked man attacked a school in southern Sweden on Thursday before being shot by police. Health authorities said one teacher was killed and two students seriously wounded in the attack.... Police spokesman Thomas Fuxborg told The Associated Press the attacker was in his 20s and carried more than one weapon, including 'at least one knife-like object.' Fuxborg said police fired two shots, one of which hit the attacker. Health authorities in Trollhattan