The Commentariat -- Feb. 28, 2014
Internal links removed.
** Margaret Hartmann of New York: "The Supreme Court's ban on recording devices has been so effective that there are only two images of the court in session, which were snapped via hidden cameras in the 1930s. That's why it's remarkable that someone managed to record video of Supreme Court oral arguments and post it on YouTube this week, even though it's shaky and only two minutes long. The events in the video are almost as rare. It shows a man interrupting arguments in a patent case on Wednesday to protest the Citizens United decision, as well as footage from oral arguments on the campaign finance case McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, which took place on Oct. 8.... The protester was identified by the court as Noah Kai Newkirk, 33, of Los Angeles. He was quickly pulled from the room by police officers, and charged under the federal law banning, 'a harangue or oration' and 'loud, threatening or abusive language in the Supreme Court building.'":
@MAG: Per your request:
... P.S. You can play Seat the Justices here. ...
... CW: Let me just say, while we're at it, that we should all be appalled that we allow the so-called public sessions of our third branch of government to remain completely hidden from public view. Not only are we prohibited from seeing the sessions ever, it is only in extraordinary circumstances that we have been permitted to hear the deliberations contemporaneously. It's a goddamned crime against the public interest. ...
... I'm just asking for video recordings of Supreme Court proceedings. I'm not asking that the Supremes take us on their workouts (even though I'd like to see Justice Ginsburg prove she can do 20 pushups, as she claims):
** Bernie Becker of the Hill: "A group of Democratic senators urged the Obama administration on Thursday to cap the amount of political activity that tax-exempt 501(c)(4) groups can engage in at 5 to 15 percent. The 15 senators, in public comments on a proposed regulation change that grew out of the IRS targeting controversy, said that the rules need to ensure that 501(c)(4)s can't use their tax-exempt status to go around campaign finance rules." The senate signators were Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Tom Carper (D-Del.), Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) signed the letter. CW: Gee, no Republicans.
Zeke Miller of Time: "Vice President Joe Biden rallied Democrats on Thursday ahead of this year's midterm elections.... Speaking at the Democratic National Committee's annual winter meeting, Biden maintained that Democrats enjoy an advantage on policy, saying a 'majority of the American people ... agree with us on every issue we are for. ... What we're worried about is the Koch brothers and their friends bringing in millions and millions and millions of dollars,' he said. But, he added, 'money can't buy an election when you're selling a bad set of goods.' The vice president called for an end to worries about the future of the party, in light of a spate of recent news stories about the DNC's more modest role and financial troubles. 'Give me a break,' he said. 'There is no Republican Party.'"
Amy Chozick of the New York Times: Democrats cash in on Republicans' sexist attacks on Democratic women leaders.
Annie Lowrey of the New York Times: "The federal budget deficit fell precipitously to $680 billion in the 2013 fiscal year from about $1.1 trillion the year before, the Treasury Department said Thursday. That is the smallest deficit since 2008, and marks the end of a five-year stretch when the country's fiscal gap came in at more than a trillion dollars a year."
Stacy Kaper of the National Journal: "Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand is looking for senators who would allow her military sexual-assault bill to pass even if they don't vote for it directly. The New York Democrat's controversial bill -- which would take away commanders' power to decide which sexual-assault cases are prosecuted -- has been granted a vote by leaders of both parties and could come to the floor as soon as next week. Gillibrand has 55 publicly declared supporters for her legislation, and if she could convince 60 members to vote yes on a procedural vote to take up her bill, it could pass with a simple majority using the votes she already has racked up."
The GOP Is Against Everything. Ramsey Cox of the Hill: "Senate Republicans stopped Democrats from advancing a bill that would have expanded healthcare and education programs for veterans. In a 56-41 vote Thursday, the motion to waive a budget point of order against the bill failed, as Democrats fell short of the 60 votes needed to overcome the Republican roadblock. GOP Sens. Dean Heller (Nev.) and Jerry Moran (Kan.) voted with Democrats."
... Charles Pierce has a very good response to the craven GOP senators who blocked the bill. So does Bernie Sanders, via Pierce:
Don't tell me that enabling a family to have a child is a political issue. When you have a 70-year-old woman taking care of her husband who had both legs blown off in Vietnam, and she's taking care of him 24 hours a day, don't tell me that's a political issue. I find it incredible that we had several Democrats come down to speak but very few Republicans, and then, when they did, I heard Iran sanctions and I heard Benghazi. Tell me what Benghazi or Iran sanctions have to do with caring for our veterans. -- Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)
... Steve M. has an excellent response, too, noting that Republicans probably won't pay for throwing veterans under the bus because "everybody knows" Republicans love the troops. ...
... CW: Maybe Bernie could have gotten unanimous consent if the bill had described veterans as "military contractors."
Awkward! Russell Berman of the Hill: John Boehner "began his weekly Capitol press conference by attacking President Obama for intending to 'pack it in for the year' and said Republicans would, by contrast, demonstrate leadership by presenting an alternative vision to the country. But when pressed on whether the House would actually hold votes on major legislation in 2014, the Speaker quickly backed away, and wouldn't commit to anything more than continued 'conversations' in the coming month." CW: As far as I can tell, Boehner's definition of "leadership" is "do nothing but attack President Obama." ...
... Boehner's presser, however, was not a complete waste of time. I am happy to pay my Boner Tax for this moment:
... So here's President Obama, "packing it in:"
... Don Lemon of CNN: "In a moving and heartfelt message Thursday, President Barack Obama challenged young minority men to make good choices.... The message was part of his new initiative called 'My Brother's Keeper,' where leading foundations and businesses will donate at least $200 million over five years towards programs aimed at minority youth of color.... A White House official said Obama improvised a good portion of his remarks and was more emotional than many planners of the event anticipated." CNN pulled some highlights:
... Here's the full speech:
Justin Sink of the Hill: "President Obama will announce Friday that two software firms have pledged more than $400 million worth of software for American classrooms during an appearance at the inaugural White House Film Festival. Software maker Adobe will provide some $300 million in free copies of programs like Photoshop and Premiere Elements that will help students and educators complete digital creative projects. Prezi, a Hungarian software company, is providing $100 million in licenses for its professional presentation program."
New York Times Editors on how raising the minimum wage affects businesses that employ low-wage workers: "Scholarly studies and the experience of businesses themselves show that what companies lose when they pay more is often offset by lower turnover and increased productivity. Businesses are also able to deal with higher costs by modestly increasing prices and by giving smaller increases to higher-paid employees."
Josh Gerstein of Politico: "The Clinton Presidential Library will make its first release on Friday of records that were previously withheld from the public under legal provisions that expired early last year, a spokeswoman for the National Archives said. About 4,000 to 5,000 pages will be put online at 1 P.M. Friday, with paper copies becoming simultaneously available at the library in Little Rock.... More releases are expected in the next couple of weeks. Politico reported Tuesday that about 33,000 pages of records withheld as confidential advice to President Bill Clinton or information about candidates for appointments to federal office, were still unavailable to the public even though the legal basis to withhold them under the Presidential Records Act ran out in January 2013.... Some of the records come from then first lady Hillary Clinton's office...."
Paul Krugman on the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal: "... both Harry Reid ... and Nancy Pelosi ... have come out against giving the president crucial 'fast-track' authority, meaning that any agreement can receive a clean, up-or-down vote. So what I wonder is why the president is pushing the T.P.P. at all. The economic case is weak, at best, and his own party doesn't like it.... My guess is that we're looking at a combination of Beltway conventional wisdom -- Very Serious People always support entitlement cuts and trade deals -- and officials caught in a 1990s time warp, still living in the days when New Democrats tried to prove that they weren't old-style liberals by going all in for globalization. So don't cry for T.P.P. If the big trade deal comes to nothing, as seems likely, it will be, well, no big deal."
Optic Nerve. Spencer Ackerman & James Ball of the Guardian: "Britain's surveillance agency GCHQ, with aid from the US National Security Agency, intercepted and stored the webcam images of millions of internet users not suspected of wrongdoing, secret documents reveal. GCHQ files dating between 2008 and 2010 explicitly state that a surveillance program codenamed Optic Nerve collected still images of Yahoo webcam chats in bulk and saved them to agency databases, regardless of whether individual users were an intelligence target or not. In one six-month period in 2008 alone, the agency collected webcam imagery -- including substantial quantities of sexually explicit communications -- from more than 1.8 million Yahoo user accounts globally.... Optic Nerve, the documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden show, began as a prototype in 2008 and was still active in 2012, according to an internal GCHQ wiki page accessed that year."
Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post: "Conservative activists said Thursday that they will continue to press for additional legal protections for private businesses that deny services to gay men and lesbians, saying that a defeat in Arizona this week is only a minor setback and that religious-liberty legislation is the best way to stave off a rapid shift in favor of gay rights." ...
... CW: This gang is like (or one-and-the-same as) the anti-abortion crowd. They have taken up a cause that gives them permission to think about sex all the time. Since gay sex is even more taboo in their view than is extramarital hetero-sex, the anti-gay-marriage gang must be more hyper-excited than the fellas in the misogynists' club.
Tami Luhby of CNN: "Diners at eight Gator's Dockside casual eateries are finding a 1% Affordable Care Act surcharge on their tabs, which comes to 15 cents on a typical $15 lunch tab. Signs on the door and at tables alert diners to the fee, which is also listed separately on the bill.... Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, an upscale restaurant is also asking guests to pony up for its employee health care costs. Since it opened in November, Republique's tab comes with an optional 3% surcharge that allows it to employ all of its 80 workers full-time and provide them with health insurance. The fee is explained in a sign and on the menu, and servers explain it to diners without prompting." ...
... "ObummerCare Tax." Jonathan Chait: "Conservatives find this development very exciting.... There are costs associated with all kinds of government regulations and spending, but he’s not creating a line item on his tab to highlight his share of, say, financing the Department of Defense.... As an act of propaganda, this is completely self-defeating. Customers are told that the dreaded Obummercare may 'ultimately' put the restaurant out of business -- maybe one day, when the Sharia FEMA camp portion is phased in. But in the meantime, they're covering it by making the two people buying lunch fork over an additional 20 cents to cover health insurance for the restaurant's employees. That really doesn't sound like the worst deal in the world." ...
... CW: It is also an admission/reminder to customers that the restaurant proprietor heretofore has been happy to see her/his underpaid employees try to get along without affordable health care. Maybe the 15- or 20-cent ObummerCare Tax will encourage customers to give the underpaid wait staff slightly larger tips.
** John Schwartz of the New York Times: "In the 10 years since Texas executed Cameron Todd Willingham after convicting him on charges of setting his house on fire and murdering his three young daughters, family members and death penalty opponents have argued that he was innocent. Now newly discovered evidence suggests that the prosecutor in the case may have concealed a deal with a jailhouse informant whose testimony was a key part of the execution decision.... [The informant, Johnny] Webb, and the prosecutor at trial, John Jackson -- who would later become a judge -- explicitly denied that any deal existed...." The Innocence Project found written evidence of a deal; also when he became a judge, Jackson continued to try to cut Webb's time & reduce the charges against him. "The Innocence Project also contends that prosecutors suppressed an effort by Mr. Webb to recant his testimony."
Luke Harding of the Guardian writes a frightening piece on what appears to be a Russian coup in the Crimea. CW: It sure looks as if Putin is doing something about that nostalgia he has for the good ole days of the Soviet Union.
New Jersey News
Ashley Killough, et al., of CNN: "Officials in Fort Lee, New Jersey released 911 audio Friday from the week in September when two out of three access lanes were closed to the George Washington Bridge, ultimately causing massive traffic gridlock across the city for four days in a controversy that has roiled the Christie administration. The 26 hours of emergency dispatch audio will reveal more information about whether the traffic jam, which was allegedly orchestrated by top former appointees of Gov. Chris Christie, led to harm or death due to delayed emergency response time from the unusually high congestion."
Shawn Boburg, et al., of the Bergen Record: "The private messages that linked Governor Christie's office to lane closures at the George Washington Bridge also contain jokes about causing 'traffic problems' at the home of a New Jersey rabbi associated with the Port Authority, newly released documents show. The information is contained in 20 pages of messages that previously had redactions shielding who sent and received texts between former Port Authority executive David Wildstein and others. The documents do not shed any new light on potential further involvement of the governor's office.... In the new batch of texts, the most insensitive texts were authored by [former Christie aide Bridget] Kelly, [former Christie campaign manager Bill] Stepien and Wildstein. The messages also confirm media reports that Port Authority police officer Chip Michaels, a friend of Christie's from their childhood in Livingston -- where Wildstein also grew up -- helped Wildstein survey and keep track of the backups throughout the closures." ...
... CW: There's a pdf of the e-mail exchanges here, but they're still heavily redacted, & I found them hard to follow.
Jed Lewison of Daily Kos: "... let's not forget that the press started asking questions about the lane closures in September -- it wasn't until January, after weeks of denying complicity -- that Christie finally conceded that his administration had been up to no good. In those intervening months, Christie did nothing to investigate what had happened, even though it was obviously that this wasn't an issue that wouldn't disappear without a full accounting of what transpired. And the most logical explanation for his lack of investigation is simple: He already knew." ...
... CW: Lewison is right. Christie's claims that he wasn't interested in learning the details of the plot(s) that ruined his chance to be POTUS make no sense -- unless he was ordering, encouraging or at least aware of the covert ops his top aides were managing. If your trusted associates & friends betrayed & destroyed your future prospects, wouldn't you want to know who, when, where & why?
Elsewhere Beyond the Beltway
Andrew Wolfson & Doug Stanglin of USA Today: "A federal judge on Thursday ordered Kentucky officials to recognize the marriages of same-sex couples performed out of state. U.S. District Court Judge John Heyburn ruled that Kentucky's Constitution and laws banning recognition of such marriages 'violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution, and they are void and unenforceable.' The decision amounted to a final ruling of his Feb. 12 opinion in the case."
Right Wing World
Get Your People in Line, Ladies. CW: It appears Bill O'Reilly thinks black ladies Valerie Jarrett & Michelle Obama have it in their power to make black kids (link fixed) be more like what O'Reilly surmises white kids are like. Jarrett & Obama just need to tell their black friends to comport themselves to standards Loofah Man has set for them. Now I'm wondering why Laura Bush didn't make all the white kids of the USA into Little Goody Two Shoes. Guess Laura was a slacker. I don't think O'Reilly has any idea he's a flaming racist.
News Ledes
Chattanoogan: "District Attorney Herbert 'Buzz' Franklin said Friday he will not prosecute a man who shot and killed a man with Alzheimer's who was outside his home."
New York Times: "After nearly 20 months of celebrity theater and an incalculable amount of effort and courtroom expense, the misdemeanor trial of Kerry Kennedy ended on Friday in breakneck fashion, as jurors took one hour to find her not guilty of driving under the influence of a drug: a sleeping pill that she said she took by accident."
New York Times: Actor "Philip Seymour Hoffman was killed by a poisonous mix of drugs that included not only heroin but also cocaine, amphetamines and sedatives, the New York City medical examiner announced on Friday. The medical examiner ruled his death an accident."
Guardian: "The Federal Reserve has no authority to supervise or regulate Bitcoin, chair Janet Yellen told Congress on Thursday.... 'Bitcoin is a payment innovation that's taking place outside the banking industry. To the best of my knowledge there's no intersection at all, in any way, between Bitcoin and banks that the Federal Reserve has the ability to supervise and regulate. So the Fed doesn't have authority to supervise or regulate Bitcoin in anyway,' said Yellen. Yellen said there were concerns about the currency being used for for money laundering but that regulators were confident that US law was 'adequate to meet enforcement needs'."
The Guardian has a liveblog of events re: the Ukraine crisis. ...
... New York Times: "Amid fears of a Kremlin-backed separatist rebellion here against Ukraine's fledgling government, armed men in military uniforms took up positions at two Crimean airports as Ukraine's interior minister warned of 'a direct provocation,' but there was no sign of any violence." ...
... New York Times: "For now, Mr. Putin's strategy for retaining Russia's influence in a country where the Kremlin has profound interests, from its largest foreign military base to gas pipelines that fuel its economy, remains unknown and full of risks. Even so, events are subtly forcing Moscow's hand." ...
... The Times has a useful map of the Ukraine that identifies the ethnic, cultural & political divide that is straining the country.
AP: "The Mt. Gox bitcoin exchange in Tokyo filed for bankruptcy protection Friday and its chief executive said 850,000 bitcoins, worth several hundred million dollars, are unaccounted for. The exchange's CEO Mark Karpeles appeared before Japanese TV news cameras, bowing deeply for several minutes. He said a weakness in the exchange's systems was behind a massive loss of the virtual currency involving 750,000 bitcoins from users and 100,000 of the company's own bitcoins. That would amount to about $425 million at recent prices."