The Commentariat -- Sept. 4, 2012

Presidential Race

You can watch the Democratic convention without annoying commentary on C-SPAN (online here). The convention schedule -- according to C-SPAN -- is here; it appears coverage begins at 5:00 pm ET & times for everything else (as listed at 2:00 pm ET) are TBA.

Liz Goodwin of Yahoo! News: "On Tuesday, a group of more than 100 protesters shouting 'Obama is a traitor' temporarily shut down official bus service that ferries around delegates at the Democratic National Convention. The protesters, some of whom were lying down in the street, were surrounded by Charlotte police, who used their bicycles to build a barrier around the group."

NEW. Ben Pershing of the Washington Post: "Former congressman Virgil Goode Jr. has qualified for the presidential ballot in Virginia, the State Board of Elections ruled Tuesday, adding a potential obstacle to Republican Mitt Romney's hopes of winning the pivotal state. The state Republican party has already challenged the eligibility of Goode, who is the Constitution Party's nominee, and could still get him knocked off the ballot."

NEW. USA Today: "Reporter Dianne Derby [of KKTV-Colorado Springs] asked Obama, 'your party says you inherited a bad situation -- you've had three and a half years to fix it -- what grade would you give yourself so far for doing that?' Replied Obama: 'You know I would say incomplete … but what I would say is the steps that we have taken in saving the auto industry, in making sure that college is more affordable and investing in clean energy and science and technology and research, those are all the things that we are going to need to grow over the long term.'"

NEW. Michael Tomasky of Newsweek on the 5 GOP myths the Real Obama must shatter.

Looks as if Time is going to have a cover a day this week. Today's celebrates Michelle Obama, who will speak at the convention tonight. The accompanying story, by Michael Scherer is okay, too.

Krissah Thompson of the Washington Post: The First Lady will speak at the convention tonight. "Michelle Obama comes to the 2012 Democratic National Convention with a delicate task: helping her husband's campaign reach out to women, who are a vital part of his coalition, without veering too far into an increasingly polarized battle over women's issues." CW: if Mrs. Obama listened to Thompson & her "experts," she couldn't say anything more than "Good evening," "I love being a traditional stay-at-home Mom & the only reason I'm out tonight is to be with my husband Whatzizname," & "Good night & God bless America." ...

... Margaret Hartmann of New York: "The revelation that as of Monday afternoon, [Bill] Clinton still hasn't finished writing his speech or submitted it for vetting by the campaign raised a new question: Could Clinton be the DNC's Clint Eastwood?" ...

... NEW. BUT David Maraniss, who has written biographies of both Bill Clinton & Barack Obama, sees Clinton as a "key asset" for Obama: "There is nothing formulaic about Clinton's presence at the Democratic National Convention this year. He is not just another old presidential war horse being trotted out for nostalgia or a staged show of unity. When Obama called in late July to say he would be grateful if his Democratic predecessor would give the speech placing his name in nomination, something that no former commander in chief has done before, it was an acknowledgment of how much the sitting president needs the former president. And Clinton, who loves to be needed as much as he needs to be loved, responded with an enthusiasm and diligence that served as yet another signal to people close to both men that an old wound has for the most part been healed."

Matt Miller of the Washington Post: "With no serious ideas to renew upward mobility, and a budget plan that perversely undermines it by slashing preschool and college aid for poor youths, the entire [Republican convention] pitch, on closer examination, seemed a hollow exercise in nostalgia. Unfortunately, the Democrats ... will do only marginally better.... Given President Obama's proposals, the outer limits of Democratic ambition are unequal to today's challenges."

Donna Cassata of the AP: "Democrats unveiled a party platform at their national convention Monday that echoes President Barack Obama's call for higher taxes on wealthier Americans while backing same-sex marriage and abortion rights. Delegates will vote Tuesday to adopt the platform that reflects the president's argument that his work is unfinished and he deserves another four years to complete the job." You can read the proposed platform here. CW: I read the parts that particularly interested me -- mush peppered with warmed-over platitudes. ...

... NEW. Matt Cooper of the New York Times: "The platform that the Democratic Party plans to approve Tuesday at its convention in Charlotte, N.C., offers a stark contrast to the platform that Republicans approved last week at their convention in Tampa, Fla., especially on social issues like abortion rights and same-sex marriage, the future of entitlements like Medicare and Social Security, and labor policy and taxes." Cooper looks "at some of the crucial differences."

[Republicans] have spent a lot of time creating a fictional Barack Obama who is supposedly taking the work out of welfare reform, or doesn't think small businesses built their own businesses. -- Barack Obama, in an interview with Susan Page of USA Today

NEW. Kevin Drum of Mother Jones has a personal stake in the election: no matter how crazy Congressional Republicans get, if Obama is re-elected, ObamaCare will be implemented & Drum can get health insurance, something he wouldn't be eligible for otherwise because of pre-existing conditions.

Mark Felsenthal of Reuters: "President Barack Obama toured hurricane-stricken Louisiana on Monday and promised federal recovery help as he sought to show his administration was on top of the disaster response on the eve of his Democrats' national convention in North Carolina." ...

... Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "Mr. Obama's timing was decided in consultation with local officials, White House aides said, to avoid the presidential entourage getting in the way of the cleanup." ...

... Ben Feller & Kasie Hunt of the AP: "Prior to his visit to Louisiana, Obama's remarks about the storm have focused on what money and resources the federal government can marshal to help. Romney used his trip Friday to emphasize the need for charitable donations to help people recover. On the flight from Ohio, White House press secretary Jay Carney said natural disasters are 'apolitical,' but ... 'It is worth noting that last year there was an effort to underfund the money that's used to provide relief to Americans when they've been hit by disasters.... That effort was led by congressman Paul Ryan, who is now running to be vice president.'"

... Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "President Obama pointed to his bailout of the auto industry, which Mitt Romney opposed, as a major argument for his re-election over the Republican rival as he spent a fourth Labor Day with union workers in a swing state."

NEW. Sour Grapes. CNN: Florida Republicans are taking to the airwaves to hammer their state's former GOP governor for his speaking slot at the Democratic National Convention, the Republican Party of Florida announced Tuesday. The group's ad features old news clips of former Gov. Charlie Crist proclaiming his conservative credentials, including praising President George W. Bush and Sarah Palin, saying he was 'about as conservative as you can get.'" CW: no, he wasn't. Crist governed as a pretty moderate Republican. ...

... NEW. A little background on Crist from Tim Padgett of Time. I didn't know about "Chain Gang Charlie."

Republicans to Obama, "We can criticize you, but you can't answer." Jonathan Bernstein in the Washington Post: "At the same time that they've been pushing the 'are you better off?' question, Republicans have also opened up a personal, character-based attack on Obama: claiming he ducks responsibility for his own time in office by constantly blaming George W. Bush for everything. Got that? Obama is being asked to compare the economy now to what it was like before he took office -- but if he says anything bad about how things were four years ago, it's evidence of a character deficit."

Joe Biden has an answer for "Are you better off today than you were 4 years ago?":

... NEW. BUT Sheldon Alberts of The Hill: "Fifty-two percent of likely voters say the nation is in 'worse condition' now than in September 2008, while 54 percent say Obama does not deserve reelection based solely on his job performance," according to a new Hill poll. CW: in a related AMA study, researchers found that 52 percent of likely voters suffer from severe memory loss and/or are ignorant as dirt (which I didn't realize was a medical term). ...

... NEW. Paul Krugman, Dean Baker & "The Fire Last Time" -- a better metaphor for "are you better off?" Here's Baker's post. ...

... NEW. Zack Beauchamp & Judd Legum of Think Progress post 10 headlines from September 2008 that answer the question. ...

... Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times: "A day after fumbling a predictable and straightforward question posed by Mitt Romney last week -- are Americans better off than they were four years ago -- the Obama campaign provided a response on Monday that it said would be hammered home during the Democratic convention here this week: 'Absolutely.'" ...

... Michael Grunwald of Time has a longer answer. CW P.S. How come Plouffe, Axelrod & O'Malley are so flatfooted? It wasn't a hard question to answer. ...

... Ed Schultz has a history lesson, too:

After working for 4 years to keep the economy in the tank, Republicans plan to upstage the Democratic convention with Friday's economic reports, which they hope will be bad. These are real patriots, aren't they? In addition, as Greg Sargent reports, they will make Obama's jobs numbers look bad by saddling him with numbers attributable to Bush. (Of course Obama can't complain; he's not allowed to mention Bush -- see Jonathan Bernstein above.)

Steve Kornacki of Salon on why the GOP convention was a dud.

Reality Chex' First International Contest. Watching the few snippets of Paul Ryan's convention speech I could stomach, I was struck that Ryan reminded me of some high school kid I knew; I just couldn't remember who. This morning I realized it wasn't someone I knew, or even -- technically -- someone. Ryan reminded me of a 1950s-early '60s sitcom character. Be the first to guess who & win a year's free subscription to Reality Chex. ...

We've Got a Winner! Mushiba wins the grand prize in Reality Chex' First International Contest -- an incredibly prestigious award. For the answer, see Mushiba's response among today's excellent Comments. Update: Akhilleus made me tart up this prestigious award. All in all, when the subject is Paul Ryan, I guess tacky is appropriate.

NEW. Stephen Webster of the Raw Story: "A video released this weekend by action movie hero Chuck Norris claims that America faces '1,000 years of darkness' if President Barack Obama is reelected." Via Adam Sorensen of Time, who writes that Norris is "determined not to cede the role of action movie star saying crazy things about Obama."

Right Wing World

I'll admit I won't be reading these posts, but the headlines made me LOL:

     ... David Hill of the Washington Times: "Bedbugs an increasing concern at DNC hotels."

     ... John Fund of the National Review: "The crack hotels of the DNC." ...

         ... Jim Newell of Wonkette has a funny response to Fund's post. Frankly, I can't stop laughing at the thought of the prissy Fund getting stuck in a sleazy motel.

News Ledes

New York Times: "Major automakers reported Tuesday that sales grew 19.9 percent in August despite higher gas prices during the month. Analysts said the wide range of fuel-efficient models on the market, particularly new small cars from the Detroit automakers, had helped spur demand and accelerate the industry's recovery."

New York Times: "More than 100,000 Syrians fled their country last month, a sudden acceleration of the exodus prompted by 18 months of conflict, the United Nations said Tuesday."

AP: "A former Navy SEAL's insider account of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden contains classified information, the Pentagon said Tuesday, and the admiral who heads the Naval Special Warfare Command said details in the book may provide enemies with dangerous insight into secretive U.S. operations.... At the Pentagon, press secretary George Little ... told reporters during a briefing that the Pentagon is still reviewing what legal options should be taken against the author."

Y!-Tech: "Just months after a half-million Yahoo! passwords, 6.5 million LinkedIn passwords, and 55,000 Twitter passwords were leaked, the hacktivists at AntiSec have found their next data goldmine: a stash of 12.4 million Apple Unique Device Identifiers (UDID). According to the Anonymous-allied hackers, a list of 12.4 million Apple Unique Device Identifiers (UDID) was found on an FBI agent's Dell notebook. Each UDID was associated with user names, device info, and in some cases, phone numbers, names, and addresses.... AntiSec leaked 1,000,001 of those UDIDs to bring light to the government's data collecting effort." ...

     ... Update: Gizmodo has some analysis.

Washington Post: "The United States is nearing an agreement with Egypt's new government to eliminate a significant portion of the $3.2 billion owed by the economically struggling nation, U.S. officials said Monday. The discussions are the first major negotiation between the Obama administration and Egypt's new democratically elected leaders."

The Commentariat -- Sept. 3, 2012

My column in the New York Times eXaminer is a follow-up to Akhilleus' post in yesterday's Comments on Ross Douthat's attempt to show that Mitt Romney is an F.D.R. clone. The NYTX front page is here. BTW, commenting on NYTX is open to everyone.

Some of the panels of a 36-foot-long mural depicting icons of the U.S. labor movement, painted by Judy Taylor for Maine's Department of Labor. Tea Party Gov. Paul LePage had the panels removed.Harold Meyerson of the Washington Post: "The primary plight of U.S. workers isn’t their lack of skills. It's their lack of power. With the collapse of unions, which represented a third of the private-sector workforce in the mid-20th century but just 7 percent today, workers simply have no capacity to bargain for their share of the revenue they produce.... If the war that business and Republicans are waging on labor isn't defeated, good jobs will continue to dwindle and work in America will grow steadily less rewarding. And a happy Labor Day to you." ...

... At Pete Seeger's 90th birthday celebration (3 years ago), on Woody Guthrie's 100th birth year, "Union Maid," by Guthrie, performed by Billy Bragg, Mike & Ruthy Merenda, Dar Williams & the New York City Labor Chorus. (Think I've embedded this before; the exuberance of the artists & the audience is infectious):

David Sanger & Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: "With Israel openly debating whether to strike at Iran's nuclear facilities in the coming months, the Obama administration is moving ahead with a range of steps short of war that it hopes will forestall an Israeli attack, while forcing the Iranians to take more seriously negotiations that are all but stalemated." CW:somebody should put a muzzle on Mitt Friend-of-Bibi Romney.

Presidential Race

Ben Feller & Calvin Woodward of the AP: President "Obama addresses a United Auto Workers Labor Day rally in Toledo on Monday before getting his first look at the aftermath of Hurricane Isaac in a stricken parish outside New Orleans."

Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "As President Obama heads into his convention this week, he is seizing on the just-concluded Republican presidential convention to ramp up his re-election argument that Mitt Romney and his party are stuck in policies of the past and afraid to spell out the details of their plans." ...

Here's a clip from President Obama's remarks in Colorado Sunday. In the clip, he addresses his differences with Romney on Afghanistan.

Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker writes a long piece on the rapprochement between Barack Obama & Bill Clinton: "Obama, who rose to the Oval Office in part by pitching himself as the antidote to Clintonism, is now presenting himself as its heir apparent. It's a shrewd, even Clintonian, tactical maneuver."

Matt Williams of the Guardian: "Democrats opened a fresh offensive on Mitt Romney's foreign policy Sunday, painting the Republican White House hopeful as a war-monger looking to take the US into further Middle East conflicts. Campaigning in Pennsylvania, vice president Joe Biden attacked Mr Romney's international agenda as laid out in last week's convention address, suggesting that it put him out of step with the US's priorities overseas."

New York magazine's cover story, by John Heilemann, is a long feature on Vice President Joe Biden.

... President Obama speaking in Des Moines, Iowa, Saturday:

Susan Page of USA Today: "President Obama wants to make it clear that..., 'I am a huge Clint Eastwood fan. He is a great actor, and an even better director," the president said in an interview with USA TODAY aboard Air Force One, on his way to campaign rallies in Iowa Saturday.... However, Obama seemed less eager to review Eastwood's latest performance.... 'One thing about being president or running for president -- if you're easily offended, you should probably choose another profession.' Obama said with a smile. He said there would be no effort to counter with a similar stunt at the Democratic National Convention, which opens in Charlotte Tuesday." ...

... Maybe Obama should say, "Thanks, Clint." Sahil Kapur of TPM: "President Obama's response to Clint Eastwood's speech to an empty chair was the most re-tweeted tweet of the Republican convention, according to a Twitter spokesperson":

... Juan Cole of Informed Comment on the top ten things Clint Eastwood got wrong in his empty-chair routine. (Link fixed.)

AP: "President Barack Obama's campaign is running a new television ad claiming Republican Mitt Romney's policies would 'hit the middle class harder.' The ad is running in Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, Ohio and Virginia, key battleground states":

Thomas Catan of the Wall Street Journal: "President Barack Obama's campaign said Sunday that this week's Democratic National Convention would feature plans to revive the economy, promising a contrast to what it described as a policy-free Republican gathering last week. 'What you're going to hear this week in Charlotte is a president who's going to present a clear agenda for the future, that talks about how we build a sound economy that lifts the middle class in this country,' Obama senior adviser David Axelrod said on 'Fox News Sunday.'"

NBC News: "About 800 people chanting and carrying signs (among them, 'Banks got bailed out. We got sold out') marched Sunday through the central business district in Charlotte, N.C., ahead of the Democratic National Convention to protest what they said was seedy corporate influence on politics."

Steve Holland of Reuters: "President Barack Obama enters an important campaign week tied with Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found on Sunday, leaving the incumbent an opportunity to edge ahead of his opponent at the Democratic National Convention." ...

... Frank Newport of Gallup: "Last week's Republican National Convention had a minimal impact on Americans' self-reported voting intentions, with just about as many saying the convention made them less likely to vote for Mitt Romney as say it made them more likely to vote for him."

"Unbecoming of a President." Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: Mitt Romney "was able to take advantage of tax benefits in innovative ways open only to a narrow slice of extremely affluent people -- mostly those who work in private-equity firms and other investment partnerships.... Some tax experts worry that the arrangements Romney benefits from set a bad precedent for a president. 'He looks for every tax angle to a degree that is unbecoming in someone who would be the executive in command of the administrative apparatus that enforces the tax law,' said Lee Sheppard, a tax lawyer and contributing editor for Tax Analysts, a publication for accounting and legal professionals." CW: not really news, but it's good to see the press is still hammering this nail.

Gerry Mullany of the New York Times: "Representative Paul D. Ryan has taken back his claim that he had run a marathon in under three hours, an assertion that had drawn great skepticism in the running community and one that came after his convention speech faced scrutiny for some questionable and misleading statements." CW: I was glad to see this story made whatever national newscast my husband watched Sunday night. This is the kind of lie that any dope can understand. ...

... AND Paul Krugman riffs off Lyin' Ryan's marathon whopper to argue, persuasively, that what's on the line in this election is the truth. (It was in 2010, too, IMHO.) CW: Sometimes, my blue-eyed Altar Boy, it's the venial sins that getcha.

"Hendrik Hertzberg and Philip Gourevitch join Dorothy Wickenden [of the New Yorker] to discuss the role of culture wars in Republican politics":

News Ledes

New York Times: "Michael Clarke Duncan, who rose from working as a ditch digger to employ his booming bass voice and immense physical presence in many movie roles, most notably a tragic prisoner with a healing touch in the 1999 film "The Green Mile," died on Monday in Los Angeles. He was 54."

Guardian: "Hillary Clinton is calling on south-east Asian states to present a united front to the Chinese in dealing with territorial disputes in the South China Sea. The US secretary of state will be in Indonesia's capital on Monday to offer support for a regionally endorsed code of conduct for all claimants to disputed islands. Jakarta is the headquarters of the Association of South East Asian Nations, and Clinton will press the group to insist that China agree to a formal mechanism to reduce short-term risks of conflict and ultimately come to final settlements over sovereignty."

AP: "Britain's Prince Andrew has rappelled 785 feet (239 meters) down the side of Europe's tallest building to raise money for charity. The 52-year-old's stunt began on London skyscraper The Shard's 87th floor and finished on the 20th, and took him 30 minutes. Following the descent Monday morning, the prince said: 'I will never do it again.'"

The Commentariat -- Sept. 2, 2012

Oh My. Nicholas Confessore, et al., of the New York Times: "New York attorney general [Eric Schneiderman] is investigating whether some of the nation's biggest private equity firms have abused a tax strategy in order to slice hundreds of millions of dollars from their tax bills, according to executives with direct knowledge of the inquiry.... Schneiderman has in recent weeks subpoenaed more than a dozen firms seeking documents that would reveal whether they converted certain management fees collected from their investors into fund investments, which are taxed at a far lower rate than ordinary income. Among the firms to receive subpoenas [is] ...Bain Capita, which was founded by Mitt Romney...."

Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post writes an interesting overview of some of the literature on "what's the matter with American capitalism," but strangely, he couldn't seem to find anything that addressed the interests of workers. As long as ordinary workers have no representatives at the table -- and that's the situation today -- don't expect income inequality to magically collapse.

Anne Eisenberg reviews The Good Girls Revolt by Lynn Povitch, the story of how women brought suit to force Newsweek management to give them writing jobs. Their effort eventually led to industry-wide change, though -- as Eisenberg writes -- "Feminism is an incomplete revolution."

Presidential Race

Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "With his party's nominating convention approaching next week, President Obama started a four-day, four-state campaign trip in Iowa on Saturday, the state where he opened his unlikely quest for the presidency five years ago." ...

... Devin Dwyer of ABC News: "Greeting Air Force One as it touched down under sunny skies and sultry heat [in Sioux City, Iowa] was a hand-painted banner draped across the top of an airplane hangar that reads, 'Obama Welcome to SUX - We Did Build This.' 'SUX' is the airport code for Sioux City." In the photo accompanying the article, you can see that the "Welcome to" is written in tiny letters, so the banner appears to say only "Obama SUX."

     ... "Ale to the Chief." This White House blogpost has the recipes for White House honey ale & White House honey porter.

Cleve R. Wootson Jr. & Ely Portillo of the Charlotte Observer: "Eight months after evicting Occupy Charlotte protesters from public property, police now appear ready to let protesters camp at an uptown park that has become the center of protest activity during the Democratic convention. A bus that arrived at Marshall Park Saturday brought dozens of protesters who erected tents at the county-owned park.... Local officials, while not explicitly granting permission, suggested the city and county are inclined to let protesters stay overnight as long as no trouble arises."

Jonathan Chait of New York makes the case that the real theme of the GOP convention was "we rich people deserve our money & we should be able to keep it all. Too bad for everybody else."

Maureen Dowd: Republicans "knocked themselves out producing a convention that was a colossal hoax."

End of the Affair. Alina Selyukh of Reuters: "A modest bump in popularity for U.S. presidential hopeful Mitt Romney from this week's Republican Party convention looks to be short-lived, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll. Democratic President Barack Obama regained a narrow lead on Saturday by 44 percent to 43 percent over his Republican challenger ... in the latest daily installment of the four-day rolling poll. Romney was ahead by one point in Friday's online poll and two points in Thursday's survey." ...

... Nate Silver: "We'll need to wait another day or two before we can make a more confident judgement on the size of Mr. Romney's bounce, but the information we have so far points toward its being a little underwhelming."

AP/Huffington Post: in his "I Care" photo-op trip to storm-torn Louisiana, Mitt Romney advised a woman whose house was literally underwater to go home & call 211, a public service number. Maybe one of his ace staffer should have explained to Romney what "flooded-out" means. The woman still said Romney "... is good. He'll do the best for us. He has our best interests at heart. I thought he'd be more like a politician, but it was more understanding and caring." Okay.

David Sirota has a swell piece criticizing the New York Times puff piece on Janna Ryan. In real life, as opposed to the Times story, Ryan was a privileged, connected Washington lobbyist.

Caroline Bankoff of New York on why Paul Ryan's lie about running a sub-three-hour marathon matters. Bankoff puts together commentary by Nicholas Thompson of the New Yorker & Paul Krugman. ...

... Shushannah Walshe of ABC News points out that Ryan also left the impression during the Hewitt interview that he ran "marathons." But according to his campaign, he ran only one. CW: the honest answer to Hewitt's question would have been something like, "Yeah, I ran a marathon once when I was in college & I think my time put me somewhere in the middle of the pack. Now I run only 10Ks." But look at how Ryan answers Hewitt's questions. Now, could somebody show me some pictures, please, of Ryan's catfish-noodling. What with his being given to fish stories, maybe that's one, too. How about some shots of Reverse Robin Hood's killing Bambi with a bow-&-arrow. Maybe we'll find out that like Romney, Ryan's big-game hunting is limited to setting mousetraps in his basement. (Romney has Jeeves do it, of course.)

AND Gene Weingarten of the Washington Post: "We've entered the final stretch of the presidential election, and it has become apparent that Mitt Romney actually won't release any more back tax returns, on the moral principle that nobody can make him, so neener, neener.... On one hand, it would be unfair and irresponsible of me to baselessly speculate about what embarrassing facts those tax returns might reveal. On the other hand, no one can stop me, so neener, neener." Weingarten's speculations include "His tax-shelter plan is so shrewd that he is, technically, indigent. He qualifies for, and uses, food stamps."

News Ledes

New York Times: "The former Navy SEALs member who is a co-author of a first-person account of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden was willing to break 'the code of silence' honored by many commandos because of 'bad blood' with his former unit, the elite SEAL Team 6, according to a new e-book written by other Special Operations veterans."

New York Times: "The Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the Korean evangelist, businessman and self-proclaimed messiah who built a religious movement notable for its mass weddings, fresh-faced proselytizers and links to vast commercial interests, died on Monday in Gapyeong, South Korea. He was 92."

New York Times: "The training of Afghan Local Police and special operations forces has been put on hold for at least a month while their American trainers conduct stricter vetting to try to root out any infiltrators or new recruits who could pose risks to the coalition troops working with them, American officials say." Washington Post story here.

AP: "A senior Obama administration political appointee and longtime aide to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano resigned Saturday amid allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior lodged by at least three Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees. Suzanne Barr, chief of staff to ICE Director John Morton, said in her resignation letter that the allegations against her are 'unfounded.' But she said she was stepping down anyway to end distractions within the agency."

Washington Post: Yosemite National Park officials have closed "the park's 91 signature tent cabins, where park officials say they believe a deadly outbreak of hantavirus originated in June, sickening four people and killing two. The cabins are closed indefinitely as officials wait to see whether their efforts to close gaps between the cabin walls are enough to keep virus-carrying deer mice out."

AP: "Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Desmond Tutu called Sunday for Tony Blair and George Bush to face prosecution at the International Criminal Court for their role in the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Tutu, the retired Anglican Church's archbishop of South Africa, wrote in an op-ed piece for The Observer newspaper that the ex-leaders of Britain and the United States should be made to 'answer for their actions.'" His opinion piece is here.

Guardian: "Syrian rebels have seized an air defence facility and attacked a military airport in the east of the country, according to a UK-based monitoring group."