The Commentariat -- September 23

Happy Autumnal Equinox. It falls at 5:04 am ET today.

By William Morris.In his column Paul Krugman fleshes out some numbers he's been reporting on in blogposts: "Detailed estimates from the Congressional Budget Office ... show that between 1979 and 2005 the inflation-adjusted income of families in the middle of the income distribution rose 21 percent. That’s growth, but it’s slow, especially compared with the 100 percent rise in median income over a generation after World War II. Meanwhile, over the same period, the income of the very rich, the top 100th of 1 percent of the income distribution, rose by 480 percent.... In 2005 dollars, the average annual income of that group rose from $4.2 million to $24.3 million. So do the wealthy look to you like the victims of class warfare?" CW Note: Krugman also gives Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren a plug for her remarks about "class warfare"; see video in yesterday's Commentariat. ...

... I've posted a Krugman page on Off Times Square.

Neil Irwin of the Washington Post: "The improvised, on-the-fly financial system that replaced Bretton Woods after 1971 has failed. The great challenge facing the world leaders gathering for the annual World Bank-International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington this weekend is to figure out what will replace it. For the past 40 years, capital has moved freely around the globe, with currencies fluctuating according to market forces and countries intervening to affect those flows according to their domestic interests. It has all proved remarkably prone to financial crises.... This is no way to run a global economy. But it’s not clear whether there is enough political will to find a new framework, because it would require many countries to sacrifice something dear to them."

Tim Egan: Republican environmental policies are so anti-scientific & so bought-and-paid-for by polluters that they're going to kill us. But President Obama has been passive on environmental issues, & passive doesn't get you an energized base that helps win elections. Doom!

Obama Names Names! Devin Dwyer of ABC News: "President Obama publicly castigated House Speaker John Boehner [yesterday] at a rally in Ohio, singling him out by name four times for his opposition to passage of his $447 billion jobs bill.... In an email blast after the speech, Obama for America campaign manager Jim Messina urged supporters to call Boehner directly to let him know 'what Americans like you think.' ... But ... many Democrats have also publicly voiced reluctance to 'pass it right away....'” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid ... says he might not consider bringing the jobs bill up for a vote until at least next month." Video of the speech is in yesterday's Ledes.

Brian Beutler of TPM: "House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) -- who's a close ally of three Democrats on the [deficit-reduction supercommittee] -- says they would be doing a disservice to advance deficit reducing legislation without knowing its impact on economic growth."

Steve Benen: "We’ve set the bar for success so low [for Congress], avoiding shutdowns is somehow deemed an accomplishment.... And so long as congressional Republicans remain radicalized, there’s no reason to think conditions will improve after this Congress, either. The public didn’t recognize or appreciate it, but 2009 and 2010 were pretty extraordinary for getting stuff done in Washington, despite Republican efforts to break the Senate.... Worst of all, this is what Americans said they wanted when they voted last year." BTW, we're set for a shutdown in exactly one week.

NEW. Eric Lipton & John Broder of the New York Times: "The government’s backing of [of the solar panel manufacturer] Solyndra, which could cost taxpayers more than a half-billion dollars, came as the politically well-connected business began an extensive lobbying campaign that appears to have blinded government officials to the company’s financial condition and the risks of the investment, according to a review of government documents and interviews with administration officials and industry analysts."

Jennifer Haberkorn of Politico: "The Obama administration has to decide by Monday whether it wants to directly ask the Supreme Court to review the constitutionality of its signature health reform legislation. Since the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the health law in August, the administration can either ask the full court to take another look at the case or ask the Supreme Court to review it and issue a final decision.... If it doesn’t file by Monday or get an extension, the Justice Department would have no other option than to ask the Supreme Court to overturn the 11th Circuit’s decision."

I don’t understand how she can be down 20 points one week and is now up 2. What is going on? -- Sen. Scott Brown, on a poll showing Elizabeth Warren beating him by two points in the Massachusetts senate race, overheard by a passing Hill staffer & reported in TPM

Tim Mak of Politico: "Former President Bill Clinton suggested Thursday that Texas Gov. Rick Perry was ideologically in line with 'militant subgroups in Israel' and was too willing to let the Jewish state do whatever it wants." ...

... Josh Rogin of Foreign Policy: "Who's to blame for the continued failure of the Middle East peace process? Former President Bill Clinton said today that it is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu -- whose government moved the goalposts upon taking power, and whose rise represents a key reason there has been no Israeli-Palestinian peace deal."

CW: I'm hoping this is the last piece I'll ever link to about Ron Suskind's Confidence Men, his "insider" look at a "dysfunctional" Obama White House. Jacob Weisberg of Slate has a well-supported takedown of Suskind & his methodology. The title of his post: "Don't Believe Ron Suskind; His book about Obama is as spurious as the ones he wrote about Bush."

Right Wing World

CW: I know "incredulous" isn't a real word, but Jonathan Bernstein of the Washington Post is just incredulous at just how clueless the Republican presidential candidates were in last night's debate. ...

... Glenn Kessler fact-checks the debate. He doesn't actually end with a Four-Pinocchio condemnation, but he does note that he has quatri-pinocchio'd at least one of the same false claims earlier, and the candidates delivered many more outright inventions. ...

... Bill Adair at PolitiFact also reviews some of the candidates' statements, some of which he rates as true, but he also came up with a couple of "falses" & one "pants-on-fire" (the same Romney falsehood Kessler cited: "President Obama went around the world and apologized for America"). ...

... FactCheck.org: "The GOP presidential candidates debated for the second time in six days — tossing out a variety of false and misleading claims on everything from Social Security to vaccines for sexually transmitted diseases." The article goes on to enumerate some of the whoppers.

... The audience low point? Booing a gay soldier stationed in Iraq who is concerned Republican candidates might cut back on advances made for gays & lesbians in the military:

     Here's The Hill headline to a report by Cameron Joseph: "Gay soldier booed at GOP debate; candidates stay mum." ...

... Can't Any Texas Governor Complete a Sentence? (and this one was scripted; evidently, Gov. Garble forgot his line):

Is it the Mitt Romney that was on the side of -- against the Second Amendment before he was for the Second Amendment? Was it -- was before -- he was before the social programs from the standpoint of -- he was for standing up for Roe v. Wade before he was against first -- Roe v. Wade? I mean we'll wait until tomorrow to see which Mitt Romney we're really talking to tonight. -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry, in last night's debate ...

... Garance Franke-Ruta of The Atlantic: "Mitt Romney subtly laid out a line of attack against Rick Perry last night that raised questions about the Texas governor's sometimes garbled syntax and increasingly apparent difficulty giving mid-length answers to policy questions.... No wonder Romney's attack strategy was to say over and over that you can't understand what Perry is trying to say -- as well as to argue with him on policy." ...

... "Texas Toast?" Jonathan Martin & James Hohmann of Politico: "... in his third debate in a month ... Perry gave a foreign policy answer that offered no indication he’s thought about how to respond to threats against America, twice bobbled attacks on Mitt Romney’s well-documented departures from conservative orthodoxy, called immigration hard-liners heartless and, in what was otherwise his best answer of the evening, stretched the truth in the course of delivering a well-rehearsed line about why he mandated pre-teen girls to be vaccinated against HPV." ...

... "Another Rick Perry Whopper." FactCheck.org: "Texas Gov. Rick Perry makes another wildly false claim in a new Web ad — saying that the U.S. poverty rate has hit an 'all-time high.' In fact, the rate is the highest since 1993, but 7.3 percentage points lower than it was in 1959, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent annual tally." Includes video of ad.

News Ledes

New York Times: "Shortly after President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority formally requested the Security Council to grant full United Nations membership on Friday, international powers reached an agreement on terms to restart talks between Israel and the Palestinians, diplomats and Obama administration officials said."

New York Times: "An impasse between the House and Senate over a bill to keep the government open after Sept. 30 and provide financial aid to natural disaster victims got worse on Friday as the Senate easily shot down a House bill passed in the early hours of Friday morning."

New York Times: " The Obama administration, increasingly alarmed by the spillover effects of Europe’s financial crisis, has begun an intensive lobbying campaign to persuade Chancellor >Angela Merkel of Germany and other leaders to act decisively to stem any contagion from the Greece debt crisis."

Congress hasn't been able to fix this, so I will. -- Barack Obama

President Obama will allow states waivers of No Child Left Behind standards:

President Obama spoke about No Child Left Behind this morning.  New York Times: "President Obama on Friday will offer to waive central provisions of the No Child Left Behind law for states that embrace his educational agenda, essentially ending his predecessor’s signature accountability measure, which has defined public school life nationwide for nearly a decade." Video above.

Washington Post: "Washington lurched toward another potential government shutdown crisis Friday, as the House approved a Republican-authored short-term funding measure designed to keep government running through Nov. 18 that Democrats in the Senate immediately vowed to reject."

Washington Post: "State and federal officials on Friday were again to meet with representatives of the nation’s largest banks, trying to finalize a much-anticipated settlement over shoddy foreclosure practices that remains elusive a year after the abuses first garnered national attention.... New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman ... has expressed concern that the pending settlement could release banks from liability for misdeeds that go beyond flawed and fraudulent foreclosure documents.... Schneiderman has insisted that he would not sign onto a deal he views as too lenient on the banks. Attorneys general from a handful of other states, including Delaware and Nevada, have expressed similar concerns."

New York Times: "U.S. EPA plans to enforce smog rules that were put in place under George W. Bush, now that President Obama has asked the agency to wait until 2013 to move on still-stricter air quality standards for ozone, Administrator Lisa Jackson told lawmakers on Capitol Hill [Thursday].... Bill Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, said turning to the 2008 standard is better than reverting to the 'outdated and nonprotective' standard that preceded it." CW: this is actually a pleasant surprise; the conventional wisdom was that the EPA would stick with the Clinton-era standards, which are worse than the Bush standards.

AP: "The world's major economic powers are pledging to launch a bold effort to deal with a chronic slowdown in growth and a European debt crisis threatening to push the global economy into another recession.... The statement by the Group of 20 major economies was issued late Thursday and pledged that the countries, which represent 85 percent of the global economy, would do what was necessary to restore financial stability...."

New York Times: "In their third debate in as many weeks, former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas engaged in a sometimes heated back and forth over immigration, health care and entitlements, their rivalry dominating a stage that included seven other candidates struggling to catch up in the race for the Republican presidential nomination."

AP: "Nearly two decades after embarking on historic peace talks with Israel, Palestinians prepared to sidestep that troubled route on Friday to seek U.N. recognition of an independent state — hoping to leverage this dramatic move on the world stage to realize their dream of an independent homeland. Earlier in the week, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas rebuffed an intense, U.S.-led effort to sway him from the statehood bid, saying he would submit the application to U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon as planned."

New York Times: "President Ali Abdullah Saleh made a dramatic and sudden return to Yemen on Friday after nearly four-months in Saudi Arabia, seeking to reinsert himself at the center of a slowly fracturing country mired in bloody clashes on the streets of its capital. His return, announced by state news agencies, appeared unlikely to immediately quell the fighting, which has left more than 70 people dead since Sunday in fierce street battles between government forces and soldiers who have sided with antigovernment protesters."

Space: "A decommissioned NASA satellite is expected to plummet to Earth today (Sept. 23), and agency officials are monitoring the dead spacecraft closely to try to narrow down when and where the debris will fall. According to NASA, the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, or UARS, will make its fiery descent through the atmosphere some time this afternoon or early evening (Eastern Daylight Time), but while it is still too soon to tell where pieces of the defunct satellite will land, scientists have been able to rule out North America from the potential impact zone. ...

     ... New York Times Update: "A wayward NASA satellite may yet fall to Earth in the United States. On Friday morning, the space agency issued an update about its defunct Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, which is dropping out of the sky more slowly than anticipated. 'Re-entry is expected late Friday, Sept. 23, or early Saturday, Sept. 24, Eastern Daylight Time,' NASA said."

AP: "A startling find at one of the world’s foremost laboratories that a subatomic particle seemed to move faster than the speed of light has scientists around the world rethinking Albert Einstein and one of the foundations of physics. Now they are planning to put the finding to further high-speed tests to see if a revolutionary shift in explaining the workings of the universe is needed — or if the European scientists made a mistake."

Live Science: "Many 9/11 conspiracy theories revolve around explosions that were seen and heard in the World Trade Center's Twin Towers prior to their collapse. Despite scientific investigations that have explained the processes that brought down the skyscrapers, some conspiracy theorists suggest the plane impacts were just red herrings, to distract from the fact that 9/11 was an 'inside job....' Now a materials scientist, [Christen Simensen of SINTEF], has come up with a more scientific explanation for the mystery booms, and says his model of the Twin Towers collapse leaves no room for conspiracies." CW: Aah, he's probably part of the vast conspiracy.

The Commentariat -- September 22

I've posted an Open Thread on today's Off Times Square.

Final Thoughts. Andrew Cohen of The Atlantic on the history of the death penalty in the U.S. You'll have to read the whole post, which is a long one, to see why Cohen says Rick Perry's "wanton and freakish" disregard for the rights of the accused could help bring an end to the death penalty.

There is nobody on this country who got rich on his own. -- Elizabeth Warren ...

Ezra Klein has a good, short analysis for laymen on what the Fed did yesterday. ...

... Mark Thoma has a bit more; his conclusion: the Fed didn't do enough. Brad DeLong.: ditto, plus. ...

... AND Paul Krugman: "... they’re trying to use a water pistol to stop a charging rhino."

More on Class Warfare from Krugman: "One is that you have to beware of the old trick of saying 'taxes', then slipping into 'income taxes'. Most Americans pay more payroll than income taxes, but the reverse is true at high incomes. So focusing only on income taxes makes it seem as if the rich pay much more of the burden than they really do." Plus other tricks of the trade designed to fool you into thinking "the rich have done enough." ...

... Krugman is no doubt talking about this "fact check" by the AP's Stephen Ohlemacher.

E. J. Dionne: "... one of the Obama administration’s most successful programs is also its most 'socialist' initiative...: the bailout of General Motors and Chrysler.... Yes, this was socialism — or, perhaps, 'state capitalism' — because the government temporarily took substantial ownership in the companies.... Today, the companies are thriving. More than that: The auto industry exemplifies how unions can do their best to protect the interests of their members while also ensuring the prosperity of the companies that employ them. This month, the United Auto Workers and GM reached a tentative four-year contract that will add or save some 6,500 jobs, provide workers with a $5,000 signing bonus and enhance a profit-sharing agreement.... The union and the company are seeking to align the interests of workers and shareholders."

The Affordable Care Act Is Working. Kevin Sack of the New York Times: "Young adults, long the group most likely to be uninsured, are gaining health coverage faster than expected since the 2010 health law began allowing parents to cover them as dependents on family policies." ...

... Linda Greenhouse has a very fine post on the legal wranglings over the constitutionality of the individual mandate, an essential element of the Affordable Care Act. Greenhouse writes approvingly of "a unanimous three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, sitting in the heart of the old Confederacy, [which] offers a powerful reminder of a fact that a dismaying number of folks appear lately to have forgotten: the Civil War is over... and that p.s., the Union won."

Helene Cooper & Steven Myers of the New York Times: "A last-ditch American effort to head off a Palestinian bid for membership in the United Nations faltered. President Obama tried to qualify his own call, just a year ago, for a Palestinian state. And President Nicolas Sarkozy of France stepped forcefully into the void, with a proposal that pointedly repudiated Mr. Obama’s approach. The extraordinary tableau Wednesday at the United Nations underscored a stark new reality: the United States is facing the prospect of having to share, or even cede, its decades-long role as the architect of Middle East peacemaking." CW: in other words, we have willingly let Israel isolate us in the region; not good for us & ultimately not good for Israel.

Adam Goldman, et al., of the AP: "The New York Police Department put American citizens under surveillance and scrutinized where they ate, prayed and worked, not because of charges of wrongdoing but because of their ethnicity, according to interviews and documents obtained by The Associated Press. The documents describe in extraordinary detail a secret program intended to catalog life inside Muslim neighborhoods as people immigrated, got jobs, became citizens and started businesses. The documents undercut the NYPD's claim that its officers only follow leads when investigating terrorism." ...

... Timothy Williams of the New York Times: "On the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Shoshana Hebshi, 35, a freelance writer and stay-at-home mother ... from a suburb of Toledo, Ohio, was on a plane flying from Denver to Detroit when something she — or another passenger in her row of seats — had done caused the government to scramble F-16 fighter planes and escort Frontier Airlines Flight 623 until it landed safely. The plane was taken to a remote part of the airport, and armed federal authorities handcuffed Ms. Hebshi and her seatmates and took them off the plane. She was placed in a jail cell, strip-searched and interrogated by the F.B.I. before eventually being released.... Ms. Hebshi says she believes she was detained because she is 'dark-skinned' — she is half Arab, half Jewish." See also Fred Drumlevich's comment on today's Off Times Square.

Skid Row, Rural South. Sabrina Tavernise of the New York Times: "The falloff of the economy of Greenwood County, [South Carolina,] a district of almost 70,000 people that once pulsed with busy factories and mills, was the steepest in the country by two counts. According to an analysis of Census Bureau figures made public on Thursday, its poverty rate more than doubled to 24 percent from 2007 to 2010, the largest increase for any county in the nation. The decline also engulfed the middle class. Median household income plunged by 28 percent over the same period...."

... Skid Row, Urban North. Sam Roberts of the New York Times: "Poverty grew nationwide last year, but the increase was even greater in New York City, the Census Bureau will report on Thursday, suggesting that New York was being particularly hard hit by the aftermath of the recession. From 2009 to 2010, 75,000 city residents were pushed into poverty, increasing the poor population to more than 1.6 million and raising the percentage of New Yorkers living below the official federal poverty line to 20.1 percent, the highest level since 2000. The 1.4-percentage-point annual increase in the poverty rate appeared to be the largest jump in nearly two decades." CW: tell it to Wall Street.

Presidential historian Matthew Dickinson is unimpressed with the so-called sensational aspects of Confidence Men, Ron Suskind's book about Obama White House infighting: "... based on reading memos and documents from thirteen previous presidencies, the scenes Suskind describes regarding dissent in the Obama White House are neither uncommon nor nearly as problematic as he would have us believe."

And speaking of books, here's another excerpt -- looks like a prologue -- from Roger Ebert's book Life Itself. Via NPR. Ebert is an easy guy to like and his style is instructive if you're thinking of writing your own memoir for the grandkids, for the public or just to organize your thoughts. Thanks to reader Haley S. for the link.

David Streitfeld of the New York Times: "As speculation swirled Wednesday that Meg Whitman might be brought in to save the troubled Hewlett-Packard, the tech world rendered a verdict: You have got to be kidding." See also today's News Ledes below.

"Let Him Die," an advocacy ad by Protect Your Care:

Right Wing World *

We're going to have a relentless focus on creating jobs. -- John Boehner, late 2010 ...

... Mike Stanfill started RepublicanJobCreation.com as a joke. He began "a chronological list of activities by the GOP beginning 2-10-2011. I'm sorry to report that none, so far, have resulted in a single new job being created in America." CW: Keep returning to Stanfill's site. As he says, "No job creation here. Seriously. Not a fucking employment sausage.... I'll keep adding to this list until the Republican House does something to create jobs. I unhappily predict this is gonna be one lonnnnng list. After all, you don't get rid of a sitting president by helping the economy."

Via AlterNet.Down the Memory Hole. Joshua Holland of AlterNet lists nine policies conservatives were for before they were against them; i.e., before Democrats adopted them. Thanks to a reader for the links to this & to RepublicanJobCreation above.

Michael McAuliff of the (ugh!) Huffington Post: "The GOP-led House Oversight Committee may be accusing the White House of a 'job killing' green energy agenda in a hearing Thursday -- but at least ten Republicans on the panel have signed letters seeking to land green energy jobs in their districts." ...

... AND. Jim Snyder of Bloomberg News: "Republican Representative Darrell Issa, who said government subsidies to specific companies can encourage corruption [& who heads the House Oversight Committee accusing Obama of "job-killing" green energy], sought U.S. help in the past for clean-energy projects in his home state of California. Issa ... wrote Energy Secretary Steven Chu to support an Energy Department loan for Aptera Motors Inc., a Carlsbad, California, electric-car maker, according to a letter received by the department Jan. 14, 2010. 'Awarding this opportunity to Aptera Motors will greatly assist a leading developer of electric vehicles in my district,' Issa wrote...."

I certainly have some concerns [about the creation of a Palestinian state]. The first step in any peaceful negotiation for a two-state solution for the Palestinians is to recognize the right of Israel’s existence. They have to denounce terrorism in both word and deed. And they have to sit down and negotiate with Israel directly. Anything short of that is a non-starter in my opinion. — Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R), in an interview with Time magazine, Sept. 15, 2011

Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post: "Perry is stuck in a time warp. He’s describing a situation that existed in the 1980s, not really today.... We sent Perry’s remarks to three experts on Middle East diplomacy — an Israeli, a Palestinian and an American. All three said he appeared to be remarkably uninformed. We contacted Perry’s spokesman for an explanation but as usual he did not respond. (The Perry campaign has become a fact-free zone, not responding to Fact Checker queries, ever since Perry received Four Pinocchios for his comments on climate change.)

Steve Benen posts a couple of photos you should look at.... Now, do you think Democrats will use the Perry, et al., shot the way Republicans used the Obama, et al., shot? Again and again and again? I don't. Maybe it's because Democrats don't think their voters are stupid bigots, which Republicans are pretty sure about a bloc of their voters.

Nice work, Rev. Al:

..."Romney Calls for a Tax Policy that Will Help "Us" in the Middle Class." Sarah Boxer of CBS News on Mitt Romney, Regular Joe, struggling along like "80 or 90 percent of us"; never mind that actually "he's in the bracket that President Obama is targeting with his proposed 'Buffett rule' to tax millionaires."

As if you had no idea, Michael Crowley of Time writes about why Jon Huntsman, Jr., can't gain any traction in the Republican presidential primaries. The article does provide an interesting overview of Huntsman's campaign.

* Where leaders are rewarded for hypocrisy.

News Ledes

New York Times: "A day after the Federal Reserve announced another measure to stimulate the economy, global financial markets on Thursday declined steeply as pessimism about the outlook for the economies of the United States and Europe was deepened by weak data and the Fed’s own grim assessment. The downcast mood appeared to be reflected across the board. Stocks fell in Asia, Europe and on Wall Street, where equities were down more than 3 percent as the market closed."

Washington Post: "The Obama administration for the first time Thursday openly asserted that Pakistan was indirectly responsible for specific attacks against U.S. troops and installations in Afghanistan, calling a leading Afghan insurgent group 'a veritable arm' of the Pakistani intelligence service. Last week’s attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul and a Sept. 10 truck bombing that killed five Afghans and wounded 77 NATO troops were 'planned and conducted' by the Pakistan-based Haqqani network 'with ISI support,' said Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff."

New York Times: "Meg Whitman, eBay’s former chief executive, was named to lead Hewlett-Packard on Thursday, the company said."

President Obama speaks about the American Jobs Act at the Brent Spence Bridge:

President Obama spoke about the American Jobs Act in Cincinnati, Ohio, this afternoon. A Bridge to Somewhere. Washington Post: "Obama’s scheduled appearance at the Brent Spence Bridge, which connects the home states of House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), has drawn rebukes from his two Republican rivals." AP post-speech story here.

AP: "The number of people applying for unemployment benefits fell last week, though the decline isn't enough to signal improvement in the job market. Weekly applications dropped by 9,000 to a seasonally adjusted 423,000, the Labor Department said Thursday."

New York Times: "Proclaiming his innocence, Troy Davis was put to death by lethal injection on Wednesday night, his life — and the hopes of supporters worldwide — prolonged by several hours while the Supreme Court reviewed but then declined to act on a petition from his lawyers to stay the execution."

New York Times: "White supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer was executed Wednesday evening for the infamous dragging death slaying of James Byrd Jr., a black man from East Texas. Byrd, 49, was chained to the back of a pickup truck and pulled whip-like to his death along a bumpy asphalt road in one of the most grisly hate crime murders in recent Texas history."

Washington Post: "World markets plunged Thursday after the Federal Reserve took a dramatic step to help revive the U.S. economy — and in the process sent a message that America’s financial malaise seems unlikely to dissipate any time soon. Key European and Asian indexes were down more than 4 percent. Investors took the Fed’s surprise action to purchase longer-term bonds--an effort to push down long-term interest rates even further -- as a sign that it felt the U.S. downturn could last for a long time."

AP: "The general commanding NATO's mission in Libya said Thursday that isolated groups of forces loyal to ousted strongman Moammar Gadhafi continue to be a threat to local people but are unable to coordinate their actions. Canadian Lt. Gen. Charles Bouchard said in a conference call with reporters that many Gadhafi forces are surrounded with no way out. On Wednesday, NATO's decision-making body, the North Atlantic Council, granted approval to extend the mission for another 90 days."

AP: "Palestinian protesters have denounced President Barack Obama for his opposition to their bid to win U.N. recognition of a Palestinian state. Dozens rallied on Thursday outside Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' office in Ramallah."

Around the Virtual Watercooler

Here is an excerpted virtual conversation I had with friends today. The subject, mostly, is whether or not President Obama is up to the job, and if not, why not? Names are changed to protect the intelligent:

Marie:

My Off Times Square question du jour is “Does Obama Really Mean It?” Will he really fight for progressive ideals or is he just shitting us the way he did in 2008?

Aphrodite (part of this response follows an earlier thread):

I think the most likely reason the Bush war crimes were never prosecuted is that Congress has dirty hands too.  They were briefed.... maybe not the whole story but enough so they are accessories after, even during, the fact.  Pelosi made it clear that impeachment was off the table.  The corruption in the Bush Justice Dept. ran deep too, and doubtless vestiges of it still exist.  There is a cover-up of the cover-up.  Holder is less than useless. And Obama?  Add weakness and inexperience into the mix.  The generals rule him, so wouldn't be surprised if the CIA does too.

Apollo:

I think we were all way to happy to be rid of Bush to see that Obama was just not ready for this job. He was a great campaigner, but as a president? I think he's a middle of the roader. Granted, if we're honest, we have to admit he did a few good things. But it was the way he did them and the fact that had he been more forceful and hit the ground running with a staff that wasn't ready to stab him in the back (Summers, et al) and question his manhood (because Larry is such a stud) and if he had been ready to fight back against the kind of evil that Bush and company spread across the land, he could have been one of the truly great presidents. I remember Clinton once complaining that he never had the kind of opportunities that presidents need (crises, wars, etc) that thrust them into the ranks of the great. I think he's right on that one. Of course Clinton deep sixed himself on many scores as well. There was no lack of hubris there. But he had no problem going toe to toe with the execrable Newtie when Gingrich shut down the government. Obama would have asked permission to please can he keep the lights on in the White House because his kids have homework to do.

Obama was never the guy we all hoped he'd be. Probably not even the guy HE hoped he'd be.  And I have to agree with Marie who recently said something along the lines of him not being able to change who he is at this late date.  I think those kinds of change are possible. Asclepius [see below] could probably describe the technical apparatus behind life-changing psychological change (such as losing a loved one in a horrible way, or falling in love), the kind that come either from trauma or from some kind of massively epiphanous events. God knows there have been enough of those events over the last 3 years but none of them appear to have penetrated the Obama dome just yet. So, no, I don't think he'll be changing anytime soon.

So, I think this latest gambit is just that. Although "gambit" might be a little too aggressive a term. In chess one attempts a gambit with the idea of following through with any opening that may occur in your opponent's game plan. Obama has had any number of chances to plunge into the breach but each time he's decided it would be better to let his enemies carry away their wounded and rebuild their defenses. It reminds me of the maddening intransigence of the civil war general McClellan who ran the Army of the Potomac, preferring to drill and practice at war for month after month while incredible opportunities to strike at the heart of confederate troops passed him by. When his patience had finally run out, Lincoln sent McClellan a telegram saying "General, if you are not going to use your troops, I'd like to borrow them for a while."

I feel the same way about Obama. If he's not going to use his position as President, use the bully pulpit, and the FUCKING FOLLOW THROUGH ON THE GODDAM FUCKING RHETORIC....I'd  like to use it for just a month. I would leave a bloody trail through the ranks of these traitorous goddam fucking Republicans. "Pyhrric victory" I hear someone saying? Fucking right. I'd take any victory right now just as long as I take some of those pig-faced lying traitors down with me.

Marie:

Someone quoted in a news article (I’m a lot of help – can’t remember the article; can’t remember the someone) said Obama believed in a Washington that just doesn’t exist – where reasonable people sit down and work out reasonable solutions to the nation’s problems. I think that guy was right. Obama thought he could wave his magical presidential powers wand & charm a bunch of hardline, fuck-you-all-I’m-in-it-for-myself officially elected sociopaths just as he charmed millions of American people, including me. Rhetoric gets you elected; hardball gets your policies passed. Obama is like the Robert Redford character in “The Candidate” who says as the end of the film, after he’s just been elected, “Now what do I do?” Obama had no fucking idea – just dreams of getting his minions to send him daily to-do lists so he could solve the problems, one-by-one. His first full day’s schedule probably looked like this:

(1) Work out with Michelle in White House personal gym. (1 hour)

(2) Call world leaders. Accept congratulations. (2 hours)

(3) Call Mitch McConnell. Get him to agree to stimulus bill. Remind him to get his caucus behind him. Accept congratulations. (30 min.)

(4) Get Chief Justice Roberts over here to re-administer the oath. Accept congratulations. Pose for photo with CJ Fuck-Up. (10 min.)

(5) Play a little B-ball (1 hour)

(6) Have an apple & some cottage cheese. (15 min.)

(7) Close Gitmo. (5 min.)

(8) Call Wall Street CEOs. Tell them to quit giving themselves big bonuses, stop making those crooked deals, & start lending more. Accept congratulations. Hit them up for 2012. (1 1/2 hours)

(9) Talk to the kids about how their school day went. Congratulate them on doing so well. Show them the secret panel in the Oval Office desk. (15 min.)

(10) Tell Geithner to put those fucking banks in receivership & make sure there are no presidential fingerprints on the move. Give Geithner some public relations pointers. (15 min.)

(11) Stop by the Lincoln Memorial & ask Lincoln why he thought the job was so tough. Thank Secret Service detail. (30 min.)

Somehow it didn’t work out that way.

Aphrodite:

I read somewhere (forget where) that since Biden will be too old to run for president in five years, he will step down and become Sec. of State.  And that Obama will ask Xavier Becerra to be his running mate to get the dwindling Hispanic support back, especially given that Marco Rubio may be no. 2 on the GOP ticket.  This would set Becerra up to run in 2016 and snag the vote of the fast growing demographic in the USA.  And I betcha Hillary is on the short list for Supreme Court.

Apollo:

Hillary on the Supreme Court.....hmmm. I guess it would allow her to drop her pretense of being a war loving demagogue as she was during Bush II, if it was a pretense. When you're on the court you can just be your own true self. Like Sam Alito is an asshole and John Roberts is a lying piece of shit and Clarence Thomas is a far-right extremist who sleeps his way through arguments and the Dark Lord is a smug, know-it-all far right-wing wise ass, and....

Well, you get the idea.

It's not that I think it would be a bad idea. I think she might make a fine justice. Politically she might be one of the few Democrats who could make the cut seeing as Republicans would lambaste anyone without her political pedigree and connections whom they thought might actually rule in favor of actual justice rather than right-wing expediency. Hillary has worked hard at building connections across the aisle. But even those connections would evaporate in a congress ruled by the Issas and Ryans and Bachmanns, not to mention the Lil' Randys [Paul] in the senate who would vote against anyone who didn't masturbate to Ayn Rand.

Marie, too bad that list [above] is probably close to Obama's actual fantasy of day one.

Marie:

I see no chance of Hillary’s being nominated to the Court. Because of Washington acrimony, presidents have to nominate young candidates; they don’t have the luxury of giving their cronies Lifetime Achievement Awards. I haven’t done the statistics, but it’s a sure bet that turnover on the Court today is way lower than it ever has been. Of course people died younger in the old days (tho that was less true of people who could afford the best health care of the day), so you’d have to factor all that in. But still. Probably half of Americans weren’t even born when Scalia took the oath. Haven’t done the demographics there, either.

Apollo:

The biggest problem, as I see it, for us, is what, or who, next? If the political pendulum swings the way it usually does (and since Reagan, that pendulum swings much farther to the right with every cycle) we will have a Repuke president in five years. Five more years for Obama to hem and haw and let the Tea Party set the agenda. His eight years will end with some kind of dramatic flourish, something he can highlight in his memoirs, or more depressingly, it will end in disaster, despondency, spiritual destitution. And what will he say then?

"Apres moi, le deluge" would probably be appropriate. And truthful.

For who do the Democrats have in the wings? Hillary will be too old. Biden? LMAO. Who? There are no rising stars, even no faux stars a la Bobby Jindal. At one point I thought Jim Webb might be someone we could look to but I haven't heard a word from him in years.

So what we have to look forward to is one of the intellectual dwarfs now running on the Repuke side. Or someone even worse.

There will be no appetite for another Democratic president after this guy is through. None. So thank you for that, Mr. President.

Asclepius (weighing in late in the conversation [doctors are always late]):

Re: Obama's character and ability to change, the way I see it is that he has the temperament and intelligence of an excellent constitutional law professor, but not of a savvy, down in the dirt pol -- which, of course is exactly what he needs to be. He just does not have the guts for dirty fights, and what a shame that he needs to. But he does.

I think Obama is basically his mother's son.  She was a scholar and mediator par excellence. However, she was quite impractical in many ways and found it hard to stay focused. She was loved and honored for her fairness and decency and her ability to research and write simply and beautifully about the importance of craftmaking in the  Indonesian culture, especially among the women, who had for generations sustained their families and contribute to their culture. She  researched endlessly about the various villages and their differing customs and contributions. Some say she probably got too nitty-gritty. But that was her passion. She also "held court" among expatriates and Indonesians alike -- which is a bit what Barry enjoys doing. And she always stayed above the fray as a non-judgmental, tolerant role-model.

Obama inherited his mother's fluency and ability to write beautifully, and I think her values. However, he had no useful male role model, so never learned to deal with bullies who tormented him, much less bullies who were supposed to serve him -- i.e., Larry Summers. I do not think it is in his nature to be a warrior (as Hillary is) and all the male Republican candidates are, with the exception of Rick Santorum (who is just a wart).  He is a good strategist about things he deems important and stays on course like a laser beam -- think bin Laden. But he can't seem to grasp the concept and necessity of fighting the foe every day, and is unable to get his own hands dirty, although he is certainly able to let others do it for him. So ... he depends on his silver tongue and golden rhetoric to "play dirty," and we have seen how ineffectual that is.

I do think he has the news about the Republicans, but it remains to be seen whether he will just travel around and speechify to the American people about how obstructive "those people" are or whether he can take his silver tongue to the Hill and smite down the toads. I'm not very hopeful. The Bully Pulpit should be his strong suit, but he cannot manage the necessary strong or vile language!

The other part of Barry's character is the genetic inheritance from his ambitious, overly confident father -- a crazy alcoholic with hubris coming out of every pore. Put that together with his mediating professorial style and  essential decency and -- yikes. Not a fit.

I agree with Marie that he cannot change who he is. None of us can, really. We can change our perspective, come to new understandings, and gain wisdom (or not), but we cannot change our essential temperament. Whatever repetoire we learn and put into practice will be in our own style.