The Commentariat -- April 27

By popular request, I'm running an open thread comments page in Off Times Square today. Comments on Brooks yesterday were, well, lively.

A Bizarro Moment in American History. President Obama releases his long-form birth certificate:

... Okay, Birthers, here it is.

     ... Click on the certificate to see a slightly larger image. To examine the certificate in any size you want, go to this White House page. A pdf of the President's & his counsel's correspondence with the Hawaii Department of Health is here. ...

... Trump responds in Trump fashion: "Today I am very proud of myself...."

     ... "An Embarrassment to the Country." Adam Serwer in the Washington Post: "... those who fostered doubts about the president’s citizenship are unlikely to relent in the face of factual proof, because birtherism was never about the facts. For its most ardent proponents, it was and is about the inability to accept the legitimacy of a black man in the White House. Nothing about the decision to release the president’s birth certificate can change that." ...

     ... Ali Weinberg of NBC News has some more blogger reactions, many of which are predictably ridiculous. For instance, winger-blogger & CNN contributing correspondent (or whatever the hell CNN calls him) Erick Erickson now demands to see the President's college transcripts. Loons!

** New York Times Editors: "Less than a year before the 2012 presidential voting begins, Republican legislatures and governors across the country are rewriting voting laws to make it much harder for the young, the poor and African-Americans — groups that typically vote Democratic — to cast a ballot. Spreading fear of a nonexistent flood of voter fraud, they are demanding that citizens be required to show a government-issued identification before they are allowed to vote. Republicans have been pushing these changes for years, but now more than two-thirds of the states have adopted or are considering such laws. The Advancement Project, an advocacy group of civil rights lawyers, correctly describes the push as 'the largest legislative effort to scale back voting rights in a century.'”

Michael Shear of the New York Times offers five reasons Republicans are opting out of the 2012 presidential race. CW: my reason -- why work so hard only to be an also-ran?

David Leonhardt of the New York Times: "Ben Bernanke ... will hold a news conference" at 2:15 pm ET. In the spirit of democratic accountability, [the media] should ask hard questions — and we shouldn’t let him get away with the evasions and half-answers that members of Congress too often allow Fed chairmen during their appearances on Capitol Hill. One question more than any than other is crying out for an answer: Why has Mr. Bernanke decided to accept widespread unemployment for years on end, even though he believes he has the power to reduce it?" Washington Post story by Neil Irwin here. ...

... Annie Lowrey in Slate: "... the press conferences hardly imply the bank is headed for Oprah-type revelations. It remains an opaque, tealeaf-manufacturing institution. In fact, the press conference itself seems designed to not make news. It is mostly a symbolic gesture.... Expect non-answers, for the most part...." CW: ironically (or on purpose), at the moment Ben Bernanke poses as the Non-Oprah, President Obama & First Lady Michelle Obama wil be sitting on Oprah's couch. (see today's President's Calendar near the bottom of the right column). ...

     ... Paul Krugman Update: "Bernanke wimps out."

... "Private Gains, Public Losses." Economist Simon Johnson: "... the banks blew themselves up at great cost to the American people, with major negative global implications. Most of the public-debt increase in the US and elsewhere is not due to any kind of discretionary fiscal stimulus; it’s all about the loss of tax revenue that comes with a deep recession. (And the Bush administration’s tax cuts for the wealthiest, unfunded Medicare prescription benefit, and debt-financed wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have severely weakened the long-term fiscal outlook.) Finally, the cost of the crisis is millions of homes lost and lives damaged, some permanently."

Jennifer Steinhauer & Carl Hulse of the New York Times: "After 10 days of trying to sell constituents on their plan to overhaul Medicare, House Republicans in multiple districts appear to be increasingly on the defensive, facing worried and angry questions from voters and a barrage of new attacks from Democrats and their allies." ...

... A Preview of the Summer of 2011. Jennifer Haberkorn of Politico: "Record crowds of supporters and opponents flooded town hall meetings throughout southeastern Wisconsin on Tuesday to hear Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) defend his plan to trim government spending — including controversial changes to the Medicare program. In the district’s Democratic stronghold of Kenosha, at least 200 people were left outside once the 300-seat auditorium filled to capacity. The people in the crowd largely opposed the Ryan plan, holding signs such as 'RyanCare = Dying Bare,' 'Leave Medicare Alone' or simply, 'Save Medicare!'" Here's a brief video from the Kenosha meeting:

... Mark Schlueb of the Orlando Sentinel: "A town hall meeting held in Orlando by U.S. Rep. Dan Webster degenerated into bedlam Tuesday, with members of the crowd shouting down the freshman Republican congressman and yelling at one another.... Webster beat Democrat U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson last year. But the 8^th Congressional District has a Democrat majority, and the party hopes to take the seat back in 2012." Thanks to Jeanne B. for the link. Here's video that is part of a related article by Scott Keyes of Think Progress:

     ... WFTV 9 Orlando has more video here.

... "We just feel like sitting ducks."Zaid Jilani of Think Progress: In New Hampshire, constituents are polite to Republican Rep. Charles Bass, but they're not favorably impressed with the Ryan/Republican budget. With video. ...

... Rachel Maddow has a great segment on citizen reaction to the Ryan/ Republican budget:

... Say What? David Nather of Politico: "Speaker John Boehner has given an interview in which he said Ryan’s plan was an idea 'worthy of consideration' and that he wasn’t 'wedded to it.' Democrats and liberal groups said Boehner’s comments to ABC News, in an interview posted Tuesday afternoon, make it sound like he’s backpedaling from the House vote two weeks ago in which all but four Republicans voted for Ryan’s budget plan [emphasis added] — including the Medicare overhaul that’s raising so many questions at their town hall meetings. Here's the interview:

      ... The whole interview is interesting. The part where Boehner backs off the Ryan budget he got his Caucus to vote for en masse comes about 2:45 min. in. ...

... AND as Brian Beutler of TPM points out, in the ABC News interview, Boehner "admitted what few members of his own party will admit...: that the GOP's Medicare privatization plan is similar in many key respects to the health care law they have spent the last two years demonizing." ...

... Economist Mark Thoma, in the Fiscal Times, explains why the voucher system, which the Ryan plan mandates to replace Medicare, would lead to rising, not falling, healthcare costs. ...

... Economist Dean Baker in TPM: "Twenty five million people are unemployed, underemployed or out of the workforce altogether..., millions of homeowners are underwater in their mortgage and facing the loss of their homes..., tens of millions of baby boomers are at the edge of retirement and have just lost their life savings," but all Washington is talking about is the deficit. And they're not serious about that; if they were, the Congressional Progressive Caucus's budget proposal "would be very much at the center of the debate." Thanks to Trish R. for the link.

Steve Benen: "It's important to appreciate the evolution of House Speaker John Boehner's (R-Ohio) rhetoric when it comes to raising the debt ceiling. This matters because, as we get closer to a crisis of Republicans' own making, Boehner is become more reckless and irresponsible, not less."

New York Times Editors: "If there was any lingering doubt, the latest data confirm that housing is still in a deep and broad recession. In the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller home price report for 20 large cities, house prices in February fell to a level last seen in April 2009 — their lowest point in the bust. In a Census Bureau report, new home sales in March remained near their lowest levels since records were first kept in 1963.... How much worse they will need to get before regulators, lawmakers and the Obama administration make an all-out effort to fix the problem."

Steven Greenhouse of the New York Times: "The nation’s main firefighters’ union, long a strong supporter of Democratic candidates, announced on Tuesday that it would indefinitely suspend all contributions to federal candidates out of frustration with Congressional Democrats who, union officials say, have not fought harder against budget cuts and antiunion legislation. The union, the International Association of Fire Fighters, said it would focus its contributions and energies on state and local races because many legislatures have sought to curtail collective bargaining or otherwise weaken public-sector unions." CW: this is what happens when Democrats act like Republicans.

** CW: As Karen Garcia and I have been say for months, President Obama is a moderate Republican. Now Ezra Klein has taken note: "... the position that Obama and the Democrats have staked out is the very position that moderate Republicans staked out in the early ’90s — and often, well into the 2000s.... It appears that as Democrats moved to the right to pick up Republican votes, Republicans moved to the right to oppose Democratic proposals." Klein gives numerous examples of Obama policies that mirror those of Republican leaders.

Make Medicare Itself a "Death Panel." Ezra Klein: one way to substantially cut Medicare costs -- require every recipient to sign a living will mandating that doctors not prolong our lives by extraordinary (and very costly) measures. CW: I have a living will, my husband has a living will, but I don't think a single politician in today's political climate would make Medicare benefits contingent on living wills. ...

     ... Update: What Klein really says is that the Medicare-required living will could include any instructions. Klein is betting that most people would choose not to ask for extraordinary measures. It was Andrew Sullivan, whom Klein quotes, who suggested, "If everyone aged 40 or over simply made sure we appointed someone to be our power-of-attorney and instructed that person not to prolong our lives by extraordinary measures if we lost consciousness in a long, fatal illness or simply old age." Sullivan suggests the living will be completely voluntary. Thanks to reader Trish R. for catching my error.

If you read this article in the New York Times, by Trip Gabriel, you will be left with the impression that Jeb Bush is a marvelous advocate for education reform. Well, he isn't. Jeb Bush is a marvelous advocate for taking public money out of public schools & putting it into private education. He's into teaching to the test, too. And his very favorite cause of all is to break teachers unions, something he tried to do while Governor of Florida, & tried to do again after he left office. The article tells you that Bill Gates is among the Bush foundation donors. It doesn't mention that his biggest backers are for-profit schools. Jennie Smith of the Miami Examiner has some of the story here and here.

Scott Shane of the New York Times: "On Monday, hours after ... WikiLeaks, The New York Times and other news organizations began publishing the documents online, the Justice Department informed Guantánamo defense lawyers that the documents remained legally classified.... Because the lawyers have security clearances, they are obligated to treat the readily available files 'in accordance with all relevant security precautions and safeguards' — handling them, for example, only in secure government facilities, said the notice from the department’s Court Security Office. It is only the latest absurdist challenge posed by the flood of classified material obtained by WikiLeaks over the past year...."

Roy Barnes of the AP: "Being against a president over his policies is one thing, but being petty over everything Obama says and does reflects the mean-spiritedness of many in the conservative movement."

Right Wing World *

I went to work at 11 years old. I became governor. It’s not a big deal. Work doesn’t hurt anybody. -- Gov. Paul LePage, Maine, on why child labor laws should be rolled back

Putting Kids to Work! Here's Maine Republican/Tea Party Gov. Paul LePage trying to justify his plan to gut child labor laws, a plan which is probably the most oppressive idea I've heard among all the oppressive ideas state Republicans have dreamed up this year:

     ... One problem with LePage's argument: it ain't true. Daily Kos: "He describes the bill affecting 14 and 15 year olds, when in fact it lowers wages for people up to 20 years old and eliminates the limit on hours a 16 year old can work on a school day."

(... Missed this one from April 23: Tom Bell of Maine Today (okay, Maine a Few Days Ago) "A federal judge ruled Friday that Gov. Paul LePage did not violate the free speech clause of the First Amendment when he ordered a mural removed from the headquarters of the Maine Department of Labor.")

* Where facts never intrude.

News Ledes

New York Times: "Fatah and Hamas, the rival Palestinian movements, announced an agreement in principle on Wednesday to end a years-long internal Palestinian schism." Haaretz story here.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke will hold a press conference at 2:15 pm ET. Related stories in today's Commentariat. Post-presser New York Times story: "The Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, defended his management of the nation’s economy on Wednesday, arguing that the central bank was doing all it could to increase employment without unduly risking higher inflation." Update: what Bernanke said, via Reuters:

NBC News: "Eight American troops and a U.S. contractor died Wednesday after an Afghan military pilot opened fire during a meeting at Kabul airport — the deadliest episode to date of an Afghan turning against his coalition partners, officials said. The Afghan officer, who was a veteran military pilot, fired on the Americans after an argument, the Afghan Defense Ministry said."

In a letter to Congressional leaders yesterday, President Obama wrote, "I ... urge you to take immediate action to eliminate unwarranted tax breaks for the oil and gas industry, and to use those dollars to invest in clean energy to reduce our dependence on foreign oil." Here's the Washington Post's story on the President's letter.

National Journal: "Vermont is on the fast track to becoming the first state with universal health care with the passage of a single-payer health care bill on Tuesday. The Vermont Senate approved the bill 21-9 to offer government-funded health insurance to all state residents. The bill will now go to a conference committee, where the House and Senate will hash out the differences in the bill before sending it to Gov. Peter Shumlin, a Democrat. Shumlin will have to obtain approval from the Obama administration before he could begin to implement the single-payer system, which would begin in 2013."

Washington Post: "President Obama is expected to announce long-anticipated changes in his national security team this week, including a new ambassador to Afghanistan.... The officials said that Ryan C. Crocker, a five-time ambassador who retired in 2009 after wartime service in Iraq, is likely to be named to take over the U.S. Embassy in Kabul...." AP story here.

     Politico Update: "... President Barack Obama has chosen a consummate Washington insider, CIA director Leon Panetta, to guide the Pentagon through what promises to be a turbulent period of transition and given Panetta’s old job to Gen. David Petraeus.... Talking to reporters this morning, White House press secretary Jay Carney would not discuss the appointments, which were confirmed by a source familiar with the decision, and said the White House will have be no personnel announcements until Thursday." Update: New York times story here.

AP: "The Syrian army sent more tanks and reinforcements into Daraa on Wednesday as part of a widening crackdown against opponents of President Bashar Assad's authoritarian regime, and gunfire and sporadic explosions were heard in the tense southern city.... Security forces conducted sweeping arrests and raids elsewhere in the country, witnesses said."

The Commentariat -- April 26

The comments page for David Brooks is up on Off Times Square. Karen Garcia & I have posted our comments -- hours before you'll see them (if ever) on the New York Times site. Post your own. Update: Garcia & I have made the NYT cut, but Akhilleus, who now has posted on Off Times Square, has not.

My favorite definition of a humanist: 'One who strives to behave decently and honorably with no expectation of eternal rewards or punishments.' -- David Clark, commenting on Off Times Square on Ross Douthat's column

The Guantánamo Files page in the Guardian provides a pretty handy way to review the newly-released WikiLeaks documents. ...

... New York Times Editors: "The internal documents from the prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, published in The Times on Monday were a chilling reminder of the legal and moral disaster that President George W. Bush created there. They describe the chaos, lawlessness and incompetence in his administration’s system for deciding detainees’ guilt or innocence and assessing whether they would be a threat if released." ...

... Scott Shane & Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "The newly revealed assessments ... have revived the dispute, nearly as old as the prison, over whether mistreatment of some prisoners there and the prison’s operation outside the criminal justice system invalidate the government’s conclusions about the detainees. Hina Shamsi, director of the national security project at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the assessments 'are rife with uncorroborated evidence, information obtained through torture, speculation, errors and allegations that have been proven false.'"

... Richard Serrano of the Los Angeles Times: "Fresh and often chilling portraits of [Khalid Shaikh] Mohammed and the other most-prized 'high value' detainees at Guantanamo emerged from the latest release of classified material by WikiLeaks...." ...

... Glenn Greenwald: "How could anyone possibly justify prosecuting WikiLeaks for disseminating classified information while not prosecuting these newspapers who have done exactly the same thing?" Greenwald goes on to contrast U.S. (New York Times & Washington Post) coverage with British stories on the files. Link to the Guardian stories Greenwald highlights here. ...

... Yesterday, I linked this WashPo article on why President Obama failed to close Gitmo. Marcy Wheeler zeroes in on the important take-aways from the Post's reporting.

A friend sent me this video on how to deal with a racist someone who makes a racist remark:

What the Ryan/Republican budget plan really means:

By Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Thanks to A. Friend for sending it my way.

Like the odds of typing monkeys eventually keying in the complete works of Shakespeare, there's a chance Donald Trump will get something right. He just did:

The seniors are afraid. The plan Paul Ryan put forth has made the Democrats so happy. -- Donald Trump 

Michael Fletcher of the Washington Post: "The state funds that pay pension and health-care benefits to retired teachers, corrections officers and millions of other public workers faced a cumulative shortfall of at least $1.26 trillion at the end of fiscal 2009, according to a new report. The study, to be released Tuesday by the Pew Center on the States, found that the pension and health-care funding gap increased by 26 percent over the previous year. Pew officials said the growing shortfall was driven by inadequate state contributions, an aging population and market losses that accompanied the recession." ...

... Michael Cooper & Mary Williams Walsh of the New York Times: "Conventional wisdom and the laws and constitutions of many states have long held that the pensions being earned by current government workers are untouchable. But as the fiscal crisis has lingered, officials in strapped states from California to Illinois have begun to take a second look, to see whether there might be loopholes allowing them to cut the pension benefits of current employees." ...

... Paul Krugman debunks the "zombie" claim that "there has been a huge expansion in the federal government under Obama.... What we’re seeing isn’t some drastic expansion of Big Government; we’re seeing the government we already had, responding to a terrible economic slump."

Steve Mufson & Jon Cohen of the Washington Post: "The Post-ABC poll shows that 60 percent of independents who say they’ve been hit hard by surging gas prices also say they definitely won’t support Obama in his bid for reelection. In a hypothetical matchup with former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, the top GOP performer in the Post-ABC poll, Romney wins by 24 points among the independents who have taken a severe financial hit because of gas prices, and the president is up 7 percentage points among other independents.

Andrew Cohen of The Atlantic: "Former Solicitor General Paul Clement took quite the parting shot at his former Washington law firm Monday when he announced that he would leave King & Spalding so that he could continue to represent House Republicans in their effort to defend the Defense of Marriage Act." Read Cohen's whole post.

Nate Silver "on the largely irrelevant news about Haley Barbour not running for President." CW: an interesting post in which Silver explains why Barbour appears to be shrewder than the Serious People. ...

... Karen Garcia is not joining the Obama campaign. Here's the video that Garcia found so unconvincing. It's a snoozer:

Fox "News" Shocker! President Obama Didn't Tell You Sunday Was Easter. Steve Benen: "Fox News today slammed President Obama for not issuing a proclamation acknowledging Easter. (Somehow, Christians managed to hear about the holiday anyway.) Conservative activists quickly followed suit.... It's a garbage story, even by the standards of GOP media.... President Obama hosted an Easter prayer breakfast; the Obamas attended Easter services; and the White House hosted a big Easter Egg Roll for families today. No proclamation was issued, but no other modern presidents -- from either party -- have issued Easter proclamations, either."

After auditing the Obamas' tax return, Stephen Colbert assesses the Republican field of presidential candidates, with emphasis on the Donald:

... Hooray! More Conspiracy Theories from the Donald. Beth Fouhy of the AP: "... Donald Trump suggested in an interview Monday that President Barack Obama had been a poor student who did not deserve to be admitted to the Ivy League universities he attended. Trump ... offered no proof for his claim but said he would continue to press the matter as he has the legitimacy of the president's birth certificate. 'I heard he was a terrible student, terrible. How does a bad student go to Columbia and then to Harvard?' Trump said in an interview with The Associated Press. "I'm thinking about it, I'm certainly looking into it. Let him show his records." ...

... PLUS ... CNN: Trump claims Barack Obama's birth certificate is "missing." Too bad that "CNN's Gary Tuchman also interviewed the former director of the Hawaii Department of Health, who said she has seen the original birth certificate in the vault at the Department of Health." ...

... AND ... Fox "News": "Donald Trump slammed Robert De Niro Monday, following the Oscar-winner’s criticisms of him this weekend, telling Fox News that the actor is 'not the brightest bulb on the planet.'"

Jonathan Chait of The New Republic. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker makes a gross misstatement about Medicaid, which he wants to dismantle. CW: It's always hard to know when Walker is out-and-out lying and when he just doesn't know WTF he's talking about.

* Where facts never intrude.

News Ledes

Politico: "The Justice Department has dropped its long-running criminal investigation of a lawyer who publicly admitted leaking information about President George W. Bush’s top-secret warrantless wiretapping program to The New York Times – disclosures that Bush denounced as a breach of national security and that stoked a congressional debate about whether the government had overstepped its authority.... The decision not to prosecute former Justice Department lawyer Thomas Tamm means it is unlikely that anyone will ever be charged for the disclosures that led to the Times’ Pulitzer Prize-winning story in December 2005...." Update: the New York Times story is here.

New York Times: "Federal investigators said Monday that they had discovered flaws in the riveting of the roof of the Southwest Airlines plane that tore open in flight on April 1, a finding that experts said probably showed manufacturing defects.

Still Playing Chicken. Politico: "Speaker John Boehner won’t guarantee a vote on raising the debt limit, the latest threat in an increasingly high stakes game of chicken with the White House over whether Congress will inch closer to letting the nation default on its credit."

AP: "A recall effort targeting two Democratic state senators has fallen short at the deadline. Organizers had until Monday afternoon to turn in petitions to recall Sen. Lena Taylor of Milwaukee and Sen. Fred Risser of Madison. But the organizers failed to meet the deadline."

AP: "Gunfire reverberated Tuesday in the southern Syrian city of Daraa where the dead still lay unclaimed in the streets a day after a brutal government crackdown on the popular revolt against President Bashar Assad, residents said." ...

... Al Jazeera Update: "As the Syrian government intensifies its crackdown against pro-democracy protesters, the international community steps up its pressure on president Bashar al-Assad to stop the bloodletting. In a session on Tuesday, members of the UN Security Council discussed the uptick in violence, but failed to issue a collective statement. Still, Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, condemned the violence against 'peaceful protesters' and called on the Syrian government to respect the people's rights to freedom of expression."

New York Times: "The Ford Motor Company reported on Tuesday its largest first-quarter profit since 1998, despite a shift in sales to smaller, more fuel-efficient cars."

The Commentariat -- April 25

This Republican President. Ezra Klein: "... The White House’s [budget] plan is, if anything, substantially more conservative than the Simpson-Bowles [Catfood Commission] framework." ...

... Paul Krugman: "... the only major budget proposal out there offering a plausible path to balancing the budget is the one that includes significant tax increases: the 'People’s Budget' from the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which — unlike the Ryan plan, which was just right-wing orthodoxy with an added dose of magical thinking — is genuinely courageous because it calls for shared sacrifice." Here's a link to the CPC budget, which has a very readable overview. Comments are activiated on the Off Times Square page, and I've posted mine. ...

     ... NEW. For a delicious taste of incomparable parody, I direct you to Krugman Comment #36, the work of one Winnie Regressivita. (You have to be at least a semi-regular Times comments reader to appreciate the art of the comment.) Please recommend it, and no, I didn't write it. But I wish I had.

     ... Update: I've also added a comments page for Ross Douthat's column on Off Times Square. Have at it. Update 2: My comment, which I submitted within minutes of the time Douthat's column went up, has been "disappeared." I guess the moderators didn't like my definition of Douthat's Hell, but you can read my comment in Off Times Square. Update 3: now there are more excellent comments on Douthat. Like mine, Akhilleus' comment likely won't make the Times cut because it's too true.

Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker writes a long, riveting piece about the evolution of Barack Obama's international policy.

Peter Finn of the Washington Post: "A cache of classified military documents obtained by ...WikiLeaks presents new details of the whereabouts [of Al Qaeda leaders] on Sept. 11, 2001, and their movements afterward. The documents also offer some tantalizing glimpses into the whereabouts and operations of Osama bin Laden and his Egyptian deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri. The documents, provided to European and U.S. news outlets, including The Washington Post, are intelligence assessments of nearly every one of the 779 individuals who have been held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since 2002." New York Times story by Charlie Savage, et al., here.

Peter Finn & Anne Kornblut of the Washington Post: "... the failed effort to close Guantanamo was reflective of the aspects of [President] Obama’s leadership style that continue to distress his liberal base — a willingness to allow room for compromise and a passivity that at times permits opponents to set the agenda."

The Republicans are looking at this as just another opening to force the president’s hand, to hold everything hostage again. The White House shouldn’t cave, and the Republicans shouldn’t count on that. The White House needs to be tough on this one. -- Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) on the vote to raise the debt ceiling. McGovern also said House Democrats would vote against a GOP-Obama deal with too many GOP cuts attached to it.

Michael Grunwald of Time wants to ask Fed Chair Ben Bernanke why he's failing. "I’ve described Bernanke as the most transparent Fed chairman ever — which, granted, is a bit like being the most intelligent Real Housewife ever — and I think it’s really cool that on Wednesday he’ll hold the first press conference in Fed history." So maybe Grunwald will ask Bernanke that question at the presser, OR ...

... Grunwald could read Paul Krugman, who already knows the real answer: "... what we’ve had is a much downsized version of the policy, more than offset by other government actions — a lot like the fiscal stimulus. And we’re supposed to be surprised that it proved disappointing?" ...

... Benjamin Wallace-Wells profiles Paul Krugman in New York magazine. The print version, which saves your clicking through, is here, but it wanted for some punctuation when I called it up.

"He Broke the Law." Glenn Greenwald has a terrific post on President & Constitutional Scholar Obama's stunning pre-trial declaration that Bradley Manning was guilty as charged. ...

... M. J. Lee & Abby Phillip of Politico cite experts who agree with Greenwald. ...

... Teddy Partridge of Firedoglake compares President Obama's statement & the follow-up/cover-up with President Richard Nxon's declaration that Charles Manson was guilty of murder -- while the jurors were still deliberating. A big difference: the Manson "jurors were not in a directly subordinate relationship to the commander-in-chief, as any jurors in a possible Bradley Manning court-martial would be."

Marcia Dunn of the AP on the launch of the Shuttle Endeavor this Friday, which Mark Kelly, husband of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, will captain. Giffords & the Obama family will attend.

Rose George in a New York Times op-ed: the shipping industry is rife with abuse of crews, because of the system of “open registries” [which] are used by over 60 percent of shippers, up from 4 percent in the 1950s. Under the flags of convenience system, registries have been divorced from government oversight."

Jonathan Cohn of The New Republic: it isn't just Medicare, Medicaid & the Affordable Health Act the GOP has voted to end/dismantle. The Ryan/Republican budget, already voted in by House Republicans, will end the food stamp program (now know as SNAP) as we know it.

"They Lied." The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee whacks Republicans who promised during the 2010 campaign to preserve Medicare, then voted to gut it shortly after they took office:

... Meanwhile, Alexander Bolton of The Hill reports that "Senate Democratic aides expect Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to force Senate Republicans to vote on the Paul Ryan budget plan. Reid hasn’t made a formal decision yet, and won’t until he returns from an overseas trip."

It’s like a big hustle. It’s like being a car salesman. Don’t go out there and say things unless you can back them up. How dare you? That’s awful to do. To just go out and speak and say these terrible things? Unless you just wanna get over and get the job. It’s crazy. -- Actor Robert De Niro, on Donald Trump's birther tour

Right Wing World *

Rick Hertzberg: "For the Donald, thinking less and less seems to be working more and more." ...

... Andy Borowitz: "A threat to the fledgling presidential campaign of Donald Trump emerged today, as a group of activists charged that Mr. Trump is not eligible to hold the nation’s highest office because his hair does not originate from the U.S. The group, who call themselves 'Balders,' claim that the hair-like substance that crowns Mr. Trump’s head is from a foreign country, which would mean that the candidate is less than one hundred percent American."

One Way to Cover up a Lie -- Erase It. Nick Carbone of Time: (1) on the Senate floor Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) asserted that more than 90 percent of Planned Parenthood's services were abortion-related. (2) Confronted with the fact that the number is closer to 3 percent, Kyl issued a statement that his remark was "not intended to be factual." (3) When that "excuse" proved to be a ridicule bomb (see, e.g., Colbert below -- about 2 min. in), he just had the remark erased from the Congressional Record.

... Or You Can Go into Hiding. Cameron Joseph of the National Journal: "Republicans who used seniors’ rage over health care changes to sweep into office last fall are now facing the same type of heat over the same issue: Modifications in Medicare and Medicaid. Many who voted for the plan House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., laid out to privatize the programs in future years have been in constituents’ crosshairs during Easter recess town-hall meetings. Others have simply avoided meeting with constituents."

Rick Santorum wants to be President so he can screw up EVERYTHING:

     ... Tanya Somanader of Think Progress lays out Santorum's Choice: "Failure to raise the debt ceiling would force Congress to make devestating cuts that would eviscerate basic government services (including national security and social safety net programs), would increase unemployment and retard economic growth, and would erode confidence in the U.S. Treasury bonds creating widespread panic in global financial markets. But if Congress pays Santorum’s 'price,' it would not only jeopardize popular provisions such as insurance pools for people with pre-existing conditions but 'cripple existing Medicare programs' by preventing the government from making payments to cover seniors. What’s more, as the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office noted, defunding health care would actually increase government spending by $5.6 billion by 2021 and, ironically, increase the federal deficit anyway."

* Where facts never intrude.

News Ledes

"Preposterous Charges." Jay Carney defends the President against Franklin Graham's conspiracy theories:

AP: "Proponents of California's same-sex marriage ban filed a motion Monday seeking to vacate the historic ruling that overturned Proposition 8 because the federal judge who wrote it is in a long-term relationship with another man. Lawyers for the ban's backers said that Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker should have removed himself from the case, or at least disclosed his relationship status, to avoid a real or perceived conflict of interest."

AP: "U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson ordered an immediate end to [NFL] the lockout Monday, siding with the players in their bitter fight with the owners over how to divide the $9 billion business. The fate of the 2011 season remained in limbo: The NFL responded by filing a notice of appeal questioning whether Nelson exceeded her jurisdiction, seeking relief from the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis. Hours later, the league filed a motion for an expedited stay, meaning it wants Nelson to freeze her ruling to let the appeals process play out."

AP: "Republican Gov. Haley Barbour bowed out of presidential contention Monday with a surprise announcement just as the 2012 campaign was getting under way in earnest, 18 months before Election Day. The Mississippi governor said he lacked the necessary 'absolute fire in the belly' to run." Barbour's full statement is here. ...

... BUT National Journal: "Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, whose outspoken libertarian views and folksy style made him a cult hero during two previous presidential campaigns, will announce on Tuesday that he's going to try a third time. Sources close to Paul ... will unveil an exploratory presidential committee.... He will also unveil the campaign’s leadership team in Iowa."

AP: "House Speaker John Boehner said Monday that Congress should 'take a look at' repealing the multibillion-dollar tax subsidies enjoyed by the major oil companies. The Ohio Republican told "ABC World News" that the government is low on revenues and that oil companies "ought to be paying their fair share." A gallon of gasoline exceeds $4 in some parts of the country." Video here.

Politico: "In a real victory for supporters of same-sex marriage -- and marking what seems like real marginalization for its foes -- a major law firm has reversed course and will refuse to represent the House of Representatives in defending the Defense of Marriage Act." ...

... Politico: "Former Solicitor General Paul Clement resigned Monday from his law firm, King amp; Spalding, over the firm's abrupt and belated decision to stop defending the Defense of Marriage Act on behalf of the House of Representatives."

Wall Street Journal: "The U.S. Supreme Court refused Monday to consider an early legal challenge to the new federal health-care law before the case has been fully litigated in the lower courts. The justices, without comment, rejected Virginia Republican Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli's bid for early Supreme Court review." TPM story here.

AP: "Taliban militants dug a lengthy tunnel underground and into the main jail in Kandahar city and whisked out more than 450 prisoners, most of whom were Taliban fighters, officials and insurgents said Monday. The massive overnight jailbreak in Afghanistan's second-largest city underscores the Afghan government's continuing weakness in the south despite an influx of international troops, funding and advisers."

 Al Jazeera: "Syrian troops backed by tanks and heavy armour have stormed the southern town of Deraa and also Douma, a suburb of the capital Damascus, resulting in many deaths and dozens of arrests. Security forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad, the country's president, have also continued a crackdown in the coastal town of Jableh for a second day.An activist said late on Monday that 18 people had been killed in Deraa alone."

However, the government insists the army was invited in to rid the town of gunmen.

... Haaretz: "The Obama administration is drafting an executive order to freeze the assets of senior Syrian officials and bar them from engaging in any business dealings with the United States...."

AP: "A Jordanian security official says Syria has sealed the border with Jordan and is preventing people from leaving the country. The Jordanian border crossing lies close to the southern Syrian town of Daraa, where government forces were launching a sharp crackdown on protesters Monday. Some of the fiercest protests against the Syrian regime have taken place in Daraa."