The Commentariat -- October 1

Gene Robinson of the Washington Post: "... this war is only tangentially about Afghanistan. The real problem is nuclear-armed Pakistan, our supposed ally, which has played a double game -- accepting billions of dollars from the United States to fight terrorism while giving clandestine advice and support to the Taliban and tolerating the presence of al-Qaeda's senior leadership.... I the purpose of this war is really to influence events in Pakistan, we're not doing a very good job.... Isn't it time for another strategy review?"

Sherly Gay Stolberg of the New York Times profiles Pete Rouse, the "anti-Rahm" who will replace Rahm Emanuel as President Obama's chief-of-staff.

CW: I'd better post this or I'll be taken as an "irresponsible" member of the "professional left":

... Keith Hagey of Politico on the White House's relationship with the "professional left." ...

... So let's see what the professional left is up to today:

... After reading in USA Today that there's "new push by federal law enforcement agencies to hunt down war criminals and human rights abusers who have found refuge in the United States," Glenn Greenwald does his civic duty & helps the feds locate one such individual.

... Jane Hamsher, one of the most "ungrateful" of "whiners," zeroes on this New York Times article that reports, 

Many wealthy Democratic patrons, who in the past have played major roles financing outside groups to help elect the party’s candidates, are largely sitting out these crucial midterm elections.

Democratic donors like George Soros ... and his fellow billionaire Peter B. Lewis, who each gave more than $20 million to Democratic-oriented groups in the 2004 election, appear to be holding back so far.

       Hamsher writes, "I personally can’t wait till the White House press office releases Obama’s speech to millionaires in Greenwich calling Soros and Lewis 'ungrateful whiners.'”

... John Aravosis agrees with Hamsher that, "liberals are being set up to take the fall for the (possibly) looming election disaster." ...

... AND Digby remarks,

When you hear the administration and the leadership complaining about the left failing to fall in line, you might want to ask them about why they are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars supporting Democratic politicians who actively run against them. I could be wrong, but I think it might not turn out so well once they get elected.

Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: TARP, "the $700 billion lifeline to banks, insurance and auto companies — will expire at a fraction of that cost and could conceivably earn taxpayers a profit." ...

... Lori Montgomery of the Washington Post: "... the report [on TARP] challenges public perceptions of the stimulus aid as slow-moving and wasteful - an image that has fueled voter anger with the dominant party; [i.e., Democrats]." ...

... CW: for many teabaggers, TARP was their raison dêtre, & they're still yelling about it. The tea party is largely a movement about nothing. If they had any sense -- which most don't -- they would say ...

... BUT Hugh Son of Bloomberg: "U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner’s plan to recoup taxpayer bailout funds is increasingly dependent on the stock price of insurers American International Group Inc. and MetLife Inc. The government’s stake in AIG will rise to 92 percent from about 80 percent under the revision to the New York-based insurer’s rescue announced yesterday. The Treasury Department must find buyers for $49.1 billion in AIG stock and $8.7 billion in MetLife equities starting next year."

Stephen Colbert discusses the Pew Research poll on Americans' knowledge of religions:

David Streitfeld of the New York Times: Home "evictions are expected to slow sharply ... as state and national law enforcement officials shine a light on questionable foreclosure methods revealed by two of the country’s biggest home lenders in the last two weeks.... "If completed foreclosures were not properly done, families who bought the troubled homes could be vulnerable to claims by the former owners."

Here's some fun reported by Elise Foley of the Washington Independent: "California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman lost the support — and then some — of conservative group Americans for Legal Immigration PAC after allegations surfaced that she employed an undocumented housekeeper for nine years. But the pro-enforcement group isn’t just calling for her to lose the election: They want her arrested."

Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "Mr. Paladino’s near-physical confrontation with a New York Post reporter on Wednesday night, along with his unsubstantiated assertions about the private life of his opponent, Andrew M. Cuomo, which he later retracted, have the political world grappling with this difficult question: In an election season defined by anger, how much is too much?" ...

... The New York Times Editorial Board on Republican gubernatorial nominee Carl Paladino: "... bullying, it is increasingly clear, is Mr. Paladino’s standard operating procedure. The last thing this state needs is an out-of-control governor who can’t take the heat.

New York Times: "The News Corporation, whose holdings include The Wall Street Journal and the Fox News Channel, has donated $1 million to the United States Chamber of Commerce, the business advocacy group that is among the heaviest anti-Democratic advertisers in this year’s elections.... In August, News Corp. confirmed that it had donated $1 million to the Republican Governors Association." Here's the Politico story which first broke the news. ...

Catherine Herridge.... Politico reports that "The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is suing Fox News for retaliating against its reporter, Catherine Herridge, after she complained that she was discriminated against because of her age and gender, according to an EEOC complaint filed Thursday."

Sorry, Catherine, you aren't blond enough:

Other Fox "News" personalities.

Of Politics and Economics, etc.

The New York Times comments moderators have been up to their old tricks all week. Last night, for instance, a couple of friends & I submitted our comments to Paul Krugman's & David Brooks' column at the same time. One of the three of us made it. The moderators have not read the other comments. My comments on Krugman's & Brooks' are below. After the comments, see also a letter I received from a Times staffer.

Paul Krugman writes about a House bill authored by Democratic Rep. Sander Levin & passed by a huge bipartisan majority. Here's the backstory. Though the bill is weak -- it doesn't force the Administration to impose sanctions on China for refusing to devalue its currency -- Krugman notes that the bill is "a signal at best — and it’s at least as much a shot across the bow of U.S. officials as it is a signal to the Chinese." 

The Constant Weader comments:

Squishy as the bill is, it has only passed one house, & Serious People say it may not leap the Senate filibuster.

Weak as the bill is, if it passes the Upper Chamber, it also has to get past the President. That, too, is a big "if." The purpose of the bill is to smack down the Administration, specifically Tim Geithner, who up until a few weeks ago was the chief "negotiator" with the Chinese. I'm not at all sure President Obama would sign a bill designed to humiliate Geithner. The President shows a distressing loyalty to his economic team, & to Geithner in particular.

Plus, the new face on economic negotiations with China is President Obama himself. Would he sign a bill that says, "Mr. President, you've done a lousy job here"? Gosh, maybe not, although it is possible the President would wrap the bill in a smile & call it another tool in his negotiating kit, another arrow in his quiver.

It seems to me the Levin bill is not aimed at China, as many news outlets characterized it. Its real targets are Tim Geithner & his boss.

Speaking of economic matters, David Brooks is impressed with fiscally conservative "New Republicans." 

First, here's a bit of the backstory:

Michael Crowley of Time: "Meg Whitman says she's running for governor of California to bring a sense of fiscal responsibility to Sacramento. But Whitman's own campaign ... has already pumped about $120 million of her estimated $1.3 billion personal fortune into the race. Yet ... she hasn't purchased much of anything yet."

AP: "California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman employed an illegal immigrant Mexican housekeeper for years even though the federal government alerted her in 2003 to the maid's dubious legal status, the worker and her attorney claimed Wednesday....

Brooks writes,

[Meg] Whitman has the personality type that you’re seeing more and more of these days.  The quintessential New Republican is detail-oriented, managerial, tough-minded, effective but a little dry. If Whitman wins her race, she’ll fit right in.

The Constant Weader thinks that's pretty funny:

Is that the personality type that hires an illegal immigrant to clean up its modest Colonial home, keeps her on for nine years, then fires her when it decides it would like to spend $120 million (& counting) to purchase the governorship of the nation's most powerful state? Is that the personality type that then rails against illegal immigrants once it has got rid of its own?

Is that the personality type that when called out for harboring an illegal immigrant blames her opponent -- without presenting a whiff of proof -- for "alerting the media" to its embarrassing indiscretion? "This is just classic smear politics," Meg Whitman said yesterday. "Jerry Brown is a career politician; it’s what they do."

"They," Ms. Whitman? Oh, Pot, they name is Kettle.

Sounds more like a personality disorder than a personality type -- maybe Republicanitis hypocritus.

It doesn't matter how many fingers Meg Whitman can flick in your face -- if she can't run her own little household, as the saying goes, how can she run the famously dysfunctional State of California?

Here's the letter, reproduced in full, which I received from the New York Times regarding their quixotic posting of comments:

Dear Ms. Burns:

Thank you for writing us and bringing your concern to our attention.  Mr. Brisbane [the Times' new Public Editor] is considering doing a column on The Times comment system at some point due to the high volume of complaints this office receives on a daily basis.

Your point regarding the arbitrary nature in which comments are allowed and what time they are approved has been a source of consternation for many and we will be looking into it in the near future. To our knowledge, The Times does not deliberately scramble the comments it approves, but we will be looking into the comment system as a whole.

We will keep your e-mail on file in the event that Mr. Brisbane decides to use it as a part of his upcoming column.  We will ask your permission before he does.

Once again, thanks for writing to us and expressing your concern.  It is much appreciated.

Best,
Joseph Burgess
Office of the Public Editor
The New York Times

The Commentariat -- September 30

Classy! As your governor, you're going to be seeing a lot of me on the front page, saying 'Governor LePage tells Obama to go to hell.'
-- Paul LePage, Maine's Republican gubernatorial nominee

E. J. Dionne of the Washington Post: President Obama "returned to his community-organizer roots to try to salvage an election" at his campaign rally in Wisconsin after disdaining "a mobilizing strategy for his first year and a half in office.... If Obama succeeds, will he continue to keep his supporters engaged and 'fired up' ...? Or will he go back to an insider strategy that helped bring him to the brink of this precipice?" ...

... Meanwhile, ConservaDems help Republicans, pretend to be Republicans, & Arianna Huffington says President Obama isn't much better:

     ... Jonathan Weisman of the Wall Street Journal writes that if ConservaDems running against their own party win, even if Democrats maintain a House majority, they "almost certainly won't have a functioning liberal majority."

New York Times Editorial Board: "Despite President Obama’s promises of reform [the overuse of the state secrets doctrine], the public still cannot reliably distinguish between legitimate and self-serving uses of the national security claims. Worse, some of the administration’s claims clearly have fallen on the darker side of that line."

In the absence of a draft, for a growing number of Americans, service in the military, no matter how laudable, has become something for other people to do. -- Robert Gates

Elisabeth Bumiller of the New York Times: "The United States is at risk of developing a cadre of military leaders who are cut off politically, culturally and geographically from the population they are sworn to protect, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told an audience at Duke University on Wednesday night." CW: no kidding. ...

... Mark Thompson of Time: Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, predicts that the number of military suicides will keep rising.

Dana Milbank: NOW President Terry O'Neill confronts Alan Simpson in the Catfood Commission meeting room, urging him to resign. Simpson changes the subject to trashing former labor leader Andy Stern. Let's go to the videotape:

Unhinged. Maggie Haberman of Politic, September 29: "New York Republican gubernatorial nominee Carl Paladino alleged Tuesday that Democrat Andrew Cuomo was unfaithful to his ex-wife years ago.... Paladino offered no proof of his claim, despite requests for substantiation, and he made it minutes after angrily declaring his 10-year-old daughter—a child from his own affair 10 years ago—off limits to the press." ...

     ... Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "Hours after the phone interview [with Politico] was conducted, Mr. Paladino nearly came to blows with a New York Post reporter who confronted him about the comments." Here's the videotape:

      ... Update: Oh, goody! The Atlantic has made the corniest possible animated version of the confrontation between Paladino & reporter Dicker. Where is Taiwan when we need them? ...

      ... See more about Paladino on the Campaign 2010 New York page.

Constantly Creepy. CNN: Andrew Breitbart protege James O'Keefe, "a conservative activist known for making undercover videos, plotted to embarrass ... CNN correspondent [Abbie Boudreau] by recording a meeting on hidden cameras aboard a floating 'palace of pleasure' and making sexually suggestive comments, e-mails and a planning document show."

     ... Here is part of the outline O'Keefe prepared. Take a look at page 3, which details his props for the "seduction." They include, "a condom jar, dildos..., lube, ceiling mirror...." It goes on. Breitbart & O'Keefe -- the Woodward & Bernstein of the right.

Barton Gellman writes the cover story for Time on the "twisted patriotism" of right-wing militias.

Jonathan Martin & Keach Hagey of Politico: "With the exception of Mitt Romney, Fox now has deals with every major potential Republican presidential candidate not currently in elected office.... The matter is of no small consequence, since it’s uncertain how other news organizations can cover the early stages of the presidential race when some of the main GOP contenders are contractually forbidden to appear on any TV network besides Fox."

Ryan Reilly & Rachel Slajda of Talking Points Memo describe a right-wing conspiracy theory gone mainstream Republican that non-whites are lolling around welfare offices cooking up voter fraud schemes. These allegations are so offensive in content & tone I can't bring myself to type them. Oh, and they're untrue.

Tim Egan of the New York Times talks to his old friend Jeff Dowd, the model for the Dude in the film "The Big Lebowski," about California's Prop 19, a ballot initiative that would legalize marijuana.

CW: something I missed in the Pew religious knowledge survey: 41 percent of Americans can't name the Vice President of the United States.

Michelle Singletary of the Washington Post: the Federal Trade Commission has instituted new rules to rein in scams & shady practices of many debt settlement companies, companies that claim to help consumers manager & reduce their outstanding debts.