;)
Sunday
Apr282013
The Commentariat -- April 29, 2013
AP: "Sen. Joe Manchin on Sunday said he would re-introduce a measure that would require criminal and mental health background checks for gun buyers at shows and online. The West Virginia Democrat says that if lawmakers read the bill, they will support it." ...
... Here's the piece by John Cassidy of the New Yorker, which contributor MAG also linked in the Comments section. "In a country where each life (and death) is supposed to count equally, surely the victims of gun violence should be accorded the same weight as the victims of bomb violence. And the perpetrators should get equal treatment, too. But, of course, that's not how things work."
Obama 2.0. CNN: "President Barack Obama will tap Anthony Foxx, the mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, on Monday to become his next transportation secretary, a White House official with knowledge of his decision said Sunday. If confirmed by the Senate, Foxx would replace Ray LaHood, who said in January he wouldn't serve a second term."
Jonathan Chait: "House Republicans are prepared to refuse to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agree to let them cut tax rates without increasing revenue. Their extraordinary threat, first presented as a way to force a reduction in the deficit, is now being wielded to prevent a reduction in the deficit." ...
... Washington Post Editors: "Led by conservative Republicans and whipped into a froth by right-wing radio talk-show hosts, opponents of [immigration] reform are banking on derailing the measure with a strategy of delay and dismemberment.... On Thursday, Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and an opponent of a pathway to citizenship, served notice that the delay-and-dismemberment plan was under way. Rather than wait for a comprehensive immigration bill to wend its way through the Senate, or for a roughly similar plan to emerge from a bipartisan group in the House, Mr. Goodlatte said his committee would consider a series of smaller bills. That strategy gives conservatives a chance to say they were for immigration reform before they were against it."
Annie Lowrey of the New York Times: "Millions of Americans suffered a loss of wealth during the recession and the sluggish recovery that followed. But the last half-decade has proved far worse for black and Hispanic families than for white families, starkly widening the already large gulf in wealth between white Americans and most minority groups, according to a new study from the Urban Institute."
If It's Working, Shut It Down. Ezra Klein: "Health Quality Partners [of Doylestown, Pennsylvania,] enrolls Medicare patients with at least one chronic illness and one hospitalization in the past year. It then sends a trained nurse to see them every week, or every month, whether they're healthy or sick.... According to an independent analysis..., HQP has reduced hospitalizations by 33 percent and cut Medicare costs by 22 percent.... Now Medicare is thinking of shutting it off.... Keeping [people] from getting very sick ... requires someone who has a relationship with them to stop by once a week to see how they're doing. The problem is, it's hard to make money off it."
E. J. Dionne states the obvious: "It's outrageous that Congress and the administration are moving quickly to reduce the inconvenience to travelers -- people fortunate enough to be able to buy plane tickets -- by easing cuts in air traffic control while leaving the rest of the sequester in place. What about the harm being done to the economy as a whole? What about the sequester's injuries to those who face lower unemployment benefits, who need Meals on Wheels or who attend Head Start programs?"
** Let He Who Is without Sin Google the Neighbors. Bill Keller: if your arrest &/or conviction record is erased, should published reports on them be erased, too? CW: I agree with Keller's conclusion on this. If you are as old as I am, there is probably some record somewhere of your doing something way back when that you wouldn't want the neighbors -- or potential employers -- to know. AND, if you're as old as I am, you're probably in luck; those records are buried in some archive somewhere or have been completely lost to time. But younger people, who are busy cooking up their own youthful transgressions, are likely to find reports of those mistakes perched on the Intertoobz forever -- & forever accessible to inquiring minds smart enough to use a search engine. ...
... Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post: "A government task force is preparing legislation that would pressure companies such as Facebook and Google to enable law enforcement officials to intercept online communications as they occur.... Driven by FBI concerns that it is unable to tap the Internet communications of terrorists and other criminals, the task force's proposal would penalize companies that failed to heed wiretap orders.... There is currently no way to wiretap some of these communications methods easily, and companies effectively have been able to avoid complying with court orders."
Paul Krugman: "... would it really be ... easy to end the scourge of unemployment [by increasing government sending]? Yes — but powerful people don't want to believe it. Some of them have a visceral sense that suffering is good, that we must pay a price for past sins (even if the sinners then and the sufferers now are very different groups of people). Some of them see the crisis as an opportunity to dismantle the social safety net. And just about everyone in the policy elite takes cues from a wealthy minority that isn't actually feeling much pain." ...
... Ben White & Tarini Parti of Politico write a well-balanced piece on the great divide between deficit doves & hawks. Maybe their report makes up for this:
... Perhaps -- like me -- you thought reporters ask their subjects all those dumb questions because they're not too good at thinking on their feet. Nope. It's worse than that. The dumb questions are planned in advance. Gabrielle Bluestone of Gawker found a copy of "Politico's White House Correspondents Dinner memo, left behind at a party last night and obtained by Gawker.... Rhe lengthy section of the memo focused on questions for visiting celebrities like Jon Bon Jovi ('What was Air Force One like?'), Kerry Washington ('Do you think the Obamas have a strong marriage?'), Conan O'Brien ('Are you nervous?'), and Scarlett Johansson ('Do you ever e-mail with President Obama anymore?')." Bluestone reproduces the whole Politico memo with her post. I hope Charles Pierce doesn't get the memo. He'll die of anti-freeze poisoning.
"Ghost Money." Matthew Rosenberg of the New York Times: "For more than a decade, wads of American dollars packed into suitcases, backpacks and, on occasion, plastic shopping bags have been dropped off every month or so at the offices of Afghanistan's president -- courtesy of the Central Intelligence Agency. All told, tens of millions of dollars have flowed from the C.I.A. to the office of President Hamid Karzai.... The C.I.A. ... has long been known to support some relative and close aides of Mr. Karzai. But the new accounts of off-the-books cash delivered directly to his office show payments on a vaster scale, and with a far greater impact on everyday governing. Moreover, there is little evidence that the payments bought the influence the C.I.A. sought. Instead, some American officials said, the cash has fueled corruption and empowered warlords, undermining Washington's exit strategy from Afghanistan."
Scott Shane & David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "F.B.I. agents are working closely with Russian security officials to reconstruct Tamerlan Tsarnaev's activities and connections in Dagestan during his six-month visit last year, tracking meetings he may have had with specific militants, his visits to a radical mosque and any indoctrination or training he may have received, law enforcement officials said Sunday. At the same time, the bureau is also still looking for 'persons of interest' in the United States who may have played a role in the radicalization of Mr. Tsarnaev, 26, and his younger brother Dzhokhar, 19...."
Harold Meyerson of the Washington Post: "The bankers' men on the [Chicago] Tribune board likely view the sale of the papers [it owns] as a financial transaction, pure and simple. But [Los Angeles] Times readers (and the Koch brothers themselves) would view a sale to the Kochs as a political transaction first and foremost, turning L.A.'s metropolitan daily into a right-wing mouthpiece whose commitment to empirical journalism would be unproven at best. A newspaper isn't just a business; it's also a civic trust. The money men who have been plunked down on the Tribune board should remember that as they sell off the civic chronicles of some of America's great cities."
Wayne Parry of the AP: "New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said Monday that President Barack Obama 'has kept every promise he's made' about helping the state recover from Superstorm Sandy. Speaking on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' program on the 6-month anniversary of the deadly storm, the Republican governor said presidential politics were the last thing on his mind as he toured storm-devastated areas with Obama last fall."
Mary Wisniewski of Reuters: "In an emotional ceremony filled with tears and applause, a 70-year-old Kentucky woman was ordained a priest on Saturday as part of a dissident group operating outside of official Roman Catholic Church authority. Rosemarie Smead is one of about 150 women around the world who have decided not to wait for the Roman Catholic Church to lift its ban on women priests, but to be ordained and start their own congregations."
News Ledes
The Hill: "Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer was hospitalized after a bicycle accident on Friday.... Breyer had surgery at a Washington hospital after fracturing his collarbone when he fell off his bike...." This is at least Breyer's third serious cycling accident. CW: Time for a stantionary bike, Mr. Justice.
New York Times: The trial of Dr. Kermit Gosnell, who is charged with murdering live-born infants during late-term abortions, "wrapped up [in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania] on Monday with summations by both sides."
AP: "A powerful explosion badly damaged an office building in the center of [Prague,] the Czech capital, Monday, injuring up to 40 people. Authorities believe people may still be buried in the rubble. It was not certain what caused the blast in Divadelni Street, in Prague's Old Town, at about 10 a.m., but it was likely a natural gas explosion...."
New York Times: "Syrian official, Prime Minister Wael Nader al-Halqi survived what appeared to be an assassination attempt Monday in an upscale neighborhood of the capital, Damascus, when a car bomb exploded near his convoy, according to state-run media and opposition reports saying that a bodyguard was killed."
New York Times: "The collapse of the [Bangladesh garment] building, the Rana Plaza, is considered the deadliest accident in the history of the garment industry. It is known to have claimed at least 377 lives, and hundreds more workers are thought to be missing still, buried in the rubble. The Rana Plaza building contained five garment factories, employing more than 3,000 workers, who were making clothing for European and American consumers. Labor activists, citing customs records, company Web sites or labels discovered in the wreckage, say that the factories produced clothing for JC Penney; Cato Fashions; Benetton; Primark ... and other retailers."
The Week: "On Saturday, anonymous law enforcement sources ... [said] the FBI had identified Misha, they told The Associated Press, but found he had no ties to terrorism generally or the Boston bombings specifically. On Sunday evening, Christian Caryl at the New York Review of Books introduced the world to the man he says is Misha." According to Caryl's report, Misha "confirmed he was a convert to Islam and that he had known Tamerlan Tsarnaev, but he flatly denied any part in the bombings. 'I wasn't his teacher. If I had been his teacher, I would have made sure he never did anything like this.'" The NYRB post is here.
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Reader Comments (12)
“Sen. Joe Manchin on Sunday said he would re-introduce…” Way to go, Joe. And ignore that bipartisan bullshit. Just make them raise their hands or not and take the consequence.
Your Body Is a Corporate Test Tube
I would add to the list the chemical soup juicing through the bodies of industrial agriculture's plants and animals and certainly the inevitable arrival of GMO's coming to a plate near you through processed foods and (most likely) eventually straight-to-your-plate savory goodness.
What about the negative side effects on our nation's health you say? Prove it!
CW: I'm bringing forward this comment by MAG, which got spammed yesterday:
Just imagine "What If the Tsarnaevs Had Been the 'Boston Shooters'?"
As John Cassidy (The New Yorker) pointed out the other day: "...numerically speaking, terrorism, especially homegrown terrorism, is a minor threat to public safety and public health. It pales in comparison to gun violence."
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/johncassidy/
A word about Obama's performance at the WHCA dinner: He has a real flair–– he has the air of someone quite comfortable as a stand-up comic, much more, I would argue, than Conan who is IN that business. Of course it could be I've never been a fan of Conan, find him too something or other–-can't quite put my finger on it––so the comparison might not be fair, but Obama has the timing, the expressions, the chuckle down pat and for my money he could go on the road with an act or two. He already does that, I hear from the back benches––Shhhhh––don't spread it around!
Over the weekend I read an article that illustrated the complexity of the Syrian situation. I have a limited understanding of the Middle East and its various cultures - religious or otherwise. I know enough to understand that there are many many groups of Islamists, benign and otherwise. However, it seems clear that there is an American media / political attempt to frame conversations in simple good guy-bad guy scenarios. This is ignorant and counterproductive. Every situation has shades of gray, but these shades are layered and intertwined and made more obscure by our general ignorance of cultures. The American lens isn't fitted for the Middle East.
"Islamist Rebels Create Dilemma on Syria Policy"
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/world/middleeast/islamist-rebels-gains-in-syria-create-dilemma-for-us.html?pagewanted=all
Caught an interesting BBC documentary on PBS last night, "Modern Spies", which purports to separate the quotidian goings-on of real life spooks from the "shaken, not stirred" variety.
A well done show, if not much I hadn't read previously somewhere or other, and I was about to turn it off when the show veered into how sources are recruited, vetted, and run. They covered the tracking and apprehension of a Jihadist in London through an American asset. And then they mentioned "Curveball", the Iraqi informant who gave the Bush war lovers everything they wanted to hear: WMDs under every bed, mobile bio-weapons labs, dirty bombs, suitcase nukes headed for the US, Al Qaeda playing footsie with Iraqi muck-a-mucks, super-cool, triple-secret spy stuff like you read about; the works.
On the unchecked, unvetted, uncorroborated word of this one guy--a source whose word, we were warned by the Brits and the Germans, was less reliable than the last seventeen guys who told you the check was in the mail--Bush and Cheney blew up the whole country. Colin Powell threw his reputation into a toilet and flushed it into the East River shilling for Bush on the basis of Curveball's "intel".
Finally, the interviewer sits Curveball down and asks him how much of what he sold to the US was true.
None of it. Not a single thing.
"So" asks the interviewer, "the Iraq War was declared on the basis of a complete lie, is that right?"
"Yes" replies Curveball, with a little chuckle.
His goal was to stick it to Saddam and he was smart enough to know, or at least to guess, how stupid the Bush people were, or how desperate they were to begin the Shock and Awe beguine.
And he was right.
But we still hear Bush saying, after waking up refreshed from a nap or heading off for a round of 18, that he's perfectly fine with what he did, and Darth Cheney says he'd do it all again. And again, and again, and again.
Stupid or criminal?
I say both.
But never mind all that. Visit that cool new library! And have a martini while you're there. Shaken, not stirred.
Diane,
The proof of what your post seems to be getting at is contained in the way the Bush administration was led by the nose, and its lust for torture, murder, and destruction, by a complete fiction. It had no interest in complexity, in gray areas, in caution; no interest in looking under the hood and kicking the tires once it saw those racing stripes, the wicked cool paint job, and shiny gewgaws decorating the kind of chick magnet car that 17 year old boys dream about.
Unfortunately for us and the world, they were just about as perspicacious as the average 17 year old.
Nah. On second thought, most 17 year olds are way smarter than any of those nimrods.
The US typically has a difficult time parsing what goes on behind the borders of countries like Syria, but during some periods, the eight year Bush Debacle, no lens, not even the Hubble, would have helped. Let's hope we get this one more right than wrong.
Along the discussion lines between Diane & Akhilleus
are two Charles Pierce postings from this morning on the Sunday talking guest heads' idiotic pronouncements:
This on the situation in Syria. "Wait. Whoa. There is evidence that you have that we can't see that proves your case? This rodeo looks a bit familiar. I recognize some of the bulls, and the clowns look famiiar. Have we been here before?"
Read more: What Are The Gobshites Saying These Days? - Esquire
And then there is his: "Something You Should Read Because Nobody Else Will" more on the Boston losers.
"Apparently, the FBI has located "Misha," the mysterious red-headed Armenian who, according to the surviving Tsarnaevs, whom many people suddenly believe on this subject and this subject alone, was the man who radicalized Tamerlan Tsarnaev and lit the fire..."
...and so the fairy tales never end happily, let alone END!
Here is Leonard Pitts of the Miami Herald responding to a letter writer with the glummest assessment of the American Union I've read in a long time.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/04/23/3360622/on-hate-mail-and-the-state-of.html
Would that Pitts were wrong, but I've read some on line comments in local newspapers that look an awful like what Pitt's' correspondent wrote, complete with capital letters. I equate the all-caps technique as equivalent to angry spittle spraying the page.
@Ahkilleus
If my recollection is correct, Bush wasn't even able to distinguish between Shiite and Sunni Muslims. Like not being able to tell a piano from a hamburger. Never mind the various smaller sects.
I suspect that an unknown # of the Syrian "rebels" are just as likely to practice domination and oppression as Assad. To date, bad guys on the "good guy" side have successfully used media ignorance to mask their actions. An especially effective tactic of the Afghani Taliban has been hiding among the gentle folk and threatening them should the Taliban be exposed. But we persist in that red line BS, when you can't tell the players even with an annotated score card.
Diane,
You are absolutely correct in your remembrance of Bush's ignorance of Muslim allegiances. I can't imagine that, outside of career people at Foggy Bottom, Langley, or respectable foreign policy think tanks, that anyone within Bush's circle would be able to distinguish Sunnis from Shiites any more than they could Hutus from Tutsis, dramatic tenors from spintos, or Continental philosophers from American Pragmatists.
It was an administration of morons. MORONS (apologies to waltwis--but if you can convince me that an all caps reference to the sort of idiots who have retarded American understanding of the world is undeserved, then....well, your cleverness is surpassing strange, and I'd like to get a copy of your reading list and dietary supplements).
History, whether of the journalistic variety or the "for the ages" variety, too often devolves to hard edges. I would venture that were one able to travel back through time to the American War of Independence or the Seven Years War (French and Indian, to you, pal) and espy the multitude of various sects, political and military groups, and social and political factions, denominations, and persuasions, one's received wisdom of that conflict would end up seriously impaired.
We like things simple. Bushies, especially, liked things simple, to the point of ABC, 123, black and white, Good Southern Christian, unAmerican Evil doers who deserved hard sanctions.
No gray areas and no dissimulation districts acknowledged.
The Right-Wing Way always wins (ie, America, no matter how awful, stupid, or devious its goals, how egregious or murderous its methods, is always right!!!!!!!!!!!).
WTF, girl, don't you watch FOX??
Sorry Akhilleus, watching Fox news cuts into my daily visits to Breibart's grave.