;)
Wednesday
Dec092015
The Commentariat -- Dec. 10, 2015
Internal links removed.
Afternoon Update:
"A Christmas Miracle -- A Bipartisan Bill":
... Cory Turner of NPR: "... the bipartisan bill being signed was the Every Student Succeeds Act -- a long-overdue replacement of the unpopular federal education law known as No Child Left Behind. The new law changes much about the federal government's role in education, largely by scaling back Washington's influence. While ESSA keeps in place the basic testing requirements of No Child Left Behind, it strips away many of the high stakes that had been attached to student scores. The job of evaluating schools and deciding how to fix them will shift largely back to states. Gone too is the requirement, added several years ago by the Obama administration, that states use student scores to evaluate teachers. The new law, which passed the House and Senate with rare, resounding bipartisan support, would also expand access to high-quality preschool."
Elizabeth Harris of the New York Times: "Gov. Dannel P. Malloy [D] of Connecticut announced on Thursday that he would sign an executive order that would bar people on federal terrorism watch lists from buying firearms in the state. Mr. Malloy said Connecticut would become the first state in the nation to have such a measure."
Richard Oppel & John Koblin of the New York Times: "Sergeant [Beau] Bergdahl recounted his experience publicly for the first time in the premiere episode of the second season of the podcast 'Serial,' which was released at 6 a.m. Thursday. In interviews with the screenwriter Mark Boal, he explained in his own words why he had left his base in June 2009, an action that prompted a manhunt involving thousands of troops and led him to spend nearly five years in brutal captivity under the Taliban."
Jack Ewing of the New York Times: "Volkswagen said on Thursday that its emissions cheating scandal began in 2005 with a decision to heavily promote diesel engines in the United States and a realization that those engines could not meet clean air standards. What followed was a textbook example of what happens when ambition combines with weak internal controls and ethical standards, the company acknowledged as it presented a preliminary report of its investigation into the origins of the scandal."
The Washington Post is moving this weekend from its building on 15th St. NW. With video.
"Rahm Emanuel Is in Deep, Deep Trouble." Amber Phillips of the Washington Post: "Thanks in part to a series of missteps by the mayor after the shooting, exacerbated by a longer-term failure to address more systemic problems with Chicago's police department, Emanuel appears to have lost much of the city's trust. His approval rating has hit a record low of 18 percent, and 51 percent of residents think he should resign, according to a new poll from the Illinois Observer.... In every new twist and turn of the McDonald shooting, Emanuel has appeared to act only after he was backed into a corner by political pressure."
"Scalia Was Wrong." Sigal Alon in the Washington Post: In a comprehensive study, I found "that the beneficiaries of race-based affirmative action at elite American institutions are better integrated academically and socially by the end of their first years in college, compared to their counterparts from socioeconomically underprivileged backgrounds who attended less selective schools, and are more likely to complete their bachelor's studies.... The beneficiaries of preferential treatment in college admissions ... thrive at elite colleges. They would not be better off attending less selective colleges instead." ...
... Yanan Wang of the Washington Post: "Scalia was referring to a friend-of-the-court brief filed in the case, which details a notion popular among affirmative action opponents: the 'mismatch' theory.... The most prominent articulation of mismatch theory comes from Richard Sander.... [His] assertions have been widely disputed...." ...
... Andy Borowitz: "A new study conducted by legal scholars indicates that Justice Antonin Scalia would fare better if he served as a judge at a court that was 'less advanced' than the United States Supreme Court.... 'If Scalia were reassigned to a "slow track" institution such as a town traffic court, that would be better for everyone,' the study recommended."
*****
"Inequality Is Now Killing Middle America." Joe Stiglitz in the Guardian: "This week, Angus Deaton will receive the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics 'for his analysis of consumption, poverty, and welfare.' Deservedly so. Indeed, soon after the award was announced in October, Deaton published some startling work with Ann Case in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences -- research that is at least as newsworthy as the Nobel ceremony. Analysing a vast amount of data about health and deaths among Americans, Case and Deaton showed declining life expectancy and health for middle-aged white Americans, especially those with a high school education or less. Among the causes were suicide, drugs, and alcoholism."
Julie Davis of the New York Times: "President Obama on Wednesday called for Americans to reject 'bigotry in all its forms' and keep pressing for equality 'no matter what ugliness might bubble up,' appearing to use the 150th anniversary of the constitutional amendment abolishing slavery to challenge the incendiary anti-Muslim politics espoused by Donald J. Trump. At a ceremony at the Capitol attended by congressional leaders and civil rights activists, Mr. Obama sought to place the end of slavery in the broader context of the nation's troubled history, saying the issue 'was never simply about civil rights; it was about the meaning of America, the kind of country we wanted to be'":
Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "A majority of the Supreme Court justices seemed unpersuaded on Wednesday that an affirmative action plan at the University of Texas was constitutional. But the member of the Supreme Court who almost certainly holds the crucial vote, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, devoted almost all of his questions to exploring whether the case should be returned to the trial court to allow the university to submit more evidence to justify its use of race in deciding which students to admit. By the end of the unusually long and tense argument, Justice Kennedy indicated that the Supreme Court might have all the evidence needed to decide the case. That could mean that the Texas admissions plan is in peril and that affirmative action at colleges and universities around the nation may be in trouble as well." ...
... Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The Supreme Court on Wednesday once again displayed its deep divide over when race can be considered in college admission decisions, in a contentious hour and a half of oral arguments about a limited race-conscious plan used by the University of Texas at Austin. There seemed little doubt that the decision would come down to Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. He has never voted to uphold an affirmative action program but seemed less convinced than the court's other conservatives that he had all the information needed to pass judgment on UT's program." ...
... ** Amanda Marcotte, in Salon: "This is a case that should have been laughed out of court years ago, but instead, this is the second time -- second time! -- it's being presented in front of the Supreme Court.... Instead of telling her where to shove it, the Supreme Court sent Fisher's case back to the appeals court. Now she and her lawyers are back again. This time, they've tweaked their argument a bit, trying to argue that diversity itself is an illegitimate goal for schools and, to add a bit of extra nastiness sauce to it, they're claiming that diversity is bad for students of color." ...
... Black Kids Are Stupid, Says Kindly Justice. Tierney Sneed of TPM: "In the oral arguments Wednesday ..., Justice Antonin Scalia -- a well known critic of affirmative action -- suggested that the policy was hurting minority students by sending them to schools too academically challenging for them. Referencing an unidentified amicus brief, Scalia said that there were people who would contend that 'it does not benefit African-Americans to -- to get them into the University of Texas where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less-advanced school, a less -- a slower-track school where they do well.... Most of the black scientists in this country don't come from schools like the University of Texas. They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they're -- that they're being pushed ahead in -- in classes that are too -- too fast for them,'..." ...
... CW: This is the first time in decades, as far as I'm aware, that a Supreme Court justice has overtly embraced a racist rationale for his opinion, tho I suppose the record may show that Scalia has said stuff like this before. Scalia, the son of Italian immigrants, attended two elite private schools: Georgetown & Harvard. Maybe those schools should have turned him down & suggested he go to CCNY, where he'd do better mingling with his "ethnic friends." ...
... Update: The Times editors, in the editorial linked below also note that Scalia's premise "has not gotten such a full airing at the Supreme Court since the 1950s." It is of course ironic that Scalia's paternalistic, racist notion was articulated during a hearing on a suit brought against a program that attempts to reduce built-in racial disparities. Just amazing. And a fine argument for term-limiting justices & judges. ...
... Charles Pierce: "And, right there beside Scalia, Justice Clarence Thomas (Holy Cross '71) sat, and said nothing." ...
... Separate But Inferior. A Perfect Response to Alito & Scalia. Frankly, I don't think the solution to the problems with student body diversity can be to set up a system in which not only are minorities going to separate schools, they're going to inferior schools. -- Gregory Garre, attorney for the University of Texas
... New York Times Editors: "Justice Scalia and the other conservative justices may prefer to ignore the systemic effects of racism and segregation in America, but they do not disappear that easily. The University of Texas, like countless other schools around the country, is already extremely restricted in what it can to counteract those effects. The court should not make the job even harder." ...
... Scott Lemieux in the Guardian: "If the US supreme court rules otherwise in the Fisher, not only will 'lesser schools', as Scalia termed them, not benefit from increased African American admissions, schools like UT and African American students will both suffer -- and the Fishers of the world won't win either. They'll just lose their last excuse for their own mediocrity."
Linda Greenhouse: "Over the dissenting votes of Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia, the court let stand a lower court's ruling that [a] ban [on assault weapons], adopted in 2013 by the city of Highland Park, was consistent with the right to gun ownership under the Second Amendment, as interpreted by the Supreme Court.... It's too soon to conclude that the Supreme Court's unwelcome transformation of the Second Amendment has reached a pivotal moment.... But what happened this week does underscore something important about the court's current dynamic: the chasm on the conservative flank between, on the one hand, two justices who embrace all-out judicial activism and, on the other, those who are willing to wait and see."
George Aisch & Josh Keller of the New York Times: "Fear of gun-buying restrictions has been the main driver of spikes in gun sales, far surpassing the effects of mass shootings and terrorist attacks alone, according to federal background-check data analyzed by The New York Times. When a man shot and killed 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., gun sales did not set records until five days later, after President Obama called for banning assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.... 'President Obama has actually been the best salesman for firearms,' said Brian W. Ruttenbur, an analyst with BB&T Capital Markets, a financial services firm." ...
... CW: Now I know for sure I'm not a "normal" American. Nothing in President Obama's speeches has compelled me (or even made me think) to rush out to get my hands on the last assault rifle on the shelf.
Mark Mazzetti & Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: "As American intelligence agencies grapple with the expansion of the Islamic State beyond its headquarters in Syria, the Pentagon has proposed a new plan to the White House to build up a string of military bases in Africa, Southwest Asia and the Middle East. The bases could be used for collecting intelligence and carrying out strikes against the terrorist group's far-flung affiliates."
FBI Director James Comey, at a Senate hearing Wednesday, on the San Bernardino killers. See also yesterday's Commentariat:
... Adam Goldman & Mark Berman of the Washington Post: "Comey was critical of anti-Muslim rhetoric, saying that it is not helpful when law enforcement officials are trying to work with communities in the United States to combat terrorism. He said that for the Islamic State and other terrorist organizations, it is part of their strategy to convince Muslims that the United States is hostile to them.... The FBI is trying to determine whether there is any connection between an earlier potential plot by Farook and his former neighbor, Enrique Marquez, and the arrests in 2012 of four men in Riverside, Calif. The men were charged with plotting to kill Americans in Afghanistan."
... Yes, this guy might be a terrorist. Nancy Dillon & Larry McShane of the New York Daily News have more details on Enrique Marquez, a long-time friend of Syed Farook: "Enrique Marquez, 24, remained a free man Wednesday as the investigation into the ISIS-inspired slaughter continued -- but it appeared he faced imminent arrest, a source told The News. 'Looks like it,' said the source, saying there was no indication that the transfers ... [were] done with the legally required paperwork."
Richard Fausset of the New York Times: "Robert L. Dear Jr. was charged with 179 counts on Wednesday, including first-degree murder, in connection with the deadly shooting rampage last month at a Planned Parenthood clinic. Bearded, unkempt and cuffed at the legs and arms, Mr. Dear frequently disrupted the proceedings in state court here, shouting out declarations of anger and defiance. 'I'm guilty. There's no trial. I'm a warrior for the babies,' he yelled at one point. 'Let it all come out. The truth!' he yelled at another. As Judge Gilbert A. Martinez discussed a pretrial publicity order, Mr. Dear shouted: 'Could you add the babies that were supposed to be aborted that day? Could you add that to the list?'"
Jamiles Lartey of the Guardian: "The risk of being killed during a police incident is 16 times greater for individuals with untreated mental illness than other civilians, according to a new report by the Treatment Advocacy Center (Tac). The report suggests that a variety of institutional and policy failures have often left law enforcement as the only available resource to deal with people in mental health crisis, sometimes with fatal results."
Presidential Race
Julian Hattem of the Hill: "President Obama does not receive briefings about the FBI's investigation into the personal email setup Hillary Clinton used as secretary of State, bureau Director James Comey said on Wednesday" at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.
Gail Collins: "... when you think of Missouri, give a fond mental shout-out to [State Rep.] Stacey Newman. And remember her lesson -- when it comes to civil liberties, there's currently far more concern in this country over the right to buy weapons than there is over a woman's right to control her own body. All the major Republican candidates for president are pretty much on the same page when it comes to firearms.... All the major candidates are also opposed to giving women any rights whatsoever when it comes to terminating a pregnancy.... The current debate on the Republican side has slid so far to the right that the moderates are people who do not want to force rape victims to carry the fetus to full term."
Gregory Krieg of CNN: "Facing harsh criticism for his proposal to temporarily halt Muslim immigration to the U.S., Donald Trump on Wednesday said he was acting in the Islamic community's best interests. 'I'm doing good for the Muslims,' Trump told Don Lemon in an interview for 'CNN Tonight.' 'Many Muslim friends of mine are in agreement with me. They say, "Donald, you brought something up to the fore that is so brilliant and so fantastic.'"... Trump said he was not likely to wage a third-party candidacy, but the billionaire businessman would not rule it out."
Jerusalem Post: "... Donald Trump is planning a visit to the Temple Mount when he comes to Israel for the first time at the end of the month.... A security source said Trump would probably not be allowed to visit the Temple Mount, the Post's sister publication Ma'ariv reported. The source said that when the current wave of terrorism began, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu banned all politicians from visiting the site. The source added that Trump's visit is meant to be a provocation, so security forces are likely to bar him from ascending the mount. Netanyahu on Wednesday rejected Trump's remarks regarding Muslims, but officials suggested his December 28 meeting with Trump would go ahead as planned." ...
... Marissa Newman & Raphael Ahren of the Times of Israel: "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to meet Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on December 28, amid calls by a growing number of lawmakers to block the GOP front-runner from entering the Knesset or the country. The meeting was scheduled two weeks ago, prior to Trump's widely criticized proposal of a blanket ban on Muslims entering the United States...." ...
... UPDATE. Peter Beaumont of the Guardian: "Donald Trump has said he will 'postpone' a trip to Israel and a meeting with the country's prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, until 'after I become president of the US'.... The cancellation is a blow to Trump with Israel treated as a regular campaign stop for many US presidential candidates." The cancellation comes after 37 MPs signed a letter asking that Trump be barred from entry & Netanyahu further distanced himself from Trump's remarks about Muslims. CW: Also, based on the Jerusalem Post piece above, it looks as if Trump would not have been able to make good on his announced plan to visit the Temple Mount. ...
... CW: Funny, because wasn't it just last week that Trump was boasting to Republican Jews that he was a great negotiator just like all of them? So when a few, mostly opposition, MPs say they want to nix a Trump visit, he just folds. Maybe Trump is running a disciplined campaign, as Schwartzman & Johnson of the WashPo claim in an article linked below, but he sure looks like a cardboard cowboy. If he can't even negotiate himself into Israel, where the Prime Minister agreed to meet with him, how is he going to negotiate with Congress, much less the U.S.'s traditional foreign foes? Sorry, Trumpbots, your guy (who also couldn't best those awesome CNN "negotiators" who refused to pay his $5mm ransom demand) is not a "strongman." ...
... Reuters: "... Donald Trump's anti-Muslim comments cost him business in the Middle East on Wednesday, with a major chain of department stores halting sales of his glitzy 'Trump Home' line of lamps, mirrors and jewellery boxes." ...
... Damien Gayle, et al., of the Guardian: "Meanwhile, Nicola Sturgeon[, First Minister of Scotland,] has moved to sever all Scottish government business links with Donald Trump. The first minister withdrew Trump's membership of the GlobalScot business network, run by Scottish Enterprise, with immediate effect." On the bright side, he can still travel to Britain, over the objections of tens of thousands of Brits. ...
... "So What? They're Muslim." Caitlin MacNeal of TPM: "While defending Donald Trump's proposed ban on Muslims visiting the United States during a debate with CNN's S.E. Cupp, Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pierson dismissed Cupp's assertion that a ban on all Muslims goes too far.... Pierson [said] ... that 'never in United States history have we allowed insurgents to come across these borders.' 'No one's talking about allowing insurgents,' Cupp hit back. 'You're talking about not allowing regular Muslims. That's what you're talking about.' 'Yes, from Arab nations,' Pierson replied. 'You know what? So what? They're Muslim.'" ...
... John McCormick of Bloomberg News: "Almost two-thirds of likely 2016 Republican primary voters favor Donald Trump's call to temporarily ban Muslims from entering the U.S., while more than a third say it makes them more likely to vote for him. Those are some of the findings from a Bloomberg Politics/Purple Strategies PulsePoll, an online survey conducted Tuesday, that shows support at 37 percent among all likely general-election voters for the controversial proposal put forward by the Republican front-runner." ...
... digby: "Being fearful of lunatics with guns randomly shooting people [is] completely rational. These things happen with terrifying frequency in our country. What isn't rational is that these Trump people are only afraid of this when a Muslim is on the other side of the semi-automatic weapon. Otherwise it's just the price of freedom. This is nuts. But then these Republican voters have been working themselves into a frenzy for quite some time." ...
... Paul Schwartzman & Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: "... while it may seem like a lurching, chaotic campaign, Trump is, for the most part, a disciplined and methodical candidate, according to a Washington Post review of the businessman's speeches, interviews and thousands of tweets and retweets over the past six months." ...
... ** Kareem Abdul-Jabar of Time: Donald "Trump is ISIS's greatest triumph: the perfect Manchurian Candidate who, instead of offering specific and realistic policies, preys on the fears of the public, doing ISIS's job for them.... While Trump is not slaughtering innocent people, he is exploiting such acts of violence to create terror here to coerce support." Abdul-Jabbar is one of those Muslim-American sports figures Trump claims he never heard of, even tho he's met them & posed for photos with them. ...
... New York Times Editors: "The Republican rivals rushing to distance themselves from his latest inflammatory proposal -- a faith-based wall around the country — have been peddling their own nativist policies for months or years. They have been harshening their campaign speeches and immigration proposals in response to the Trump effect. Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush want to allow only Christian refugees from Syria to enter the country, and Mr. Cruz has introduced legislation to allow states to opt out of refugee resettlement.... The racism behind the agenda of the right wing on immigrants and foreigners has long been plain as day." ...
... He's a Jerk, But He's Our Jerk. Paul Waldman in the Washington Post: "... as his statements grow more repellent and his opponents slowly become more willing to criticize him (very slowly in some cases), 'Will you support Donald Trump if he is the GOP nominee?' is the question every Republican is getting.... If you're saying on one hand that he's 'entirely unsuited to lead the United States' (John Kasich), or that his plan to ban Muslims from coming to the country 'is not what this party stands for. And, more importantly, it's not what this country stands for' (Paul Ryan), or that he's 'unhinged' (Jeb Bush), or that he's 'a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot' (Lindsey Graham), then it's awfully hard to say on the other hand that if he's your party's nominee for president, you'll be right at his side. Yet that's exactly what Republicans are saying, even if not in so many words." ...
... Kasie Hunt & Jordan Frasier of NBC News: "Jeb Bush on Wednesday called Donald Trump "Barack Obama - the other version of it," as he campaigned in New Hampshire with a surrogate who's said he'd vote for Hillary Clinton over Trump.... He was making the point Obama has divided the country in a way that's similar to Trump." CW: Or at least that was the reporters' best guess. ...
... OR. Driftglass: "Jeb(!) reduced to saying random words."
... Steve Benen: "Jeb Bush told MSNBC's Chuck Todd yesterday that the Trump campaign is relying on 'dog-whistle proposals to prey on people's fears.' That's half-right -- Trump is clearly preying on people's fears, but these aren't 'dog-whistle proposals'; they're the exact opposite. The whole point of dog-whistle politics is subtlety and coded language. Trump's racism, however, is explicit and overt. 'So what? They're Muslim' is less of a dog whistle and more of a bullhorn." ...
... Jesse Byrnes of the Hill: Conspiracy theorist "Jeb Bush on Tuesday questioned whether GOP presidential rival Donald Trump made a deal with ... Hillary Clinton to get elected to the White House. 'Maybe Donald negotiated a deal with his buddy @HillaryClinton. Continuing this path will put her in the White House,' the former Florida governor tweeted. trump, however, has repeatedly dismissed those charges, noting that he has attacked Hillary Clinton hard throughout his campaign."
I used to think [guns] needed to be registered, but if you register them they just come and find you and take your guns. -- Conspiracy theorist Ben Carson (via Gail Collins)
Beyond the Beltway
Margaret Hartmann of New York has a summary of the latest news from Chicago, which includes the initiation of a recall effort to oust Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
Way Beyond
Brian Murphy of the Washington Post: For the first time in Saudi Arabia, women are allowed to run for political office, & this Saturday, to vote. The government still bars women from driving cars.
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Reader Comments (32)
Well now we know how Antonin Scalia would have decided Plessy v. Ferguson. As if there was ever any doubt.
"CW: This is the first time in decades, as far as I'm aware, that a Supreme Court justice has overtly embraced a racist rationale for his opinion, tho I suppose the record may show that Scalia has said stuff like this before. Just amazing. And a fine argument for term-limiting."
OMG! I think all of us know that Scalia is a racist, but never have I heard him make such a public declaration of his disgusting
(and erronous) beliefs. This has me thinking that there must be a way to get a whacked-out, admittedly racist Supreme Court justice to step down. I know that an ethically challenged judge can be axed, but isn't hateful racism unethical in a sitting Supreme Court justice?
Please! Say. It. Is.
The fact the Scalia is a racist is no surprise. The fact he had absolutely no problem publicly announcing it says more. Anyone see the pattern among Republicans? I sort of said the before but the words Republican politician refer to a pattern of behavior. Not are they racist, fascist scumbags, they have no problem making it public.
The core piece is using their various forms of NPD to inflate the minds of those who only want the world to be like a farm in Texas.
The good news is if Adolf becomes emperor of the U.S. of Trump we will save some money since are new leader will not be allowed to travel to any other country on earth.
Alongside the blatancy of Scalia's bigotry is the fact that he is UNAWARE that his statements are broadcasting it! For me, that takes his hate & ignorance to an even lower (were that possible) level.
How the bloody hell did we get from JFK, MLK, Bobby, Medgar Evers, Chaney-Goodman-Schwerner, et al to this day?!?
(Never mind: They - along with too many others - were all murdered: I've answered my own question.)
Rummaging for that vomit-bag I'd saved - as a "gag" gift - from the last time I travelled by air.
@Kate Madison -
<< I know that an ethically challenged judge can be axed, but isn't hateful racism unethical in a sitting Supreme Court justice? >>
Yes - It is! But my sense of things as they are, sadly, is that the response would likely go something like "Tell It To The Judge".
@Victoria D. writes, "Well now we know how Antonin Scalia would have decided Plessy v. Ferguson. As if there was ever any doubt."
You ain't just whistling Dixie. Former Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who was only 12 years older than Scalia & served as CJ while Scalia was on the Court, was a clerk for Justice Robert Jackson in the 1950s. In 1952, as the Court was hearing Brown v. Board of Education, Rehnquist wrote a memo in 1952 on his impressions of the case:
"I realize that it is an unpopular and unhumanitarian position, for which I have been excoriated by 'liberal' colleagues, but I think Plessy v. Ferguson was right and should be reaffirmed. To the argument that a majority may not deprive a minority of its constitutional right, the answer must be made that while this is sound in theory, in the long run it is the majority who will determine what the constitutional rights of the minority are."
During his Senate confirmation hearings (in 1971 for Justice & 1986 for CJ), Rehnquist claimed that he was expressing Jackson's views in the memo, not his own. According to Jackson's secretary Elsie Douglas, who also testified during the 1986 hearing, Rehnquist's claim was "a smear of a great man, for whom I served as secretary for many years. Justice Jackson did not ask law clerks to express his views. He expressed his own and they expressed theirs. That is what happened in this instance." Via Wikipedia.
So, yeah, it's quite clear Scalia would uphold Plessey. As UT attorney Greg Garre brilliantly retorted (in response to questions Justice Alito posed) in yesterday's hearing, Scalia (& Alito) were going not for "separate but equal" -- the term coined in Plessey -- but "separate and inferior." I haven't seen the opera "Scalia/Ginsburg," but it's time to update it to have the Scalia character sing a rendition of "Way Down upon de Swanee Ribber."
@Ophelia M. is right: "Alongside the blatancy of Scalia's bigotry is the fact that he is UNAWARE that his statements are broadcasting it! For me, that takes his hate & ignorance to an even lower (were that possible) level."
Marie
P.S. to you fuzzy-headed liberals who think it would be a good idea to let the GOP presidential candidate beat Hillary because she's such a flawed candidate: Scalia is exactly the kind of judge the Republican candidate would appoint to the Supreme Court, & that president might have three vacancies to fill. Justices stay on the Court for decades. So electing a Republican isn't giving him just one or two terms to mess up the country, it's giving him decades. Try to show you've got some sense, people. Giving your vote to a Republican to spite moderates or to "teach the country a lesson" is still as smart as voting for Ralph Nader was in 2000. One would think Nader voters had learned that lesson. Apparently not.
NPR calls it the "tipping point", as the amount of households classified as "middle income" officially slips below 50% this year, and of course whites have historically been the centerpiece of this status symbol.
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/12/09/459087477/the-tipping-point-most-americans-no-longer-are-middle-class
While nuances are to be made (over the last few decades all social classes have become relatively more wealthy through economic growth, but the distribution of the fruits of our labor has been gobbled up by the higher-income classes), it does not bode well for the American psyche. Cue Trump/Cruz 2016
This "tipping point" was a matter of time as politicians have refused to lend a helping hand to Main Street, but this symbolic line we've just crossed makes me think even more about two recent articles linked here (thanks Marie):
First, the analysis of Princeton University scholars, Ann Case and Angus Deaton about the relative decline of the middle-aged white population and their increase in mortality rates.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/more-on-that-most-important-study
Second, an article (can't remember who wrote it/my Google skills are failing me, sorry) that was an analysis about how whites are showing resentment even to their fellow whites (not to mention the blah people) regarding the use of "entitlements" and how that is psychologically tied to the pressure of those white Americans to keep their heads above water while they see their incomes and opportunities slowly shrink away in a country they "hardly recognize".
Seems to me to be a perfect brew of perceived slights of unacknowledged privilege, mixed with a revived Civil Rights Redux that many angry whites had already shut the book on and patted themselves on the back about, combined with real and painful economic and social status demotions, topped with a carefully crafted touch of racial animus by those whites' perceived "leaders".
This toxic recipe is being dressed up on a platter just at the moment when we have collectively put together the least productive Congress in the history of the country and while fundamentalists have completely highjacked the Right.
Let's make sure we don't give the keys to the Crazy Bunch in 2016.
Your morning chuckle:
http://time.com/4141783/time-person-of-the-year-runner-up-donald-trump-eagle-gif/
And another, scroll down to Faux News on air apology:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/nogozones.asp
Universities have long used diversity as a means to have a vibrant student body. I don't know why the University of Wisconsin accepted me. My high school grades were good, but I was not at the tippy-top of my class. I was involved in a lot of extracurricular activities & I probably wrote a good essay on my application. UW-Madison likely had a quota for out-of-state students, & I was a Floridian who made the cut.
Is geographical diversity more desirable or justifiable than racial diversity?
Scalia was valedictorian of his high school class, but he claims he was a nerdy bookworm, so he probably wasn't that "well-rounded" fellow schools used to say they were seeking. So Georgetown may have chosen Scalia because it was looking for ethnic diversity in its student mix; that is, there's a good chance he was an (informal) affirmative-action choice. Like so many conservatives who benefit from some liberal-minded policy, Scalia wants to make sure those who follow him don't get a similar leg up. He was deserving, but they are not.
Why he thinks Abigail Fisher is more deserving than whatever student got "her slot" is no mystery. As Amanda Marcotte (& others) have pointed out, Fisher was not going to get into UT anyway. Her grades & SAT scores precluded her making the cut, & she didn't have other qualities to mitigate her poor academic performance. Marcotte cites a Pro Publica investigation:
"It’s true that the university, for whatever reason, offered provisional admission to some students with lower test scores and grades than Fisher. Five of those students were black or Latino. Forty-two were white. Neither Fisher nor Blum [the "brains" & money behind the Fisher suit] mentioned those 42 applicants in interviews. Nor did they acknowledge the 168 black and Latino students with grades as good as or better than Fisher’s who were also denied entry into the university that year."
The Pro Publica analysis is here. It's very readable. Here's the crux of it: "... university officials claim in court filings that even if Fisher received points for her race and every other personal achievement factor, the letter she received in the mail still would have said no."
Fisher was destined for one of those "slower-track" schools where she might have "done well," as Scalia put it. Funny Scalia didn't suggest to her attorneys that she would be better off at one of those schools. (In fact, Fisher went to & was graduated from Louisiana State University & has some kind of "finance" job in Austin, Texas.)
Marie
@safari: The article you couldn't find was a NYT op-ed by Alec MacGillis, writing in response to other analyses of why "parts of the country that depend on the safety-net programs supported by Democrats are increasingly voting for Republicans who favor shredding that net." Using both anecdotal evidence & statistical data, MacGillis concluded that,
"The people in these communities who are voting Republican in larger proportions are those who are a notch or two up the economic ladder — the sheriff’s deputy, the teacher, the highway worker, the motel clerk, the gas station owner and the coal miner. And their growing allegiance to the Republicans is, in part, a reaction against what they perceive, among those below them on the economic ladder, as a growing dependency on the safety net, the most visible manifestation of downward mobility in their declining towns."
Marie
Marie, I like the reference 'cardboard cowboy' because it exposes the another fact that the media ignores, Adolf is a coward. If he was in charge, Putin would rule the world. Anyway, I can't wait for the next seriously stupid statement from his highness.
The good news is the fact that the most seriously mentally ill Republican candidate, Carson, has sort of disappeared.
Marie--the University of Wisconsin has long had a higher quota for out of state students than other Midwestern schools--hence, in the 60s, the frequent blame on "out of state agitators" for campus unrest.
If you were to apply next year, you might have an even better chance of admission, since the UW is raising its out of state quota to increase tuition revenue. This is because the state has both frozen instate tuition and drastically slashed state aid to the UW.
You know how it goes, you're reading an online article and as you scroll you notice something clickable on the side that looks interesting...but, by the time you finished reading article one and go Googling more details, you've forgotten to go back to that one on the side. Fortunately, a friend traveling in India responded to my outrage at Donald the Drumpf's one-armed salute...by, noting that as usual I was in my usual Gloria Steinem mode. Gloria! Right...had to search, but found the piece I meant to read a few days ago...and boy, Steinem put out there in her '10 Things (she) Wants for Christmas':
"10. An abject apology from Donald Trump for being a Birther; anti-immigrant; a builder of buildings that look like big Dunhill cigarette lighters; the world's most punishing source of Green Cards for women who marry him to get one; daring to rate women as no longer Tens when he himself has never been a One; going bankrupt multiple times in order to stick other people with his bad-judgment debt; pretending he ever hit a home run when actually, he was born on Third Base -- and oh, yes, setting the hair weave industry all the way back to Rogaine.
9. If Trump doesn't apologize, I wish us all the gift of remembering that Hitler was democratically elected -- in a low voter turnout."
Low voter turn-out! Isn't that how we've gotten most of the
lousy idiots in Congress? as Governors? (Paul LePage, a prime example) et al.
To read her complete list: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gloria-steinem/the-top-10-things-i-want-for-christmas_b_8751268.html
Donald Drumpf is expected a few miles away this evening at an event...sponsored, I believe by the N. E. Policeman's Benevolent Association (picture with a grinning Jerry Flynn, president of the PBA). http://www.seacoastonline.com/article/20151208/NEWS/151209290/101098/NEWS
P.S. Gloria's ten things she wants for Christmas...shouldn't she have said, "...ten things I want for Holiday"? P.C. Funny! I'm being a wee bit snarky here!
In Noah Feldman's excellent book ( about S. C. justices and decisions throughout history)" Scorpions," he addresses the Rehnquist/ Black issue that Marie refers to. It's interesting how that slipped the fact finding vetting process so neatly during Rehnquist's confirmation hearings. When Feldman is discussing William Douglas he says this:
"According to the realist theory of the law in which William Douglas had been trained...judges inevitably make the law in their own image. Douglas needed a sense of who he was in order to know what the law should be."
Could we conclude then, that in the case of Scalia, his sense of himself is one of a racist, homophobic, opera loving, gun toting tiger of the Supremes?
Jeb(!)'s conspiracy theory about Trumpy being in cahoots with Clinton is not an isolated fever dream. At least twice this week I've heard the same idea floated by local wingers. One may have been uttered with the tip of the tongue in the cheek but the other was dead serious. In that case, the theory was that Democrats are "paying Trump" to stay in the race just to make Republicans look bad, because Hillary couldn't possibly win on her own.
There are so many things wrong about that claim, including the articles, conjunctions, and prepositions. First, "paying Trump"? I don't think Trump needs their money. Second, paying him to get him to stay in the race? You couldn't get Trump out of this race with the jaws of life. Make Republicans look bad? They're doing a bang-up job on their own. Not a one of them looks even vaguely "not bad". And finally, I wouldn't bet the farm on Hillary's victory, but I'd probably bet the house and a few of the outbuildings.
But this sort of thinking is part and parcel of being a Confederate today. It's a funky, weird combination of triumphalism ("We're the best! You Ess Ay!") and victimization ("Everyone's out to get us! Boo-hoo."). They're the best evah in the history of mankind but so put upon and downtrodden. And shit, they need guns to stop those evil liberals and their Mooslim buddies. OH god help us! We're so fucking afraid.
But we're strong and we're the best.
But those enemies, everywhere! Aiiieeeeee!
They also loves them some whacko theories. But the idea that Trump is being paid by Democrats to help Hillary doesn't even come close to the Army, under orders from Obama, to take over Texas and confiscate all the guns.
It just gets crazier and crazier.
Hey, maybe Democrats are paying Jeb(!) to SAY that they're paying Trump to stay in the race to help Hillary. No...no...wait..maybe...Jeb(!) is paying Trump AND the Democrats....oh wait, that's wrong....okay....maybe...
Marie wrote: "...Scalia is exactly the kind of judge the Republican candidate would appoint to the Supreme Court..."
I don't think so. I think we'd be lucky to get a Scalia. We'd be lucky to get a Rhenquist or a Bork.
Do you think Trump would appoint a guy like Scalia? Would Cruz or Rubio appoint a guy like Bork or Rhenquist? Hell, we'd be lucky to get Jay fucking Bybee.
Most likely, we'd get a bargain basement Alito or some firebrand racist fundie who wants to turn the country into an all-white Christian theocracy. I think we'd get the bottom of the barrel, a snarling, Confederate douchebag (would never be a woman) who thinks torturing people for running a red light, especially if they're black or Muslim, should be the law of the land and that any woman saying the word "abortion" should be locked up in a cell and forced to bring that baby to term. After which the baby would be sent to a fundie orphanage and the woman sentenced to 20 years hard labor.
Another Scalia would be the best possible outcome.
Just in case we lose sight of our other candidates' fancy feats here's Jonathan Cohn's dismissal of Marco Rubio's "big brag" that he is the "mastermind" behind the Republican's attack on the ACA.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/marco-rubio-obamacare-bailout_5668a2dfe4b0f290e521e056
@Akhilleus writes, "It's a funky, weird combination of triumphalism ('We're the best! You Ess Ay!') and victimization ('Everyone's out to get us! Boo-hoo.').
This apparent contradiction only makes sense to a brainwashed confederate. It isn't that they're so smart they can "hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." Rather, they have to find explanations for why they are doing so poorly in this exceptional country where everybody can be a Horatio Alger hero.
Since it is the interest of the billionaire-bought GOP to hide or rebuke analysis like Joe Stiglitz's essay above, it has to be something else that has stymied these poor folks. So to Abigail Fisher it was the (assumed) black kid who got "her spot" at UT. To the Republican-voting teacher in Alec MacGillis's article, it's the lazy white neighbors who rely on government handouts. To your small businessman acquaintance (whom you mentioned a couple of days ago), it's "Obama's regulations." And so forth. (To most, it's a combination of these evil, liberal forces.)
When Donald Trump repeats "Something isn't right in this country," his lemmings nod their heads. Of course Trump is bound by the not-so-secret code of billionaires to misdirect their attention from what-all is not right. The GOP has been running a con/set of conspiracy theories that's worked quite well for them for a long time. As long as billionaires make sure their own GOP lackeys are well-fed (even if they lose an election, they're guaranteed a good job at a "think tank" or maybe even a spot on Fox "News"), the con will go on, & the rubes will keep cheering You-Ess-Ay, Obama God Away.
Marie
P.S. The only reason I can say this is that I am a graduate of one of Obama's re-education camps.
To hell with dog whistles.
Several commenters have noted, with appropriate alarm, that there doesn't seem to be any consternation on the right with saying things like black kids are stupid and SHOULD be kept in different schools (I heard Nina Totenberg report this last night on NPR and almost ran off the road). Out and out racist statements are now quotidian events in the Confederacy. Trump wants to ban all Muslims and his spokeswoman defends this by saying that of course we should ban them. They're fucking MOOSLIMS, ain't they, as if that's reason enough, and what don't you get about it?
It doesn't seem too long ago that such comments would guarantee a one way ticket to Palookaville for a candidate. No more. Now they get a bump in the polls. They've dispensed with the dog whistles. Public discourse becomes more hateful and aggressive by the day.
And please leave off with the crocodile tears on the part of oleaginous dissemblers like Lyin' Ryan. "This isn't my kind of conservatism..." Oh no? It's exactly your kind of conservatism. Exactly. And all the Republican candidates too. These people have been trading on bigotry for years, counting on winks and nods to let the knuckledraggers know that of course, you agree with them, but your white hood and robe just happen to be at the cleaners today.
But as soon as someone starts shouting it out in public (and not just any someone; a Supreme Court justice and a candidate for president!!!), the Ryan types don't even have the courage of their convictions, coming right out and saying that minorities deserve to be second and third class citizens. As do women.
Last week one of these fucksticks went on live TV to call the president a "pussy". Well find a mirror, confederates. There's your pussies.
@PD Pepe: Thanks for the link to Jonathan Cohn's piece. It illustrates perfectly one of those lies that Republicans always will get away with because the lie is so easy to tell & the facts refuting it are so complicated.
Marie
Scalia's statements that African Americans are better off in schools that are more suited to "inferior intellects" fits perfectly in the mindset that is often mirrored in the work world. Diversity is encouraged at entry level positions (usually less desirable work) and less so with increasing status. I became senior management at an early age (law enforcement). I challenged promotions that rarely included minorities and women. The most common response was "we aren't descriminating, we just want the most qualified candidate." Of course, like Scalia, the standards for judgement are promulgated to exclude minorities and women and are based on their own fear of others. The easiest way to exclude others is to say they're stupid, slow, can't make the grade, aren't ready, etc....
A work situation effects a few people, but Scalia's statement makes it clear he's identifying African Americans as inferior. I suppose that extends to President Obama too. Its pretty clear that Scalia could not be impeached and removed, even though that's the obvious response.
Seeing the Supremes mess with affirmative action calls to mind an image of Alley Oop "fixing" a computer with his stone axe.
Just as Mr. Oop (no blame to him) wouldn't have the vaguest idea of a computer's purpose or how it functions, at least half the Supremes don't seem to have any notion of what universities do or how they work.
Universities have always had quotas and they still do. They have never been blind to gender, race, religion, academic qualifications or geographic distribution and admissions offices still consider all those variables (and more as Nadd2 says) and they couldn't function if they were.
I'm sure geographic distribution considerations had something to do with my admission to the university I attended. The same factor benefitted our two sons, I'm sure. In each of those cases, someone otherwise equally qualified was not so fortunate. In other words, in any limited group (I think the classes then ran about 1500 and still do), anyone who got in kept someone out.
Over time universities adjust as populations and social mores change. My Class of '68 contained a high proportion of Jews. (If there were any in my Northwest Washington State home town, they were very well hidden.) Today similar-sized classes include far more Asians, Blacks (I think there were around ten in my class, a lonely bunch), and certainly more women, all of whom take the place of someone else. For each in there is an out.
Denying entrance solely on the grounds of race or religion should be unconstitutional, as it is. But considering race and religion among the many others as every university does in the admissions process is an institutional requirement.
Academic qualification (however we measure it, and goodness knows, that varies mightily from place to place) has never been the only college admission consideration. (What of legacy admissions, which remain rife? Or the influence of a family's large bank account?)
Anyone who pretends, even worse believes, that test scores sand grades ever were, or now in our polyglot nation should be, the alpha and omega of college admissions makes Alley Oop and his axe look smart.
The ever readable Amanda Marcotte opines (above) that the Fisher case against the University of Texas should have been laughed out of court. Indeed it should have. And would have, had we a reasonable court properly respectful of legal precedent and a concern for justice rather than what's best for the Republican Party. But, no. We have a Supreme Court (and many other federal and state courts) run by card carrying Confederates. There's a reason Republicans blocked every judicial nominee put forward by the Obama administration for years and why those same charlatans screamed bloody murder whenever one of the authoritarian thugs selected by The Decider was not ushered into court immediately, on comfy cushions carried by their lessers. Confederates know that their best friend, after election rigging, for controlling the country and remaking it according to their wishes, is domination of the courts. Winger controlled courts have bordered on the kangaroo variety and the Supreme Court is not all that much different.
Fisher, as Marcotte suggests, should have been told where to shove her bullshit case. Likewise the Christianist Hobby Lobby complaint should never have seen the light of day, but supporters of Christian hegemony on the Court made sure it made the list of cases to be decided in favor of whining fundamentalists who don't feel they should have to obey the law.
There likely have been many more terrible cases chosen by the Roberts Court in order for the remaking of America to continue apace, and more importantly perhaps, many cases of sterling merit they've ignored, left to languish in juridical limbo.
Some enterprising legal scholar might want to look at the cases with questionable or no merit--other than the opportunity they presented to support the Confederacy--selected by Roberts, Scalia, Alito, et. al. and while they're at it, check out important and worthy cases they decided might be bad for Confederate ideology.
re: Scalia the racist:
The LA Times begs to differ.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-scalia-affirmativeaction-supremecourt-20151209-story.html
Study: Scalia Better Off in “Less Advanced” Court
http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/study-scalia-better-off-in-less-advanced-court
Trump covering the bases.
Let's see, Nazi style fascism, check.
Making fun of the disabled, check.
Alienating Mexicans, Syrians, Muslims of all stripe, check.
Anti-Semitic, check.
Misogynist, check.
Liar, check. Oh, check, check, and double check.
Hmmm....let's see, what's not on the public resume so far?
Hey! How about the mafia?
Sure enough, a former high level "advisor" to Trumpy, a nasty piece of work named Felix Sater, "...a twice-convicted Russian émigré who served prison time and had documented mafia connections" has become the source of some interest. Somehow though, the man with the World's Greatest Memory, doesn't seem to recall this guy with whom he worked up some of his biggest development deals, a guy who once threatened to cut off the legs of an investor in another Trump project and leave him dead in the trunk of a car (a situation settled out of court by Trump's group). One of Sater's earlier convictions involved an assault he made on a man at a bar, breaking a glass then attacking the man, shoving the broken glass into his neck and face. Nice sort of playmates Trumpy chooses. Just imagine what his cabinet would be like.
No wonder Trump has no problem with his thugs beating up people at his rallies. They're lucky he doesn't sic Felix Sater on them.
It's not difficult to imagine that a shark like Trump has plenty of skeletons in his closet. Maybe some of them will come out and do a little Danse Macabre for us.
Cowichan:
Actually, as I read it, the LATimes doesn't differ so much, just sprinkles on a little nuance to distinguish its take from that of "Mother Jones," which might have been, not for the first or last time, a bit extreme.
The Times does call Scalia's point, expressed by others before him, "controversial," even hinting it might have a shaky foundation in fact.
In my judgement that Scalia chose to utter the remark at all, knowing as he must the position is hardly universally accepted as fact, brands him as what he is, someone who thrills himself by saying extreme, contrarian things simply to get noticed.
He may not be much of a jurist, (his Constitutional interpretations based on his selective Originalism are simply silly) just as Trump is not much of a politician, but he too is a good showman, if not also a racist.
Too bad we're not better at paying attention to the substance and ignoring the show.
The Good and the Not so Good.
So this is funny.
Trumpy had his lawyers draw up a cease and desist order to Florida billionaire, Mike Fernandez, a supporter of Jebbie, because Fernandez has been taking out full page ads saying that he'd vote for Clinton before he'd vote for Trump. This, of course, is a big no-no for carrot-head. He's the only one who can bash away. Trump and his goons have obviously never heard of a little something called the First Amendment.
Anyway, a lawyer for Jeb(!)'s Right to Rise PAC sent a seriously ass-kicking response to carrot-top's legal henchman. It's a great read!
Some high spots, in this letter to Trumpy's legal beagle:
"Should your client actually be elected Commander-in-Chief, will you be the one writing the cease and desist letters to Vladimir Putin, or will that be handled by outside counsel?"
and
"If you have the time between bankruptcy filings and editing reality show contracts, we urge you to flip through the Supreme Court's decision in New York Times v. Sullivan."
So that's the good. The not so good? The WaPo piece is annotated by its author, Chris Cillizza, using a very cool app called Genius. Try it out. It's pretty spiffy. Until you get to the annotation on the reference to New York Times v Sullivan, one of the landmark First Amendment cases in Supreme Court history, a case that directly affects the fourth estate's treatment of public figures in their reporting.
Cillizza states that he's never heard of it.
Sad trumpet. But not sad for him, sad for us that we have guys like this standing on such huge soap boxes who are ignorant of such seminal elements of their profession.
Oh well, I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Chuck Todd doesn't even think it's his job to report anything.
@Akhilleus: There's a reason I almost never link to or even read Cillizza's stuff. Sometimes I'll find Cillizza has written about a topic I think would be interesting to Reality Chex readers, so I look around to see if someone else has covered the same topic & if so, link that.
Since Cillizza occasionally dances close to the edge of NYT v. Sullivan, it would be a good idea for him to familiarize himself with what the Supremes determined constitutes journalistic "malice." However, I have to admit that if someone did bring suit against Cillizza for writing something malicious, the judge or jury would be inclined to believe him when he claimed ignorance, & such demonstrable ignorance could provide him a get-out-of-jail-free card. Nitwit.
Marie
Marie,
Cillizza went to Georgetown after attending a toney prep school to get him ready for, ya know, the rigors of student life. I wonder how many minority students, the kids Scalia considers too stupid to actually have been admitted to Georgetown, could have explained the importance of New York Times v Sullivan to Cillizza before he settled in to expounding on the impressive virtues of Paul (Lyin') Ryan and how Haley Barbour, when he talked about the good old days when darkies knew their place and sat on the porch eating watermelon and singing songs, had made just a slight boo-boo and hoped he could recover quickly and continue on with Confederate business as usual.
Your decision to ignore such a hack is commendable. Unfortunately, his bullshit is trumpeted by the Post and linked and linked and linked across the web to his both-sider fans.
Marie,
Oh, and one other thing.
Should Cillizza actually find himself athwart NYT v Sullivan, ignorance of the law would provide him no cover. That is, unless he had slandered a Democrat, in which case the Supreme Court would give him a big 'attaboy and tell him to go and sin some more.