;)
The Commentariat -- Dec. 19, 2013
David Sanger & Charlie Savage of the New York Times: "A panel of presidential advisers who reviewed the National Security Agency's surveillance practices urged President Obama on Wednesday to end the government's systematic collection of logs of all Americans' phone calls, and to keep those in private hands, 'for queries and data mining' only by court order. In a more than 300-page report made public by the White House, the group of five intelligence and legal experts also strongly recommended that any operation to spy on foreign leaders would have to pass a rigorous test that weighs the potential economic or diplomatic costs if the operation becomes public. The decision to monitor those communications, it said, should be made by the president and his advisers, not the intelligence agencies." The report is here. ...
... The Times charts the major changes recommended. ...
... The Guardian's liveblog on the report -- which includes in-house analysis & other reactions -- makes for some interesting reading. ...
... Benjamin Wittes of Lawfare: "This is a really awkward document for the Obama administration. Really awkward. The President, after all, has stood by the necessity of the Section 215 program and objected to legislative proposals to curtail it. Then the White House handpicks a special review group, and it kind of pulls the rug out from under the administration's position. The review group concludes 'that the information contributed to terrorist investigations by the use of section 215 telephony meta-data was not essential to preventing attacks and could readily have been obtained in a timely manner using conventional section 215 orders.'" And more.
... Marcy Wheeler, writing in the Guardian, has some background & scuttlebutt. Also, the Guardian seems to have provided her with an editor, so her piece isn't as convoluted & minutiae-laden as is her usual writing. ...
... Charles Pierce: "These recommendations are just that. The White House can tell the panel to pound sand. And, even if it doesn't, there is no reason on god's earth why anyone should believe that the NSA actually would abide by any agreement going forward." ...
... Josh Gerstein of Politico: "... the panel's report raises a pointed question: If collecting huge volumes of metadata on telephone calls from, to and within the United States doesn't bring much benefit, just how much political capital is Obama willing to spend to keep the program going?" ...
... Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: Judge Richard "Leon asked the right question, the one that the FISA court, Obama, and key House and Senate Intelligence Committee leaders have failed to ask since 2006: Has the nature and quantity of data that we all relinquish to third parties changed so fundamentally since 1979 that the doctrine set out by Smith[, the 1979 case on which the NSA hangs it metadata collection hat,] is no longer useful as a constitutional roadmap? The Supreme Court may not ever ask, or answer, Leon's question. But Congress, and President Obama, certainly must." ...
... Frank Rich: "... as a practical matter, Leon's action has no effect, and there's no known reason to hope that his ruling will be upheld once it lands in the Roberts court." Thanks to contributor MAG for the link. ...
... The Last Scoundrel of Refuge (from the NSA) Is Not the Perfect Guest (And Hardly the Perfect Litigant on an Important Constitutional Issue). Tal Kopan of Politico: "Conservative legal activist Larry Klayman got into an argument on CNN with host Don Lemon and legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin when he was brought on to discuss his victory this week in a lawsuit challenging NSA surveillance, resulting in Lemon cutting him off the screen and Klayman comparing Lemon to disgraced former MSNBC host Martin Bashir." ** Totally entertaining:
... Etiquette Note to Toobin: Just because a guest is a "tinfoil-hat lunatic" doesn't mean you should say so on the teevee. There are more polite -- if less amusing -- ways to convey your assessment of his credibility. ...
Ed O'Keefe & Lori Montgomery of the Washington Post: "Senators voted 64 to 36 to approve the bipartisan budget agreement Wednesday afternoon. Nine Republicans joined with 55 Democrats to approve the legislation, which Obama is expected to sign before departing this weekend for his Christmas vacation in Hawaii. The Republican senators who joined with Democrats were Saxby Chambliss (Ga.), Susan Collins (Maine), Orrin G. Hatch (Utah), John Hoeven (N.D.), Johnny Isakson (Ga.), Ronald Johnson (Wis.), John McCain (Ariz.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Rob Portman (Ohio)."
Binyamin Appelbaum of the New York Times: "The Federal Reserve said on Wednesday that it would reduce its monthly bond-buying campaign to $75 billion in January, beginning a retreat from its stimulus campaign, because it no longer saw the need for the full force of those efforts." ...
... The Times has a handy interactive graphic "decoding" the Fed statement. ...
... Binyamin Appelbaum: "Stock markets in Asia and Europe on Thursday welcomed the news that the Federal Reserve would gradually end its bond-buying program during 2014, a modest first step toward unwinding the American central bank's broader stimulus campaign as its officials gained confidence that the economy was growing steadily." ...
... Dana Milbank: "It is tantalizing to wonder, as Ben Bernanke did Wednesday afternoon, how much better the economy would be today, and how many millions more would have jobs, if Congress hadn't done so much over the past few years to drag down growth.... A dozen times he mentioned fiscal drag, fiscal head winds, tight fiscal policy and the like. In his opening statement, he noted that 'despite significant fiscal head winds, the economy has been expanding at a moderate pace' and will pick up further, helped by 'waning fiscal drag.' The waning fiscal drag was apparently a reference to this month's budget deal.... Bernanke ... can feel good about what he did to fight the twin menaces of his tenure: the Great Recession and the lawmakers whose policies made it worse."
Steve Yaccino of the New York Times: "The director of Minnesota's health insurance exchange, April Todd-Malmlov, abruptly resigned this week, making the exchange the fourth state program to see a leadership change in the midst of mounting criticism over the rollout of President Obama's new health care law.... Ms. Todd-Malmlov's successor was quick to promise fixes to problems still plaguing consumers...."
Maggie Haberman & Manu Raju of Politico: "Sen. Max Baucus, the veteran Montana Democrat who has served in the Senate since 1978, is expected to be nominated by the White House to serve as the next U.S. ambassador to China.... [Baucus], who has been a central figure in battles over trade, taxes and health care for a generation, has already announced he will not run for reelection in 2014. And if he leaves early, Baucus will be opening up a Senate seat in a competitive state where Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock appoints the senator when there is a vacancy."
People Are Stoopid. Jeffrey Jones of Gallup: "Seventy-two percent of Americans say big government is a greater threat to the U.S. in the future than is big business or big labor, a record high in the nearly 50-year history of this question. The prior high for big government was 65% in 1999 and 2000. Big government has always topped big business and big labor, including in the initial asking in 1965, but just 35% named it at that time." ...
... Steve M.: "The survey results are disheartening, but what's really disheartening is the fact that big business has never taken the #1 slot in this poll. It didn't even happen after Big Finance unleashed a global financial Katrina that drowned much of the world in 2008...." ...
Right Wing World
... Shades of Newt. The poll of Stoopid People above explains why they vote for a guy who says stuff like this. Amanda Terkel of the Huffington Post: "Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) ... is proposing that low-income children do some manual labor in exchange for their subsidized meals. On Saturday, Kingston, who is vying to be his party's nominee in Georgia's Senate race next year, spoke at a meeting of the Jackson County Republican Party about the federal school lunch program." Includes video of Kingston saying,
But one of the things I've talked to the secretary of agriculture about: Why don't you have the kids pay a dime, pay a nickel to instill in them that there is, in fact, no such thing as a free lunch? Or maybe sweep the floor of the cafeteria.... Think what we would gain as a society in getting people -- getting the myth out of their head that there is such a thing as a free lunch.
... Digby: "Why not poor houses and orphanages? It worked for Queen Victoria." ...
... Sins of the Father. Jim Newell in Salon: Yo, Jack! "Every kid gets a 'free lunch.' So it doesn't make sense to put one into janitorial labor and not the other because of parental earning disparities." ...
... Jessica Williams did this segment before Kingman's bright idea hit the national media:
... Olivia Kittel of Media Matters: "Forbes columnist John Tamny's declaration on The Daily Show that food stamps are 'cruel' and would be replaced by private charity if people were 'literally starving' with 'distended bellies' is in keeping with his past remarks on the program -- In his regular role as a Fox panelist, Tamny has lamented that food stamp recipients are not publicly shamed and embarrassed for receiving the benefits."
... David Edwards of the Raw Story: Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO), "a tea party-back Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Missouri, this week asked that a flag be moved because she did not want to stand near a photo of President Barack Obama during a press conference." ...
... Rudy Keller of the Columbia (Missouri) Daily Tribune: "She has issued numerous official press releases denouncing Obama, the health care plan Republicans have labeled with his name and his proposals on tax and spending policies to control the federal deficit." ...
... CW: Hartzler's press conference took place at the Truman Memorial Veterans Hospital. I wonder if Hartzler knows that the place she chose for her presser is named for a Democratic president. I wonder if she knows that every one of the patients at that hospital is the recipient of socialized medicine -- way more "socialized" than ObamaCare. And she's worried about optics?
Evan McMorris-Santoro of BuzzFeed: "The Republican National Committee publicity effort to tar Democrats with PolitiFact's 'Lie Of The Year' includes sending Democrats trophies emblazoned with the American Flag that are made in China. A Democratic source said the trophies have been sent to the offices of all the top Republican targets for defeat in next year's Senate elections."
Just Who Is Conservative Enough for Wingers?
November 2013 Election
Laura Vozzella & Ben Pershing of the Washington Post: "State Sen. Mark D. Obenshain (R) conceded the race for Virginia attorney general to Democrat Mark R. Herring on Wednesday... Obenshain's announcement put an end to a drawn-out contest that, on election night, was the closest statewide election in history.... Herring had significantly widened his slim lead over Obenshain in a statewide recount that began Monday and was scheduled to finish Wednesday.... Herring and Obenshain are state senators, and Herring's win will prompt a special election. Because Herring's Loudoun County district is seen as highly competitive, his win could cause Democrats to lose power in the evenly divided Senate." ...
... Adam Weinstein of Gawker: "... Virginia Republicans will go from holding every statewide office in Richmond to none when the new governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general are sworn in next year. It will be the first time in four decades that Democrats have held those positions and both of the state's U.S. Senate seats."
Presidential Election 2012
Brett Logiurato of Business Insider: "Netflix is out with a trailer for its new Mitt Romney documentary -- 'MITT' -- which provides a fascinating, behind-the-scenes look into some of the most important moments of his failed campaign for president." The trailer shows "Romney checking his phone, the moment he realized he was going to lose the 2012 election....":
... "New Documentary Threatens to Make You Like Mitt Romney." Paul Waldman: "This two-minute trailer is full of charmingly human moments, particularly since Mitt's greatest unmet challenge was convincing us that he was indeed human.... The passage of time -- and the fact that he will no longer be affecting politics or policy -- allows us to see him as just a human being, and maybe even spare a generous thought for him." CW: I had to read the headline twice. The first time I thought it meant I could become a MittClone.
Local News
** Rosalind Helderman, et al., of the Washington Post: "Federal prosecutors told Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell last week that he and his wife would be charged in connection with a gift scandal, but senior Justice Department officials delayed the decision after the McDonnells' attorneys made a face-to-face appeal in Washington, according to people familiar with the case."
When Gail Collins writes a column that involves Chris Christie, Sheldon Adelson & Donald Trump, you can bet -- so to speak -- it's worth reading. Collins' bottom line, though: "There is no possible way the country could be improved by giving people a greatly expanded freedom to gamble for money in their pajamas."
Jon Hurdle of the New York Times: "Gov. Tom Corbett of Pennsylvania has thrown his support behind a state bill that would ban discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, adding unexpected support from a Republican who once said gay marriage was the equivalent of a brother marrying a sister.... Mr. Corbett has been lagging in the polls ahead of his bid for re-election next year and is viewed as perhaps the nation's most vulnerable governor."
News Ledes
New York Times: "With an eye perhaps to the coming Winter Olympics, President Vladimir V. Putin said on Thursday that Russia could soon free its most famous prisoner, Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, the former chief executive of Yukos Oil, whose arrest and imprisonment 10 years ago signaled an authoritarian turn in the nation's modern history."
Reuters: "Target Corp. said data from about 40 million credit and debit card accounts might have been stolen during the Thanksgiving weekend, in one of the largest credit card breaches at a U.S. retailer.... Target said the accounts, which might have been compromised between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15, affected customers making credit and debit card purchases at its U.S. stores."
New York Times: "President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Thursday explained his decision to rescue Ukraine with a $15 billion bailout and discounts on natural gas as a gesture of good will given the close historic ties between the two countries."
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Reader Comments (18)
David Nir in Daily Kos on Baucus:
“[T]his is all assuming Baucus' appointment actually goes forward, and that he's confirmed in a timely manner. But in this post-filibuster world, he's probably good to go. That means Montana will soon get a new senator—and China will have to endure the stupid things that come out of Baucus' mouth instead of us.”
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/12/18/1263731/-So-long-Max-Obama-will-reportedly-tap-Montana-s-Baucus-as-new-U-S-ambassador-to-China
@James Singer: Yeah, my first thought was, "Oh. China. What a great place to stash Max Baucus." Now we'll never have to hear from him again. When, after all, is that last time you heard from Gary Locke? Probably when he was Secretary of Commerce. Or Governor of Washington state.
Obama probably figured the same thing I did: "Let's put Baucus on the other side of the globe! And pretend it's a promotion."
One thing I'll say for Baucus -- he was damned right about the "train wreck." Despite what Republicans claim, Baucus was warning way back when that the Website -- not the ACA -- would be a disaster.
Marie
I'm movin forward this comment by Noodge, which got spammed two days ago:
@ CW: You wrote, "Their (the spies) bottom-line ethic is that they work for their own team. And broadly speaking, the spies' supervisors are supposed to know what they do in the course of that work. If they employ methods (waterboarding) that the supervisors decide is not ethical, the supervisors will tell them to cut that out....In every line of legitimate work, there are ethics & there are rules. Well-intentioned employees more-or-less know what those rules are & follow them."
The implication being that Edward Snowden should have followed the rules and not revealed what he knew, even if what he saw going on was against the law, because his supervisors had given it their approval, and the supervisors' approval made it unnecessary for Snowden to decide whether what he was doing was ethical.
Judging from your response I'm apparently reading too much into what you wrote. I am, however, very sensitive to this issue; we all must assume responsibility for what we do. We can disagree over whether Snowden was being unethical in leaking what he did, but if he truly felt that what he was doing at the NSA was illegal, unconstitutional, and/or unethical, he was honor-bound to tell someone about it. Since the people within his normal chain of command were the ones telling him to act unethically, his only options were to either go public with what he knew and face the consequences or cop the Nuremberg Defense (of course, if Snowden were 100% ethical, he'd be writing his own Letter From a Birmingham Jail right now, instead of hiding in Russia).
As for how Snowden could have gotten passwords, that is the easiest thing in the world to do. I once was commissioned to do a information systems security survey for a large hotel/casino in Las Vegas. First thing I did was call the front desk, tell the agent who answered the phone I was with the hotel's software service provider and I needed to log into the system to run a software update. I asked for the agent's user name and password, and he gave it to me, no questions asked. I then had access to the credit card information of every guest in the 3,000 - plus rooms. Later on I went to check into the hotel, and just by standing at the front desk and being able to read upside-down I was able to get a log-in name and password from the piece of paper taped to the desk. By asking for something special I was able to get a supervisor to attend to my problem and watched carefully while she typed in her user name and manager's password. All sorts of access.
Granted, NSA hirees are probably a little more "hip" to this kind of scam, and would probably never give out a password over the phone, but most of them would probably have their passwords written on a desk blotter someplace. Anyone already inside the facility would have a lot less trouble than you think acquiring access to systems if passwords were all that were required.
I have a hard time believing, however, that NSA computers only require a log-in name and a password to gain access to our most sensitive information. They should require some sort of biometric confirmation, or a card of some sort. If not, then shame on the NSA. They have nobody but themselves to blame for the leaks.
I wouldn't put too much stock in that Gallup poll. As with all polls, it depends on how the question is worded.
@Nancy: What, specifically, is your objection to how the question was worded? Was the question worded differently in 1965, when the results were dramatically different from today's results? Please elaborate.
As we discussed in yesterday's thread, words matter -- as do other factors, like the personal bias of the questioner -- but I don't see how the apparent trend is really just a product of poor word choice.
Marie
Baucus in China.
I'm reminded of the story of the Zen master and the boy.
The boy is given a bicycle for his birthday. Everyone says "That's a wonderful gift!" The Zen master says "We'll see."
The very first day the boy falls off his bike and breaks both legs. Everyone says "How awful." The Zen master says "We'll see."
Several years later war is declared but the boy stays home because his legs are bad. Everyone says "How lucky." The Zen master says "We'll see."
Obama sends a loudmouthed hack to China to get rid of him. China. A place infamous for recondite ceremonial and social rules, a notoriously xenophobic country suspicious of anyone who doesn't seem to appreciate Chinese history, culture, or customs. A good thing?
We'll see.
(He couldn't have sent him to Liechtenstein? I mean, c'mon. Even Bush didn't send John Bolton to China.)
Lord Have Mercy! I would pay actual dollars to see the hideous Robert F. McDonnell and his commensurately hideous wife make a "face-to-face appeal" (hopefully on their bellies, wailing with snotty noses) for clemency. If I were the recipient of the groveling, you bethcha I'd want a pound of flesh. I'd gather an entire group of the women who-would-be-probed and let them loose on those two with the very same probes.
The blame the victim mentality driving demeaning children in exchange for food is a perversion. It is just ever so slightly removed from the belief, in some cultures, that rape victims are the actual criminals and must be punished and shamed. How it the hell did people get so ignorant and butt ugly mean.
@Noodge: I'm with you most of the way. When an employee -- particularly a government employee -- comes upon some practice that he believes is grossly unethical, s/he's between a rock & a hard place. If s/he thinks it's something that her supervisors may be unaware of, she can try the organizational route. Clearly that was not a possibility for Snowden. He saw the entire NSA operation as unethical.
I've have wondered more than once what I would do in Snowden's situation.
Most likely, I would have done absolutely nothing -- just like the many other principled employees who certainly work at the NSA & have a good idea of the big picture. Hey, this is the system: the administration knows what we're doing, the courts know what we're doing, some members of Congress know what we're doing. Maybe I think it's sleazy, but it's legal. Besides, I've got a great job here! I don't mean to suggest that what the Real Marie would do is laudable; I just don't think this is a place I would go out on a limb. (Probably if I'd found data collection & interpretation unseemly, I wouldn't have taken a job at the NSA in the first place.)
This, BTW, is not the Nurnberg defense, as you asserted: those analysts collecting your metadata & maybe even snooping thru your e-mails are not annihilating you & all your neighbors. Remember that rule: if you have to employ a Hitler analogy, you've already lost the argument (or at least have a mighty weak case).
If, on the other hand, I were Snowden & thought the offenses were egregious (and certainly would not be fixed by pointing them out to the boss or the boss's boss), I'd ponder other courses of action. I would in all likelihood try to figure out the best way to blow the whistle that would do the least harm to me. This would require some research. Probably I would have ended up copying some evidence of what I believed were unconstitutional or immoral practices. (I would not have copied 30K files, as is alleged Snowden did.) Then, for starters, I would have taken that evidence to Ron Wyden's national security staffer. I would have tried to do this anonymously. If time passed & I saw no sign that Wyden had acted on my info, I probably would have gone to one of the major U.S. papers. I would, of course, have asked for anonymity. If the Feds figured out who I was, I would have hired a lawyer & a PR guy.
Supporters of Snowden seem to think he did the only ethical thing he could. I believe he had other options that would have (a) caused little or no damage to our national security, (b) achieved his claimed goals, & (c) been much less traumatic to him personally.
When people want to argue about what a smart or ethical guy he is, they should think first if he couldn't have taken some course -- not necessarily the one I suggest -- that would have had much better outcomes all around. I think a smart, ethical person could have effected those better outcomes.
Marie
Re: CW and Nancy, Evaluating long term trends, much less snapshots, is often as compromised by selection bias as by measurement criteria. Polling technology has evolved, even as the quality of the questioner may not have. Gallup is an experienced organization but even the most expert good faith attempts at randomization often have hidden biases that, in effect, Gerrymander the sample. To be accurate, the pollster would, among other issues, need to normalize the sample for perceptions of what "big government," "big business" and "big labor" mean 40 years later. After a career that included reviewing applications for grants to fund clinical epidemiology, I retired with the sense that most of what got funded with good scores was eventually trivialized by hidden bias or statistical hand waving, as well as by poor choices of questions (measurements). Recent articles on cholesterol and blood pressure triggers (the latter covered in today's NYTimes) are good illustrations. Many parallels with polling. Take home lesson: No single poll, or maybe polls in general, should be taken too seriously.
After Gallop blew the 2012 election (they predicted a Romney win by 9 or 10 points, as I recall), they went through a period of public hand wringing. The upshot was, they blamed their sampling protocols for the error and said they would set about modifying how they sampled. I assume they have changed something; whether for the better is another matter. But it also raises a question about the validity of comparing 1965 results to 2013 results even if all other factors were the same.
@Whyte Owen: Thanks for your very helpful input. I have no doubt that the perception of "big government" has changed since 1965. That, of course, is largely because of the very effective campaign by conservatives to load the term with negative implications.
But maybe that's the point. Americans are now actually much more afeared of big government than they were in 1965.
Add to that the fact that government is bigger now than then: the NSA, Medicare, Medicaid, environmental regs, etc. (and big labor isn't very big anymore), and no matter how much care a polling org took to ensure a poll's integrity, it might get about the same results as Gallup did.
What the recent Gallup poll says to me is that efforts like Occupy, not to mention -- as Steve M. does -- the 2008 financial meltdown, have not made much of a dent in Americans' overall views of business.
Marie
Today in Born-Againia.
So, you may have heard about this show, Duck Dynasty. A bunch of bearded, camoed guys from the backwoods of Louisiana who have made an enormous business out of selling duck calls and have parlayed that calling into hundreds of millions of dollars from an A&E show and a merchandising deal with Wal-Mart. They also happen to be born-again bible thumpers. Except their god hates gays. Not only are homosexuals going to hell, they're also on a par with people who have sex with animals, greedy, drunken swindlers, prostitutes, adulterers, and other assorted lowlifes. According to Phil Robertson, one of the (truly) Lucky Duckies. I mean, it's not enough for these people to just say they hate gay people. They have to cast them down with criminals and perverts.
In an interview with GQ he also questions discrimination against black people. As a young man in Louisiana, he declares that all the black people he knew were happy to be picking cotton in the field, singing, dancing, smiling, never complaining, never saying boo to white people. All that's missing is the watermelon.
But that's neither here nor there, right? He's rich now because of his show, his ghostwritten books, his born-again righteousness and his deal with Wal-Mart. But now, because of his rather slanderous remarks, A&E, a network that may not think it good business to support a guy who defames a large percentage of its viewers, has told Phil to fuck off with that homophobic religious ranting bullshit. They've suspended his duck tail until further notice. It remains to be seen what, if anything, Wal-Mart will do. They do a $400 million dollar business off Duck Dynasty merch. It was clear why they needed to cut ties with Paula Deen after her racist sentiments made headlines, because a large number of Wal-Mart regulars--and employees--are from the black community (many not being able to afford shopping at Macys and upscale grocery stores). But it's unclear if they give a shit about offending the gay community. My guess is they don't.
But back to homo hating Phil Robertson's terrible plight.
Predictably, wingnuts are peeing their pants, lining up to support his right to insult gay people. After all, Jesus hates gays, right? Sarah Palin (surprise, surprise) is screaming about a breach of first amendment rights. As usual, she has no fucking clue what she's talking about. If you stand up in the lunch room at work or your office and start spouting hate speech, your employer has every right to put your bigoted ass on the curb. Your freedom of speech is not taken away. You can say that shit anywhere else. There are not usually blanket first amendment rights in private workplaces (or corporations), such as the right to hate speech, which could easily trigger EEO harassment suits.
Besides, if you buy the Republican line of thinking, corporations are people too and, as such, have their own rights, such as the right to boot a nincompoop off their payroll, especially given all the codicils that must be in place in a contract with a company like A&E.
But now Mr. Robertson is playing the Bible Card, which, in this case--in most cases--smacks of the Nuremberg Defense to which Marie alluded the other day, that is, I did it, said it, etc because Jesus told me to say it. It wasn't my idea. It's in the Bible!
Which brings me to a simple question.
Why is it that you never hear these born-again types say something like "I've found Jesus and I want to spread love and peace and tolerance to everyone no matter who they are"? You never, ever, ever hear that. And did I say never? That doesn't mean that those people aren't out there. But you never hear anyone in situations like this saying that.
What you hear is "I've found Jesus and according to him, you're a damned sinner and are going straight to the fiery pits, so burn you evil motherfucker."
Or "I've found Jesus and you and everything you stand for are an abomination in the eyes of the lord and he hates you, so eat shit and die. Do it today!"
This is my major problem with organized religion. The blank intolerance and outright hatred that comes along with something that purports to be about love. And, of course, the absolute support of other haters like Palin and Bobby Jindal who back this knucklehead wholeheartedly.
Is he entitled to his opinion, no matter how intolerant and ignorant? Sure. Is he entitled to spout that opinion through the offices of a corporation who might, for whatever reason, not like that opinion?
Of course not.
But not according to the wingnuts from Born-Againia. They're victims. Againia.
@Re: Kingston and Tammy: First Kingston. Don't we in Georgia have real sweethearts representing us in DC? Not only Kingston, but Broun, Gingrey, Price, Graves, especially Broun. Kingston's total lack of empathy is appalling. Maybe he's thinking most of the poor kids are minorities, so making them do manual labor puts them back in their "place." He does represent the far southeast corner of the state, which isn't noted for its tolerance.
As for Tammy, if a person felt guilty about receiving help from the gummit, wouldn't he//she also feel guilty about accepting help from a charity? I don't see his logic. And just what charity is structured to handle millions of people? And where will it get the money? From us, of course, just like SNAP. I don't see plutocrats funding a charity that feeds poor people.
Remember one thing about Snowden: he was a contractor. Why does modern, mean America like contractors? Because you can fire them easier and pay fewer benefits. Due process is such a bummer.
"Why is it that you never hear these born-again types say something like "I've found Jesus and I want to spread love and peace and tolerance to everyone no matter who they are"?" AK - nicely put, especially this time of the year. Merry Christmas and Happy Kwanzaa.
Citizen,
Thanks. Right back at ya. Wonder why Fox isn't doing regular pieces on the War on Kwanzaa?
The web at times more closely resembles a maze. Like the old Boston Garden, you never know where you'll come out once you start down a path.
A search for tidbits on the 12th century renaissance might careen you, pell-mell, into an article about Borgese's Amazing Typing Dogs who were taught to bang out BAD DOG whenever they were stumped by a question. The ambition might be for a steady hand on the rudder but too often the hope for a straight line is tossed like a yawl in a squall.
So it was that I found myself clicking on one of those ubiquitous items that beckon us ominously like Dickens's Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, which is how I came to discover the present whereabouts of one Linda Tripp, formerly intrinsically entwined with presidential actions below and beyond the call of duty. One would think she would have been a natural for NSA work, what with her inclination for sabotage and interest in privacy invasions, but no, she's engaged in a much more seasonal occupation.
She runs a shop called Christmas Sleigh in a monied Virginia suburb, specializing in preposterously overpriced holiday tchotchkes including, I kid you not--I couldn't make this up--"mouth blown" ornaments.
Oooookaaay.
And speaking of Dickens, one can only speculate with glee the fun he'd have with Republicans who deem it necessary to strap children to the grindstone for their scraps of food. Jack Kingston comes across as a combination of Uriah Heep, Mr. Bounderby, and half the cast of Bleak House. What's next, repealing child labor laws so the little tykes can go to work in the Koch salt mines for their bowls of steam?
Merry fucking Christmas to you too, pal. Your very own mouth blown ornament is in the mail.
Watched the interview with Kingston, or is it Kingmon, A most bizarre experience . I can't decide if he was on a Mary Jane high or was recovering from plastic surgery. His google eyes kept wandering away from the interviewer, like she had a teleprompter over her head. His facial expression or lack of same reminded me of recent mug shots or pre-crime pictures of school shooters or the theater shooter from Colorado. The man looks to have some gears missing,
Marie; re size of government.
I'm not sure dollars are the best measure of the size of government. For example in 1965 the Phantom F-4b fighter cost $14.1 million 2012 dollars compared to todays F-35 which costs $196.5 million. I think a fairer measure of the size of government is the number of employees. In 1965 there was 1 federal employee for every 36 citizens, a total of 5,354,000. In 2012 there was 1 federal employee for every 70 citizens a total of 4,403,000. Or The number of federal employees has been reduced by 18%. or: today's civil servant services twice as many citizens as the 1965 employee. Rather than say the government has grown since 1965 you might say the dollar doesn't go as far as it did in 1965 but the government is more efficient.