;)
The Commentariat -- Feb. 1, 2013
Noah Bierman of the Boston Globe: "Scott Brown ... announced Friday afternoon that he will not enter the special election to replace John F. Kerry. Brown's announcement was unusual. Rather than a formal press conference or statement, he initially released the news to the Boston Herald in a text message that said 'U are the first to know.' His spokesman later confirmed the news to the Globe in a text that read 'Not running.' No explanation was given. Brown's decision leaves the Republican Party scrambling to find a viable candidate for the June 25 election."
Friday News Dump. Robert Pear of the New York Times: "The Obama administration proposed yet another compromise on Friday in an effort to address the concerns of religious organizations that object to its policy requiring health insurance plans to cover contraceptives for women at no charge.... Under the proposal, the administration said, 'eligible organizations would not have to contract, arrange, pay or refer for any contraceptive coverage to which they object on religious grounds.' Female employees of such organizations would receive contraceptive coverage through separate individual health insurance policies, without having to pay premiums or co-payments. The proposed rule is somewhat ambiguous about exactly who would pay the costs."
Mark Singer wrote a piece published in the New Yorker in December 2012, on Ed Koch. Here's the trailer for the documentary, by Neil Barsky, which Singer mentions:
... Kevin Roose of New York magazine: "... for Koch, appealing to Main Street was less a political play than an expression of who he truly was." ... And the magazine has pulled together some uniquely Koch quotes. Here's one:
Have you ever lived in the suburbs? ... It's sterile. It's nothing. It's wasting your life, and people do not wish to waste their lives once they've seen New York! ... This rural American thing -- I'm telling you, it's a joke. -- Ed Koch
Elisabeth Bumiller of the New York Times: "Chuck Hagel, President Obama's nominee to be secretary of defense, came under sharp and sometimes angry questioning Thursday on a wide range of issues from fellow Republicans at his Senate confirmation hearing, including from his old friend, Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican who is still smoldering about their break over the Iraq war." ...
... Ernesto Londoño of the Washington Post: "Chuck Hagel ... confronted withering criticism during a marathon confirmation hearing Thursday, but administration officials said they felt confident that the Republican-led attacks did not derail his bid to lead the Pentagon." The Post has some low-lights videos here. ...
... AND all this, as contributor MAG points out, made Hagel very sad. ...
... BUT then, Chuck Hagel always looks sad, even when things are going well. ...
... Spencer Ackerman of Wired: "If Chuck Hagel wins approval in the Senate to run the Pentagon..., it'll be despite his performance in his confirmation hearing on Thursday, not because of it." ...
... Josh Rogin of Foreign Policy: "Several more Republican senators tell [me they] have decided to oppose the confirmation of Chuck Hagel ... after hearing him testify Thursday." ...
... Nick Turse of TomDispatch: Chuck Hagel's concern for American troops unnecessarily put in harm's way does not seem to extend to civilians -- even chilidren -- living in enemy territory.
** John Boehner Does Not Live in the Rational World. Greg Sargent: "Politico's Glenn Thrush reports ... that Republicans believe the GDP report showing the economy is shrinking gives them political 'leverage' over Obama, since bad economic news is terrible for the President. But ... this shouldn't be the case, since the contraction was the result of a drop in spending, which in theory should undermine the GOP argument that we should cut spending as deeply as possible.... The economic contraction was driven largely by a steep drop in defense spending. As Ezra Klein details, this shows that 'government is hurting the recovery' by 'spending and investing too little.' .... Yet Republicans are responding to the news of the economic contraction by suggesting it validates their view that we need to further cut spending to help the economy." ...
... Steve Benen criticizes Thrush's report, as well he should; the Politico headline, on which Thrush elaborates, is "Obama's GOP Problem. Benen writes, "It's almost as if facts, evidence, reason, and a cursory understanding of economic policy no longer matters at all.... Through much of 2010 and 2011, we saw state and local governments pursue austerity measures, slashing public investments and laying off public-sector workers.... But as 2012 drew to a close, we saw similar cuts in federal spending, and the result was yesterday's report showing an economy that's shrinking for the first time since 2009. is incredibly easy to fix -- policymakers can invest in the economy, lower unemployment, and inject capital into the system. But that's not going to happen...." ...
... "Looking for Mr. Goodpain." Paul Krugman: "... the [austerian] doctrine that has dominated elite economic discourse for the past three years is wrong on all fronts. Not only have we been ruled by fear of nonexistent threats, we've been promised rewards that haven't arrived and never will. It's time to put the deficit obsession aside and get back to dealing with the real problem -- namely, unacceptably high unemployment." ...
... Neil Irwin of the Washington Post explains why the Flock of the Deficit Hawks can't understand Paul Krugman, other economists, the Fed, bankers & business forecasters.
Jessica Silver-Greenberg & Ben Protess of the New York Times: "Federal authorities are scrutinizing private consultants hired to clean up financial misdeeds like money laundering and foreclosure abuses, taking aim at an industry that is paid billions of dollars by the same banks it is expected to police.... On Thursday, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Representative Elijah Cummings, Democrat of Maryland, announced that they would open an investigation into the foreclosure review...."
New York Times Editors: "... at the opening Senate hearing on gun controls this week..., Judiciary Committee members seemed to have largely swallowed gun lobby propaganda that the evidence shows the original 10-year ban on assault weapons was ineffective." It ain't so. ...
... ** Gun Rights Are Not Women's Rights. Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post: "'Guns make women safer,' Gayle Trotter of the conservative Independent Women's Forum, told the Senate Judiciary Committee at its Wednesday hearing.... The facts suggest precisely the opposite. First, women are far more likely to be the victims of gun violence than to benefit from using a gun in self-defense. Second, the restrictions under discussion would not harm women." ...
... Jon Stewart comments on the hearing:
Paul Kane of the Washington Post: "The Senate Ethics Committee is reviewing allegations that Sen. Robert Menendez accepted inappropriate gifts from a Florida doctor who has flown the New Jersey Democrat to his estate in the Dominican Republic, a senior member of the panel confirmed Thursday." ...
... Raymond Hernandez & Frances Robles of the New York Times on Menendez's financial entanglements with Dr. Salomon Melgen, a wealthy Florida eye surgeon. CW: I'm not seeing a lot of "public service" here. ...
... Steve Kornacki of Salon on what the Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) scandal could mean to Senate Democrats. If Menendez is forced to resign, guess who gets to appoint his replacement? ...
... Okay, Kornacki didn't count on this. Seattle Post-Intelligencer: "Fox News personality Geraldo Rivera may run for the U.S. Senate from New Jersey in 2014 as a Republican, Rivera told his radio show on Thursday...." Fortunately, Geraldo has no underaged-hooker problem: "In his book 'Exposing Myself,' the former Jerry Rivers boasted of affairs, flings and flirtations with Margaret Trudeau, then the estranged wife of Canada's Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and Marian Javits, widow of New York's Republican Sen. Jacob Javits. The list also included Liza Minelli, Bette Midler, Chris Evert and Judy Collins." CW: if Menendez steps down, there's no reason Geraldo couldn't run for his seat. Bob Menendez may join a long line of corrupt, avaricious sex-crazed, lying, cheating pricks a/k/a New Jersey Democrats, but theists have a strong case here: there is a god, she is a Democrat, and she has a sense of humor. Thanks to Kate M. for the heads-up.
Sarah Posner of Religion Dispatches: "John J. DiIulio, the first director of George W. Bush's White House Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, has taken to the Washington Post to laud President Obama's White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.... Less than a year into his own tenure, DiIulio resigned in disgust.... He notoriously coined the term 'Mayberry Machiavellis' to describe Bush insiders, who ... 'winked at the most far-right House Republicans' in attempting to pass legislation for the faith-based office." Read Posner's whole post. Obama's OFBNP routinely grants waivers to participants who don't want to comply with anti-discrimination employment laws. DiIulio thinks that's great, but Posner writes. "... feeding hungry children is an essential goal. But since it could be done without raising these constitutional issues, why isn't it?" Why, indeed? Via Jonathan Bernstein.
Right Wing World
Tim Egan: "Fox and friends can still crush their own, as Obama noted [in a remark this week]. But that only drives the Republican Party further to the fringes. Virtually everything the broadcast bullies are against -- sensible gun measures, immigration reform, raising taxes on the rich -- are favored by a majority of Americans."
News Ledes
AP: "A Milan appeals court has convicted a former CIA station chief in Rome and two other Americans in the 2003 rendition kidnapping of an Egyptian cleric. The court on Friday sentenced former CIA station chief Jeff Castelli to even years, and handed sentences of six years each to Americans Betnie Madero and Ralph Russomando. All three had been acquitted in the first trial due to diplomatic immunity."
New York Times: "A county prosecutor in [Kaufman, Texas, a] small town southeast of Dallas was fatally shot on Thursday morning near the courthouse by one or perhaps two gunmen, whom witnesses described as wearing masks, black clothing and tactical-style vests.... Lawyers and prosecutors throughout North Texas were stunned by the attack." CW: excuse me; you live in Texas & you're "stunned" by gun violence in Texas?
AP: "Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who won a Nobel Prize in physics but came under questioning for his handling of a solar energy loan, is stepping down. Chu offered his resignation to President Barack Obama in a letter Friday. He said he will stay on at least until the end of February and may stay until a successor is confirmed."
CNBC: "An encouraging U.S. jobs report propelled blue-chip stocks above the closely watched 14,000 bulwark on Friday, with investors momentarily downplaying fears about the economic recovery."
Boston Globe: "Senator John F. Kerry will be sworn in as secretary of state by Associate Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan in a small, private ceremony Friday afternoon, State Department officials said." ...
... Boston Globe: "Kerry said President Obama offered him the job of secretary of state a week before United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice withdrew her name from contention, an earlier timeline than has been previously reported."
Boston Globe: "... a top university official said Friday that more than half of the Harvard students investigated by a college board have been ordered to withdraw from the school."
AP: "A suspected suicide bomber detonated an explosive Friday in front of the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, [Turkey,] killing himself and a guard at the entrance gate, officials said.U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardione told reporters that a Turkish citizen was also wounded in the 1:15 p.m. blast in the Turkish capital."
AP: "U.S. employers added 157,000 jobs in January, and hiring was stronger over the past two years than previously thought, providing reassurance that the job market held steady even as economic growth sputtered. The mostly upbeat Labor Department report Friday included one negative sign: The unemployment rate rose to 7.9 percent from 7.8 percent in December."
New York Times: "Edward I. Koch, the master showman of City Hall, who parlayed shrewd political instincts and plenty of chutzpah into three tumultuous terms as mayor of New York with all the tenacity, zest and combativeness that personified his city of golden dreams, died Friday morning at age 88."
Los Angeles Times: "Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez on Thursday announced dramatic actions in response to the priest abuse scandal, saying that Cardinal Roger Mahony would no longer perform public duties in the church and that Santa Barbara Bishop Thomas J. Curry has stepped down. Gomez said in a statement that Mahony -- who led the L.A. archdiocese from 1985 to 2011 -- 'will no longer have any administrative or public duties.' Gomez also announced the church has released a trove of confidential church files detailing how the Los Angeles archdiocese dealt with priests accused of molestation." The New York Times story is here.
Share Article
Reader Comments (22)
Re: Truth test; does the MIC run this country or not? Lose a man like Chuck Hagel because he doesn't dance to the tune you're playing and you lose him and all the dances he does know. "He don't know that tune."
Let's take Steve Benen's comments about the wingnuts and economic policy: "It's almost as if facts, evidence, reason, and a cursory understanding of economic policy no longer matters at all....' and change the term, "economic" to "defense." Then look at the videos of SAD Chuck Hagel's hearings today.
What is missing from the Republican side are: facts, evidence, reason and a cursory understanding of defense policy. And, more importantly, an ability to THINK CRITICALLY! Yikes. If John McCain is an example of thoughtfulness and reason, we might as well buy the farm. The man is Mr. Black and White. "Give me a "yes" or "no" answer" (McCain) to Hagel's thoughtful response about whether or not the "surge" in Iraq was right or wrong. "I will leave that for history to judge." (Hagel) Sane. Sound. Thoughtful.
Sad (like Hagel), but true. We have no room in our foreign policy and defense formulations to question the status quo or to think critically about what we are doing now, or plan for in the future. It is Terror, Terror, Terror all day every day. Still. What paranoid craziness!
And to hear Sen. Carl Levin do his AIPAC routine with Hagel was beyond disgusting. Doesn't want to lose that big money, I guess. But, in the end, I think he will vote FOR Hagel. Just had to get his "I represent the Israeli Lobby" voice on the record. Asswipe.
I sincerely detest all of these players. They are cynical, bought off and without conscience. I.E., their heads are up their butts. All they truly care about is the money, honey. Like Chuck Hagel, I am really sad too. But probably for a different reason.
I am losing hope that things will get better (saner) in our lifetimes--or our children's--or even their children's. SAD. Period.
More about Hagel from Tom Dispatch. Note Nick Turse's new book, "Kill Anything That Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam," important, but devastating. Of course, I will read it.
**********************
..."Barack Obama arrived in Washington in 2009 buoyed by the slogan “change we can believe in.” The bitter Hagel hearings will be a fierce reminder that, when it comes to foreign policy, old is new, and the words “change” and “Washington” don’t belong in the same sentence. It remains something of an irony that, whether it’s John Kerry or Chuck Hagel, what little breathing room exists in the corridors of power can be credited to a now-ancient war whose realities, as Nick Turse reminds us in his remarkable new book, "Kill Anything that Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam," most Americans -- Chuck Hagel evidently among them -- could never truly face or take in."
***************
As I said before: SAD. So, so sad.
CW: I'm bringing forward this comment by Barbarossa, as it got spammed yesterday:
This link brings up some disturbing info on how the NRA is governed: http://www.progressive.org/what-judiciary-comm-should-ask-wayne-lapierre
It's governed by and for the gun snd ammo manufacturers. LaPierre wants legalization of fully automatic weapons. Ya gotta buy a LOT of ammo to feed one of them critters. Did anyone else notice the all of a sudden it's not about hunting; it's defending against HOME INVASIONS, as that loony female lawyer brought up.
I'll give the women credit for equal opportunity. The female Repugs have shown the can be just as batty as the menfolk.
Re: Hagel hearing yesterday: Why were we refighting Iraq and only cursorily Afghanistan? McCain wanted to score some points about the "surge." As Hagel said "Let history judge" whether or not it was the right thing to do. Hagel did say that one thing it accomplished was 1000 dead Americans and thousands more wounded, not to mention who knows how many Iraqis. Petraeus was the one crowing about the success of the surge, not more sober military analysts such as Thomas Ricks.
This question may be hopelessly naive, but has a woman's right to govern her own body ever been framed as a pure civil rights issue? Just as a person of color has a civil right not to be abused on that basis ...
Whenever I hear all the sonorous boilerplate about all the good religion does in the world, I look a little closer to home at all those good "people of faith" who would like nothing more than to drive women back into the shadows to terminate unwanted pregnancies.
So, once again, a society 200 years after the Enlightenment is forced to confront the entitled religious, who of themselves are so very humble but lookit who they represent!
I realize that many who have confronted the divine codependents are themselves religious, but that's their Gordian Knot to unravel.
Yes, the Republicans Eat Their Own (Chuck Hagel Edition) is sad and tiring. It feels like the last ten years have been narrated by George Carlin, Kurt Vonnegut, Molly Ivins, and Lewis Black. And, as the old saying goes, tomorrow doesn't look so hot either.
Re: Yes or no... The answer is "yes" to your question, "Ace". A Big "yes", Just like, yes, the lifeboats on the Titanic were a huge success.
Yes, just like winning the hearts and minds in Vietnam. Yes, yes, yes; "Ace" the surge was a stunning reversal of a war that never had to be. We paid out untold millions of US greenbacks for the locals to stop shooting us and concentrate on shooting each other. What a great plan. YES. yes, yes, In fact, "Ace", my first order of business would be to expose just how wonderful of a plan the surge was. First, you turn a country's infrastructure into rumble, then you destroy all civil services; and when the bubbling hatred between various sects explodes into revenge killings and suicide bombings; sprinkle dollars everywhere.
So, YES, yes, claro que si, seguriomente, the surge was just the ticket, "Ace", like the tide, in and then out, in then out. A foundation built on sand. Fucking brilliant, "Ace".
Ricardo Cabeza working the keyboard for the man; hoping to get picked up for a better gig then what I got now. Really, I love the guy. He's never here; I write when I want, what I want. Is this country great or what?
As usual, if you want to know what the facts are re: Hagel, read Juan Cole. http://www.juancole.com.
My wife, after 20 years with me in the Army, can spot a military phony. She deemed Petraeus one right away, or as she put it "Betrayus."
Another opening, another show––whoops! Oh, gosh, I meant to say another hearing, another...but such stellar performances, especially one of the first out of the box, that "Global warming is a hoax" guy who, to be kind, is a nattering nabob to coin a phrase from the late and not great Safire––followed by that disgruntled, vindictive Johnny come lately who just can't seem to let Iraq go into the dustbin of history as one of the worst decisions ever. Poor SAD Hagel who, god forbid, has to pretend to love Israel and their lobby as much as everyone else and you would think he could suggest that we cut back on some of our weapons of mass destruction without certain senators reacting as though he wants to leave us naked and unprepared–-horrors! But in my estimation the one that sent a chill down my spine was that beady eyed guy I wrote about yesterday. And today in the New Republic Judis finds that Cruz "was the most vindictive and unscrupulous of the questioners."
"In his closing round of questions, Cruz reverted to a time-honored rightwing tactic of guilt by association. He tried to tie Hagel to former American Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Chas Freeman who has voiced criticisms of Israel’s right-wing government. But Cruz’s line of questioning, apparently inspired by Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin and William Kristol’s Weekly Standard, fell flat.
I am sure some readers thought the comparison to Joe McCarthy in the first paragraph was the usual left-wing hyperbole, but those old enough to remember, or who are familiar with, the history, will recognize Cruz’s line of attack as classic McCarthy tactics. Cruz isn’t out to prove Hagel is a communist; only that he has “a greater antagonism toward Israel than any other member of this body.” Americans who worry about democracy need to keep on this guy. He is a not dumb drunk like McCarthy. He’s very smart and slick like some up and coming European rightists or Israel’s Naftali Bennett."
So hold on to your seats––we are in for more than just a bumpy ride.
There was much buried in or sidestepped by yesterday's spoiled boy McCain's self-justification tirade ("I dare you to tell me I was wrong") and the prolonged Israel litmus test, namely any realistic discussion of the American military's place in the modern world.
Shunted to a NYTimes sidebar was a brief note about how some CEOs report the President open to discussion of a "territorial" income tax on profits earned overseas, which translates as no tax at all.
The question I would have asked Hagel is how much the military should charge multi-nationals for enhancing and protecting their overseas interests when they are not paying tax on their profits? After all, we can't afford to keep subsidizing the "takers," can we?
Of course, that question would not even be considered, let alone asked in Hagel's confirmation hearings, but its absence is another instance of how destructively incongruent national and corporate interests have become.
@Jack Mahoney. The women's movement has always been a civil rights movement, & reproductive rights are an important subset of the women's civil rights movement. The term for black civil rights got shortened to "civil rights," probably because blacks were deprived of so many rights: the right to vote, the right to employment equality, the right to attend the schools of their choice, the right to shop & go to restaurants & other quasi-public establishments, the right to equal public accommodations, the right to use the restroom (for Pete's sake!), the right to live wherever they like, the right to a fair trial by a jury of their peers, the right to marry outside their race, etc., etc. (It's a stunning list, isn't it?)
But I consider every equality movement a civil rights movement, even if fewer equality rights may be at stake. Gay Americans are only asking for certain "civil rights" of which they have been/are deprived, not some extra-special "gay rights."
In Planned Parenthood v. Casey, a plurality of the Court ruled that the state had a valid interests in the health of the mother & fetus. That may be the law, but it strikes me that the moral truth is more compelling: if a mother & her doctor deem that a pregnancy should be terminated, I think the state should keep the hell out of it. The onus should be on the state, not on the pregnant woman or her doctors, to prove that a pregnancy was terminated with callous disregard for human life. Does the state ever have an interest? Yes, I think so. But, in practice, rarely so.
Marie
@P. D. Pepe: so far, I've learned about brand-new Sen. Cruz from two hearings in which he slammed the witnesses. In both cases -- the gun safety & Hagel hearings -- he apparently got his talking points (if not his visual props) from "vindictive & unscrupulous" right-wing pundits. That kind of puppetry doesn't impress me much.
Note to Readers: It isn't clear in Pepe's comment, by after the first quotation mark, all of the rest of what may appear to be her comment is actually by TNR's John Judis. Judis's whole post is quite good. You can find it here.
Marie
Help! Does anyone understand this Netflix thang? I would like to watch "House of Cards," & I have the $0.0 to pop for a free month's subscription, but I don't have an i-Pod or whatever the hell device I think I might need.
I have watched some movies I've played off the Intertoobz via PBS & Direct TV; I have a computer with DSL connection hooked up to a combo TV/computer monitor so the picture is okay.
So, um, can I use that to download from Netflix? I've found the site. It would appear I can just click & watch without pledging my estate to Netflix.
I'd appreciate any help I can get. Thanx.
Marie
Marie,
Check your e-mail.
CW: Sounds like you are referring to what Netflix calls "streaming".
You need a lot of bandwidth to stream movies from Netflix. I gave
up and only get them by mail, one day service. Best advice is to
give them a call at 1-888-579-7172. The have always been helpful
in my area, don't know about Florida.
Yesterday's Chuck Hagel bashing produced nothing but hot air and an extended display of fealty to the right-wing in Israel, one of the more important shibboleths of the right-wing in the United States.
The attacks by Graham and Cruz, among others, upon Hagel for not being appropriately obsequious to Israel, demonstrate two other vital elements required of all residents of wingnut bubbledom, a black and white, good and evil view of the world (with right-wingers and any of their select groups in the good category, natch), and an obsessively immoderate, with us or against us mode of observing all policy choices.
There are no gray areas on the right. At least none that can or will be acknowledged. There is only "do what we say". And what they say has become more and more unhinged, further and further from reality. It never seems to matter that a more realpolitik approach to Israel would be beneficial both for the US and for Israel, just as the value of universal health care can never be considered by any who wish to remain members in good standing of the right's version of the Flat Earth Society, and where any discussion of reducing gun violence is met with the kind of horror reserved for seeing your mother buried in sand up to her neck and covered with red army ants.
And like other groups whose insularity and self-reflexive, incestual thought processes tend eventually to devolve into self parody, gibberish, and impotence, the modern GOP has begun to double down on their most stupid and dangerous ideas, even as they try to white wash their most extreme policies.
It appears that in Kentucky a group of angry Teabaggers (are there any other kind?) are gathering momentum to take down Mitch McConnell. Now, as glittering a goal as that might be for all sorts of reasons, I'm thinking, "Hey, knock yourselves out." Because, if the chinless wonder is replaced by some Teabagger kook (oh yeah, that's the other kind), there is a better than decent chance that his seat could go to a Democrat. The same could happen elsewhere as voters, not already besotted by the Kool-Aid, begin to cotton to the extreme and gettin' 'xtremer wingnut agenda. On the face of it, it's simply nuts.
So there's another reason for hope. The dominant emotions (not ideas, emotions) that drive the current GOP are hatred and outrage. Hatred and outrage take a huge emotional toll. It takes a lot of effort and energy to stay stirred up. Even Fox viewers seem to be turning away as Tim Egan notes in his column today.
Eventually this factless, hate-filled country of the blind may collapse in on itself.
Couldn't happen any too soon for me. And hopefully when shit starts falling, something big and hard will land on Graham. That rat fuck.
@Akhilleus: Your observation that the wingnuts operate on pure emotion reminds me of the Nazi philosopher Alfred Rosenberg's
observation: "We think with our blood."
Barbarossa,
I've never heard that but it's chillingly accurate. In the case of the Nazis it probably also served as a reminder of the necessity of pure Aryan blood to be included as a member of the 1,000 year Reich. In the case of the modern GOP, I suppose the reference would be to ideological purity.
Ya know a McConnell challenge may have possibilities. There have been a few studies in recent years that show that nice looking candidates get more votes. Not across the board, but with voters who watch a lot of TV and who are deemed "low information". If Ashley Judd decides to run, she may pick up some support just on her looks as Lord knows Kentucky appears to be overpopulated with low info voters.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110718121726.htm
The Hagel hearings were predictable on the Republican side and disappointing on the Hagel side. Cruz, McCain and others came off looking like enormous piles of angry ratshit. Cruz in particular had to eat some of his "gotcha" BS. My view of McCain was obscured most of the time by the 2 sets of balls in front of him that he was alternately laving - Petraeus and Netanyahu must have been well satisfied.
I thought at least 1/2 the questions were appropriately directed at a nominee for Secretary of State, not Secretary of Defense. It wasn't so much about Hagel as it was more of the usual vitriol at Obama. I wish Hilary Clinton could have been Hagel's surrogate. He seemed surprised by the hostility, in which case he was either naive or was ill prepared. A person commenting on another blog had a great idea before the hearing, the suggestion was that Hagel rip his shirt open, slap a magnet on his chest, and just say any questions? Might have been a better plan.
@Kate
I listened to an interview with Nick Turse on Fresh Air earlier this week. Sadly, My Lai was "the tip of the iceberg". As angry, disturbed and horrified as I felt, I did find some solace and hope in hearing that there were American soldiers who tried to intervene and prevent the atrocities committed. It's deeply sad to learn that the American military can be just as savage as those in countries which we condemn. Big sigh......
Diane,
Love the magnet idea but I doubt it would have found much purchase with the GOP chicken hawks.
Sending people off to die is their forte, not actually, you know, doing any of the soldiering themselves. I mean, shit, you could get hurt that way! That stuff is for blah people and poor white trash, not masters of the senate.
McCain, while no chicken hawk, is a walking, talking, blowharding bile factory who needs everyone to admit that he's right, he's always been right, and always will be right. Anyone who insults his wife as he so notoriously did in front of reporters needs to be kept under observation or at least locked up in the garage when company comes.
Maybe give him some pins and a Sarah Palin doll.
@Marie: Sorry for the confusion re: the quotes. I thought that putting them in at the beginning of the first paragraph and closing with the second would suffice.