The Ledes

Tuesday, October 1, 2024

Washington Post: “ John Amos, a running back turned actor who appeared in scores of TV shows — including groundbreaking 1970s programs such as the sitcom 'Good Times' and the epic miniseries 'Roots' — and risked his career to protest demeaning portrayals of Black characters, died Aug. 21 in Los Angeles. He was 84.”

New York Times: “Pete Rose, one of baseball’s greatest players and most confounding characters, who earned glory as the game’s hit king and shame as a gambler and dissembler, died on Monday. He was 83.”

The Ledes

Monday, September 30, 2024

New York Times: “Kris Kristofferson, the singer and songwriter whose literary yet plain-spoken compositions infused country music with rarely heard candor and depth, and who later had a successful second career in movies, died at his home on Maui, Hawaii, on Saturday. He was 88.”

~~~ The New York Times highlights “twelve essential Kristofferson songs.”

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Public Service Announcement

Washington Post: "Americans can again order free rapid coronavirus tests by mail, the Biden administration announced Thursday. People can request four free at-home tests per household through covidtests.gov. They will begin shipping Monday. The move comes ahead of an expected winter wave of coronavirus cases. The September revival of the free testing program is in line with the Biden administration’s strategy to respond to the coronavirus as part of a broader public health campaign to protect Americans from respiratory viruses, including influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), that surge every fall and winter. But free tests were not mailed during the summer wave, which wastewater surveillance data shows is now receding."

Washington Post: “Comedy news outlet the Onion — reinvigorated by new ownership over this year — is bringing back its once-popular video parodies of cable news. But this time, there’s someone with real news anchor experience in the chair. When the first episodes appear online Monday, former WAMU and MSNBC host Joshua Johnson will be the face of the resurrected 'Onion News Network.' Playing an ONN anchor character named Dwight Richmond, Johnson says he’s bringing a real anchor’s sense of clarity — and self-importance — to the job. 'If ONN is anything, it’s a news organization that is so unaware of its own ridiculousness that it has the confidence of a serial killer,' says Johnson, 44.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I'll be darned if I can figured out how to watch ONN. If anybody knows, do tell. Thanks.

Washington Post: “First came the surprising discovery that Earth’s atmosphere is leaking. But for roughly 60 years, the reason remained a mystery. Since the late 1960s, satellites over the poles detected an extremely fast flow of particles escaping into space — at speeds of 20 kilometers per second. Scientists suspected that gravity and the magnetic field alone could not fully explain the stream. There had to be another source creating this leaky faucet. It turns out the mysterious force is a previously undiscovered global electric field, a recent study found. The field is only about the strength of a watch battery — but it’s enough to thrust lighter ions from our atmosphere into space. It’s also generated unlike other electric fields on Earth. This newly discovered aspect of our planet provides clues about the evolution of our atmosphere, perhaps explaining why Earth is habitable. The electric field is 'an agent of chaos,' said Glyn Collinson, a NASA rocket scientist and lead author of the study. 'It undoes gravity.... Without it, Earth would be very different.'”

The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

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The Commentariat -- July 19, 2014

Internal links removed.

Ewen MacAskill, et al., of the Guardian: "Pro-Russia separatist groups in eastern Ukraine are hastily covering up all links to the Buk missile battery suspected to have been used to shoot down the Malaysia Airlines passenger plane, according to western-based defence and intelligence specialists. As the UN security council called for a 'full, thorough independent international investigation' into the downing of the plane, concern that a cover-up was under way was fuelled by a standoff at part of the crash site between observers from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and rebel gunmen, which ended with a warning shot being fired."

Ralph Ellis, et al., of CNN: "International monitors investigating the Malaysia Airlines crash in eastern Ukraine said Friday the team was not given full access to the site and was greeted with hostility by armed men."

Everything Is Obama's Fault, Ctd. Jed Lewison of Daily Kos: "Guess who Sen. John McCain blames for the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight 17? Yup, President Obama: 'Mr. McCain said that Mr. Obama is running a "cowardly administration that failed to give the Ukrainians weapons with which to defend themselves."'" ...

We need more leadership from the president. He gave this a passing reference in his speech in Delaware, then went on to tell Joe Biden jokes and take the usual shots at Republicans -- which is fair game, but not on this day -- and then to go to New York and go to two fundraisers. I mean, I can't imagine Eisenhower or Kennedy or Reagan doing that. -- Rep. Steve Peter King (R-N.Y.), a member of the House Homeland Security Committee

... Yes, Why Can't Obama Be More Like Reagan? Steve M. Conservatives "are looking at President Obama's response to the shootdown of the Malaysian airliner and finding it lacking -- specifically, they think it falls short of Ronald Reagan's reaction to Russia's shootdown of a Korean passenger jet in 1983.... I would like to point out that Reagan slept through the shootdown -- and was not awakened." Uh, and then he went horseback-riding on his ranch & made no plans to return to Washington. He left it up to Press Secretary Larry Speakes to handle the administration's response. As Deborah Potter of CBS News reported later, "Officials [in Washington] began to worry that, given the circumstances, it wouldn't have looked right for the President to stay on his ranch. So he's returning to Washington later today for an urgent meeting with his national security advisors":

... Josh Marshall of TPM: "In a paradoxical way, I think the future ramifications of [the downing of the Malaysian Airlines jet] are almost greater because it is about Russia's recklessness and bumbling than it would be if it were more clearly a matter of intent. This is a f'-up on Putin's part of almost mind-boggling proportions. Yes, a tragedy. Yes, perhaps an atrocity. But almost more threatening, a screw up. Malign intent is one thing. So is aggression. But goofs of this magnitude by someone who controls a massive military arsenal and nuclear weapons are in a way more threatening." ...

... Now, let us return to Not-President-Thank-God McCain's assertion that Cowardly President Obama caused this tragedy by not arming Ukraine. Take it away, Charles Pierce:

It is becoming plain that the atrocity visited on the Malaysian jetliner is a direct result of arming morons. The New York Times obtained audiotape, allegedly from the people who shot down the plane, and these guys sound like they shouldn't be trusted with a lemon zester, let alone a surface-to-air missile. And it is quite plain that the one thing this situation doesn't need is to arm more morons, or to have another superpower come bungling in.... Vladimir Putin is responsible for a horrendous crime, and one that weakens his international standing. The only thing that would bail him out would be a flood of American arms to our own set of morons. The only thing that would bail him out would be if we all started listening to John McCain again.

CW: I don't know what the correlation is between morons & armed persons -- whether soldiers or civilians -- but I'm certain it is higher than the correlation between morons & the general public. A lot of morons are drawn to bright, shiny steel gadgets that go bang.

David Koenig & Scott Mayerowitz of the AP: "Airlines are already being more vigilant about avoiding trouble spots. That will make flights longer and more costly because of the need for extra fuel -- an expense that will be passed on to passengers. They may be quicker to abandon routes near conflict areas. In the aftermath of Thursday's disaster, carriers around the globe rerouted flights to avoid Ukraine. Malaysia Airlines announced that it will no longer fly over any portion of the country, routing flights over Turkey instead."

John Plunkett of the Guardian: Sara Firth, "a London-based correspondent of Kremlin-funded news channel Russia Today, has resigned in protest at its coverage of the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17.... Russia Today, which has been criticised as a propaganda mouthpiece for the Russian government, suggested Ukraine was to blame for the crash, while most media organisations have said it was shot down by a suspected Russian-made missile.

CW: I know one John McCain remark a day is one too many, but I can't resist adding a second. Jake Tapper of CNN: "Sen. John McCain ... [suggested that] if he had been elected in 2000, there might not have been a war in Iraq.... If he had been president, McCain said, 'I think I would have challenged the evidence [that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction] with greater scrutiny. I think that with my background with the military and knowledge of national security with these issues that I hope that I would have been able to see through the evidence that was presented at the time.'" Pretty rich, coming from Sen. Bomb-Bomb-Bomb who is usually first to demand military action no matter what the conflict & who was captain of the Iraq War Cheerleading Squad.

Two Friday Afternoon News Dumps to Applaud:

(1) Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post: "The Environmental Protection Agency issued a proposal Friday under the Clean Water Act that would limit mining activity in Alaska's Bristol Bay watershed, striking a major blow to a project that would rank as one of the world's largest open-pit mines. The proposed determination, which will now be subject to a public comment period until Sept. 19, represents the latest step by the Obama administration to impose restrictions on a massive gold and copper mining project, called Pebble Mine."

(2) Zachary Goldfarb of the Washington Post: "President Obama, resisting calls from several prominent faith leaders, will not include a new exemption for religiously affiliated government contractors when he issues an executive order Monday barring discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, the White House said Friday."

AND Another DocuDump. Josh Gerstein of Politico: "More previously secret files from President Bill Clinton's eight years in office went public Friday, offering new insight on when he turned to first lady Hillary Clinton for advice, the pitfalls the president's advisers saw in some of his Supreme Court nominees and how a news story prompted the president to express doubts about deadly bombings the CIA had pinned on Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden." Gerstein summarizes some of the docs. ...

** Read this New York Times editorial on the Senate's confirmation of Ronnie White's nomination to the federal bench. At long last, justice is served. Oh, & only because the Democrats changed the rules on filibustering judicial nominees. Senate Republicans really are a despicable lot.

Jeff Shesol in the New Yorker: "... conservatives are doing exactly what they say the left has long done: rushing to litigate political questions, elevating all manner of disputes to the level of high constitutional principle, and asking judges to settle (or revisit) policy arguments that ought to be resolved by legislators or voters. If the Affordable Care Act can't be repealed..., it can be undercut by judges, as in the Supreme Court ruling in the Hobby Lobby case. If the National Labor Relations Board can't be shut down, the Presidential power to make recess appointments -- which has kept the agency running -- can be curbed, possibly for good, as last month's Noel Canning decision portends. And if Obama can't be impeached, well, he can be sued. That Republicans have learned to stop worrying and love the lawsuit ... is a measure of their success in remaking the judiciary and reshaping the legal environment over the past forty years."

Sheryl Gay Stolberg of the New York Times: "Even before Senator Elizabeth Warren entered the grand ballroom of the Cobo Center [in Detroit] on Friday for a much-anticipated speech to hundreds of liberal activists [at the Netroots convention], her admirers were handing out plastic boater hats, bumper stickers and lawn signs declaring, 'Elizabeth Warren for President.' ... 'Run, Liz, run!' the crowd chanted as the senator took the stage for her morning talk.... Then she opened the sort of blistering populist assault on corporations, Republicans, banks, lobbyists and trade deals that has become her trademark." ...

... Warren takes the stage at about 15:15 min. in. Gary Peters, Democratic nominee for Michigan's open U.S. Senate seat, introduces her at about 13:15 in:

... John Dickerson of Slate (of whom I'm not a big fan) urges Elizabeth Warren to run for president. She wouldn't win, he says, but she would force a campaign of ideas & she would get Hillary Clinton to sharpen her message. CW: Or get one. ...

... digby: "I suspect the Villagers are yearning for a way to balance the crazy tea partiers with some false hippie equivalence.... Let me just point out the one reason Dickerson doesn't mention: how wonderful it would be for me to watch two intelligent, accomplished women stand for president and debate the issues?"

AP: "Germany wants 'sensible talks' with the United States on the two countries' spat over alleged American spying, the chancellor, Angela Merkel, said on Friday, indicating that Berlin is still aiming for a formal accord. Washington has dismissed the idea of a 'no-spy' agreement demanded by Germany since reports last year that the US National Security Agency was conducting mass surveillance of German citizens -- and eavesdropping even on Merkel's cellphone. The discovery of two alleged US spies in Germany earlier this month further stoked German anger, prompting Merkel to demand the departure of the CIA station chief in Berlin."

John Tye in the Washington Post: "Public debate about the bulk collection of U.S. citizens’ data by the NSA has focused largely on Section 215 of the Patriot Act," a provision which provides extensive protections for U.S. persons. "Executive Order 12333 contains no such protections for U.S. persons if the collection occurs outside U.S. borders. Issued by President Ronald Reagan in 1981 to authorize foreign intelligence investigations, 12333 is not a statute and has never been subject to meaningful oversight from Congress or any court. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, has said that the committee has not been able to 'sufficiently' oversee activities conducted under 12333. Unlike Section 215, the executive order authorizes collection of the content of communications, not just metadata, even for U.S. persons."

Stephen Colbert, like so many on the right, is a compassionate conservative:

Danielle Ivory & Rebecaca Ruiz of the New York Times: "... G.M. maintains that a distinct difference exists between its recall of 2.6 million older Chevrolet Cobalts and other cars, which started in February, and its more recent recall of 7.6 million cars like the Chevrolet Malibu, announced on June 30. For that reason, it has refused to expand a fund set up to compensate victims of the defective Cobalts, infuriating safety advocates. Its insistence comes even after new information filed with regulators was made public Friday that further detailed the similarities."

Dylan Byers of Politico: "CNN has removed international correspondent Diana Magnay from Israel after she referred to a group of Israelis as 'scum.' Magnay, who was covering the Israeli missile attack on Gaza, tweeted Thursday, 'Israelis on hill above Sderot cheer as bombs land on #gaza; threaten to "destroy our car if I say a word wrong". Scum.' In a statement, a CNN spokesperson said Magnay had been 'threatened and harassed' but 'deeply regrets the language used.'" ...

... Jennifer Shutt of Politico: "NBC News is sending a high-profile correspondent back into Gaza after unexpectedly removing him from the troubled region earlier this week, the network said Friday. Ayman Mohyeldin would go back into Gaza this weekend, NBC said, but didn't clarify why it had removed him."

Tim Egan: "He's had a busy summer. As God only knows, he was summoned to slaughter in the Holy Land, asked to end the killings of Muslims by Buddhist monks in Myanmar, and played both sides again in the 1,400-year-old dispute over the rightful successor to the Prophet Muhammad."

Congressional Races

Nate Cohn of the New York Times: "Nearly five decades after the passage of the Voting Rights Act, black voters in the South are poised to play a pivotal role in this year's midterm elections. If Democrats win the South and hold the Senate, they will do so because of Southern black voters.... If Democrats win this November, black voters will probably represent a larger share of the winning party's supporters in important states than at any time since Reconstruction."

News Ledes

AP: "Ukraine accused Russia on Saturday of helping separatist rebels destroy evidence at the crash site of a Malaysia Airlines plane shot down in rebel-held territory with 298 people onboard. The government in Kiev said militiamen have removed 38 bodies from the crash site in eastern Ukraine and have taken them to the rebel-held city of Donetsk. It says the bodies were transported with the assistance of specialists with distinct Russian accents."

McClatchy News: "Islamic State gunmen overran a former U.S. military base early Friday and killed or captured hundreds of Iraqi government troops who'd been trying to retake Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, the worst military reversal Iraqi troops have suffered since the Islamist forces captured nearly half the country last month."

Reuters: "More than 40 Central American children were expelled from the United States on flights to Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador on Friday, as the U.S. government stepped up its deportation of illegal child migrants.... Thirty-three minors aged 6 months to 15 years along with 26 mothers landed on a U.S. flight to San Pedro Sula, Honduras, the city with the world's highest murder rate."

Guardian: "As Israel pressed ahead with a ground offensive in Gaza on Saturday morning, the death toll of Palestinians rose above 300, many of them children.... As diplomatic efforts to end the conflict continued in Cairo and at the UN, Hamas was looking increasingly isolated in its refusal to negotiate a truce without concessions in advance. It wants prisoners released and the easing of the blockade on Gaza by both Israel and Egypt."

Washington Post: "The press secretary of a House Republican was arrested Friday morning for carrying a firearm into a House office building. Ryan Shucard, press secretary for Rep. Tom Marino (R-Pa.), was arrested at approximately 9:15 a.m. after officers found a 9mm Smith & Wesson handgun and magazine with Shucard as he went through security to enter the building."

Comments Off

Reader Comments (5)

At Netroots Nation, Pierce seems to be most impressed by William Barber:

“On Thursday night … the Reverend William Barber of the newly insane state of North Carolina lit the sky on fire. Barber is the guiding force behind the state's Moral Monday movement…

“He wound into a conclusion by talking about how his son, an environmental geologist, told him about how, if he ever got lost, Barber should climb to the highest ground he could find because, above a certain altitude, snakes cannot survive.

"They call this The Snake Line," Barber said. "We have got to get America back above The Snake Line."

http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/The_Weekend_7_18_14http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/The_Weekend_7_18_14

July 18, 2014 | Unregistered CommenterJames Singer

@James Singer. Yeah, like Pierce, I looked in vain for a recording of the Rev. Barber's speech. I'll look again tomorrow.

One day, in the early '80s, I think, I was walking my dog in downtown Manhattan & I ended up near City Hall. Mario Cuomo happened by & he called me aside to chat about the dog & other things. Our conversation ended when he took to the steps of City Hall to give an extemporaneous speech about something or other. Cuomo is one of the great orators of our times, & his little speech was a mini-masterpiece.

After he had finished, I walked on a bit further, & there was Charlie Rangel, standing on some other steps & giving an extemporaneous speech about something or other. His speech was just as good as Cuomo's.

There is a poetry to speechifying (Matilda Cuomo once told me that Mario courted her with poems he wrote for her) that good politicians learn from black preachers: it's the cadence, the passion, the appropriate use of rhetorical devices -- especially repetition. I don't think Barack Obama is a very religious guy, but he learned something in church from that preacher who gave him all the trouble -- he learned how to deliver a speech. And that's why he's president & Hillary Clinton isn't. And Thank God John McCain Isn't. Amen, amen, amen.

Marie

P.S. You can see Elizabeth Warren using repetition in her Netroots "we believe" speech Friday. She always used it.

July 18, 2014 | Registered CommenterMarie Burns

Charlie Rangel is one of my heroes. We were in Korea together and he got a bronze star while I was safe in 8th Army HQ. Someone should explain about combat, death and destruction to the chicken hawks on the Sunday shows. Some of those guys are fearsome but safe from any aggressive action taken on their advice. Bring back the draft so we can get their children in the mix and the tune will change.

July 18, 2014 | Unregistered Commentercarlyle

I can't find Barber's speech either, but here's a synopsis by Dave Dayen in "Salon":

"Appealing to history in a lengthy address, Barber noted America’s habitual phases of moral reconstruction, where people came together for renewal (for example, Barber excerpted long passages from the 1868 North Carolina constitution, the first after emancipation, which called for voting rights, asserted a right to public education and warned against big-money factionalism, the very issues the state deals with to this day). Every time a moral fusion movement sought great changes among the populace, Barber explained, they invited a backlash, from extremists wanting to deconstruct this moral foundation. The way to deal with them was not through rational compromise or horse trading. Barber stated firmly that they need to be fought, that a movement must grow and bear witness to the most basic rights of citizenship, and show America the “higher ground.”

Barber’s theory of change stems from planting your feet firmly and defending immutable values from injustice and racism. Not only that, Barber said, it has worked; his movement rallied North Carolina to his cause, brought low the approval ratings of the extremists who have curtailed voting rights and unemployment benefits and resources for education in the state (“never call those who would do these things Republicans,” he cautioned), and showed the possibility of a new dawn. And as you might expect from a preacher, he explained it in waves of testimony, eliciting applause and laughter and exhortations from the audience."

He's telling us not to be wishy-washy.

July 19, 2014 | Unregistered CommenterBarbarossa

All it takes is a little religion to get 'em going. I see that Egan's column hit the commentary jackpot, about 550 of them so far.

Apparently in the glut the brief snark I sent last night when there were only 80 in the queue got buried in the landslide. Here 'tis:

"I have chosen to call the five Supremes in question handmaidens (or maybe better, the Wikianswer male equivalent of handmaidens, "eunuchs") of the Catholic Caliphate. No one of the Founders they supposedly channel would recognize their legal or moral "reasoning."

And yes, as many others have said, Mr. Egan's definition of religious wars is far too narrow. For instance, the current border issue that has caused the Right such outrage and angst could be seen as a latter-day Children's Crusade.

"Suffer the little children to come unto me," He said. But apparently not to us."

July 19, 2014 | Unregistered CommenterKen Winkes
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