;)
The Commentariat -- July 2, 2015
Internal links & defunct videos removed.
Afternoon Update:
Jim Kuhnhenn of the AP: "Wading into presidential politics, President Barack Obama on Thursday promoted his brand of middle-class economics by drawing sharp contrasts with 'mean' Republicans in the state where the GOP governor was preparing to enter the vast 2016 presidential field. 'They're good people,' Obama said.... 'It's just their ideas are bad.' Obama leveled some of his sharpest criticism of Republicans, who disagree with him on most matters, on the issue of health care....'"
Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "Jim Webb, the former Virginia senator and Reagan-era secretary of the Navy, announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination Thursday, bringing his antiwar credentials to the field in what many consider a long-shot campaign for the presidency. Mr. Webb's announcement caught some political observers by surprise -- the politician was the first to form a presidential exploratory committee among both Democrats and Republicans, but he has been barely visible ever since." ...
... The Washington Post story, by Rachel Weiner, is here.
Jerry Markon of the Washington Post: "The Obama administration has begun a profound shift in its enforcement of the nation's immigration laws, aiming to hasten the integration of long-term illegal immigrants into society rather than targeting them for deportation, according to documents and federal officials. In recent months, the Department of Homeland Security has taken steps to ensure that the majority of America's 11.3 million undocumented immigrants can stay in this country, with agents narrowing enforcement efforts to three groups of illegal migrants: convicted criminals, terrorism threats or those who recently crossed the border."
*****
Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post: "The Justice Department announced Thursday an $18.7 billion agreement in principle with BP to settle outstanding claims arising from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico--the worst oil spill in U.S. history."
Julie Davis of the New York Times: "President Obama on Wednesday announced his plans to formally re-establish diplomatic relations with Cuba this month, declaring that the two nations were ready to reopen embassies in each other's capitals and to start a 'new chapter' of engagement after more than a half-century of estrangement":
... Dana Milbank: "In the space of just over a week, [President] Obama's tired tenure came back to life." CW: Milbank is overstating the case. The President has been working -- and producing -- ever since the 2014 elections.
John Harwood of CNBC: "... don't expect Nancy Pelosi to line up behind Elizabeth Warren and demand President Barack Obama get tougher on Wall Street. 'There may have been a couple of people who say that, but that is not the consensus in our party,' Pelosi said in a 45-minute interview. On the charge that the administration has been 'too soft' on Wall Street, she added: 'The financial industry doesn't agree with that.' Her comment was a reminder that, as the leader of House Democrats, Pelosi outranks Warren despite all the attention the Massachusetts senator has attracted lately...."
Drew Harwell, et al., of the Washington Post: "The Justice Department is investigating whether some of America's biggest airlines have colluded to keep airfares high, striking at an industry that has posted record profits recently while limiting routes and affordable seats, officials familiar with the matter said Wednesday."
Chris Geidner of BuzzFeed: "A federal appeals court [Fifth District] on Wednesday afternoon directed the district courts in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas to issue final orders ending enforcement of the states' respective bans on same-sex couples' marriages.... In the Louisiana case, in which the trial court had upheld the ban, the appeals court, in a second opinion by Judge [Jerry] Smith, wrote that 'the judgment appealed from is REVERSED, and this matter is REMANDED for entry of judgment in favor of the plaintiffs.' Notably, Smith added: 'The district court must act expeditiously on remand, especially in view of the declining health of plaintiff Robert Welles,' a plaintiff in the case.... Nothing yet from U.S. District Court Judge Martin Feldman, who upheld Louisiana's marriage ban...." CW: Feldman is a singular winger.
Steve Benen: Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy "Moore and his lawyer are under the impression that the United States is a theocracy. It's this assumption that leads them to believe public officials -- judges, governors, county clerks, et al -- are obligated to follow religious dictates, as defined by Moore and his lawyer's interpretation of Scripture."
AP: "Episcopalians have voted to allow religious weddings for same-sex couples, just days after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide. The vote came Wednesday in Salt Lake City at the denomination's national assembly. The measure passed by an overwhelming margin in the House of Deputies, the voting body of clergy and lay people at the meeting. The day before, the House of Bishops had approved the resolution, 129-26 with five abstaining.... Many dioceses have allowed priests to perform civil same-sex weddings."
Dana Hedgpeth of the Washington Post: "The White House said Wednesday it is lifting its longstanding ban on cameras and taking photos on its public tours." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
James Loewen, in a Washington Post op-ed: "We are still digging ourselves out from under the misinformation that [Neo-Confederates] spread, which has manifested in both our history books and our public monuments.... Neo-Confederates also managed to rename the war, calling it 'the War Between the States.' Nevermind that while it was going on, no one called it that.... Perhaps most perniciously, neo-Confederates now claim that the South seceded for states' rights. When each state left the Union, its leaders made clear that they were seceding because they were for slavery and against states' rights [claimed by Northern states].... Publishers [of grade-school textbooks] mystify secession because they don't want to offend Southern school districts and thereby lose sales." ...
... Jeet Heer of the New Republic: "The endorsement of the Klan not only underscores the long affiliation of the [confederate] flag with racist terrorism; it also makes plain why debates about symbols have real-world consequences.... As Charleston mass murderer Dylann Roof's comments about black rapists should remind us, [the Klan's] toxic brew of racism and chivalry is still an essential part of white supremacy."
Jessica Derschowitz of Entertainment Weekly: TV Land has pulled reruns of The Dukes of Hazzard off its schedule, a spokesperson for the network confirmed to EW on Wednesday. The network did not comment further or say why the episodes were removed, but the news comes as the show became part of the growing national debate over use of the Confederate flag, which is displayed on the roof of the Duke boys' car. Last week, Warner Bros. Consumer Products said it would no longer license toys or models of the iconic 1969 Dodge Charger...." CW: What a shame. Now I'll never get to watch this exemplar of the vast American television wasteland (or so I would suspect, based on no direct knowledge of what I would assume were the tritest of plotlines, writ in service of stock-character rednecks racing around in souped-up cars). ...
... So then the stars of "The Dukes of Hazzard" speak out in defense of the show (and their residuals). ...
... Now, let us contemplate Greek history & philosophy. (Life is a glorious cycle of non sequiturs.) ...
... What Thucydides Said about the Greek Financial Crisis. Robert Zaretsky, in a New York Times op-ed: "When Thucydides declared his work was 'a possession for all time,' he meant that its relevance was as fixed and unchanging as was human behavior. Like his friend, the tragedian Sophocles, he would not be surprised that the blindness and hubris that undid ancient Athens remain with us today, and that the noble and humanist aims that once animated the European project have given way to unbending technocratic impulses.... Looming behind the euro has been the blunt fact of Germany's strict monetary and economic policies, the edginess of a European Central Bank preoccupied by the specter of inflation and the eagerness of the European Union's Council of Ministers to make policy in what is the near-total absence of democratic process." ...
... Jennifer Rankin of the Guardian: "Germany has dismissed a last-ditch compromise plan from Greece that bowed to some key demands of its creditors. In an address to the Bundestag, the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, reiterated her stance that there was no point in having talks with the government of Alexis Tsipras before a referendum in Greece on an EU bailout plan. 'The door to talks with the Greek government has always been, and remains, open,' she said, but added that talks could not take place before Sunday's poll." ...
... The Guardian is liveblogging the financial crisis.
Melissa Eddy of the New York Times: German Chancellor Angela "Merkel's conversation with an unidentified adviser, along with another document from the chancellor's top aide for European affairs and a list of 69 telephone numbers said to belong to members of the German government and their aides, were made public Wednesday by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks. The files seem to contain little new information, but if authentic, they would appear to be the first solid evidence that the N.S.A. eavesdropped on Ms. Merkel, after allegations in 2013 that were based on lists of telephone numbers revealed by the former agency contractor Edward J. Snowden." ...
... CW: Hmmm, is Snowden passing material to Wikileaks? Or is a journalist-recipient of his files the culprit? It's possible the Wikileaks source is someone completely unrelated to the Snowden "team" or others who had access to the journalists' materials. But if my suspicions are correct, this (fairly harmless and unsurprising) leak is an indication of exactly the kind of threat that I've warned Snowden & his "sharing" methods pose to U.S. security. Snowden fans, take pause.
David Sanger & Michael Gordon of the New York Times: A major sticking point in the Iran nuclear deal is whether or not Iran will allow International Atomic Energy Agency officials to interview Iranian scientists & others who have worked on the country's nuclear program.
Give Peas a Chance? Uh-uh. Alan Rappeport on the Compelling Controvery of the Day: "President Obama and Jeb Bush have found something they agree on: Peas in guacamole are a no-no. The meeting of the taste buds came after The New York Times posted a recipe suggestion on Twitter that adding peas was a good idea. The recipe, which started a debate on Twitter so raucous that Mr. Obama was asked about it, suggests that 'the peas add intense sweetness and a chunky texture to the dip, making it more substantial on the chip.'"
Presidential Race
Gail Collins has an interactive Fourth of July quiz that's all about the presidential candidates. CW: I'm happy to say I'm back to my average of missing one. A person can know too much.
E. J. Dionne: "Will any [Republican candidates] have the temerity to appeal to their party's many working-class supporters by making the point that Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and other Democrats are sure to advance: that reinforcing our 'conservative' values about the honor of work often requires what are usually seen as 'progressive' measures by government to keep workers from being short-changed?"
Bernie Sanders at Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Madison, Wisconsin, Wednesday evening.AP: "The Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders touted his progressive credentials before his largest crowd to date on Wednesday night as he pushed his campaign into Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker's backyard. Sanders packed the Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Madison, filling its 10,000 seats to show his bid to snatch the Democratic nomination from front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton isn't a longshot. 'Tonight we have made a little bit of history,' the white-haired Sanders said at a podium positioned between Wisconsin and United States flags at the outset of his hourlong speech before a boisterous crowd. 'Tonight we have more people at any meeting for a candidate of president of the United States than any other candidate.'"
Obama 2008. See comments for context.
Ben Kamisar of the Hill: "The House Select Committee on Benghazi is a 'charade,' Hillary Clinton's campaign charges in a new video blasting the committee for wasting taxpayer money on politics":
... Adam Lerner of Politico has more of the details of the recently-released Clinton e-mails. ...
... Laura Clawson of Daily Kos: "Could there possibly be a bigger 'move along, nothing to see here' moment on the giant scandal of Hillary Clinton's email than a Politico article headlined 'The 12 Hillary Clinton emails you must read' in which all 12 are [silly]? ...
... Daniel Schulman of Mother Jones: "... some of the more intriguing exchanges involved the media -- how her team sought to shape the news, the journalists they considered receptive to their message, and the close degree to which Clinton monitored how she was covered." ...
... Peter Baker of the New York Times sees the e-mails as revealing Clinton's difficulty in "finding her place" in an administration headed by the guy who beat her in the race for the presidential nomination. ...
... Amanda Becker & Emily Stephenson of Reuters: "Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has raised about $45 million since she entered the 2016 race in April, her campaign said on Wednesday. More than 90 percent of Clinton's donations were in amounts of $100 or less, a campaign aide said, emphasizing the Democratic front-runner's broad-based grassroots support. The campaign did not release the total number of donors so far." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "For Democrats, Donald Trump amounts to a kind of divine intervention. With the Republican Party on an urgent mission to woo Latino voters, one of its leading presidential candidates has been enmeshed for two weeks in a nasty feud over his inflammatory comments about Mexican immigrants.... Hillary Rodham Clinton and other Democrats, meanwhile, are eager to make Trump the face of the Republican Party, which is momentarily leaderless with a disparate presidential field and no clear front-runner." ...
... Josh Feldman of Mediaite: "New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced in a statement today that the city is reviewing all of Trump's contracts with the city due to his 'disgusting and offensive' remarks." ...
... Phil Mickelson of the Golf Channel: "When it comes to the employees at his own private [golf] clubs and resorts, Trump is not worried about repercussions. 'I have Mexicans and South Americans working for me all over the country and believe me, they love me and I love them,' Trump told [Tim] Rosaforte [of the Golf Channel]. 'I think they're great. I've had great support and I haven't heard one negative thing and frankly I don't expect to.' Both the PGA Tour and PGA of America declined comment...."
... Robin Givhan of the Washington Post: "More than 728,000 people signed a Moveon.org petition calling on Macy's to ditch the Donald -- to sever its ties with Donald Trump, the real estate mogul-turned-celebrity designer-turned-Republican presidential candidate. And Wednesday morning, national department store chain announced that it was doing just that.... Trump responded with his own statement, suggesting that he was breaking up with them first anyway.... Once the Trump-branded merchandise is gone from the stores, that's it. Collectors can still purchase his menswear -- on sale! -- via the Macy's website. The decision does not effect the Ivanka Trump collection, which Macy's also sells." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Simon Miloy of Salon: "... not one Republican has stood up and done literally the easiest, least controversial, most politically buzzy thing one could do in this situation: denounce Donald Trump."
Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: Chris Christie "canceled a morning event in New Hampshire, the state on which he is staking his campaign, and headed to Portland, Me., to pick up the endorsement of its deeply embattled governor, Paul R. LePage -- a man who is gripped in a veto-and-override standoff with a hostile Legislature, has exhausted many fellow Maine Republicans and is being threatened with impeachment by Democrats and independents. Say this for Mr. LePage, though: He makes Mr. Christie's problems in his home state look puny." ...
Scenes from a Diner. Tweedle-Dum & Tweedle-Dumber (see MAG's comment below):
... Margaret Hartmann: Like all GOP presidential candidates, Chris Christie disagrees with the Supreme Court's Obergefell decision. However, he says of governors & all state employees, "'You took the job and you took the oath.... When you go back and re-read the oath it doesn't give you an out. You have to do it.' Christie did note that there are some 'individual circumstances that might merit some examination,' but his position puts him at odds with many of his Republican rivals for the presidential nomination, who have argued that religious exemptions should be allowed. Looks like Christie's Straight Talk Express has officially left the garage! Let's see if it makes it down the block."
Ed Kilgore thinks Ted Cruz won the post-SCOTUS sweepstakes because his ill-advised proposal to subject U.S. Supreme Court justices to retention elections dovetails with ultra-conservative Iowans' own partially-successful efforts to recall state supreme court justices who voted in 2009 to legalize same-sex marriage. Kilgore does acknowledge that the Obergefell decision gave "Scott Walker an excuse for changing his own position on same-sex marriage; he now embraces a constitutional amendment to overturn SCOTUS" & this burnish his creds with folks who thump the Bible rather than read it.
Maggie Haberman & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: To some Republican bigwigs -- and the Koch boys! -- Scott Walker's abrupt shifts rightward increasingly suggest he is "willing to lose the general election to win the primary."
Beyond the Beltway
Equal Rights, a State at a Time. Laura Nahmias of Capital New York: "... a year after [New York] Governor Andrew Cuomo made it a focal point of his re-election campaign, the majority of a women's equality-centric legislative package that proved hugely controversial in last year's session sailed through. That legislation, the Women's Equality Act, was a ten-part group of bills aimed at advancing women's rights.... All but one of the Women's Equality Act bills quietly passed the Legislature. One has already been signed. Eight more are awaiting Cuomo's signature." The part that didn't pass in the GOP-dominated legislature related to abortion rights. Via Erica Schwiegershausen of New York.
Steve Mistler of the Portland (Maine) Press Herald: "The [Maine] Legislature's watchdog committee voted unanimously Wednesday to investigate Gov. Paul LePage's threat to withhold state funds from a school for at-risk children unless it withdrew a job offer to Democratic House Speaker Mark Eves. The probe will focus on how state funding is sent to Good Will-Hinckley, a private school in Fairfield, and the effects of the Republican governor's threat on a political foe, which rocked the State House last week and led some Democrats to call for the Republican governor's impeachment.... The unanimous vote [cam] after the governor's attorney tells the agency that will investigate that it doesn't have jurisdiction over LePage.... 'They can't investigate me,' [LePage] said. 'It's in the Constitution.'" At least one independent legal expert disagreed, in part, with the governor & his attorney.
Gretel Kauffman of the Christian Science Monitor: "An escaped murderer that was captured 22 days after breaking out of Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, N.Y., is claiming that he and his partner in crime used only hacksaw blades to cut through steel cell block walls." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
How to Make Your Anti-Gay Storefront Signs More Polite. Jaime Fuller of New York: "On Monday, a few days after last week's Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage, Jeff Amyx put a sign that said 'No Gays Allowed' on the door of his hardware store in Tennessee. On Tuesday night, he amended the sign slightly. It now reads, 'We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone who would violate our rights of freedom of speech & freedom of religion.' He told WATE 6 in Knoxville, 'People told me I ought to do it a little bit more, make it a little nicer because I'm a very blunt person.'" CW: Ah, much better. ...
... CW Update: Be sure to see Steve Van Nest's additional reporting & commentary on the story in today's Comments.
News Ledes
Washington Post: "The Washington Navy Yard was on lockdown Thursday as police responded to a report of an active shooter at the facility, authorities said. The call came in about 7:40 a.m.... The U.S. Navy retweeted a message from their Washington district office saying 'no incident can be confirmed as of yet.'" ...
... UPDATE: New Lede: "Police flooded in to search after a report of gun shots was called in by someone inside the building. They found no gunman, no evidence that shots had been fired; nothing but shaken workers."
... The Post has live updates here. ...
... National Journal: "The Washington Navy Yard is on lockdown Thursday as police are looking into reports of an incident there. The U.S. Navy confirmed on Twitter at 7:59 a.m. that the building complex has been placed on lockdown, but not the exact nature of the incident. NBC News is reporting that shots were reported at the Yard."
AP: "U.S. employers likely hired at another strong pace in June, a sign that the job market is nearing full health and giving the Federal Reserve reason to raise interest rates as early as September. Economists predict that employers added 233,000 jobs and that the unemployment rate dipped to 5.4 percent from 5.5 percent in May, according to data firm FactSet." ...
... New York Times Update: "The American economy is entering the summer powered by a decent head of steam, with employers adding 223,000 jobs in June."
ABC News: "A train carrying chemicals caught fire overnight in Maryville, Tennessee, displacing up to 5,000 people, authorities said. The CSX train was traveling from Cincinnati to Waycross, Georgia when the fire broke out, said Kristin Seay with CSX Corporate Communications. The train was carrying liquefied petroleum gas and acrylonitrile -- a product used in the manufacture of plastics."
Reuters: "The pilot flying a TransAsia Airways ... ATR mistakenly switched off the plane's only working engine seconds before it crashed in February, killing 43 people, Taiwan's Aviation Safety Council (ASC) said in its latest report on Thursday. The ASC's report also showed that Captain Liao Jian-zong had failed simulator training in May 2014, in part because he had insufficient knowledge of how to deal with an engine flame-out on take-off. 'Wow, pulled back the wrong side throttle,' Liao, 41, was heard to say on voice recordings seconds before the crash."
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Reader Comments (23)
I didn't go see Bernie last night, although I know many who did. I love Bernie as a voice for progressives, but I just don't see him as a viable candidate for president. I fail to see how attracting 10,000 of the long-suffering Madison liberals is an indication of his strength. It's like Walker going to Iowa or South Carolina to bask in the adulation of the right wing.
That's not the Marty Feldman who told me to "walk this way".
Everything I read suggests that Bernie Sanders is a long shot.
Be that as it may, I am delighted to see the strength and size of his crowds...because let's hope his messaging gets across to more of the voting public and that it is a wake up call for many that they can do make a difference in elections.
I haven't commented on Maine's governor yet, still banging my head against the wall as he issues one more stupid statement after another. What an embarrassment! There's a video on the Portland Press Herald this morning with scenes
from Becky's Diner with (as someone said, maybe Charlie Pierce) "Tweedledum and Tweedledumber." aka Paul LePage and Chris Christie.
@Nadd2: I agree with you, but Bernie's audience has to trouble Hillary. After all, the crowd estimate at her speech in NYC was half the size of Bernie's, & Clinton was speaking in a town where 8 million people were only a subway ride away (okay, requiring a transfer for most).
What Bernie's following proves is that you can't attribute Obama's rock-star status to his cool -- see photo above. There are millions of Americans longing for progressive ideas and policies, not just symbols of those ideas & policies.
I suppose Bernie's presidential bid will go the way of Howard Dean's, but the desire for progress is in the American DNA, our selfish, scaredy-cat retrogressive factions notwithstanding. Whoever can best espouse those ideas -- and at the moment that's an authentically-liberal Bernie Sanders -- will get our attention, if only to remind those of us struggling to be heard above the din of right-wing chatter, that we are not alone. Roly-poly Howard Dean, rumpled Bernie Sanders -- they r us, & the fact that the kids seem to feel that too is an encouraging sign for the future of the country.
Hillary Clinton may be the reality, but Bernie Sanders shares our dream.
Marie
A little info on the Tennessee hardware story. I live just outside Washburn, about 5 minutes from Amyx. Washburn is a tiny town, made up of a school, a bank, a gas station, a Dollar Gen and the hardware store and maybe 20 houses. It's a very remote and isolated place but it's beautiful here.
There is one openly gay guy in the area, and he is loved and respected by many. We had a lesbian couple for a few years, but they moved away some time ago. Effectively, when Amyx posted his sign, he was telling one guy to stay out of his store. I and many others here do not see this as a "principled" stand so much as a last gasp of a desperate man whose business has been shaky from the start.
Every man in the valley seems to be either a former Baptist preacher, a current Baptist preacher, or not interested in church. He will keep the Baptist crowd, but he has lost the rest of us.. It remains to be seen if there are enough Baptists to keep him going.
TO THE WOMAN WHO KNOWS TOO MUCH: I bet I can guess which one you missed in the Collin's quiz. I got four wrong, but won't divulge which ones ––don't want to spoil it for others.. Maybe tomorrow we can compare answers.
@Steve–-good to hear from someone who is close to the heart of the Hardware. Thanks.
Here's a clip of Elizabeth Warren giving a "what for" ( a polite term for "fuck you") to Scott Walker:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/07/01/1398024/-Elizabeth-Warren-Slams-Scott-Walker-On-Marriage-Equality?detail=email
Bernie, Hillary, Socrates, and Me
No, we don't have regular poker nights together. That would never work. Besides Socrates would never shut up, and he'd probably drink us all under the table.
No, as happens not infrequently, the varied topics covered out here in RC Land have spurred a not too (hopefully) spurious connection. The Times op-ed concerning itself with what Thucydides might have to say about the current kerfuffle between Greece and the EC overlords (might have something to say later about Angela Merkel's maddening insistence that member countries all approach their finances like a thrifty "Swabian hausfrau" makes me want to throw things; she must subscribe to the National Review) and the discussion about Bernie Sanders' chances in the upcoming battle for supremacy in the Democratic Party triggered a few thoughts of a, shall we say, Socratic nature.
So here's the set up. The pre-Socratics were all vying for preeminence in seeing who could come up with the best way of thinking about, well, thinking. And stuff. Where does stuff come from? What's it made of? Why is it here? And also, us. We're stuff too. Why are we here? What's goin' on? What's it all about, Alfie?
Now two of those guys had completely opposite ideas. Heraclitus (a wild man if ever there was one) believed that everything changed. Nothing remained the same. Evah. He's the guy who famously informed us that we can never step into the same river twice. Nice point. Good thought. And over in this corner in the white trunks, Paaaaaaaarrrr-Mennnideeeees. Now Parmenides believed that nothing changed. That change was only an appearance, an illusion. A leaf appears on a tree. It grows, becomes green, turns yellow, then brown, then falls off and becomes fertilizer. But it's still the same leaf. The essence of the leaf never changes. For you physicists out there, this is a nice early thought experiment that presages some of Newton's ideas about conservation in a closed system. But I digress.
Anyway, Socrates, being Socrates, sees value in both propositions, but how to bring them together so that they make sense?
Easy! And here's the short version. Reality, at least what we can see, does change. There's no way one can say that change never occurs. But what doesn't change is the ideal behind the reality. The idealized form of ideas, of existence, of the soul, for without the soul, and without a vibrant well cared for soul, nurtured by an examined life, what's the point? Might as well crack a beer and watch Hannity scream about how white evangelicals are all under attack from blahs and gays, then die and go straight to hell.
Methinks Socs had a point. Which brings us 'round to Hills and Bern. If Hillary is the reality of the Party, Bernie is the soul, the unchanging ideal that enlivens and enriches our view of life that prepossesses our impression of the polis. Certainly of my life (got that "me" part just in time, eh?).
Watched an interesting sci-fi movie a couple of weeks ago. Scarlett Johannson plays a woman, "Lucy", who, through a convoluted plot twist, is able to access more and more of her brain power. As the percentages go up, she starts to lose some of her humanity. At one point, as shit starts blowing up, she grabs onto a Parisian cop and takes him with her as she wades through all manner of deadly interference as if it wasn't there. The cop asks her why she needs him, given her new superhuman abilities. She tells him he's there to remind her of who and what she really is. A human being.
Bernie is here to remind us of the ideal liberal soul of the Democratic Party. As Marie says, Hillary may be the reality, but we all, Hillary especially, need Bernie to help us not to forget what it's all about.
Socrates would approve.
P.S. That Times op-ed was going along nicely until the author mentioned despicable, neo-con asshole and faux historian Victor Davis Hanson. The less heard from that bag o' rocks the better.
P.P.S. Favorite lede of the day so far, on the NBC site, for a story about the Sanders Wisconsin appearance: "Feel the Bern". Yeah, baby.
I believe I have divined Christie's plan to pacify Iraq:
Send his staff to Baghdad and close the bridges.
Steve,
Thanks for that info.
It's a good reminder that most of the time we have access only to high level factoids. It's nice to hear about things at the ground level, with additional information that fleshes out both the story, the context, the characters (including supporting ones), and the milieu.
The recent conviviality between wingnut guvs from Maine and New Jersey, both of whom are loudmouthed braggarts, bullies, and absolute failures at governance, prompts the question of why we have so many horrible Republican governors. I mean, look at them.
Rick Scott, a finagling fraud in the business world and the same as a governor.
Mike Pence, former golden boy turned Confederate foot in mouth man who tried his best to make his state a pariah.
Sam Brownback.....need I say more?
Bobby Jindal. Likewise.
Scott Walker. Eek!
Mary Fallin who believes she and a handful of other Oklahomans "built" the state with no help from the federal government. I guess all those Native American tribes left of their own accord when Mary showed up. Rick Snyder, John Kasich, Greg Abbott, Bruce Rauner, former hedge fund guy who wants Illinois to dissolve all unions so he can run the state "like a business".
Disgraces. All of them. All operating in one way or another off the Confederate Ideology Playbook that has time and again proven to be dangerously backwards. Instead of plays that move the team forward, these guys are constantly running the wrong way and dropping the ball. And what's worse, they know it but continue calling the same failed plays.
The Republican Way.
They needn't worry though. Fox and Chuck Todd are there to remind everyone that both sides are to blame.
Does my abysmal performance on the Collins quiz (missed two of the first five and one right answer was a lucky guess) mean that I should be paying more attention to the Republican Presidential field, or does it mean that they all exhibit so much lunacy it's hard (and--my excuse here--hardly worthwhile) to keep it all straight?
I don't know about you guys, but is there something a bit too post postmodern about "liveblogging" a financial crisis?
I'm wondering if it would be something like this.
More on LePage...he often brings up his French heritage (at which I am inclined to think most French people might cringe),
then I wondere, is there a French politician who shares commonality with LePage ?
Indeed, there’s...Le Pen. Hmmmmm! LePage?
Le Pen, LePage ou Le Pen, Le Pen et LePage. Qu’elle amusant sur le papier!
What else starts with Le P....? Ahhhhh,
Le prout. (the fart)
Les prouts (the farts)
C’est tres tres apropos!
Well, well. Isn't this special?
A few weeks ago, Right Wing World was all a-flutter about a statement made by Jerry Seinfeld to the extent that he had given up performing at colleges because of the PC-ishness of it all. Students, he complained, didn't like his kind of edgy humor. We'll overlook the fact that Jerry Seinfeld's stuff has always been about as edgy as an Andy Griffith Show episode.
But wingers LOVED it! Finally an "elite" bi-coastal type--and a New York Jew--was complaining about how PC things had gotten in liberal colleges. Oh the joy of it all! Confederates were blowing gaskets right and left over this affirmation of how right they've been all along about liberal colleges training all those humorless, knee jerk socialists. Along with this revelation came an article written under a pseudonym, by someone calling themselves a professor who claimed he was afraid of his liberal students. Oh the humanity! Wingers were dee-lighted.
But now LSU, not exactly a bastion of liberality I would guess, has fired a professor citing "sexual harassment" because she occasionally said "fuck no" or words to that effect. The powers that be cited some other PC infractions as well. It seems that that worse than dropping F bombs, the teacher, Teresa Buchanan, had gotten into it with some local parish official. In any event, she is being sacrificed on the altar of winger political correctness, the exact offense with which the Fox bots are forever charging northern "socialist" colleges.
Wonder what Hannity and Loofah Boy will have to say about this?
@MAG: Le Pétomane, bien sûr. Both Le Pen & LePage talk out of their asses, so there you go. BTW, a French court just gave Le Pen back his exalted status in the National Front party, even as Republicans may boot LePage.
Marie
Terry Gross, NPR Fresh Air, has a very interesting interview with Adam Liptak reviewing the 2015 SCOTUS term. It will be available later (today ?) on the interwebs.
Re Collins quiz and political humor:
I'm reminded of many years ago seeing DC comedian Mark Russell, lamenting the difficulty of writing jokes that were funnier than the politicians.
Noting that the IRS would no longer provide free filing assistance to taxpayers except for: "the blind, the mentally handicapped, and (wait for it) members of Congress." "I can't top that!" he cried.
More recently, Lewis Black:
“‘Donald Trump is running for president.’ That’s already a punchline. That’s the joke! The joke’s done!”
Plus ça change...
@Marie: Le Pétomane. I can't top such an explosive retort! What a damn funny bio!
And here's another Governor LePetomane.
Could this performance be the model used by LePage?
Harrumph!
MAG et Marie: How could you forget - LePew! (TM-Warner Bros.)
Please take a moment to read historian James Loewen's piece in the Washington Post which Marie has linked above.
Loewen is refreshingly unaccommodating to the discomfort of Confederate fee-fees when confronted with actual, as opposed to invented, historical truth.
Just yesterday I was accosted by several residents of my blood red state with the complaint that liberals and the media had no idea--"no fucking idea"--what the War Between the States (their term) was about. "States' rights! Not slavery." Loewen tells them to fuck off. It was, in fact, about slavery and very much AGAINST states' rights. And he quotes their own documents to prove it. He also points out that the term "War Between the States" was never used during that conflict. That came into being as the losers rewrote its history. And they're still doing it.
152 years ago today, the fighting at Gettysburg got very real. On July 2nd, 1863, 100,000 troops were engaged. Over 20,000 were killed, wounded, or lost. Back in 1993 a film about the battle based on Michael Sharra's novel "The Killer Angels" was produced. I've seen it several times and I believe there is only a single mention of slavery. There is, however, a privileged scene in which captured Confederates pretty much discount the notion of slavery being any kind of issue (which, in fairness, it may not have been for many of the poor schlubs who fought and died for the southern aristocratic slave owners). Instead, they declare that they were fighting for states' rights.
As Loewen points out, this is the sort of pernicious re-writing of history at which Confederates have been inordinately successful. To prove that the states' rights argument is just a canard, he points to seminal documents of secession by southern states that declare their antipathy to states' rights, specifically, the rights of northern states like Massachusetts and New York to pass laws depriving them of their possessions (slaves) should they need a few inferiors to serve them while traveling up thataway.
Their most immediate and vital reason for seceding was the preservation and continuation of the institution of slavery. Period. Not states' rights bullshit, no constitutional questions. Nothing. Just the right to own human beings and beat them like rented mules until they keeled over dead. Then to go out and buy more.
All lies. And all the bullshit today's Confederates sling about states' rights, and "heritage not hate" are out and out lies as well. Ahistorical bilge.
But to hear Jeb! tell it, the Confederate flag--the banner taken into battle to keep slaves in their place--didn't acquire that stink of hatred and human bondage until a century or so later. Remember, he's the smart one.
Fuckers, all of them.
Read the piece. It's a good one.
Amazing. After all these years, Mel Brooks gives me another laugh. Gov. Lepetomane, indeed. Thanks Marie.
A further, more detailed history of the Civil War's cause can be found in Egerton's YEAR OF METEORS, published a few years back.
And yes, it was slavery...or maybe a state's right to own and use slaves.
Maybe required reading for Akhilleus' interlocutors.