;)
The Commentariat -- July 24, 2016
Afternoon Update:
Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Michael R. Bloomberg, who bypassed his own run for the presidency this election cycle, will endorse Hillary Clinton in a prime-time address at the Democratic convention and make the case for Mrs. Clinton as the best choice for moderate voters in 2016, an adviser to Mr. Bloomberg said. The news is an unexpected move from Mr. Bloomberg, who has not been a member of the Democratic Party since 2000; was elected the mayor of New York City as a Republican; and later became an independent."
Abby Phillip of the Washington Post: "The release of thousands of embarrassing internal email exchanges among Democratic officials threatens to overshadow the party's message of unity on the eve of the its convention in Philadelphia. A trove of messages released by hackers on the website WikiLeaks apparently show party officials working to boost Hillary Clinton's candidacy during the primary.... On Sunday, [Bernie] Sanders renewed his call for [Debbie] Wasserman Schultz to resign and said that the emails vindicate his claims during the primary that party officials were actively working to undermine his candidacy." -- CW ...
... Jeff Zeleny & Eric Bradner of CNN: "Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz will not have a major speaking role or preside over daily convention proceedings this week, a decision reached by party officials Saturday after emails surfaced raising questions about the committee's impartiality during the Democratic primary. The DNC Rules Committee has named Rep. Marcia Fudge, D-Ohio, as permanent chair of the convention, according to a DNC source. She will gavel each session to order and will gavel each session closed. 'She's been quarantined,' another top Democrat said of Wasserman Schultz, following a meeting Saturday night. Wasserman Schultz faced intense pressure Sunday to resign her post as head of the DNC, several party leaders told CNN, urging her to quell a growing controversy threatening to disrupt Hillary Clinton's nominating convention. David Axelrod, a former top adviser to Barack Obama's presidential campaigns and a CNN senior political commentator, said Wasserman Schultz should resign."
*****
Presidential Race
AP: "Hundreds of neighbors and other well-wishers greeted ... Sen. Tim Kaine, when Kaine and his wife returned to their home in Richmond, Virginia.... Cheers erupted when Kaine and wife Anne Holton arrived at their home in the tree-lined Ginter Park neighborhood on Richmond's north side about 10:30 p.m." -- CW ...
... Amy Chozick & Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "Hillary Clinton debuted her running mate, Senator Tim Kaine, to boisterous and bilingual cheers [in Miami, Florida,] on Saturday, calling him a 'progressive who likes to get things done' even as some liberal Democrats began making clear that they were disappointed with her choice.... Mr. Kaine bounded up to the microphone, appearing immediately comfortable in his brand new role as Mrs. Clinton's top cheerleader.... He slipped easily between English and Spanish, animating the receptive and mostly Latino crowd at Florida International University by mixing political rhetoric with homey reflections on his own life story." -- CW ...
... C-SPAN has video of the full program here. Tune in at 19:30 min. for Sen. Kaine's speech. ...
... Michael Tomasky of the Daily Beast: "Holy crap. He killed it. I'm not trying to spin you.... Tim Kaine was unbelievable. He was natural. He was smart. He was relaxed and funny, and he was serious. He was proud of himself and his wife and family but never arrogant. He was humble without ever being cloying in that way the politically humble can often be. He was genuine. He was unbelievable.... He is the perfect choice for her because he comes across as so at ease and so real. These are two things, as we know, that Hillary Clinton has a lot of trouble with." -- CW
Binders Full of Candidates. Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "When Hillary Clinton delivered the news to Tim Kaine that he was her pick for running mate, the senator from Virginia was in Rhode Island ... raising money for his colleague Jack Reed at the Newport Shipyard. The call came through at 7:32 p.m. Friday. Clinton offered the job, Kaine accepted and then the former secretary of state said: 'Now, I don't want to alarm you, but John Podesta is outside your building right now.' So it was that a process begun in secret more than three months ago -- which had remained a mystery throughout, even to those who were being vetted -- came to its cloak-and-dagger conclusion." -- CW ...
... Edward-Issac Dovere & Gabriel Debenedetti of Politico: "For the finalists in the hunt to be Hillary Clinton's running mate, it was five weeks of questions and follow-up, and follow-up to the follow-up questions, starting from when they were summoned one-by-one to meet with campaign chairman John Podesta and lawyer Jim Hamilton and told to bring along just one trusted person who'd serve as the point of contact.... They had to turn over every password for every social media account for every member of their families. They had to list every piece of property they'd ever owned, and copies of every résumé that they'd put out for the past 10 years. Every business partner. Every gift they'd ever received, according to those familiar with the details of the vetting process." -- CW
Steve M.: "Clinton can certainly win the election with Kaine, but he won't help her with [white working-class men]." -- CW
Sheryl Gay Stolberg & Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: "For [Tim] Kaine..., no issue has been as fraught politically or personally as the death penalty. His handling of capital punishment reveals a central truth about Mr. Kaine: He is both a man of conviction and very much a politician, a man of unshakable faith who nonetheless recognizes -- and expediently bends to, his critics suggest -- the reality of the Democratic Party and the state he represents.... He opposes both abortion and the death penalty, he has said, because 'my faith teaches life is sacred.' Yet he strongly supports a woman's right to choose and has a 100 percent rating from Planned Parenthood. And Mr. Kaine presided over 11 executions as governor, delaying some but granting clemency only once. He cast his decisions in simple terms: As Virginia's governor, he was sworn to uphold the law -- a message that helped him get elected governor." -- CW
Stephen Braun & Eileen Sullivan of the AP: "... Kaine's cautious, left-leaning political profile in a closely contested state is blurred by his ties to energy industry interests and his personal qualms over abortion.... Oil and gas interests rank with law firms and investment and technology companies among Kaine's strong campaign financiers.... Some state environmentalists said Kaine, as governor, helped undermine clean-coal and other anti-pollution efforts in Virginia.... [BUT] Leaders of two national environmental groups, the League of Conservation Voters and the Sierra Club, voiced approval of Clinton's choice of Kaine, who backs Obama on climate change and opposed construction of the Keystone XL pipeline." -- CW
Moriah Balingit & Emma Brown of the Washington Post: "In tapping Sen. Timothy M. Kaine (D-Va.) as her running mate, Hillary Clinton ... also chose one half of a Virginia power couple with a history of public service and advocacy on issues related to child welfare and education.... Anne Holton, his wife -- who serves as Virginia's secretary of education -- has an even more extensive record [than her husband] when it comes to advocating for children, particularly foster youth. As a schoolgirl in 1970, she was on the front lines of the fight to desegregate Virginia's public schools. Holton is the daughter of Virginia Gov. A. Linwood Holton (R), who championed integration in a state that was known for its vigorous efforts to resist it." -- CW
Washington Post Editors: "In choosing Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, [Hillary Clinton] has picked someone not only supremely capable of serving as her No. 2 but also fully prepared -- from day one -- to be president.... In every office he has held -- from Richmond mayor to Virginia governor to U.S. senator -- he has shown a steady hand marked by a mastery of policy details and politics." -- CW
New York Times Editors: "Hillary Clinton's choice of Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia as her running mate is a safe and solid choice.... His political success as a liberal Democrat -- with a perfect score from Planned Parenthood and an F rating from the National Rifle Association -- in a state with a deeply conservative tradition shows an ability to retain his principles while being pragmatic enough to work with Republicans." -- CW
Gail Collins has a brief profile of Hillary Clinton. Collins suggests that Clinton is relaxed and "natural" when she isn't the center of attention. CW: For the rest of her life Clinton, who is about to become the Leader of the Free World, will find herself the center of attention, so I guess relaxed, natural Hillary can be seen only thru a rear-view mirror. ...
Karen Tumulty writes a long profile of Hillary Clinton. -- CW
Catherine Lucey of the AP: "Efforts by Bernie Sanders supporters to eliminate or reduce the influence of superdelegates failed at a meeting of the Democratic National Convention rules committee Saturday. At the gathering in a Philadelphia conference room Saturday, an amendment to get rid of superdelegates -- party insiders who can vote for the candidate of their choice at the convention -- was defeated, as were a number of efforts to limit the power of super delegates. The proposals did win enough support to potentially move on to the convention floor for votes next week, though compromise plans were still being discussed by the Democratic campaigns." -- CW
Maryclaire Dale of the AP: "Protesters, party leaders and city officials were making final plans as Philadelphia prepared to host the four-day Democratic National Convention that starts Monday. More than 5,000 delegates are among the 50,000 people set to attend the gathering at the Wells Fargo Center in South Philadelphia, which is expected to culminate with Hillary Clinton being named the party's official nominee for president." -- CW ...
... ** Dave Weigel of the Washington Post: "The Democratic Party arrived [in Philadelphia] still divided over the results of its presidential primary season, with anger at the nominating process, the Clinton-Kaine ticket and hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee spilling into the party's final meetings before the convention begins. On each count, supporters of Bernie Sanders found new reasons to bristle about their choice in November." -- CW ...
... Maryalice Parks of ABC News: "Bernie Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver said his team was 'disappointed' by the emails from the Democratic National Committee leaked through WikiLeaks.... 'Someone does have to be held accountable,' Weaver said during an interview with ABC News.... Weaver said the emails showed misconduct at the highest level of the staff within the party and that he believed there would be more emails leaked, which would 'reinforce' that the party had 'its fingers on the scale.... You had in this case a clear example of the DNC taking sides and looking to place negative information into the political process.'" -- CW ...
... Kristen East of Politico: Brad Marshall, the chief financial officer of "the Democratic National Committee has apologized after suggesting that the organization use Bernie Sanders' religious beliefs against him in the Democratic primary." CW: Gee, Brad, that's mighty odd, because 24 hours earlier you told the Intercept that the e-mail where you slammed the Jew who might be an atheist wasn't Bernie Sanders at all, but some other candidate for some other office on a planet far, far away. (See yesterday's Commentariat.)
Senate Race
Christopher Cadelago of the Sacremento Bee: "Democratic Rep. Loretta Sanchez, in an interview with Univision 19 that aired this weekend, suggested that President Barack Obama's endorsement of U.S. Senate rival Kamala Harris [D] was in part based on race.... Speaking in Spanish, she noted that Obama and Harris are longtime friends, then added: 'She is African American. He is, too.'... Her remarks come days after she ripped Obama for endorsing Harris, arguing he should be focused on helping Democrats win the presidential race rather than inserting himself in a contest between two party members." -- CW
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd.
The Fox Casting Couch. Jim Rutenberg, et al., of the New York Times: "The Times spoke with about a dozen women who said they had experienced some form of sexual harassment or intimidation at Fox News or the Fox Business Network, and half a dozen more who said they had witnessed it. Two of them cited [former chief Roger] Ailes and the rest cited other supervisors.... Several said that inappropriate comments about a woman's appearance and sex life were frequent. Managers tried to set up their employees on dates with superiors." -- CW ...
... Gabriel Sherman of New York has more on Rudi Bakhtiar, who is featured in the Times story, & "who says she was fired from Fox News after complaining about sexual harassment." -- CW
Way Beyond the Beltway
Sayed Salahuddin & Pamela Constable of the Washington Post: "At least 80 people were killed and more than 230 wounded Saturday when attackers detonated explosives amid a huge crowd of peaceful protesters in the Afghan capital, most of them from the country's Shiite ethnic Hazara minority, Afghan officials said. Spokesmen for the Islamic State quickly claimed responsibility for the attack at a traffic circle jammed with demonstrators, according to Afghan media." -- CW
News Lede
New York Times: "Olympic officials said on Sunday that all Russian athletes were tainted by the country's state-run doping system and would not be allowed to compete in the Summer Games unless they convinced individual sports federations of their innocence. With just 12 days before the Games begin, the International Olympic Committee said in a statement that 'all Russian athletes seeking entry to the Olympic Games Rio 2016 are considered to be affected by a system subverting and manipulating the antidoping system.'" -- CW
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Reader Comments (21)
Here's hoping that beginning in Jan 2017 every day will be a
"no trump news day".
If a divided Democratic party results in the election of Donald Trump I will personally lay the blame on Sore-Loser-in-Chief Bernie "one-note" Sanders and his band of delusional true believers.
I hope I never have to hear that gravelly voice again. Go back to being the "Independent Senator who Caucuses with Democrats," Bernie. You lost.
Forrest,
Hear, hear. Oh, except for the day he is found guilty on all counts for one of his many scams and trades his navy blue potato sack for an orange one.
Pat,
The recent revelation of how DWS and the DNC plotted to fuck Sanders won't go very far in winning over his Never Hillary acolytes. Why does she still have a job?? Now I'm hearing renewed yelps about protest votes for Gary Johnson or some Green Party schmoe. What's a little impending Armageddon if you can retain your purity while Trump sends out the storm troopers to arrest his enemies?
Marie - thanks for the Mendelssohn. Even over a PC sound system, the execution seemed flawless. But it was the visual that captivated, with that young lady's confidence, athleticism and refined power shining through.
I find it amazing that human beings can do such things. And in this case, without breaking a sweat.
The promised Sunday sermon.
Its subject, numeracy, an essential life skill Republicans for all their talk about budgets seem never to have acquired.
Was thinking of he-who-shall-not-be-named-today's scary nomination address, the one that told us how dangerous things were and how they were getting worse every day and only he could fix it fast, that speech, and wondered how hazardous our world really is.
Mentioned yesterday the numbers on police deaths by violence. Here they are again. The absolute number of police deaths from violence has steadily declined from 101 per year during Reagan's reign to a low of 62 during the first seven Obama years. (Washington Post Wonkblog)
Not exactly the impression we get from the media, is it?
How about the terrorism numbers, the ones that are supposed to terrify us into electing HWSNBNT. They're kinda interesting, too.
I was surprised, memory being short, to rediscover terror deaths in Europe were greater than 150 yearly between 1972 and 1988, in a few of those years much higher. In 2004 they reached 196 and in 2015-16 very likely to exceed that number. Only since 2004, no wonder about why, have the majority of terrorist attacks been Islam-inspired, and between then and 2015 when they ticked up again, the number had actually declined.
Here the 9/11 attacks have had their Islam-inspired step-children, most recently mass shootings in CA and FLA, each startling displays of seemingly random, unchecked violence, each fostering its understandably frightening news cycle.
But what do the numbers tell us about how scared we should really be?
Even including mass shootings, the murder rate in the U.S. was 4.5/100,000 in 2014, its lowest since 1963. So, despite the headlines, one's chances of being murdered in the U.S. have been declining. So says the math, pure and simple.
Now back to terror attacks and the magic of the denominator. Let's heighten the stakes considerably and say terrorists kill 5000 innocent victims, not 150 or 500, each year. What would that mean about our chances of being one of them?
The denominator is world population, which has grown from 3.8 billion in 1972 to 7.4 (a near doubling--something else I'd lost track of) at present, our chances are still less than one half of what they would have been in 1972-- if I'm reading my calculator correctly, a vanishingly small 6 hundred-thousanths of one percent.
Not a number to strike much terror in even the faintest heart, I'd think.
So when the Republican chorus of "Be afraid, be very afraid" works well, it's likely doing its number on an innumerate audience that probably didn't like arithmetic in school and is happy to depend on a magic machine to make change.
No wonder they don't understand taxes or that corporate greed victimizes them almost every time they shop, that they ignore climate change and think terrorism, not falling down stairs or drowning in a bathtub, is the greatest danger we face.
Of course, as his bankruptcies suggest, HWSNBNT has a little arithmetic trouble, too.
Maybe for his audience that's a secret part of his appeal.
Ken - the innumerates of whom you write keep the lottery business (and Las Vegas) alive.
Put it all on 5 red.
Pat
Maybe that gravely voice was trying to tell us something we all desperately need to hear. While I don't consider myself a sixty seven year old "Bernie Bro", I take pride in being in the ideological company of Bill Moyers and Thomas Frank.
If there is an electoral catastrophe, perhaps the DNC should spend a few moments on introspection.
Be brave citizen.
Excellent piece by Tamara Draut on the reality of today's "working class" versus the myth sold by the Republicans. [Also up at Salon.]
Love the musical interlude, Marie. Be nice as a regular Sunday feature. Makes for very relaxing reading.
So the DNC "plotted" against Sanders? Where is the proof that these "plots" were actually carried out?
I'd rather think that they saw Sanders as a threat to the entire election if he kept up with his schtick. And exchanged emails about it.
Sounds pretty innocuous to me.
Yes, he was trying to tell us something important and I think he got that through. But to believe that he could beat Trump is fantasy land.
Patrick,
Hadn't thought of the gambling-casino wealth redistribution scheme in quite that way.
Though the proliferation of Indian casinos and their full parking lots have warmed my cockles as I passed them, appealing as they do to my sense of justice a long time coming, hadn't thought specifically of the proportion of gamblers that are likely are Republicans.
A Sunday revelation to me. Have to Google that one.
Thanks.
Pat,
I wrote that, according the leaked emails from the DNC, it seems pretty clear that a plan was in place to undermine the Sanders campaign. If you don't like the word "plotted" there are a number of other synonyms available. What I did not say was that there was proof that any of these "plots" were carried out, nor did I suggest that they were in any way effected. All I said was certain elements within the DNC had traded ideas along those lines, which I think does not, and will not, sit well with Sanders diehards, many--if not all--of whom will be needed to stop the orange headed monster.
Please take a moment to review my post before jumping the gun on what you thought I was saying. Stating that X, Y, and Z had plotted to do A, B, or C is not the same as saying that there was any follow through.
Pat,
If a divided Democratic party results in the election of the Trumpster it will be tragic. But the blame lies fully with DWS, a master manipulator, and HRC, a bank pandering hawk. I am old. My first political love was Adlai Stevenson, I was madly for Adai even though at the time I was too young to vote. I have been an active democrat for many years. I am so resentful at being forced to vote for Hillary I could weep.
Not that Pat
P.S. Marie, thank you so much for RealityChex and a big lovin hug for this morning's Mendelssohn.
Today, as I do most weekends on driving to NYC I pass by a hotel in SOHO whose owner I cannot mention today. Since I have carpel tunnel syndrome, the drive by gives me the opportunity to exercise my right hand middle finger.
Ken,
Excellent post. The innumerate hordes, however are unlikely to be swayed by anything as boring and mundane as facts. They have been addicted to a steady drip of chaos, murder, racism, and fear with a large dose of righteous vengeance, which translates into a No Matter What We Do To Those We Hate, It Ain't Enough.
It's like a B action movie where , because the Bad Guy is shown selling children into sexual slavery, no amount of terrible payback could be too much. Thus, we have people at a national convention calling for the immediate imprisonment of the opposing candidate and surrogates of Trump calling for her summary execution. Ailes may be getting some measure of well deserved disgrace, but Fox has been a single biggest primer of this pump.
Numbers and facts don't register. Only the myth of good guys and bad guys gets any traction. They deal in mythical absolutes.
http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com
Washerman has been kicked out as chair at the convention!!!!
@(the first) Pat: @Akhilleus is right. Obviously, all the muckamucks at the DNC have their favorites within the party, and there's nothing wrong with that. But they have to park that intra-party partisanship outside the door of DNC HQ.
Not only did they not do so, the Chief Financial Officer of the DNC (not some kid in the mailroom) used the "company letterhead" to suggest using one of the top two candidate's religious beliefs against him. Then, when caught, he claimed that the e-mail (which didn't identify Sanders by name) was about some other ethnic Jew who might be an atheist. That, of course, doesn't pass they smell test, & yesterday he said he was vewwy, vewwy sorry for doing what he said he didn't do the day before.
In addition, as Daniel Strauss & Bianca Ocasio of Politico reported, Wasserman Schultz called Bernie Sanders' campaign manager Jeff Weaver a 'damn liar' in one e-mail to an aide, & in another she called Weaver "particularly scummy" and "an ASS." Maybe Weaver is a particularly scummy ASS, but again, you don't use the company stationery to denigrate the campaign manager of a top presidential candidate.
Wasserman Schultz said during primary season that the DNC was neutral in the primaries. That turned out, to no one's surprise, not to be true. Sanders' campaign complaints that the DNC was "rigging the election" weren't paranoid; they were -- at least in substance if not in some details -- accurate. She should lose her job for dereliction of duty, and in fact, she did just lose her speaking slot at the convention.
Marie
Tsk! tsk! the both-siderists must be loving this. Looky, looky what's going on with the Dems. What a blow to DWS who I'm sure had dreams of sharing the convention spotlight with the first woman nominee for President.
One more ride on my hobby horse of the day.
Did a little googling and did not find what I was hoping to find, confirmation of my suspicions about a link between Republican voters and a penchant for gambling.
From Harrah's research. "Gamblers also tend to be somewhat more politically active than nongamblers, according to the survey. Twenty-six percent of gamblers said they contributed money to a political candidate or cause compared with 19 percent of nongamblers. Fifty-one percent of gamblers said they have signed a petition in support of a political candidate or cause in the past four years compared with 42 percent of nongamblers. Slightly more gamblers identified themselves as "mostly Democratic" than "mostly Republican."
"Slightly" is not much, and I'd imagine this aggregate disguises regional differences, but...for now, not being a Republican, will have to go with those darn facts.
I have never liked DWS and am not sorry to see her go, and while it does not appear that the DNC was neutral, I'm not seeing the direct link to the primary being "rigged". The DNC had nothing to do with my checking the box for HRC, and the nomination never came down to the super delegates that Bernie despises. The popular vote is what garnered HRC the necessary delegates, not the party insiders.
I hope you all get a chance to watch Tim Kaine's speech. He is TERRIFIC! I love 'cool' Obama, but it sure is fun to watch lively, warm, and enthusiastic Kaine.
Patrick rightfully comments on the performer. Oddly enough I was struck by the miracle of the instrument. How would anyone suspect that a wooden box and some strings could create such moving beauty. Miraculous!