;)
The Commentariat -- October 2, 2018
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
FBI to Complete Whitewash Wednesday. Sheryl Stolberg & Michael Shear of the New York Times: "The F.B.I. is expected to complete its investigation into allegations of sexual assault against Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh and deliver the results to the Senate as early as Wednesday, and Republican leaders said Tuesday that they expect to vote on the nomination this week."
Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "President Trump said Tuesday the controversy surrounding Brett Kava[na]ugh's nomination to the Supreme Court shows it is a 'scary' time for young men.... 'You can be accused before you prove your innocence.' Asked if he had a message for young women, Trump said, 'Women are doing great.'"
Greg Sargent: "Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who has emerged as the contorted face of right-wing rage at the very idea that Christine Blasey Ford's claims should merit a serious and thorough examination, has done it again. On Fox News on Monday night, he showcased what is emerging in some quarters as the last-ditch strategy to save Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court nomination -- a strategy that exposes Trumpism at its ugliest. 'This good man should not be destroyed,' Graham told Sean Hannity, speaking about Kavanaugh. Graham warned that if the Senate does no confirm Kavanaugh now -- say, if two GOP senators end up opposing him -- it will 'end up legitimizing' the 'destruction of a good person' by a 'horrible process.'... But what this argument really means, inescapably, is that Ford's claims should never have gotten the examination they are now getting. Note that Graham is claiming this whole process has been deeply unfair to Kavanaugh. The ads on [Kavanaugh']s behalf claim that Democrats are trying to 'ruin' him with 'smears' -- but what they've really done is insist on a fuller inquiry than Republicans wanted." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Mitch McConnell was on the Senate floor this morning advancing the same argument. The underlying premise seems to be that a good, white, conservative man can do no wrong, so whatever his behavior, whether sexual assault or perjury, it is normative for a good, white conservative man. Needless to say, this standard does not apply to people of other persuasions.
Karen Weise of the New York Times: Amazon "on Tuesday said it would raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour for all of its United States workers. It said the pay increase would include part-time workers and those hired through temporary agencies. The company said it would also lobby Washington to raise the federal minimum wage. Amazon said the new wages would apply to more than 250,000 Amazon employees, including those at the grocery chain Whole Foods, as well as the more than 100,000 seasonal employees it will hire for the holiday season. It goes into effect on Nov. 1."
Jenny Rowland of ThinkProgress: "The Republican-controlled Congress allowed the country's most popular parks program, the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) to expire Sunday. The lapse threatens access to public lands and water and leaves many potential projects in limbo.... The Land and Water Conservation Fund provides funding to protect parks, forests, cultural heritage sites, and water resources, at zero expense to taxpayers. The fund, which is paid for through revenues from offshore drilling, was passed in 1964 and has financed projects in all 50 states." --safari
Julian Zelizar of The Atlantic: "Senator Lindsey Graham is among Kavanaugh's most ardent defenders and will likely vote to confirm the judge no matter how many lies he may have told. Back in the 1990s, however ... Graham blasted those who dared to pretend that perjury didn't rise to the level of a 'high crime or misdemeanor,' and strongly suggested that lying under oath merited removal for any high-level government official, not just a president.... To make their case for impeachment [of then pres. Bill Clinton] to the House, Graham and other Republicans on the Judiciary Committee held a nine-hour meeting on December 1, 1998, about the consequences of perjury." --safari
David Dayen in The Intercept (Sept. 28): "Comments submitted to a top banking regulator supporting a 2015 merger between OneWest Bank and CIT Bank were attributed to people who never sent them, according to documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.... The fake comments appear to be tied directly to Joseph Otting, the head of the regulatory agency himself. The documents reviewed by The Intercept show that the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the main bank regulator for nationally chartered banks, knew about the fake comments at the time, before it approved the merger. But the OCC appears to have done no meaningful investigation of the matter, and even cited public support for the merger when approving it." --safari
Nelson Cunningham in Politico Magazine: "... we shouldn't expect [FBI Director Christopher] Wray and [Deputy AG Rod] Rosenstein to stand up and push back against this political interference [in the Kavanaugh "investigation."]... First, background checks are not independent investigations. Here, the FBI is very much an organ of the White House, assisting the Senate (meaning today, the Republican majority) in what is an inherently political mission to examine a presidential nominee.... [Second, to Wray & Rosenstein], Kavanaugh is a longtime colleague, political ally and perhaps even friend. The three men have known each other for decades, working closely on the shared mission of advancing conservative judicial and policy goals."
Sarah Boseley of the Guardian: "One in two women will develop dementia or Parkinson's disease, or have a stroke, in their lifetime, new research suggests. About a third of men aged 45 and half of women of the same age are likely to go on to be diagnosed with one of the conditions, according to a study of more than 12,000 people. The researchers, from the University Medical Center Rotterdam in the Netherlands, said preventive measures could 'substantially' reduce the burden of the illnesses. The indings have been published in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry." --safari
*****
** Peter Baker & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "The White House has authorized the F.B.I. to expand its abbreviated investigation into sexual misconduct allegations against Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh by interviewing anyone it deems necessary as long the review is finished by the end of the week, two people briefed on the matter said on Monday. The new directive came in the past 24 hours after a backlash from Democrats, who criticized the White House for limiting the scope of the bureau's investigation.... The F.B.I. has already completed interviews with the four witnesses its agents were originally asked to talk to, the people said.... 'The F.B.I. should interview anybody that they want within reason, but you have to say within reason,' Mr. Trump told reporters in the Rose Garden after an event celebrating a new trade deal with Canada and Mexico. 'But they should also be guided, and I’m being guided, by what the senators are looking for.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... ** BUT former FBI honcho Frank Figliuzzi, speaking on MSNBC Monday night, says there's every indication the FBI has NOT received new instructions allowing the agency to expand its investigation. So Baker & Schmidt may be drinking the Kool-Aid, not for the first time. ...
... About That Bar Fight. Emily Bazelon & Ben Protess of the New York Times: "As an undergraduate student at Yale, Brett M. Kavanaugh was involved in an altercation at a local bar during \ which he was accused of throwing ice on another patron, according to a police report. The incident, which occurred in September 1985 during Mr. Kavanaugh's junior year, resulted in Mr. Kavanaugh and four other men being questioned by the New Haven Police Department. Mr. Kavanaugh was not arrested, but the police report stated that a 21-year-old man accused Mr. Kavanaugh of throwing ice on him 'for some unknown reason.' A witness to the fight said that Chris Dudley, a Yale basketball player who is friends with Mr. Kavanaugh, then threw a glass that hit the 21-year-old man in the ear, according to the police report.... The report said that the victim, Dom Cozzolino, 'was bleeding from the right ear' and was treated at a hospital. A detective was notified of the incident at 1:20 a.m.... Speaking to the officers, Mr. Kavanaugh did not want 'to say if he threw the ice or not,' the police report said.... The outlines of the incident were first referred to in a statement issued on Sunday by Chad Ludington...." Dudley, a former NBA player, has "disputed reports that [Kavanaugh] drank excessively." ...
... Alan Levin & Ben Brody of Bloomberg: "What the incident illustrates about Kavanaugh 'is just the aggressiveness that came along with the alcohol, the hair-trigger machismo, which was pathetic, [Chad Ludington] said. That bar episode and others were something Ludington didn't find 'very attractive' and he found himself drifting away from Kavanaugh as a friend." ...
... ** See Judge Brett. See Judge Brett Tamper with Witnesses. Heidi Przybyla and Leigh Ann Caldwell of NBC News: "In the days leading up to a public allegation that ... Brett Kavanaugh exposed himself to a college classmate, the judge and his team were communicating behind the scenes with friends to refute the claim, according to text messages obtained by NBC News. Kerry Berchem, who was at Yale with both Kavanaugh and his accuser, Deborah Ramirez, has tried to get those messages to the FBI for its newly reopened investigation into the matter but says she has yet to be contacted by the bureau. The texts between Berchem and Karen Yarasavage, both friends of Kavanaugh, suggest that the nominee was personally talking with former classmates about Ramirez's story in advance of the New Yorker article that made her allegation public. In one message, Yarasavage said Kavanaugh asked her to go on the record in his defense. Two other messages show communication between Kavanaugh's team and former classmates in advance of the story. The texts also demonstrate that Kavanaugh and Ramirez were more socially connected than previously understood and that Ramirez was uncomfortable around Kavanaugh when they saw each other at a wedding 10 years after they graduated. Berchem's efforts also show that some potential witnesses have been unable to get important information to the FBI.... Bob Bauer..., White House counsel for President Barack Obama, said 'It would be surprising, and it would certainly be highly imprudent, if at any point Judge Kavanaugh directly contacted an individual believed to have information about allegations like this....'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: There's a reason Mark Judge spent a couple of weeks hiding out in Delaware & Brett's high-school buddy P.J. Smyth had a convenient lapse of memory. And it probably has more to do with requests from Brett than from their actual feeble brains. Also, too: the FBI, as Republicans tell us ad nauseum, have conducted six background checks on Kavanaugh. If they had found out about this bar fight, you would think Democrats would have asked about it during the hearings. They didn't. So how come New York Times reporters were able to find the police report in a single day, yet the FBI appears to have overlooked it when doing all those background checks? This is a public record in a town where young Kavanaugh lived for some seven years. And the FBI never thought to check to see if his name popped up on the local police blotter? Also too, did agents even bother to ask Choir Boy Kavanaugh if he'd ever had any run-ins with the police? If they did, did he lie about it? Did they even ask him about substance abuse? If so, did he lie about it? I seriously doubt Kavanaugh confined his lying to Senators. ...
... Kevin Drum: "This is from the afternoon session of the Brett Kavanaugh hearings last week: ORRIN HATCH: 'When did you first hear of [Deborah] Ramirez's allegations against you?' KAVANAUGH: 'In the last -- in the period since then, the New Yorker story.'... [As NBC News reports in the story linked above,] 'The texts show Kavanaugh may need to be questioned about how far back he anticipated that Ramirez would air allegations against him. Berchem says in her memo that Kavanaugh 'and/or' his friends 'may have initiated an anticipatory narrative' as early as July to 'conceal or discredit' Ramirez.' [Emphasis Drum.]... If it turns out that Kavanaugh (a) reached out to potential witnesses weeks ago regarding allegations of misconduct and (b) lied to the Senate about when he first heard about these allegations, then he's toast." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: So how did Kavanaugh know in July that Ramirez had a story to tell? According to the NBC story, her friend Kerry Berchem didn't know about it. The implication is that Kavanaugh & his "team" (I'd guess that includes Don McGahn) were trying to quash it months ago. That kind of suggests that Kavanaugh knew about the story because, um, (1) it happened & (2) he remembers it. ...
... Tim Dickinson of Rolling Stone: "... that Fox News interview that Kavanaugh conducted with Martha MacCallum has been entered into evidence as testimony by Kavanaugh -- under 'penalty of felony,' as the judge might put it.... In the Judiciary Committee transcript [of a staff interview of Kavanaugh], the Fox News interview is placed retroactively under oath. A staffer, whose name is redacted, asks Kavanaugh: 'Everything that you said on that interview, do you -- do you affirm that today? Do you adopt that as your testimony today?' Kavanaugh replies, 'Yes.' The SCOTUS nominee also responds in the affirmative when the questioner asks if Kavanaugh understands that entering his answers to Fox News as testimony means that he is 'subject to felony prosecution if you're lying.'"
... Megan Keller of the Hill: "Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) said Sunday that there's 'not a chance' he would have called for an FBI investigation into the allegations of sexual misconduct against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh if he were running for reelection. 'Not a chance,' Flake said when asked on CBS's '60 Minutes' if he would have asked for the investigation if he were up for reelection in the November midterms. 'There's no value to reaching across the aisle,' Flake said. 'There's no currency for that anymore. There's no incentive.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: This is disingenuous. The fake Flake "investigation," unless the FBI ignores the White House's constrictions, does nothing but provide a cover for Senators -- like Flake -- who want to vote for Kavanaugh but find it politically expedient to pretend they've fulfilled their Constitutional responsibility to vet the candidate. What Flake is saying, too, is that a Republican running for re-election would be committing political suicide to fulfill that duty. This is an admission that Republican legislators have no intention of doing their jobs, at least during any period in which they may run for office again. ...
... Harry Litman, in a New York Times op-ed: "... by Sunday the Democrats were dismissing the investigation as a farce -- and rightly so. Thanks to the White House and Senate Republicans, not only is the F.B.I. limited to a weeklong investigation -- a constraint ... James Comey called 'idiotic' in these pages -- but, far more important, the bureau is seriously limited in terms of who it is allowed to interview.... The Times has reported that Senate Republicans identified a list of just four witnesses.... Such constraints are very unusual, if not unprecedented for such an investigation.... The nucleus of agents' work in a background investigation is to pursue leads and widen the circle of witnesses.... The fact that witnesses do not know the universe of others that the bureau will be talking to serves as a kind of truth serum: They are deterred from lying by the prospect that they could be contradicted by another unknown witness." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Brett's Miscalculation. Jonathan Chait: "... the fact that the administration is attempting to strangle the FBI is itself a sign [they're worried about Kavanaugh's confirmation]. And the fact that the FBI is obviously leaking about White House interference shows that at least somebody within the Bureau wants to conduct a legitimate investigation. And what is there to turn up? Potentially a lot. Kavanaugh's testimony was, at best, wildly misleading. You can find detailed accounts of Kavanaugh's train of lies here, here, here, and (most thoroughly) here. Would it matter if this is proven? Senator Jeff Flake said on 60 Minutes it would, and provable testimony perjury would be disqualifying. (Obviously there is some cause to doubt whether Flake would follow through on this promise.)... The issue of Kavanaugh's lying ... is probably the central weakness in his candidacy at the moment. Kavanaugh['s] ... opening statement ... was intended to rally his party with red-meat partisan rhetoric, and lead directly to a rapid vote in a flourish of tribalistic emotion. It was not intended to survive a week of close factual scrutiny by the media or potentially the FBI.... He also calculated that any partial defense would come unraveled, and settled from the outset on a stance of total denial. This is why he has told lie after lie after lie. But now Kavanaugh is caught in those lies." ...
... Demand Justice, in a Medium essay, details 29 lies Kavanaugh told to Senators & other officials. ...
... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said the Senate will hold a vote on Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court nomination this week. 'The time for endless delay and obstruction has come to a close. Judge Kavanaugh's nomination is out of committee. We're considering it here on the floor and ... we'll be voting this week,' McConnell said." Mrs. McC: Speaking of "endless delay, Mitch, time to bring up the Garland nomination. ...
... AND Speaking of Merrick Garland.... Zoe Tillman of BuzzFeed News: Brett Kavanaugh's testimony "was a startling display of partisan rhetoric from a judicial nominee -- and one that raises ethics questions that are likely to follow him whether he is confirmed or not.... Kavanaugh's angry jabs at Democrats and liberal groups could be grounds for recusal requests in either court. Ethics complaints have been filed against Kavanaugh in the DC Circuit, including at least one claiming he lied about the sexual assault allegations against him. Ethics experts say there's no precedent for what happens to those complaints if he's elevated to the Supreme Court. For now, they're under the purview of the DC Circuit chief judge -- former Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland. If Democrats take control of the House of Representatives after the midterm elections in November, they could launch further investigations into the sexual assault allegations against Kavanaugh as well as his Senate testimony and other public statements.... Federal judges and Supreme Court justices have to follow federal law when it comes to recusing. The law says judges and justices should step aside from cases where their 'impartiality might reasonably be questioned,' and if they have a 'personal bias or prejudice.'... Lower court judges are ... subject to a code of conduct..., and they can be investigated via the judiciary's internal conduct review system for alleged violations.... The federal judiciary doesn't have the power to remove judges." ...
... Laurence Tribe in a New York Times op-ed: Brett Kavanaugh "himself has unwittingly provided the most compelling argument against his elevation to that court. His intemperate personal attacks on members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and his partisan tirades against what he derided as a conspiracy of liberal political enemies guilty of a 'calculated and orchestrated political hit' do more than simply display a strikingly injudicious temperament. They disqualify him from participating in a wide range of the cases that may come before the Supreme Court: cases involving individuals or groups that Judge Kavanaugh has now singled out, under oath and in front of the entire nation, as implacable adversaries.... His required recusal would extend to a very broad slice of the Supreme Court's docket during his lifetime tenure as a justice. That would leave the court evenly split in far too many cases, for years on end, if he were to recuse himself as required -- or deeply damaged in the public's trust if he were not." ...
... Pema Levy of Mother Jones: "A former colleague of Rachel Mitchell, the sex crimes prosecutor hired by Senate Republicans to question Christine Blasey Ford, blasted Mitchell for writing a memo casting doubt on Ford's allegations against ... Brett Kavanaugh. Matthew Long, a former sex crimes prosecutor who was trained by Mitchell in the Maricopa County, Arizona, attorney's office, told Mother Jones the memo was 'disingenuous' and inconsistent with Mitchell's own practices as a prosecutor.... On Sunday, Mitchell submitted the memo to the Republicans who had hired her, stating that Ford's case would be too weak to bring charges in a criminal trial. 'A "he said, she said" case is incredibly difficult to prove,' Mitchell wrote. 'But this case is even weaker than that ... I do not think that a reasonable prosecutor would bring this case based on the evidence before the Committee.'... [Long said] '[Mitchell] should only be applying this standard when there's an adequate investigation.' Rather than jump to conclusions, Mitchell should have laid out the steps that needed to be taken in order to gather enough information to make a determination about the case." ...
... Marcy Wheeler of emptywheel: "The Senate Judiciary Republicans' hand-picked sex prosecutor, Rachel Mitchell, has released a report that is generating the desired headlines from credulous journalists. It should take reporters no more work than to compare what Mitchell claims in her memo with what actually happened last Thursday to declare it a sham report. But since journalists are reporting it as an honest submission, I guess I'll have to debunk it." So she does. ...
To be a good judge and a good umpire, it's important to have the proper demeanor. Really important, I think. To walk in the others' shoes, whether it be the other litigants, the litigants in the case, the other judges. To understand them. To keep our emotions in check. To be calm amidst the storm. On the bench, to put it in the vernacular, don't be a jerk.... In your opinions, to demonstrate civility -- I think that's important as well. To show, to help display, that you are trying to make the decision impartially and dispassionately based on the law and not based on your emotions.... There's a danger of arrogance, as for umpires and referees, but also for judges. And I would say that danger grows the more time you're on the bench. As one of my colleagues puts it, you become more like yourself -- and that can be a problem. -- Federal Judge, speech in 2015 ...
Wow, too bad Brett Kavanaugh never considered anything like that. Somebody should have shared that advice with him before he went in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee &, even in prepared remarks, had a big, wacky, whiney, rude, partisan, sobbing, shouting temper tantrum. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "President Trump hailed a revised North American Free Trade Agreement as a victory for the United States, Canada and Mexico on Monday, saying his get-tough approach to trade, including his use of tariffs, was bringing results. 'This landmark agreement will send cash and jobs pouring into the United States and into North America,' Mr. Trump said in remarks at the White House. 'Good for Canada, good for Mexico.' Mr. Trump portrayed the new agreement as the fulfillment of a campaign promise to terminate Nafta, saying he had made good on his plan to rip up 'the worst trade deal ever made' and help American businesses and workers." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... The Farce Be with Us. David Rothkopf of the Daily Beast on "how a narcissist admits he is wrong.... He doesn't believe he makes errors. Errors are made by the Deep State and blamed on him as part of their plots. So, instead what he does is, he attacks the deals, throws the world into chaos by withdrawing from them or threatening to, attacks our trading partners and their leaders, goes big with his initial but grossly wrong-headed beliefs. Then, at the eleventh hour, when his bad policies are about to flush the good economy he inherited from his predecessor down the toilet, he rebrands the bad old deal as a new one with a shiny new name, makes a few relatively modest changes, takes credit for it, and declares victory. That is what happened with the trade deal the U.S. announced with Mexico and Canada today. That is also what happened with the trade deal the U.S. announced with South Korea a few weeks back." Read on. Rothkopf is ever so mean to the narcissist in question. ...
... Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post: "Well, that was unnecessarily painful. After spending a year and a half alienating our friends, punishing our farmers and manufacturers with devastating tariffs and counter-tariffs, and fracturing the hard-won alliance we had built to isolate and pressure China, we finally got a new trade deal -- and a 'new' trade strategy. Yet somehow, they look an awful lot like the old ones.... For the most part, despite Trump's assertion that 'it's not NAFTA redone, it's a brand-new deal,' the president mostly kept NAFTA intact. What's more, some of the more significant changes -- relating to issues such as labor standards, environmental protections and e-commerce -- appear to be cribbed from another trade deal that Trump has demonized: the Trans-Pacific Partnership.... Now Trump seems to have realized his mistake. Despite how he characterizes his 'historic transaction,' the USMCA is mostly just a smooshing together of two trade deals that he derided as the worst trade deals ever made.... In other words, Trump has wrought a lot of destruction in service of landing us in roughly the same position we would have been in had we simply stayed in TPP and pursued more amicable negotiations with Mexico and Canada on other outstanding issues." ...
... Heather Long of the Washington Post has a rundown of what's in the "new NAFTA." BTW, Trump has named the deal "USMCA." Rolls right off the tongue, doesn't it? (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Editing out Misogyny. Daily Beast: "After President Trump was caught on camera telling a reporter she 'never' thinks, the White House moved to retroactively alter the president's attack at a Monday afternoon press conference by changing a word in the official transcript. While the president told ABC News reporter Cecilia Vega, 'I know you're not thinking. You never do,' the White House transcript reads, 'I know you're not thanking. You never do.'" ...
Josh Gerstein of Politico: "Three New Yorkers are suing in federal court to try to halt a test scheduled for Wednesday of a system that allows ... Donald Trump or any future president to send alert messages to the cellphones of all Americans. The activists filed the suit last week in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, arguing that the system violates their free speech rights and constitutes an unconstitutional seizure of their electronic devices.... Wireless phone users have the ability to opt out of most alerts sent under the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System...[;] receipt of the top-level 'presidential alerts' is mandatory."
Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Paul Manafort met Monday with special counsel Robert Mueller's office as part of his cooperation agreement in the special counsel's investigation into Russia interference in the 2016 presidential election. The sit-down at the special counsel's downtown Washington D.C. office stems from Manafort's guilty plea last month, which requires the former Trump campaign chairman to cooperate 'fully, truthfully, completely, and forthrightly ... in any and all matters as to which the government deems the cooperation relevant.'"
Darren Samuelsohn: "A liberal talk show host described as an intermediary between Trump confidant Roger Stone and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange told Senate Russia investigators on Monday that he's planning to plead the Fifth Amendment in response to its subpoena for testimony and documents. Randy Credico, a Bernie Sanders-supporting activist and comedian, told the Senate Intelligence Committee through his lawyer that he'd invoke his constitutional right against possible self-incrimination rather than answer the panel's questions in the ongoing investigation into Russian influence on the 2016 presidential election."
The Secretary is Out. Tanya Snyder, et al., of Politico: "Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao's day-to-day calendars are filled with large swaths of time blocked out as 'private,' according to Politico's analysis of newly released records -- a pattern that several former DOT officials called unusual. In total, Chao clocked more than 290 hours of appointments labeled private -- the equivalent of about seven weeks' vacation -- during her first 14 months in ... Donald Trump's Cabinet, based on a review of documents provided under the Freedom of Information Act. That total does not include any private hours that occurred on nights, weekends, days marked as vacation or federal holidays." Mrs. McC: Luckily for Chao, she has job security as long as her husband Mitch does. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Mean AND Stupid. Conor Finnegan of ABC News: "The Trump administration will no longer provide visas for same-sex domestic partners of foreign diplomats and U.N. officials serving in the U.S., a policy that went into effect Oct. 1. Only if a same-sex couple is married will the spouse be eligible for a visa, but that could prove problematic for some, as the majority of the world's countries do not recognize same-sex marriages. The decision is meant to 'ensure and promote equal treatment,' according to a State Department spokesperson, as heterosexual domestic partners of foreign diplomats are also not eligible for U.S. visas. That rule has been in effect since 2009, but the Trump administration is saying because same-sex marriage is now legal in the U.S., it's no longer necessary or fair.... 'It is an unfortunate change in rules, since same-sex couples, unlike opposite-sex couples, have limited choices when it comes to marriage,' said U.N. Globe, a U.N. LGBTI staff advocacy group, in a statement."
Jesse Eisinger & Paul Kiel of ProPublica: "Starting in 2011, Republicans in Congress repeatedly cut the IRS's budget, forcing the agency to reduce its enforcement staff by a third. But that drop doesn't entirely explain the reduction in tax fraud cases. Over time, crimes only tangentially related to taxes, such as drug trafficking and money laundering, have come to account for most of the agency's cases.... The rate at which the agency audits tax returns has plummeted by 42 percent since the budget cuts started. Criminal referrals were always rare and are becoming rarer still, dropping from 589 referrals in 2012 to 328 in 2016.... The result is huge losses for the government. Business owners don't pay $125 billion in taxes each year that they owe, according to IRS estimates." ...
... OR, as Eric Levitz puts it, "For much of the last decade, the Republican Party has branded itself as a champion of fiscal responsibility and the rule of law -- while doing everything in its power to help rich people steal from the Treasury. Since taking Congress in 2011, the GOP has forced through a series of aggressive cuts to the Internal Revenue Service budget.... Last year, congressional Republicans attempted to divert the IRS's attention away from policing the one percent's tax evasion even further, by requiring the agency to invest more of its limited resources into cracking down on working poor Americans who improperly claim the Earned Income Tax Credit."
Kyle Potter of the AP: "An ex-girlfriend's allegation that Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison once physically abused her could not be substantiated because she refused to provide video she said she had of the incident, an attorney with links to the state's Democratic party who was hired to investigate the claims concluded in a draft report obtained by The Associated Press. The party launched an investigation after Karen Monahan alleged in August that the Democratic congressman dragged her off a bed by her feet while screaming obscenities at her in 2016. Ellison, also a deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, has denied the accusation."
Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha. Aiden McLaughlin of Mediaite: "Kevin Jackson was swiftly fired as a Fox News contributor last week after he unleashed a torrent of tweets that, amongst other nuttery, referred to Brett Kavanaugh's accusers as 'Lying skanks.' The pro-Trump radio host spoke out about his firing on Joe Piscopo's radio show Monday morning and ripped Fox News for apparent hypocrisy.... On Piscopo's show, Jackson eventually turned his ire towards what he cast as hypocrisy at Fox News. 'Ed Henry was hanging out with strippers while he was married,' Jackson said, before falsely claiming Henry ... has a show on the network. Jackson continued: 'Jesse Watters, who just recently divorced his wife, or is in the process, and he's hanging out with some young chick that he did.'... Henry took time off from the network in 2016 after tabloids reported on an alleged affair with a Las Vegas stripper. Fox News host Jesse Watters, meanwhile, is currently divorcing his wife after an affair. Jackson also expanded on his attacks on Kavanaugh's accusers, calling Christine Blasey Ford a 'lying piece of crap.'... In one tweet, he said Ford's 'academic problems came from her PROMISCUITY!' 'Dang girl, stop opening your legs and OPEN A BOOK!' he wrote."
News Ledes
New York Times: "Officials said Tuesday that at least 1,234 people in Indonesia had died [as a result of the recent tsunami], including 120 foreigners. Others, still uncounted, lie in the rubble of ruined buildings or were swept away by the tsunami, which in some places reached a height of more than 20 feet. Nearly 6,400 personnel from an array of government agencies -- including the military, the police, the national search-and-rescue agency and the Energy and Mineral Resources Department -- were involved in efforts to find survivors, recover bodies and evacuate people from the stricken area, officials said."
CNN: "The Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to a woman for the first time in 55 years, and for only the third time in its history. Donna Strickland, a Canadian physicist, was awarded the 2018 prize jointly with Gérard Mourou, from France, for their work on generating high-intensity, ultra-short optical pulses. They share the award with an American, Arthur Ashkin, who at 96 becomes the oldest Nobel Laureate, for developing 'optical tweezers.' Both inventions had 'revolutionized laser physics,' the Royal Swedish Academy said."
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Reader Comments (20)
Shouldn't the agreement be dubbed CAMUS? Existential and all that.
@NiskyGuy: Good idea. But Americans would call it KAY-muss rather than Kuh-MOO & drain all the existential angst from it.
I'm bringing forward this comment Akhilleus made late yesterday as he caught on to my dirty trick right away.
By Akhilleus, Oct. 1:
Demeanor on the Bench
That 2015 (bullshit) speech that Bart O'Kavanaugh gave is proof of how easily so many of these creeps can play the pretend game. Bart, no doubt, was trying to play the Solomon Card, pretending that he understood, and in all cases, the necessity of implementing the sort of judicial temperament required to judge other human beings.
Unfortunately, reality has set in.
It's pretty clear now that, were Bart in Solomon's shoes, adjudicating that famous Biblical case of the women claiming to be the mother of a baby, he'd have gone right ahead and sliced the baby in half, especially if the real mother was poor and not a member of his country club.
And here's the real problem. There are plenty of people out there who know how they're supposed to act. Bart is not a stupid person. He clearly, based on this (bullshit) speech, understands what's expected of a judge. The problem is can he do it in the real world?
I once had a high school coach who preached a certain kind of approach which sounded, to anyone who cared to listen, that he was a determined adherent of a new style of coaching that left behind the cro-magnon punishment and retribution style of the 40's and 50's. That was, until he got pissed. Trying to demonstrate the proper way to our quarterback to take a snap from center, he called for the center (me) to snap him the ball. Unfortunately, he forgot the proper way quarterbacks should place their hands when taking a hard, banging snap from center. I snapped him the ball and almost broke his fingers because he didn't have his hands positioned correctly.
His response? He walked around the line and kicked me flush in the face as hard as he could, with a fair number of expletives to go along with it.
I guess he taught us all lesson. Just probably not the lesson he intended. Or maybe that was the lesson. Make me look bad--even if it's my fault--and I'll kick you in the face.
A Bart O'Kavanaugh if I ever saw one.
Akhilleus
A new survey from the Pew Research Center shows not only how unpopular Trump himself is, but also how the extent of that unpopularity is bleeding into how Europeans view the U.S. This from the Atlantic:
THE WORLD HAS MORE CONFIDENCE IN PUTIN THAN IN TRUMP:
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/10/global-opinion-of-trump/571870/
@AK: What a jerk! the visual of that coach kicking you in the face is pathetic! Looks like the lesson learned here not only applies to B.K. but D.T. as well. Did you ever contemplate reporting this? Did you tell your parents?
Once I was walking close to my son's High School football coach giving a pep talk to the guys and heard him say.."And Gornaki, godammit, if you continue throwing that ball like a girl, I'm gonna skin your hide from here to here." I waited till he was through and had dismissed the guys then walked up to him and very softly said––"Throw like a girl? Really??" and shook my head. On the way home I told my son what I had said and he moaned––listen, I said, any repercussions landing on you, you let me know and of course I knew he would never let me know.
Rules of the game.
KavaNO is a bully, probably always has been. And that is what Dumpster likes about him, probably, along with the assertion that a president can't be prosecuted while in office-- I don't think the False Bureau of Investigation-Lite will make any difference in his confirmation.
I can't bear watching the clips of those rallies (supposedly about other crap candidates--)and they are reaching levels of hostility that even Clownstick didn't reach during the campaign. Apparently one political party shouldn't even exist, and its members should be jailed/killed. He sounds like all the other fascists around the world. I do worry about the stoking he does at these so-called GOTV rallies-- the people going to them are deranged already-- they don't need stoking. And so thrilled that we are paying for them...
Kavanaugh, last day drunk? Oct. 1 1988 or Oct. 1 2018.
Trump: 'I know you’re not thinking.', I'm an expert on the subject.
Last night I watched the excellent documentary "Dark Money"–about the effects of corporate money and influences in the American polItical system. This film uses the filmmaker's home state of Montana as a primary case study. And who should pop up here but Don McGhan when he was a member of the Federal Election Commission. I would not have recognized him but for his name plate; looked like a member of a sixties rock band–-a pretty boy for all that. Looked him up on Wiki:
"George W. Bush nominated McGahn as a Republican-selected member of the Federal Election Commission in 2008. He was confirmed on June 24, 2008 by the United States Senate and was sworn in shortly thereafter. He is credited as having played a crucial role in loosening regulations on campaign spending. As presented with documentary footage in the 2018 film Dark Money, McGahn's brief period as incoming chair of the Commission ushered in a newly partisan rigor to the FEC whereby he and his two fellow Republican members, also new, formed an unprecedented lockstep voting block preventing any and all enforcement of FEC regulations."
So given this it would follow that he was all for Citizen's United which is one of the worst decisions made by the S.C. and given that he is Kavanaugh's right hand man here, it would follow young Brett tends to lean in the same direction.
Will see if I can find the POV video.
Here's snippets of the documentary. If you are interested but don't have the time to watch them all click on the one that says "Dark money and elections" which sets the film in motion. Jon Tester makes an appearance here.
http://www.pbs.org/pov/darkmoney/
@ Jeanne
Yeah it's pretty incredible how our president* talks about the "Democrat" party like we're all a bunch of extremist who are solely interested in "burning down" the entire country. Presidential* speech right there. He paints the regular Joe not supporting him as a malatov throwing hooligan bent on destruction, throwing red meat to his own clueless diaper dandies. He doesn't even give a thought to bringing us together: divide and destroy and give rich quick. Our Dear Leader*.
And anyone else catch Steve Mnuchin give a great hearty chuckle with that malformed mouth of his when Drumpf insults the female reporter for "never thinking"? Both barbarians, cut from the same frayed cloth, stained by their rich man bubbles of privilege and disdain.
Jeanne and Safari,
Trump's adoption of the "Democrat Party" slur is something he picked up during his Russian assisted run for the White House. I don't believe he used it before that, but once he caught on to the way Confederates gleefully use it as an insult, he pig-piled right on.
It's an insult, it's meant as an insult, and anyone using it is either A) ignorant (because there is no such thing as the "Democrat Party", B) insulting, or C) both.
The Decider used this slur almost exclusively when yapping about the opposition as does every single Fox asshole I've heard (Chris Wallace may not use it, but it's a prime for of insult for the rest of them).
McConnell uses it as does Lyin' Ryan.
And, of course, president* doucheclamp.
Ak: yep-- the "Democrat party" slur really got my goat long ago, which is why I seldom, if ever, use the word "Republican." That doesn't count all the other slurs they use on the right-- really, there is zero respect anywhere, so I feel perfectly free to use r, repugnican, repugnant, repub, pubbies, or just plain crapweasel or pigblossom.
PD,
No, I didn't tell anyone. My parents had a lot more to worry about back then, and besides, it was a different time. Coaches got away with stuff that today would result not only in being fired, but prosecution on top of it. The next coach we had was even more of a thug. He was a teacher as well. During a practice routine called "Bull in the Ring", he punched my brother. Hitting a student was verboten, even way back then, but before he could do it again, my brother hit him back (this got a big response from the rest of the guys who were astounded to see anyone touch a coach). This made Coach Macho furious. He knocked my brother down and started punching him on the ground. I jumped on him, pulled him off (no one punches my brother), and head butted him--hard--in the nose, with my helmet.
The other coaches ran over and broke it up. I was 100% sure we would both be kicked off the team and maybe expelled, but nothing happened. I'm pretty sure that the other coaches explained that hitting a student was bad and that he would almost certainly lose his job. Plus, there were fifteen kids who witnessed his attack first hand, and because everyone hated his guts, they'd all be happy to line up at the principal's office and tell what they had seen.
It never occurred to us to take this to anyone else, that's not how it was done back then.
But it speaks to the issue of temperament. If you are unable to control yourself to the point where you start attacking kids, there's something very wrong with you and not only should you not be coaching, you shouldn't be around kids, period.
Just as we've seen with "Judge" Bart. If you are so tightly wound that you can't deal with a difficult setback in a responsible, professional, and adult manner, so that you start yelling and weeping and calling names and coming completely unraveled on national television, and insulting senators, do you really have the temperament to sit in judgment on others?
Absolutely not.
One could say the same thing about president* whackjob, who routinely shows his ass in very public ways.
I agree the whole Kavanaugh confirmation process has been unfair. The fact that Rs have allowed his fibs and lies to go unchallenged is unfair to the country. Wink wink nudge nudge getting along has no place in a Supreme Court nomination.
The Uncanny White House
Do you get creeped out whenever you see that smirking orange puss on president* pussy grabber?
Don't bother, I know the answer.
So does Freud.
For some obscure reason not worth going into, I've been reading Freud's essay on "Das Unheimlich", which is typically translated as the English word "uncanny". Freud mentions right up front that he doesn't often indulge in analysis of aesthetic issues (which is funny considering how influential his work has been in the arts), but in this case he's willing to make an exception because of the unusual phenomena at hand. What he's concerned with is how we often find ourselves disturbed by " ...the impression made by waxwork figures, ingeniously constructed dolls and automata." (Freud also includes bodies and images of the dead, this essay having been written in 1919, the end of a world war and in the middle of a world wide flu epidemic, there were plenty of those going around.)
I usually refer to this as the "scary doll effect".
You know what I mean, right? Whoa!
And just as computer simulations of humans started becoming a thing (back in the 70's), the term "uncanny" has since been applied to viewers' responses to human, but not quite human, faces and bodies. The descriptions of those responses run the gamut from weird, to eerie and creepy, all the way to alarming and revolting.
If you want an example, here's one. If you've ever watched that computer animated version of the children's book "The Polar Express", you'll know what I mean. The faces are just too weird. Close, but no cigar.
In fact, a psychological scale has been developed that traces the response levels as images move along the spectrum before plunging into what is referred to as the Uncanny Valley. As long as the digital characters look human enough, but not too human (cartoonish, perhaps), everything is perfectly fine. No barf bags or fight or flight responses. But as the images get more and more human, but never quite make that last leap, the result is entirely unsettling. Freud defines uncanny as things that are familiar but strange at the same time. Of course he uses this reaction as the jumping off point for his usual raft of favored psychoanalytical riffs, especially castration complex and repressed memories from infancy, two of his greatest hits.
So where is all this talk of infantile doings and castration and creepiness going?
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, natch. Where we have a thing that presents itself as a president, it lives in the White House, it works in the Oval Office, it wears a tie (too long) and a suit (too baggy) and it flies in Air Force One (not fancy enough) and makes speeches (such as they are). And as long President* Uncanny stays cartoonish, the reactions are what you might expect. It's when he really does try to be prezidenshul, that things drop off into the uncanny valley. When he tries to appear moderate and acts like someone who isn't a raving idiot, he becomes increasingly disturbing, because he appears to be getting closer, but can never quite make the leap, to Actual, Real President Mode.
But in general, the creepiness of Trump is a function of a pretender (to borrow Ken's term) trying to give the impression that he is a human being. He isn't. He'll always be creepy and disturbing.
Except, of course, to the Trump minions, who can look at this weird, alarming representation of a real person and see nothing wrong.
What might Freud say about them?
Castration complex? Hysteria? Compulsion neurosis? Masochism? Maybe it's just good old polymorphous perversity.
Yeah, that's probably it. Uncanny and perverse. The presidency in the Age of Trump.
And now, a word from Alex H.
The stats are in. Federalist 78 is the most referenced of those papers. And there's a good reason. 78, one of six written by Alexander Hamilton, addresses the problem of judicial review and judicial independence. And in an age where the Republican controlled congress has pretty much abdicated its constitutional responsibilities, the court plays a greatly enlarged role in the United States. And with the rise of a hack like Kavanaugh, the delicate balance between the branches has never been more tenuous.
An oft-quoted line from 78 reminds Americans of the difference between the branches. The executive branch, says Hamilton, has the sword, the legislative, the purse.
"The judiciary, on the contrary, has no influence over either the sword or the purse; no direction either of the strength or of the wealth of the society; and can take no active resolution whatever. It may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment..."
"Merely judgment". In other words, the efficacy of the judiciary, especially the Supreme Court, lies in the faith of those being judged, the citizens of the United States, in the ability of the courts to proceed fairly and justly. Lacking that belief in the fairness of the courts, we have a sham, a hollow branch of government that provides neither checks nor balances, but acts in a nakedly partisan manner to further the aims of their party. (This is why McConnell and company have been confirming every unqualified hack and Nazi judge sent their way-by the authoritarian-in-chief.)
And I'm not talking about Democrats. Wingers love to describe Sotomayor, Kagan, Breyer, and RBG as nothing more than liberal rubber stamps, but that has never been (and never will be) the case. The other side is a different story. And now, with the ascendancy of Gorsuch and the imminent canonization of a liar, a mean drunk, a would-be rapist, and a lifetime party hack, the standing of the court is diminished further. The event horizon for a Confederate controlled kangaroo court has moved infinitely closer.
Why can I make that assertion? That the court, with Kavanaugh on it, a hyper-partisan hack, will pervert the role of the court?
Here's what Hamilton says about that:
"...though individual oppression may now and then proceed from the courts of justice, the general liberty of the people can never be endangered from that quarter; I mean so long as the judiciary remains truly distinct from both the legislature and the Executive. For I agree, that "there is no liberty, if the power of judging be not separated from the legislative and executive powers."
The Roberts Court has demonstrated a strong penchant for ruling based on the needs of party over country. A Republican president and congress, trusting that the Court will rule in their favor ensures that, as Hamilton puts it, "there [will be] no liberty", if such a deleterious situation obtains.
Just as Trump and the R's wish it.
And they're getting ready to punish Democrats for daring to insist on a fair and just court.
More zero-sum bullshit.
I'm sure you guys have noticed that wingers feel that the best card they can play when faced with things they hate, like universal health insurance, workers' rights, and environmental protection, such as the recently eviscerated rules against allowing corporations to spew mercury into the biosphere and Trump's decimation of the Clean Air and Water acts, is the "IT WILL HURT THE ECONOMY" card.
Now a question. Why is that the only consideration that needs to be addressed? Because according to Trump and his little minions, you can either have healthy people and terrible economy, or a great economy and sick people can go fuck themselves. Individualism, and all that.
Why is there no room for a great economy AND healthy Americans? There have been plenty of studies, and common sense makes a similar case, that healthier Americans means a better, more capable work force.
No one's arguing that a good economy is important. But why can't we have that plus healthy, educated Americans as well?
But, no. That argument never gets traction. Anytime they're faced with something they don't like:
IT WILL HURT THE ECONOMY.
After that, they believe they shouldn't have to answer any other questions.
Maybe it's because they have no other answers.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund, America's most important conservation program, expired on September 30 due to Congressional inaction. Since then, our public lands have already lost over $4 million in funding.
But just this morning, a bill that would permanently reauthorize and guarantee full funding for LWCF passed out of committee in the Senate by a wide bipartisan margin of 16 to 7. Now is the time to call your Senators and urge them to move this bill over the finish line.
NYT headline: Trump Engaged in Suspect Tax Schemes
as He Reaped Riches From His Father.
Jail time?
Akhilleus' reflections on the Uncanny Valley and DiJiT caused me to think of pareidolia, the human mind's compulsion to interpret visual inputs as meaningful patterns, and particularly to perceive the existence of a face given the slightest hint of a pattern of facial feature.
You expect to see a President in that space normally occupied by one; DiJiT occupies that space now, and so your mind tries to assemble the pieces into something presidential. Uncanniness ensues. Pareidolia.