The Ledes

Thursday, September 19, 2024

New York Times: “A body believed to be of the suspect in a Kentucky highway shooting that left five people seriously injured this month was found on Wednesday, the authorities said, ending a manhunt that stretched into a second week and set the local community on edge. The Kentucky State Police commissioner, Phillip Burnett Jr., said in a Wednesday night news conference that at approximately 3:30 p.m., two troopers and two civilians found an unidentified body in the brush behind the highway exit where the shooting occurred.... The police have identified the suspect of the shooting as Joseph A. Couch, 32. They said that on Sept. 7, Mr. Couch perched on a cliff overlooking Interstate 75 about eight miles north of London, Ky., and opened fire. One of the wounded was shot in the face, and another was shot in the chest. A dozen vehicles were riddled with gunfire.”

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

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

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

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

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

Click on photo to enlarge.

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

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

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

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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The Commentariat -- September 19

Bill Clinton praises the tea party constituency, then explains why they should vote Democratic. The guy is a fucking genius: 

Glenn Greenwald on Jon Stewart's false equivalencies:

Stewart's examples of right-wing rhetorical excesses (Obama is a socialist who wasn't born in the U.S. and hates America) are pervasive in the GOP, while his examples of left-wing excesses (Code Pink and 9/11 Truthers) have no currency (for better or worse) in the Democratic Party.  The claim that Bush is 'a war criminal' has ample basis, and it's deeply irresponsible to try to declare this discussion off-limits, or lump it in with a whole slew of baseless right-wing accusatory rhetoric, in order to establish one's centrist bona fides. 

Digby on rich people whining because the President wants to "punish" them by making them pay taxes....

     ... Krugman comments.

Christine O’Donnell is the best kind of fringe candidate — the kind with a history of random, long-ago television appearances. -- Joshua Green, The Atlantic

Frankly, if we get the majority again, even if it's just in the House, and we don't do what we say, I think the Republican Party is dead.... And the urgency for me here is the Democrat Party -- and I know this sounds partisan but -- are completely dysfunctional. They're the left of Europe. -- Sen. Jim DeMint

     ... Here's the full transcript of DeMint's appearance on CNN's "State of the Union." Of course Candy Crowley didn't have the sense to ask DeMint about how tax cuts for the rich fit into his deficit reduction meme. ...

... Jon Walker of Firedoglake: where have all the deficit hawks gone now that they're pushing tax breaks for the rich?

... in Washington talk about 'reducing the deficit' is almost always nothing more than code for screwing over regular Americans and almost always completely divorced from any actual concern about the size of the federal debt. -- Jon Walker

Yahoo News: President Clinton has some campaign advice for President Obama:

 

Sandhya Somashekhar & Perry Bacon Jr. of the Washington Post on Christine O'Donnell: "While her come-from-nowhere victory undoubtedly catapulted the 'tea party' movement forward, it has also brought a new and intense level of scrutiny that has the potential to damage it. Even as many activists within the movement praised her victory as a strike for the everywoman against elite politicians, strange stories about O'Donnell emerge daily. Some of her financial troubles could counter the tea party's message of fiscal and personal responsibility. And her wide-ranging comments on sex could marginalize a movement that has tried hard in recent months to portray itself as a cross-section of America." ...

Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker & Robert Reich discuss tea party populism & what President Obama should do about it (volume control is on the right):

 

... Janie Lorber & Eric Lipton of the New York Times profile Sal Russo, the long-time Repubican operative who runs the Tea Party Express, who has raised more than $5.2 million since January 2009, a goodly portion of which he has kept for himself and his wife's political "consulting" firm. Thanks to reader Bob M. for the link. ...

... Dana Milbank on the Republican/Tea party: "The "civil war" [Mark] McKinnon and others describe implies that party leaders are fighting back. Instead, they're stepping out in front of the Tea Party parade and pretending to be drum majors. Who in the supposed Republican establishment has opposed the Tea Party? Not Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele....  Not House Republican leader John Boehner....  Not Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell.... Not National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn. Not even Karl Rove." ...

... Here's a link to the Time cover story Milbank mentions & to which I linked last weel. AND here's a link to the USA Today story that cites Mark McKinnon. ...

... ** Jacob Weisberg of Newsweek analyzes the tea party phenomenon: "... the Tea Party is old and looks backward to a capitalist-constitutionalist paradise that, needless to say, never existed.... Other than nostalgia, the strongest emotion at Tea Parties is resentment, defined as placing blame for one’s woes on those either above or below you in the social hierarchy.... The most radical statement of individualism is choosing your own reality, and to some in the Tea Party, the very fact that experts believe something is sufficient to disprove it."

Peter Orszag in the New York Times on why "... slowing the growth of health costs may be among the best things we can do to help the next generation attend a high-quality public college." ...

... Glenn Hubbard & Chris Mayer of the Columbia School of Business suggest a home refinancing program that would reduce mortgage payments & add no tax burden. Hubbard is a former chair of George W. Bush's Council of Ecnomic Advisers.

Joe Conason of Salon: at the Values Voters convention, speaker after speaker claimed not to be an Islamophobe, then made a speech stoking fears of Islam. ...

... Nicholas Kristof apologizes "to Muslims for the wave of bigotry and simple nuttiness that has lately been directed at" them.

"The Most Secretive Election Cycle since the Watergate Years." New York Times Editorial Board: "... this [is] .... The battle for Congress is largely being financed by a small corps of wealthy individuals and corporations whose names may never be known to the public. And the full brunt of that spending — most of it going to Republican candidates — has yet to be felt in this campaign."

Rick Hertzberg blogs on the Carter-Kennedy feud, this time over competing healthcare proposals. Here's Hertzberg on Chris Matthews' "Hardball":

Gardiner Harris of the New York Times: "... the Senate has still not acted to fix many of the flaws in the nation’s food safety system — although a bill to do so has broad bipartisan support, is a priority for the Obama administration and has the backing of both industry and consumer groups. The House passed its version of the bill more than a year ago.... The blame lies with a tight Senate calendar, a stubborn senator [Tom Coburn] from Oklahoma and an unusual coalition of left- and right-wing advocates for small farmers who have mounted a surprisingly effective Internet campaign. Their e-mail messages have warned, among other untruths, that the bill would outlaw organic farming."

Manfred Gans in 1945. Photo via the New York Times.New York Times: Manfred Gans of Fort Lee, New Jersey has died. His obituary reports his remarkable World War II experience.

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