The Commentariat -- Sept. 7, 2015

Internal links removed.

"City Building." Thomas Hart Benton. One of a ten-panel series at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.... Randy Kennedy takes a tour of art works in New York City that depict laborers & the fruits of their labor. Includes slide show.

Peter Baker of the New York Times: "President Obama plans to sign an executive order on Monday requiring federal contractors to provide up to seven days of paid sick leave a year, his latest use of executive power to change the rules of the American workplace, the White House said. The president will announce the order during a Labor Day trip to Boston, where, aides said, he will also renew his call on Congress to pass legislation expanding paid sick and family leave in the private sector. He chose Boston as the venue because Massachusetts voters approved a new paid sick-leave law last year. It took effect in July. The executive order will have no real effect until after Mr. Obama's presidency; because it must first go through a public comment period, it will apply only to new federal contracts starting in 2017." ...

... CW: You have to wonder why President Obama didn't do this years ago. If Republicans wanted to call out his "imperial presidency," or his "jobs killer" agenda. they'd have a hard time doing so by complaining "he made contractors pay workers for seven sick days a year." The appropriate response: "Yeah. I did." ...

... President Obama's speech in Boston:

Raymond Hogler, in a Hill op-ed: "Despite the falsity of its claims and the damage it does to workers, right-to-work marches on with the aid of well-financed campaigns. Politicians like Gov. Scott Walker (R-Wis.) bow and scrape at the altar of corporate wealth, and any legislation attempting to curb the power of capital faces long odds. The best chance of repeal combines a joint federal-state strategy with meaningful consequences for politicians who refuse to support a repeal bill. ...

Fifty years ago, the right-to-work movement in this country underwent a near-death experience. Organized labor and a powerful Democratic coalition during the Johnson administration joined in support of a bill to repeal Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, a statutory provision which allows states to prohibit compulsory financial support to labor unions. President George Meany of the AFL-CIO viewed Section 14(b) as the major threat to the labor movement, and he made repeal his top legislative priority in 1964. President Johnson pledged in his 1965 State of the Union address to eliminate Section 14(b). Labor achieved a significant victory when the House passed H.R. 77, its version of repeal, by a 221 -- 203 vote on July 28, 1965. The legislative effort came to an unsuccessful end in October when Sen. Everett Dirksen (R-Ill.) led a filibuster against the bill, and Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield (D-Mont.) had to withdraw the proposal.

... E. J. Dionne: "Many conservatives and most libertarians argue that every new law or regulation means that government is adding to the sum total of oppression and reducing the freedom of individuals.... As long as there are markets, government will have to establish rules determining how they operate. These necessarily affect the interests of market participants. Many of the choices are not between more or less government. They are about whether what government does provides greater benefit to workers or employers, management or unions, individual investors or investment firms."

Charles Pierce (Sept. 4): "... the more I read Judge Richard Berman's haymaker of a decision vacating Tom Brady's Goodell-imposed and Goodell-reiterated punishment, the more I see it as ... a damned appropriate greeting card with which to begin Labor Day weekend. This is a win for all workers no matter the color of their collars. (I do admit to some amusement when I hear the more conservative members of the media, especially the ones on the radio, and the more conservative members of a football fan base, which is practically everybody, suddenly discover their inner liberal on this issue.... I consider this a minor day of jubilee.)"

Jared Bernstein in the Atlantic: Surprise! The welfare-to-work program doesn't work if there is no work available: "I cannot overemphasize the importance of this fundamental flaw in poverty policy, i.e., the assumption that there is an ample supply of perfectly good jobs out there that poor people could tap if they just wanted to do so. To this day, this misguided notion underlies the conservative policy agenda that views anti-poverty policy as a narcotic that weans people away from the jobs awaiting them. Kill the programs, and they'll get out of their hammocks (Rep. Paul Ryan's term for the safety net) and get to work."

Micahel Eisenscher in Foreign Policy in Focus on why labor should support the Iran nuclear agreement: "For most of its first 50 years of existence, the country's largest labor federation -- the AFL-CIO -- never once challenged the deployment of U.S. troops into foreign conflicts. But it turns out that workers have as much of a stake in those decisions as anyone.... With increasing clarity, unions have come to recognize that a country that commits over half its discretionary budget to war spending can't afford to address the increasingly pressing needs of its people.... If [war hawks] succeed [in scuttling the Iran deal], they'll put our country and the world on a fast track to yet another disastrous military conflict, the costs of which are too horrific to contemplate." Via Daily Kos. ...

... CW: While it's true that war destroys lives & things & wastes billions & billions of dollars, it also is a jobs creator. Ask any Republican. Somebody has to build those bombs; somebody has to fight those wars. You might think Hitler, Mussolini & Tojo would be GOP heroes -- they created a U.S. jobs program that ended the Great American Depression; Roosevelt couldn't do it without their help.

Peter Baker: "Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, announced on Sunday that she will support the nuclear agreement with Iran that has roiled many in her Florida district. 'I'll be casting my vote to support the deal and if necessary sustain the president's veto,' she told Jake Tapper on 'State of the Union' on CNN. While she called it a 'gut-wrenching' decision-making process that caused her 'angst and pause,' she concluded that the agreement would 'put Iran years away from being a threshold nuclear state.'" CW: Also, I guess she really wanted to keep her DNC chair, not likely to happen if she had ditched the president on this. ...

... Here's Wasserman Schultz's op-ed in the Miami Herald. ...

... Alexandra Jaffe of NBC News: "Former Secretary of State Colin Powell expressed support for the nuclear agreement with Iran on Sunday, calling the various planks Iranian leaders accepted 'remarkable' and dismissing critics' concerns over its implementation. 'It's a pretty good deal,' he said on NBC's 'Meet the Press.'" ...

... Scott Wong of the Hill: "Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said Sunday he used two computers [link fixed] while leading the department, one for transmitting sensitive material and another for emailing 'housekeeping stuff.' 'I had a secure State Department machine for secure material and I had a laptop that I could use for email. I would email relatives, friends, but I would also email in the department," Powell explained on NBC's 'Meet the Press.'" ...

... David Edwards of the Raw Story: "Fox News host Chris Wallace forced former Vice President Dick Cheney to admit that Iran's centrifuges went from zero to 5,000 under his watch, not President Barack Obama's. During an interview on Fox News, Cheney refused to back down from his assertion that Obama's nuclear deal with Iran was like Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler":

... Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Saturday suggested Democrats wouldn't to try to block a final vote on the Iran nuclear deal -- but only if Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) agrees to a higher threshold for passage.... While Reid's offer would let Republicans bypass procedural votes on the Iran resolution, it would still require that they get 60 supporters -- the same number they would need to overcome a potential Democratic filibuster." Some Democratic senators may not support a filibuster if if they favor the Iran deal.

Shalia Dewan of the New York Times on the "collateral consequences" of our criminal justice system. The Justice Department gives light penalties when big banks commit crimes, but the justice system seldom gives "consideration to collateral consequences when prosecuting individuals," even when an individual is arrested on a minor charge &/or never convicted.

Steven Myers & Clifford Krauss of the New York Times: "The dream of an Arctic Klondike, made possible by the rapid warming of once-icebound waters, has been at the core of Russia's national ambitions and those of the world's biggest energy companies for more than a decade. But even as Royal Dutch Shell began drilling an exploratory well this summer off the north coast of Alaska, Russia's experiences here have become a cautionary tale, one that illustrates the challenges facing those imagining that a changing Arctic will produce oil and gas riches.... After years of planning and delays, Shell's drilling project in the stormy waters of the Chukchi Sea is now being watched by the industry, officials, residents and critics as a make-or-break test of the viability of production in the Arctic." ...

... War on the World. CW: AND the hopes & dreams of oil company executives provide just one example of why Republicans pretend climate change does not exist. The GOP is actually in favor of climate change. They would destroy the Earth for a few campaign donations from Big Oil.

Joshua Albert of the Daily Beast: "Fans of the Confederate flag marched on Washington, D.C., to defend their standard and claim victimhood.... According to the event page that was set up for the demonstration, 1,400 people were planning to attend. As it turned out, roughly 75 people made it.... 200 counter-protesters ... showed up with speakers, tubas, colorful signs, and infinitely more energy. D.C. law enforcement officials set up a barrier of about 100 yards using themselves as a fence between the 'we're not racist' Confederate flag demonstration and the counter-protesters."

"The Pope vs. the Donald." Nahal Toosi of Politico: "The anti-Donald Trump is coming to town. And he speaks Spanish, too. When Pope Francis addresses Congress later this month, U.S. Catholic leaders expect the popular, groundbreaking pontiff to call on Americans to set aside their political divisions and unite to tackle challenges such as climate change, economic inequality and immigration reform."

Dahlia Lithwick of Slate: "In a remarkable conversation, [Justice Sonia Sotomayor] talks about why she doesn't feel like she belongs on the Supreme Court."

Presidential Race

Mark Murray of NBC News: "Bernie Sanders has jumped out to a nine-point lead over front-runner Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire, and he's gained ground on her among Iowa voters in the Democratic presidential race, according to a pair of brand-new NBC News/Marist polls.... Without [Vice President] Biden in the race, Sanders' lead over Clinton in the current survey increases to 11 points, 49 percent to 38 percent. In Iowa, Clinton maintains her previous advantage over Sanders -- but her lead has declined from 24 points in July (49 percent to 25 percent) to 11 points (38 percent to 27 percent); Biden sits at 20 percent." CW: Do bear in mind that in 2008 Barack Obama was leading Clinton in New Hampshire days before the primary, but Clinton won.

In Iowa, Unions Still Matter. Grant Rodgers of the Des Moines Register: "Clinton, Sanders and former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley all courted union members at events surrounding the Labor Day holiday. Sanders on Friday stood alongside union members on a picket line outside Penford Products, a Cedar Rapids corn processing plant whose union workers are renegotiating a contract with management. O'Malley and Clinton are both scheduled Monday to be at union picnics in eastern Iowa. The three Democratic rivals also spoke at town hall events in Altoona and Newton organized by AFSCME, Iowa's largest public employees union." ...

... BTW, the number of GOP candidates in Iowa over the Labor Day weekend: zero.

Anne Gearan of the Washington Post: "... Hillary Rodham Clinton ridiculed Donald Trump's plan to deport all undocumented immigrants and then allow provisional returns as unrealistic 'political rhetoric' as she sought votes Sunday amid falling poll numbers [in Iowa]." ...

... David Atkins in the Washington Monthly: As Secretary of State, "Hillary Clinton was instrumental in reducing [Hungarian PM Viktor] Orban's influence in Europe and his efforts to thwart liberal democracy at home." (See also Guardian editorial on Orban, linked below.)

** Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone: "The decision by huge masses of Republican voters to defy D.C.-thinkfluencer types like George Will and throw in with a carnival act like Trump is no small thing. For the first time in a generation, Republican voters are taking their destiny into their own hands. In the elaborate con that is American electoral politics, the Republican voter has long been the easiest mark in the game, the biggest dope in the room."

Scammer-in-Chief. Greg Smith of the New York Daily News: "... hundreds of ... 'students' ... [attended] now-defunct Trump University; an entity the New York attorney general says was a grand scam that put $5 million in Trump's pocket.... According to lawsuits filed in New York and California, 'students' got repeat come-ons to run up credit card debt to buy increasingly expensive mentorships topping out at nearly $35,000 per person.... In a lawsuit pending in Manhattan Supreme Court, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman says 600 ex-Trump U. students in the state were defrauded. Trump Organization counsel Alan Garten defended the school as 'a substantive, real program' that 'offered people valuable training, valuable courses and valuable mentorships.'... So far, Judge Cynthia Kerr has found Trump violated state education laws by calling his entity a 'university' when it wasn't licensed as one. She will decide on possible restitution after a yet-to-be scheduled hearing. Meantime, two more class-action lawsuits are pending in California."

Friend of Fraudsters. Steve Eder of the New York Times highlights one of Jeb!'s shady acquaintances, who while Jeb! was governor, defrauded the state of Florida of $1.2 million for a never-started "tribute" museum to Dorothy Walker Bush, Jeb!'s grandmother. Jeb! swore to investigators that he barely knew the fraudster Tony Campos. "But emails and letters between Mr. Bush and Mr. Campos suggest something more than a limited acquaintance, especially after Mr. Campos began corresponding with the family about his plans to honor Mrs. Bush." ...

... CW: This story strikes me as yet another of a series of tales of Jeb!'s SOP, where he pals around with crooks but manages to keep enough distance to establish plausible deniability of wrongdoing. The story won't stick, especially when you compare Jeb!'s culpability to Trump's. But when you see what kind of ethics the two top GOP presidential candidates have, all the sturm und drang over Hillary's private e-mail server seems damned silly. Hillary's e-mail saga repeatedly makes the front page of major news media like the New York Times. (As far as I can tell the only instance in which the Times carried the Trump "University" story this year was a Reuters-written item that appeared in the online business section of the paper.) ...

... Paul Krugman: "... the issues the Bush campaign is using to attack its unexpected nemesis are precisely the issues on which Mr. Trump happens to be right, and the Republican establishment has been proved utterly wrong.... Mr. Trump ... is exactly the ignorant blowhard he seems to be.... Some of [his rivals] may come across as reasonable and thoughtful, but in reality they are anything but. Mr. Bush, in particular, may pose as a reasonable, thoughtful type ... but his actual economic platform, which relies on the magic of tax cuts to deliver a doubling of America's growth rate, is pure supply-side voodoo.... All indications are that Mr. Bush's attacks on Mr. Trump are falling flat, because the Republican base doesn't actually share the Republican establishment's economic delusions.... Mr. Trump, who is self-financing, didn't need to genuflect to the big money, and it turns out that the base doesn't mind his heresies. This is a real revelation, which may have a lasting impact on our politics."

Amy Davidson of the New Yorker: "It doesn't seem to matter that [Ben Carson] is a man of science who does not believe in evolution and has called climate change 'irrelevant': he is an ideologue with the trappings of a technocrat. Insofar as Carson has a political platform, it involves a low flat tax, modelled on the Biblical tithe; an end to Obamacare and to welfare for able-bodied adults; and the removal of restraints on our military in the Middle East.... His success in the polls may be best understood as desperation on the part of voters who have rejected political experience as a test of competence."

Mark Hensch of the Hill: "Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) said on Sunday that state marriage clerks should issue same-sex marriage licenses even if they morally oppose the practice. Kasich added that government employees are responsible for obeying the law upon assuming their positions."

Hayley Walker of ABC News: "After exceeding his $1 million crowd-funding goal, Harvard Law School professor Larry Lessig announced today on 'This Week' that he is running for president. 'I think I'm running to get people to acknowledge the elephant in the room,' he told ABC's George Stephanopoulos. 'We have to recognize -- we have a government that does not work. The stalemate, partisan platform of American politics in Washington right now doesn't work.'"

Beyond the Beltway

Michael Muskal of the Los Angeles Times: "Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who spent her fourth day behind bars Sunday, has filed an appeal notice of the judge's decision that put her in a Kentucky jail for failing to follow his order to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples."

Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post: The state of "Washington's charter school law, which narrowly passed in a 2012 referendum with financial support from Microsoft founder Bill Gates and other wealthy philanthropists, has been struck down as unconstitutional by the state's Supreme Court.... The Washington state high court ruled Friday that the law violates the state constitution, which says that public school funds can be used only to support 'common schools.'" Thanks also to Ken W. for mentioning this on Saturday.

Brian Bakst of the AP: Walter Palmer, mild-mannered dentist & large-animal slayer, is going back to work after spending the last several weeks at "undisclosed locations." He granted his one-and-only interview to the Minneapolis Star Tribune & the AP, but refused to answer "several lines of inquiry" regarding the hunt in which he killed Cecil the Lion after his team lured Cecil from the Hwange National Park preserve in Zimbabwe.

Way Beyond

Guardian Editors: "Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán..., has been denting his country's standing for some time now. He has trampled on democratic principles, concentrated power in the hands of his rightwing Fidesz party, threatened the independence of the judiciary and bullied the media. He has been consistently provocative towards EU institutions, and made shows of solidarity with Vladimir Putin that have undermined EU efforts to make a strong stand on the war in Ukraine.... Now, with the refugee crisis, the 'Orbán problem' is clear for all to see. And it's getting worse. On Friday, the Hungarian parliament fast-tracked new laws to strengthen police powers and set strict new punishments, including jail terms, for unauthorised border crossing."

News Ledes

Washington Post: "The Iraqi military has used the F-16 fighter jet in combat operations for the first time, more than a year after Iraqi officials began pressing Washington to deliver them to assist in the fight against Islamic State militants."

New York Times: "In an acknowledgment of severe shortcomings in its effort to create a force of moderate rebels to battle the Islamic State in Syria, the Pentagon is drawing up plans to significantly revamp the program by dropping larger numbers of fighters into safer zones as well as providing better intelligence and improving their combat skills. The proposed changes come after a Syrian affiliate of Al Qaeda attacked, in late July, many of the first 54 Syrian graduates of the military's training program and the rebel unit they came from. A day before the attack, two leaders of the American-backed group and several of its fighters were captured."

The Commentariat -- Sept. 6, 2015

Defunct video removed.

Alison Smale of the New York Times: "Pope Francis on Sunday called on every parish, religious community, monastery and sanctuary in Europe to shelter refugees fleeing 'death from war and hunger,' adding that the Vatican's two parishes would lead the way by taking in two families." ...

... Katrin Bennhold, et al., of the New York Times: "Germans waving welcome signs in German, English and Arabic came to the train station [in Munich] Saturday to greet the first group of what is expected to be about 8,000 migrants to arrive in Germany by early Sunday, after an arduous and emotional journey through Hungary and Austria. Germans applauded and volunteers offered hot tea, food and toys as about 450 migrants arrived on a special train service from Austria, finally reaching Germany, which had held out an open hand to them." ...

... Griff Witte & Michael Birnbaum of the Washington Post: "A column of thousands of people fleeing war and poverty made it to Western Europe on Saturday, after forcing Hungary's anti-immigrant leaders to yield in a days-long campaign to turn them back. But with a fresh rush of migrants at Europe's borders, the broader refugee crisis only looked to be worsening." ...

... Ian Traynor of the Guardian: "Europe’s meltdown in the face of its biggest post-1945 immigration emergency is generating the worst east-west split since the Iraq war.... On Thursday Germany and France ordered the European commission to come up with a new 'permanent' and binding regime for spreading the refugee load around all of the 28 countries in the union. [British PM] David Cameron and home secretary Theresa May want nothing to do with the scheme and have absented themselves from the policymaking, carping from the sidelines. On Friday the prime ministers of Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic told Paris and Berlin to get stuffed, arguing that west European-style multiculturalism is nothing but trouble and that they have no intention of repeating the same mistakes.... On Wednesday [the commission] president, Jean-Claude Juncker, will unveil proposals obliging at least 22 countries with a combined population of almost 400 million to absorb 160,000 people from Italy, Greece and Hungary, which are struggling with influxes from the Middle East and Africa." ...

... Der Spiegel: "This year has seen a sharply increased number of attacks on asylum hostels in Germany, many of them perpetrated by right-wing extremists. Officials are concerned that neo-Nazi networks may be spreading across the country." ...

... Der Spiegel: "The attacks on refugee hostels in Germany have reached a shocking level this year. By July 6, there were fully 199 of them, and the attacks have shown no signs of stopping. At the same time, though, Germans seem more willing to help than ever before. They visit refugee hostels, bringing along clothes and toys. They cook together with the Syrians and Sudanese. They invite migrant boys to join the football teams where their own children play. Which Germany will prevail?" ...

... David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "Pleas for more aggressive American-led rescue measures seem all the more futile given the failures to reach a consensus on the country's own immigration problems, made vivid in the simmering debate over policing the border with Mexico and calls by a leading Republican presidential candidate to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants." ...

... Ben Hubbard of the New York Times: Rich Gulf nations that won't aid Syrian refugees angry at critics.

Jana Kasperkevic of the Guardian on what has changed for American women -- and what hasn't -- since Hillary Clinton gave her speech on women's rights in Beijing.

Bob Cesca, in Salon: "... the GOP appears to be getting behind the idea that both public and private sector workers can refuse to do their jobs with impunity as long as they can recite a biblical verse to back it up." ...

... What Kim Davis & David Koch Have in Common. Elias Isquith of Salon: "... just as a socialist and a liberal can differ on many things but still share a fundamental belief in the legitimacy of redistribution, so too can conservatives find common ground in the 'defense of power and privilege.' As [Kim] Davis and her Republican champions show us, if there's one organizing principle to conservatism, that -- and not law, order, gradualism or liberty -- is it."

Presidential Race

Sabrina Siddiqui of the Guardian: "Twenty years to the day since her iconic address on women's rights in a suburb of Beijing, Hillary Clinton delivered a stirring speech on gender issues in America while casting her Republican rivals as decidedly anti-women. And for those who might accuse her of playing the gender card, Clinton repeated a simple message: 'Deal me in.' Clinton spoke before more than a thousand supporters on Saturday at a launch event for 'Women for Hillary' in New Hampshire, touching upon many of the familiar themes of her presidential campaign -- equal pay for women, paid family leave, raising the minimum wage."

Beyond the Beltway

Reuters: "A high school football player in Louisiana died from injuries he sustained on the field during a game, officials told Reuters on Saturday. Tyrell Cameron, 16, a student at Franklin Parish High School in north-east Louisiana, was wheeled off the field on a stretcher after he was injured during the fourth quarter on Friday night, Franklin Parish Sheriff Kevin Cobb said in an interview. Tyrell was pronounced dead later at a local hospital, Cobb said."

Way Beyond

Veit Medick of Der Spiegel: Jim Messina, "who organized Barack Obama's 2012 re-election campaign and this year orchestrated British Prime Minister David Cameron's spectacular, nail-biting win, is now getting into German politics. Messina has agreed to a consulting job in Berlin: He wants to help the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) beat Chancellor Angela Merkel of the conservative Christian Democrats in the next national election in 2017."

The Commentariat -- Sept. 5, 2015

White House: "In this week's address, the President recognized Labor Day by highlighting the economic progress our country has made, and underlining what needs to be done to continue that growth":

Peter Baker of the New York Times: "President Obama and King Salman of Saudi Arabia met at the White House on Friday in hopes of moving past their differences four months after the king refused the president's invitation to visit amid concerns over American negotiations with Iran. During brief public remarks at the beginning of their meetings, neither of the leaders directly addressed the disagreement that has driven a wedge between their countries, namely the deal to lift sanctions against Iran in exchange for limits on its nuclear program. Instead, they stressed a long history of cooperation and friendship between the United States and Saudi Arabia." ...

... Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), in a Washington Post op-ed, says he will vote against the Iran nuclear deal. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "Mr. Cardin's closely watched decision did not jeopardize the implementation of the nuclear accord, but it did raise the likelihood that the president would have to veto a resolution disapproving it this month -- a diplomatic embarrassment the White House is hoping to avoid.... Also on Friday, Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado, the only incumbent Democrat facing a possibly difficult re-election fight next year, said he supported the deal." ...

... Jonathan Chait: "The pro-Israel lobby organized an important constituency in American politics that shared a relatively unified understanding of its collective self-interest. A month ago, that lobby was gearing up for a massive national campaign to block the Iran nuclear deal, using every medium at its disposal.... The campaign has not only failed, it has appeared almost completely ineffectual, and its failure has left its members stupefied. "

** Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post: "If you've heard anything about the upcoming budget battle, it's probably that Republicans want to dramatically slash spending. Yay, fiscal conservatism! What you may not know is that many of their desired funding cuts would increase deficits in the long run." CW: Once again proving that ideology & stupid are a bad mix. I realize that some form of representative democracy is the best form of government humankind has devised. Again and again the Congress of the United States reminds us what a misbegotten species we are.

Shut 'Er Down. Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), in a New York Times op-ed: "Since its formation, the Select Committee on Benghazi has been aimless and slow moving, not knowing what it was looking for or where. It has acted in a deeply partisan way, frequently failing to consult or even to inform Democratic members before taking action, and selectively leaking information to the press. After 16 months and more than $4 million, the committee has gained no additional insight into the attacks in Benghazi.... The committee is solely concerned with damaging [Hillary Clinton's] candidacy, searching for something, anything, that can be insinuated against her.... A committee that cannot tell the American people what it is looking for after 16 months should be shut down."

Elections Matter! A Lot! Ed Kilgore: Confederate legal theorists have proposed a litmus test for Supreme Court nominees that would require them to "have a clearly documented willingness to ignore both other branches of government -- the principle behind the receding Republican doctrine of 'judicial restraint' -- and stare decisis -- the principle against overturning well-settled Court precedent -- in pursuit of the 'original' meaning of the Constitution. That means treating SCOTUS as an all-powerful institution communing with eighteenth century Founders -- or worse yet, Con Con mythologies about those Founders -- and empowered to kill many decades of decisions by all three branches of government, precedent and democracy be damned.... [The theorists] are very clearly pointing the way to abolition of the entire New Deal/Great Society legacy via rulings by judges serving lifetime terms."

Presidential Race

Heidi Przybyla of USA Today: "Hillary Clinton plans to launch a new initiative this weekend as she seeks to weave women's issues into every facet of her campaign instead of using them in a separate silo as she did in her unsuccessful 2008 presidential bid.... The rollout coincides with the 20th anniversary of the former first lady's 1995 speech to the United Nations World Conference on Women in Beijing, in which she proclaimed 'women's rights are human rights.'" ...

... Alex Seitz-Wald of MSNBC: "In an exclusive interview with NBC News/MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell on Friday, Hillary Clinton said she's 'sorry' there's been so much controversy over her private email server, but declined to apologize for the decision to use it. She also suggested that GOP front-runner Donald Trump is unqualified to be president and weighed in on the surprisingly robust challenge to her candidacy from Democratic primary rival Bernie Sanders": (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

... Rosalind Helderman & Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "Hillary Rodham Clinton and her family personally paid a State Department staffer to maintain the private e-mail server she used while heading the agency, according to an official from Clinton's presidential campaign.... The private employment of [Bryan] Pagliano [-- who this week said he he would invoke his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination rather than testify before the House Benghaazi! committee --] provides a new example of the ways that Clinton ... hired staff to work simultaneously for her in public and private capacities.... Pagliano did not list the outside income in the required personal financial disclosures he filed each year." ...

... Michael Hirsh of Politico: "If Clinton's long-running problem until now is that the public mistrusts her -- and the revelations about her private email server have only exacerbated this mistrust -- the emails themselves appear to leave the opposite impression. They are, for the most part, utterly mundane, the chatter of daily diplomatic life at a high stratum of society and, all in all, prosaic rather than pernicious. If there's plotting going on, it isn't happening here -- either that or Hillary Clinton has developed a very clever code. Does 'bring some skim milk' really mean 'destroy the documents'?"

Sabrina Siddiqui of the Guardian: "Against the backdrop of a crushing debt crisis, Hillary Clinton and Marco Rubio took their presidential campaigns to Puerto Rico on Friday. They offered pointedly different views on how to best resolve the financial woes afflicting the US territory.... Speaking entirely in Spanish [sorry, Donald!] at a restaurant in San Juan, Rubio told around 150 people that allowing Puerto Rican municipalities to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection was not the solution to its problems.... Clinton stood firmly behind her stance [of extending bankruptcy protection] on Friday and, though she did not mention Rubio by name, sharply criticized Republicans in Washington over congressional inaction."

The Drs. Frankenstein Not Happy with the Monster. Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "... the mammoth big-money network assembled by Republicans in recent years is torn about how best to defuse the threat Mr. Trump holds for their party, and haunted by the worry that any concerted attack will backfire." ...

... Sean Sullivan & Matea Gold of the Washington Post: "Officials with the Club for Growth -- a prominent anti-tax group that frequently targets Republicans it deems not conservative enough -- said Friday that the organization began reaching out to its network of donors in recent weeks to help fund an anti-Trump ad blitz. The organization's super PAC arm, Club for Growth Action, would run the ads, the group said.... But the group's pitch has been met with skepticism among some top GOP financiers, who believe that any effort to attack the real estate mogul could backfire.... Trump has criticized the Club for Growth for attacking him after previously talking to him about donating money....

Who knows more about growth than I do? -- Donald Trump

The stock market. -- Constant Weader ...

... ** Trump Is No Biz Wiz. S.V. Dáte of the National Journal: "As 'really rich' as Donald Trump is today, he might have been even rich­er if, instead of dab­bling in skyscrapers and casinos, he'd simply taken his eight-figure inheritance decades ago and sunk it into the stock market. Had the celebrity businessman ... invested his eventual share of his father's real-estate company into a mutual fund of S&P 500 stocks in 1974, it would be worth nearly $3 billion today, thanks to the market's performance over the past four decades. If he'd invested the $200 million that Forbes magazine determined he was worth in 1982 into that index fund, it would have grown to more than $8 billion today.... That a purely unmanaged index fund's re­turn could outperform Trump's hands-on wheeling and dealing calls into question one of Trump's chief selling points on the campaign trail: his business acumen."

Mark Hensch of the Hill: "Donald Trump is blasting Hugh Hewitt after stumbling over foreign policy questions in an interview with the conservative radio host. '[He is] a third-rate radio announcer,' Trump told hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' on Friday morning."

Robert Schlesinger of US News: "The great Donald Trump experiment of 2015 entered a new phase this week with the exchange of attacks between the ersatz (Trump) and erstwhile (Jeb Bush )GOP frontrunners. Trump has been running a campaign so long on tone and posture as to be post-ideological. Bush has started systematically mounting a thoroughly conventional assault aiming to demonstrate issue by issue that Trump is an unsuitable standard bearer for the party. It's not so much a battle for the soul of the Republican Party as it is a struggle over whether the GOP needs a soul -- a core set of issues that define it -- at all. Instead Trump offers leadership -- snarling, angry and combative -- as an end instead of means." ...

... The Bodyguard: David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "Two weeks ago, [Trump bodyguard Keith] Schiller stepped between his boss and Univision anchor Jorge Ramos during a news conference and physically ejected the influential journalist...." This week, Schiller punched out a protester who grabbed Schiller from behind after Schiller wrested a banner from the hands of protesters. "'The Secret Service would not operate that way,' Ralph Basham, who oversaw the federal protective agency from 2003 to 2006, said of the fisticuffs outside Trump Tower. 'They're not a bunch of jackbooted thugs.'" Nakamura goes on to report on the system for providing Secret Service protection for presidential candidates. Clinton, because she is a former First Lady, is the only candidate who currently has protection. (No link.)

Beyond the Beltway

James Higdon, et al., of the Washington Post: "An attorney for jailed Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis said Friday that the marriage licenses issued by her deputies to several same-sex couples are invalid. 'They are not worth the paper they're written on,' Mat Staver said outside the Carter County Detention Center, where Davis is being held on a contempt charge." CW: So Kim the Incarcerated is still trying to impose her personal religious beliefs on others. Talk about tyranny, Ted Cruz. ...

... Lyle Denniston of ScotusBlog: "... even the judge conceded that those licenses, if issued, may not be valid, although he refused to decide that issue and left it to the lawyers for the same-sex couples to confront. ...

... Renee Graham of the Boston Globe: "Kim Davis ... isn't a religious freedom fighter. She's a homophobe, pure and simple.... Wrong and strong, Davis's actions are reminiscent of Alabama Governor George Wallace's infamous 'Stand in the Schoolhouse Door.'... Defying the rule of law didn't work for Wallace, and it won't work for Davis.... Davis is just the latest in a long, infernal line of fanatics to contort their so-called faith into an excuse for hatred and division." ...

... John Tierney of KGW Portland, Oregon: "A Marion County[, Oregon,] judge has refused to perform same-sex marriages and has asked his clerks to refer couples seeking same-sex marriages to other county judges. Judge Vance Day, a circuit court judge and former chairman of the Oregon Republican Party, is now facing an ethics investigation over that decision, according to the judge's spokesman.... Day hasn't performed any same-sex marriages since he joined the bench in 2011, but only stopped doing marriages of any kind this past spring. Judges in Marion County are not required to perform marriages...."

Way Beyond

Rick Lyman, et al., of the New York Times: "Thousands of migrants who have been bottled up in Hungary, demanding passage to the West, will be allowed into Austria and Germany, the Austrian chancellor said late Friday. Early Saturday, the first buses carrying them arrived at the Hungary-Austria border." ...

     ... The Guardian story, by Emma Graham-Harrison & others, is here. ...

     ... Update. Shawn Pogatchnik & Pablo Gorondi of the AP: "Thousands of exhausted, elated migrants reached their dream destinations of Germany and Austria on Saturday, completing epic journeys by boat, bus, train and foot to escape war and poverty. Before dawn, they clambered off a fleet of Hungarian buses at the Austrian border to find a warm welcome from charity workers offering beds and hot tea." ...

... Griff Witte & Michael Birnbaum of the Washington Post: "Stepping back from a confrontation with asylum-seekers that drew condemnation from throughout Europe, Hungary will use buses to ferry thousands of migrants from Budapest to the border with Austria, a senior government official said Friday. The government's fierce attitude to asylum-seekers fleeing war and poverty sent more than a thousand of them on a long march across the nation in a bid to reach Western Europe, where they hope for better lives. The turnaround was a major admission of defeat for Hungarian authorities...." ...

... Anthony Faiola of the Washington Post: "Call him Europe's Donald Trump. Hungary's maverick Prime Minister Viktor Orban is emerging as the straight-talking voice of right-wing Europe, vowing to block a wave of desperate refugees from seeking sanctuary in the region. Continuing a wave of blunt statements rarely heard from heads of state on this side of the Atlantic, he warned Friday that Europeans now stand to become 'a minority in our own continent' if the floodgates are not immediately closed."

News Ledes

New York Times: "Ben Kuroki, a decorated Japanese-American gunner in the Army Air Forces of World War II, who was hailed on the American homeland at a time when tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans were confined to internment camps as supposed security risks, died on Tuesday in Camarillo, Calif. He was 98."

New York Times: The annual pillow "fight on the West Point, N.Y., campus turned bloody as some cadets swung pillowcases packed with hard objects, thought to be helmets, that split lips, broke at least one bone, dislocated shoulders and knocked cadets unconscious. The brawl at the publicly funded academy, where many of the Army's top leaders are trained, left 30 cadets injured, including 24 with concussions, according to West Point."