The Commentariat -- July 17, 2015

Internal links removed.

Afternoon Update:

Richard Fausset, et al., of the New York Times: "The 24-year-old gunman who killed four Marines in an attack on two military sites here traveled to Jordan last year for about seven months, a senior intelligence official said Friday, one of several trips to the country in recent years. The official said that investigators were combing through the computer, cellphone and social media contacts of the gunman, identified as Mohammod Youssuf Abdulazeez, to determine whether he was in touch with any extremist groups in Jordan before or during this trip."

Stephanie Clifford of the New York Times: "Michael G. Grimm, a former New York congressman who resigned from office after pleading guilty to tax fraud, was given an eight-month sentence on Friday. A federal investigation that initially focused on Mr. Grimm's campaign fund-raising turned into a 20-count indictment related to his running of a restaurant in Manhattan, Healthalicious. Prosecutors said he underreported wages and revenue to the government and filed false tax documents as a result.... [Now for a hilarious side-note:] He is now working as a consultant to start-up businesses." ...

... CW: What's your advice to start-ups, Mikey? To cut costs, pay employees under the table. AND If the building inspector gives you grief, tell him you want to show him something on the roof, then threaten to toss him off.

If we keep taking steps toward a more perfect union, and close the gaps between who we are and who we want to be, America will move forward. -- Barack Obama, this week

** It's the perfect response to the Confederate flag wavers. -- Dana Milbank

*****

Peter Baker of the New York Times: President Obama "came to the El Reno Federal Correctional Institution [in Oklahoma] on Thursday to get a firsthand look at what he is focused on. Accompanied by aides, correctional officials and a phalanx of Secret Service agents, he crossed through multiple layers of metal gates and fences topped by concertina wire to tour the prison and talk with some of the nonviolent drug offenders he says should not be serving such long sentences.... Where other presidents worked to make life harder for criminals, Mr. Obama wants to make their conditions better":

CW: Matt Bai is kind of a jerk, but I think he's right to suggest that President Obama has -- since the last election -- transitioned from the 20th century to the 21st. This of course is what his opponents can't stand about him, caught as they are in a mist of nostalgia for a mythological past when everything was wonderful (and everybody knew her place).

Julie Davis of the New York Times: "More than 100 former American ambassadors wrote to President Obama on Thursday praising the nuclear deal reached with Iran this week as a 'landmark agreement' that could be effective in halting Tehran's development of a nuclear weapon, and urging Congress to support it. 'If properly implemented, this comprehensive and rigorously negotiated agreement can be an effective instrument in arresting Iran's nuclear program and preventing the spread of nuclear weapons in the volatile and vitally important region of the Middle East,' said the letter, whose signers include diplomats named by presidents of both political parties." Includes copy of the letter.

Suzanne Goldenberg of the Guardian: "... Al Gore has made a rare criticism of Barack Obama as Royal Dutch Shell prepares to drill an exploratory well in the Arctic Ocean, denouncing the venture as 'insane' and calling for a ban on all oil and gas activity in the polar region."

** Chris Geidner of BuzzFeed: "The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has ruled that existing civil rights law bars sexual orientation-based employment discrimination a groundbreaking decision to advance legal protections for gay, lesbian, and bisexual workers.... The ruling -- approved by a 3-2 vote of the five-person commission -- applies to federal employees' claims directly, but it also applies to the entire EEOC, which includes its offices across the nation that take and investigate claims of discrimination in private employment."

     ... CW: The ruling seems so obvious to me that I wondered how anyone could think otherwise. ...

     ... Well, here's how. Dale Carpenter of the Washington Post: "The EEOC’s view on sexual orientation, however, runs counter to the rulings of several circuit courts. These courts have reasoned that 'sexual orientation' is not among the list of prohibited bases for employment action, that Congress did not intend to eliminate anti-gay discrimination when it enacted Title VII, and that Congress has repeatedly refused to add 'sexual orientation' to employment protections. The EEOC calls these earlier circuit court decisions 'dated,' and some of them have been undermined by subsequent precedents in the same circuits recognizing that gender stereotyping, including gender stereotypes evidenced by anti-gay comments, is sex discrimination.... The EEOC's views on the scope of Title VII are considered persuasive, but not binding, authority on the courts."

Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "For this first time in 14 years, the Senate on Thursday approved a revised version of No Child Left Behind, the signature Bush-era education law that ushered in an era of broadly reviled high-stakes standardized testing. But the passage of the bill on an 81-17 vote, coming just a week after the House narrowly passed its own version, sets up a showdown between the two chambers, both controlled by Republicans, and leaves the fate of a final measure in doubt." ...

... Strange Bedfellows. Libby Nelson of Vox: "Hidden behind Thursday's overwhelmingly bipartisan Senate vote to get rid of No Child Left Behind is one of the strangest alliances in politics: Teachers unions have joined hands with Republicans. That's because they share two goals. They both want to get rid of the testing and accountability regimen of No Child Left Behind, and they want to cut back on Education Secretary Arne Duncan's influence."

Samar Khurshid of Roll Call: "Rep. Tim Murphy [R-Pa.], a member of the House Pro-Life Caucus and chairman of the Energy and Commerce subcommittee looking into the video [of a Planned Parenthood doctor talking to sting operators about fetal tissue & organ transfers to research organizations], said at a Wednesday news conference he'd seen the clip weeks before. Asked afterward why he and others waited until this week to take action, Murphy struggled for an answer before abruptly ending the interview with CQ Roll Call, saying he should not be quoted and remarking, 'This interview didn't happen.'... Another Pro-Life Caucus and Judiciary committee member, GOP Rep. Trent Franks [R] of Arizona, said Wednesday he had also seen the video about a month ago." Via Paul Waldman.

Jeffrey Young of the Huffington Post: "Alaska would become the latest state to sign on to a major expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act through a plan announced by Gov. Bill Walker on Thursday. Walker, a Republican-turned-independent elected in 2014 on a platform that included Medicaid expansion, had been courting the Republican-led state legislature on the issue. But after lawmakers failed to advance his proposal in their latest session, he decided to carry out the policy on his own authority, he said during a press conference at the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium headquarters in Anchorage. Absent legislative action to halt or alter the plan, the expansion will take effect Sept. 1, the governor said."

Adam Goldman, et al., of the Washington Post: "Four Marines were killed Thursday in shootings at a pair of military facilities in Tennessee by a gunman who is being investigated for possible ties to Islamist terrorist groups, U.S. law enforcement officials said." ...

... Craig Whitlock & Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "The gunman who targeted U.S. military service members in a late-morning shooting Thursday in Tennessee was a 24-year-old electrical engineer who had grown up in Chattanooga as part of a conservative Muslim family. Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez was born in Kuwait but moved with his family to the United States as an infant after the start of the Persian Gulf War and became a U.S. citizen, according to accounts given by friends and one of his sisters."

Paul Waldman: "... the Little Sisters [of the Poor] (and other religious organizations that have their own cases) are suing on the grounds that having to sign a letter declaring that they do not want to provide contraception coverage is itself an intolerable burden on their religious freedom.... Having to sign a letter opting out of contraception coverage is just too much to bear.... This week, the Little Sisters ... lost before a federal appeals court.... Not surprisingly, since this case is an attack on a provision of the ACA, every Republican everywhere has sided with the organizations demanding relief from their letter-signing burden. Yet at the same time that they see government's crushing hand there, they want government to put as many obstacles as possible in the way of women who need abortions." (Emphasis added.) ...

     ... CW: Aw, c'mon Paul. Signing a letter is a burden. Ow, my hand is cramped. Holy Mother, I can't find my glasses. We're poor, for God's sakes; forever stamps are expensive.

Annals of "Justice," Ctd. Another It-Could-Happen-to-You Edition. Dahlia Lithwick: In Charlottesville, Virginia, a "fanatical" prosecutor won the conviction of an innocent man despite overwhelming (& suppressed) evidence he committed no crime. The "man was finally freed, but that doesn't mean the system worked."

Alison Smale of the New York Times: "German lawmakers on Friday approved entering into detailed negotiations for a Greek bailout amid a simmering international debate over providing more debt relief to Athens and intensifying questions about whether Greece would be better off leaving the European common currency." ...

... Melissa Eddy of the New York Times: "... in negotiating a new deal this week to bail out Greece, Germany displayed what many Europeans saw as a harder, more selfish edge, demanding painful measures from Athens and resisting any firm commitment to granting Greece relief from its crippling debt. And that perception was fueled on Thursday when the German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, suggested that Greece would get its best shot at a substantial cut in its debt only if it was willing to give up membership in the European common currency." ...

... Anthony Faiola & Stephanie Kirchner of the Washington Post: "... just like that, the image of the 'cruel German' is back. Germany -- more specifically, its chancellor, Angela Merkel -- has faced years of derision for driving a hard bargain with financially broken Greece, which has received billions in bailouts since 2010. But for both Germany and Merkel, the concessions extracted this week to open fresh rescue talks with Athens appear to have struck a global nerve. By insisting on years more of tough cuts and making other demands that critics have billed as humiliating, Berlin is wiping out decades of hard-won goodwill.... In its online edition, even Germany's own Der Spiegel magazine decried the Berlin-led demands as 'the catalogue of cruelties.'" ...

... Whaddaya mean, cruel? "Politics is hard sometimes." ...

     ... Update. Also, Angela Lied to Crying Child. Dylan Matthew of Vox: "Merkel, to be clear, is a liar. Germany can in fact manage more than the 400,000 people a year it let in as of 2012. It currently lets in fewer permanent migrants, as a share of its population, than do many other developed nations."

NOAA: "2014 was earth's warmest year on record. In 2014, the most essential indicators of Earth's changing climate continued to reflect trends of a warming planet, with several markers such as rising land and ocean temperature, sea levels and greenhouse gases ─ setting new records. These key findings and others can be found in the State of the Climate in 2014 report released online today by the American Meteorological Society (AMS). ...

Presidential Race

Niall Stanage of the Hill: "Bernie Sanders is making a push for support from black and Hispanic voters as he seeks to intensify his challenge to Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination." Sanders has spoken recently on a black-oriented radio program & at a La Raza meeting. "Sanders' embrace of minority concerns and sensibilities can hardly be called opportunistic. His involvement with civil rights stretches back to his youth, when he attended the 1963 March on Washington where Martin Luther King gave his most famous speech, organized financial support for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and was arrested for protesting segregation."

Paul Krugman: Hillary "Clinton's [economic] speech reflected major changes, deeply grounded in evidence, in our understanding of what determines wages. And a key implication of that new understanding is that public policy can do a lot to help workers without bringing down the wrath of the invisible hand.... There's just no evidence that raising the minimum wage costs jobs, at least when the starting point is as low as it is in modern America." ...

... Kyle Blaine of BuzzFeed: "Hillary Clinton on Thursday wouldn't commit to supporting a $15 national minimum wage but said she is working with Democrats in Congress who are determining how high it can be set. 'I support the local efforts that are going on that are making it possible for people working in certain localities to actually earn 15,' Clinton said in a response to a question from BuzzFeed News during a press availability in New Hampshire on Thursday."

** digby in Salon: "The GOP's deranged foreign-policy dream: Build a wall around America -- and then prepare for World War III." But here's a big problem: "... we still don't know if the Democrats and Hillary Clinton will have the fortitude to resist their provocations and wage their 2016 campaign based on reason instead of paranoia. This is an old fault line in postwar American politics and Democrats have traditionally had a difficult time traversing it."

Meaner than a Junkyard Dog. Paul Waldman: "... Scott Walker ... is hell-bent on making sure that anyone who gets food stamps in Wisconsin has to endure the humiliation of submitting to a drug test. First the Wisconsin legislature sent him a bill providing that the state could test food stamp recipients if it had a reasonable suspicion they were on drugs; he used his line-item veto to strike the words 'reasonable suspicion,' so the state could test any (or all) recipients it wanted. And now, because federal law doesn't actually allow drug testing for food stamp recipients, Walker is suing the federal government on the grounds that food stamps are 'welfare,' and welfare recipients can be tested. This is why Scott Walker is never going to be president of the United States.... Walker isn't trying to solve a practical problem here. He wants to test food stamp recipients as a way of expressing moral condemnation.... there is no inherent connection between drug use and food stamps.... Walker ... practically oozes malice...." ...

... Charles Pierce on Walker's state supreme court victory (see yesterday's Commentariat): "If you're keeping score at home, the same organizations that were the subject of the criminal probe gave hundreds of thousands of neatly laundered dollars to the judges who ruled that those same organizations did nothing wrong on behalf of Scott Walker because fk you, that's why. If this happened in Myanmar or Kazakhstan, we'd all be laughing at it. Instead, let's once again congratulate Justice Anthony Kennedy for his immortal observation that: "...independent expenditures do not lead to, or create the appearance of, quid pro quo corruption." ...

... Scottie's Big Day, Ctd. Kevin Draper of Deadspin: "Wisconsin Senate votes to give $250 million to billionaires.... The Wisconsin Senate voted 21-10 to approve $250 million in public financing for a new arena for the Milwaukee Bucks. The bill will now be sent to the state Assembly for approval.... Just a few days ago, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker signed a state budget that includes cuts of $250 million to the University of Wisconsin system, among other cuts to public education funding." CW: Scottie is the prime mover behind the big bucks for Bucks billionaires scheme. ...

... CW: I realize I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but I just want to remind readers how utterly ignorant was this shift of taxpayer dollars from higher education to a sports arena. Walker "sold" the Bucks deal as an "economic development" scheme that will require No New Taxes (because, um, bonds). Never mind that new sports facilities provide only a short-term economic boost (during the construction period) & merely shift entertainment dollars from other venues to the sports arenas. Meanwhile, an equal investment in higher education pays off for this generation of young people & for generations to come.

I have a message for my fellow Republicans and the independents who will be voting in the primary process. What Mr. Trump is offering is not conservatism, it is Trump-ism -- a toxic mix of demagoguery and nonsense. -- Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry

Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: Sen. John McCain (R-Az.) "was particularly rankled by [Donald] Trump’s rally [in Phoenix]. 'This performance with our friend out in Phoenix is very hurtful to me,' McCain said. 'Because what he did was he fired up the crazies.' McCain, who has long supported comprehensive immigration reform and was a member of the so-called Gang of Eight that successfully pushed immigration legislation through the Senate in 2013, has been at war with the far right in Arizona for years.... McCain, who had a testy relationship with Senator Marco Rubio, another member of the Gang of Eight who is running for President, couldn't resist adding, 'Rubio backed away from it.'" ...

... "McCain Mocks Rubio for Pulling a McCain." Jonathan Chait: "Of course McCain also backed away from Rubio's immigration bill. And that's not all! In 2006, he sponsored a comprehensive immigration bill, and then when it interfered with his chance to win the Republican nomination, declared he would no longer support his own bill." ...

... digby: "The people who are angry about the border situation are ill-informed xenophobes who blame every perceived problem on someone else, usually people of color.... They are right wingers who, by the way, McCain also courted when he was running for the nomination and trying to hold on to his Senate seat. Mr Integrity isn't above a little demagoguery when it's necessary. Where does he think Trump got his ideas?

News Ledes

New York Times: "The Islamic State appears to have manufactured rudimentary chemical warfare shells and attacked Kurdish positions in Iraq and Syria with them as many as three times in recent weeks, according to field investigators, Kurdish officials and a Western ordnance disposal technician who examined the incidents and recovered one of the shells. The development, which the investigators said involved toxic industrial or agricultural chemicals repurposed as weapons, signaled a potential escalation of the group's capabilities, though it was not entirely without precedent."

Guardian: "Former Fifa vice-president Jeffrey Webb has been extradited to the United States following his arrest in Switzerland on racketeering and bribery charges filed by American prosecutors."

The Commentariat -- July 16, 2015

Internal links & defunct video removed.

Michael Shear & Julie Davis of the New York Times: "President Obama on Wednesday urged lawmakers to support the nuclear deal reached with Iran, saying that failure to put it in to effect would increase the likelihood of war in the Middle East and accelerate a nuclear arms race in the region that would threaten the safety of the United States. 'That's the choice that we face,' Mr. Obama said in opening comments at a news conference in the East Room of the White House. 'If we don't choose wisely, I believe future generations will judge us harshly, for letting this moment slip away.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon; story has been updated.) ...

... Squeaky Wheel Refuses Grease. Julie Davis & Matthew Rosenberg of the New York Times: "When President Obama called Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday to discuss the nuclear deal with Iran, the American president offered the Israeli leader, who had just deemed the agreement a 'historic mistake,' a consolation prize: a fattening of the already generous military aid package the United States gives Israel.... Mr. Obama said he was prepared to hold 'intensive discussions' with Mr. Netanyahu on what more could be done to bolster Israel's defenses, administration officials said. But, as in previous talks with Mr. Obama, Mr. Netanyahu refused to engage in such talk 'at this juncture,' the officials said...." ...

... David Sanger & Michael Gordon of the New York Times: "... as the negotiations [on the Iran nuclear deal] went into their third week..., a major dispute lingered: whether a ban on Iran's ability to purchase conventional weapons and missile technology would remain in place. The American delegation, led by Secretary of State John Kerry, insisted on extending the ban. But Mohammad Javad Zarif, the Iranian foreign minister and his country's chief negotiator, was opposed. Backing him were the Russians and Chinese, equal parties in the talks, who saw a lucrative market in selling arms to Tehran. A compromise was struck that fully satisfied neither side: a five-year ban on the sale of conventional weapons and an eight-year ban on ballistic missiles." ...

     The Washington Post story, by Karen DeYoung & Carol Morello, is here. ...

... "Blame George W. Bush." Noah Feldman of Bloomberg: "Iran's rise wouldn't have been possible -- and the deal wouldn't have been necessary -- had the U.S. not unleashed Iran from the regional power that did the most to contain it: Saddam Hussein's Iraq.... Had the U.S. never invaded Iraq, Hussein's Iraq would probably have continued to play its traditional role of containing Iran.... A democratic Iraq was always going to be Shiite-led, and a democratically elected Shiite government in Baghdad was always going to be relatively positive toward Iran." ...

... Paul Waldman: Now that we have a nuclear deal with Iran, Republicans are jostling each other to determine who can make the most angry and apocalyptic statements about it..... If President Walker/Bush/Rubio/Trump walked away from the deal, it wouldn't actually hurt Iran that much. But it would mean saying that America is no longer interested in keeping tabs on Iran's nuclear program.... That's a plan so stupid that it's hard to imagine even the current GOP presidential candidates carrying it out.... At the moment Republicans can't articulate their own alternative, because it sure seems like that alternative is another war. But if they're fortunate enough to win the White House next year, they're likely to find that walking away from this deal is a lot less attractive than it seemed when they were trying to win over Republican primary voters." ...

... E. J. Dionne compares President Obama's dealings with Iran to those of President Reagan's with the Soviet Union. Oh, and the critics aren't much different: "the conservative activist Howard Phillips accused Reagan of being 'a very weak man with a very strong wife and a strong staff' who had become 'a useful idiot for Kremlin propaganda.'" ...

... Andrew Kaczynski of BuzzFeed: "Senator Mark Kirk, a Republican from Illinois, says the nuclear agreement with Iran 'condemns the next generation to cleaning up a nuclear war in the Persian Gulf.' Kirk, who has consistently spoken out against the deal with Iran, told WRKO's Financial Exchange radio program on Tuesday that he believes 'tens of thousands of people in the Middle East are gonna lose their lives because of this decision by Barack Hussein Obama.'... Kirk said he believed the only reason the president supported legislation from Republican Sen. Bob Corker, the chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, that allowed Congress to review the deal was because he 'wants...to get nukes to Iran.'"

Igor Volsky of Think Progress: "Obama Heroically Prevents Reporter [Jonathan Karl] From Diverting News Conference About Iran To Donald Trump."

Michael Shear: "President Obama on Wednesday [in response to a question asked near the end of his press conference] said bluntly that the actions described in accusations that the comedian Bill Cosby drugged women for sex would constitute nothing less than rape, and he said the country should have 'no tolerance' for such actions. In his first comments on the decades-old accusations against Mr. Cosby, the president sought to carefully avoid a direct comment on civil legal actions that have been lodged against the longtime comedian and television star by several women in recent years. And he dismissed the idea that he might revoke the Presidential Medal of Freedom conferred on Mr. Cosby by President George W. Bush in 2002." ...

... Hunter Schwartz of the Washington Post: "Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) don't think [Cosby] deserves the highest civilian honor in America anymore. In a statement to Politico, a spokeswoman for Gillibrand said Cosby's medal must be revoked 'because we need to set a clear example that sexual assault will not be tolerated in this country.' But revoking the award isn't a simple matter of presidential decree or congressional vote. In fact, we don't actually know how the medal would be revoked because it's never happened before."

Jackie Calmes & Nicholas St. Fleur of the New York Times: "House Republican leaders on Wednesday announced a congressional investigation of Planned Parenthood, a day after anti-abortion activists released a video of an unsuspecting official from the organization explaining how it provides fetal tissue to researchers." CW: This would be Benghaaazi! for girls, except Benghaaazi! is already for one particular lady (see story linked under Presidential Race). ...

... Sarah Kliff of Vox: "The video itself raises two issues. The first is whether Planned Parenthood's actions are legal; selling fetal remains for profit is against the law. But Planned Parenthood says it only charges enough to cover its own costs for preserving and transporting the fetal tissues, and that's allowed under federal law. The larger issue raised by the video is harder to resolve, and it's about the medical ethics of using fetal tissue in research.... Fetal tissue has historically played an important role in scientific research because of fetal cells' ability to rapidly divide and adapt to new environments."

Ziva Branstetter & Dylan Goforth of the Tulsa Frontier: "When President Barack Obama arrives in Durant[, Oklahoma,] today and travels to the town's high school to give a speech, he will apparently be greeted by residents waving Confederate flags." CW: Nothing racist about this demonstration of "heritage," of course. Funny, the Chocktaw Nation kicked these fine patriots off Chocktaw land. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

     ... Update. Bill Schammert of OKCFox: "The group was moved several times throughout the day.... The rally disbanded by early afternoon, prior to the president's arrival." ...

     ... Update 2. Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "President Obama was greeted by protesters waving the Confederate flag during his visit to Oklahoma. About nine or 10 protesters waved the Confederate battle flag, as well as an American flag, across the street from the hotel where Obama is staying here, standing among a larger group that included Obama supporters.... Obama was also greeted by protesters waving the Confederate flag when he visited Tennessee earlier this month."

You know, there are three branches of our government. You have the Supreme Court, the legislative branch and the people, the people and their ability to vote. -- Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, explaining the Oklahoma constitution to people she had better hope are even more ignorant than she, in the context of her refusal to follow a state supreme court's order to remove a monument of the Ten Commandments from the statehouse grounds

One has to wonder where Fallin sees her job fitting into this scheme. -- Constant Weader

Thanks to Akhilleus for the news from Oklahoma.

Eric Tucker & Michael Kunzelman of the AP: "Capitol Hill lawmakers from Louisiana have intervened on behalf of a New Orleans company that has failed to stop a decade-old oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico but lobbied for a refund of money reserved for spill containment work, according to letters obtained by The Associated Press through public records requests.... Sen. Bill Cassidy (R), former Sen. Mary Landrieu (D) and Reps. Cedric Richmond (D) and Steve Scalise (R) have sent letters on Taylor Energy's behalf since December 2014.... Sen. David Vitter also made a telephone call to request a meeting between company and government officials...."

Erwin Chemerinsky in a Los Angeles Times op-ed: "Justice Antonin Scalia is setting a terrible example for young lawyers. Ignore, for now, his jurisprudence, his famously strict originalism; it's his tone that's the problem.... Scalia has long relied on ridicule.... Scalia's opinions this term, however, were especially nasty, sarcastic and personal.... Such mockery does not amount to a legal argument...."

Joshua Partlow of the Washington Post: "Mexican authorities released the surveillance footage of [Joaquin] Guzman's dramatic prison escape on Tuesday night. From a hole in the shower floor, one of the small blind spots for the surveillance camera, Guzman's allies had built a hatch over a shaft dropping 30 feet underground and leading to a tunnel that ran to a small cinder-block house in the corn fields south of the prison." Includes video. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Sam Roberts of the New York Times: "More than six decades later, the prosecution of Ethel Rosenberg remains one of America's most controversial criminal cases: Her conviction -- and eventual execution -- for joining in her husband Julius's espionage conspiracy rested largely on trial testimony from her younger brother. But in private testimony to a grand jury seven months before the 1951 trial, Mrs. Rosenberg's brother, David Greenglass, never mentioned involvement by his sister in Mr. Rosenberg's delivery of atomic secrets to Soviet operatives, according to a grand jury transcript released Wednesday."

Presidential Race

Eric Lichtblau & Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "Presidential contenders provided a glimpse inside their campaign war chests on Wednesday, releasing financial statements.... The reports showed, for instance, that Jeb Bush has relied largely on wealthy donors giving the maximum contribution -- attracting far less financial support from more modest donors -- and that Rick Perry, Ben Carson and Rick Santorum are burning through the money they have raised much more quickly than most of their opponents. Hillary Rodham Clinton raised the most money for the primary of any candidate, $46.7 million, while Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, running against Mrs. Clinton for the Democratic nomination, brought in $15 million, the vast majority of it from donors giving $200 or less.... The reports, filed with the Federal Election Commission..., did not include money being raised by the 'super PACs' and other outside groups that are supporting many of the candidates." ...

... Matea Gold & Anu Narayanswamy of the Washington Post: "A small cadre of super-wealthy Americans is dominating the fundraising for the 2016 Republican presidential nominating contest, doling out huge sums to independent groups that overwhelm total contributions to the candidates. Nearly $4 out of every $5 raised so far on behalf of GOP White House contenders has gone to independent groups rather than the official campaigns." ...

... Shane Goldmacher of the National Journal: "Only 3 Percent of Jeb Bush's Campaign Cash Came From Small Donors."

Jamelle Bouie: The "dueling speeches" of Hillary Clinton & Scott Walker on Monday "are clear: There is no middle ground or overlap between Walker's America and Clinton's coalition of blacks, Latinos, women, and young people. Which means that there's no amount of 'leadership' -- of rhetorical restraint, of triangulation, of closed-door maneuvering -- that would yield a 'governing majority' that's capable of serious progress. Indeed, there's no national -- or at least, no bipartisan -- agreement on what 'progress' means."

Martin Matishak of the Hill: "Democrats serving on the House Select Committee on Benghazi say the panel's GOP chairman has 'abandoned' plans for hearings to shift the focus of the investigation to Hillary Clinton. 'At the beginning of this year, Select Committee Republicans provided Democrats with detailed information about their plans to hold 11 hearings between January and October on a wide range of topics relating to the Benghazi attacks,' the panel's five Democrats wrote Wednesday in a letter to chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.). Since then, however, Republicans have completely abandoned this plan -- holding no hearings at all since January and instead focusing on former Secretary Hillary Clinton.'..." CW: No kidding.

Jonathan Easley of the Hill: "C-SPAN is partnering with a handful of regional newspapers in early-voting states for a nationally televised forum with the Republican presidential candidates just days before Fox News Channel's first scheduled debate. The network has invited all 17 of the GOP presidential hopefuls to the Aug. 3 Voters First Forum in New Hampshire. Publishers at the New Hampshire Union Leader, The Post and Courier of South Carolina, and Iowa's The Gazette say the forum was prompted in part by Fox's controversial decision to cap the number of candidates in its Aug. 6 debate at 10." ...

     ... Ed Kilgore: "The 64k question about this 'forum' is whether it's in danger of being deemed an 'unsanctioned debate' by the RNC, which would mean participants would be barred from sanctioned debates right on through to the end of the primary process."

Rosalind Helderman & Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "In the year before Donald Trump launched his presidential campaign, booming real estate markets increased the celebrity mogul's wealth by more than $1 billion, Trump said Wednesday. Trump's 2014 gains were announced by his campaign with typical Trump flair -- spelled out in all capital letters in a press statement proclaiming that his net worth as of now 'is in excess of TEN BILLION DOLLARS.'... But Trump did not release the document.... The FEC confirmed receiving Trump's form and has up to 30 days to review it before releasing it publicly.... The eventual release of the FEC form, which carries stiff penalties for false information, would provide a rare look into Trump's finances." ...

... Julie Bykowicz of the AP: "Federal documents Trump filed Wednesday show that he has lent his high-profile campaign $1.8 million." CW: Not sure why the AP has access to the filing but the WashPo doesn't.

Molly Beck of the Wisconsin State Journal: "Clearing a potentially serious obstacle from Gov. Scott Walker's intended path to the White House, the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday blocked a secret investigation into millions of dollars spent on financing of recall election victories by Walker and other Republicans." ...

... Mary Bottari & Brendan Fischer, in a Cap Times op-ed, explain how Scottie's good fortune came about. Thanks to Nadd2 for this depressing news. ...

... While the Koch-sponsored team cheers, let us note that its designated hitter's foot-in-mouth slump continues ...

... Allegra Kirkland of TPM: "On Tuesday, a day after entering the 2016 race, [Scott] Walker, an Eagle Scout, was asked about the recent decision by the Boy Scouts of America to lift its longstanding ban on gay troop leaders. Walker told the Independent Journal Review he supported the ban because it 'protected children and advanced Scout values.'... The comments were met with outrage by LGBT rights groups.... But during a Wednesday press conference in South Carolina, according to the New York Times, Walker said his comments had been misunderstood. 'The protection was not a physical protection,' he said, according to the Times. Instead, it was about 'protecting them from being involved in ... the political and media discussion about it, instead of just focusing on what Scouts is about, which is about camping and citizenship and things of that nature.'" CW: Very believable walkback, Scottie.

Beyond the Beltway

Jon Swaine of the Guardian: "Witnesses have told Mississippi state investigators that an unarmed black man died after being kept in a chokehold by a police officer for more than 20 minutes and denied CPR, according to his family's attorneys, who said an autopsy confirmed he was fatally strangled. State medical examiners provisionally found Jonathan Sanders died through homicide by manual asphyxiation, according to attorneys Chokwe Lumumba and CJ Lawrence."

All Quiet on the Western Front. Tom Dart of the Guardian: "A small town near Austin[, Texas,] with a quaint Victorian downtown, Bastrop is supposed to be a hub of the vast US military training exercise that spans seven states and runs until 15 September. But Wednesday seemed to be a day like any other in Bastrop -- which is to say not much was happening. It was certainly not the imposition of martial law, ice cream trucks being used as portable morgues and empty Walmarts being turned into concentration camps, as some of the more extreme conspiracy theorists had predicted...."

News Ledes

New York Times: "A Colorado jury has reached a verdict in the murder case against James E. Holmes, a former neuroscience student whose shooting rampage three years ago killed 12 and wounded 70 inside a suburban Denver movie theater. The verdict will be announced shortly, court officials said Thursday." ...

     ... Denver Post UPDATE: "A jury on Thursday found James Holmes guilty of murder for the Aurora movie theater attack, one of the worst mass shootings in American history. The jury of nine women and three men delivered the verdict at 4:15 p.m., after deliberating for about 12 hours over two days. In doing so, they rejected Holmes' plea of insanity."

New York Times: "A gunman opened fire on a Navy and Marine reserve center in Chattanooga, Tenn., on Thursday, leaving four Marines dead, and wounding several others, including a Marine recruiter and a police officer, officials said. The gunman was also killed." ...

     ... Washington Post UPDATE: "The gunman who opened fire at a Naval facility in Tennessee on Thursday morning, killing four Marines, has been identified as Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez [of Hixson, Tenn.], according to the FBI."

Guardian: "Eurozone finance ministers are to begin discussions on delivering Greece's bailout after MPs in Athens adopted the contentious package, amid angry scenes in parliament and violent clashes on the streets. The Eurogroup of finance ministers is due to hold a conference call to discuss the situation at 8.00 GMT (9.00 BST) on Thursday, as they scramble to assemble a short-term financing package -- expected to be worth about €7bn -- to keep Greece afloat until the new bailout can be finalised." ...

     ... New York Times Update: "The European Central Bank on Thursday expanded the emergency line of credit for Greek banks, raising it by an amount -- 900 million euros, or almost $990 million -- meant to meet the banks' needs for an additional week. That decision, announced at a news conference by Mario Draghi, the central bank's president, does not give the banks much extra breathing room. But it is likely to be welcomed by Greek banks and their depositors as a sign that the central bank intends to continue providing support while the country's bailout negotiations continue."

Reuters: "The Liberal Democrats, the former junior coalition partners of Prime Minister David Cameron, on Thursday named left-leaning Tim Farron as their new leader, two months after the party was virtually wiped out in May's British election. Former Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who in 2010 led the Liberal Democrats to their first ever spell in government alongside Cameron's Conservatives, stood down as leader after all but seven of his 56 colleagues lost their seats in the election."

New York Times: "Former President George H. W. Bush broke a bone in his neck in a fall at his home in Kennebunkport on Wednesday, his official spokesman said. Mr. Bush, the 41st president, was in stable condition, but he will have to wear a neck brace, the spokesman, Jim McGrath, said on Twitter. The former commander-in-chief has Parkinson's disease and uses a wheelchair."

Los Angeles Times: "Uber -- plagued by problems with regulators, drivers and taxi unions around the world -- took a big blow in its home state Wednesday when an administrative judge recommended that the ride-sharing giant be fined $7.3 million and be suspended from operating in California. In her decision, chief administrative law judge Karen V. Clopton of the California Public Utilities Commission contended that Uber has not complied with state laws designed to ensure that drivers are doling out rides fairly to all passengers.... She said Uber's months-long refusal to provide such data is in violation of the 2013 law that legalized ride-hailing firms. Uber said it would appeal." Also, they're mean to MoDo.

AP: "One of the seven FIFA officials arrested in Zurich as part of a corruption probe has been extradited to the United States, the Swiss Justice Ministry said Thursday. The Federal Office of Justice said the man, whom it did not identify, was extradited on Wednesday."

The Commentariat -- July 15, 2015

Internal links & defunct videos removed.

Afternoon Update:

Michael Shear & Julie Davis of the New York Times: "President Obama on Wednesday urged lawmakers to support the nuclear deal reached with Iran, saying that failure to put it in to effect would increase the likelihood of war in the Middle East and accelerate a nuclear arms race in the region that would threaten the safety of the United States. 'That's the choice that we face,' Mr. Obama said in opening comments at a news conference in the East Room of the White House. 'If we don't choose wisely, I believe future generations will judge us harshly, for letting this moment slip away.'"

Ziva Branstetter & Dylan Goforth of the Tulsa Frontier: "When President Barack Obama arrives in Durant[, Oklahoma,] today and travels to the town's high school to give a speech, he will apparently be greeted by residents waving Confederate flags." CW: Nothing racist about this demonstration of "heritage," of course. The Chocktaw Nation kicked these fine patriots off Chocktaw land. ...

You know, there are three branches of our government. You have the Supreme Court, the legislative branch and the people, the people and their ability to vote. -- Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, explaining the Oklahoma constitution to people she had better hope are even more ignorant than she, in the context of her refusal to follow a state supreme court's order to remove a monument of the Ten Commandments from the statehouse grounds

One has to wonder where Fallin sees her job fitting into this scheme. -- Constant Weader

Thanks to Akhilleus for the news from Oklahoma.

Joshua Partlow of the Washington Post: "Mexican authorities released the surveillance footage of [Joaquin] Guzman's dramatic prison escape on Tuesday night. From a hole in the shower floor, one of the small blind spots for the surveillance camera, Guzman's allies had built a hatch over a shaft dropping 30 feet underground and leading to a tunnel that ran to a small cinder-block house in the corn fields south of the prison." Includes video.

*****

CW: Okay, I know this is painful, but sometimes we must make sacrifices:

... For the both-sides report, Peter Baker of the New York Times does his usual best. ...

... Alexander Bolton of the Hill: "Republican leaders in Congress are crafting their attack plan against the Obama administration's nuclear deal with Iran. Lawmakers will have 60 days to review the deal after the White House delivers the text of the historic agreement to Capitol Hill. The GOP could seek to move a measure of disapproval, but it will be difficult to win a filibuster-proof 60 votes, much less the 67 required to overcome a presidential veto." ...

... Dana Milbank: Sen. Lindsey Graham went on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" early Tuesday to denounce the Iran nuclear agreement in dramatic terms. "But had Graham actually seen the deal? 'No,' he admitted. But Graham and his congressional colleagues are not reserving judgment until they know the facts.... This is legislating by reflex -- a mass knee-jerk by the Republican majority in Congress.... [Serious] considerations got lost in the reflexive response, kicked off by [Israeli PM Benjamin] Netanyahu, who proclaimed an hour before the deal was announced that, based on 'early reports,' it was 'a historic mistake.'... By about 9 a.m., House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had both reached conclusions. Boehner said that ... the deal would put Iran on 'a break-out threshold to produce a nuclear bomb,' and that it would 'only embolden Iran -- the world's largest sponsor of terror.' 'It sounds,' a reporter later said to Boehner, 'like you've already rejected it.' 'I want to review all the facts,' the speaker replied. Verdict first -- then the facts." ...

... ** American Self-Deceptionalism. Peter Beinart of the Atlantic: "When critics focus incessantly on the gap between the present deal and a perfect one, what they're really doing is blaming Obama for the fact that the United States is not omnipotent. This isn't surprising given that American omnipotence is the guiding assumption behind contemporary Republican foreign policy. Ask any GOP presidential candidate except Rand Paul what they propose doing about any global hotspot and their answer is the same: be tougher.... And recognizing the limits of American power also means recognizing the limits of American exceptionalism. It means recognizing that no matter how deeply Americans believe in their country's unique virtue, the United States is subject to the same restraints that have governed great powers in the past. For the Republican right, that's a deeply unwelcome realization. For many other Americans, it's a relief. It's a sign that, finally, the Bush era in American foreign policy is over."

... Julian Borger of the Guardian outlines the key points of the agreement. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Joby Warrick of the Washington Post: "In a remarkable reversal, the goal of freezing Iran's progress toward a weapons capability was achieved not with warplanes but with handshakes." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... The New York Times is updating reactions to the international nuclear agreement with Iran. "The Iran nuclear deal was welcomed by world leaders like David Cameron of Britain, Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and Pope Francis." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Abby Ohlheiser of the Washington Post: "The fate of several Americans held in Iran, including a Washington Post journalist detained last July, remains separate from the historic nuclear deal announced Tuesday, even after U.S. officials repeatedly raised the issue with Tehran. After news of the nuclear deal, Jason Rezaian's brother and The Washington Post's executive editor renewed calls for the release of Rezaian, The Post's Tehran bureau chief, who is facing trial on charges that include espionage. Rezaian has strongly denied the allegations."

Katie Zezima of the Washington Post: "President Obama will announce a pilot program to bring broadband to low-income households, attempting to close a gap that leaves many without high-speed internet. The plan, called ConnectHome, will launch in 27 cities nationwide and is expected to reach 275,000 low-income households. The program will also come to the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma, where Obama will speak Wednesday."

Binyamin Appelbaum of the New York Times: "Janet L. Yellen, the Federal Reserve chairwoman, told lawmakers Wednesday that proposals to increase congressional oversight of the central bank could cause collateral damage to the broader economy. Ms. Yellen's warning, delivered in prepared testimony to the House Financial Services Committee, marked an intensification of the Fed's opposition to the measures, mostly backed by congressional Republicans."

Josh Lederman & Nancy Benac of the AP: "... President Barack Obama called Tuesday for bipartisan action to revamp a criminal justice system riddled with inequities that result in unduly harsh prison sentences, particularly for minorities, and cost the government billions for unwarranted mass incarceration. 'In far too many cases, the punishment simply does not fit the crime,' Obama told a crowd of more than 3,000 at the NAACP's annual convention.... Obama ticked off statistics showing that the U.S. prison population has quadrupled since 1980 and doubled in the last two decades alone."

Katrina vanden Heuvel in the Washington Post: "... House Republicans are actively working to protect dark-money groups, inserting a provision into a spending bill last month to protect them from new disclosure requirements. But there is a simple way that President Obama can address the issue of dark money and advance the cause of transparency. The president should sign an executive order requiring federal contractors to disclose their contributions to dark-money groups.... Such an order would not eliminate dark money. It would, however, expose de facto political contributions by powerful corporation that hold federal contracts, including JP Morgan Chase, Exxon Mobil, and Koch Industries. Moreover, with the 10 largest federal contractors receiving approximately $1.5 trillion from the government since 2000, an executive order would enable the American people to see where their tax dollars are really going."

Paul Krugman: "... only a combination of rigid preconceptions and sheer ignorance can explain the way right-wingers still go around sniggering about [President] Obama's green-energy promotion. Far from being a bust, that policy was at least a contributing factor to an energy revolution."

Jonathan Chait on the ridiculous gimmicks Congressional Republicans cook up to increase domestic spending without upsetting Grover Norquist. "In theory, they like cutting spending, but in practice, the only spending programs they actually specify for reductions are the ones aimed at poor people, which Democrats don't like to cut, creating a stalemate."

Mark Berman of the Washington Post: "Missouri and Texas, which have combined to carry out nearly all of the executions in the United States this year, are set to execute two inmates by lethal injection this week.... These executions would be the first since the Supreme Court said last month that a drug used in troublesome lethal injections could be used going forward. ...

     ... New Lede: "Authorities in Missouri executed an inmate on Tuesday night, making him the first person put to death by a state since the U.S. Supreme Court weighed in on lethal injection last month."

Please Don't Feed the Animals People. Tara Culp-Ressler of Think Progress: "In a Facebook post published Monday night, the Oklahoma GOP suggested that the millions of Americans receiving food stamps this year should not be enrolled in the program because 'the animals will grow dependent on handouts and will not learn to take care of themselves.'... Opponents of maintaining state and federal funding for social safety net programs have a long history of making comparisons between government beneficiaries and animals, which is widely considered to be a racially coded insult." ...

     ... Randy Brogdon, Oklahoma Republican party chair: Oh, sorry, didn't mean to offend. BUT "This post was supposed to be an analogy that compared two situations illustrating the cycle of government dependency in America, not humans as animals." You yahoos "misinterpreted" it. Something, something about "free market principles." CW: Yes, how could anybody find an analogy -- a mere literary device -- offensive? We must be stoopid. ...

... Ed Kilgore: "For a political party or an elected official or a great big adult political candidate to do so is offensive not because it 'offends' people or is 'politically incorrect' but because it is factually incorrect and hateful and certainly in conflict with the Judeo-Christian values that I am quite sure the Republican Party of Oklahoma believes it upholds."

Sandhya Somashekhar & Danielle Paquette of the Washington Post: "An anti-abortion group on Tuesday released an undercover video of an executive at Planned Parenthood sipping red wine while discussing in graphic detail how to abort a fetus to preserve its organs for medical research -- and also the costs associated with sharing that tissue with scientists. The video, filmed by a group called the Center for Medical Progress, threatens to reignite a long-standing debate over the use of fetal tissue harvested through abortions, and could add fuel to efforts seeking to ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. In a statement, a spokesman for Planned Parenthood said the video misrepresents the organization's work." ...

... Here's Planned Parenthood's statement. CW: Sorry, PP, being reasonable, lawful & ethical holds no truck in right-wing world's view. Just looky here:

     ... Polly Mosendz of Newsweek: "Planned Parenthood is under investigation in Louisiana after a video surfaced claiming to implicate the organization in a scheme to sell the body parts of infants. 'Today's video of a Planned Parenthood official discussing the systematic harvesting and trafficking of human body parts is shocking and gruesome,' Governor Bobby Jindal said in a statement. However, the video is not nearly as straightforward as Jindal's explanation." CW: There is no matter too obscure, too discredited nor too crazy to incite Bobby Jindal to exploit. ...

     ... Also, Carly Fiorina. John McCain.weighs in, too. And Connie Chung, what are you doing? ...

     ... Scott Walker, et al.: me too, me too, me too. Surprisingly, they're calling on Congress to defund Planned Parenthood.

Jack Ewing of the New York Times: "The International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday that it would remain involved in Greece's bailout only if eurozone leaders agreed on a plan that would make the country's debt manageable for decades to come. The aggressive stance sets up a stand-off with Germany and other eurozone creditors, which have been reluctant to provide additional debt relief. The I.M.F., in a report released publicly on Tuesday, proposed that eurozone creditors should consider letting Athens write off part of its huge debt or at least make no payments on its eurozone debt for 30 years." ...

... Josh Barro of the New York Times: "The I.M.F. memo amounts to an admission that the eurozone cannot work in its current form. It lays out three options for achieving Greek debt sustainability, all of which are tantamount to a fiscal union, an arrangement through which wealthier countries would make payments to support the Greek economy. Not coincidentally, this is the solution many economists have been telling European officials is the only way to save the euro -- and which northern European countries have been resisting because it is so costly.... If Greece stays in the euro, it will need much more financial support from the rest of Europe than was admitted in Monday's deal, and the I.M.F. is asking European governments to put that admission on paper."

Presidential Race

Mike Lillis & Cristina Marcos of the Hill: "Hillary Clinton took Capitol Hill by storm on Tuesday with a daylong series of friendly talks with congressional Democrats on the most pressing issues of the day.... Bernie Sanders ... hijacked a set of microphones -- usually reserved for Senate leaders -- after leaving a private meeting between the former secretary of State and Senate Democrats in the Capitol Tuesday afternoon. He then used the impromptu press conference to question Clinton's populist bona fides on a range of issues, including trade policy, the Iraq War, regulating big banks and tackling climate change." ...

... Jonathan Weisman & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "Hillary Rodham Clinton unequivocally embraced the Iran nuclear deal in a meeting with House Democrats at the Capitol on Tuesday, according to people who were at the meeting. Mrs. Clinton, who was secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, reminded the Democrats, many of whom are nervous about the agreement, that she helped assemble the international coalition that imposed crippling economic sanctions on Iran. That, she told them, was what forced the Iranians to the bargaining table." ...

... Nicholas Fandos: "Hillary Rodham Clinton took her campaign to Capitol Hill on Tuesday, where she made overtures to Congressional Democrats and spoke cautiously -- and with a potential eye toward the future -- about the Iran nuclear deal announced earlier in the day." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "Statements from [GOP] White House hopefuls warned of nuclear chaos in the Middle East, criticism of President Obama's abilities as a negotiator, and calls on Congress to stop the deal in its tracks." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Nick Gass & Adam Lerner of Politico rounded up all the GOP presidential candidates' statements about how horrible was the deal they hadn't read. ...

... Ed Kilgore contrasted the "Tell It Like It Is" Chris Christie from a few weeks ago with the "Tough Talking" Chris Cristie of yesterday.

Alan Rappeport: Donald Trump "is in a statistical tie with former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida in a Suffolk University/USA Today national poll of potential primary voters released on Tuesday." CW: Yeah, yeah, I know: early polling isn't predictive of the eventual outcome of the primaries, but in this case, it does remind us of how base the GOP base is. ...

... Ben Dreyfus of Mother Jones: Donald Trump tweeted -- & his campaign later deleted -- a "Make America Great" campaign message featuring Waffen-SS soldiers as exemplars of "greatness." His campaign blamed an intern for the tweet. CW: You're fired, kid. The stock photo the Donald/intern lifted is here.

CW: We've all been so terribly upset that Ted Cruz's book A Time for Truth didn't make the New York Times best-seller list that we forgot to read it. Seems Ted's fellow Republicans Mitch McConnell & Rand Paul are denying some of Ted's "truths." They are all such paragons of probity it's hard to know whom to believe, isn't it?

Beyond the Beltway

Manny Fernandez of the New York Times: "Jade Helm 15, an eight-week military exercise that has generated paranoia for months fueled by conservative bloggers and Internet postings, begins Wednesday in Texas and six other states: Arizona, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico and Utah.... The military exercise will train Special Operations troops in what Army planners call 'unconventional warfare.'... Much of the paranoia over Jade Helm 15 is the outgrowth of an anti-Obama sentiment that is widespread in Texas and parts of the Southwest.... Sindy Miller, who runs a hair salon on Main Street [in Christoval, Texas], said fears of a military takeover have been the talk of this West Texas town, southeast of Midland. 'They're worried that they're going to come in and take their firearms away,' Ms. Miller said. 'Martial law, basically. I try not to listen to all these conspiracy-theory-type people. All they're worried about is their beer and their guns.'" ...

... CW: If you want to know how successful the McConnell-Boehner-Ailes-Koch alliance has been at unifying the nation behind conservative ideals, this article should help. Their efforts have turned common ignoramuses into crazy ignoramuses. This bunch will go down in history as the worst source of domestic turmoil & anti-American sentiment in 100 years, maybe in 175 years.

Richard Winton & Joel Rubino of the Los Angeles Times: "In the two years since Gardena police officers fatally shot an unarmed man, city officials fought to keep graphic video of the killing under wraps.... Gardena's attempts to prevent the public from viewing the shooting met with defeat Tuesday, when a federal judge ordered the release of the recordings. In unsealing the videos, U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson said the public had an interest in seeing the recordings, especially after the city settled a lawsuit over the shooting for $4.7 million.... The judge's decision was a response to a request from the Los Angeles Times, the Associated Press and Bloomberg, which challenged a blanket protective order that had prevented the release of the videos and other evidence in the court case.... After The Times published the videos online, 9th Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski issued an order that 'the police car camera video footage shall remain under seal pending further order of this court.'" Includes video.

News Ledes

New York Times: "After a marathon session that stretched into the early hours of Thursday, Greek lawmakers narrowly approved a package of harsh austerity measures and economic policy changes that were required by its creditors as the terms of a $94 billion bailout package.... The vote was seen as a victory for the country's prime minister, Alexis Tsipras."

Denver Post: "Starting Wednesday morning, jurors will begin deliberating about whether James Holmes is guilty of killing 12 people and trying to wound 70 more.' The prosecution & defense presented their closing arguments today.

AP: "A team trying to fly a solar-powered plane around the world said Wednesday it is suspending the journey in Hawaii after the plane suffered battery damage during its record-breaking flight to the islands."

Reuters: "The United States handed back to Iraq on Wednesday antiquities it said it had seized in a raid on Islamic State fighters in Syria, saying the haul was proof the militants were funding their war by smuggling ancient treasures."

Reuters: "A 94-year-old German who worked as a bookkeeper at the Auschwitz death camp has been convicted of being an accessory to the murder of 300,000 people and sentenced to four years in prison, in what could be one of the last big Holocaust trials. Oskar Groening did not kill anyone himself while working at the camp in Nazi-occupied Poland during the second world war, but prosecutors argued that by sorting the bank notes taken from the trainloads of arriving Jews he helped support a regime responsible for mass murder." ...

... CW: For more on Groening, Politico Magazine publishes an adaptation of a section of Laurence Rees' book Auschwitz, a New History.