The Commentariat -- April 13, 2013

Contributors' comments on Reality Chex are always superb. If you missed those to my post on Jim Gile, I highly recommend you give them a read.

Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "President Obama has asked the mother of a six-year-old killed in last December's massacre in Newtown, Conn., to stand in for him in addressing the nation this weekend. Francine Wheeler, whose son, Ben, was killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School, will deliver the president's weekly address that is aired on television and radio, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters on Friday." New York Times story, by Sarah Wheaton, here:

... See also Charles Pierce's commentary on the Politico piece on the Newtown family members, linked below. CW: what is galling about this week's address is that Wheeler has to make this plea to the Cowardly Congress, begging members to just do their damned jobs. ...

... Dana Milbank has more on how the Newtown family members pressured senators. (The difference between Milbank's characterization & Politico's is striking.)

Gail Collins, on President Obama's budget: "... anything that makes Paul Ryan this enthusiastic is scary." ...

... Annie Lowrey of the New York Times: President Obama's plan to calculate Social Security benefits based on chained CPI "would mean less money for the elderly. But it would also mean less money for children. One underappreciated point is that Social Security benefits millions of children and working-age Americans, as well as older adults." ...

... Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar of the AP: "... President Barack Obama's budget would raise ... Medicare premiums ... [for] comfortably retired seniors, adding to a surcharge that already costs some 2 million beneficiaries hundreds of dollars a year each. More importantly, due to the creeping effects of inflation, 20 million Medicare beneficiaries would end up paying higher 'income related' premiums for their outpatient and prescription coverage over time. Administration officials say Obama's proposal will help improve the financial stability of Medicare by reducing taxpayer subsidies for retirees who can afford to pay a bigger share of costs. Congressional Republicans agree with the president on this one, making it highly likely the idea will become law if there's a budget deal this year." CW: I guess I'm "comfortably retired" because the Feds take out about a fifth of my Social Security payment to cover the Medicare premium, a hefty deduction that makes me "uncomfortable."

Obama 2.0. John Broder of the New York Times: "Sally Jewell officially became the 51st interior secretary on Friday, taking the oath at noon from retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor in the Supreme Court's West Conference Room, one of two formal ceremonial conference rooms at the court.... The Senate approved her nomination on Wednesday on a vote of 87 to 11."

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Obama's personal income has plummeted in the four years since he was first inaugurated, thanks mostly to declining sales of his two best-selling books, according to his 2012 tax returns released on Friday. For 2009, Mr. Obama and Michelle Obama reported earning $5.5 million in income, almost all of it from royalties related to Mr. Obama's books, 'Dreams from My Father' and 'The Audacity of Hope.' Sales of the books made him a multimillionaire. By 2012, the couple's taxable income had dropped to about $608,000, with only about $273,000 from sales and royalties from the books, according to the tax return. Most of the income came from Mr. Obama's presidential salary of $400,000 per year." A pdf of the Obamas' tax return is here. The Bidens' tax return is here.

Kirk Johnson of the New York Times: "Under an agreement signed with the Obama administration last year, and just now taking shape, Oregon and the federal government have wagered $1.9 billion that -- through a hyper-local focus on Medicaid -- the state can show both improved health outcomes for low-income Medicaid populations and a lower rate of spending growth than the rest of the nation."

News Flash! Corporations Are Not Democracies. James Stewart of the New York Times: At 41 publicly traded companies where directors actually lost their elections last year, meaning that more than 50 percent of the shareholders withheld their votes of approval..., they remained in their posts.... That an electoral system unworthy of Soviet-era sham democracies is flourishing today in corporate America is largely thanks to the management- and director-friendly policies of Delaware, where more than half of United States companies are incorporated and where the corporate franchise tax contributes disproportionately to the state's revenue. State law controls board governance, and Delaware has long tolerated [so-called] plurality voting [where] ... directors run unopposed and just one vote is enough to be elected."

Graft, Virginia-Style. The Washington Post Editors whack Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell for taking bribes gifts to family members from a Virginia CEO in exchange for promoting his company's products.

In a few grafs about a disgusting piece by Jim VandeHei & Mike Allen, Charles Pierce sums up what's the matter with Politico.

Local News

Laura Vozzella of the Washington Post: "The Virginia Board of Health voted Friday to require clinics that perform abortions to meet strict, hospital-style building codes that operators say could put many of them out of business."

News Ledes

Reuters: "A former justice of the peace in Kaufman County, Texas, whose home was searched as part of the probe into the killings of the local district attorney, his wife and a prosecutor, has been arrested on suspicion of threatening violence, officials said on Saturday. Eric L. Williams, 46, was arrested on Friday on charges of making a 'terroristic' threat, which generally involves a threat to commit violence.... It was not immediately clear whether the alleged threat had any connection to the slayings...."

AP: "Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad resigned on Saturday, leaving the Palestinians without one of their most moderate and well-respected voices just as the U.S. is launching a new push for Mideast peace."

New York Times: "Secretary of State John Kerry arrived [in Beijing] on Saturday to seek China's help in defusing the growing tensions with North Korea." ...

     ... AP Update: " The United States and China committed Saturday to a process aimed at ridding North Korea of its nuclear weapons, with the Obama administration gaining at least the rhetorical support of the only government that can exert significant influence over the reclusive North."

Washington Post: "As promised, Russia on Saturday released the names of American officials who are now banned from the country, in retaliation for the Magnitsky list made public in Washington on Friday. The United States imposed visa and banking sanctions on 18 Russian officials suspected of human rights abuses. Russia responded by naming 18 Americans it accuses of human rights violations at the Guantanamo prison camp, or of having had a role in the detention of Russian citizens in third countries."

Reuters: "The retrial of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was aborted on Saturday when the presiding judge withdrew from the case and referred it to another court, causing an indefinite delay that sparked anger in the courtroom. Lawyers said that while the transfer would give prosecutors more time to draw on new evidence in an unpublished fact-finding commission's report into the repression, it could delay the case by months, increasing the risk that Mubarak, 84, may never be finally convicted and sentenced."

It Was Never Okay to Say "Nigger"

A couple of contributors have referred to this post by Neetzan Zimmerman of Gawker:

County Commissioner Jim Gile, 68, of Saline County, Kansas, was in a study session with his fellow commissioners when the subject of hiring an architect to design the repairs for the county's Road and Bridge Department building came up. Gile, a first-term commissioner who started serving in January, told the county that he preferred to hire an architect over having someone 'nigger-rigging it.'

According to Chris Hunter of the Salina Journal,

His comment brought laughter from others in the room. Salinan Ray Hruska, who attends most commission meetings and study sessions, asked Gile what he said. 'Afro-Americanized,' Gile replied.

So ha-ha, Gile thought saying "nigger" in a public meeting was pretty hilarious.

Now, let's look at Gile's "excuses," offered after the fact:

     (1) "... he meant to say 'jury-rigged.'" Because "jury" sounds a lot like "nigger," which sounds a lot like "Afro-American," so it was a slip of the tongue.

     (2) "It was a bad choice of words." Yeah.

     (3) Commission Chair Randy "Duncan said Friday that Gile's choice of words was not intended to offend anyone." So he had good intentions when he used a racial slur, then laughed about it.

     (4) "Gile said he grew up around the term, but it is something he shouldn't have used." Old habits die hard.

     (5) "I am not a prejudiced person. I have built Habitat homes for colored people." "Colored people": another great choice of words, a term that has been taboo for half a century. Evidently Gile forgot he knows how to say "Afro-American" -- as a "joke."

     (6) "Gile said he also has a close friend whom he regards as a sister who is black." So one of his best friends is black. This is one white boy who can't be a bigot.

     (7) "I don't ever do anything bad and don't know how to do anything bad. People know I am not." Well, maybe just this one time he did something bad.

As Zimmerman of Gawker & Commission Chair Duncan both point out, Gile's remark -- and his excuses -- were reminiscent of U.S. Rep. Don Young's (R-Alaska) casual remark last week about "wetbacks."

Like Gile, I am white and I grew up in the South. He and I are roughly the same age. I attended segregated public schools in a relatively poor section of the city. Racial prejudice was part of the fabric of the times. But "nigger" was never an acceptable term, and nobody I knew used it. You didn't hear it from students; you didn't hear it from teachers. You didn't read it in the newspaper; you didn't hear it on the radio. I won't say I never heard it. I did. But people who used racial slurs might as well have walked around wearing big signs that said "ignorant." Decent people -- and we're talking decent poor white people -- knew better.

There's a difference between the racial prejudice that pervaded the South (and elsewhere) and the racial animus that characterized the pushback against the civil rights movement. Whatever prejudices whites had against blacks -- and there were many -- they viewed as the nature of what was. They may have thought black people were "different" or "inferior" or should be "separated," but they took that as the "natural order of things," not as an indictment against a race of people.

What Gile was expressing was racial animus. He's Bull Connor, writ small. There are far too many like him still around. And one of the bad things they know how to do, to borrow Gile's phrase, is to lie. They are lying when they tell you they can't help these innocent little slips of the tongue because "they grew up around the term." They grew up knowing the term was taboo, that it was derogatory and that it was hurtful. They choose to use it anyway.

Where I grew up, people would call Jim Gile "white trash." I'll just refrain. Because I am a good, well-intentioned person who is not prejudiced and has a close friend who is white and I don't mean to offend anybody with my choice of words.

The Commentariat -- April 12, 2013

Julia Preston & Ashley Parker of the New York Times: "A bipartisan group of senators has largely agreed on a broad immigration bill that would require tough border measures to be in place before illegal immigrants could take the first steps to become American citizens, according to several people familiar with drafts of the legislation." ...

... Erica Werner of the AP: "A bipartisan immigration bill soon to be introduced in the Senate could exclude hundreds of thousands of immigrants here illegally from ever becoming U.S. citizens, according to a Senate aide with knowledge of the proposals. The bill would bar anyone who arrived in the U.S. after Dec. 31, 2011, from applying for legal status and ultimately citizenship, according to the aide, who was not authorized to discuss the proposals before they were made public and spoke on condition of anonymity." ...

... CW: as Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) has learned it is difficult being part of a Gang of Eight Egomaniacs. How is one to become the Top Egomaniac? First, young Marco attempted to distinguish himself by dramatically announcing that he was putting the brakes on the group's efforts. That didn't work well as the Gang of Eight-Minus-One Ecomaniacs went right along doing stuff. So now, as Manu Raju of Politico reports, Marky Marco is "offering himself up as the public face of a bill that will split the Republican Party -- but that his allies hope will propel him to the front of the GOP presidential sweepstakes." You said you want more transparency in government? Well, there you have it. No one could be more transparent than Marco.

** The People v. the Congress of the United States. Tim Egan on federal gun safety legislation and those who oppose it. ...

... New York Times Editors: "Democratic leaders are trying to prevent some of these dangerous amendments [to the gun bill] from ever reaching the floor, and many will have trouble getting the necessary 60 votes. But Thursday's brief victory of common sense has shaken the antiregulation extremists, who are quickly gearing up to make the road ahead as difficult as possible." ...

... Whither the Turtle? David Rogers of Politico: "Thursday's Senate vote to move ahead with gun control legislation marked the fifth time in just two months that Democrats have won a procedural showdown by peeling off Republicans at the expense of Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)... This fits a pattern seen increasingly since mid-February: McConnell steadfast in opposition even as his rank-and-file cross the aisle, raising fragile hopes of a bipartisan revival. Without overstating, it's a record that suggests a real shift as the Kentucky Republican has seemed to turn his attention single-mindedly to protecting his right flank at home where he faces re-election next year.... The immediate beneficiary is Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), but also what some see as a fledgling legislative revival in the Senate itself." ...

... CW: Maybe the Kentucky Gestapo has beat down poor Mitch: Phillip Bailey, et al., of WFPL, Louisville, Kentucky: "A secret recording of a campaign strategy session between U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell and his advisors was taped by leaders of the Progress Kentucky super PAC, says a longtime local Democratic operative.... Jacob Conway, who is on the executive committee of the Jefferson County Democratic Party, says that day, Shawn Reilly and Curtis Morrison, who founded and volunteered for Progress Kentucky, respectively, bragged to him about how they recorded the meeting." ...

... Kevin Robillard of Politico: "Jacob Conway, the Jefferson County Democratic Party's executive committee member who originally accused Progress Kentucky of making the recording, told NBC News he was on his way to talk to the FBI about the allegations. And the group's treasurer [who is not accused of being a party to the taping] confirmed he had quit his position after the audio was published." ...

... Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs: "McConnell has been going completely ballistic, comparing this to the Gestapo and Watergate; turns out it was a couple of guys standing in a public hallway with a smartphone, probably not doing anything illegal (although the jury’s still out on that)."

Greg Sargent: "Yesterday, GOP Rep. Greg Walden -- the chairman of the NRCC -- attacked the Chained CPI in Obama's budget as an assault on seniors. This was curious, because GOP leaders John Boehner and Eric Cantor had expressed support for the idea only hours earlier.... Today reporters pressed Boehner on Walden's claims, and he distanced himself from the NRCC chair.... [SO] the GOP Congressional leadership is demanding that Obama embrace entitlement reform, and blasting him as unserious for failing to offer sufficient entitlement cuts. Obama has offered Republicans Chained CPI -- which is a Social Security benefits cut that Republicans themselves said they wanted. But the NRCC has now signaled Republicans may use this to pillory Dems in 2014 for going after seniors, just as Republicans attacked Dems on Medicare in the last two cycles.... This is not politics as usual." ...

... Jed Lewison of Daily Kos: Boehner twice deflected reporters' questions about whether or not Republicans would use Obama's budget -- with its cuts to Social Security & Medicare -- to attack Democrats in the 2014 elections." ...

... This is a Republican proposal. And cynical attempts to make it otherwise by some represent, I think, dissonance within the Republican Party, and we've seen plenty of condemnation from conservatives and Republicans of that sort of flagrantly ridiculous and cynical attempt to disown a proposal that emanated from Republican leaders. -- White House Press Secretary Jay Carney ...

... Jonathan Strong of Roll Call: Nothing "change[s] the breathtaking cynicism of Walden's move.... Boehner declined to publicly urge Walden not to use chained CPI to attack Democrats, noting again that he had talked to Walden and 'we'll leave it at that.' Asked later in a Capitol hallway what he said to Walden, the speaker just laughed." Via Greg Sargent., who aptly pegs the Boehner-Walden two-step as "policy nihilism .... that helps explain why addressing the country’s problems has become all but impossible." ...

... Oh, gosh, the deficit hawks that operate the Washington Post Editorial Board are not impressed with Paul Ryan's fake "budget": Republicans' "pooh-poohing [Obama's budget] would be easier to take if the GOP had a real-world plan of its own. Instead, it pretends it can balance the budget without raising taxes -- but also without ever specifying the details of the spending that would be decimated, discretionary or otherwise. Mr. Ryan and others so far have wanted credit for fiscal prudence without political cost." They don't like Obama's budget either, of course, because it "it's not big enough.... But Mr. Obama has injected a courageous note of realism where the Republicans so far have shown none."

** Igor Volsky of Think Progress: "Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) embarrassed government regulators during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Thursday morning as she demanded to know why they won't reveal how frequently big banks illegally foreclosed on homeowners. In January, regulators abandoned a case-by-case review of foreclosure fraud conducted by some of the nation's largest banks in favor of a $9.3 billion settlement. Under the deal, most of the 4.4 million homeowners who were foreclosed on in 2009 or 2010 received less than $1,000 each.... Warren pressed officials from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and The Federal Reserve for answers about how frequently banks broke the law, only to discover that regulators didn't know the exact number before reaching their settlement and were now unwilling to publicize the error rate." Listen to Warren at work ...

Edward Williams, in Salon: "The first lady elevated the conversation [about gun violence] Wednesday, during a rare return to her hometown of Chicago. In a city ravaged by violence, with more than 500 gun-related homicides last year alone, she spoke eloquently -- and apolitically -- transcending the partisan politics that seem to subvert her husband's efforts for reasonable gun control legislation. But what was most unique was for whom, and to whom, Michelle spoke. Her words gave voice to an oft ignored (but disproportionately affected) victim of America's gun violence: the black mother." Video of Obama's speech is in yesterday's Commentariat.

The Goldbugs. Paul Krugman: "Conservative-minded people tend to support a gold standard -- and to buy gold -- because they're very easily persuaded that 'fiat money,' money created on a discretionary basis in an attempt to stabilize the economy, is really just part of the larger plot to take away their hard-earned wealth and give it to you-know-who.... In modern America..., everything is political; and goldbuggism, which fits so perfectly with common political prejudices, will probably continue to flourish no matter how wrong it proves." ...

... Goldbugs, Ctd. Andrew Rosenthal: "The price of gold ... has fallen 17 percent since late 2011.... The explanation for this decline is fairly simple: Despite what the Ron Pauls of the world have been insisting for years, the Federal Reserve's loose monetary policy has not led to rampant inflation. The inflation rate was 1.6 percent in January and 2 percent in February."

Washington Post Editors: "President Obama is following through on the promise made at the start of his second term to stand up for the rights of the people of the District of Columbia. The inclusion in his proposed budget of a legislative provision that would give the District control over its own dollars is a significant development. With momentum building for budget autonomy -- D.C. residents are set to vote soon on a referendum on the issue -- Congress should take note and take the steps necessary to give the District its legitimate rights."

Peter Finn of the Washington Post: "The military justice system at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which has been dogged by charges of secret monitoring of proceedings and defense communications, became embroiled in a fresh controversy Thursday when it was revealed that hundreds of thousands of defense e-mails were turned over to the prosecution. The breach prompted Col. Karen Mayberry, the chief military defense counsel, to order all attorneys for Guantanamo detainees to stop using Defense Department computer networks to transmit privileged or confidential information until the security of such communications is assured."

Robert Parry: Tom Friedman is crazy. And stupid. Thanks to reader Bonnie for the link.

Right Wing World

Come out, come out, Dave Agema.Katie McDonough of Salon: "Family Research Council president and noted homophobe Tony Perkins hosted Republican National Committeeman and noted homophobe Dave Agema on the Wednesday broadcast of Perkins' 'Washington Watch' radio series.... Agema defended his decision to share a pseudoscientific 'research' paperthat alleges gays and lesbians are gonorrhea-riddled social deviants responsible for 'half the murders in major cities.' After expressing surprise that people found the 'research' and his subsequent comments to be hateful, Agema equated being gay with being an alcoholic...."

News Ledes

New York Times: "Marie Tallchief, a daughter of an Oklahoma oil family who grew up on an Indian reservation, found her way to New York and became one of the most brilliant American ballerinas of the 20th century, died on Thursday in Chicago. She was 88."

New York Times: "Jonathan Winters, the rubber-faced comedian whose unscripted flights of fancy inspired a generation of improvisational comics, and who kept television audiences in stitches with Main Street characters like Maude Frickert, a sweet-seeming grandmother with a barbed tongue and a roving eye, died on Thursday at his home in Montecito, Calif. He was 87."

Reuters: "U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry dismissed as 'unacceptable by any standard' weeks of bellicose warnings of impending nuclear war by North Korea and said Washington would never accept the reclusive state becoming a nuclear power. Kerry, addressing reporters after talks with South Korean President Park Geun-hye and leaders of the 28,000-strong U.S. military contingent in the country, also said the United States would defend its allies in the region if necessary."

AP: "Both of the white supremacist prison gang members whose names surfaced during an investigation into the slaying of Colorado's prisons chief are now behind bars. Colorado Springs authorities arrested Thomas Guolee, 31, around 5:30 p.m. Thursday.... Last week, fellow 211 Crew member James Lohr was arrested in Colorado Springs after a short chase."

AP: "Authorities say law officers in Arizona have intercepted an explosive device that was earmarked for Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office said late Thursday night that the device was contained in a package addressed to the sheriff at his downtown Phoenix office."

McClatchy News: "A promising young U.S. Foreign Service officer, three American soldiers and a civilian government contractor who were killed Saturday in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan probably wouldn't have been close to the blast if they hadn't gotten lost while walking to the school where they were to participate in a book-donation ceremony, according to an Afghan television reporter who was with them and was wounded in the attack.... A U.S. government official ... confirmed Wednesday night that the party had been on foot, and said earlier reports that they were in a vehicle convoy were inaccurate."

Al Jazeera: "Greece's unemployment rate reached a new record of 27.2 percent in January, new data has showed, reflecting the depth of the country's recession after years of austerity imposed under its international bailout."