Around the Virtual Watercooler

Here is an excerpted virtual conversation I had with friends today. The subject, mostly, is whether or not President Obama is up to the job, and if not, why not? Names are changed to protect the intelligent:

Marie:

My Off Times Square question du jour is “Does Obama Really Mean It?” Will he really fight for progressive ideals or is he just shitting us the way he did in 2008?

Aphrodite (part of this response follows an earlier thread):

I think the most likely reason the Bush war crimes were never prosecuted is that Congress has dirty hands too.  They were briefed.... maybe not the whole story but enough so they are accessories after, even during, the fact.  Pelosi made it clear that impeachment was off the table.  The corruption in the Bush Justice Dept. ran deep too, and doubtless vestiges of it still exist.  There is a cover-up of the cover-up.  Holder is less than useless. And Obama?  Add weakness and inexperience into the mix.  The generals rule him, so wouldn't be surprised if the CIA does too.

Apollo:

I think we were all way to happy to be rid of Bush to see that Obama was just not ready for this job. He was a great campaigner, but as a president? I think he's a middle of the roader. Granted, if we're honest, we have to admit he did a few good things. But it was the way he did them and the fact that had he been more forceful and hit the ground running with a staff that wasn't ready to stab him in the back (Summers, et al) and question his manhood (because Larry is such a stud) and if he had been ready to fight back against the kind of evil that Bush and company spread across the land, he could have been one of the truly great presidents. I remember Clinton once complaining that he never had the kind of opportunities that presidents need (crises, wars, etc) that thrust them into the ranks of the great. I think he's right on that one. Of course Clinton deep sixed himself on many scores as well. There was no lack of hubris there. But he had no problem going toe to toe with the execrable Newtie when Gingrich shut down the government. Obama would have asked permission to please can he keep the lights on in the White House because his kids have homework to do.

Obama was never the guy we all hoped he'd be. Probably not even the guy HE hoped he'd be.  And I have to agree with Marie who recently said something along the lines of him not being able to change who he is at this late date.  I think those kinds of change are possible. Asclepius [see below] could probably describe the technical apparatus behind life-changing psychological change (such as losing a loved one in a horrible way, or falling in love), the kind that come either from trauma or from some kind of massively epiphanous events. God knows there have been enough of those events over the last 3 years but none of them appear to have penetrated the Obama dome just yet. So, no, I don't think he'll be changing anytime soon.

So, I think this latest gambit is just that. Although "gambit" might be a little too aggressive a term. In chess one attempts a gambit with the idea of following through with any opening that may occur in your opponent's game plan. Obama has had any number of chances to plunge into the breach but each time he's decided it would be better to let his enemies carry away their wounded and rebuild their defenses. It reminds me of the maddening intransigence of the civil war general McClellan who ran the Army of the Potomac, preferring to drill and practice at war for month after month while incredible opportunities to strike at the heart of confederate troops passed him by. When his patience had finally run out, Lincoln sent McClellan a telegram saying "General, if you are not going to use your troops, I'd like to borrow them for a while."

I feel the same way about Obama. If he's not going to use his position as President, use the bully pulpit, and the FUCKING FOLLOW THROUGH ON THE GODDAM FUCKING RHETORIC....I'd  like to use it for just a month. I would leave a bloody trail through the ranks of these traitorous goddam fucking Republicans. "Pyhrric victory" I hear someone saying? Fucking right. I'd take any victory right now just as long as I take some of those pig-faced lying traitors down with me.

Marie:

Someone quoted in a news article (I’m a lot of help – can’t remember the article; can’t remember the someone) said Obama believed in a Washington that just doesn’t exist – where reasonable people sit down and work out reasonable solutions to the nation’s problems. I think that guy was right. Obama thought he could wave his magical presidential powers wand & charm a bunch of hardline, fuck-you-all-I’m-in-it-for-myself officially elected sociopaths just as he charmed millions of American people, including me. Rhetoric gets you elected; hardball gets your policies passed. Obama is like the Robert Redford character in “The Candidate” who says as the end of the film, after he’s just been elected, “Now what do I do?” Obama had no fucking idea – just dreams of getting his minions to send him daily to-do lists so he could solve the problems, one-by-one. His first full day’s schedule probably looked like this:

(1) Work out with Michelle in White House personal gym. (1 hour)

(2) Call world leaders. Accept congratulations. (2 hours)

(3) Call Mitch McConnell. Get him to agree to stimulus bill. Remind him to get his caucus behind him. Accept congratulations. (30 min.)

(4) Get Chief Justice Roberts over here to re-administer the oath. Accept congratulations. Pose for photo with CJ Fuck-Up. (10 min.)

(5) Play a little B-ball (1 hour)

(6) Have an apple & some cottage cheese. (15 min.)

(7) Close Gitmo. (5 min.)

(8) Call Wall Street CEOs. Tell them to quit giving themselves big bonuses, stop making those crooked deals, & start lending more. Accept congratulations. Hit them up for 2012. (1 1/2 hours)

(9) Talk to the kids about how their school day went. Congratulate them on doing so well. Show them the secret panel in the Oval Office desk. (15 min.)

(10) Tell Geithner to put those fucking banks in receivership & make sure there are no presidential fingerprints on the move. Give Geithner some public relations pointers. (15 min.)

(11) Stop by the Lincoln Memorial & ask Lincoln why he thought the job was so tough. Thank Secret Service detail. (30 min.)

Somehow it didn’t work out that way.

Aphrodite:

I read somewhere (forget where) that since Biden will be too old to run for president in five years, he will step down and become Sec. of State.  And that Obama will ask Xavier Becerra to be his running mate to get the dwindling Hispanic support back, especially given that Marco Rubio may be no. 2 on the GOP ticket.  This would set Becerra up to run in 2016 and snag the vote of the fast growing demographic in the USA.  And I betcha Hillary is on the short list for Supreme Court.

Apollo:

Hillary on the Supreme Court.....hmmm. I guess it would allow her to drop her pretense of being a war loving demagogue as she was during Bush II, if it was a pretense. When you're on the court you can just be your own true self. Like Sam Alito is an asshole and John Roberts is a lying piece of shit and Clarence Thomas is a far-right extremist who sleeps his way through arguments and the Dark Lord is a smug, know-it-all far right-wing wise ass, and....

Well, you get the idea.

It's not that I think it would be a bad idea. I think she might make a fine justice. Politically she might be one of the few Democrats who could make the cut seeing as Republicans would lambaste anyone without her political pedigree and connections whom they thought might actually rule in favor of actual justice rather than right-wing expediency. Hillary has worked hard at building connections across the aisle. But even those connections would evaporate in a congress ruled by the Issas and Ryans and Bachmanns, not to mention the Lil' Randys [Paul] in the senate who would vote against anyone who didn't masturbate to Ayn Rand.

Marie, too bad that list [above] is probably close to Obama's actual fantasy of day one.

Marie:

I see no chance of Hillary’s being nominated to the Court. Because of Washington acrimony, presidents have to nominate young candidates; they don’t have the luxury of giving their cronies Lifetime Achievement Awards. I haven’t done the statistics, but it’s a sure bet that turnover on the Court today is way lower than it ever has been. Of course people died younger in the old days (tho that was less true of people who could afford the best health care of the day), so you’d have to factor all that in. But still. Probably half of Americans weren’t even born when Scalia took the oath. Haven’t done the demographics there, either.

Apollo:

The biggest problem, as I see it, for us, is what, or who, next? If the political pendulum swings the way it usually does (and since Reagan, that pendulum swings much farther to the right with every cycle) we will have a Repuke president in five years. Five more years for Obama to hem and haw and let the Tea Party set the agenda. His eight years will end with some kind of dramatic flourish, something he can highlight in his memoirs, or more depressingly, it will end in disaster, despondency, spiritual destitution. And what will he say then?

"Apres moi, le deluge" would probably be appropriate. And truthful.

For who do the Democrats have in the wings? Hillary will be too old. Biden? LMAO. Who? There are no rising stars, even no faux stars a la Bobby Jindal. At one point I thought Jim Webb might be someone we could look to but I haven't heard a word from him in years.

So what we have to look forward to is one of the intellectual dwarfs now running on the Repuke side. Or someone even worse.

There will be no appetite for another Democratic president after this guy is through. None. So thank you for that, Mr. President.

Asclepius (weighing in late in the conversation [doctors are always late]):

Re: Obama's character and ability to change, the way I see it is that he has the temperament and intelligence of an excellent constitutional law professor, but not of a savvy, down in the dirt pol -- which, of course is exactly what he needs to be. He just does not have the guts for dirty fights, and what a shame that he needs to. But he does.

I think Obama is basically his mother's son.  She was a scholar and mediator par excellence. However, she was quite impractical in many ways and found it hard to stay focused. She was loved and honored for her fairness and decency and her ability to research and write simply and beautifully about the importance of craftmaking in the  Indonesian culture, especially among the women, who had for generations sustained their families and contribute to their culture. She  researched endlessly about the various villages and their differing customs and contributions. Some say she probably got too nitty-gritty. But that was her passion. She also "held court" among expatriates and Indonesians alike -- which is a bit what Barry enjoys doing. And she always stayed above the fray as a non-judgmental, tolerant role-model.

Obama inherited his mother's fluency and ability to write beautifully, and I think her values. However, he had no useful male role model, so never learned to deal with bullies who tormented him, much less bullies who were supposed to serve him -- i.e., Larry Summers. I do not think it is in his nature to be a warrior (as Hillary is) and all the male Republican candidates are, with the exception of Rick Santorum (who is just a wart).  He is a good strategist about things he deems important and stays on course like a laser beam -- think bin Laden. But he can't seem to grasp the concept and necessity of fighting the foe every day, and is unable to get his own hands dirty, although he is certainly able to let others do it for him. So ... he depends on his silver tongue and golden rhetoric to "play dirty," and we have seen how ineffectual that is.

I do think he has the news about the Republicans, but it remains to be seen whether he will just travel around and speechify to the American people about how obstructive "those people" are or whether he can take his silver tongue to the Hill and smite down the toads. I'm not very hopeful. The Bully Pulpit should be his strong suit, but he cannot manage the necessary strong or vile language!

The other part of Barry's character is the genetic inheritance from his ambitious, overly confident father -- a crazy alcoholic with hubris coming out of every pore. Put that together with his mediating professorial style and  essential decency and -- yikes. Not a fit.

I agree with Marie that he cannot change who he is. None of us can, really. We can change our perspective, come to new understandings, and gain wisdom (or not), but we cannot change our essential temperament. Whatever repetoire we learn and put into practice will be in our own style.

The Commentariat -- September 21

John Dickerson of Slate thinks this time the President really means what he says -- because "the previous approach [of caving] didn't work." CW: yeah, we noticed. ...

... I've posted a "Does He Really Mean It This Time?" page on Off Times Square today. You can write on this or something else, as usual. ...

... David Kocieniewski of the New York Times: "President Obama's proposal for a new tax on millionaires echoes a call in many countries struggling with budget deficits and overwhelming debts to make the wealthy pay more. Britain and France have imposed new taxes on their highest earners — and Italy, Spain, Greece and Japan are considering similar moves.... Obama ... has also framed his plan as a way to make the system more equitable. Specifically, his proposal would counteract decades of tax reductions for most Americans that have given the wealthy the most benefit. But the idea being embraced by much of the world faces strong opposition in the United States from Republicans and other conservatives who say it would harm the economy and cost jobs." CW: another he said/he said report. ...

... Steve Benen finds some cracks in the Republicans' no new taxes ever policy. Benen notes that this is because all the polls are against the GOP policy; Americans want the rich to pay more.

** "Doom!" The Lessons of History Fall on Deaf Ears. John Judis has an excellent long piece in The New Republic: "Unless there is a fundamental — and difficult-to-imagine — change in the way our politics interacts with our economy, the United States and much of the world are headed for a very grim future." I highly recommend it, especially to our conservative readers who are trying to decide which Republican candidate will do the least harm. Answer: None of 'em. ...

... Paul Krugman recommends Judis' article & adds, "The amazing thing now is not that we’re having a crisis, it’s the fact that we’re having the same crisis, and making the same mistakes. A lot of the blame goes to the economists, by the way, who abandoned what they used to know — and many of whom are giving bad advice now, I firmly believe, based more on ego and political affiliation than on analysis. That is, I believe that we’re looking at a moral failure as well as an intellectual failure."

David Corn, in The New Republic, parodies & takes down David Brooks for his nasty little lies about the Obama deficit-reduction plan. ...

... Tim Noah, also in The New Republic, is just plain sick of Brooks' bullshit about the rich paying all the taxes & how Obama is being "mean and intransigent" because he won't give the rich a break. Noah writes, "Oh, please. The top 10 percent pays nearly 70 percent of all income taxes [about which Brooks whined] because the top 10 percent makes half the income." ...

... AND ...

... "you people" being Brooks. Krugman writes, "Tax policy has very much leaned into that growing inequality, not against it — and anyone who says otherwise should not be trusted on this issue, or any other." (Emphasis added.) CW: it is stunning that one NYT columnist would call another completely untrustworthy, and that's what Krugman said about Brooks today: that David Brooks cannot be trusted to be honest about any issue.

New York Times Editors: "Troy Davis is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday for the 1989 killing of a police officer in Savannah, Ga. The Georgia pardon and parole board’s refusal to grant him clemency is appalling in light of developments after his conviction: reports about police misconduct, the recantation of testimony by a string of eyewitnesses and reports from other witnesses that another person had confessed to the crime.... The board’s failure to commute Mr. Davis’s death sentence to life without parole was a tragic miscarriage of justice." ...

... Steve Kornacki of Salon on the implications of Davis' impending execution for the death penalty -- and, implicitly -- what it says about Americans.

President Obama should take a moment out of his very busy schedule today to commute the sentence of Mr. Davis to life without possibility of parole. Yes, he can. -- Constant Weader

CW: Bob Reich agrees with me (almost word-for-word! -- see today's Ledes): "Whatever shred of doubt you may have harbored about the determination of congressional Republicans to keep the economy in the dumps through Election Day should now be gone. Today, in advance of a key meeting of the Federal Reserve Board’s Open Market Committee to decide what to do about the continuing awful economy and high unemployment, top Republicans ...  stated in no uncertain terms the Fed should take no further action to lower long-term interest rates and juice the economy.... Besides, they've never met a government institution they don’t mind trashing." ...

... Steve Benen: "... the leaders of a major political party appear eager, if not desperate, to prevent steps that may improve the economy. The top four GOP members of Congress, including the Speaker of the House, practically demanded yesterday that no steps be taken at all as our anemic growth stalls and the job crisis intensifies. [CW Note: all links that follow are Benen's, & they point to the evidence of his assertions.] The 'sabotage' question comes up from time to time, and this certainly won’t help. As things stand, Republican leaders, some of whom have admitted that defeating President Obama is their single highest priority, now want the Fed to sit on its hands, want to strip the American Jobs Act of its most effective measures, and want to raise middle-class taxes. Oh, and they’re threatening to shut down the government, too. These are just the positions they’ve talked up over the last week." ...

     ... CW: Actually, Matt, I think the story of the day is the execution of Troy Davis -- a man who may be innocent (see links above). I am physically sick about it.

Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren appeared on Morning Joe today. And she sticks it to assholes Mark Halperin & Joe Scarborough who think they're going to hit her with a gotcha question:

Josh Boak of Politico: Contra a Republican Congressional parade of industrial whiners, "Federal regulations may not be so bad after all. Challenging a flood of firsthand business testimonials about the burden of federal red tape, new research by environmental and consumer groups suggests some regulations might even lay the groundwork for a lasting economic recovery." Thanks to Doug R. for the link.

Steve Thomma of McClatchy News: "A new McClatchy-Marist poll finds that Obama looks increasingly vulnerable in next year's election, with a majority of voters believing he'll lose to any Republican, a solid plurality saying they'll definitely vote against him and most potential Republican challengers gaining on him." CW: Hmm, maybe progressives should be defending Obama more. ...

... AND Andy Borowitz of the award-winning Borowitz Report, always a reliable source for public polling results: "Frustration with President Barack Obama has grown to the point where some voters are now considering replacing him with people who appear to be blatantly brain-damaged, according to a new poll released today."

AlterNet: "Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has been stripped of legal immunity ... for acts of torture against US citizens authorized while he was in office. The 7th Circuit made the ruling in the case of two American contractors who were tortured by the US military in Iraq after uncovering a smuggling ring within an Iraqi security company [which] ... was under contract to the Department of Defense.... The ruling comes as Rumsfeld begins his book tour with a visit to Boston on Wednesday, September 21, and as new, uncensored photos of Abu Ghraib spark fresh outrage across [the] Internet." CW Warning: horrendous photos accompany the article.

What Ron Suskind wrote in his book on the Obama White House:

Looking back, this place would be in court for a hostile workplace.... Because it actually fit all of the classic legal requirements for a genuinely hostile workplace for women. -- Anita Dunn

What Dunn actually told Suskind, based on his recorded interview of Dunn, which Washington Post reporters reviewed:

I remember once I told Valerie [Jarrett] that, I said if it weren’t for the president, this place would be in court for a hostile workplace.... Because it actually fit all of the classic legal requirements for a genuinely hostile workplace to women. -- Anita Dunn

     -- Via Kevin Drum of Mother Jones. CW: Substantive difference? You betcha.

A Sweatshop in Allentown. Spencer Soper of the Allentown, Pennsylvania, Morning Call documents conditions in Allentown's Amazon.com warehouse where summer temperatures regularly rise to 100 degrees with a heat index well above that,they keep a team of paramedics [in an air-conditioned room] to deal with all the heatstroke victims, there have been numerous OSHA complaints including at least one from a doctor who treated heatstroke sufferers, Amazon demands workers perform at super-human speed even under such conditions, and most workers are temps, many of whom get fired & marched out in front of others as examples. CW: Now wonder they call it "Amazon." Allentown has always been a factory town, & it's had a high unemployment rate for decades. There is a high immigrant population there, and it's rough. When I lived in nearby Western New Jersey, politicians used to like to scare their constituents by warning, "If we don't do [whatever], they'll bus people in from Allentown." You might want to think twice before you buy your next book or doodad from Amazon. I'm boycotting the bastards. Thanks to Kate M. for the link.

Would you buy a $16 muffin or pay $8.24 for a cup of coffee? Oh, wait, you already did. But somebody in the DOJ ate it. Jerry Markon of the Washington Post: "A report released Tuesday by the [Justice] Department’s acting inspector general, Cynthia A. Schnedar, is full of what she called 'wasteful or extravagant spending' at 10 law enforcement conferences spanning the George W. Bush and Obama administrations. Descriptions of cookies and brownies costing the government nearly $10 each and beef Wellington hors d’oeuvres at $7.32 per serving struck a nerve in Washington, where austerity and belt-tightening are the watchwords at a time of economic hardship."

Ed Kilgore, the Democratic Strategist, has a fairly funny piece about Phony Pundits Universal, Ltd. a few of whom immediately crawled out of jumped from the woodwork to decry Obama's dastardly "shift to the left."

Right Wing World

Israel is our oldest and most stable democratic ally in that region.... I also as a Christian have a clear directive to support Israel. So from my perspective, it's pretty easy. Both as an American and as a Christian, I am going to stand with Israel. -- Rick Perry, September 20 ...

... Rick Perry, Way Dumber & More Dangerous than Bush. William Saletan of Slate: "By framing U.S. foreign policy in terms of a religious alliance between Christians and Jews, Perry is validating the propaganda of Islamic extremists. He's jeopardizing peace, Israel, and the United States. [President George W.] Bush understood that the terrorists who struck us on 9/11 wanted a religious war. The key to defeating them wasn't to wage that war, but to refuse it. That's why Bush constantly praised Islam, emphasized American freedom of religion, and dismissed Osama Bin Laden as a renegade killer of Muslims."

Dahlia Lithwick in Slate: "The same Republicans who are dubious of government's ability to do anything right have an apparently bottomless faith in the capital-justice system. Everything is broken in America, they claim—except the machinery of death." CW Note: Lithwick wrote her post before the U.S. Supreme Court stayed the execution of Duane Buck, another person Perry was sure it was fine to send to his death.

Mixed Signals. Michael Finnegan of the Los Angeles Times: "On her visit to a traffic-signal plant Monday, Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann called it an example of how President Obama's policies are 'continuing to dig us deeper into the hole toward another recession.' Standing before a row of shiny orange trailers carrying portable solar-powered traffic lights, she said her plans for a smaller government with fewer rules and lower spending would help OMJC Signal Inc. 'grow, grow, grow, grow, grow.' ... OMJC thrives on the kind of road and bridge spending that Obama has promoted as a key remedy to the nation's economic slowdown. As much as 80% of OMJC's revenue comes from government, according to the company's chief executive, Arlen Yost..., a conservative Republican.... Yost acknowledged that his company has profited from the infrastructure spending promoted by the president." CW: I'd day Bachmann & Yost are tied for Dumbest. But I'll warrant it's a close one.

Listen to Jerry Brown, Mr. Obama. Adam Nagourney of the New York Times: California Gov. Jerry Brown, who served two terms as governor three decades ago, "has told friends he was unprepared for the extent, in his view, to which Republicans have not made sufficient efforts to accommodate him on critical issues, like putting on the ballot measures to extend taxes to avoid budget cuts.... Again and again, he said, he has found that approaches that once worked ... were no longer effective." CW: the local leaders of Right Wing World want you to fail, Governor.

Not a big deal, BUT ... Juana Summers of Politico: "... a new poll by Public Policy Polling ... showed [Texas Gov. Rick] Perry with a negative approval in Texas: while 45 percent of the state’s voters approve of Perry’s job performance, 48 percent of Texas voters say they don’t approve."

News Ledes

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is updating their Webpage on Troy Davis. The New York Times is also updating their story regularly. You'll have to refresh the pages. Pete Williams on MSNBC-TV just (at about 7:15 pm ET) said it appears Georgia is waiting to hear whether the U.S. Supreme Court will grant a stay. At 8:00 p.m. ET, MSNBC is still reporting Davis' execution has been delayed pending the U.S. Supreme Court decision. ...

     ... New York Times Update: "The United States Supreme Court rejected a last-ditch request to step in late Wednesday to stay the Georgia execution of Troy Davis, who was convicted of gunning down a Savannah police officer 22 years ago, after Mr. Davis filed an eleventh-hour plea Wednesday with the high court." ...

     ... At about 10:50 pm ET, Pete Williams of NBC News said it was likely Mr. Davis would be executed tonight. ...

     ... MSNBC Update: Davis was executed at 11:08 pm ET. This is a tragic day for the nation.

President Obama at the U.N.:

     ... The White House site has videos of President Obama meeting in New York City with other world leaders.

President Obama addressed the United Nations General Assembly this morning. The text of the speech, as prepared, is here (pdf). New York Times: "President Obama declared his opposition to the Palestinian Authority’s bid for statehood through the Security Council on Wednesday, throwing the weight of the United States directly in the path of the Arab democracy movement even as he hailed what he called the democratic aspirations that have taken hold throughout the Middle East and North Africa."

Reuters: "The Federal Reserve on Wednesday looks set to launch a fresh effort to invigorate the faltering economic recovery, embarking on what could be the first in a series of incremental steps to foster stronger growth." ...

     ... New York Times Update: "The Federal Reserve announced a new plan Wednesday to stimulate growth by purchasing $400 billion in long-term Treasury securities with proceeds from the sale of short-term government debt, defying Republican demands to refrain from new actions. In extending its campaign of novel efforts to shake the economy from its torpor, the Fed said that it was responding to evidence that there was a clear need for help." CW: What? And ignore extraordinary pressure from Republicans to let the country go to rack and ruin? I guess Ben Bernanke is "almost treasonous," after all. Good for him. (See next link.)

... BUT New York Times: "Even though the financial markets have been counting on the Federal Reserve to take action, Republican Congressional leadership sent a letter to the Federal Reserve chairman on Tuesday evening urging it not to engage in further stimulus." CW: this should end any lingering doubts you might have that Republicans don't really want the economy to tank. Yes, they do.

Washington Post: "The Obama administration has sharply warned Pakistan that it must cut ties with a leading Taliban group based in the tribal region along the Afghan border and help eliminate its leaders, according to officials from both countries. In what amounts to an ultimatum, administration officials have indicated that the United States will act unilaterally if Pakistan does not comply."

Washington Post: "The two Americans held in Iran for more than two years will be freed within hours, their lawyer said on Wednesday. After waiting several days for a judge to return from vacation, lawyer Masoud Shafiei secured a second signature that was needed to free Shane Bauer and Joshua Fattal on $1 million bail." ...

     ** New York Times Update: "Two Americans arrested while hiking along the Iran-Iraq frontier two years ago and sentenced to eight years for espionage were released Wednesday on $1 million bail by the Iranian authorities, news agencies reported. The men, Shane M. Bauer and Joshua F. Fattal, both 29, were seen by reporters for The Associated Press leaving Evin prison in a diplomatic convoy including Swiss and Omani officials. Press TV, a state-controlled broadcaster in Iran, also said that the men had left the prison and were headed in the direction of Tehran’s international airport."

The Commentariat -- September 20

I've posted a comments page today on Off Times Square on the President's deficit-reduction speech of yesterday.

Markos Moulitsas gives the President a Thumbs-Up: in reading "Obama's deficit reduction plan, looking for that poison pill. It looked too good to be true—an aggressive and truly progressive position at odds with his previous efforts at bipartisan compromise.... The process-focused consensus builder was a flop, and now we get to try something new, something inspiring, and something that genuinely motivates me to fight." ...

... Daily Kos & Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) are calling on the supercommittee to support (1) "Independent review by the Congressional Budget Office to measure how many jobs it would create or eliminate; & (2) "Reject any budget package that would cost more jobs than it creates." You can sign a petition in support of their position here. I did. ...

... Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: President "Obama ... seems to have given up on his strategy of nearly a year, beginning when Republicans won control of the House last November, of being the eager-to-compromise 'reasonable adult' — in the White House’s phrasing — in his relations with them." ...

... Dana Milbank: "... it was refreshing to see the president in the Rose Garden on Monday morning delivering a speech that, for once, appealed to the heart rather than the cerebrum.... Whether his plan to tax the wealthy ever could — or should — become law is not really the point. Obama finally gave his side something to stand for after too much uncertainty. He also showed that he is finally learning to negotiate." ...

... Paul Krugman: "some notes on the actual class war that has taken place over the past 30 years — namely class warfare for the rich against the middle class."

... Karen Garcia: "The reviews of today's speech are mixed between those who feel it's too little, too late and a big fat fake, to those who are experiencing renewed hope that our beleaguered president has finally grown a spine, has drawn a line in the sand and thrown down the gauntlet and is fighting for the people. I tend to go along with the former. Obama should be leaving the deficit out of it. He should be leaving the social safety net out of it. He should be calling for higher taxes in order to create jobs, period. Working people will bring down the deficit once they're allowed to work." ...

... Jonathan Cohn of The New Republic: "President Obama’s new deficit reduction plan includes about $320 billion in cuts to government health care programs. Most of the cuts [are]  from Medicare.... But these reductions are less severe, and less worrisome, than some of the proposals Obama indicated he was willing to support over the summer.... The cuts ... are more or less consistent with the kind of cuts that you find in the Affordable Care Act: They are reductions designed to change the way Medicare pays for treatment and services, ideally (although not always) in ways that will actually improve the efficiency or quality of care." ...

... Sam Baker of The Hill: "There’s something for just about everyone to dislike in the $320 billion of healthcare savings President Obama proposed Monday."

... Brad Plumer of the Washington Post reports on five unexpected ideas in President Obama's deficit reduction plan, one of which is reforming the Postal Service.

The Wrong War. CW: A commenter in yesterday's Off Times Square got miffed at me for "deliberately misleading" readers on Paul Volcker's record as Fed Chair. Well, no I didn't, but the point I made was an aside & not a very important one, so I deleted it. Now comes Paul Krugman, who gets to the heart of the Volcker Fallacy: "Volcker, I’m sorry to say, is worrying about refighting the 1970s when we’re actually refighting the 1930s. And fighting the wrong war is a good way to lose the one we’re in." ...

     ... AND Krugman: "There are worse things than inflation," Part 2.

Landon Thomas of the New York Times: "As concerns grow that Greece may default on its government debt, economists are starting to map out possible outcomes. While no one knows for certain what will happen, it’s a given that financial crises always have unexpected consequences, and many predict there will be collateral damage. Because of these fears, Greece is working frantically in concert with other European nations to avoid default, by embracing further austerity measures it has promised in return for more European bailout money...."

Helene Cooper of the New York Times: "Increasingly convinced that President Bashar al-Assad of Syria will not be able to remain in power, the Obama administration has begun to make plans for American policy in the region after he exits. In coordination with Turkey, the United States has been exploring how to deal with the possibility of a civil war among Syria’s Alawite, Druse, Christian and Sunni sects, a conflict that could quickly ignite other tensions in an already volatile region."

Jeff Benedict in the Hartford Courant: At a social event, Connecticut Supreme Court Justice Richard Palmer apologized to Susette Kelo for his vote in favor of the City of New London. A vote in favor of Kelo would have changed the outcome of the case, at least at the state level. The U.S. Supreme Court, in a controversial 5-4 decision, ruled for the city to tear down a neighborhood in favor of urban redevelopment that never happened. The redeveloper backed out of the deal after the city moved Kelo's house & razed the neighborhood.

Horse Race Prelims. Susan Page of USA Today: "Texas Gov. Rick Perry leads former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney for the GOP presidential nomination, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds, in what is becoming a battle between the candidate who excites more Republicans and the one who shows stronger appeal among swing voters. The only other candidate in double digits is Texas Rep. Ron Paul, at 13%. Support for Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann has plummetted to 5%."

Right Wing World

Too Much Noon-Day Sun. Jillian Rayfield of TPM: After meeting with a local Tea Party group last month who thinks President Obama's long-form birth certificate could be a forgery, "infamous Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio ... announced a five-person 'Cold Case Posse' that will delve into the issue of President Obama's birth certificate."

News Ledes

Reuters: "The House of Representatives unexpectedly defeated a bill that would fund the federal government past September 30 on Wednesday as dozens of Republicans broke with their party to push for deeper spending cuts. The measure failed by a vote of 195 to 230, with 48 of the chamber's most conservative Republicans joining Democrats in opposition. It was an embarrassment for House Republican leaders who have at times struggled to rein in rank-and-file conservatives." New York Times story here.

President Obama salutes the people of Libya:

     ... New York Times: "President Obama on Tuesday extended to Libya’s transitional leader a diplomatic honor never offered his predecessor, meeting formally with Mustafa Abdel-Jalil at the United Nations and heralding the victory of Libyan rebels who brought an end to the 42-year reign of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi."

New York Times: "Al Jazeera, the pan-Arab news network controlled by Qatar, named a member of the Qatari royal family on Tuesday to replace its top news director following disclosures from the group WikiLeaks indicating that the news director had modified the network’s coverage of the Iraq war in response to pressure from the United States."

New York Times: "Troy Davis, whose death row case ignited an international campaign to save his life, has lost what appeared to be his last attempt to avoid death by lethal injection on Wednesday. Rejecting pleas by Mr. Davis’s lawyers that shaky witness testimony and a lack of physical evidence presented enough doubt about his guilt to spare him death, the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles ruled on Tuesday morning that Mr. Davis, 42, should die for killing Mark MacPhail, an off-duty police officer, in a Savannah parking lot in 1989." Atlanta Journal-Constitution story here. A pdf of the ruling is here.

AP: "The world economy has entered a 'dangerous new phase,' according to the chief economist of the International Monetary Fund. As a result, the international lending organization has sharply downgraded its economic outlook for the United States and Europe through the end of next year."

New York Times: "Actions taken by David M. Becker, the former general counsel of the Securities and Exchange Commission, in the Bernard L. Madoff matter are being referred to the Department of Justice for a possible criminal investigation to determine whether they ran afoul of federal conflict-of-interest laws."

New York Times: "The most prominent Afghan official trying to negotiate a reconciliation with the Taliban was assassinated Tuesday night by a suicide bomber with explosives tucked in his turban who had been brought to his home by a trusted emissary, officials said. The assassination was a potentially devastating blow to the Afghan-led peace process aimed at ending 10 years of war."

New York Times: "The 18-year-old “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy officially ended at midnight...." Washington Post story here. AP story here.

CNN: in a surprise appearance, Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) showed up at an event Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry held in Rangel's district. Rangel said his purpose was pleasantries, but he later blasted Perry in a statement.