The Commentariat -- Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

President Obama speaks to volunteers today:

My column in the New York Times eXaminer is titled "Springtime for Vultures -- Ross Douthat on the Benefits of Creative Destruction." The NYTX front page is here. You can contribute to the online journal here. ...

... CW: Writing on another topic, but still backing up my riposte to Douthat, Paul Krugman writes, "... the bulk of a consumer dollar spent in America falls on American-produced goods and services. For one thing, most consumer spending is on services, few of which are really tradable. For another, even if the thing you buy in WalMart says 'Made in China', the price includes a lot of US value-added in the form of transportation and retailing costs."

Oh, and the Commentariat is open for comments.... Thanks to Haley Simon & Kate Madison for the "Atta Girls" in yesterday's comments!

Paul Krugman: "When we observe Martin Luther King’s Birthday, we have something very real to celebrate: the civil rights movement was one of America’s finest hours, and it made us a nation truer to its own ideals. Yet if King could see America now, I believe that he would be disappointed, and feel that his work was nowhere near done.... King — who was campaigning for higher wages when he was assassinated — would surely have considered soaring inequality an evil to be opposed.... The chances that someone born into a low-income family will end up with high income, or vice versa, are significantly lower here than in Canada or Europe. And there’s every reason to believe that our low economic mobility has a lot to do with our high level of income inequality.... Mitt Romney says that we should discuss income inequality, if at all, only in 'quiet rooms.' There was a time when people said the same thing about racial inequality. Luckily, however, there were people like Martin Luther King who refused to stay quiet." ...

Rick Hertzberg: Martin Luther King, Jr. -- a "drum major for justice"? Nope. Hertzberg suggests the Naitional Parks Service carve the Web address for King's full speech into what he and I agree is an "unfortunate" monument "unequal to" King on the National Mall. That Web address -- and the speech, of course, is here.

... Stephen Tuck, who is British, in a New York Times op-ed on the influence of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., outside the U.S. In the U.S., "I have heard the man who marched for jobs and freedom invoked by all sides of the political spectrum. African-American activists seek to honor his legacy by calling for race-based remedies to combat stubborn racial inequality. Conservatives invoke his color-blind ideology to remove those same race-based remedies."

Andrew Sullivan in Newsweek/Daily Beast on President Obama's long game. Pretty interesting.

Tim Egan: "The Tea Party has proved to be a fraud, betraying the professed ideals from which it sprang.... The Tea Party gang never intended to govern, or — God forbid — compromise. They were birthed by Fox News and right-wing radio, where fact-challenged outrage is the blood that keeps the heart pumping."

Michael Fletcher of the Washington Post: the train to nowhere is going nowhere. President Obama's plans for high-speed rail hit speed bump after speed bump.

Right Wing World

What's the Matter with Kansas? Well, they voted in this guy. Then his fellow Republicans made him Speaker of the state House. I think the Secret Service should pay him a call, preferably while he's in the middle of delivering a speech on the floor of the Kansas state House.

A short, brilliant post by Driftglass: "I personally find it hilarious that the only way for the 75% of the GOP who fucking hate Willard Romney to deny him the nomination would be to act like a pack of evil S!O!C!I!A!L!I!S!T!S and put the interest of the group ahead of the interest of any one individual." Watch the clip.

Post Mortem. Ben Smith of BuzzFeed: Jon "Huntsman's campaign has been, from the beginning, a fantasy driven by a fundamental misunderstanding of his own party.... The party Huntsman imagined -- modernizing, reforming, and youthful -- could still be born."

David Carr of the New York Times on the film "When Mitt Romney Came to Town": "... there is something deeply funny about watching Republicans, who routinely invoke the film industry as an epicenter of all that is wrong with this country, brazenly aping the techniques of Hollywood to influence how primary voters see the front-runner. 'The Republicans fought for as much freedom as possible in campaign spending, but now it looks like they are beginning to eat themselves,' said [producer/director Judd] Apatow. 'I don’t think they anticipated that they would use some of that money to Swift Boat themselves.'”

Jeffrey Frank of the New Yorker on a bit of the history of the modern Republican party: ".... the increasingly angry, suspicious, and divided party of Romney, Gingrich, Santorum, and Perry seems ever more immersed in its current orthodoxies. None of the candidates, though, seem the least bit interested in even addressing how they, or their party, might actually govern the 'whole people' of a fractious nation."

Rick Santorum, Earmark King. Michael Luo & Mike McIntire of the New York Times: "A review of some of his earmarks, viewed alongside his political donations, suggests that the river of federal money Mr. Santorum helped direct to Pennsylvania paid off handsomely in the form of campaign cash."

Brett Blackledge & Stephen Braun of the AP: "Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul has been spending large amounts on airfare as a congressman, flying first class on dozens of taxpayer-funded flights to his home state. The practice conflicts with the image that Paul portrays as the only presidential candidate serious about cutting federal spending."

Ariel Levy of the New Yorker has a new profile of Callista Gingrich, which I haven't yet taken the time to read, but I might.

CW: I hate to promote the Huff Post, but this article by Robert Greenwald is too good to pass on: "Billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch ... released its rankings this week of senators and congressman who tow the Koch line most, and it gave a total of 44 A+s for the 112th Congress. Americans for Prosperity, the Tea Party group funded by the Kochs, based its grades on opposition to affordable health care, clean air, alternative energy and net neutrality. Scores were also boosted if the elected official signed the tea party group's anti-revenue pledge.... The five senators who scored 100 percent on the Americans for Prosperity how-can-we-make-the-Kochs-richer test received $187,400 in campaign contributions from the Kochs and their allies. These senators are Ron Johnson (R-WI), Tom Coburn (R-OK), Mike Crapo (R-ID), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and potential Republican vice presidential nominee Marco Rubio, a freshman from Florida." ...

... AND this from the Koch Boys Gang. Jake Tapper of ABC News: "Americans for Prosperity, the conservative advocacy group that promotes lower taxes and fewer regulations for businesses, is unleashing a $6 million ad campaign against President Obama leading up to the State of the Union on January 24, ABC News has learned. The ad contains claims that are not tethered to facts.... The 60-second TV ad seems an attempt to muddy the waters amidst the charges against GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney and his tenure at Bain Capital...."

News Ledes

CW: Oh, I completely missed the fact that there's another GOP presidential debate tonight beginning at 9 pm ET. And, as usual, I'll be completely missing the debate itself. Update: here's the Times liveblog. Here's the WashPo's liveblog.

New York Times: "Reversing himself in what had become an awkward intraparty stalemate for Democrats, Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey said Friday that he would no longer block President Obama’s nominee to a federal appeals court."

Despite our nation’s record of progress, and long tradition of extending voting rights – today, a growing number of citizens are worried about the same disparities, divisions, and problems that Dr. King fought throughout his life to address and overcome. -- AG Eric Holder, at an MLK Day event in Columbia, S.C. ...

... Politico: "Attorney General Eric Holder used Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy on the anniversary of the civil rights leader’s birthday Monday to emphasize the Obama administration’s dedication to protecting the American people from discriminatory voting practices.... Holder’s remarks in the Palmetto State come just weeks after the Justice Department blocked the state’s new voter ID law from taking effect, citing an unfair burden on minority voters."

New York Times: "Jon M. Huntsman Jr. will announce Monday that he is ending his bid for the Republican presidential nomination and endorsing Mitt Romney, narrowing the field and erasing a challenge to Mr. Romney from the moderate wing of his party." ...

     ... Politico Update: "Jon Huntsman ended his presidential campaign Monday and immediately endorsed Mitt Romney."

New York Times: "Iraqi authorities have detained a few hundred foreign contractors in recent weeks, industry officials say, including many Americans who work for the United States Embassy, in one of the first major signs of the Iraqi government’s asserting its sovereignty after the American troop withdrawal last month."

New York Times: "The owners of a cruise ship that ran aground and capsized near an Italian island, killing at least six people, on Monday blamed human error by its commander, saying he made an “unapproved, unauthorized maneuver” to divert from its programmed course."

AP: "House and Senate negotiators are drawing on Obama's budget and the work of the defunct congressional supercommittee on deficit reduction to come up with the $160 billion or so needed to continue the tax cut and federal jobless benefits. Both of are set to expire Feb. 29."

AP: "Al-Qaida militants seized full control of a town south of the Yemeni capital on Monday, overrunning army positions, storming the local prison and freeing at least 150 inmates, security officials said. The capture of Radda in Bayda province, some 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of Sanaa, underscores the growing strength of al-Qaida in Yemen as it continues to take advantage of the weakness of a central government struggling to contain nearly a year of massive anti-government protests."

AP: "Pakistan's Supreme Court ramped up the pressure on the nation's beleaguered government Monday, beginning contempt proceedings against the prime minister for failing to carry out its order to reopen a corruption case against the president. The court ordered Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to appear before the bench on Thursday to explain his refusal to reopen the graft investigation, injecting fresh uncertainty into the political crisis threatening to engulf the country."

The Commentariat -- January 15, 2012

My column in today's New York Times eXaminer is on Frank Bruni's latest escape from fact-based commentary. The NYTX front page is here. You can contribute to NYTX here.

Nicholas Kristof: GOP presidential candidates warn that President Obama wants to turn the U.S. into a European socialist nation. "... it is worth acknowledging Europe’s labor rigidities and its lethargy in resolving the current economic crisis.... But embracing a caricature of Europe as a failure reveals our own ignorance — and chauvinism." Despite problems, Western Europe is doing better economically and socially than the U.S.

I didn’t know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was. So I backed away and turned it over to some other people, people I thought would have a little more expertise than I did. It didn’t work out that way. -- Former Penn State Coach Joe Paterno, on why he didn't confront Jerry Sandusky, accused of 50 counts of child sexual abuse ...

... Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post interviewed Paterno on the Sandusky scandal. Her story is here. Video of Jenkins discussing the interview is here, and includes brief audio clips of the interview. The Post's page on the scandal is here.

Paul Krugman: Angela Merkel, "Still barreling down the road to nowhere."

CW: Here's a Friday afternoon White House document dump I missed (and of course that's the idea). Carol Leonnig & Joe Stephens of the Washington Post: "Senior White House officials were warned that solar-panel-maker Solyndra planned to announce layoffs just before the hotly contested November 2010 midterm elections, newly released e-mails show. The White House also got advance notice that the company had agreed to postpone delivering the politically damaging news, according to the e-mails provided Friday by a government source. Energy Department officials persuaded the company to delay the announcement until after Election Day."

Jonathan Alter in the Washington Monthly: President "Obama was reportedly stunned that [White House Chief-of-Staff Bill] Daley quit after only a year in the post, but he shouldn’t have been. The affable Chicago banker had already experienced Washington’s classic death of a thousand cuts."

For a project I'm working on, I just read Jimmy Carter's 1976 Democratic convention nomination acceptance speech. We have not come a long way, baby. But the goals President Carter expressed in the bicentennial year are still worthy -- and most are still just goals more than 35 years later. Hope springs eternal, even if progress is much too elusive.

Right Wing World

** Mitt Romney Was Always a Liar. William Cohan, in a Washington Post op-ed: When Mitt Romney was running Bain Capital, Cohan has first-hand knowledge that Bain didn't play fair; it so often played bait-and-switch, to the unfair detriment of companies for sale, that Cohan refused to deal with Bain. Bain's "word [was] not worth the paper it [was] printed on.... This win-at-any-cost approach makes me wonder how a President Romney would negotiate with Congress, or with China, or with anyone else — and what a promise, pledge or endorsement from him would actually mean.... When he was running Bain Capital, his word was not his bond." ...

... 'Corporations are people'? In this little figure of speech, wouldn’t that make Mitt Romney a metaphorical serial killer? ... Steve Benen, August 11, 2011 ...

... "Mitt the Ripper," courtesy of the Stephen Colbert Jon Stewart superPAC (sorry, this thing may just start on you uninvited; just click it off):

... For a slightly less bombastic take, here's a brief clip of Paul Krugman on Fareed Zakaria's GPS:

... Mitt Romney Is White! He's Really White! Lee Siegel in a New York Times op-ed: "Mr. Romney’s Mormonism may end up being a critical advantage. Evangelicals might wring their hands over the prospect of a Mormon president, but there is no stronger bastion of pre-civil-rights-America whiteness than the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.... Mr. Romney meticulously cultivates [his] whiteness.... He is implacably polite, tossing off phrases like 'oh gosh' with Stepford bonhomie.... He has ... a practiced insincerity, an instant sunniness that, though evidently inauthentic, provides a bland note that keeps everyone calm. This is the bygone world of Babbitt, of small-town Rotarians. Mr. Romney does not merely use the past as an inspirational reference point.... He conjures it as a total social, cultural and political experience that must be resurrected and reinhabited." ...

... Laurie Goodstein of the New York Times: But many white evangelical Christians consider Mormonism apostasy. ...

... Maureen Dowd begins, then drops an attempt to compare & contrast Romney & Obama, but some of the details she provides about Romney are mildly interesting. ...

... Your Sickening Romney Story of the Day -- A Come-to-Willard Moment. Emily Friedman of ABC News. "God" tells a desperate unemployed South Carolina woman to seek out Mitt Romney and Romney reaches into his wallet and pulls out "about $50 or $60," and gives it to the woman. Noblesse oblige. The woman is now voluntarily cleaning Romney's Columbia, South Carolina campaign office -- I guess Romney got his money's worth. A jobs program worthy of Newt Gingrich's schoolkids-to-janitors plan. Who needs big government when the needy can beg political candidates for alms?

Stephen Colbert appears on ABC News's "This Week with Whoever." The interview might have gone better if "Whoever" had not been George Stephanopoulos. Colbert discusses, among other things, the superPAC ad "Mitt the Ripper," seen -- sometimes without your prompting -- above:

News Ledes

No SOPA. AP: "The Obama administration raised concerns Saturday about efforts in Congress that it said would undermine 'the dynamic, innovative global Internet,' urging lawmakers to approve measures this year that balance the need to fight piracy and counterfeiting against an open Internet. White House officials said in a blog post that it would not support pending legislation that 'reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk' or undermines the global Internet, cautioning the measure could discourage innovation and startup businesses." ...

... Update: here's the White House's response to two anti-SOPA ("Stop Online Piracy Act") petitions it received. ...

... Update 2: The Hill: "House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) said early Saturday morning that Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) promised him the House will not vote on the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) unless there is consensus on the bill."

The Hill: "The Obama administration has signaled to allies that it will take a more aggressive role this year in protecting homeowners from foreclosure, a posture that fits with Obama’s populist campaign stance."

Reuters: "Iran said [in a letter directed to U.S. officials] on Saturday it had evidence Washington was behind the latest killing of one of its nuclear scientists, state television reported, at a time when tensions over the country's nuclear program have escalated to their highest level ever.

Reuters: "A South Korean honeymoon couple and an injured crewmember were plucked from a capsized Italian liner on Sunday, more than a day after it was wrecked, as rescue workers struggled to find any others still trapped on board. Teams were painstakingly checking thousands of cabins on the Costa Concordia for people still unaccounted for after the huge vessel foundered and keeled over with more than 4,000 on board, killing at least three people and injuring 70."

Reuters: "Influential evangelical Christian leaders endorsed Rick Santorum on Saturday for the Republican presidential nomination, in an attempt to strengthen him as the more conservative alternative to front-runner Mitt Romney."

Reuters: "European leaders promised on Saturday to speed up plans to strengthen spending rules and get a permanent bailout fund up and running as soon as possible, a day after U.S.agency S&P cut the ratings of several euro zone countries' creditworthiness."

The Commentariat -- January 14, 2012

The Commentariat is open for comments.

President Obama's Weekly Address:

     ... The transcript is here. Mark Landler & Annie Lowrey of the New York Times: "President Obama on Friday announced an aggressive campaign to shrink the size of the federal government, a proposal less notable for its goal — the fight against bloat has been embraced by every modern-day president — than for the political challenge it poses to a hostile Congress. Mr. Obama called on lawmakers to grant him broad new powers to propose mergers of agencies, which Congress would then have to approve or reject in an up-or-down vote."

Bill Moyers Is Back! You can catch his entire show online at BillMoyers.com. Many PBS stations are also carrying the show, though it doesn't appear to be on their regular primetime schedule. I tried the Moyers program schedule finder and it didn't work, so alternatively, you can go to the PBS station program finder. (The PBS page automatically went to my local station; it might do the same for you.) The segment below -- which leads Moyers' first show -- is truly compelling:

Jacob Hacker & Paul Pierson on Winner Take All Politics from BillMoyers.com on Vimeo.

Josh Lederman of The Hill: "Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) sent Democrat Elizabeth Warren a letter on Friday challenging her to join him in denouncing outside groups, who have already spent millions on attack ads in the race. Rather than ignore the challenge, Warren called Brown on his cell phone — and sent him a letter proposing a meeting between the two campaigns to reach an 'enforceable agreement' to rein in the outside groups. Now the Brown campaign says it will dispatch its campaign manager to meet with his counterpart in Warren's campaign."

Jason Zinoman of the New York Times: Stephen "Colbert is a serious performer playing a silly character, while the media and political world are deeply silly but pretending to be serious. That was never more clearly illustrated than in the most triumphant part of his show on Thursday, when the respected [???] Politico writer Mike Allen offered a (mock?) serious analysis of his prospects, citing polls and strategy.... You’ve heard of fantasy baseball? This is fantasy politics. And it’s perfectly suited to a cycle in which journalists spent weeks obsessing over the political future of the host of 'The Apprentice.'”

Right Wing World

Mitt Romney -- American Populist, a/k/a Lie of the Day. I'm concerned about the poor in this country. We have to make sure the safety net is strong and able to help those who can't help themselves. I'm not terribly worried about the very wealthiest in our society; they're doing just fine. I'm concerned about the vast middle class of our nation, the 90 percent of Americans, the 95 percent of Americans who are having tough times. -- Mitt Romney

In a barely audible caveat, Romney added, "That's why I plan to drastically lower taxes on rich people like me and raise them on the poor and middle class." CW: Well, that's what I heard anyway. Brian Beutler of TPM has the lowdown on Romney's tax plan from hell. (I also linked this a couple of weeks ago.) ...

... ** "Untruths, Wholly Untrue and Nothing but Untruths." Paul Krugman: "... is there anything at all in Romney’s stump speech that’s true? It’s all based on attacking Obama for apologizing for America, which he didn’t, on making deep cuts in defense, which he also didn’t, and on being a radical redistributionist who wants equality of outcomes, which he isn’t. When the issue turns to jobs, Romney makes false assertions both about Obama’s record and about his own. I can’t find a single true assertion anywhere."

... Steve Benen: "Last week, I launched a new Friday afternoon feature, highlighting the Republican frontrunner’s most offensive falsehoods from the previous week. Last week was a Top 5 list, but thanks to two debates and a victory speech, we had enough examples to fill a Top 10 list." CW: Benen's list is worth a read. And Benen doesn't even mention Romney's claim he cares more about the poor than the rich. ...

... Here's one Romney lie Benen cites: "Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney asserted that federal low-income programs are administered so inefficiently that 'very little of the money that’s actually needed by those that really need help, those that can’t care for themselves, actually reaches them." But Jared Bernstein posts this bar graph from the Center on Budget & Policy Priorities that disproves Romney's claim:

... Matea Gold, et al., of the Los Angeles Times: "As Mitt Romney defends his record running a private equity firm, he frequently points to a fast-growing Indiana steel company, financed in part by Bain Capital, that now employs 6,000 workers. What Romney doesn't mention is that Steel Dynamics also received generous tax breaks and other subsidies provided by the state of Indiana and the residents of DeKalb County, where the company's first mill was built. The story of Bain and Steel Dynamics illustrates how Romney, during his business career, made avid use of public-private partnerships, something that many conservatives consider to be 'corporate welfare.' It is a commitment that carried over into his term as governor of Massachusetts, when he offered similar incentives to lure businesses to his state. Yet as he seeks the GOP presidential nomination, he emphasizes government's adverse effects on economic growth.... Another steel company in which Bain invested, GS Industries, went bankrupt in 2001, causing more than 700 workers to lose their jobs, health insurance and a part of their pensions. Before going under, the company paid large dividends to Bain partners and expanded its Kansas City plant with the help of tax subsidies. It also sought a $50-million federal loan guarantee." Thanks to Dave S. for the link. ...

... Dana Milbank compares Willard to Al Gore & John Kerry, all millionaires who would be president. ...

... Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post: "Romney asserts that President Obama wants to 'fundamentally transform America,' turning the country 'into a European-style entitlement society.' In fact, Romney and his Republican presidential rivals have a far more radical transformation in mind. They envision a dramatically shrunken federal government and a dangerously unraveled social safety net.

Scott Powers of the Orlando Sentinel: "Saying he does not want false claims made on his behalf, Republican presidential contender Newt Gingrich on Friday morning called on a 'super PAC' that supports him to withdraw commercials it ran in South Carolina criticizing Mitt Romney and his old company Bain Capital. Gingrich made the call to a crowd of supporters at his new Orlando campaign headquarters, saying there is no way he can legally contact Winning Our Future to make the request directly."

Si vous êtes un républicain, il est important d'être ignorant. CW: Newt Gingrich runs an ad against Mitt Romney with a French accordian music soundtrack the ad claims Romney is just like John Kerry because they both speak French. (Romney was a Mormon missionary in France for two years.) The funniest part is that in the ad clips, Romney speaks first-year -week high school French with an American accent, and Kerry says "Laissez les bons temps rouler," a Cajun construction familiar even to Americans who haven't struggled through that difficult first week of French class:

Horse Race. Richard Stevenson of the New York Times: neither Obama nor Romney is very appealing to white working-class voters, but they are critical to the 2012 race. If you're interested in the horse race, this is a pretty good analysis of this demographic. ...

... Horse Race. Ron Brownstein of the National Journal: "... a series of recent Quinnipiac University surveys in key swing states shows that as Romney enters the general election, blue-collar whites are inclined to trust him to revive the economy more than President Obama -- whom they have resisted since his emergence as a national candidate in 2008."

Gail Collins on the billionaires' campaign of 2012.

News Ledes

Reuters: "A U.S. judge on Friday, in a victory for the Obama administration, upheld new federal rules requiring gun dealers in four states bordering Mexico to report the sales of multiple semi-automatic rifles, despite a challenge by the gun industry."

Reuters: "Standard & Poor's downgraded the credit ratings of nine euro-zone countries, stripping France and Austria of their coveted triple-A status but not EU paymaster Germany, in a Black Friday the 13th for the troubled single currency area." ...

... Reuters: "Ratings downgrades in the euro zone by S&P underline why Europe must seal a pact to tighten fiscal rules quickly and get its permanent bailout fund up and running as soon as possible, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Saturday."

New York Times: "President Ma Ying-jeou [of Taiwan] was re-elected by a comfortable margin on Saturday, fending off a fierce challenge from his main rival, Tsai Ing-wen, who criticized his handling of the economy but also sought to exploit fears among voters that his conciliatory approach toward China was eroding the island’s sovereignty."

AP (via the NYT): "Mohamed ElBaradei, a former top United Nations nuclear official and a Nobel Prize winner, said Saturday that he was pulling out of the presidential race in Egypt to protest the military’s failure to put the country on the path to democracy."

Reuters: "Small Iranian military motorboats approached U.S. vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz twice last week but the Pentagon said the interactions were not seen as hostile, even at a moment of heightened tensions between the two countries."

Politico: "Following a hearing in Richmond [Friday], U.S. district judge John Gibney ruled against Rick Perry's challenge to the Virginia ballot rules. In his opinion, Gibney says Perry, and the other candidates who joined the challenge, waited too long to bring the suit.... The decision means Perry, as well as Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman, will not appear on the ballot in the state's March 6 primary."