The Commentariat -- March 18

President Obama addresses the situation in Libya:

New York Times: "In one of the most forceful statements he has issued from the White House Mr. Obama said that his demands were not negotiable: Colonel Qaddafi had to pull his forces back from major cities in Libya or the United States and its allies would stop him. The president said that he was forced to act because Colonel Qaddafi had turned on his own people and had shown, Mr. Obama said, 'no mercy on his own citizens'.”

A no-fly zone requires certain actions taken to protect the planes and the pilots, including bombing targets like the Libyan defense systems. -- Hillary Clinton

... Mark Thompson of Time on what the no-fly zone means: war against Libya. CW: Thompson wrote his post before Gaddafi announced a ceasefire. ...

... Josh Rogin of Foreign Policy: Richard Lugar, "the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, argued against implementing a no-fly zone over Libya on Thursday, and also said that Congress must pass a formal declaration of war if the Obama administration decides to take that step.... Lugar's stance against imposing a no-fly zone puts him at odds with committee chairman John Kerry (D-MA)...." ...

... Also from Rogin: "Several administration officials held a classified briefing for all senators on Thursday afternoon in the bowels of the Capitol building, leaving lawmakers convinced President Barack Obama is ready to attack Libya but wondering if it isn't too late to help the rebels there." ...

... ** Josh Rogin again. He has a fascinating new piece on when & how President Obama changed his position on Libya.

Jeremy Peters of the New York Times: "The New York Times introduced a plan on Thursday to begin charging the most frequent users of its Web site $15 for a four-week subscription in a bet that readers will pay for news they are accustomed to getting free." The plan goes into effect in Canada today....

... CW: Canadian Readers: after you've hit your 20-visit limit, if you try to link to a Times article via Reality Chex, I'd really appreciate knowing if it works as it supposed to. E-mail me via this link. Thanks.

CW: we do have to wonder why neither the Administration or the NRC is willing to be frank about U.S. nuclear facilities. See, for instance, M. J. Lee's Politico report on Joe Scarborough's scathing takedown of the Administration's nuclear facilities point man.

Paul Krugman: "But for a few notable political figures, most of Washington seems to have abandoned unemployed Americans."

Jia Lynn Yang of the Washington Post: "Democrats ratcheted up pressure on the country’s top nuclear regulators to ensure that U.S. plants can withstand disaster, even as watchdogs charged that the agency has a flawed record of monitoring this country’s aging fleet of reactors. On Thursday, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released a study evaluating the NRC’s performance last year as a regulator, saying it has repeatedly found over the years that the agency’s enforcement of safety rules is 'not timely, consistent, or effective.' The UCS cited 14 'near-misses' at domestic plants last year."

Jeffrey Smith & Dan Eggen of the Washington Post: "A surge of lobbyists has left K Street this year to fill jobs as high-ranking staffers on Capitol Hill, focusing new attention on the dearth of rules governing what paid advocates can do after moving into the legislative world.... New tallies indicate that nearly half of the roughly 150 former lobbyists working in top policy jobs for members of Congress or House committees have been hired in the past few months. And many are working on legislative issues of interest to their former employers.... More than four-fifths of the lobbyists hired this year for top jobs on personal staffs went to Republican offices...."

Brady Dennis of the Washington Post: "State attorneys general, who soon will enter settlement talks with the nation’s largest mortgage servicers after revelations of flawed foreclosure paperwork and other shoddy practices, will accept nothing less than wholesale changes to the way those companies treat troubled homeowners, the group’s leader [-- Iowa AG Tom Miller --] said Wednesday."

Spy Story. Chris Arsenault of Al Jazeera: "The case of Raymond Davis has all the trappings of a 21st century spy novel. It is a story of murder, prison and clandestine payments, starring a burly former US Special Forces soldier tangled in a murky web of intelligence agencies, competing diplomats and ... shady private military contractors.... The events in question transpired on January 27. Davis was driving his car through a poor section of Lahore. He stopped at a crowded intersection. Two Pakistani men jumped off motorcycles and came towards him, with weapons drawn, according to American accounts of the incident. Davis opened fire with his Glock, killing them. He said he fired in self-defence, assuming they were trying to rob him. Pakistani authorities disputed this claim, saying the men were shot in the back and Davis got out of his car to take photographs of the bodies. Pakistani security forces chased Davis to a traffic circle a short distance away from the crime scene and arrested him. Before being taken down, Davis called the US Consulate to extract him from the dicey situation. The US sent an unmarked SUV tearing through the streets of Lahore. It drove the wrong way down a one way street, killing a random motorcyclist, in a development that further infuriated Pakistanis."

Editors Leonard Downie, Jr., & Robert Kaiser, in a Washington Post op-ed, explain why NPR is a vital news medium both on the national & local levels, and why House Republicans are making a big mistake in cutting out funding for a network their own constituents rely on. ...

Right Wing World

Citizens United Is Not Bad Enough. Ken Vogel of Politico: "Not satisfied by the 2010 Supreme Court ruling that opened the floodgates to corporate-sponsored election ads, conservative opponents of campaign finance regulations have opened up a series of new legal fronts in their effort to eliminate the remaining laws restricting the flow of money into politics. They have taken to Congress, state legislatures and the lower courts to target almost every type of regulation on the books: disclosure requirements, bans on foreign and corporate contributions and – in a pair of cases the Supreme Court will consider this month – party spending limits and public financing of campaigns."

Simon Maloy of Media Matters: provocateur James O'Keefe has come out with another "shocking" exposé of NPR: "NPR director admits to having received Soros money for years." Right. You can find that info by checking NPR's tax records. Or by reading their press releases. Or by Googling Soros & NPR. Big scoop, O'Keefe. You sniveling idiot. .....

... James Poniewozik, Time Magazine's media critic, does a hatchet job on O'Keefe for O''Keefe's hatchet job on NPR. ...

... Michael Gerson, a former Dubya speechwriter & current Washington Post columnist, lambastes O'Keefe for his unjustified subterfuge. "... there can be no moral duty to deceive in order to entrap a political opponent with a hidden camera."

... Speaking of NPR, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) is glad Republicans know what's important to the American people -- get rid of Click & Clack:

     ... Careful, Anthony. Click & Clack might sic their lawyers -- Dewey, Cheatham & Howe -- on you.

How to Boggle an Ideologue: Present the Facts. Pat Garofalo: Republican House budget czar Paul Ryan says he is "boggled" that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he won't touch Social Security, even though Ryan admitted, when questioned, that the Social Security fund is solvent for the next two decades & doesn't "drive the deficit." In other words, there's no compelling reason to reduce Social Security benefits; Ryan's whole purpose is to privatize it, not "fix" it.

News Ledes

AP: "A new assessment of President Barack Obama's budget released Friday says the White House underestimates future budget deficits by more than $2 trillion over the upcoming decade. The estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says that if Obama's February budget submission is enacted into law it would produce deficits totaling $9.5 trillion over 10 years — an average of almost $1 trillion a year."

Washington Post: "The United States and its allies prepared Friday to launch military attacks on Libya as forces led by Moammar Gaddafi continued to bombard rebel-held towns despite government promises of a cease-fire."

Wisconsin State Journal: "A Dane County judge Friday ordered a temporary halt to Gov. Scott Walker's controversial measure curbing collective bargaining for public employees, saying a legislative committee likely violated the state Open Meetings Law when it rushed passage of the bill earlier this month. Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi ruled that a joint Assembly-Senate conference committee did not provide the public with adequate notice before approving the bill March 9.... Assistant Attorney General Steven Means said afterward that the state plans a quick appeal."

New York Times: "Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the former priest who rose to become [Haiti’s] first democratically elected president before being forced into exile twice, returned home to an uncertain political climate on Friday, only days before a presidential runoff intended to settle months of discord in this rattled nation."

Washington Post: "Veteran political reporter Shailagh Murray is leaving the Washington Post to serve as communications director for Vice President Joe Biden...."

"Married to the Mess." Fortune: "The FDIC today ... [sued] three of [Washington Mutual's] senior executives for gross negligence and breach of fiduciary duty. The complaint seeks $900 million in relief, and claims that the trio 'focused on short term gains to increase their own compensation, with reckless disregard for WaMu's longer term safety and soundness.' The former WaMu executives are: CEO Kerry Killinger, president and COO Stephen Rotella and home loans boss David Schneider.... The FDIC kept it interesting by expanding the defendant rolls to include the wives of both Killinger and Rotella." Here's the New York Times story. And here's a pdf of the complaint.

New York Times: "Japanese engineers battled on Friday to cool spent fuel rods and restore electric power to pumps at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station as new challenges seemed to accumulate by the hour.... As the crisis seemed to deepen, Japan’s nuclear safety agency raised the assessment of its severity from 4 to 5 on a 7-level international scale." ...

... Los Angeles Times: "U.S. government nuclear experts believe a spent fuel pool at Japan's crippled Fukushima reactor complex has a breach in the wall or floor, a situation that creates a major obstacle to refilling the pool with cooling water and keeping dangerous levels of radiation from escaping. That assessment by U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials is based on the sequence of events since the earthquake and information provided by key American contractors who were in the plant at the time...." ...

... Los Angeles Times: "A top Japanese official acknowledged Friday that the government was overwhelmed by the scale of last week's twin disasters, slowing its response to the earthquake and tsunami that left at least 10,000 people dead and led to a major nuclear crisis. The admission by Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano came as Japan reached out Friday to the U.S. for help in stabilizing its overheated, radiation-leaking nuclear complex...."

New York Times: Bahrain takes the pearl out of Pearl Square, tearing down the huge sculpture because it had become symbolic of the resistence to the government.

New York Times: "Security forces and government supporters opened fire on demonstrators on Friday as the largest protest so far in Yemen came under violent and sustained attack in the center of the capital, Sana. At least 10 people were killed and more than 100 injured, according to a doctor at a makeshift hospital near the protest." Story has been updated: at least 40 protesters killed.

Reuters: "Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah on Friday ordered the handout of billions of dollars in benefits to Saudi citizens and created more domestic security jobs in an attempt to insulate the top oil exporter from regional unrest."

Washington Post: "The Securities & Exchange Commission is moving toward charging former and current Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac executives with violations related to the financial crisis, setting up a clash with the housing regulator that oversees the companies.... The SEC ... is alleging that at least four senior executives failed to provide necessary information to investors about the companies’ mortgage holdings as the U.S. housing market collapsed. But the agency that most closely regulates Fannie and Freddie, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, disagrees with that assessment...."

Washington Post: "A Pentagon audit has found that the federal government overpaid a billionaire oilman by as much as $200 million on several military contracts worth nearly $2.7 billion.... The study also reported that the three contracts were awarded under conditions that effectively eliminated the other bidders. Harry Sargeant III, a well-connected Florida businessman and once-prominent Republican donor, first faced scrutiny over his defense work in October 2008, when he was accused in a congressional probe of using his close relationship with Jordan’s royal family to secure exclusive rights over supply routes to U.S. bases in western Iraq."

Wall Street Journal: "The House voted 228-192 ... to block public-radio stations from spending federal funds on programming.... The measure would ban NPR's local affiliates from spending any federal money on radio programming, limiting them to using taxpayer dollars only for administrative costs. The proposal, advanced by Rep. Doug Lamborn (R., Colo.), does not cut government expenditures.... No Democrats voted for the bill Thursday, and seven Republicans opposed it.... The bill faces dim prospects in the Senate and is opposed by the White House."

The Commentariat -- March 17

** In a letter from publisher A. O. Sulzberger, the New York Times announces its new pay subscription policy for the online Times, to go into full effect March 28. CW: I'll be paying up, so any articles I link will be available to nonsubscribers even if you've used up your 20 "free" hits per month.

Martha Raddatz of ABC News: "U.S. officials are alarmed at how the Japanese are handling the escalating nuclear reactor crisis and fear that if they do not get control of the plants within the next 24 to 48 hours they could have a situation that will be 'deadly for decades.'" Here's Raddatz's video report:

... David Sanger, et al., of the New York Times: "The chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission gave a far bleaker appraisal on Wednesday of the threat posed by Japan’s nuclear crisis than the Japanese government had offered. He said American officials believed that the damage to at least one crippled reactor was much more serious than Tokyo had acknowledged, and he advised Americans to stay much farther away from the plant than the perimeter established by Japanese authorities." ...

... Hiroko Tabuchi, et al., of the New York Times: "Foreign nuclear experts, the Japanese press and an increasingly angry and rattled Japanese public are frustrated by [Japanese] government and power company officials’ failure to communicate clearly and promptly about the nuclear crisis. Pointing to conflicting reports, ambiguous language and a constant refusal to confirm the most basic facts, they suspect officials of withholding or fudging crucial information about the risks posed by the ravaged Daiichi plant." ...

... CW: a lot like White House Press Secretary Jay Carney at his press briefing yesterday. You can watch the stonewalling briefing here. ...

... William Broad of the New York Times: "A United Nations forecast of the possible movement of the radioactive plume coming from crippled Japanese reactors shows it churning across the Pacific, and touching the Aleutian Islands on Thursday before hitting Southern California late Friday. Health and nuclear experts emphasize that radiation in the plume will be diluted as it travels and, at worst, would have extremely minor health consequences in the United States, even if hints of it are ultimately detectable." ...

... Andrew Higgins of the Washington Post: "Unlike victims of earthquakes in Haiti, Indonesia or China, those suffering in Japan expect their government to work and can’t understand why a country as affluent as theirs can’t keep gasoline, the lifeblood of a modern economy, flowing and why towns across the northeast have been plunged into frigid darkness for five days." ...

Secretary Clinton tells Wolf Blitzer she will "be moving on" at the end of President Obama's first term:

     ... Update. Glenn Thrush of Politico: "Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s revelation that she won’t be staying on if there is a second Obama term ... [came] coming at a critical moment in her fierce internal battle to push President Barack Obama to join the fight to liberate Libya from Muammar Qadhafi. Clinton’s position seemed to be vindicated on Thursday as the U.S. pushed for a U.N. no-fly-zone resolution."

Mark Landler & Dan Bilefsky of the New York Times: "The prospect of a deadly siege of the rebel stronghold in Benghazi, Libya, has produced a striking shift in tone from the Obama administration,which is now pushing for the United Nations to authorize aerial bombing of Libyan tanks and heavy artillery to try to halt the advance of forces loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi." ...

... BUT. Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post: "As Persian Gulf monarchs forcibly suppress street protests in the kingdom of Bahrain, the Obama administration has responded mostly with mild or muted objections — a sharp contrast from its demands for new governments in the republics of Egypt and Libya." ...

... Nicholas Kristof: "The Arab democracy spring that begun with such exhilaration in Tunisia and Egypt is now enduring a brutal winter in Libya, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Yemen."

Rama Lakshmi of the Washington Post: "A WikiLeaks cable suggesting Indian government payoffs to lawmakers to secure support for a controversial nuclear deal in 2008 rocked the parliament Thursday, when opposition parties demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh." ...

     ... The backstory from the India Times: "An aide of Congress leader Satish Sharma allegedly showed a US Embassy employee 'two chests containing cash' and said Rs 50-60 crore is ready for use as 'pay-offs' to win the support of some MPs ahead of crucial vote of confidence in UPA government over the Indo-US nuke deal, claimed a set of US diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks." ...

... Kim Zetter of Wired: "The American Civil Liberties Union calls the treatment of WikiLeaks suspect Bradley Manning unconstitutional and 'gratuitously harsh.' The remarks came in a letter sent Wednesday to U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates." Here's the ACLU statement & a copy of their letter to Gates. ...

San Francisco Chronicle Editors: "President Obama made things worse by insisting that Manning's treatment was 'legal.' In the past decade this country has insisted that many horrible imprisonment procedures were legal. Obama campaigned on the promise that just because some things were 'legal' didn't mean that they were right. He should heed his own words on the Manning case."

Alissa Rubin of the New York Times: "Western diplomats, Taliban leaders and the Afghan government have begun to take a hard look at what it would take to start a negotiation to end the fighting.... Interest in a political track is growing as pressure mounts to find a palatable way to reduce the military commitment here and as public support for the war ebbs in the United States and Europe."

If there had been a cop on the beat with the authority to hold mortgage servicers accountable a half dozen years ago, if there had been a consumer agency in place, the problems in mortgage servicing would have been exposed early and fixed while they were still small, long before they became a national scandal. -- Elizabeth Warren, in testimony before a House Financial Services subcommittee.

... Tim Noah of Slate: Republicans & Wall Street Journal editors are railing against the overreaching & politicization of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau even though it "hasn't done anything yet," & can't even open for business before July 1, 2011.

Stealth Attack. Meredith Shiner of Politico: "House Republicans quietly took their first legislative step Wednesday at repealing Wall Street reform, exposing the difficulty of rolling back a major Barack Obama law that isn’t health care. Republicans clearly want to strike at the heart of banking reform with legislation attacking new regulations on derivatives, credit rating agencies and private equity firms. But their piecemeal approach suggests they are trying to do so without appearing to favor Wall Street over Main Street." ...

... The people who write loopholes for their friends know how to write loopholes for themselves, too. Raymond Hernandez of the New York Times: a ban on earnmarks "was one of the promises made by a newly elected class of conservatives in the House. But ... lawmakers still have a way to get their favorite projects funded: appealing directly to federal agencies for money that is already available. And agency officials seem to be paying attention.... In some cases, that may be the result of the clout certain lawmakers have over how much money an agency receives." ...

... Shira Toeplitz of Politico: "Twenty-two Republicans senators are threatening to vote against raising the debt ceiling later this year unless the president concedes to cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in the current budget negotiations." ...

... BUT. Alexander Bolton of The Hill: "Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and liberal Democrats opposed to cutting Social Security benefits are trying to outflank President Obama and centrists who have signaled a willingness to cut a deal with Republicans. In a move intended to put lawmakers on the record regarding the “third rail” of American politics, the liberal senators introduced a measure Tuesday to require a two-thirds majority in both chambers of Congress in order to pass any cuts to Social Security benefits." ...

... This from the "Screw America" Party. John McKinnon of the Wall Street Journal: Dave Camp (R-Mich.), "the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, wants to cut the top U.S. tax rate to 25% for individuals and corporations, and cut or eliminate many popular deductions." ...

... How to Become a Congressional "Expert" Witness: give a member of Congress a hefty campaign donation. T. W. Farnam of the Washington Post reports.

New York Times Editors: "Mr. Obama owes the country muscular White House leadership to make sure his reforms happen. A good starting point ... is a new measure sponsored in Congress by two New York Democrats, Senator Charles Schumer and Representative Carolyn McCarthy.... The National Rifle Association ... declined the administration’s invitation to talk — a sign of real disrespect for a president who has actually expanded gun rights. It also shows disdain for the well-being and safety of the public."

But one clear and terrible fact remains. A man our Army rejected as unfit for service; a man one of our colleges deemed too unstable for studies; a man apparently bent on violence, was able to walk into a store and buy a gun. He used it to murder six people and wound 13 others. And if not for the heroism of bystanders and a brilliant surgical team, it would have been far worse. -- Barack Obama, Arizona Star, March 13, 2011 ...

... Forget Due Process. President Convicts Accused. Karen Garcia wants to know if a Constitutional scholar who is now President of the United States would really write such an op-ed in the hometown newspaper of a man who has been charged with but not convicted of multiple murders? Talk about tainting the jury pool. ...

... ** E. J. Dionne of the Washington Post: instead of effectively pleading with the NRA, as he did in the above-linked Arizona Daily Star op-ed, President Obama must stand up to "the bullies of the NRA." Read all of Dionne's column. By parsing Obama's the op-ed, Dionne really captures the essence of the President's capitulation to the gun lobby.

Matt Negrin of Politico wrote an acerbic post yesterday on President Obama's acceptance of a "transparency" award. In an update, Negrin writes that the scheduled presentation was postponed because of scheduling changes. Here's Negrin's lede & a few excerpts:

President Obama's only event at the White House that isn’t closed to the press on Wednesday is a ceremony in which he’ll accept an award for being open to the press.... But he probably won’t mention that his administration acted on fewer requests for information last year even as it was asked for more, a tally documented by the AP. And he also probably won’t talk about his aggressive effort to prosecute federal workers who leak information to shed light on wrongdoing. Or that despite his anti-lobbyist rhetoric, his aides are meeting with lobbyists just outside the White House, allowing the administration to keep the meetings off the books from public view. We wonder if he’ll even take a question from the press pool, a practice Obama seems to have grown to hate.

Right Wing World

CW: Here's my vote for the most hypocritical statement of the week. It comes from teabagger South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint on "RomneyCare," a Massachusetts program which is a great deal like "Obamacare," the "nightmare" DeMint has loudly & repeatedly condemned, tried to undermine, has vowed (and has written a Senate bill) to repeal & rallied his base against. Ready?

One of the reasons I endorsed Romney [in 2008] is his attempts to make private health insurance available at affordable prices.
-- Jim DeMint

Andy Borowitz: "With unprecedented crises engulfing the world, millions of television viewers are finding the news too stressful to watch – and are turning to the Fox News Channel instead."

Josh Dorner of Think Progress: "Last year, former Speaker Newt Gingrich offered his vocal support for the ultimately successful campaign to oust three of the nine Iowa Supreme Court justices who had unanimously ruled in favor of marriage equality. As Gingrich courts social conservatives while exploring a possible presidential bid, new disclosures from his camp indicate that he and his associates bankrolled more than one-third of the $850,000 campaign to remove the Iowa justices." ...

... P. Z. Myers explains Newt's traditional family values: "The Republicans support a version of marriage that rests on tradition, authority, and masculine dominance.... If we strip marriage of the asymmetry of power, as we must if we allow men to marry men and women to marry women, then we also strip away the man and wife, dominant and submissive, owner and owned, master and servant relationship that characterizes the conservative view of marriage."

Local News

Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) presents his budget proposal to an audience of Ohio voters. Washington Post photo. CW: Kasich, a former Fox "News" contributor, looks suspiciously like Glenn Beck giving one of his enthusiastic blackboard-assisted lectures.Amy Gardner of the Washington Post: Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) put on a rousing dog-&-pony show to tout his proposed "austerity" budget. "Despite his best efforts to win over his audience, however, his performance was met with only sporadic applause from the crowd of nearly 900. Kasich received tough questions from Republicans and downright skepticism from Democrats as well as teachers and other public workers who say his proposals would gut schools and government services...."

Sick-o. Jonathan Cohn of The New Republic for Kaiser Health News: Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels proposed "the Healthy Indiana Plan" as an alternative to Medicaid, & state Republican legislators are loving it. The plan covers less, has a lifetime cap, doesn't deal with chronic illness & is more expensive than Medicaid.

News Ledes

The U.N. Security Council approved a far-reaching resolution establishing a no-fly zone over Libya yesterday. Here's the vote. Raw video:

** New York Times: "The United Nations Security Council voted Thursday to authorize military action, including airstrikes against Libyan tanks and heavy artillery and a no-fly zone, a risky foreign intervention aimed at averting a bloody rout of rebels by forces loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. After days of often acrimonious debate, played out against a desperate clock, as Colonel Qaddafi’s troops advanced to within 100 miles of the rebel capital of Benghazi, Libya, the Security Council authorized member nations to take 'all necessary measures' to protect civilians, diplomatic code words calling for military action. Diplomats said the resolution — which passed with 10 votes, including the United States, and abstentions from Russia, China, Germany, Brazil and India — was written ... to allow for a wide range of actions, including strikes on air-defense systems and missile attacks from ships." ...

... Guardian: "British, French and US military aircraft are preparing to defend the Libyan rebel stronghold of Benghazi after Washington said it was ready to support a no-fly zone and air strikes against Muammar Gaddafi's forces."

Washington Post: "The Senate approved another stopgap budget bill Thursday that would keep the federal government open until April 8. The measure, which had already passed the House, is expected to be signed by President Obama on Friday. The bill would cut $6 billion in federal spending."

** President Obama spoke to the press about Japan this afternoon. USA Today item here. Update: the President said dangerous levels of radiation are not expected to reach the U.S. He did not take questions. Here's the transcript, courtesy of the White House. ...

... New York Times: "Amid widening alarm in the United States and elsewhere about Japan’s nuclear crisis, military fire trucks began spraying cooling water on spent fuel rods at the country’s stricken nuclear power station on Thursday, but later suspended the operation, the NHK broadcaster said." ...

... Bloomberg News: "The U.S. plans to airlift [U.S.] citizens from Japan along with military and diplomatic families, reflecting widening skepticism that the authorities can contain leaks from the quake-stricken Fukushima nuclear plant."

After meeting, President Obama & Irish PM Enda Kenny made statements to the press this morning. CNN Update: "Clad in a light green tie, complete with shamrocks emerging from his suit pocket, President Obama welcomed Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny to the Oval Office stressing the 'incredible bond' between the two countries.... Obama announced he will travel to Ireland in May around his state visit to the United Kingdom.... Obama said he hopes to visit ... the birthplace of his great-great-great-great-great grandfather." See the President's & PM's remarks to the press above.

Washington Post: "The Environmental Protection Agency released a plan Wednesday that would reduce emissions of mercury and other toxins from coal-burning power plants, drawing praise from health officials and condemnation from some industry representatives and lawmakers."

The Commentariat -- March 16

CW: click on the map to take this click-and-drag map test. If you can locate all these countries on the first pass, you're a lot smarter than I am:

"President Obama's Trivial Pursuits." Following up on Karen Garcia's theme (here), Keith Koffler, who writes the White House Dossier, says, "The Middle East is afire with rebellion, Japan is imploding from an earthquake, and the battle of the budget is on in the United States, but none of this seems to be deterring President Obama from a heavy schedule of childish distractions.... [Tuesday] morning, as Japan’s nuclear crisis enters a potentially catastrophic phase, we are told that Obama is videotaping his NCAA tournament picks.... Saturday, he made his 61st outing to the golf course as president, and got back to the White House with just enough time for a quick shower before heading out to party with Washington’s elite journalists at the annual Gridiron Dinner." And so forth. ...

     ... CW: President Obama had his last job -- U.S. Senator -- for a little more than two years before he got bored with it & decided to run for President. He's had his current job for the same length of time. Is he bored with it, too?

Transparently Opaque. AP: "Two years into its pledge to improve government transparency, the Barack Obama administration took action on fewer requests for federal records from citizens, journalists, companies and others last year even as significantly more people asked for information."...

... From the AP report: The Obama administration censored 194 pages of internal e-mails about its Open Government Directive that the AP requested more than one year ago. Adam Sorensen of Time labels this "the Obama transparency paradox in one sentence."

Alexander Bolton of The Hill: "Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, National Economic Council Director Gene Sperling and Sperling’s deputy, Jason Furman ... are pressing [President] Obama to cut Social Security benefits if necessary. But Obama’s political team, led by David Axelrod, David Plouffe and Jim Messina, are urging the president to understand that backing benefit cuts could prove disastrous to his 2012 reelection hopes, sources say. The political team is winning the argument so far...."

Shock and Awe? Or Aw, Shucks? Shahien Nasiripour of the Huffington Post: "The Obama administration is seeking to force the nation's five largest mortgage firms to reduce monthly payments for as many as three million distressed homeowners in as little as six months as part of an agreement to settle accusations of improper foreclosures and violations of consumer protection laws, six people familiar with the matter said.... The modified mortgages could cost the five financial behemoths -- Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and Ally Financial -- as much as $30 billion.... But the deal is far from complete.... The banks are now crafting their own proposals." CW: I'll bet they are. ...

... Associated Press: Elizabeth Warren "... is rebuffing banking industry claims that the [Consumer Financial Protection Bureau] is too powerful and lacks accountability.... Warren is also giving little ground against Republicans who say she's played an inappropriate role as federal agencies and states try pressuring big U.S. banks to overhaul how they modify mortgages and handle foreclosures." ...

... AND Geithner Sticks up for Warren. Brady Dennis of the Washington Post: "Secretary Timothy F. Geithner pushed back Tuesday against lawmakers questioning the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau role in negotiating a settlement with mortgage servicing firms whose shoddy practices and flawed foreclosure paperwork came to light last fall."

The Speaker's Dilemma. Brian Beutler of TPM: "... the 54 Republicans who voted against the stop-gap legislation [to continue funding the government] put [Speaker John Boehner] in an unenviable box: Either he kowtows to his right flank, and pushes initiatives that can't pass in the Senate; or he abandons them..., and passes consensus legislation. The latter option, however, would require significant concessions to win Democratic votes, and further delegitimize himself with the Tea Party base."

Robin Bravender & Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Senate Democrats are scrambling to combat a GOP-led offensive against the Obama administration’s climate regulations ahead of a possible Wednesday floor showdown. In a surprising move, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid signaled Tuesday he would allow a floor vote on a Republican amendment to nullify the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases." Also, see today's Right Wing World below.

Katrina vanden Heuvel in the Washington Post: neither Republicans nor President Obama has the sense to face economic realities; their destructive plans to reduce the deficit will only worsen the U.S. economy, just as British PM David Cameron's Conservative austerity program has caused Great Britain's economy to decline.

New York Times Editors: "The [Supreme] Court’s lack of a recusal policy leaves each justice to decide whether he or she is meeting that standard. That plainly violates the age-old legal principle: Nemo iudex in causa sua — no one should be a judge about his or her own case.... The court is still not addressing the issue despite months of questions about possible cozy friendships, suspected political biases and family ties.... A bipartisan group of 107 law professors from 76 law schools have made their own proposal for how the court should solve its recusal problem.... The professors’ proposal is a good start.... If the justices don’t act, Congress may have to require them to adopt a more transparent recusal process.... The questions about the court’s impartiality are too serious to ignore."

Jeffrey Gettleman of the New York Times: "From Liberia to South Africa to the island of Madagascar, Libya’s holdings are like a giant venture capital fund, geared to make friends and win influence in the poorest region in the world. This may help explain how Colonel Qaddafi has been able to summon sub-Saharan African soldiers to fight for him in his time of need — Libyans have spoken of 'African mercenaries' killing protesters and helping him rout rebel fighters — and why so many African leaders have been so slow to criticize him, even as his forces slaughter his own people."

Fred Kaplan of Slate on Gen. David Petraeus' testimony Tuesday before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Petraeus & Michele Flournoy, a Defense undersecretary, testified that the war in Afghanistan was going great! One little problem Petraeus acknowledged: the government we're propping up is totally corrupt. The senators didn't ask the witnesses any "awkward questions" about that.

Anybody who says you can't save money at the Pentagon has never been to the Pentagon. We can save money on defense and if we Republicans don't propose saving money on defense, we'll have no credibility on anything else. -- Haley Barbour

Kasie Hunt of Politico: "America should slash defense spending — and consider shrinking its presence in Afghanistan, Haley Barbour said Monday night. Barbour, a likely candidate for president in 2012, told Iowa county leaders and activists here that the GOP won't have any credibility on cutting spending if they're not willing to trim the defense budget — often considered sacrosanct for Republicans." ...

      ... Ben Smith dubs Barbour's speech "a major moment" in the Republican race to the nomination. "Barbour's leading Republican rivals have positioned themselves to President Obama's hawkish right on a range of foreign policy issues. They've also resisted calls from some associated with the Tea Party movement for deep cuts to federal spending that would include defense cuts." ...

     ... Joe Klein of Time: "... this is Haley Barbour, folks -- and we know two things about him: he's not the world's boldest policy thinker and he's probably the smartest political strategist in the field. When Barbour decides that Afghanistan is a loser, you can bet that more than a few Republicans are heading that way -- and that means interesting times for the trigger-happy neoconservatives...."

"The Sad, Hypocritical Retirement of Evan Bayh." Ezra Klein: as a near-retiree from the Senate, Evan Bayh -- pretty much a career do-nothing senator -- made surprisingly candid statements against the usual Washington corrupt politics. Now he has three new jobs: (1) at "the massive law firm McGuire Woods [whose] ... principal clients ... 'include national energy companies, foreign countries, international manufacturing companies, trade associations and local and national businesses'"; (2) at "Apollo Management Group, a giant public-equity firm"; and (3) as a Fox "News" contributor. Klein writes:

The 'corrosive system of campaign financing' that Bayh considered such a threat? He’s being paid by both McGuire Woods and Apollo Global Management to act as a corroding agent on their behalf. The 'strident partisanship' and 'unyielding ideology' he complained was ruining the Senate? At Fox News, he’ll be right there on set while it gets cooked up. His warning that 'what is required from members of Congress and the public alike is a new spirit of devotion to the national welfare beyond party or self-interest' sounds, in retrospect, like a joke.

Right Wing World

Evan McMorris-Santoro of TPM: "Thirty-one Republicans on the House Energy And Commerce Committee -- the entire Republican contingent on the panel -- declined on Tuesday to vote in support of the very idea that climate change exists. Democrats on the panel had suggested three amendments that said climate change is a real thing, is caused by humans and has potentially dire consequences for the future. The amendments came on a Republican bill to block the EPA from offering regulations to mitigate the results of global climate shifts. The global scientific community is in near unanimous agreement that climate change is real, and that humans contribute to it."

Rush Limbaugh thinks it's a hilarious irony that the Japanese, who are famous environmentalists, have been hit with an environmental disaster. And they're recycling at their refuge camps. This man is a bona fide sociopath. Media Matters has the transcript. Here's their video:

Emergency! Quick, before anybody notices that even Glenn Beck knows James O'Keefe is a scam artist. Benjy Sarlin of TPM: "House Republicans are holding an emergency meeting of the Rules Committee on Wednesday to take up legislation that would block funding to NPR in the wake of James O'Keefe's hidden camera prank on the news organization.... A spokesman for the Rules Committee Democrats, Shurid Sen, called the bill 'a reactionary response to the O'Keefe video' and said it was being 'rushed to the floor' without going through regular committee hearings." ...

... Alex Pareene of Salon posts on Beck's little war on O'Keefe & Andrew Breitbart. ...

... How Gullible Is NPR? Jamison Foser of Media Matters has a startling post on NPR's coverage of James O'Keefe: "NPR repeatedly covered O'Keefe, and adopted his (false) claims about what his videos showed. But only a single NPR report ... contained so much as an allegation that he'd ever been less than honest. NPR's coverage of O'Keefe helped enhance his stature and credibility."

Kendra Marr of Politico: "Michele Bachmann fired back at the media Tuesday, saying her Revolutionary War gaffe was only reported because she is a conservative politician." CW: actually, Congresswoman, the media are reporting on your misrepresentations because you think a person as ignorant of American history as you are is qualified to be president. Backstory in the March 13 Commentariat.

Local News

Jim Dwyer of the New York Times: as the state legislature of New York aims to cut healthcare costs, there's one area they refuse to touch: executive compensation. Assemblywoman Deborah J. Glick, a Democrat whose district includes Greenwich Village, is bucking the system by "sponsoring a bill that would limit executive salaries at publicly financed hospitals to $250,000." Glick lamented the loss of the 160-year-old St. Vincent’s Hospital in the Village which closed last year, amid serious management problems. Still, "the top 10 executives took home about $6 million that year. They may have gone out of business, but they didn’t go cheap."

Scott Rothschild of the Lawrence Journal World: after initially refusing to apologize for suggesting that illegal immigrants should be shot from helicopters in the same way the state shoots feral hogs, Kansas state Rep. Virgil Peck, a Republican, issued an apology Tuesday. Less than an hour before Peck apologized, Republican Gov. Sam Brownbeck said the legislator should apologize. See original story in yesterday's Commentariat. With audio.

Matthew Haggman & Martha Brannigan of the Miami Herald: "Voters swept Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez out of office by a stunning margin [almost 90 percent!] Tuesday, capping a dramatic collapse for a politician who was given increased authority by voters four years ago to clean up much-maligned county government but was ushered out in the largest recall of a local politician in U.S. history. The spectacular fall from power comes after two years of missteps, ranging from granting top staffers big pay hikes to construction of a publicly funded stadium for the Florida Marlins to implementation of a property-tax rate increase...."

News Ledes

New York Times: "The New York Times said Wednesday that four of its journalists reporting on the conflict in Libya were missing.... The missing journalists are Anthony Shadid, the Beirut bureau chief and twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize for foreign reporting; Stephen Farrell, a reporter and videographer who was kidnapped by the Taliban in 2009 and rescued by British commandos; and two photographers, Tyler Hicks and Lynsey Addario, who have worked extensively in the Middle East and Africa."

"Blood Money Deal." Washington Post: "A CIA contractor who shot and killed two Pakistani men was freed from prison on Wednesday after the United States paid $2.34 million in 'blood money' to the victims’ families, Pakistani officials said, defusing a dispute that had strained ties between Washington and Islamabad. In what appeared to be carefully choreographed end to the diplomatic crisis, the U.S. Embassy said the Justice Department had opened an investigation into the killings on Jan. 27 by Raymond Allen Davis. It thanked the families for 'their generosity' in pardoning Davis, but did not mention any money changing hands."

New York Times: "Japan’s nuclear crisis intensified dramatically on Wednesday after the authorities announced that a second reactor unit at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi plant in northeastern Japan may have ruptured and appeared to be releasing radioactive steam." ...

... Los Angeles Times: "A series of grim developments hit a shaken Japan on Wednesday, including reports that high-level radiation may have leaked from a second damaged nuclear reactor and that emergency workers were forced to temporarily scramble for safety. The setbacks aggravated public fears that authorities might not be able to contain the expanding nuclear crisis." ...

... New York Times: "Emperor Akihito of Japan, in an unprecedented television address to the nation, said on Wednesday that he was 'deeply worried' about the ongoing nuclear crisis at several stricken reactors and asked for people to act with compassion 'to overcome these difficult times.' An official with the Imperial Household Agency said that Akihito had never before delivered a nationally televised address of any kind, not even in the aftermath of the Kobe earthquake in 1995 that killed more than 6,000 people. The address was videotaped."

New York Times: "Stepping up its involvement in Mexico’s drug war, the Obama administration has begun sending [unarmed] drones deep into Mexican territory to gather intelligence that helps locate major traffickers and follow their networks, according to American and Mexican officials."

Los Angeles Times: "The GOP-led House approved a short-term spending bill Tuesday but only after dozens of Republicans rejected the measure, forcing party leaders to rely on Democrats to achieve passage and help skirt a threatened government shutdown.... With House conservatives opposing their party's stopgap proposal as inadequate, the vote also signals trouble ahead for House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) as he negotiates a long-term deal with Democrats on behalf of a deeply split Republican caucus."

Al Jazeera: "Security forces in Bahrain have driven out pro-democracy protesters from the Pear Roundabout in the capital Manama. Helicopters hovered overhead as troops backed by tanks stormed the site - the focal point of weeks-long anti-government protests in the tiny kingdom - early on Wednesday, an Al Jazeera correspondent said. Multiple explosions were heard and smoke was seen billowing over central Manama." With video.

Al Jazeera: "At least 120 people have been wounded in renewed clashes between pro- and anti-government protesters in the Yemeni port city of Al-Hudayah. Witnesses said police and government loyalists attacked anti-government protesters with tear gas, rocks and bullets on Wednesday. The violence comes as pro-democracy opposition groups and students escalate their campaign to remove Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen's president for 32 years, from power."

New York Times: "The former chief executive of Freddie Mac may face a civil action as the government ramps up an investigation of disclosure practices at the mortgage finance giant and its sister company, Fannie Mae, people briefed on the investigation said. The executive, Richard F. Syron, a former president of the American Stock Exchange and now an adjunct professor and trustee at Boston College, has received a so-called Wells notice from the Securities and Exchange Commission, an indication the agency is considering an enforcement action against him."

AP: ousted former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide is expected to return to Haiti soon. Meanwhile, former dictator Jean-Claude 'Baby Doc' Duvalier is living in luxury in a private villa. Haiti will hold a presidential run-off election Sunday between "two outspoken Aristide critics, singer Michel Martelly and law professor Mirlande Manigat."

A Made-for-TV Horror Story. Los Angeles Times: On Tuesday, Los Angeles County prosecutors charged "the German-born con man Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter — alias Chris Chichester, Christopher Crowe and Clark Rockefeller ... with the 1985 murder of his 26-year-old San Marino landlord. The skeleton of Jonathan Sohus, a computer programmer who had mysteriously disappeared with his wife, Linda, was discovered in the backyard of the San Marino home in 1994. But Los Angeles area authorities had been unable to locate Gerhartsreiter...." The AP story is here.