The Commentariat -- Dec. 29, 2013

NEW: AFP: "The US National Security Agency has collected sensitive data on key telecommunications cables between Europe, north Africa and Asia, German news magazine Der Spiegel reported Sunday citing classified documents. Spiegel quoted NSA papers dating from February and labelled 'top secret' and 'not for foreigners' describing the agency's success in spying on the so-called Sea-Me-We 4 undersea cable system." ...

... The full Der Spiegel article (in English) is here. It covers other aspects of super-duper hacking done by an NSA unit called "Tailored Access Operations."

David Kirkpatrick of the New York Times has a Big Piece on Benghazi! ...

... Driftglass: "The New York Times just pulverized any last remnants of the wingnut fairy tale of Benghaaaaazi! But before you get too excited, do not for one minute imagine this will trigger a sudden outbreak of Conservative self-awareness." ...

... Yes, because there will always be Louie Gohmert.

Ernesto Londoño, et al., of the Washington Post: "A new American intelligence assessment on the Afghan war predicts that the gains the United States and its allies have made during the past three years are likely to have been significantly eroded by 2017, even if Washington leaves behind a few thousand troops and continues bankrolling the impoverished nation, according to officials familiar with the report." ...

... See Jeffrey Goldberg, August 2008. Also, Herman Melville, 1851.

Alice Marwick in the New York Review of Books: "... private companies systematically collect very personal information, from who you are, to what you do, to what you buy. Data about your online and offline behavior are combined, analyzed, and sold to marketers, corporations, governments, and even criminals. The scope of this collection, aggregation, and brokering of information is similar to, if not larger than, that of the NSA, yet it is almost entirely unregulated and many of the activities of data-mining and digital marketing firms are not publicly known at all."

The Pope of Janesville. Joan Walsh of Salon: As he prepares his new campaign to "help" he poor, Altar Boy Paul Ryan laments Pope Francis's ignorance of matters economic: "'The guy is from Argentina, they haven't had real capitalism in Argentina,' Ryan said (referring to the pope as 'the guy' is a nice folksy touch.) 'They have crony capitalism in Argentina. They don't have a true free enterprise system.'"

Lena Sun & Amy Goldstein of the Washington Post have a moving piece on people who are delighted to get health insurance coverage under the ACA.

Sean McElwee of the Atlantic: Vermont is finding out that switching to more-or-less a single-payer health insurance system is mighty difficult, too, even in a state as small, homogeneous & liberal as Vermont. Although the concept was signed into law in 2011, Jonathan Gruber -- who helped develop both the Massachusetts & U.S. plans -- says, “There is no Vermont plan. There are Vermont ideas, but there is no Vermont plan."

CW: Ross Douthat does a self-audit, which makes me like him a little better. Probably we could find more Mistakes Ross Made, but that would mean reading his columns. I would do one myself, except I can't recall all the stupid stuff I said. (Perhaps you'll want to remind me.) ...

... Here's Dave Weigel's "Everything I got wrong this year," which Douthat links.

... Not everybody admits his mistakes:

"The Year of the Weasel." Paul Krugman: "... we've now seen that one side of the debate [over monetary policy] not only refuses to take evidence into account, but tries to dodge personal responsibility for getting it wrong. This has gone from a test of ideas to a test of character, and a lot of people failed."

"Money Talks." Before we bid adieu to the "Duck Dynasty" clan, let give Driftglass the last word, the word which puts this squalid story in perspective: "Obviously, as 25 years of Rush Limbaugh has demonstrated, you can haul the poo-flingingest, bigoted loudmouth out of the dankest wingnut watering hole in America and stick a microphone in front of him, and nothing he says or does -- no matter how offensive or untrue -- will earn him more than token slap on the wrist just as long as he can generate ad revenue and hold an audience. So nothing new there. What is mildly interesting is the curve on which those wrist-slaps are graded." ...

... CW: After today, you will have to satisfy your thirst for "Duck Dynasty" news elsewhere, unless we learn that Phil has a black boyfriend, a development that will raise in me a brief stirring of schadenfreude somewhat vitiated by my sympathy for the young man.

Money Talks, Ctd. Tal Kopan of Politico: The right-wing bill mill ALEC has moved "toward greater openness ... in the wake of dozens of corporate members pulling out earlier this year after ALEC was drawn into the Martin case. By some estimates, as many as 400 lawmakers and 60 companies, including brand names like Coca-Cola, Pepsi and McDonald's, bolted. But critics say the transparency effort is a smokescreen, and they charge that ALEC remains the same corporate-driven 'bill mill' designed to push right-wing business interests in statehouses with as little notice as possible."

Local News

Ken Dilanian of the Los Angeles Times: "... at Shooters World, a Tampa-based temple of American gun culture..., about 50 people took turns on a recent Saturday firing pistols, military assault weapons, an Uzi machine gun and a .50-caliber sniper rifle. It was a charity event called Shooting With SOF, which stands for special operations forces. Organizers say they have raised $75,000 for military and veterans causes by allowing car dealers, insurance brokers, makeup artists and other ordinary folks to live out fantasies firing some of the world's deadliest guns while being tutored by 20 current and former commandos -- seasoned, seen-it-all veterans of Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and places they can't talk about." CW: The geniuses who participated in this event used the word "badass" a lot. I myself cannot think of a better way to show my charitable heart than by shooting & "reveling in the gun's destructive power."

News Ledes

AFP: "An Australian icebreaker was Monday battling against bad weather to reach a ship carrying a scientific expedition stranded off Antarctica, leaving open the possibility of a helicopter evacuation, authorities said."

AP: "Dozens of lawsuits seeking damages from the federal government for Hurricane Katrina-related levee failures and flooding in the New Orleans area are over. U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval Jr. has dismissed the cases. The move comes more than a year after a federal appeals court overturned his ruling that held the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers liable for flooding caused by lax maintenance of a shipping channel."

New York Times: "The detention of four American military personnel in Libya on Friday was preceded by a confrontation at a checkpoint in which gunshots were fired and a vehicle was damaged, a witness in Libya and an Obama administration official said on Saturday."

AFP: "At least 18 people were killed and dozens injured Sunday when a suicide bomber blew herself up in a train station in the Russian city of Volgograd ahead of February's Olympic Games in nearby Sochi. Regional officials said the woman set off her charge near the metal detectors stationed at the entrance to the city's main train station while it was packed with afternoon travellers."

AFP: "The Israeli military fired a barrage of shells into southern Lebanon in retaliation after five Katyusha-style rockets were launched against the Jewish state on Sunday, officials said. The attacks struck uninhabited areas of both Israel and Lebanon without causing any casualties or damage, officials on both sides said."

Comments

[Diane]

The Kirkpatrick article is a fine piece of journalism, well written and researched. It is the most clear, logical picture of the event in Benghazi that I have read.

McFarland (US Diplomat) met with militia leaders on 9/09/12. "They specifically asked for Benghazi outlets of McDonald’s and KFC." They also warned that Benghazi wasn't safe and hoped the Americans would leave "now". Other interviews indicate that there was a conflicting message asking the Americans to stay and help Libyans. The thinking feels chaotic and unpredictable.

I took 3 thoughts away from this piece. First, Ambassador Stevens was dedicated to a Democratic Libya. He lost his life, wishing it were so and perhaps, minimizing truths. Second, there was a failure of intelligence. A simplistic statement that conveys a complex reality. I think the US has some basic misunderstanding of cultural and social ties. Probably, because the social ties of Libyans ( Iraqis, Afghans, etc) are not based on Western rules. There is no Golden Rule in play. It’s difficult to maneuver in a construct you find wrong. Third, we continue to underestimate the power of the hostility, hate, and disgust for Westerners and our culture.

Yesterday, I listened to an interview with David Kilcullen (http://www.npr.org/2013/12/27/257524634/stratgegist-kilcullen-warfare-is-changing-in-3-ways), a military strategist. I struggled through his first book (The Accidental Guerrilla) and I gained some valuable understanding. What he has to say bears on the Benghazi events.

From his interview, remember he's a military strategist:
"As I've looked at all the cities that are growing, one of the inescapable conclusions is you get conflict not where you have just basic income inequality. You get conflict where people are locked out of progress and they look at all these people having a good time and realize I'm never going to be part of that party and they decide to burn the house down. So a lot of it is about getting communities into collaborative approach to solving their own problems. And that's fundamentally the realm of, you know, social work and international assistance and diplomacy. It's not really a military function." ( some domestic applicability too yeah)

I connected the NYT piece and the interview in my head around Kilcullen's discussion about a Coca-Cola factory (Libyans want a KFC/ McDonalds) in Mogadishu that had survived 20 years of civil war. It survived because Coca Cola was the perfect pairing for leafy Khat, a stimulant used by everybody. He suggests that the idea of the community protectiing the Coca Cola plant can be broadened: " I mean if you like Coke you're going to love having water and you're going to love having education for your kid."

It seems like an approach that supports existing community rather than tries to bend the community to a radically different construct.
Apologize for the length. I think the Kilcullen interview is well worth a read and shows an alternative to the failures we are currently perpetrating.

[Marie Burns]

@oldstone50 wrote: "The right to free speech - like any other right - can't be absolute. That seems pretty clear. But Marie Burns, in her comment above, suggested there may be 'extraordinary circumstances' that allow the exercise of civil disobedience, i.e., to 'cause a public hazard or [...] seriously limit the reasonable rights of others -- occupying a park, a public building, a street, etc.' in the pursuit of being heard. If that is indeed the case, then how does one know when extraordinary circumstances are in effect, and whose judgement is determinant? It seems to me there is a terrible element of wiggle room here that can be used by anyone who knows the Truth to insist that now is the time to be civilly disobedient or, conversely, to insist that no disobedience be tolerated at this time in this, the most civil of all societies. So how can inquiring minds be sure of where to find the high ground?"

There is "a terrible amount of wiggle room," & protesters & authorities test it all the time. Quite often police will decline to arrest protesters who are breaking a local ordinance; at other times, they might go overboard & arrest even passers-by.

And the same act of protest can have different effects in different circumstances. If I walk across the Brooklyn Bridge wearing a T-shirt that says, "Tax the 1% @ 90%," it's very unlikely the cops will even notice me -- unless I try to do the very same thing with a thousand of my BFFs.

Everyone has to decide in his own mind whether or not something is "extraordinary" enough to risk the possible downsides of participating in an unlawful demonstration. For instance, when the Texas legislature tried to pass a strict abortion ordinance, protesters in the hall drowned them out so the clerk couldn't call the roll. All of those protesters were violating the law, they knew it & they were willing to risk the consequences. The situation was extraordinary. The state police chose not to arrest them in that instance, as I recall (and the legislature definitely passed the law when next they met).

In addition, ordinances may be unconstitutional. If my town had an ordinance that effectively precluded orderly demonstrations, it might be worth mounting one just to test the law itself. Or maybe my town had a law that precluded "certain types" of demonstrations -- ones that didn't suit the powers-that-be. Just because it's a law doesn't make it constitutional.

Principled people break local laws all the time because they believe the circumstances that provoked them to speak out warrant it. Congressman John Lewis was arrested -- with seven other MOCs as well as many others -- in Washington, D.C. recently in support of immigration reform. It was Lewis's 45th arrest for protesting. Obviously, he can take it. I can't recall whether or not the charges were dropped; often they are. Lewis, et al., were charged with “crowding, obstructing and incommoding” the public. Even tho there were thousands of people participating in that particular demonstration, I doubt they were severely "incommoding" people going about their business.

As I said in my original comment, your First Amendment rights will often be in tension with my rights to get to work or eat lunch in the park. Usually, we can accommodate each other. If public officials are sensible, they will facilitate that. But protesters should not count on public officials having the same sensitivities they do -- especially if what the protesters are protesting are the public officials who decide who gets arrested & charged.

Marie

[Barbarossa]

So now Grannystarver Ryan is an expert on Argentina? His range of expertise boggles the mind! And Pope Francis is "the guy." Hmm. Very respectful for a devout Catholic.

I spent several hours researching Argentina's economy. The end result: too complicated to boil down to "crony capitalism."

Remember Argentina's default? As Krugman freqeuently warns, any country that depends on a currency they don't control is asking for trouble. In Argentina's case, the peso was pegged to the US dollar. That wasn't the only cause of the defayult, but it contributed to the crisis. The link below compares Ryan and the Pope.

Http://www.thewire.com/politics/2013/12/who-more-fallible-economics-paul-ryan-or-pope-francis/356503/

[Noodge]

Vermont may be finding that creating a single payer health care plan for their individual state is difficult to do, but they have to fit everyone in their state into whatever federal program they may or may not already be in.

Creating a federal single payer system would be ridiculously easy, as we already have the plans and the bureaucracy in place. All we have to do is decide whether we want Medicare for all or Medicaid for all and adjust taxes accordingly.

[James Singer]

This is my story about the grand and pervasive corporate data hustle. It starts with a boring prolog: My car insurance guy wanted to chat. My rate had just gone up 12 percent so I wanted to chat, too, because at my age that meant I was paying nearly $2 a mile to drive my truck, not counting gas, oil, and depreciation.

When we were done chatting (and my corporate hostility had been put back in its cage), he said something like: “It’s smart to check our competitors every now and then. Get quotes from other companies. If we don’t stack up, let me know.” I don’t know what “stack up” means, but that doesn’t matter to the rest of what I want to relate.

Now the juicy part of my story. So I did; I checked out that omnipresent insurance-nag Progressive (a cyber-parasitic mistletoe on our tree of life). I punched up Progressive, entered my name, state, and zip, and—lo and behold—up popped my address, my truck, my sister’s car, and all the facts and figures about my current coverage and my sister’s current coverage. To this rather startling display, they also had images of our vehicles and the colors of our vehicle in those images is correct. The image of my truck also shows that it sports a high-rise cap.

Progressive’s quotes, however, were not remotely competitive.

[Marie Burns]

@James Singer: I had a similar experience with whoever it is that sells insurance for AARP. They advertised they had the best rates (natch), so when it was time to re-up my car insurance, I called them. The company knew not only all about my cars but also what I was currently paying for insurance with what company & what my driving record was (I didn't give them my drivers license #). I said I had gotten a speeding ticket several years back but I thought I was past having points on my license -- they told me when I got the ticket & assured me its effect had lapsed. Nope, they said they couldn't beat the rates I was paying.

The NSA may be holding my metadata, but odds are, they aren't mining it. The same is not true for private companies; they seem to know more about me than I know about myself.

Sometimes that benefits the customer. Some crooks used two different credit cards of mine (they seem to have selected the numbers randomly rather than having actually stolen the info). In each case, the cardholder called me to ask me if I had bought cheap perfume in California or whatever. The cardholders have algorithms that tell them well before the customer may find out that someone else is likely using the card. I also got a call from the bank about a legitimate charge because the vendor had a Miami address, & I live on Florida's West Coast.

Forget the morality of it; being a criminal -- if your crimes are serious enough for the cops to bother to investigate -- must be damned difficult these days.

Marie

[Haley Simon]

I think I still have a few minutes before the deadline and I have just now watched my first Duck video with accompanied comment by Ralph Reed and a woman named Something or Other Angela Davis. I've decided I don't care what the hell the Ducks or the Martin Bashirs want to say on television. I would be mighty pleased if I never had to see Ralph Reed again, but if some damn fool wants to rant about his religious beliefs or how happy the Nee groes were during his childhood - let the fool rant on. With a little luck maybe the Ducks will overreach and some will come to see how vile they are. And with maybe just a little more luck and some quiet on the liberal front, I won't have to see that weasily little Ralph Reed ever again.