The Commentariat -- February 22, 2012

My column in today's New York Times eXaminer is on Stanley Fish's post "Missing Pat Buchanan." The NYTX front page is here. You can contribute here.

Sam Baker of The Hill: "Democrats successfully shifted a debate over religious liberty to birth control last week, but opponents of the contraception mandate are trying to shift it right back." Read the whole article. Here's the Democratic House members petition, mentioned in the article, that demands women be allowed "at the table when discussing women's health issues."

Sahil Kapur of TPM: "The Supreme Court is poised to rule this summer on the constitutionality of the health care reform law’s requirement that Americans buy insurance or pay a tax penalty. But it has the legal option to delay a decision until at least 2014, and although the possibility has received little attention, new evidence suggests that justices are considering it more strongly." ...

... Glenn Greenwald does an I-told-ya-so. Justice Elena Kagan sides with the conservative justices on a Miranda ruling. The split was 6-3. Not good. ...

... CW: I seldom, if ever, recommend readers wade through legal documents, but this court order (pdf) by Judge Fred Biery is a gem (and it's short -- read the whole order, including the "personal statement" at the end). Thanks to a reader for the link. Tracy Hamilton of the San Antonio (Texas) Express-News has the background, which you may want to read first: "When former House Speaker Newt Gingrich calls out activist judges on the campaign trail, the name he mentions most often is Fred Biery. Biery, the chief federal judge for the Western District of Texas, emerged as a target for conservative criticism after he ruled last summer that Medina Valley High School couldn't officially sanction prayer at its graduation ceremony.... His ruling stood for just two days before it was overturned by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans ... [and] remanded the case back to Biery's court, without addressing the merits of his decision.... Biery has also urged the two sides into mediation." Under the approved agreement, "... the Medina Valley ISD won’t officially make prayer part of graduation ceremonies. The MSA does not, however, prohibit valedictorians or other student speakers from praying. Those moments must be introduced as 'student remarks.'” Andrew Cowen of The Atlantic has an analysis here, refuting Gingrich.

Conservative writer Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic: "Memo to Republicans: Obama Is Tougher on Iran than George W. Bush": One "reason we have arrived at this moment of high tension: The Obama Administration, through its stalwart opposition to the Iranian nuclear program, has narrowed Iran's maneuverability, and forced the regime to make some obvious errors.... It is precisely because the Obama Administration has constructed a sanctions program without precedent, and because the Obama Administration has funded and supported multinational cyber-sabotage efforts against the Iranian nuclear program, that Iran is panicking and lashing-out."

     ... Related item from CBS News. CW: The concert, which I ran live on Reality Chex, was pretty enjoyable. It will air on PBS Monday February 27 at 9 p.m. ET.

"Serious Businss Tycoons." Nicholas Confessore, et al., of the New York Times: "About two dozen individuals, couples or corporations have given $1 million or more to Republican super PACs this year, an exclusive club empowered by the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and other rulings.... Collectively, their contributions have totaled more than $50 million this cycle.... They have relatively few Democratic counterparts so far.... And unlike in past years, when wealthy donors of both parties donated chiefly to groups that were active in the general election campaign, the top Republican donors are contributing money far earlier, in contests that will determine the party’s presidential nominee." ...

... Dan Eggen & T. W. Farnam of the Washington Post: "... a rarefied group of millionaires and billionaires [are] acting as kingmakers in the GOP contest, often helping to decide, with a simple transfer of money, which candidate might survive another day. Although many of these mega-donors have long participated in politics, none were able to wield the kind of influence now possible under loosened campaign finance regulations, which allow super PACs and other outside groups to spend unlimited amounts on political races."

Right Wing World

It’s not a new candidate the right needs. It’s a new electorate. -- Michael Tomasky in the Daily Beast (Read Tomasky's whole post.)

Charles Pierce of Esquire explains the evolution of the Church of Rick -- "a 20-year effort to develop Roman Catholics who could talk like Southern Baptists, bonded as both groups were now by their twisted views of human sexuality, and by their desire to re-establish control over what American women can do with their bodies. It is an alliance of powerful convenience." ...

... Maureen Dowd has a rundown of some of Rick's Greatest Hits in her column today, beginning with this one:

Satan has his sights on the United States of America. Satan is attacking the great institutions of America, using those great vices of pride, vanity and sensuality as the root to attack all of the strong plants that has so deeply rooted in the American tradition. -- Rick Santorum, 2008 ...

... AND here's Santorum, just yesterday, on President Obama's secret plot to raise gas prices so you can't afford to get to work or the grocery store. Because, you know, high gas prices are such a plus for an incumbent in an election year. Okay, actually, this is Santorum's salvo in the Drill, Baby, Drill sweepstakes.

... Santorum's outrages are coming with such speed that the punditocracy can't keep up. Finally, two days after the fact, Dana Milbank calls out that horrid little man for equating President Obama with Adolf Hitler. "This is where Santorum exists, in a place of binary extremes of good and evil, where his political foe isn’t just wrong but adheres to a 'phony theology' not found in the Bible. His frequent tendency to go from zero to Nazi over ordinary political disagreements ... shows why he’s outside the bounds major political parties have applied to their past presidential nominees. Some of Santorum’s opponents have suggested that his Hitler tic reflects his own autocratic tendencies."

Romney's Got Nothin' on Santorum. Steve Benen: Yesterday, standing next to his No. 1 Ohio supporter, Sen. Rob Portman (R), Mitt Romney again criticized Rick Santorum for voting to raise the debt ceiling while he was in Congress, which is kinda funny because "Portman, who not only repeatedly voted to raise the debt ceiling himself as a member of Congress, but also served as George W. Bush's budget director when the Bush/Cheney administration repeatedly raised the debt ceiling."

How to say "quiet rooms" (see Romney, Willard) in New Jersey:

... Greg Sargent: "Buffett’s point is that the scale of the problem requires his class as a whole to chip in a bit more to solve it.... It’s very inconvenient for Republicans to have people like Buffett out there forcing issues of inequality and tax unfairness into the national conversation. It makes it a lot harder to equate proposed solutions to them with 'envy' and 'class warfare....”

Local News

Harry Minium & Julian Walker of the Virginian-Pilot: "In the face of widespread criticism, Republican state lawmakers delayed a vote again [Tuesday] on a bill that would require women to undergo an ultrasound before having an abortion. SB48 ... was one of the targets of two protest rallies on the State Capital grounds that drew nearly 1,000 women on Monday. Republican efforts to restrict insurance coverage of contraception and abortion rights have been lampooned by commentators, including a skit on Saturday Night Live. Some legislators suggested on Tuesday that they may attempt to soften ultrasound legislation."

News Ledes

CNN will host another GOP presidential debate tonight at 8:00 pm ET. Update: The New York Times is liveblogging the debate. The Washington Post has live updates here. ...

     ... Update: the New York Times reports on the debate. Here's the Washington Post report. CW: I listened to the crowd reactions. They pretty much applauded everything stupid & booed any sensible measures the candidates had accidentally supported in the past. Yep, the GOP needs a new electorate.

Washington Post: "A jury [in Charlottesville, Virginia] on Wednesday evening convicted George Huguely V of second-degree murder in the 2010 death of his onetime girlfriend Yeardley Love after about nine hours of deliberations. Huguely faces up to 40 years in prison on the murder charge."

New York Times: "A federal advisory panel on Wednesday overwhelmingly recommended approval of what could become the first new prescription drug to treat obesity in 13 years."

Washington Post: "A former Baltimore-area resident held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has reached a plea agreement with military prosecutors that calls for him to testify at the trials of other detainees in exchange for a much-reduced sentence and eventual freedom, according to officials familiar with the case. The plea agreement with Majid Khan, 31, is the first with a high-value detainee who was previously held by the CIA at a secret prison overseas. Khan was charged this month with war crimes, including murder, attempted murder, spying and providing material support for terrorism, and faced up to life in prison."

New York Times: "New York State's courts, frustrated by delays in thousands of foreclosure cases, are planning to speed them along in a new program that would give judges added control and require banks to send officials who have the power to alter loans to keep people in their homes."

New York Times: "Two Western journalists, one American and one French, were killed early Wednesday in Syria as forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad pursued a deadly bombardment of the central city of Homs, according to activists and officials. Valérie Pécresse, the French government spokeswoman, identified the dead as Marie Colvin, an American reporter working for The Sunday Times of London, and Rémi Ochlik, a French photographer."

Washington Post: "President Obama on Wednesday plans to propose a major overhaul of the nation’s corporate tax code, an election-year gambit that is likely to draw a contrast over a key policy issue with the Republicans vying to replace him. Obama will propose lowering the nation’s corporate tax rate to 28 percent. At the same time, however, he will seek to increase the amount of revenues raised overall through corporate taxation by eliminating numerous deductions and loopholes that save companies tens of billions of dollars a year on their tax bills, according to a senior administration official."

Washington Post: "Gov. Robert F. McDonnell is backing off his unconditional support for a bill requiring women to have an ultrasound before an abortion.... Until this weekend, McDonnell (R) and his aides had said the governor would sign the measure if it made it to his desk. McDonnell, who strongly opposes abortion, will no longer make that commitment. But delegates and governor’s staff were scheduled to meet Tuesday night to strike a compromise after learning that some ultrasounds could be more invasive than first thought...." ...

     ... Update: "The Virginia House of Delegates voted Wednesday afternoon to amend a proposed bill on ultrasounds before abortions to say that no woman will have to undergo an internal ultrasound involuntarily. The revised bill says that only an external ultrasound will be required to satisfy the requirements to determine gestational age. And Sen. Jill Holtzman Vogel (R), the bill’s sponsor in the Senate, said she will ask that the bill to be striken. The action came the same day that Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) reversed course and said he was asking the General Assembly to amend the proposed bill."

New York Times: "Protests against the burning by NATO personnel of an undisclosed number of Korans spilled into a second day on Wednesday and seemed poised to widen as the American Embassy here suspended all travel by its staff, and NATO soldiers in the capital appeared to be restricting their movements, keeping military vehicles off the streets."

AP: "Fitch ratings agency says it has downgraded Greece further into junk status, from 'CCC' to 'C' following the announcement of the details of the country's debt swap deal with private creditors. The agency said Wednesday the downgrade indicated 'that default is highly likely in the near term.'"

New York Times: "Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd of Australia resigned on Wednesday amid growing speculation that he and his backers in Parliament were seeking to topple Prime Minister Julia Gillard and regain for him the country’s leadership role."

Reuters: "Salvage workers have found four more bodies in the submerged Costa Concordia cruise liner, bringing the confirmed number of dead to 21 on the ship that ran aground and capsized off the Italian coast last month, authorities said on Wednesday."

Comments

[Carlyle]

We are not going to survive our current economic situation as anything resembling a Democracy. Already, we have become captives of the whims of those of great wealth. The Corporate and Capital interests have not just bought votes, they have purchased the system. The influx of huge amounts of money into the voting system has made the promise of support from an important special interest faction necessary before becoming a candidate.
Selling out before the campaign even starts has become the norm. As the disparity between those in power and the serfs increases , protests are inevetable . Protests that will finish off any pretense of Democracy as Capital defends itself from the rabble with cops, courts and clubs.

[Marie Burns]

@ Carlyle. We've never had a democracy. Democracy is what you get in small New England towns where the townspeople gather together, speak out on the issues, then vote. What we have is a federal republic, albeit one that is now, and not for the first time, largely run by an oligarchical aristocracy.

But people still have power. Take, for example, today's news: "Washington Post: "Gov. Robert F. McDonnell is backing off his unconditional support for a bill requiring women to have an ultrasound before an abortion.... Until this weekend, McDonnell (R) and his aides had said the governor would sign the measure if it made it to his desk. McDonnell, who strongly opposes abortion, will no longer make that commitment. But delegates and governor’s staff were scheduled to meet Tuesday night to strike a compromise after learning that some ultrasounds could be more invasive than first thought...." (Linked in today's Ledes.) A free press & free speech, exercised in the form of protests, led to McDonnell's apparent "change of heart." If the Virginia law is changed, that is one small step for womankind.

Today, President Obama is reportedly going to propose sweeping changes to the corporate tax structure, too. Will it happen? Not anytime soon. But popular protests -- Occupy -- are responsible for Obama's sudden recollection of his populist roots.

A lot more must be done. But consider the alternative, which I believe you -- and certainly others -- have suggested: popular rebellion. Tell me, do you want our new set of leaders to be those who are willing to take the helm by forcible means? Ask the Egyptians how that's working out. And remember that guillotine Rick Santorum warned was in our future. His reasoning was bull, but the French Revolution was a typical example of good intentions gone wrong. Revolutionary leaders are seldom democrats. For every George Washington, there are many Hugo Chavezes & Fidel Castros. The hopes for a revolution are a good lesson in BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR in all caps.

[Akhilleus]

Here’s a little quiz.

Can you name the politician who claims to know the mind of God, who has raised intolerance against women, gays, and political enemies to a level rarely seen, who rails about Christians with a false theology, and who takes advantage of people’s hard times not to help them but to help himself, and who is on the verge of becoming the most powerful leader of his demesne?

If you said Rick Santorum, you’re right. But you’re also correct if you said Girolamo Savonarola. They are blood brothers; religious demagogues who get their hands on political power and use it to force their twisted worldview on the populace.

The current iteration of the Republican Party, under the influence of far right fanatics, rants on about the goal of removing government influence in as many spheres of daily life as possible, especially in areas such as regulating big oil and gas, Wall Street trading practices, banking and investments, and pretty much any corporate dealings. But they have no problem attempting to employ the power of government to impact the private and personal lives of citizens, especially in the bedroom.

Prior to the rise of Savonarola in Florence, a rather progressive city-state of the Italian Renaissance milieu, sexuality was considered a private affair and approached with a fair amount of tolerance for the 15th – 16th centuries. But not by Savonarola and his followers. Once in power, Savonarola made the practice of homosexuality punishable by death. This is exactly the level of punishment called for by many of today’s intolerant right-wing bigots supporting Santorum. Savonarola loudly complained about the degrading influences of art, literature, and culture, and had his followers force their way into Florentine homes to remove paintings, books, and other artifacts they considered sinful and anathema to their strict religious codes. These items were burned in Savonarola’s infamous Bonfire of the Vanities.

Like Santorum, Savonarola goal was to force Florentines to abide by his conception of religious rule. The state became subordinate to a warped and fractious form of his personal Christianity. When Santorum screams about the president’s “false theology” it makes me wonder whose theology is in fact false? 16th century Florence decided that it was Savonarola’s theology that was left wanting.

They burned him at the stake.

Although I’m not in any way suggesting the same fate for Rick Santorum, I’m hoping the American electorate will stop this modern-day Savonarola before he is able to inflict his twisted and distorted religious views on the rest of us.

An ominous footnote for any who think such ideas could only gain purchase in the 16th century. Savonarola has never really gone away in some dark recesses of the Catholic Church. Less than 60 years after his execution for heresy (eventually his demagoguery became so virulent that he claimed to know more than God—something even those fearful of such firebrands could not brook) the mark of heresy was removed by the pope. In the 20th century and even now under the current pope, a strong movement has gathered around Savonarola calling for his canonization. Saint Savonarola. The previous pope, John Paul II wrote an encyclical calling for Savonarola’s beatification, the first step on the road to sainthood. Why pick up the mantle of such a dangerous, clearly demented demagogue? Savonarola has enormous appeal to the far right traditionalists in the modern Catholic Church, like John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, because he represented the kind of take-no-prisoners hatred of secularism, a suspicion of the world, of art, of sex, of culture, bordering on derangement. He sought to make his religious authority the ONLY authority.

Sounds more than a little like Rick Santorum, doesn’t it? He already, like so many on the religious right, sees himself as a victim, attacked by the media, progressives, and those he considers apostates or whose faith is not the same as his. I bet he’d love to be Saint Santorum.

Just as long as he doesn’t get to be President Santorum.

[akhilleus]

One more note on the Santorum affront to logic, morality, ethics, and basic old common decency.

Anyone who has been paying the slightest attention to network news realizes that there truly is no such thing as the "liberal media". There might be a case made that a sizable number of reporters vote on the Democratic side, but that doesn't mean they've all decided to go the same route as Fox zealots. There simply isn't anything on the left like Fox. That being said, the hated "liberal media" broadcast outlets try as hard as they can to make sure no one can ever consider them the least bit "liberal", in fact, it's difficult to see how they are even fair when it comes to covering issues over which right-wingers will go to war. Last night the NBC evening news aired a package covering the hoopla over Santorum's rant against Obama's theology. The piece replayed the Santorum quote without providing any context (in other words, as if Santorum was simply stating a fact). To reinforce Santorum's crap, the package went on to show incendiary footage of Jeremiah Wright, who has absolutely NOTHING to do with this issue, but it has the very nice effect of softening Santorum's outrageous claims by providing a reminder of Wright's craziness. At this point one would expect something from the other side that questioned Santorum's motives for this statement or at least something that offered a view from the other side. Nope. The next SOT comes from Billy Graham's son who goes on to further question the president's religion. He babbles on about not being able to really look into another man's soul but that doesn't stop him from deciding that Obama is probably not a true Christian after all. That was it. No other side was given equal time. It was almost as if Santorum's people produced this package as a hit.

So much for the liberal media. Don't expect any of them to take on Santorum or question why it's important in any way that the president or ANY candidate not come up to what he considers the only real standards to be considered a Christian.

Just disgusting.

[Carlyle]

Ahh Marie:... You do not understand me. I am not a proponent of revolt, I just suggest that it is inevitable. There is no plan, proposal program, or idea of any political entity designed to stop the decline of working Americans. The administration's plans are inadequate in face of the size of the problem. Republicans are happy or indifferent.
Franklin D. Roosevelt had a subdued Nation that in desperation allowed extreme things to be tried.
We are not now a subdued Nation. When enough Americans have been damaged, there will be a window of opportunity where extreme measures can be taken to revive the middle class or facing revolt the government will go from a plutocracy to a police state. I hope for a champion like FDR but am afraid that the power of money will blow the next champion out of the water. There is no way for a person, a new idea, or any plan to get past the huge amounts of money dedicated to making the rich richer and keeping labor cheap and in its place and apparently, reverent.

[James Singer]

For one, I'd rather have a Hugo Chavez or a Fidel Castro than a Barak Obama.

[Marie Burns]

@ James Singer. That wants some explaining.

[forrest morris]

@James Singer: Hugo and Fidel aren't in a position to appoint
Supreme Court Judges after the upcoming election. Very important
point for the future of all of us peons. Hopefully it won't be
someone like santorum doing the appointing.

[forrest morris]

Sorry----Justices.

[DaveS]

@akhillieus...Bravo!

@carlyle,,,I understand your trepidation and respect your perspective, but my parents lived through the depression too. My mother is 82, in 1937 she was 7 years old, still she insists that FDR made the depression worst, guess her family didn't hang his picture in the wall. Don't get me wrong, I love my mom but I've often wondered how she formed a strong opinion about a such a complicated and controversial topic as macro-economics at 7 years old.

My point is I dispute that we are a subdued nation. The modern Father Coughlin is a multi-headed virulent hydra with a fat wallet and the seeming ability make Randolph Hearst look like a piker. If anything we are a nation ripe for a fascist takeover, and if that happens you'll get the riots you keep predicting.

I remain optimistic that the nation will not let that happen. Faux news be damned I believe the nation is smarter than that.

[Carlyle]

DaveS; Best wishes to your mother. I am a little older than she is and her opinion of FDR was quiet common among many Americans. My mother in law always called him "that man" and ridiculed both Franklin and Eleanor.
I can also remember Father Coughlin broadcasting from The Shrine of the Little Flower on Sunday afternoons.
Franklin and a dedicated group of New Dealers struggled to turn the economy around . They had some hits and some misses but they stopped the downward trend until they got nervous and tightened spending in 1937.
It is hard to believe that a balanced budget with twenty five percent unemployment would have halted the depression.
A public that is accepting the unemployment and underemployment that we have now does not inspire me to believe the country is safe.
There is a lack of public concern about the fifty million or so Americans being damaged by this period of very low growth.
Of course we are not a subdued Nation. No extreme measures will be possible until we become one.

[Julie in Massachusetts]

@James Singer

Yes, please explain why you would prefer Hugo Chavez to Barack Obama. Do you have any idea how absolutely scary it is to live in Venezuela since the takeover by Hugo Chavez? Do you know what it is like to constantly need to look over your shoulder for fear of being robbed, killed or kidnapped? Do you have any idea the worry parents have for their children on a daily basis? If not, I suggest you you visit for a few weeks and get a dose of life under Chavez, and then report back to us. As a visitor of this country for over 20 years, I can tell you that there was a time when I could safely walk the streets of Caracas with little worry. This is not the case today. For those that live there day in and day out crime is a constant companion.