Sunday
Jan052014
The Commentariat -- January 6, 2014
Most of the people I meet who are on unemployment are people who have had jobs for 25 years, lost them, they've been knocking on doors every week. I think it's a little insulting, a bit insulting to American workers when Rand Paul says that unemployment insurance is a disservice. They want to work, they don't want unemployment benefits. They're just hanging on with unemployment benefits, you cut them off, they may lose the house they paid for, take their kids out of college. So I would hope he would reconsider, past the three month extension. -- Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on ABC's "This Week" Sunday ...
... Mike Lillis & Vicki Needham of the Hill: "Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) remains open to an extension of emergency unemployment benefits even in the face of growing conservative opposition to such a move. The Ohio Republican maintains the position he expressed last month that Republicans would 'clearly consider' an extension of federal help for the long-term unemployed 'as long as it's paid for and as long as there are other efforts that will help get our economy moving once again,' Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said Friday." ...
... E. J. Dionne sees a United States of America. The majority of Americans favor unemployment compensation and other New Deal-y programs; it is Congressional Republicans who are out-of-step. ...
... Alec MacGillis of the New Republic on the Boeing machinist union's forced capitulation to Boeing's demands. "But to really address the underlying trends will also mean taking on the more fundamental forces that lead to an outcome like we just saw in the Puget Sound: strengthening labor laws and unions in right-to-work states...; raising taxes on upper incomes and capital gains to slightly rebalance the equation...; and, perhaps most difficult of all, changing the norms for acceptable behavior by corporate titans, even if they've been named to the presidential exports council." This is an excellent piece, which P. D. Pepe linked in yesterday's Comments. MacGillis asks a question which demands -- and will not receive -- a federal answer: strengthening unions nationwide.
Brian Knowlton of the New York Times: "A debate over whether Edward J. Snowden deserves lenience or the strict treatment the Obama administration has demanded for divulging a vast array of national secrets drew sharply opposing views on Sunday from two prominent senators. Senator Rand Paul ... said he disagreed with those who have argued for the most severe penalties for Mr. Snowden.... Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, took a directly opposing view. 'I disagree with Rand Paul that we should plea-bargain with him prior to him coming back,' Mr. Schumer said." ...
... Amy Davidson of the New Yorker disagrees with Fred Kaplan's required Reality Chex reading. Her major point sounds like a quibble to me: Kaplan wrote that Snowden "signed an oath ... not to disclose classified information, and knew the penalties for violating the oath." But Davidson says he did not sign an oath; instead, he signed "a contract in which the signatory says he will 'accept' the terms, rather than swearing to them." Her argument then is that breaking a contractual agreement is not as bad as breaking one's word. Okay. Of course, she writes much more than that. ...
... Gene Lyons, noted hyperbolist, takes down novice hyperbolist Ed Snowden. CW: Lyons get a lot right, but he gets some pretty important stuff wrong, too: ferinstance, Snowden is probably not -- by the Constitutional definition -- a traitor, as Lyons claims, unless Snowden has been sending stuff to Al Qaeda & North Korea." Thanks to Barbarossa for the link.
Matea Gold of the Washington Post: "The political network spearheaded by conservative billionaires Charles and David Koch has expanded into a far-reaching operation of unrivaled complexity, built around a maze of groups that cloaks its donors.... The resources and the breadth of the organization make it singular in American politics: an operation conducted outside the campaign finance system, employing an array of groups.... Members of the coalition target different constituencies but together have mounted attacks on the new health-care law, federal spending and environmental regulations." ...
... Matea Gold: "The Washington Post and the Center for Responsive Politics identified a coalition of allied conservative groups active in the 2012 elections that together raised at least $407 million, backed by a donor network organized by the industrialists Charles and David Koch." Gold lists the coalition's current members. A graphic here shows how the organizations interact.
Michael Tomasky of the Daily Beast: "On the 50th anniversary of LBJ's initiative, [the War on Poverty,] Marco Rubio says it failed.... But the policies did succeed -- Democrats are just afraid to say so.... We have not, of course, been fighting any kind of serious war on poverty for five decades. We fought it with truly adequate funding for about one decade.... By 1981, Ronald Reagan's government was fighting a war on the war on poverty. The fate of many anti-poverty programs has ebbed and flowed ever since. But at the beginning, in the '60s, those programs were fully funded, or close. And what happened? According to Joseph Califano, who worked in the Johnson White House, 'the portion of Americans living below the poverty line dropped from 22.2 percent to 12.6 percent, the most dramatic decline over such a brief period in this century.' That's a staggering 43 percent reduction. In six years." ...
... Annie Lowrey of the New York Times: "Half a century after Mr. Johnson’s now-famed State of the Union address, the debate over the government’s role in creating opportunity and ending deprivation has flared anew, with inequality as acute as it was in the Roaring Twenties and the ranks of the poor and near-poor at record highs."
Larry Summers, in a Washington Post op-ed, uses terms like "secular stagnation" to say that if the economy keeps going as it is, bubbles will grow & burst, & one way to avert that is to have the federal invest in infrastructure. I don't know if the guy really cannot communicate with the average reading public or if he can't help showing off. In any event, he's a terrible writer.
Jessica Silver-Greenberg & Ben Protess of the New York Times: JPMorgan Chase "plans to reach as soon as this week roughly $2 billion in criminal and civil settlements with federal authorities who suspect that it ignored signs of Bernard L. Madoff's Ponzi scheme, according to people briefed on the case."
Linda Greenhouse on the Fair Sentencing Act: When new laws call for more leniency, shouldn't that leniency apply retroactively? ...
... CW: Luckily for me, my own excellent Congressman Trey Radel (RTP-Fla.) is as white as, well the driven snow, & he will be going back to doing the people's work today now that his cocaine bust is behind him.
Jordan Sargent of Gawker: "Republican congressman Aaron Schock -- who represents Illinois' 18th congressional district -- is known for one thing: being pretty and probably-almost-certainly gay. Schock is anti-gay on the record and he's frequently affirmed his straightness, but he may be feeling a gust of air this morning thanks to a sledgehammer wielded by journalist Itay Hod." ...
... Marc Ambinder of the Atlantic objects to Hod's methods, which are at best sophomoric.
Ashley Parker of the New York Times: "After a two-week vacation on the windward side of Oahu, ensconced with his family in a private beachfront rental, President Obama prepared on Saturday to return to the chillier clime -- both politically and weather-wise -- of the nation's capital."
Politico publishes an adaptation of a portion of a new book by CIA attorney John Rizzo. In this section, Rizzo recalls the decision-making process that allowed the CIA to use waterboarding & other "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques" like sleep deprivation.
Another Right-Wing Senator Sues Instead of Legislating. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.): "On Monday, Jan. 6, I am filing suit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin to make Congress live by the letter of the health-care law it imposed on the rest of America. By arranging for me and other members of Congress and their staffs to receive benefits intentionally ruled out by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the administration has exceeded its legal authority." ...
... ObamaCare is Doomed! ObamaCare Is a Scandal! Jonathan Chait: "... the nature of [Republican] opposition [to ObamaCare] will ... slowly morph. Gleeful predictions of imminent collapse will give way to bitter recriminations at the nefarious tactics used to make the law work. Obamacare will cease to be the something certain to destroy Obama and become something Obama has gotten away with." CW: Chait cites some recent Republican potshots at the law. Johnson's is another one. ...
... Noam Scheiber of the New Republic is optimistic: he says "ObamaCare actually paves the way to single-payer." CW: Despite the way Scheiber frames his post, he is actually saying pretty much the same thing Michael Moore said in a NYT op-ed; Scheiber is just providing more examples of how he thinks politicians will be forced to morph ObamaCare into a single-payer system.
A climate denier studies global warming.Eric Holthaus of the Daily Beast explains to climate deniers why scientists theorize that global warming is causing this week's (and others, of course) deep freeze. I don't think people who keep their ears covered in all weather conditions while yelling "La La La" & shutting their eyes tight will get this.
Here's Mitt Romney's response to the Melissa Harris-Perry segment. I think he did fine. Chris Wallace, however, couldn't let it go:
Bob Schieffer has had about enough of Peggy Noonan -- which does make you wonder why his producers book Our Lady of Las Contras:
... Lest you have forgot why Peggy Noonan should know who was a Sandinista & who was not, David of Crooks & Liars reminds you of why she should know. ...
... Save the Children! Charles Pierce recaps Sunday show highlights. It turns out that almost everybody on these shows -- with the exception of Republican Steve Schmidt -- is a David Brooks clone, as if you didn't already know. ...
... Save the Children! Driftglass recaps Sunday show highlights. It turns out that almost everybody on these shows is a David Brooks clone, & the evidence suggests Greggers has a contractual obligation to recite Brooks verbatim.
Senate Race
Buh-bye to a Daughter of a Dick. John King & Peter Hamby of CNN: "Liz Cheney, whose upstart bid to unseat Wyoming Sen. Mike Enzi sparked a round of warfare in the Republican Party and even within her own family, is dropping out of the Senate primary, sources told CNN late Sunday." CW: Worth Noting: Enzi himself is a Son of a Bitch. ...
... Brent Logiurato of Business Insider: "There was little public polling conducted on the race, but each public and partisan poll showed Enzi with wide leads." ...
... Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Liz Cheney announced early Monday morning that she is withdrawing from the Wyoming Republican Senate primary, bringing an abrupt end to her unsteady challenge to the incumbent, Michael B. Enzi. 'Serious health issues have recently arisen in our family, and under the circumstances, I have decided to discontinue my campaign,' Ms. Cheney said in a statement. 'My children and their futures were the motivation for our campaign and their health and well-being will always be my overriding priority.'" Cheney didn't say what the health issues were. ...
... Margaret Hartmann of New York: "On the plus side, thanks to her public feud with her lesbian sister over gay marriage, Liz now knows she's Dick and Lynne Cheney's favorite daughter."
Presidential Race 2016
Maggie Haberman of Politico: "Publicly, [Hillary] Clinton insists she's many months away from a decision about her political future. But a shadow campaign on her behalf has nevertheless been steadily building for the better part of a year -- a quiet, intensifying, improvisational effort to lay the groundwork for another White House bid. Some of the activity has the former first lady's tacit approval. Some involves outside groups that are operating independently, and at times in competition with one another, to prepare a final career act for the former senator and secretary of state, whose legacy as the most powerful woman in the history of American politics is already secure." ...
... CW: Since Haberman's story is about a shadow campaign, not a shadowy candidate, this photo that accompanies the piece is a low blow:
AP photo.
Local News
** AP Brief: " The Supreme Court has put same-sex marriages on hold in Utah, at least while a federal appeals court more fully considers the issue. The court issued a brief order Monday blocking any new same-sex unions in the state."
... Update. Adam Liptak of the New York Times has a fuller story.
Alex Altman of Time: "The early success of pot's pilot program [in Colorado] was ushered in by a phenomenon almost as rare: a government working as it should."
News Ledes
;)
Live Science: "A blast of Arctic air pushing south as far as Atlanta has caused air temperatures across the United States to plunge, creating a massive 140-degree Fahrenheit (77 degrees Celsius) temperature difference between the chilly Dakotas and balmy Florida yesterday (Jan. 5)."
New York Times: "Iran could improve its chances of playing at least a limited role in the upcoming peace conference on Syria if it persuaded President Bashar al-Assad to stop the bombardment of Aleppo and allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to besieged towns and cities, senior State Department officials said on Monday."
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Reader Comments (10)
Liz Cheney pulling out because of family sickness?
Must have been an intervention there, it's about time some Cheney recognized it.
http://www.nationalmemo.com/snowden-conspiracies-are-the-lefts-benghazi/
Gene Lyons isn't impressed with Snowden. I guess Snowden did spark a much-needed debate.
And down in N.C., known for its grits and pork bellies among other yummy edibles, Art Pope, the mini-me of the Koch brothers, has taken over that state in exactly the same way the Kochs' have––complicated funding networks that end up in Republican legislator's large hot hands. Jane Mayer had a terrific piece in the New Yorker earlier this year about Pope and his tentacles. Last night Bill Moyers addressed Pope's influence and backlash on his PBS show.
We can curse the Supremes for helping all this along and my memory of Sam I Am shaking his head when Obama warned of disastrous results due to the Citizen United decision is still chilling.
Liz leaving us? Best news ever! I always hoped I'd witness a discussion in which someone knowledgeable, able and clever could slice brilliantly through her flimsy rhetoric and reduce her infuriating arrogance to pieces of puny particles. Some dreams, I guess, just never come true.
@PD re: One mother of a patriot; “As a mother and a patriot, I know that the work of defending freedom and protecting liberty must continue for each generation. Though this campaign stops today, my commitment to keep fighting with you and your families for the fundamental values that have made this nation and Wyoming great will never stop.” Liz Cheney
"...someone knowledgeable, able and clever could slice brilliantly through her flimsy rhetoric..." PD
A plastic spoon would cut through that spam. Might come pre-sliced like baloney.
Let me get this straight. L'il Randy, a self-important teabagging little scutboy in a fright wig who has never wanted for anything in his life, has had pretty much everything handed to him, spends three weeks in the senate and thinks himself ready for the White House, self-certifies himself as ready to poke people in the eye with sharp objects, and makes money hand over fist selling books full of lies, stupidity, and wingnut bromides about the horrors of blah people and the poor, declares that those who are out of work can go it alone because unemployment benefits will not stiffen their spines or encourage good Republican Virtues, and Chuck Schumer calls this a "bit of an insult"?
Are you kidding Chuck? This is a fucking kick in the teeth and should be responded to in kind.
This is why churls like Aqua Buddha Boy get off scot-free when saying and doing things like this. This is not a "bit of an insult", this is a smug, noxious, amoral attack on Americans workers. This is a shiv in the back and it should be called what it is.
"Little insult" my ass.
Interesting that Cheney quit such a" glorious struggle" so easily. Don't "patriots" fight on even in the face of adversity? Obviously in this case, not if power is not being handed to her on a platter and if she won't be making enough money on the deal.
Question. How long before her "lifelong" residency and commitment to Wyoming evaporate like her dad's White House e-mails?
Oh well, least now she won't have to worry about that hunting and fishing license bullshit. Bigger fish back in Virginia anyway.
AK: Good––that's exactly what I said–-aloud–-A BIT? How I hate this soft blanket covering over rubbish and noxious fuming of people like A.B.B.
JJG: Yeah, you're right–-a plastic spoon would suffice, but I've seen her spar with plastic before and she somehow manages to bend the spoon (at least that's how some viewed it––after all, she does have a few fans).
I think that "bit" came from the sports world:
MLB MANAGER: I think his hitting .400 and 12 homers helped us a little bit.
HITTER: I think our batting coach kind of helped.
I yell at the teevee when I hear the likes of the above. Everything is always "a little bit" or "kind of."
If the evil spawn of The Dick Cheney is leaving the race, do you think that they all realized they'd have to spend their own money to get her elected/not elected?
Hmmm....if Peggy (Triple Vodka Breakfast) Noonan and can rip Bill DeBlasio as "Sandanista" because he opposed her former boss's illegal and unconstitutional activities abetting right-wing terrorists, can't she be referred to, by the same logic, as "Contra Death Squad Chick" for her support of same?
I swear, there must be some secret site which disseminates these gimpy memes because now Rush (Fourth Marriage is Sacred) Limbaugh and other panty soiling denizens of Planet Wingnut are all glomming on to this "Bill DeBlasio is a Sandanista" thing, as if the opposite (Right Wing Death Squad Devotee) is the height of nobility.
Perhaps they're all visited by the Paraclete of Prevarication who descends upon them with tongues of fire above their heads, triggering blasts of bullshit out their asses.