The Commentariat -- July 5

I've posted an Open Thread on Off Times Square. Karen Garcia & I have added comments. 

"As His Batshit Chickens Come Home to Roost." Driftglass blames David Brooks for his decades-long promotion of ideas & policies that have led to what Brooks now complains is an immoral, unreasoning gang of Republicans. A tour-de-force (on Driftglass's part, not Brooks'). ...

... AND, while we're at it, Driftglass has figured out a way to save the economy AND give in to Republican demands to cut the deficit. It's the "Rewarding Wealth Producers and Penalizing Moochers Patriotic American Values Re-alignment" Act. The act will make things a little tough on denizens of Sarah Palin's Alaska & Rand Paul's Kentucky, ferinstance, but it's all for the good of the country. ...

... New York Times Editors: "In addition to demanding trillions of dollars in spending cuts in exchange for raising the nation’s debt limit, [Congressional Democrats Republicans] are now vowing not to act without first holding votes in each chamber on a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.... It won’t be enough for Democrats to merely defeat the amendment when it comes up for a vote.... They also need to rebut the amendment’s false and dangerous premises." ...

... Gene Robinson of the Washington Post: "Obama’s in-your-face attitude [on the debt ceiling "negotiations"] seems to have thrown Republicans off their stride. They thought all they had to do was convince everyone they were crazy enough to force an unthinkable default on the nation’s financial obligations. Now they have to wonder if Obama is crazy enough to let them. The difficult work of putting the federal government on sound fiscal footing can’t begin as long as a majority in the House rejects simple arithmetic on ideological grounds." ...

... BUT. Know How to Hold Fold 'Em. Robert Pear of the New York Times: "Obama administration officials are offering to cut tens of billions of dollars from Medicare and Medicaid in negotiations to reduce the federal budget deficit, but the depth of the cuts depends on whether Republicans are willing to accept any increases in tax revenues. Administration officials and Republican negotiators say the money can be taken from health care providers like hospitals and nursing homes without directly imposing new costs on needy beneficiaries or radically restructuring either program." CW: because poor people have to die in the service of billionaires & big corporations. ...

'The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion' -- this is the important thing -- 'shall not be questioned.' -- Tim Geithner, pulling a copy of the Constitution from his pocket & reading a section of the Fourteenth Amendment

... CW: I don't like Tim Geithner & I don't like his inteviewer Mike Allen of Politico, but this video is interesting. As expected, Geithner pushes the "confidence v. uncertainty" meme. But at about 39:30 min. in (cursor forward), Geithner invokes the Fourteenth Amendment option. Whether or not President Obama ultimately resorts to the Fourteenth Amendment, obviously, he has placed that option "on the table" during negotiations. As I've said, if Obama caves to Republican pressure & cuts essential programs for Americans in need, it's because he wants to. He knows he doesn't have to. Thanks to Jim Fallows for the link & the guidance:

... Moderate Republican David Frum, a former Bush II speechwriter: "Why don't the Democrats rebel? Presumably, they elected Obama to stand up for their shared principles. But he's not standing up. He's rolling over. Or being rolled." Thanks to reader Doug R. for the link.

Just in case you thought the WashPo editorial page was worth perusing, there's this from regular columnist & another former Bush II speechwriter Marc Thiessen: AG Eric Holder is "... pursuing his ideologically driven crusade against the CIA’s interrogators." CW: Oh, it gets worse from there. The real crime is giving this disreputable hack real estate in a major newspaper. 

Edward Wyatt of the New York Times on Prof. Elizabeth Warren & the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which she has organized: "... with no clear signal as to who will run the bureau, many bankers are now worrying that the opposition to Ms. Warren may produce a leaderless consumer bureau." 

Dan Eggen of the Washington Post: "... a new breed of 'super PACs' and other independent groups are poised to spend more money than ever to sway federal elections.... The rise of these independent groups, which can raise unlimited amounts of money..., could end up defining the 2012 campaign. But some of the groups could also pose a threat to established campaigns, which may find it difficult to stop them from wandering off message or committing strategic blunders. One rogue super PAC in Southern California has upended a Republican congressional campaign by producing a crude video depicting the female Democratic candidate as a stripper giving tax money to gang members." (CW: the words "crude video" appear in the WashPo article as "cru de video"; I thought it was some new wine!)

Raymond Hernandez of the New York Times: Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) "has begun a campaign, called Off the Sidelines, to mobilize women across the country, in advance of the national elections next year and as evidence emerges that the slow but steady progress made by women in elective politics has begun to stall. In the past few months, Ms. Gillibrand has activated her network of donors to help female candidates, emerged as a headliner among audiences of women, tried to recruit female candidates, advised women thinking about running, and started a Web site, offthesidelines.org."

Al Hunt of Bloomberg News on the rapid evolution of American attitudes toward gay marriage & how so many politicians (Obama) are still skirting the issue. In the lede, Hunt gives us one more reason to love Mario Cuomo.

Alissa Rubin & Rod Nordland of the New York Times: Ambassador Karl Eikenberry, Gen. David Patraeus & Gen. David Rodriguez, who runs day-to-day operations, are all leaving Afghanistan at about the same time. "From an American policy standpoint, the changing of the guard means little, but from the Afghan standpoint, in which a leader’s personality can determine the policy, the triple departure, along with President Obama’s June 22 speech on the withdrawal of troops, has stoked fears of abandonment, especially for Afghans who have depended on the Americans."

Missed this one. Binyamin Appelbaum of the New York Times: "President Obama announced Friday that he would nominate Thomas J. Curry to lead the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which oversees hundreds of national banks.... Mr. Curry’s nomination responds to the demands of Senate Democrats that the White House replace the acting head of the comptroller’s office, John G. Walsh, whom they regard as obstructing key aspects of the law passed last year to overhaul financial regulation."

Right Wing World *

Flip, Flip, Flop, Flip-Flop. Maeve Reston of the Los Angeles Times: "Mitt Romney has struggled to craft a consistent economic message in recent weeks — first blaming President Obama for driving the country deeper into recession and then backing off that charge during a visit to Pennsylvania. On Monday in southern New Hampshire, he appeared to offer those conflicting messages within one sentence:

The recession is deeper because of our president; it's seen an anemic recovery because of our president.

      ... Reston writes, "Those statements — that the president had driven the economy deeper into recession but also that an 'anemic' recovery had occurred — not only seemed to be contradictory, but also at odds with what Romney has previously argued. In a June..., Romney said Obama 'didn't create the recession, but he made it worse and longer.' Later..., he was quoted by NBC as saying the state's voters '...but [Obama] made it worse.' But when asked to elaborate on those statements..., he backtracked: 'I didn't say things are worse.' On Monday in Amherst, he combined both messages."

* Where a single sentence may be internally inconsistent.

News Ledes

President Obama makes brief remarks in the Brady Press Room about the deficit reduction talks:

** New York Times: "Members of the Afghan Parliament came to blows Tuesday as a majority for the first time began to discuss impeaching President Hamid Karzai, signaling the near-total breakdown of relations between the Parliament and the president as the country teeters on the brink of a constitutional crisis."

Guardian: "President Barack Obama is attempting to block the execution in Texas on Thursday of a Mexican man because it would breach an international convention and do "irreparable harm" to US interests. The White House has asked the US supreme court to put the execution of Humberto Leal Garcia on hold while Congress passes a law that would prevent the convicted rapist and murderer from being put to death along with dozens of other foreign nationals who were denied proper access to diplomatic representation before trials for capital crimes. The administration moved after the governor of Texas, Rick Perry, brushed aside appeals from diplomats, top judges, senior military officers, the United Nations and former president George W Bush to stay Leal's execution because it could jeopardise American citizens arrested abroad as well as US diplomatic interests." CW: pardon my ignorance, but can't the President do this unilaterally?

New York Times: "The Obama administration announced Tuesday that it would prosecute in civilian court a Somali accused of ties to two Islamist militant groups.... In an indictment unsealed in the Southern District of New York, the Somali, Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame, was charged with nine counts related to accusations that he provided support to the Shabab in Somalia and Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, in Yemen. Mr. Warsame ... was captured on April 19, and a plane carrying him arrived in New York City around midnight Monday, officials said." The article contains a link to the indictment.

The Hill: "The Senate as early as Wednesday could vote on a 'Sense of the Senate' bill that says taxpayers earning $1 million or more each year should 'make a more meaningful contribution to the deficit-reduction effort.' The bill ... was introduced last week by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). Reid filed a cloture motion on the bill on Tuesday afternoon, meaning a vote to end debate could take place as early as late Wednesday or, more likely, Thursday." ...

... Cornyn Goes Full Emily Litella. NBC News: "Though he may have hinted over the weekend that he would consider raising revenue in order to avoid a government shutdown, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) says not so fast. 'We're not for raising taxes through the front door or back door during a fragile economic recovery....'" Sen. Cornyn told Andrea Mitchell.

The Audacity of Betrayal. New York Times: "President Obama stepped up pressure on Congressional Republicans on Tuesday to agree to a broad deficit-cutting deal, pledging to put popular entitlement programs like Medicare on the table in return for Republican acquiescence to some higher taxes."

New York Times: "Manhattan prosecutors are scheduled to meet on Wednesday with the lawyers for Dominique Strauss-Kahn to discuss whether the sexual assault case against him can be resolved through a dismissal or a plea, according to a person briefed on the matter."

New York Times: "Obama administration officials believe that Pakistan’s powerful spy agency ordered the killing of a Pakistani journalist who had written scathing reports about the infiltration of militants in the country’s military, according to American officials. New classified intelligence obtained before the May 29 disappearance of the journalist, Saleem Shahzad, 40, from the capital, Islamabad, and after the discovery of his mortally wounded body, showed that senior officials of the spy agency, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, directed the attack on him in an effort to silence criticism...."

Reuters: "Prosecutors will drop sexual assault charges against ex-IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn at his next court appearance in two weeks, or earlier, because of doubts about the credibility of the alleged victim, he New York Post said Tuesday." CW: remember to consider the source.

AP: "The initial cleanup along the oil-fouled Yellowstone River could be tested Tuesday as rising waters make it harder for Exxon Mobil Corp. to get to areas damaged by the crude spilled from a company pipeline."

The Commentariat -- Independence Day

Paul Krugman opposes the tax holiday corporations are lobbying for the Congress to pass in order for the U.S. to have the privilege of corporations' returning their overseas profits to the U.S. so they can pay their stockholders dividends, up their CEOs' pay, pay down debt, buy other companies -- and create zero jobs. ...

... I posted a comments page for Krugman's column on Off Times Square. Comment on Krugman or whatever.

** What to Read. Frank Rich is back with his first essay in New York magazine: "The president’s failure to demand a reckoning from the moneyed interests who brought the economy down has cursed his first term, and could prevent a second." Here's a taste:

For all the lurid fantasies of the birthers, the dirty secret of Obama’s background is that the values of Harvard, not of Kenya or Indonesia or Bill Ayers, have most colored his governing style. He falls hard for the best and the brightest white guys.

David Remnick of the New Yorker writes a good commentary on the brief history of the gay marriage movement. "The struggle for marriage equality is about more than the definition of marriage; it’s about the definition of justice."

The Abu Ghraib Accountability Model, Con'd. Glenn Greenwald on the criminal investigations into two prisoner deaths: "... the U.S. Government has effectively shielded itself from even minimal accountability for its vast torture crimes of the last decade.  Without a doubt, that will be one of the most significant, enduring and consequential legacies of the Obama presidency." CW: how is it that a President can be impeached over perjuring himself about sex, but Obama has protected a former President, Vice President & assorted administration & other officials from their likely culpability in the torture & deaths of (primarily) men in their custody. Perjury is wrong, but does anyone think it is more wrong than torture & murder? You may argue that Obama's policy is akin to the reconciliation amnesty overseen by Archbislop Desmond Tutu, but it ain't. Those who received amnesty in South Africa were granted it only after fully disclosing their crimes, and only one in eight who applied were granted amnesty. Not only have our war criminals not apologized for their war crimes, some -- like John Yoo -- have vigorously defended their actions. Why are we protecting them?

The Three Amigos Do Afghanistan. AP (via the NYT), Kabul: "The senators — John McCain, Joseph I. Lieberman and Lindsey Graham — said that they were heartened by the progress of Afghan security forces, but concerned that Mr. Obama’s withdrawal plan could deplete American military strength before dealing a decisive blow to the Taliban, especially in the east. That part of the country is a haven for the Afghan and Pakistani wings of the Taliban and affiliates of Al Qaeda."

Eric Lipton of the New York Times: Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), who represents the Napa Valley, "is not only the industry’s foremost champion in Washington, helping it secure tax breaks, get money for pet projects like the Napa Valley Wine Train or beat back restrictions on direct sales of wine. He is also a vineyard owner.... Mr. Thompson is in business with some of the same companies whose agendas he promotes. His vineyard has been paid at least $500,000 since 2006 by two wineries whose executives have appealed to Congress on legislative matters. Mr. Thompson could also benefit from his own efforts on the industry’s behalf, including a push to increase the value of grapes grown near his vineyard by seeking a special designation from the Treasury Department."

Okay, here's the news on DSK from the journalists at the New York Post:

... Brad Hamilton & Larry Celona: "She was turning tricks on the taxpayers' dime! The<> Sofitel maid who accused Dominique Strauss-Kahn of a sex attack in his suite wasn't just a hotel hooker -- she continued to work as a prostitute in a Brooklyn hotel where she was stashed by prosecutors, The Post has learned." ...

... AND Hamilton & Cathy Burke: " Sources now tell The Post that when the two were finished, the woman demanded cash from Strauss-Kahn -- but he refused to pay."

News Ledes

The Obama family will attend an Independence Day celebration this evening. President Obama will speak at 6:30 pm ET.

The Atlantic: "French writer Tristane Banon will file charges for attempted rape against Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Tuesday, her lawyer told Reuters. She alleges that Strauss-Kahn attacked her in 2002 when she was interviewing the former IMF chief in an apartment in Paris. She compared his behavior that day to a, 'rutting chimpanzee' in a television interview in 2007. The statute of limitations on rape in France is ten years."

Sick, Vicious. BBC News: "The @foxnewspolitics feed stated: "BREAKING NEWS: @BarackObama assassinated, 2 gunshot wounds have proved too much." More than two hours after the malicious postings appeared, they had still not been removed. A group or individual, calling themselves The Script Kiddies appeared to claim responsibility. Fox News said it was investigating the posts. The bizarre messages began appearing around 07.00 BST on July 4." ...

... Fox News: "FoxNews.com alerted the U.S. Secret Service, which is declining public comment. Jeff Misenti, vice president and general manager of Fox News Digital, said FoxNews.com is working with Twitter to address the situation as quickly as possible." ...

     ... The New York Times has an updated story here.

New York Times: "Two senior Republicans [Sens. John Cornyn & John McCain] said Sunday that they might be open to raising new government revenue as part of a deal to resolve the dispute over the federal debt ceiling, but they warned that there was little time to enact a comprehensive deal."

AP: "A leading credit ratings agency warned on Monday that Greece would be considered to be in default if banks rolled over their holdings in the country's debt as proposed recently in a French plan. Standard & Poor's said in a statement that two proposals by an association of French banks 'would likely amount to a default' under its criteria because both options offer 'less value than the promise of the original securities.'"

AP: "Thailand's military eased concerns of renewed turmoil Monday by accepting the sweeping electoral win of toppled ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra's party, while his sister vowed to reconcile the deeply divided nation as its first female prime minister. The election marked an extraordinary rebuke of the military-backed establishment that deposed Thaksin in a coup five years ago, and the opposition's strong mandate in parliament was likely to boost stability in the short-term — a fact reflected in a sharp rise in the Thai stock market Monday."

AP: "Police say a motorcyclist participating in a protest ride against helmet laws in upstate New York died after he flipped over the bike's handlebars and hit his head on the pavement. The accident happened Saturday afternoon in the town of Onondaga, in central New York near Syracuse."

AP: Army Command Sgt. Major Jeffery Mellinger, believed to be the last Vietnam-era draftee, is retiring after 39 years of service.

The Commentariat -- July 3

Okay, for you royal watchers & wedding sentimentalists, here's a doubly-whammy. If the bride, Princess Charlene, looks sad -- and she does -- it might be because a third woman came forward this past week claiming she had a child by the groom, Prince Albert II of Monaco. Here's the New York Times wedding announcement & here's an AP story on today's ceremony. This Reuters story mentions the 13th-century "Curse of the Grimaldis":

     ... The couple were married Friday in a civil ceremony. A video of the civil ceremony & link to the news story are under the Soaps near the bottom of the right column.

Now, to our own travails:

Maureen Dowd doesn't quite know what to make of the unraveling of the case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn. She concludes, "When a habitual predator faces off against a habitual liar, the liar will most likely lose, even if it is the rare case when she is telling the truth." ...

... I've added a comments page for Dowd's column on Off Times Square. You can write on something else, if you prefer. My comment got whacked again, so Off Times Square is the only place to read it. ...

... Alan Feuer, et al., of the New York Times profile Cyrus Vance, Jr., the Manhattan District Attorney, whose office has experienced a string of high-profile losses & whose management style is controversial.

News You Can Use. David Streitfeld of the New York Times: "Two of the nation’s biggest lenders, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, are quietly modifying loans for tens of thousands of borrowers who have not asked for help but whom the banks deem to be at special risk."

NEW. Matt Yglesias on the Constitutional option on the debt ceiling: "It’s not clear that anyone would have standing to sue if Obama refused to abide by the debt ceiling. But it seems perfectly clear that if the government promised to pay you to do some work, and then just doesn’t pay you that you have grounds for a legal complaint. The president must 'take care that the laws be faithfully executed' and the appropriations bills are real laws. [Emphasis mine.] Congress passed them." CW: this is what makes sense to me. Of course, I'm not a lawyer & I don't think Yglesias is, either.

Ghost of the Gipper -- Obama Assumes the Reagan Persona

Karen Garcia one-ups Krugman's post of yesterday and finds "Four Reaganisms in One Paragraph" of President Obama's radio address. "The good news, according to the One, is not the fact that he is fighting back, but that Democrats and Republicans are agreeing on the same fake problem."...

... David Rogers: "... a POLITICO review of [President Ronald] Reagan’s own budget documents shows that the Republican president repeatedly signed deficit-reduction legislation in the 1980’s that melded annual tax increases with spending cuts just as President Barack Obama is now asking Congress to consider.... The rich diversity of Reagan-era tax changes is most striking, impacting even such conservative priorities now as the estate tax. At the same time, Reagan also signed laws to double the federal gasoline tax to build more roads and increase payroll taxes to stabilize Social Security." ...

... Steve Benen. On taxes, this puts Reagan slightly to Obama’s left.... Doesn’t it bother Republicans, just a little, that Barack Obama is more in line with the Reagan legacy than they are?" ...

... Constant Weader: it sure bothers Democrats like me. ...

... BooMan: "... today's conservatives ... don't see Reagan's presidency as the ideal. They see it as the beginning. He was the great man who got the ball rolling, not the man who governed (Goldilocks-style) just right.... So, telling Republicans how reasonable Reagan was doesn't impress today's Republicans; it just reminds them of how much progress they've made. And I'm tired of writing things that make Republicans feel warm all over."

The War on Terror Everybody. Adam Estes of The Atlantic: "Somalia is now the sixth country over which the United States is flying attack drones." And boots on the ground: "Somalia's defense minister says that American military forces touched down to collect the bodies of the insurgents."

He’s a rotten prick.... This is all about him being a bully and a punk. I wanted to punch him in his head.... You know who he reminds me of? Mr. Potter from ‘It’s a Wonderful Life,’ the mean old bastard who screws everybody.... He’s mean-spirited. He’s angry. If you don’t do what he says, I liken it to being spoiled, I’m going to get my way, or else. -- New Jersey Senate President Stephen Sweeney on Gov. Chris Christie, who line-item vetoed many state programs for the disadvantaged. Thanks to commenter Marvin Schwalb for this rhetorical gem

Aristocracy Watch. Pradnya Joshi of the New York Times: "... the median pay for top executives at 200 big companies last year was $10.8 million. That works out to a 23 percent gain from 2009. Some chief executives have consistently taken token salaries — sometimes, $1 — choosing instead to rely on their ownership stakes for wealth. These stock riches don’t show up on the current pay lists.... Warren E. Buffett, for instance, saw his stock holdings rise last year by 16 percent, to $46 billion.... The average American worker was taking home $752 a week in late 2010, up a mere 0.5 percent from a year earlier. After inflation, workers were actually making less."

... Aristocracy Watch, Con'd. E. J. Dionne: "The United States Supreme Court now sees its central task as comforting the already comfortable and afflicting those already afflicted." ...

... Lincoln Caplan, the New York Times editorial writer for legal affairs, writes a powerful editorial condemning the 5-4 Supreme Court decision in Connick v. Thompson which overturned a $14MM jury award for John Thompson, who was the victim of serial prosecutorial misconduct. Caplan concludes, "The capital punishment system in this country has put many innocent people on death row. It cannot be fixed and should be repealed everywhere. With this ruling, the court made it even more likely that innocent people will be railroaded by untrained prosecutors — with the terrible prospect of their being put to death for crimes they did not commit."

** Chris Geidner of Metro Weekly: "... the Department of Justice filed a brief in federal court employee Karen Golinski's federal court challenge, supporting her lawsuit seeking access to equal health benefits for her wife and arguing strongly that the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional in terms unparalleled in previous administration statements.... Unlike in other cases where DOJ has stopped defending DOMA in accordance with President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder's decision that Section 3 of DOMA -- the federal definition of marriage -- is unconstitutional, DOJ lawyers today made an expansive case in a 31-page filing that DOMA is unconstitutional."

Bibi's Big Fat Greek Wedding. Barak Ravid of Haaretz: Israeli PM Benjamin "Netanyahu’s personal investment in his relationship over the past year-and-a-half with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou in which he increased diplomatic ties with the floundering European nation seems to have put the final nail in the Gaza flotilla’s coffin." CW: see also today's Ledes on arrest of flotilla captain.

Andy Greenberg of Forbes: "If Visa Europe and MasterCard Europe haven’t re-opened payment WikiLeaks by next Thursday, the group and its payment provider DataCell plan to file a complaint with the E.U. Commission against the two companies as well as the Danish payment processor Teller, according to Sveinn Andri Sveinsson, the Icelandic lawyer for WikiLeaks and DataCell." In this knockoff "ad," WikiLeaks claims the financial institutions have cost it $15MM:

Right Wing World *

Vicki Needham of The Hill: Congressional Democrats & the Obama Administration expected smooth sailing for three trade deals the White House sent to Congress last week, but House Republicans walked out of the committee hearing on the markup. Here's why: "GOP lawmakers are opposing the decision to include Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA), which helps retrain workers displaced by foreign trade, as part of the South Korean deal, insisting, instead, that TAA be considered separately."  CW: They don't want to retrain displaced American workers???? Can we just face it? Republicans hate people. The 2012 Democratic campaign theme for 2012 should be "Republicans: They're just not that into you."

Ryan Reilly of TPM: "The sponsor of an Ohio bill which restricts access to the ballot box was arrested back in April on drunk driving charges.... On April 23, an Indiana state trooper pulled Rep. Robert Mecklenborg, [a Republican,] over for a burned out headlight.... After failing three separate field sobriety tests, Mecklenborg allegedly refused to take a breath test and was placed under arrest. A blood test later revealed that he had recently taken a Viagra.... Mecklenborg was accompanied by a 26-year-old woman, who a local blogger claims has 'personal connections' with Concepts Show Girls strip club, which is right near where Mecklenborg was arrested." CW: since the police almost certainly confiscated Mecklenborg's driver's licence, he no long has a voter ID.

* Where the facts occasionally kick the deserving in the ass. 

News Ledes

CNN: Speaking at Aspen, former President Bill Clinton urged the White House "not to blink" in the debt ceiling negotiations & said President Obama should stand his ground.&

AP: "Greek authorities have arrested the captain of a boat that is part of a Gaza-bound flotilla trying to deliver humanitarian aid to the Palestinian territory, officials said yesterday."

AP: "Hundreds of barrels of crude oil spilled into Montana's Yellowstone River after an ExxonMobil pipeline beneath the riverbed ruptured, sending a plume 25 miles downstream and forcing temporary evacuations, officials said. The break near Billings in south-central Montana fouled the riverbank and forced municipalities and irrigation districts Saturday to close intakes."

AP: On Friday Commander Christopher Ferguson, co-pilot Douglas Hurley, Rex Walheim and Sandra Magnus will make NASA's 135th and final shuttle flight on board Atlantis. "It will be years before the United States sends its own spacecraft up again."