The Commentariat -- March 26, 2016

If you are interested in taking over Reality Chex -- that is, owning it to do with as you will -- please contact me. I am looking forward to discontinuing my work on the site but would like to see it continue "under new management." I'll help you get started. Thank you to all who have contributed over the years. If I don't find a suitable "buyer," I'll close down next Friday, April 1. -- Constant Weader

Afternoon Update:

Sarah Posner in the Washington Post: "The South Carolina Senate on Thursday passed a controversial bill targeting refugees in the state, prompting concern that it may portend a wave of anti-refugee legislation around the country, particularly in the tense climate following the terrorist attacks in Brussels. The bill, if passed by the South Carolina House and signed into law by Gov. Nikki Haley, would require refugees' sponsors to register them in a database maintained by the state's Department of Social Services. It would also impose strict liability on a refugee's sponsor if the refugee, at some point in the future, commits a terrorist or criminal act." ...

     ... CW: I'd like to be a confederate so I could sit up nights thinking up draconian, repressive bills to punish minorities & women. Still, I'm not sure my best efforts could have dreamed up this one, which aims not to punish any miscreant refuges but the likely kindhearted people who took them in. Of course the idea of the legislation is to intimidate the kindhearted to the point that they fear helping others. Welcome to Right Wing World. Next stop, Trumpsylvania.

Michael Birnbaum & Griff Witte of the Washington Post: "Belgian authorities announced Saturday that they had charged a man in connection with this week's suicide bombings, saying they believe he participated in the attacks. Two others were also charged with terrorism-related offenses. The man, identified by a European official as Fayçal Cheffou, appeared before a judge after he was detained Thursday night while sitting in a car in front of the Belgian prosecutor's office.... Prosecutors did not say whether Cheffou -- whom they identified only as 'Fayçal C.' -- was the third man [in the airport surveillance videos circulated after the attacks]. Belgium's Le Soir newspaper reported that he was, citing an unidentified source...."

David Sanger & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times interviewed Donald Trump for 100 minutes about foreign policy issues. They attempt to synthensize Trump's views: "In Donald Trump's worldview, America comes first and everybody else pays.... Mr. Trump explained his thoughts in concrete and easily digestible terms, but they appeared to reflect little consideration for potential consequences around the globe. Much the same way he treats political rivals and interviewers, he personalized how he would engage foreign nations, suggesting his approach would depend partly on 'how friendly they've been toward us,' not just on national interests or alliances." ...

... The reporters provide a summary, or "highlights," of the interview here. The full, edited transcript is here. ...

... CW: Trump has found a clever way to avoid answering questions about international policy where he has no idea whatsoever: "I wouldn't want to say. I wouldn't want them to know what my real thinking is." Well, it beats, "And when they ask me who is the president of Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan I'm going to say, you know, I don't know. Do you know?" Trump is on his way to winning the nomination, & who knows where Herman Cain is now? Don't tell me Republican voters aren't discerning. BTW, if you think Trump speaks like a 7th-grader because he is aware that's the best way to reach the great unwashed to whom he appeals, forget that. He uses just about the same level of language & lack of nuance when speaking to David Sanger, a highly-knowledgeable international policy reporter.

*****

The President's Weekly Address

White House: "In this week's address, President Obama offered his thoughts and prayers to the people of Belgium and to families of the victims of the terrorist attacks in Brussels, including at least two Americans":

George Lardner & P. S. Ruckman, in a Washington Post op-ed: President Obama "has granted just 70 pardons, the lowest mark for any full-term president since John Adams, and 187 commutations of sentence. Meanwhile, 1,629 pardon petitions have been denied (more than five of the previous six presidents), as well as 8,123 requests for commutations (a new record). An additional 3,444 requests have been 'closed without presidential action.'... If current patterns persist, Obama will go down as one of the most merciless presidents in history." ...

     ... CW: And remember, the general U.S. population in Adams' time was about 1.5 percent of what it is now, & the prison population was probably one percent or less of today's prison population.

Charles Pierce: "... there's some serious McCarthyite damage being done to medical research by a congressional committee chaired by a member of Congress whose brains are leaking out of her shell-pink ears. You should pay attention if you or any members of your family has been struck by diseases like Parkinson's, Alzheimer's or ALS. I think, at this point, former NFL football players should take special note, too." The anti-choice wackos have "moved on from the people who actually perform abortions to the people who use fetal tissue in medical research." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Chico Harlan of the Washington Post: "Just a few years ago, the U.S. oil industry reveled in a surge of production fueled by new technologies. Now it's bracing for the greatest wave of financial defaults since the subprime mortgage crisis -- and the consequences are far-reaching."

Alan Neuhauser of US News: "Citing 'morally reprehensible conduct on the part of Exxon Mobil,' the Rockefeller Family Foundation -- whose namesake, John D. Rockefeller, founded Exxon's precursor, Standard Oil -- will dump its holdings in America's largest oil conglomerate, plus coal and tar sands companies, the charity announced Wednesday. The nonprofit pointed to both economics and ethics: Amid a huge surplus of oil and sluggish global demand, oil prices are in the middle of a 19-month slump, spurring hundreds of thousands of layoffs from the energy sector worldwide. Climate change, meanwhile, has created a moral imperative to decrease the planet's reliance on fossil fuels like oil, the fund said."

Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post: "The highest-ranking U.S. Navy officer convicted so far in a massive bribery scandal was sentenced to almost four years in prison Friday for selling military secrets to an Asian defense contractor in exchange for prostitutes, stays at luxury hotel and other favors. Capt. Daniel Dusek, the former commander of the USS Bonhomme Richard, an amphibious assault ship, received a 46-month prison sentence and was ordered to pay $100,000 in fines and restitution during a hearing in federal court in San Diego."

Presidential Race

Alaska, Hawaii & Washington state hold Democratic caucuses today.

Gabriel Debenedetti of Politico: "Without a big win in Washington Saturday, there's no path forward for Bernie Sanders. And that cold political reality has turned this state into an unlikely battleground between the Vermont senator and Hillary Clinton."

Jason Horowitz of the New York Times: "Regardless of the results on the scoreboard, the state on the map, the year or even the decade, [Bernie] Sanders has talked with clockwork consistency about an economy rigged against the working class, a campaign finance system that corrupts politicians and a corporate media that obscures the truth.... While other candidates have been lampooned for robotic redundancies or caricatured as cut-and-paste campaigners, Mr. Sanders has made oratorical consistency his calling card."

Harper Neidig of the Hill: "Bernie Sanders's campaign lashed out at Hillary Clinton on Friday for a lavish fundraising dinner her campaign has planned with actor George Clooney.... Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver said in an email to supporters, '... Hillary Clinton ... is now enlisting the support of George Clooney ... at a dinner event that will cost people up to $353,400 to attend.' Weaver added that the price of admission an 'obscene amount of money. It's a sum that would require an employee making the federal minimum wage to work 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, for more than 5 years.'..." ...

... CW: The figure $353,400 seems like an odd number. Why not $350K or $400K? Brendan O'Connor of Gawker has some details on the planned Clinton fundraiser.

In case you were wondering, Ralph Nader is still a narcissistic, unrepentant prick.

Donald Trump's major endorsers are "Catty, Fatty & Batty":

Gail Collins on the GOP candidates: "One thing that all these guys have in common is a desire to put themselves in charge of the reproductive rights of the entire female half of the country."

Amy Chozick & Trip Gabriel of the New York Times: Donald "Trump's nasty skirmish with [Ted] Cruz, including his warning to 'spill the beans' about Mrs. Cruz, without offering specifics, and his re-posting of a message that mocked her looks, have played into a crucial Democratic strategy to defeat Mr. Trump in November: to portray him as an unabashed sexist. [Hillary] Clinton's allies hope to sway suburban and independent women, who will play an outsized role in deciding the fall election, to support her candidacy by pushing this theme. These Democrats say the matchup would be historic: one pitting the first female nominee of a major political party against a Republican rival who has repeatedly dismissed and disparaged women and their looks." ...

     ... CW: Be sure to read Franklin Foer's little history of Trump's misogyny, linked yesterday. Clinton has plenty of material to work with.

Manuel Roig-Franzia of the Washington Post: In 1996, when Donald Trump was trying to take by the home of an Atlantic City widow by eminent domain, he called the woman's lawyer Glenn Zeitz & tried to hire Zeitz to represent him in another case: "Trump, who had been championing the use of eminent domain to take the home of Zeitz's client, Vera Coking, suddenly wanted him to help fight the use of eminent domain for a project that would have benefited one of his rivals." An associate of Zeitz said, 'It's like, if we can't beat you, we'll buy you."

Six months ago, Dana Milbank promised to eat his column if Donald Trump got the Republican nomination. Now Milbank is looking for recipes for newsprint.

Jesse Byrnes of the Hill: "An aide to Donald Trump on Friday fulfilled the businessman's threat to 'spill the beans' on Republican presidential rival Ted Cruz's wife, Heidi. Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pierson rattled off a list of attacks three days after Trump first made the threat. 'Spilling the beans is quite simple when it comes to Heidi Cruz,' Pierson said in an interview with MSNBC's Steve Kornacki. 'She is a Bush operative; she worked for the architect of NAFTA, which has killed millions of jobs in this country; she was a member on the Council on Foreign Relations who -- in Sen. Cruz's own words, called a nest of snakes that seeks to undermine national sovereignty; and she's been working for Goldman Sachs, the same global bank that Ted Cruz left off of his financial disclosure,' Pierson said." CW: Some beans. I think all of this is public knowledge.

Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "Ted Cruz on Friday accused 'Donald Trump and his henchmen' of planting the seeds behind a 'garbage' National Enquirer report alleging that the Texas senator has had extramarital affairs. 'This National Enquirer story is garbage. It is complete and utter lies,' Cruz said after a campaign event in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. 'It is a tabloid smear, and it is a smear that has come from Donald Trump and his henchmen.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... CW: Earlier today, I seriously considered skipping the reports of the National Enquirer story, but it seemed to be part-and-parcel of the Nasty Boys' Sleaze-Throwing Fight, so I didn't want to deprive readers of the escalation of said fight. If I made an error, Cruz has retroactively justified my error by addressing it. (And I don't think he had a choice.) If it was just crap earlier; it's crap news now. ...

... Donald Trump on Facebook: "I have no idea whether or not the cover story about Ted Cruz in this week's issue of the National Enquirer is true or not, but I had absolutely nothing to do with it, did not know about it, and have not, as yet, read it.... Ted Cruz's problem with the National Enquirer is his and his alone, and while they were right about O.J. Simpson, John Edwards, and many others, I certainly hope they are not right about Lyin' Ted Cruz." ...

.. Asawin Suebsaeng & Betsy Woodruff of the Daily Beast: "A half-dozen GOP operatives and media figures tell The Daily Beast that Cruz's opponents have been pushing charges of adultery for at least six months now -- and that allies of former GOP presidential hopeful Marco Rubio were involved in spreading the smears. For months and months, anti-Cruz operatives have pitched a variety of #CruzSexScandal stories to a host of prominent national publications, according to Republican operatives and media figures. The New York Times, The Washington Post, Bloomberg News, Politico, and ABC News -- reporters at all those outlets heard some version of the Cruz-is-cheating story.... The Cruz campaign team has been aware of the sex-scandal rumors for months." Trump is a friend of the publisher of the National Enquirer, David Pecker. ...

... CW: The other day, I suggested Marsha Blackburn as Trump's running mate. Now I'm liking a Trump Pecker ticket. ...

... Ed Kilgore thinks Trump might make a "unity pick" for veep: "Even if Donald Trump nails down a majority of delegates on June 7 with a solid showing in California and New Jersey, naming a running mate whose characteristics show a conciliatory attitude toward the rest of the GOP could be just what the doctor ordered to head off some party coup to deny him the nomination, via a rules change or some other devilish device." B-o-o-ring.

... Alex Griswold of Mediaite: "A CNN debate between a Donald Trump supporter and former Ted Cruz communications director Amanda Carpenter went off the rails Friday when the Trump supporter suddenly accused Carpenter of having an illicit affair with her former boss.... 'What's out there is tabloid trash. If someone wants to comment on it, they can talk to my lawyer,' [Carpenter] responded. 'It's categorically false,' she continued angrily. 'You should be ashamed for spreading this smut. Donald Trump supporters should be held to account for it.'" Includes video of the segment. CW: Yep, this is what passes for presidential today.

Andrew Kaczynski & Nathan McDermott of BuzzFeed: "Don Black, the founder of the first major white supremacist website Stormfront.com and a former Ku Klux Klan member, said on his radio program earlier this month that he wanted his listeners to vote for and support Donald Trump."

Shootout at the Quicken Arena. Fox8 Cleveland: "Support is growing for an online petition to allow guns inside Quicken Loans Arena during the Republican National Convention. More than 4,000 people have signed the Change.org petition since it was started two days ago." ...

... digby: "... but seriously, these people want the rest of us to be subjected to a bunch of loons and crackpots armed to the teeth everywhere we go, they ought to be forced to do it too. What are they so afraid of? If everyone has a gun, they'll all be ready to fire into the crowd if someone loses their cool, right? Isn't that what they always say will keep everyone safe?" ...

... CW: C'mon, digby. They're not going to shoot each other. They're going to shoot Islamic terrorists. ...

... Bethania Markus of the Raw Story: "The petition claims that 'Cleveland, Ohio is consistently ranked as one of the top ten most dangerous cities in America.' But, 'This doesn't even begin to factor in the possibility of an ISIS terrorist attack on the arena during the convention. Without the right to protect themselves, those at the Quicken Loans Arena will be sitting ducks, utterly helpless against evil-doers, criminals or others who wish to threaten the American way of life.'" CW: digby should be ashamed of herself for suggesting people dedicated to preserving "the American way of life" might be "loons & crackpots."

Beyond the Beltway

Gray Rohrer of the Orlando Sentinel: "Planned Parenthood and other health clinics that provide abortions in Florida will go without taxpayer funds and face increased regulations for the procedure, under a bill signed Friday by Gov. Rick Scott.... A similar law in Texas, which women's health activists say has helped shut down several abortion clinics there, is under review by the U.S. Supreme Court."

Amy Yurkanin of AL.com: "An Alabama judge has permanently stripped from state law a requirement that abortion providers have admitting privileges at local hospitals. U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson issued the ruling Friday. He ruled against the state in 2014 in a lawsuit filed by providers, but the latest development extends that decision to all abortion clinics." CW: There are currently 380 comments on this story. I'm not reading a one, but I'll wager there are some real doozies.

Howard Koplowitz of AL.com: "A complaint into possible misuse of state property by Gov. Robert Bentley and potential violations by his alleged mistress and senior political advisor, Rebekah Caldwell Mason, was filed Friday by State Auditor Jim Zeigler. Both Bentley and Mason have denied an affair, although the governor admitted earlier this week that he made sexually inappropriate remarks to his senior political advisor after audio of Bentley's side of the conversation was leaked." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...

... Al.com has published another audio recording of Bentley declaring his love for, presumably, Rebekah Mason.

New York Times Editors: "Officials in Charlotte, N.C., spent more than a year carefully considering and debating an antidiscrimination ordinance that was passed in February to promote the city's culture of inclusiveness. State lawmakers quashed it on Wednesday by passing an appalling, unconstitutional bill that bars transgender people from using public restrooms that match their gender identity and prohibits cities from passing antidiscrimination ordinances that protect gay and transgender people." Gov. Pat McCrory (R), who signed the bill into law, "is running for re-election.... Voters should reject the candidate who made the state a pioneer in bigotry."

Way Beyond

Reuters: "A third man caught on CCTV footage with two bombers who attacked Brussels airport on Tuesday was named as Faycal Cheffou in Belgian media on Saturday." ...

... Lilia Blaise & Aurelien Breeden of the New York Times: "Counterterrorism officials widened a sweep targeting suspected Islamic State operatives to several European countries on Friday, reporting newly uncovered links between the Brussels and Paris massacres, at least five arrests and the foiling of what France described as an advanced plan for another attack. The actions reflected both new momentum from information uncovered since the Brussels bombings on Tuesday and deep worries about missed opportunities to thwart the attacks. European officials, particularly in Belgium, have come under strong criticism for lapses that might have enabled the Brussels plotters to succeed."

Jon Henley & Angelique Chrisafis of the Guardian: "A veteran Belgian fighter and bomb-maker with Islamic State whose DNA was found on two of the explosive belts used in last November's carnage in Paris has been confirmed as one of the suicide bombers in Tuesday's Brussels attacks. Belgian prosecutors said that DNA evidence had confirmed that Najim Laachraoui, 24, was one of two jihadis who blew themselves up at Brussels airport, killing 11 people."

AP: "A suicide bomber has blown himself up in a football stadium south of the Iraqi capital, killing 29 people and wounding 60, security officials said, as the military announced new gains on the ground against Islamic State. The bombing took place during a match in the small stadium in the city of Iskanderiyah, 30 miles from Baghdad, the officials said. Medical officials confirmed the death toll." CW: Will Republicans urge President Obama to go to Baghdad? Nope. I forgot they don't care about Iraqi civilian deaths. You likely won't hear a peep out of them.

The Commentariat -- March 25, 2016

If you are interested in taking over Reality Chex -- that is, owning it to do with as you will -- please contact me. I am looking forward to discontinuing my work on the site but would like to see it continue "under new management." I'll help you get started. Thank you to all who have contributed over the years. If I don't find a suitable "buyer," I'll close down next Friday, April 1. -- Constant Weader

Afternoon Update -- GOP Not-Sex Report:

Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "Ted Cruz on Friday accused 'Donald Trump and his henchmen' of planting the seeds behind a 'garbage' National Enquirer report alleging that the Texas senator has had extramarital affairs. 'This National Enquirer story is garbage. It is complete and utter lies,' Cruz said after a campaign event in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. 'It is a tabloid smear, and it is a smear that has come from Donald Trump and his henchmen.'” ...

... CW: Earlier today, I seriously considered skipping the reports of the National Enquirer story, but it seemed to be part-and-parcel of the Nasty Boys' Sleaze-Throwing Fight, so I didn't want to deprive readers of the escalation of said fight. If I made an error, Cruz has retroactively justified my error by addressing it. (And I don't think he had a choice.) If it was just crap earlier; it's crap news now.

Howard Koplowitz of AL.com: "A complaint into possible misuse of state property by Gov. Robert Bentley and potential violations by his alleged mistress and senior political advisor, Rebekah Caldwell Mason, was filed Friday by State Auditor Jim Zeigler. Both Bentley and Mason have denied an affair, although the governor admitted earlier this week that he made sexually inappropriate remarks to his senior political advisor after audio of Bentley's side of the conversation was leaked."

MEANWHILE, in Congress. Charles Pierce: "... there's some serious McCarthyite damage being done to medical research by a congressional committee chaired by a member of Congress whose brains are leaking out of her shell-pink ears. You should pay attention if you or any members of your family has been struck by diseases like Parkinson's, Alzheimer's or ALS. I think, at this point, former NFL football players should take special note, too." The anti-choice wackos have "moved on from the people who actually perform abortions to the people who use fetal tissue in medical research." CW: This perversion of Congress, people, also is all about sex. They're just pretending it's something else.

*****

"There Is No Biden Rule." Kathleen Hennessey of the AP: "Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday tried to clear his name and tout his record on Supreme Court nominations, calling Republican branding of his past remarks on the subject 'ridiculous' and casting himself as a longtime advocate of bipartisan compromise in filling seats on the high court. In a speech at Georgetown Law School, Biden issued a broad warning that Republicans' election-year blockade of President Barack Obama's nominee 'can lead to a genuine Constitutional crisis' and sought to distance himself from the strategy. He argued Republicans have distorted a 1992 speech in which he seemed to endorse the notion of blocking any Supreme Court nominee put forward in the throes of the election season. Republicans have labeled their strategy the 'Biden rule.'...  But there is division within the ranks on that front. Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., made the case earlier this week that [Judge Merrick] Garland should get a vote":

... Nick Gass of Politico: "A top conservative group threatened to back a primary challenger against Sen. Jerry Moran on Friday, days after the Kansas Republican told constituents that he was calling upon the Senate to take up Merrick Garland's nomination to the Supreme Court." CW: Because the Tea party reveres the Constitution, but only in a special, secret form that can morph to fit their needs of the day. I think they're still solid with the 3/5ths solution, tho. ...

... Jeff Toobin of the New Yorker games out the likely path of Garland's Supreme dreams (not going to happen this term) & sees this: "Merrick Garland’s nomination will prove consequential indeed if it helps usher the filibuster to its long-overdue demise." CW: You'll have to read his post to see how Toobin reaches his conclusion, but it seems plausible, to me, too. Until Democrats control of the House, I don't see how that body will function, but if the Senate eventually dropped the filibuster (and individual holds!), it might start legislating.

Mary Walsh of the New York Times: "Politicians in Washington are coalescing around a financial plan to rescue Puerto Rico, just weeks before an expected major default on bond payments that would spread more turmoil through the island’s shaky economy. The plan, being drafted as legislation by House Republicans, would not grant Puerto Rico’s most fervent request: permission to restructure its entire $72 billion debt in bankruptcy. It would, however, give the island certain crucial tools that bankruptcy proceedings can offer — but only if it first comes under close federal oversight and meets other conditions."

Patrick Clark of Bloomberg: "It's been more than 15 years since Congress increased funding for the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, the government's primary method for encouraging construction of affordable housing. On Thursday, Senator Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) is to announce a plan that calls for Congress to spend 50 percent more on the program, enough to build as many as 400,000 homes over the next decade. That makes the Democrat's plan an ambitious attempt to increase the stock of affordable rental housing, one that comes in the face of potential opposition by a Republican majority, along with the legislative gridlock of a presidential election year. It’s also just a drop in the bucket."

Nick Gass: "Dianne Feinstein's office on Friday released a blistering rebuttal to the latest book from former CIA Director Michael Hayden, slamming numerous examples of what it characterizes as misrepresentations or plain falsehoods related to the use of enhanced interrogation techniques. The 38-page document from the staff of the California Democrat, who is vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, methodically goes over statements from Hayden's 464-page book released in February, titled 'Playing to the Edge: American Intelligence in the Age of Terror.'"

** Gene Demby of NPR: "... the tug of war over who gets to enjoy the benefits reserved for 'real Americans' has always been all tied up with racial politics. People of color were overwhelmingly excluded during the 'glory days' that so many white voters this election cycle look back on as better times. That's why Trump's 'Make America Great Again' mantra reads so menacingly to so many — whiteness seems to be a necessary precondition for that nostalgia." Via Paul Waldman. ...

... CW: Demby's essay also helps explain -- tho he doesn't discuss this -- Paul Ryan's new disavowal of his infamous "makers & takers" dissection. This was not a moment of self-reflection & correction on Ryan's part; rather, it was another GOP con -- an appeal to the white working-class "takers"/voters who have fled to Trump. A proper translation would be, "Yo, yahoos! My party is your party. You don't need Trump when you've got me, Paul Ryan -- elite, brilliant wonk -- on your side. (P.S. Never mind that just this week I used elite brilliant wonkish jargon to secretly endorse tax breaks for the rich & screw you undeserving yahoos.)" ...

... Digby, in Salon: "... while [Ryan] may be softly chastising Donald Trump for his rudeness and bad manners, it’s highly unlikely that anything fundamental in the GOP has changed. All these modern Republicans, whether Rand-loving 'intellectuals' like Ryan, power-mad hawks like Dick Cheney, anarchic nihilists like Cruz or vulgarians like Trump come from the same toxic ideological swamp."

CW: I'm late with this link, but Graciela Mochkofsky, writing in the New Yorker, provides some essential context for President Obama's declassification of American documents that may reveal the U.S.'s involvement in the Argentine coup that ushered in the infamous junta. (Note to Hillary: You may not want to mention again how much Henry Kissinger likes you.)

Mr. & Mrs. Kelley Learn Their Lawyers Are Not Their Friends. Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "A Florida couple on Thursday dropped a lawsuit over the federal government’s disclosure of their identities in connection with the F.B.I. investigation that uncovered evidence that David H. Petraeus, the C.I.A. director at the time, was having an affair.... This month, [Jill] Kelley’s lawyers told a federal judge that they would no longer represent the couple, citing irreconcilable differences.... In a statement, Ms. Kelley said she had difficulty finding a new lawyer because her previous ones had demanded that they be paid $7 million of any money she received."

Presidential Race

Nick Gass: "Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders are effectively tied among Democratic voters, according to the results of a [national] Bloomberg Politics poll released Thursday. Of the 311 people who indicated that they have voted or will vote in their state's Democratic primary or caucus, 49 percent said they support Sanders, while 48 percent indicated that they prefer Clinton and the remaining 3 percent said they are not sure." CW: This is just one poll, so nothing to get excited about. But it is a reminder that Clinton, assuming she prevails in the delegate count, can't ignore half of her party. Sanders' popularity makes it impossible -- or at least stupid -- for her to Etch-a-Sketch out his platform.

Harold Meyerson of the American Prospect: "Are all these experienced activists even right in hoping that this time will be different, that this time a powerful social democratic left might just take root in America’s political soil? I think they are. Chiefly because Bernie Sanders’s campaign didn’t create a new American left. It revealed it.... At first glance, this new socialist presence just seems to have sprung up, unsummoned, unannounced. And yet, it clearly has been building for years. Its emergence was foretold by Occupy Wall Street...." ...

... CW: Meyerson may be dreaming, but his essay is heartening. Read it & smile.

Nolan McCaskill of Politico: "Bernie Sanders’ campaign on Thursday officially served the Democratic National Committee with a lawsuit, alleging the organization unfairly revoked its access to voter file data. Sanders’ campaign initially filed a suit in December and was facing a Thursday deadline to serve the committee with the suit. The allegations stem from a controversy late last year in which Sanders staffers improperly accessed information from Hillary Clinton's data file after a firewall between the campaigns' information was inadvertently dropped."

Steve LeBlanc of the AP: "U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren waded deeper into the presidential primary debate Thursday, sharpening her criticism of Donald Trump and cheering on Bernie Sanders.... Warren said. 'He has put the right issues on the table both for the Democratic Party and for the country in general so I'm still cheering Bernie on.' Warren declined to say which candidate she voted for in the Massachusetts primary. She said she plans to make an endorsement, but not yet.... The Massachusetts Democrat described the Republican presidential front-runner as a failed businessman who inherited a fortune from his father and then maintained it 'by cheating people, by defrauding people, and by skipping out on paying his creditors through Chapter 11' bankruptcy protection." ...

... Jim Newell of Slate: "The Democrats won’t force [Bernie Sanders] out of the race, no; they’ll just smother him with smarmy condescension.... They’re asking Sanders to continue running for the nomination without really running for the nomination. It doesn’t work that way.... Sanders has earned the right to finish out his candidacy, just as Clinton had in 2008.... Clinton and her supporters, which include the vast majority of the Democratic Party apparatus, would like Sanders to back the hell off and not put her in any uncomfortable positions. Putting Clinton in uncomfortable positions is exactly what Sanders wants to do."

Drip, Drip. Julian Hattem of the Hill: "Conservative legal watchdogs have discovered new emails from Hillary Clinton’s private email server dating back to the first days of her tenure as secretary of State. The previously undisclosed February 2009 emails between Clinton from her then-chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, raise new questions about the scope of emails from Clinton’s early days in office that were not handed over to the State Department for recordkeeping and may have been lost entirely. Clinton’s presidential campaign has previously claimed that the former top diplomat did not use her personal 'clintonemail.com' account before March 2009, weeks after she was sworn in as secretary of State. But on Thursday, the watchdog group Judicial Watch released one message from Feb. 13, 2009, in which Mills communicated with Clinton on the account to discuss the National Security Agency’s (NSA) efforts to produce a secure BlackBerry device for her to use as secretary of State."

Adam Gopnik of the New Yorker on the fall of Rome -- and other places: "Today ... we find ourselves in the midst of the ascent of a figure right out of Petronius: an orange-colored vulgarian of meretricious display, right down to the trophy wives from Far Elsewhere — with an ambition to dominate, a cunning out of proportion to his wisdom, a contempt for truth coupled with a readiness to manipulate, and a personal arrogance combined with, and indifferent to, a universal understanding that he is utterly unfit to govern. Now that we are in possession of an honest-to-God demagogue of the classical model, old portents of doom seem pertinent.... Democracy remains more delicate than we imagine."

Katy Tur & Ari Melber of NBC News: "While [Donald] Trump publicly dismisses talk of a battle in Cleveland, he is quietly assembling a team of seasoned operatives to manage a contested convention. Their strategy, NBC has learned, is to convert delegates in the crucial 40 days between the end of the primaries and the convention - while girding for a floor fight in Cleveland if necessary. The outreach is already underway." ...

... Greg Sargent follows up : "If Trump is far ahead of both his two rivals in delegates, accepting him might look like the most plausible — or the least undesirable — path. Obviously this might not work, because GOP elites and delegates may continue to hold to their #NeverTrump resolve. But it might!"

Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "... it is with pleasure that we can present [RNC chair Reince] Priebus with a bit of good news.... There is someone even less popular than the Republican Party and less popular than Congress. That person is Donald Trump." ...

... Jamelle Bouie of Slate: "... Donald Trump is one of the most unpopular figures in national politics. He’s disliked (or despised) by a large majority of Americans. This isn’t because the public doesn’t know him. With nearly $2 billion in free coverage from news networks — dwarfing Hillary Clinton’s $746 million — the public knows him well. And they don’t like what they see. Far from scrambling political alliances in his favor, Trump may be the key to further gains for Democrats, from solidifying an advantage with Hispanics to making inroads with college-educated whites."

Tim Egan on the symbiotic relationship between Trump & terrorists: "The more people who are murdered by the savages from the Islamic State, the better it is for [Donald Trump]. The Islamic State is a gift to Trump. And he is a gift to them, playing into the grand scheme of the killers. He would make the world far less safe, and bring the Islamic State closer to the global clash of worlds that those monsters desire."

Gene Robinson: "Donald Trump’s ignorance of government policy, both foreign and domestic, is breathtaking. The Republican Party is likely to nominate for president a man who appears to know next to nothing about the issues that would confront him in the job." ...

... CW: Yeah? So? Drumpf knows what he needs to know: like the beans on Heidi he's going to spill. ...

This Is What Republicans Call "Presidential"

"Your wife is a slut!" "Your wife is an ugly, angry nut-job."

The "comparison" Trump tweeted.Nolan McCaskill: "Ted Cruz blasted Donald Trump on Thursday, calling the Republican front-runner a 'sniveling coward' for bringing Cruz’s wife to the forefront of his presidential campaign. 'Donald, you’re a sniveling coward,' Cruz told reporters Thursday in Dane, Wisconsin, forcefully pointing his finger. 'Leave Heidi the hell alone.'” ...

... CW: As far as I can tell, based partly on a Google search, Cruz never disavowed the anti-Trump ad featuring Melania Trump in a nude pose. So his self-righteous "leave my wife the hell alone" is, like all of his temper tantrums, rather hollow dudgeon.

Jesse Byrnes of the Hill: "Donald Trump has intensified his feud with Ted Cruz over the Republican presidential rival's wife after she slammed his statements for having 'no basis in reality.' Trump shared an image on Twitter around midnight Wednesday comparing his wife, Melania, a former model, to Cruz's wife, stating, 'A picture is worth a thousand words.'... CNN’s Kate Bolduan sparred with a Trump adviser over the tweet during an interview Thursday.... 'As a woman, it’s demeaning to not only Ted Cruz’s wife, it’s demeaning to Melania Trump because she has a lot more going for her than just her looks, and you don’t see that in this retweet,' Bolduan said...."

Jose DelReal & Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: "A nasty feud that escalated Thursday between Donald Trump and ... [Ted Cruz] over their wives set off a new wave of alarm among establishment Republicans, who fear the GOP front-runner would drive away female voters in a general-election fight with likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.... GOP strategist Katie Packer, who leads the anti-Trump Our Principles super PAC[, said,] 'Half of the reason why I’m fighting so hard to stop Donald Trump is because I think he’s a walking, talking stereotype of a sexist misogynistic pig.'”

Emma Green of the Atlantic: "Ted Cruz was ... always that guy ... who would look away as his allies circulated a naked picture of the wife of his enemy, and then suggest that 'real men don’t attack women.'... That guy who would suggest the only female Democratic presidential candidate in this race needs a spanking."

Women, you have to treat them like shit. -- Donald Trump, ca. 1990s

** Franklin Foer in Slate: "... there’s one ideology that [Donald Trump] does hold with sincerity and practices with unwavering fervor: misogyny.... In his view, treating women like meat is a necessary precondition for winning.... By winning, Trump means asserting superiority. And since life is a zero-sum game, superiority can only be achieved at someone else’s expense.... He relishes judging women on the basis of their looks, which he seems to believe amounts to the sum of their character.... Misogyny isn’t an incidental part of Donald Trump. It’s who he is."

CW: Like Karoli Kuns of Crooks & Liars, I don't buy the National Enquirer story that Ted Cruz found five attractive women who would have sex with him. (Okay, one is supposedly a sex worker, so maybe she was just doing her job.) "It feels to me like Trump dropped a whole lot of garbage over at the Enquirer to discredit Ted Cruz, and that sense is backed up even more by the fact that one of the lovely ladies is supposedly Donald Trump's spokeswoman. That's just a little too convenient.... It's hearsay at this point, but it leaves a nice pile of grist for the rumor mill." ...

     ... AND it's fun stuff in Twitter World. ...

Andrew Kaczynski of BuzzFeed: "Ted Cruz says he declined to directly attack Donald Trump for much of the Republican primary because those who did ended up 'as roadkill.'... Cruz said Wednesday to radio host Charlie Sykes of WTMJ..., '... If you look at a number of the candidates that took on Donald Trump early on, they ended up as roadkill.... I am very strongly committed on the anti-roadkill approach.'”

Paul Krugman: "... Mr. Cruz has staked out positions on crucial issues that are, not to put too fine a point on it, crazy. How can elite Republicans back him? The answer is the same for Mr. Cruz and the elite as it is for Mr. Trump and the base: Leading Republicans support Mr. Cruz, not despite his policy positions, but because of them. They may not like his style, but they agree with his substance.... While his policy ideas are extreme, they reflect the same extremism that pervades the party’s elite. There are no moderates, or for that matter, sensible people, anywhere in this story."

Pick Me! Pick Me! Jessie Opoein of the Madison, Wisconsin, Capital Times: "If the Republican Party finds itself with an open convention in July, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker believes the nominee may not be Donald Trump, Ted Cruz or John Kasich. 'I think if it’s an open convention, it’s very likely it would be someone who’s not currently running,' Walker told reporters Thursday."

David Schwartz of Reuters: "Phoenix's mayor on Wednesday urged a federal probe into the local county's handling of voting in Arizona's presidential nominating contest, questioning whether minority voters were granted a fair chance to cast their ballots. Greg Stanton asked the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate a decision by Maricopa County officials to slash the number of polling locations in Arizona's most populous county and leave minority-heavy areas with seemingly fewer sites.  The Democratic mayor called the vote 'a fiasco after voters had to wait in line for several hours on Tuesday to cast their ballots." ...

... CW: Cutting down the number of polling places in "urban areas" & voter ID laws are two tricks among many in a well-stuffed Republican Voter Suppression Bag. Ask President Kerry. ...

... Fernanda Santos of the New York Times: "Days later, angry and baffled voters are still trying to make sense of how democracy is working in Maricopa County, the state’s most populous, where officials cut the number of polling places by 70 percent to save money — to 60 from 200 in the last presidential election. That translated to a single polling place for every 108,000 residents in Phoenix, a majority-minority city that had exceptional turnout in Tuesday’s Democratic and Republican primaries.... But beyond the electoral breakdown here, many observers saw Arizona as a flashing neon sign pointing toward potential problems nationally at a time that 16 states will have new voting restrictions in place for the first time in a presidential election." ...

... Eliza Collins of Politico: Bernie Sanders & the Clinton campaign weigh in on the Maricopa County voting scandal.

Senate Race

Alex Roarty of Roll Call: "Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson on Wednesday was endorsed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, an important sign of support for the business-friendly lawmaker ahead of a difficult re-election test this November. But it's unclear whether the behemoth business lobby -- and other well-funded Republican-aligned groups like it -- will actually spend big money on the GOP senator's behalf in a general election.... Early surveys of the race paint a grim picture for Johnson: Since April of last year, five of six polls from Marquette Law School have found [former Sen. Russ] Feingold sporting a double-digit lead, including a mid-February survey that found the Democrat winning by 12 points."

David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "Republican leaders say they are taking a principled stand against election-year appointments rather than focusing on Judge [Merrick] Garland’s qualifications, [Sen. Ron] Johnson, without any pretense, is boasting that he and his Republican colleagues are preventing Mr. Obama from tilting the ideological balance of the court to the left. And he is attacking Judge Garland — without any basis, many legal experts say — as posing a grave threat to Second Amendment gun rights.... Democrats, including [former Sen. Russ] Feingold, say they are confident that Mr. Johnson is making a politically fatal mistake by playing to the Republican Party’s conservative base in a state that despite the party’s recent inroads has voted Democratic in the past seven presidential elections, and where pocketbook issues like jobs and trade are dominant."

Beyond the Beltway

Sandhya Somashekhar of the Washington Post: "Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (R) signed a controversial abortion bill Thursday that, among other things, would ban the procedure if it is sought because the fetus was diagnosed with a disability or defect such as Down syndrome.... The law, which was passed by the legislature earlier this month, would make Indiana the second state in the nation, after North Dakota, to ban abortion in cases where a fetal anomaly is detected.... And it could make Indiana the first state in the country to require that fetal remains be buried or cremated, rather than treated like medical waste." ...

... CW: Red State/Blue State. If you're a woman of child-bearing age, you don't want to live in a state governed by Republicans. In fact, any man who intends to be or is in a relationship with a young woman should consider getting the hell out of Red State America. ...

... Let's not forget North Carolina & Georgia:

Sandhya Somashekhar : "A new North Carolina law that bars local governments from extending civil rights protections to gay and transgender people is provoking a growing backlash from businesses and others who say the law is discriminatory. American Airlines, Wells Fargo and the National Basketball Association were among those to raise concerns about the law, which was introduced and passed Wednesday in a hastily called special session and signed by Gov. Pat McCrory (R) later that day." ...

... Niraj Chokshi of the Washington Post: "Another industry is warning Georgia’s governor not to sign a religious-liberty bill into law — the latest to suggest that the state risks losing business over the measure. Actors, writers, producers, directors, movie studios and whole entertainment companies have weighed in on the debate, many calling the bill discriminatory and some threatening to sever ties with Georgia if it’s passed. The latest threat comes from a group of 34 individuals in the movie business, including celebrities Kristin Chenoweth, Lee Daniels, Anne Hathaway, Seth MacFarlane, Julianne Moore, Rob Reiner and Marisa Tomei. In a Thursday letter, they warn Gov. Nathan Deal (R) that they 'plan to take our business elsewhere' should he sign the bill, which passed the legislature last week. The Walt Disney Co. and its subsidiary movie studio, Marvel, said the same in a statement Wednesday.... At least 20 Fortune 500 companies — including Delta Air Lines, Google, Home Depot, IBM, Marriott, Microsoft, Nordstrom, Coca-Cola, Dow Chemical, UPS and Verizon — belong to a coalition urging Deal to veto the measure. The coalition has several hundred corporate members in all." ...

... CW: Excuse me. That's no "religious liberty bill: "The bill protects religious leaders from being forced to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies and individuals from being forced to attend such events. It also allows faith-based organizations to deny use of their facilities for events they find 'objectionable' and exempts them from having to hire or retain any employee whose religious beliefs or practices differ from those of the organization." The first part is absolute nonsense; the First Amendment protects ministers from performing rituals they oppose, & who the hell thinks the government can require "individuals" to go to weddings? The second part isn't about "religious liberty," either; generally speaking, faith-based organization can hire whom they want to & rent their facilities to whom they want, unless they receive government grants.

Paul Gattis of Al.com: "A state audit released last month reported no issues with the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, whose director was fired Tuesday by Gov. Robert Bentley after "several areas of concern" were discovered. Spencer Collier, the first director of the new organization designed to consolidate and streamline 12 state law enforcement agencies, denied any wrongdoing at a news conference Wednesday in which he outlined elements of what he described as an inappropriate affair between the governor and senior advisor Rebekah Caldwell Mason." ...

... CW: I have a feeling Bentley didn't quite know how to "keep his friends close & his enemies closer." He got right close with one friend, but he canned an enemy -- a guy who had the goods on him -- for no reason Bentley has been willing to make public, so perhaps for no good reason. Feeling up the help, if the help was willing, appears at this time to have been a lesser mistake. The story may evolve, but right now Bentley looks like an idiot.

Way Beyond

Matthew Lee of the AP: "At least two American citizens have been confirmed killed in this week’s attacks in Brussels, a U.S. official said Friday, as Secretary of State John Kerry is visiting the city to express his condolences to the Belgian people." CW: Hate to mention it to Republicans who said President Obama should drop everything & go give some speeches in Brussels, but elite snob John Kerry, unilike Obama, actually speaks one of Belgium's official languages.

Alistair Macdonald, et al., of Reuters: "Belgian police arrested six people in their probe of Tuesday's Islamic State suicide bombings in Brussels, while authorities in France said they thwarted a militant plot there 'that was at an advanced stage.' The federal prosecutor's office in Belgium said on Thursday that the arrests came during police searches in the Brussels neighborhoods of Schaerbeek in the north and Jette in the west, as well as in the center of the Belgian capital." ...

... Aurelien Breeden, et al., of the New York Times: "Belgium’s justice and interior ministers acknowledged Thursday that the authorities had erred by not acting on Turkey’s request last year that they take custody of a Belgian citizen arrested for suspected terrorist activity. The man was one of the Islamic State suicide bombers in the devastating Brussels attacks. The acknowledgments by the justice minister, Koen Geens, and interior minister, Jan Jambon, were the first high-level Belgian admissions of blunder in the aftermath of the bombings on Tuesday. The attacks have exposed missteps by European security officials and police, just four months after the Islamic State’s assault on targets in Paris."

Liz Sly of the Washington Post: "As European governments scramble to contain the expanding terrorist threat posed by the Islamic State, on the battlefield in Iraq and Syria the group is a rapidly diminishing force. In the latest setbacks for the militants on Thursday, Syrian government troops entered the outskirts of the historic town of Palmyra after a weeks-old offensive aided by Russian airstrikes, and U.S. airstrikes helped Iraqi forces overrun a string of Islamic State villages in northern Iraq that had been threatening a U.S. base nearby. These are just two of the many fronts in both countries where the militants are being squeezed, stretched and pushed back."

The Commentariat -- March 24, 2016

If you are interested in taking over Reality Chex -- that is, owning it to do with as you will -- please contact me. I am looking forward to discontinuing my work on the site but would like to see it continue "under new management." I'll help you get started. Thank you to all who have contributed over the years. If I don't find a suitable "buyer," I'll close down next Friday, April 1. -- Constant Weader

Afternoon Update:

Gardiner Harris of the New York Times: "A special House committee empaneled to investigate fetal tissue research is preparing to issue 17 subpoenas to medical supply companies and laboratories, seeking the names of researchers, graduate students, laboratory technicians and administrative personnel. The House investigation into how some of the nation's most prestigious universities acquire fetal tissue has prompted charges of intimidation and coercion, escalating a battle that some researchers fear could shut down studies seeking cures for Parkinson's disease, the Zika virus and a host of other conditions. Representative Marsha Blackburn, Republican of Tennessee, who opposes most fetal tissue research because of its association with abortion, intends to issue the subpoenas on behalf of the Republicans on the House Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives." ...

... CW: Blackburn's move here is fascistic enough to impress Donald Trump. She's a successful publicity hound, a climate denier & otherwise standard-issue Tea party grande dame. If Trump picked Blackburn as his running mate, it would mitigate his unpopularity with women, & she'd be just the person to attack Hillary Clinton, if Clinton is the Democratic nominee. And Blackburn is willing: Washington Examiner: "U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn said Friday she'd be open to becoming GOP front-runner Donald Trump's vice president if he wins the nomination." So Marsha Blackburn is my entry in today's GOP Veepstakes.

Republicans Being Sorry for Stuff:

Amanda Marcotte, in Salon, on Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley's (R) hypocritical apology for extracurricular sex or sex-words or not-sex or whatever: "This is what Bentley should be apologizing for: Treating everyone else who isn't a straight man like their private, consenting sex lives that harm absolutely no one are some great evil to be snuffed out by denying them medical care and basic rights like marriage.... It's clear that Bentley thinks that being mildly embarrassed is punishment enough for a straight man caught having sexytimes. But the rest of us won't get off so easy. We're denied marriage rights, birth control, abortion access, and told we're a danger to our children."

"Today in Paul Ryan's Shadow Campaign for President." Charles Pierce: "Remember, he's sorry for all those terrible things he's said about the poor, but he might say them again, and he'll feel even more sorry. Biggest. Fake. Ever."

*****

BBC News: "President Barack Obama, who is on a visit to Argentina, has promised to release secret files concerning the US role in the military coup there 40 years ago that installed one of the region's most brutal regimes. He was speaking after talks with Argentine President Mauricio Macri. Mr Obama said US military and intelligence files from the era would be declassified for the first time":

David Sanger of the New York Times: "The Justice Department on Thursday unsealed an indictment against seven Iranian computer specialists who regularly worked for the country's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, charging that they were behind cyberattacks on dozens of American banks and that they attempted to take over the controls of a small dam in Rye, N.Y. The indictment, while long expected, is the first time that the Obama administration has sought action against Iranians for a wave of computer attacks on the United States that began in 2011.... None of the named Iranians live in the United States and it is doubtful that they will ever make it to an American courtroom."

Alissa Rubin, et al., of the New York Times: "The Brussels suicide bombers included two Belgium-born brothers with a violent criminal past and suspected links to plotters of the Islamic State's Paris attacks last November, the authorities said Wednesday, raising new alarms about Europe's leaky defenses against a militant organization that has terrorized two European capitals with seeming impunity. One of the brothers was deported by Turkey back to Europe less than a year ago, Turkey's president said, suspected of being a terrorist fighter intent on entering Syria, where the Islamic State is based. Despite that statement, Belgian officials said neither brother had been under suspicion for terrorism until recently, an indication of the Islamic State's ability to remain steps ahead of European intelligence and security monitors." ...

... Joby Warrick & Greg Miller of the Washington Post: "As Belgian police delve into the backgrounds of the men behind Tuesday's attacks in Brussels, they are encountering a pattern familiar to investigators in Paris and other European cities targeted by the Islamic State: The shock troops used in the terrorist group's signature attacks are largely men already well known to local law enforcement -- not as religious radicals, but as criminals." ...

... Lori Hinnant & Paisley Dodds of the AP: "The Islamic State group has trained at least 400 fighters to target Europe in deadly waves of attacks, deploying interlocking terror cells like the ones that struck Brussels and Paris with orders to choose the time, place and method for maximum chaos, officials have told The Associated Press." ...

... Josh Lederman of the AP: "A day after bombs ripped through Brussels, President Barack Obama declared that fighting the Islamic State is his 'No. 1 priority' and pledged that the United States will pursue the jihadist group until it is destroyed. 'I've got a lot of things on my plate, but my top priority is to defeat I ISIL and to eliminate the scourge of this barbaric terrorism that's been taking place around the world,' Obama said Wednesday. '... The issue is, how do we do it in an intelligent way?" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Nicole Perlroth & Katie Benner of "the New York Times: Why are hackers willing to help the FBI unlock Apple's iPhone? Maybe because Apple, unlike other big tech companies, doesn't offer hackers a "bug bounty" when they alert the companies to programming flaws. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "In an address billed as an examination of the future of politics, Speaker Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin on Wednesday admonished politicians in both parties for debasing political discourse.... It was a familiar role for the speaker: He has become something of a Washington scold.... In the most striking part of his speech, Mr. Ryan faulted himself for having referred to the 'makers and takers' in society when he was the Republican vice-presidential nominee in 2012.... But what Mr. Ryan did not address in his speech has been the inability of Congress to turn those ideas into laws, even with Republican majorities in both houses, or to maintain much decorum in its own chambers." ...

... Amber Phillips of the Washington Post: "Yes, House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) addressed the nation on Wednesday to once again rebuke GOP front-runner Donald Trump in all but name. But as Ryan waxed wishfully about what the Republican Party and our political dialogue should be, it almost sounded like he had given up trying to shift its inevitable march to disaster this presidential election -- and was laying the groundwork for the next. Possibly even his own.... Ryan has slowly, carefully been pitching himself as the Republican Party's anti-Trump, and Wednesday's speech sounded like he hoped to emerge as an alternative to a party burned by Trump for 2020." ...

... Driftglass puts it more simply: "There can be no end to political madness in this country until this kind of speech is laughed at every time anyone tries it."

... The Cowardly Ryan. Dana Milbank: Ryan "clearly would, despite his demurrals, like to be the consensus nominee. But to preserve his neutrality, and his presidential prospects, Ryan is making a corrupt bargain. There is no neutrality between good and evil."

... CW: 2020? I'm with Milbank. Ryan is thinking 2016. Just as he became the Reluctant Speaker, so he would like to become the Reluctant President. ...

The Vagina Dialog. Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court weighed moral theology and parsed insurance terminology on Wednesday in an extended and animated argument that seemed to leave the justices sharply divided over what the government may do to require employers to provide free insurance coverage for contraception to female workers. A 4-to-4 tie appeared to be a real possibility, which would automatically affirm the four appeals court decisions under review. All four ruled that religious groups seeking to opt out of the requirement that they pay for the coverage must sign forms and provide information that would shift the cost to insurance companies and the government." ...

... Today's Word: "Hijack." Lyle Denniston of ScotusBlog: "'Hijacking' is what a long list of religious institutions that object for reasons of faithto contraceptive methods have used to describe what they say the federal government will do to their health-care plans as it moves toward providing free birth control to those institutions' female employees and college students. And, if there was a startling moment during the ninety-four-minute hearing on Zubik v. Burwell, it came when Justice Anthony M. Kennedy deployed that word in obvious sympathy to those institutions." ...

... Dahlia Lithwick of Slate: "In case you believed Wednesday's big contraception/religious liberty case at the Supreme Court was about contraception, or about religious liberty, you would be wrong. It's about Obamacare. Again. For the fourth time in four years. And in case you believed the court's conservatives have maybe come around on Obamacare -- well, no. They still hate it. But now they hate it in sound bites.... Specifically, the idea that Obamacare has 'hijacked' the nonprofit religious charity Little Sisters of the Poor (and others like it) and their insurance apparatus to force the horror that is Obamacare onto them." ...

... Clueless Geezers Want You Ladies to Get an Imaginary Healthcare Policy. Tierney Sneed of TPM: "Judging by the questions from conservatives on the court -- all men -- they're still not fully aware of how every day people -- particularly women -- receive health care in the United States, or how health insurance actually works." ...

... Judicial Malpractice. Kevin Drum: "These justices have already heard two major cases on Obamacare, and they've presumably read the briefs for this one. But they still seem unable to grasp the concept that you can't just go out to the exchange and buy a 'contraceptive policy.' Nor do they seem to care that even if you could, it would mean not being able to get contraceptives from your regular doctor, which for some women would cause real problems with continuity of care." ...

... Nancy LeTourneau of the Washington Monthly: "It all reminds me of the three qualities President Obama outlined that he'd be looking for in a Supreme Court nominee....

There will be cases in which a judge's analysis necessarily will be shaped by his or her own perspective, ethics, and judgment. That's why the third quality I seek in a judge is a keen understanding that justice is not about abstract legal theory, nor some footnote in a dusty casebook. It's the kind of life experience earned outside the classroom and the courtroom; experience that suggests he or she views the law not only as an intellectual exercise, but also grasps the way it affects the daily reality of people's lives in a big, complicated democracy, and in rapidly changing times.

... Obama Is Mean to Nuns. Charles Pierce: "The plaintiff's entire case is based on the sub rosa notion that a small order of nuns is being bullied by the big, bad government. (It's also based, on a deeper level, on a distrust and fear of female sexuality.)... In any event, Zubik is yet another example of what a dog in the manger is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Yet another blessing on the nation signed by Bill Clinton in his attempt to get re-elected, RFRA ... is the only reason Zubik (and, earlier, Hobby Lobby) even got this far. It is the reason that the preposterous argument that filling out a form is a 'near occasion of sin,' as the Sisters of St. Joseph used to call them, ever made it to the eight wise souls herein sitting in judgment. It's the reason why employees of all faiths may now have to submit to the anti-human dictates, and the bullshit theology, of an encyclical that American Catholics have been lubriciously ignoring for going on half-a-century."

Richard Painter, a Bush II lawyer, in a New York Times op-ed: "Judge [Merrick] Garland is just the kind of candidate we would have advised President Bush to nominate if he had been in this situation. A proven moderate, he has enjoyed widespread Republican support in the past.... It is time for the Senate to consider the Garland nomination. Judge Garland should get exactly what Justice Alito got in 2006: a hearing, perhaps with some bluster along the way, but a vote in the end, and confirmation.... If the Senate does not move forward with the Garland nomination now, a lot of senators could find themselves voting on a Supreme Court nominee in December while packing up their offices."

Max Ehrenfreund of the Washington Post: "In recent decades, rich black kids have been more likely to go to prison than poor white kids.... Hispanic participants who were less affluent in 1985 were more likely to be eventually incarcerated than their white peers with similar wealth, but less likely than black participants."

Alan Schwartz, et al., of the New York Times: "... an investigation by The New York Times has found that the N.F.L.'s concussion research was far more flawed than previously known. For the last 13 years, the N.F.L. has stood by the research, which, the papers stated, was based on a full accounting of all concussions diagnosed by team physicians from 1996 through 2001. But confidential data obtained by The Times shows that more than 100 diagnosed concussions were omitted from the studies.... The committee then calculated the rates of concussions using the incomplete data, making them appear less frequent than they actually were."

This really upset the scolds on "Morning Joe," who, as we know, are Very Serious People:

... That's kinda funny, because they weren't all upset when Mika & Jonathan Capehart danced through "the most serious election coverage in all of teevee" the day after 31 Americans were murdered by guns & 151 people went to the emergency room after a gun assault. (No, I don't know the exact date of Mika & Jonathan's routine, but those are the averages. They don't include the 55 people who commit suicide by gun daily or the 46 who die in accidentaly shootings daily.)

The NRA's version of "Hansel & Gretel."... Lindsey Bever of the Washington Post: "Hansel with a hunting rifle. Or Little Red Riding Hood's granny with a shotgun.... [These stories are featured] on the National Rifle Association's NRA Family website, which partnered with author Amelia Hamilton 'to present her twist on those classic tales' -- a series that has infuriated gun-control advocates, some of whom called it 'absolutely sick.' Gun-rights supporters say the stories -- which started with 'Little Red Riding Hood (Has a Gun)' and continued with 'Hansel and Gretel (Have Guns)' -- are a more peaceful alternative to the often disturbing fairy tales from childhood."

Presidential Race

Amy Chozick of the New York Times: "In her most vigorous assault yet on her Republican rivals, Hillary Clinton on Wednesday ridiculed the foreign policy prescriptions of [link fixed] Donald J. Trump and Senator Ted Cruz, calling them 'reckless actions' that would alienate America's closest allies, demonize Muslims and empower Russia.... Yet in her own policy prescriptions -- which included an 'intelligence surge' to collect more data on the Islamic State, partnerships with Silicon Valley firms that have been suspicious of Washington, and beefing up security on soft targets like airport check-in areas -- Mrs. Clinton resisted calls to distance herself from the Obama administration's actions, and instead called for an acceleration of the approaches already underway."

Charles Pierce: "You want to know what it's like to be president of the United damn States, and there's nothing anybody can do about it, and you no longer have any fcks left in that big old bag to give?":

     ... Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "President Obama on Wednesday delivered a sharply personal rebuke of GOP presidential candidate Ted Cruz for his call to institute surveillance on Muslim communities in response to the Brussels terrorist attacks. During a press conference in Argentina, Obama called such a proposal 'wrong and un-American' and said it would undermine the U.S. campaign against Islamic extremists.... 'I just left a country that engages in that kind of neighborhood surveillance, which, by the way, the father of Sen. Cruz escaped for America,' the president said. '... The notion that we would start down that slippery slope makes absolutely no sense.'” ...

... Simon Maloy of Salon: "... Ted Cruz really isn't the guy to make the case that Obama is not acting presidential, given that his own response to the Brussels attack has been hysteria, demagoguery, and a foul sop to anti-Muslim sentiment.... He's proposed denying American citizens their civil liberties and using the heavy hand of the state to treat them as potential criminals for no other reason than their faith.... He sees a terrorist attack unfold overseas and his immediate instinct is to bomb things, violate religious freedom, and curtail civil liberties at home.... I'll happily take a 'cool' and 'detached' president over one who freaks out and proposes creating a discriminatory police state." ...

... Allegra Kirkland of TPM: "... Donald Trump accused Muslims of intentionally declining to report suspected terrorist activity in a Wednesday interview on ITV's 'Good Morning Britain.' 'When they see trouble, they have to report it. They are not reporting it; they are absolutely not reporting it, and that's a big problem,' Trump told host Piers Morgan.... British officials were quick to condemn Trump's comments as false and potentially dangerous." ...

... Ana Swanson of the Washington Post on the "Trump Network," a sleazy pyramid scheme (I mean "multi-level marketing model") that sold multivitamins supposedly engineered to the individual based on a costly fakey test. "Trump says he was not involved in the company's operations. But statements by him and other company representatives -- as well as a plethora of marketing materials circulating online -- often gave the impression of a partnership that was certain to lift thousands of people into prosperity. In fact, within a few years, the company fell on hard times, leaving some salespeople in tough financial straits." CW: In case you didn't notice, everything about Trump Network is a scam. Yes, that's your future Republican presidential nominee. See more below on the guy who imagines he will be Vice President Doctor Carson.

... E. J. Dionne: "The terrorist attacks in Belgium brought out the worst in Ted Cruz and Donald Trump. Cruz demonstrated that his only focus right now is to find ways of out-Trumping Trump. He seeks words that sound at least as intolerant and as dangerous to civil liberties as the formulations that regularly burst forth from the Republican front-runner.... With large parts of the Republican establishment giving up on Kasich and embracing Cruz as the last anti-Trump hope, we can now look forward to a GOP race to the bottom in which fear itself is the only thing its leading candidates have to offer." ...

... Gail Collins: "How can things get worse for Republicans? Jeb Bush turned out to be a terrible candidate. Marco Rubio turned out to be an annoying twit. Donald Trump is a nightmare. Something had to be done, and so the solid, steady moderate elite decided the best strategy was to rally around ... Ted Cruz. Welcome to worse.... Maybe they think if Cruz is the spoiler at the convention, it'll be easier to shove him away to make room for a brand new superhero? (Looking at you, Mitt.)"

... Greg Sargent: "Large percentages of GOP voters reject the GOP elite argument for giving the nomination to someone other than Trump at a contested convention, to spare the GOP a disastrous election, even as polls (and other evidence) also suggest GOP elite fears of a Trump disaster may be well founded." That is, Republican "leaders" plan to solve a problem by creating another, perhaps worse, problem. ...

... Betty Cracker of Balloon Juice: "Why on earth wouldn't [Republican voters] unite behind Trump? It's not the open bigotry they're unable to countenance after decades of trafficking in covert racism to gin up votes.Sure, Trump is embarrassing. But if the party grandees can just convert Trump to the Church of Austerity, he could continue to peddle the same old shit in a brand new package. No reason to think that couldn't be done fairly easily. Just prescribe some scripture -- Two Rand, perhaps." ...

... Trip Gabriel of the New York Times: "Republicans desperate to stop Donald J. Trump from capturing the presidential nomination increased the pressure Wednesday on Gov. John Kasich of Ohio to quit the race, with Jeb Bush joining the growing number of party figures throwing their weight behind Senator Ted Cruz. Mr. Kasich refused, saying that he ... was the best option to stop Mr. Trump. But his argument was undercut by his dismal showings Tuesday in Utah and Arizona, where he won no delegates -- as well as by the surprise endorsement Wednesday morning by Mr. Bush of Mr. Cruz." ...

... Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: "There are no more states like Utah [where Ted Cruz won all of the delegates] on the primary calendar. The stop-Trump forces have only been given a brief respite. But it was a significant one. If Trump had swept [Tuesday] night's contests, the race would effectively be over. It's no coincidence that Jeb Bush endorsed Cruz [Wednesday] morning, after Cruz proved that his efforts to deny Trump a majority of delegates were not entirely futile."

You may think that this is the end, Well, it's not. (Music by John Phillip Sousa, lyrics attributed to Fred Allen):

... If It Looks Like a Crook & Quacks Like a Crook.... Bonnie Kristian of the Week: "A super PAC called the 2016 Committee is still raising money for Ben Carson -- even though he ended his campaign weeks ago. 'The 2016 Committee will now kind of morph itself into the objective of having Dr. Carson be Donald Trump's running mate,' the founder of the fundraising group, John Philip Sousa IV..., told supporters last week.... [Sousa's superPAC] collects mainly small donations. And according to analysis ... by the Daily Caller, nearly half of the 2016 Committee's listed donors are retirees who may be on a fixed income. Though Sousa promises supporters that 'Whatever you send will be used carefully to put Ben Carson on the Republican presidential ticket in 2016,' in practice the committee has spent money on things like buying 450,000 copies of Sousa's own book and taking paychecks for hundreds of thousands of dollars."

NAME THAT VICE PRESIDENT. All of us, including Sousa (but maybe not Ole Doc himself), know that Stubby Fingers will not make Ben Carson his veep. But that raises the question, Who will the Mophaired Menace choose as his running mate? Let's have your best guess or a helpful suggestion we can pass along to @realDonaldTrump. Ridiculous recommendations accepted/unavoidable. Contest ends April 1.

Beyond the Beltway

Paul Egan & Matthew Dolan of the Detroit Free Press: "A task force appointed by Gov. Rick Snyder issued a hard-hitting report on the Flint drinking water public health crisis, slamming the catastrophe as a story of 'government failure, intransigence, unpreparedness, delay, inaction and environmental injustice.' The 116-page report said the state's controversial emergency manager law contributed to the lead contamination crisis by removing governmental checks and balances. It called for a review of the law and said Snyder should look for alternatives to the current approach so that locally elected officials can be kept more engaged." ...

... Brady Dennis of the Washington Post: "The independent group faulted Snyder and his administration for failing to act even after 'suggestions to do so by senior staff members in the Governor's office.' The group said the state Department of Health and Human Services failed to quickly recognize the crisis and protect public health. It said the Flint Water Department 'rushed unprepared' into switching to a new water source in spring 2014 -- the Flint River -- without proper use of corrosion controls. Finally, the task force blamed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's delayed enforcement of federal drinking-water standards for 'prolonging the calamity.'" ...

... The report is here (pdf).

David Philipps of the New York Times: "North Carolina legislators, in a whirlwind special session on Wednesday, passed a wide-ranging bill barring transgender people from bathrooms and locker rooms that do not match the gender on their birth certificates. Republicans unanimously supported the bill, while in the Senate, Democrats walked out in protest." CW: I hope all North Carolinians realize that they may now be required to show their birth certificates before entering any public restroom. Kinda beats voter ID, doesn't it? Oh, and just like those anti-abortion & anti-contraception laws, we learn that this law was designed to "protect women." Thanks, guys! ...

... This weird GOP obsession with other people's sexual identity & bathroom habits leads us to ...

... Today in GOP Sex News

Alan Blinder of the New York Times: "Gov. Robert Bentley of Alabama [R] acknowledged Wednesday that he had made inappropriate and sexually charged remarks to one of his closest aides, but he denied an accusation that he and the woman had pursued a physical relationship.... Mr. Bentley's public demonstration of remorse came nearly seven months after Dianne Bentley, to whom the Republican governor was married for 50 years, sought a divorce, and just hours after [Spencer] Collier, the recently ousted leader of the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, described what he saw as a history of improper conduct between the governor and [top aide Rebekah] Mason. Mr. Collier said that Mr. Bentley had, in 2014, effectively acknowledged an affair, and that it appeared to be continuing as recently as last month." ...

... It Depends on What the Meaning of "Sexual" Is. John Archibald of AL.com: "The tapes for which [Bentley] apologized were purportedly created by members of the Bentley family in 2014 as they tried to ascertain whether he was involved in a relationship. People close to the Bentley family allowed AL.com to hear portions of the tapes.... 'You know I just I worry about sometimes I love so you much,' Bentley is heard saying in a phone conversation with a woman he calls Rebekah. 'I worry about loving you so much.... You know what?' he goes on. 'When I stand behind you, and I put my arms around you, and I put my hands on your breasts, and I put my hands (unintelligible) and just pull you real close. I love that, too.' After being asked about that, Bentley reiterated that the relationship was not sexual." Includes audio....

... CW: So, hands on breasts, not sexual. Hands on (unintelligible), not sexual either. Also (from the audio), putting hands "under you," not sexual. "Doing what we did the other night, Baby," which requires "locking the door" also not sexual.

Josh Gerstein of Politico: "A previously unidentified victim of alleged sexual abuse by former House Speaker Dennis Hastert has come forward to federal prosecutors and may seek to testify next month when Hastert faces sentencing in federal court in Chicago. The new accuser, labeled as 'Individual D' in court papers, is not the 'Individual A' to whom Hastert agreed to pay $3.5 million, setting off a series of events that led to the former speaker pleading guilty to illegally structuring $900,000 used in payments to the man.... Hastert defense attorney John Gallo said Tuesday that the former speaker doesn't plan to contest 'Individual D''s claims."

Way Beyond

Brian Murphy of the Washington Post: "A former Bosnian Serb leader was found guilty of genocide and other charges Thursday for his roles in deadly campaigns during the country's war in the 1990s, including the massacres in Srebrenica, as an international tribunal announced a long-awaited reckoning for Europe's bloodiest chapter since World War II. Radovan Karadzic was found guilty of charges including genocide in connection with the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the Srebrenica enclave."

News Lede

Los Angeles Times: "Larry Shandling, the pioneering cable TV star and writer whose turn as a self-doubting talk show host on HBO's 'The Larry Sanders Show' during the 1990s helped redefine the television sitcom, has died. He was 66. The Chicago-born Shandling died of a heart attack, said his spokesman Alan Nierob."