The Commentariat -- October 7, 2014

Internal links & illustration removed.

Lyle Denniston of ScotusBlog analyzes the practical effects of the Supreme Court's decision not to hear any of the marriage equality cases & explains why their decision was a surprise. ...

... The Washington Post has an interactive graphic of the each state's status re: gay marriage. ...

... Rick Hasen sees a done deal: "... you may think that this could well be reversed once there is a circuit split, perhaps in a case from the 5th or 6th Circuit. But remember, there will now be all of these children from legal same sex marriages performed until the Supreme Court could decide to take a case from another circuit. The idea that Justice Kennedy would let that happen, knowing there could well be a reversal down the line seems unlikely. ...

... Garrett Epps of the Atlantic: "I don't see how [Monday's] decision doesn't signal that even within the Court, the fight is over.... The four dissenters in United States v. Windsor -- the Defense of Marriage Act case -- may have looked around the conference table last week and realized they would never get five votes to overturn the lower courts; that is, that Justice Anthony Kennedy was committed to taking his Windsor opinion to its fullest extent." ...

... Jeff Toobin: "Same-sex marriage will be the law of the land -- inevitably but not immediately." Toobin thinks the reason for the Court's deciding not to decide is that neither the four ultra-conservative justices nor the four more liberal justices trusted Justice Kennedy to be their fifth vote. Conservative justices, in Toobin's view, are hoping a Republican president will replace Justice Ginsburg, tipping the balance of the Court even further their way, while the more liberal justices are hoping the momentum gay equality rights has gained will force the Court in future years to rule with public opinion. ...

... Caitlan MacNeal of TPM: "Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) conceded that the state of Wisconsin lost its fight to ban same sex marriage on Monday when the Supreme Court declined to hear gay marriage cases in multiple states.With the Supreme Court's punt back to the appeals court that struck down the ban, county clerks in Wisconsin have started issuing marriage licenses to gay couples. And Walker seems to have accepted that this is the end of the road for the state's ban." (CW Update: Yeah, but Walker had a good day, all-in-all. See links further down the page on the 7th Circuit's ruling upholding Wisconsin's voter ID law, estimated to disenfranchise some 300K likely-Democratic-leaning voters.) ...

... Ed Kilgore: "... so long as there is an opportunist or two in the [GOP] presidential field who's frantic for right-wing support (I'm looking at you, Bobby Jindal!), the odds of this issue being 'off the table' in Iowa are very low." CW: Oh, Ed, I do believe I've found us just such an opportunist. ...

The Supreme Court's decision to let rulings by lower court judges stand that redefine marriage is both tragic and indefensible. By refusing to rule if the States can define marriage, the Supreme Court is abdicating its duty to uphold the Constitution. The fact that the Supreme Court Justices, without providing any explanation whatsoever, have permitted lower courts to strike down so many state marriage laws is astonishing. This is judicial activism at its worst.... When Congress returns to session, I will be introducing a constitutional amendment to prevent the federal government or the courts from attacking or striking down state marriage laws. -- Sen. Ted Cruz (RTP-Texas) ...

Because inaction is just another word for "activism" in upside-down Right Wing World. -- Constant Weader

MEANWHILE, Kate Nocera of BuzzFeed; "... hardly any Republicans have reacted to the news.... Sen. Mike Lee was one of the few GOP members to issue a statement. His home state of Utah was one of the states where a marriage ban was overturned by an appeals court and the state is now moving forward with allowing same-sex couples to marry. Lee called the Supreme Court decision to not review the appeals 'disappointing.'" ...

     ... NEW. Charles Pierce is not too sure of Mike Lee's powers of legal analysis. ...

... CW: I'm not a fan of Andrew Sullivan's, but today he expressed my own sense of why we have enjoyed such remarkable progress in the extension of gay rights: "The reason we persuaded so many in so short a time is that so many unknown private individuals [[ from Thanksgiving tables to church meetings to office cubicles to locker rooms -- simply told the truth about who we really are. It took immense personal courage at times -- and each moment someone came out, more light, more reality, seeped into the debate."

CW: Worth remembering: a mere two-and-a-half years ago, we had a Democratic President who was "still evolving" on gay marriage. ...

... Dahlia Lithwick of Slate: "... while this is a massive win for gay marriage, it could surely have been done so much more bravely. For all practical purposes, it kicks the question of same-sex marriage down the road yet again. It's a big, big win but achieved in a small way, and possibly for very wrong reasons.... The court should not be in the business of gingerly surfing public opinion until it's safe enough to ride that wave into shore." ...

     ... CW: Besides, by deciding not to decide, The court has deprived us of a classic, entertaining Scalia rant. ...

... Jeff Toobin in the New Yorker: "It is a day to note and to celebrate a civil-rights revolution that is nearing a complete victory. But it is also a moment when other progressive causes are losing ground in the Supreme Court. On race and voting rights, the Roberts Court's likely direction is all too clear." ...

... CW: Something that struck me immediately about the Court's decision to, at the very least, kick the gay marriage can down the road, was this: What John Roberts cares most about is increasing the already-outsized advantages of elites, particularly moneyed elites. Preserving gay marriage bans matters very little within that framework. Voter suppression, on the other hand, aims to keep liberal-leaning voters from electing marginally reformist/inclusive Democrats. The same is true of Roberts' quest to undo anti-discrimination laws & policies. The outlier is his choice to support most of the ACA; the only way I can connect that to my supposition on his overarching philosophy is to posit that he believed a victory for the inane "broccoli argument" would undermine the institution of the Court itself. The one elitist Roberts most wants to protect is himself.

Paul Waldman reviews what the current conservative justices said during their confirmation hearings about their possible pro-choiciness. You might think they were obfuscating.

Voter Suppression, Ctd. Scott Bauer of the AP: "A federal appeals court ruled Monday that Wisconsin's requirement that voters show photo identification at the polls is constitutional, a decision that was not surprising after the court last month allowed for the law to be implemented while it considered the case. State elections officials are preparing for the photo ID law to be in effect for the Nov. 4 election.... The American Civil Liberties Union and the Advancement Project asked the U.S. Supreme Court last week to take emergency action and block the law." Thanks to Nadd2 for the link. ...

... Rick Hasen: "Regardless of where you stand on the merits of the constitutional and voter id problem, it is unconscionable to roll out voter id without adequate time for everyone who wants to get id to do so.... As a matter of substance, this is vintage Judge [Frank] Easterbrook: crisp writing but heartless and dismissive. Judge Easterbrook picks out the evidence from the record he likes, and dismisses the evidence he does not like." Do read the whole post. I probably should title this graf "Our Corrupt Judiciary." When a court has to write falsehood after falsehood to justify it's position, just maybe the position is untenable. ...

... CW: One thing to bear in mind on all these voter suppression laws is that voting is not a Constitutional right in the U.S. (as it is in many [most??] other countries). The 26th Amendment (1971) reads, "

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

     ... Now wouldn't it be nice if that phrase "on accunt of age" had been omitted? I don't know if the 26th Amendment has ever been cited to counter voter-suppression laws, where the purpose & effect is to disenfranchise college students, but it sure as hell should be.

Steve M. "What we should worry about with regard to Ebola is not that ISIS and the Zeta drug gang will conspire to send infected bioterrorists across the Rio Grande, or whatever the hell it is Fox viewers fear. What we should worry about is that the outbreak in West Africa won't be contained soon despite the fact that we know how to contain Ebola outbreaks. If the delivery of protective gear is being delayed by petty bureaucrats [in Sierra Leone] engaged in partisan politics, those petty bureaucrats are multiple murderers."

Ben Protess & Jessica Silver-Greenberg of the New York Times: "The Justice Department is preparing a fresh round of attacks on the world's biggest banks, again questioning Wall Street's role in a broad array of financial markets. With evidence mounting that a number of foreign and American banks colluded to alter the price of foreign currencies, the largest and least regulated financial market, prosecutors are aiming to file charges against at least one bank by the end of the year, according to interviews with lawyers briefed on the matter. Ultimately, several banks are expected to plead guilty."

Evan Osnos of the New Yorker profiles Larry Lessig, whose quixotic attempts to secure campaign finance reform a/k/a "corruption of the system" remains, well, quixotic. CW Hint: If you want this to work, Larry, you must bring some talented crooked politicians into the fold. They know how the system works & they know how to exploit it. There are many to choose from, although a few would have to work from jail.

Peter Baker of the New York Times reviews Panetta's Complaint. ...

... Dana Milbank: Panetta's "level of disloyalty is stunning, even though it is softened with praise for Obama's intellect."

Hadas Gold of Politico: "New York Times reporter James Risen said Sunday that none of the current leak investigations would be happening if President Barack Obama did not hate the media so much, the Morning Sentinel of Maine reports. 'I don't think any of this would be happening under the Obama administration if Obama didn't want to do it,' Risen said at Colby College in Maine after he received the Elijah Parish Lovejoy award for journalism. 'I think Obama hates the press. I think he doesn't like the press and he hates leaks.'"

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd.

Max Fisher of Vox: "Author and former Democratic political consultant Naomi Wolf published a series of Facebook posts on Saturday in which she questioned the veracity of the ISIS videos showing the murders and beheadings of two Americans and two Britons, strongly implying that the videos had been staged by the US government and that the victims and their parents were actors. Wolf published a separate Facebook post, also on Saturday, suggesting that the US was sending troops to West Africa not to assist with Ebola treatment but to bring Ebola back to the US to justify a military takeover of American society...." ...

... Dave Weigel, now with Bloomberg Politics (thus a colleague of Mark Halperin's!), has more. ...

... CW: A while back, some readers were accusing me of being a right-wing mole since I never (or almost never) linked Wolf's stuff. I believe I responded that I thought her views were fairly batty. Well, case closed. ...

... In Wolf's defense, Rush Limbaugh has an opinion not far removed from hers on the Ebola crisis. Limbaugh's theory is that Obama has indeed arranged to bring Ebola into the U.S. in order to sicken white Americans because they enslaved Africans. (To be fair to Rush, he expresses his theory in a lot of abstruse blather.) Jonathan Chait has a nice little survey of Rush's obsession with slavery. Rush thinks whites got a bum rap; not that many people of European descent kept slaves, Rush notes, & white Americans even fought a war to free their slaves. ...

... CW: In addition, the similarities between the name of the President & the name of the virus are so striking that one can hardly assume a mere coincidence: (1) Both have five letters; (2) Both have three syllables; (3) Both begin with a vowel; (4) The 2nd letter of both is "b"; (5) Both end in the letter "a"; (6) Both are African words.

Ed Kilgore gets some more mileage out of Mark Halperin's debut "scoop" for Bloomberg Politics: "Halperin suggests ... Jeb [Not-His-Real-Name Bush] would be insane not to run, such are his vast talents and the hosts of important people (e.g., donors) 'panting' (Halperin's own word for one of them) to make him president.... The problem here is in considering Halperin a 'journalist' in the normal meaning of the term. His niche is to serve as a courtier and a vanity mirror for what Digby so aptly labeled The Village, the small group of elite beltway-centered movers and shakers who want to form the political world in their own image.... Does any of this make sense from the point of view of honest journalism? No, but that's not Halperin's gig, and I am quite confident he does not care about our mockery."

Senate Race

Out with the Old? James Carroll of the Louisville Courier-Journal: "After two polls in his favor, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has slipped behind Democratic challenger Alison Lundergan Grimes in his re-election bid, according to the latest Bluegrass Poll. Grimes, Kentucky's secretary of state, now leads the five-term senator 46 percent to 44 percent among likely voters, the survey found. Libertarian candidate David Patterson had 3 percent support in the poll, while 7 percent of likely voters said they were undecided.... Perhaps the most alarming number for McConnell is that 57 percent of registered voters surveyed said that after 30 years in office, it's time for him to be replaced. That sentiment was shared by 33 percent of conservatives and 27 percent of Republicans." CW: I'm not getting my hopes up. Much.

Beyond the Beltway

Charles Pierce details the atrocities of the Philadelphia School Reform Commission (i.e., school board), which in a secret session yesterday, tossed the teachers' union contract, established work rules that will remind you of the conditions under which tenant farmers & company-town denizens lived in the bad old days, & cut benefits to retired teachers. The governor appoints three of the commission's members & the mayor appoints two. Thanks to MAG for the link.

Okra Bust. Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post: "Georgia police raided a retired Atlanta man's garden last Wednesday after a helicopter crew with the Governor's Task Force for Drug Suppression spotted suspicious-looking plants on the man's property. A heavily-armed K9 unit arrived and discovered that the plants were, in fact, okra bushes.... Marijuana eradication programs, like the one that sent the helicopter up above the Georgia man's house, are typically funded partly via the Drug Enforcement Agency's Cannabis Eradication Program. Many of these funds come from the controversial asset forfeiture programs, which allow law enforcement officials to seize property from citizens never even charged - much less convicted - of a crime."

Randal Archibold of the New York Times tells the horrifying story of Mexican policy likely slaughtering high school boys last month. "The state prosecutor investigating why the police opened fire on students from their vehicles has found mass graves in Iguala -- the small industrial city where the confrontations occurred -- containing 28 badly burned and dismembered bodies. The prosecutors had already arrested 22 police officers after the clashes, saying the officers secretly worked for, or were members of, a local gang. Now they are investigating whether the police apprehended the students after the confrontation and deliberately turned them over to the local gang.... The students were not known to have criminal ties.... The mayor and the police chief of Iguala are now on the run...."

News Ledes

Los Angeles Times: Some Ebola experts are concerned the current strain of the virus may spread more readily than has been assumed.

New York Times: "Warplanes from the American-led coalition fighting militants of the Islamic State were reported on Tuesday to have struck targets in Syria near the Turkish border in support of Kurdish forces locked in street fighting with the militants. If confirmed, the reports could indicate an escalation in American-led efforts to help the Kurds resist, if not repel, an onslaught by the Sunni militants whose forces control portions of Syria and Iraq."

Washington Post: "At an announcement in Stockholm on Tuesday, the Nobel Prize committee awarded this year's prize in physics to Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura. The three men -- Akasaki from Meijo University, Amano from Nagoya University (both in Nagoya, Japan) and Nakamura from UC Santa Barbara -- produced blue light beams from their semi-conductors in the early 1990s." The Los Angeles Times story is here.

The Commentariat -- October 6, 2014

Internal links, defunct tweet & related text removed.

Capitalism Is Awesome, Ctd.

Evan McMurry of AlterNet, in Salon: "Since Edmund Burke conservatism has been the defense of the distressed elite disguised as populism. [Ayn] Rand was a perfect iteration of this. Born into wealth in St. Petersburg, she formed an early sense of disenfranchisement when her father's chemistry shop was seized by the Soviets and her family was plunked into the proletariat.... Burke had the Jacobins; Rand had the Democrats. The philosophy she forged was a counterattack on behalf of an aristocracy she thought threatened, first by Lenin, later by LBJ.... Almost seventy years after she first became involved in the American political process, Rand has finally made it into the halls of power. She has the extreme right wing to thank.... Paul Ryan (R-WI) ... has labored the hardest to legitimize Rand ... [in furtherance of] his strategy to preserve the conservative elite.... Thanks to the Supreme Court, it's also now a legal theory of corporate personhood that includes religious rights, showing just how far Rand's theory of wealth as morality has spread."

Economist Jeff Madrick in the New York Times: "Starting in the 1970s..., under the influence of free-market enthusiasts like Milton Friedman, economists urged further removal of barriers to trade and capital flows, hoping to turn the world into one highly efficient market, unobstructed by government. The results were often disastrous.... Every free-trade agreement should come with a plan to strengthen the social safety net, through job training, help for displaced workers, and longer-term and higher unemployment benefits. Free-trade deals must also be accompanied by policies to stimulate growth through infrastructure investments, subsidies for clean energy and, perhaps, other industries, as well as loans to small businesses, and even wage subsidies."

Paul Krugman: If Republicans take control of the Senate, they'll be able to "impose their will on the Congressional Budget Office, heretofore a nonpartisan referee on policy proposals. As a result, we may soon find ourselves in deep voodoo.... Paul Ryan, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, is dropping broad hints that after the election he and his colleagues will ... try to push the budget office into adopting 'dynamic scoring,' that is, assuming a big economic payoff from tax cuts."

MEANWHILE, Fred Hiatt -- Washington Post editorial-page editor & deficit-hawk extraordinaire, the same guy who saw fit to run an op-ed suggesting that Obama-hater & scary wingnut Allen West be appointed to run the Secret Service & "protect" the President & his family -- has written a column chastising President Obama for falsely declaring "victory over the deficit" because the deficit will rise again, beginning a few years after Obama leaves office. Hiatt is right about this, assuming the Congress does not make the tax structure more progressive, & especially if Republicans take charge & make the tax code even more regressive, as they are wont to do, god bless the "jobs-creators."

Cops as Capitalists. John Oliver follows up on a three-part Washington Post investigation titled "Stop & Seize." Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, which I linked here at time of publication. Thanks to Victoria D. for the link to the Oliver video:

Supremes Finally End Long Summer Vacation. During which we learned that Ruth Ginsburg doesn't think Obama can appoint anybody as great as she is & Nino Scalia believes the framers wanted everybody to go to church. ...

... Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court on Monday returns to work to face a rich and varied docket, including cases on First Amendment rights in the digital age, religious freedom behind bars and the status of Jerusalem.... In the coming weeks, the justices will most likely agree to decide whether there is a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, a question they ducked in 2013. They will also soon consider whether to hear a fresh and potent challenge to the Affordable Care Act, which barely survived its last encounter with the court in 2012." ...

... Ben Goad of the Hill lists five cases to watch. ...

... Lyle Denniston of ScotusBlog: The federal government filed a brief late Friday urging the Supremes not to get involved in the latest ObummerCare challenge until the full D.C. Appeals Court has reheard Halbig v. Burwell, a case in which the full court set aside a three-judge panel decision favoring the plaintiffs. ...

... Garrett Epps of the Atlantic, who can make the mundane exciting, on the case of Heien v. North Carolina, which is being argued before the Supreme Court today. The question: is there a "Barney Fife Loophole" to the 4th Amendment; that is, if an officer pulls over someone for what turns out not to be unlawful, can the "poisonous fruit" found as a result of that stop be used against the driver or vehicle occupants?North Carolina law requires only that a vehicle have one "stop lamp." The cop pulled the vehicle over because one of two brake lights didn't work. He'd been following the car because he thought the driver looked "suspicious." That is, the driver's name was Vasquez. ...

... ** UPDATE. Mark Sherman of the AP: "The Supreme Court has turned away appeals from five states seeking to prohibit same-sex marriages, paving the way for an immediate expansion of gay and lesbian unions. The justices on Monday did not comment in rejecting appeals from Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin. The court's order immediately ends delays on marriage in those states. Couples in six other states should be able to get married in short order." ...

     ... Adam Liptak: "The move was a major surprise and suggests that the justices are not going to intercede in the wave of decisions in favor of same-sex marriage at least until a federal appeals court upholds a state ban." ...

     ... CW: It takes only four justices to agree to hear a case; i.e., issue a writ of certiorari. This means that at least two, count'em two, of the conservative justices voted against hearing each of these cases. This makes me think Anthony Kennedy told his buddies he would decide against state gay marriage bans.

Driftglass reviews the Sunday shows. Ferinstance, "Peggy Noonan expressed her fluttery, merlot-glazed concern that something untoward may be happening to her friend's maid's health insurance." ...

... David of Crooks & Liars: Republican party chair Prince Rebus explains to Tuck Chodd that Republicans -- the deregulation party -- regulated most of Texas's abortion-providing clinics out of business because the party believes "women deserve compassion, respect, counselling." Also, taxpayer-funded abortions. (The clinics don't get "taxpayer funds" for providing abortions, but never mind.) Also ""Obamacare, jobs, the economy, Keystone pipeline." Yeah.

Sean McElwee in Salon on "Why the GOP hates U.S. history." Because, um, facts. Worth reading, if only for McElwee's inclusion of this astonishing citation:

Slavery Was Swell. No free workers enjoyed a comparable social security system from birth until death.... Masters ... encouraged the family unit which basically remained intact.... Slavery appears such a relatively mild business that one begins to wonder why Frederick Douglass and so many other ever tried to escape.... In summary, the American slave was treated like property, which is to say, pretty well. -- Dinesh D'Souza, The End of Racism, an actual book

... David Edwards of the Raw Story: "Miles O'Brien, the science correspondent for PBS Newshour, lamented on Sunday that he was embarrassed at some of the coverage of Ebola on Fox News that had a 'racial component,' and seemed intended to scare viewers." CW: "Racial component," you say? Oh, come now: "... Fox News host Andrea Tantaros ... had warned viewers that West Africans might come to the U.S. infected with Ebola, and then go to a 'witch doctor' instead of the hospital." Includes video. ...

... Caitlan MacNeal of TPM: "Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, on Sunday cast doubt on concerns that undocumented immigrants will cross the southern border into the United States with Ebola or that terrorists will use the disease as a weapon. Lawmakers, candidates and pundits have expressed concern that the disease will enter the U.S. either from immigrants or due to terrorism, prompting 'Fox News Sunday- host Chris Wallace to ask Fauci about potential threats." ...

... CW: I am pretty sure if you vote for members of the party of the African-American President, they will make sure you get Ebola & die. Oh, wait. It was the Republican-led House that cut hundreds of millions from the CDC & NIH budgets. Sam Stein of the Huffington Post (October 1): The CDC's "current budget, in fact, is nearly $600 million lower than it was in 2010" the year Republicans won the House.... And a memo the CDC released on sequestration highlighted a number of areas that would suffer with less funding. At the top of the list: 'Reduced ability to ensure global disease protection.'"

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Steve M.: "I'll save you the trouble of reading Mark Halperin's 2,228-word article [titled "The Truth about Jeb Bush's Presidential Ambitions"] addressing the question of whether Jeb Bush will really run for president in 2016: Um, Halperin's not sure.... Wow, thanks, Mark! I'll definitely keep returning to the new Bloomberg Politics site if it continues to deliver breaking news like this! ... Halperin's claiming insider knowledge when he hasn't even bothered to Google the relevant polls. But he's being exactly what you'd expect him to be: a cheerleader for the pre-Tea Party GOP establishment."

Senate Races

Nate Cohn of the New York Times: "The fight for control of the Senate is stable and tight, with Republicans maintaining the inside track to a majority in the latest round of data from the New York Times/CBS News/YouGov online panel of more than 100,000 respondents."

Extreme GOTV, Alaska Edition. Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska) is running "an expensive, sophisticated political field operation that reaches into tiny villages along rivers and in mountain ranges throughout the vast Last Frontier. The Begich ground game -- which the senator and his campaign detailed for the first time to The Washington Post -- is on a scale far beyond anything that has been tried here before."

News Ledes

Guardian: "Three neuroscientists, including a married couple from Norway, have won the 2014 Nobel prize in physiology or medicine for their discovery of the brain's internal GPS. Their work, which collectively spans four decades, revealed the existence of nerve cells that build up a map of the space around us and then track our progress as we move around." Norwegians May-Britt & Edvard Moser shared the prize with John O'Keefe, a U.S.-British citizen.

Guardian: "Warships from the rival Koreas exchanged warning shots after a North Korean ship briefly violated the disputed western sea boundary, the South has announced. The shots were fired into the sea and there were no reports of injuries or damage on either side, a defence official said."

Washington Post: "President Obama said Monday the U.S. government would increase passenger screenings in the United States and Africa to detect the Ebola virus, even as he resisted calls to impose a ban on those traveling from the three countries most affected by the outbreak."

Guardian: "A nurse in Spain has tested positive for the Ebola virus after treating a patient repatriated to Madrid from Sierra Leone, the country's health authorities said on Monday. The nurse is thought to be the first person to have contracted the virus outside west Africa."

Guardian: "... Hong Kong democracy protests ... dwindled [today] and exhaustion began to set in. Schools reopened and government employees returned to work - one or two wearing yellow ribbons, a symbol of support for the movement - as the number of demonstrators dropped to the hundreds. At its peak, the movement saw more than 100,000 people take to the streets of the city."

The Commentariat -- October 5, 2014

Defunct video & related text removed.

Andrew Bacevich in the Washington Post: "... Syria has become at least the 14th country in the Islamic world that U.S. forces have invaded or occupied or bombed, and in which American soldiers have killed or been killed. And that's just since 1980.... Even if we win, we lose. Defeating the Islamic State would only commit the United States more deeply to a decades-old enterprise that has proved costly and counterproductive.... By inadvertently sowing instability, the United States has played directly into the hands of anti-Western radical Islamists intent on supplanting the European-imposed post-Ottoman order...." ...

... Don't worry, Andrew. The "war against ISIS" will be over in a month. Igor Volsky of Think Progress: "New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R) argued on Sunday that President Obama has declared war against ISIS in Iraq and Syria in order to help Democrats win the midterm elections in November and expressed concern that he would abandon the fight in the new year."

Matthew Dallek, in the Washington Post, on the history of high security at the White House. "It was after Dec. 7, 1941, the attack on Pearl Harbor, that the White House truly ceased to be the 'people's house.'" ...

... Maureen Dowd: Julia Pierson "earned her abrupt exit fair and square. It's no blot on the copybook of women. She withheld crucial information and helped paper over fiascos at an agency where mismanagement and denial put the president's life (and his family's lives) in jeopardy."

God News

Shadee Ashtari of the Huffington Post: "The separation of church and state doesn't mean 'the government cannot favor religion over non-religion,' Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia argued during a speech at Colorado Christian University on Wednesday.... Defending his strict adherence to the plain text of the Constitution, Scalia knocked secular qualms over the role of religion in the public sphere as 'utterly absurd,' arguing that the Constitution is only obligated to protect freedom of religion -- not freedom from it." ...

... Steve Benen: "If U.S. policymakers passed a law that deliberately treated American atheists as second-class citizens, Scalia seems to believe that's perfectly permissible under the Constitution. Of course, there is nothing in the Constitution that empowers the state to favor religion over irreligion, but Scalia has apparently morphed the document to comport with his preferred vision of a government that blurs the church-state line.... The strict constructionist just made up his own rules, based on what he wishes the Constitution says, but doesn't. It's what happens when someone starts with an answer, then works backwards in the hopes of reaching an agreed upon conclusion." ...

... ** Rob Boston, in the American Constitution Society: "... for all this bluster, Scalia isn't really harkening back to the founding document of the Constitution. Nothing there provides comfort for his view of a religion-tinged government. In fact, Scalia is endorsing a much more modern theory of church-state relations: It's what scholars call 'ceremonial deism.' The idea behind ceremonial deism seems to be that government can endorse religion as long as it's not terribly serious about it and no one faith is endorsed over others." Via Benen.

Jack Jenkins of Think Progress: "Pope Francis had some harsh words for religious extremists this weekend, voicing his strongest condemnation yet for those who use religion to justify violence. Speaking on Sunday to an audience that included the President, governmental authorities, and diplomatic corps of Albania, where he is spending a one-day apostolic visit, the first Argentinean pope directly addressed the growing issue of religious violence. Francis first praised the 'climate of respect' in Albania -- which is a Muslim-majority country -- between Muslims, Catholics, and Orthodox Christians, saying the culture of tolerance was a 'precious gift.' He then expressed firm criticism for those who cite faith as grounds for killing others."

AP: "An American nun credited with curing a boy's eye disease moved a step closer to sainthood Saturday in what church officials said was the first beatification Mass held in the United States. A beatification Mass for Sister Miriam Teresa Demjanovich, who died in 1927, was led by Cardinal Angelo Amato at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark. Beatification is the third in a four-step process toward sainthood."

Congressional Races

Carrie Dann of NBC News: "Independent candidate Greg Orman is leading incumbent Republican Sen. Pat Roberts in Kansas by 10 points, while Democrats have a slim lead in North Carolina's contest and both candidates are in a dead heat in Iowa's Senate race, new NBC News/Marist polls find."

Don't you ever touch me. Don't ever touch me. The last guy who touched me ended up on the ground dead. -- Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), to Democratic challenger Forrest Dunbar, when, just prior to a debate, Dunbar lightly touched Young on the arm during a conversation

Gubernatorial Race

Jason Salzman of the Huffington Post (October 2): "During a debate Tuesday against Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Beauprez said he thinks intrauterine devices (IUDs) cause abortions, and he would not use public funds on them.... 'These comments illustrate how little Bob Beauprez really understands about women's health,' said Cathy Alderman of Planned Parenthood Votes Colorado, in a news release issued after the debate." CW: Sorry I missed this earlier. Beauprez's view isn't about opposition to abortion; it's about opposition to women, especially poor women -- women who would benefit from receiving "public funds" to obtain IUDs. ...

... Today's Rant. Pardon my paranoia, but I have long thought that a fundamental reason for opposition to abortion is to maintain income & "class" inequality. Higher-income women can afford to practice family planning. If they accidentally get pregnant at an inconvenient time in their lives or under other undesirable circumstances, they can obtain abortions even if they live in Texas 150 miles from the nearest abortion provider. Not so for poorer women & families, who may find themselves saddled with child-rearing responsibilities when they are financially &/or otherwise ill-equipped to do so. Unplanned children may prove to be joys to their parents, but the expense & time it takes to rear them necessarily limit the mothers' or families' opportunities for upward mobility. I think there are many abortion opponents who are right pleased with that disparity. They probably see family planning as one of the perks of wealth -- another way to distinguish themselves from "those people," & to make sure "those people" remain in the underclass. -- Constant Weader

Presidential Race

Dana Milbank: The GOP presidential primary lineup is beginning to look like a police lineup, so many of the potential candidates are under investigation for criminal activities.

When "Madame President" Was Unthinkable

A man must be protected while he is the President of the United States. -- Eleanor Roosevelt, in her autobiography, published 1961

If all of us except Frances were killed we would have a woman president. -- Franklin Roosevelt, ca. 1942, on how a White House dinner with his Cabinet could have an absurd result (Both citations from Matthew Dallek's article, linked above)

News Ledes

Guardian: "The parents of Peter Kassig, an American aid worker held hostage by Islamic State (Isis) militants, have appealed for his release in a statement and video message that highlighted his aid work and mentioned his conversion to Islam."

Guardian: "Pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong have vowed to keep up their occupation as a Monday deadline fast approaches, but are seeking compromise by offering to open access lanes."

Guardian: "The condition of Thomas Duncan, the first patient ever to be diagnosed with Ebola outside Africa, was reported to have worsened on Saturday as health officials in Texas said they were closely monitoring nine people who had close contact with him before he was admitted to hospital."

New York Times: "Jerrie Mock, who as a relatively untested pilot accomplished in 1964 what Amelia Earhart could not -- becoming the first woman to fly solo around the world -- died on Tuesday at her home in Quincy, Fla., near Tallahassee. She was 88."