The Commentariat -- Oct. 3 & 4, 2015

Internal links & defunct video removed.

CW: I'll be out for all or most of the weekend. Also, the NYT seems to be having some problems: between 1:52 am ET & 5:40 am (so far), they haven't added any content.

Michael Crowley of Politico: "Vladimir Putin is weak, Russia faces a 'quagmire' in Syria, and critics of U.S. policy in Syria are talking 'mumbo-jumbo.' That was President Barack Obama's defiant take at a White House press conference on Friday afternoon, at which he fielded questions about Russia's surprise air strikes on Syrian rebels." CW: Sorry I missed this earlier; it wasn't on the White House schedule as of late Friday morning. ...

... Peter Schroeder of the Hill: "President Obama vowed Friday that he would not sign another short-term funding measure, pushing lawmakers to craft a long-term budget agreement. Speaking to the press two days after signing a two-month continuing resolution to keep the government from shutting down, Obama said that would be the last he is willing to tolerate. Government funding is now set to expire Dec. 11 after the latest agreement." ...

... The presser begins at about 19 minutes in:

White House: "In this week's address, the President emphasized that we need to do everything we can to strengthen economic growth and job creation":

... Also see clip under Presidential Race. ...

... ** Daniel Drezner (a fairly conservative writer) in the Washington Post: "The most obvious difference between tea party conservatives and [President] Obama is their divergence on a host of policy issues. But another significant difference is that the president, like [Speaker] Boehner, is a traditional politician who recognizes the limits of what can be accomplished without political support. This president has not been afraid to use his executive branch powers to enact controversial policies, but he also recognizes the hard limits of that approach." ...

Rachel Bade & John Bresnanhan of Politico: "House Oversightand Government Affairs Chairman Jason Chaffetz [RTP-Utah] is planning to run for House speaker, taking on Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy in what appears to be a long-shot bid to lead House Republicans, according to multiple sources." ...

.. Oops! I Forgot. Secret Service Director Joseph Clancey suddenly remembers he did know about agency personnel circulating an e-mail urging the Service to publicize the fact that Jason Chaffetz once unsuccessfully applied for a Secret Service job. Carol Leonnig & Jerry Markon of the Washington Post report: "The director of the Secret Service knew that unflattering, private information about a congressman was circulating among agency staff members before it was leaked to the news media, contrary to an earlier statement made to federal investigators.... President Obama picked Clancy as director this year against the advice of an administration panel of experts, who urged selecting an outsider to help improve the Secret Service. Clancy is a 27-year veteran of the agency." CW: Now, this is something actually worthy of an investigation by Chaffetz's House Oversight Committee, but I guess it would look bad for a public official to investigate why federal agents would break privacy laws to humiliate him. So Planned Parenthood. Because beating up on Cecile Richards looks so manly. And somewhere there's an Obama advisor saying, "Toljaso." ...

... CW: I'd say it's no coincidence that the White House just (Oct. 2) published a video of President Obama's commending the Secret Service (on September 29) for keeping safe the Pope & members of the U.N.:

Larry Buchanan, et al., of the New York Times: "Criminal histories and documented mental health problems did not prevent at least eight of the gunmen in 14 recent mass shootings from obtaining their weapons, after federal background checks led to approval of the purchases of the guns used." A case-by-case report of "how they got their guns." ...

... ** Adam Gopnik of the New Yorker: "... the only amendment necessary for gun legislation, on the local or national level, is the Second Amendment itself, properly understood, as it was for two hundred years in its plain original sense. This sense can be summed up in a sentence: if the Founders hadn't wanted guns to be regulated, and thoroughly, they would not have put the phrase 'well regulated' in the amendment." ...

... CW: We often discuss here how winger presidential candidates & crazy Congress inflame the nut-base with irresponsible rhetoric & careless legislative agendas. But few of these presidential hopefuls or elected representatives have done as much to validate & encourage the crazies as did Nino Scalia & the Supreme confederates in their 2008 5-4 decision in Heller v. D.C. Heller confirmed to these freeedom/gun-loving nuts that government officials had been depriving them of their Constitutional rights for 200 years, & now, by god, they were going to exercise those rights. While I don't deny that much of the right's antipathy to President Obama is racist & tribal, it is also no coincidence that he ascended to the presidency at the same time Nino instantly released the freeedom/gun guys from the long national nightmare of reasonable gun safety laws.

This is fairly hilarious. Tom Kingston of the Los Angeles Times: "A week after Pope Francis met Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk jailed for her refusal to issue marriage licenses for same-sex couples, the Vatican on Friday suggested that she exploited the meeting to promote her views, denied that the pope fully supports her and cast doubt on her account of the encounter. The Vatican later noted that Francis did have a private 'audience' in Washington with a former student of the pope, Yayo Grassi, an openly gay Argentine who along with his longtime partner and some friends met with Francis." CW: Don't punk the Pontiff, Kimbo. ...

... Philip Pullella of Reuters: "One Vatican official said there was 'a sense of regret' that the pope had ever seen Kim Davis.... While [Vatican spokesman Federico] Lombardi declined to take questions on the incident, his assistant, Canadian priest Father Tom Rosica, laid the blame on the Vatican embassy in Washington, saying it had underestimated the impact of Davis's presence at the reception.... Rosica said he did not believe the pope was even indirectly involved in inviting Davis.... Asked if the pope had been set up intentionally by someone in the embassy, Rosica said: 'No, reading all of the information, listening to all of the facts, these things happen.'" ...

... Joshua McElwee of the National Catholic Reporter: "Rosica said the Vatican was unsure who the meeting was organized by, and that it might have been an initiative by the Vatican's ambassador to the U.S., Archbishop Carlo Vigano.... Rosica said ... Francis had personally approved Friday's press statement after a meeting with Lombardi on the issue." ...

... Jason Horowitz of the New York Times writes an informative background story on Vigano, who was at the center of the "Vatileaks" scandal & whose "exile" to the U.S. was a major demotion. CW: As contributor Diane & I have speculated, Vigano will go, & it turns out there's a ready-made mechanism to do that: "In January, Archbishop Viganò will turn 75, the age at which bishops must submit a formal request to the Vatican for permission to resign. These requests are not automatically accepted, and bishops often stay in their appointments long after. It seems unlikely, church analysts say, that Archbishop Viganò will be one of them." MEANWHILE, lawyer is Mat Staver is not helping his client Kim Davis's case: "... Mathew D. Staver said in an interview that the Vatican's version of events was 'absolute nonsense' and that 'somebody is trying to throw some people under the bus.'" Since Francis reportedly personally approved the official Vatican statement distancing the Pope from Davis, Staver is calling the Pope a liar. Even if he's right, which is doubtful, that's pretty stupid. ...

... Rosie Scammell & David Gibson of Religion News Service: "After breaking the news Tuesday night, Davis' camp said the meeting had been requested by the pope and validated Davis' efforts.... [Davis' attorney Mat] Staver on Tuesday told CBS News that the Vatican contacted him a few days before the pope was to arrive on his first visit to the U.S., because Francis had been following Davis' saga 'and obviously is very concerned about religious freedom not just in the United States but worldwide.'" ...

... Laurie Goodstein & Jim Yardley of the New York Times: "The church distanced itself on Friday from the case of [Kim] Davis, the Rowan County, Ky., clerk who defied a judge's order and refused to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples. It said 'the only real audience' Francis gave in Washington was to a former student of his. Contacted by phone, a former student of Francis, Yayo Grassi, said he had been granted a meeting with the pope. Mr. Grassi is an openly gay man living in Washington, and he said he had been accompanied by his partner of 19 years, Iwan Bagus, as well as four friends." (Also linked yesterday.)

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "Arne Duncan, the secretary of education and a member of President Obama's original cabinet, will step down in December after a long tenure in which he repeatedly challenged the nation's schools to break out of their hidebound ways." CW: Buh-bye. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Presidential Race

Noam Scheiber & Amy Chozick of the New York Times: "The International Association of Fire Fighters, one of the country's more politically powerful unions, has abandoned its initial plans to endorse Hillary Rodham Clinton for president, according to union sources. Harold A. Schaitberger, the union's general president, informed Mrs. Clinton's campaign manager, Robby Mook, in a telephone call on Monday. According to a union official, Mr. Schaitberger told Mr. Mook that the executive board and rank-and-file members -- the latter were recently polled -- did not support a Clinton endorsement.... In recent weeks, as Mrs. Clinton's numbers in some polls have sagged and she has faced an increasingly formidable challenge from Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, some labor unions appear to have had second thoughts.... 'Secretary Clinton doesn't sell well here,' said Roy L. McGhee III..., an I.A.F.F. board member who represents Texas and Oklahoma. 'I think the Republican attack machine, the media machine, has made sure of that. The vice president will do better. He's popular among firefighters.'"

Larry Lessig in Politico Magazine: "I'm running for President. Or trying. After raising $1 million in less than 30 days, I entered the primary on September 9 as the Democrat's only non-politician.... But [my] message is being stifled with the tacit approval of the Democratic Party leadership, who are deploying the oldest method available for marginalizing campaigns they don't like: keeping me out of the Democratic presidential debates." ...

... CW: The question is, should the Democratic party let every person who can put up $1MM participate in the debates?

Stuff happens. -- Jeb Bush, responding to Oregon mass murder ...

... Yeah, He Really Said That. Inae Oh of Mother Jones: "While speaking to reporters during a campaign stop in Greenville, South Carolina, on Friday, Jeb Bush weighed in on the latest school shooting to take place in the United States, this time in Oregon, just a day before. 'We're in a difficult time in our country and I don't think more government is necessarily the answer to this,' Bush said. 'I think we need to reconnect ourselves with everybody else. It's very sad to see. But I resist the notion, and I had this challenge as governor -- look, stuff happens. There's always a crisis. The impulse is always to do something and it's not necessarily the right thing to do.'" ...

... Daniel Strauss of Politico: "The New Yorker's Ryan Lizza asked if Bush made a mistake with the phrasing. 'No, it wasn't a mistake, I said exactly what I said. Why would you explain to me what I said wrong?' Bush said. Lizza responded, 'Well you said "stuff happens.'" "'Things" happen all the time. "Things," is that better?' Bush said." Bush went on to say that people die all the time & "you don't solve the problem by passing the law."... "Asked to react to Bush's comment, President Barack Obama was blunt. 'I don't even think I have to react to that one, I think the American people should hear that and make their own judgments based on the fact that every couple of months we have a mass shooting,' Obama said at a press conference Friday afternoon. 'They can decide whether they consider that "stuff happens."'"

... Politico reprises some of the Doofus's "growing number of unfortunate comments." ...

... Matt Flegenheimer Jeb!, who last week revived the "free stuff" for black people meme, has had problems addressing issues important to minorities since before he became governor of Florida. What will you do for blacks if elected governor? "Probably nothing." CW: "Probably nothing" & "free stuff" do make nice bookends to an undistinguished, elitist political career. It's about time for Jeb! to quit the campaign trail & go back to ruining public schools, one of his signature causes.

Dana Milbank: "The day [Donald] Trump clinches the nomination I will eat the page on which this column is printed in Sunday's Post. I have this confidence for the same reason [Mitt] Romney does: Americans are better than Trump.... Consider what Trump said in Keene, N.H., this week about those fleeing Syria in the largest refugee crisis since World War II. 'This could be one of the great tactical ploys of all time,' he said of the desperate masses fleeing Syria's civil war. 'A 200,000-man army, maybe.... I don't know that it is, but it could be possible.' And what would happen to the refugees under President Trump? 'They're going back,' he said. To their deaths, presumably."

Paul Waldman: "... there's one thing that distinguishes [Ben Carson] from other candidates: ... only he fully embraces an apocalyptic vision of the American nightmare that is upon us.... If you listen to Carson, you won't have to wait long before he references some bizarre conspiracy theory or says something indicating that he thinks everything is about to turn to hell.... Conspiracy theorists ... seem to have slunk back away from the center of the conservative movement, at least to the point where Republican presidential candidates feel no need to court them. Except for one, Ben Carson. By all indications, he's doing it not by way of some clever political strategem, but because he actually believes what he says. Which is the most disturbing thing of all."

Beyond the Beltway

Catherine Thompson of TPM: "The sheriff investigating a mass shooting at an Oregon community college ... posted a ["truther"] video to Facebook in 2013 that raised questions about the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin posted a link to a YouTube video called 'The Sandy Hook Shooting - Fully Exposed,' which summarized conspiracy theories surrounding the shooting and quickly racked up millions of views, about a month after the massacre took place. The post was deleted or made private sometime after 2:30 p.m. Friday.... The viral video was quickly debunked in arenas as disparate as The Huffington Post and Glenn Beck's website TheBlaze...." ...

... At about the same time he posted the truther video, Hanlin wrote to Vice President Biden expressing his vehement opposition to gun control laws, which he believes violate the Second Amendment. He vowed to nullify "any federal regulation enacted by Congress or by executive order of the President offending the Constitutional rights of my citizens." ...

... Ian Millhiser of Think Progress: "The letter is also riddled with language commonly used by the 'Oath Keepers,' a right-wing veterans and law enforcement group that is closely associated with armed, anti-government militias.... Hanlin's letter also blurs the line between a matter that is lawfully within state officials' discretion and something much more akin to insurrection.... What Hanlin may not do ... is unilaterally assign himself the power to decide what is or is not constitutional and then refuse to 'permit the enforcement' of federal laws by 'federal officers within the borders of Douglas County Oregon.'"

News Ledes (October 3)

New York Times: "A United States airstrike appears to have badly damaged the hospital run by Doctors Without Borders in the Afghan city of Kunduz early Saturday, killing at least three people and wounding dozens, including members of the hospital staff. The United States military, in a statement, confirmed the 2:15 a.m. airstrike, saying it had been targeting individuals 'who were threatening the force' and that 'there may have been collateral damage to a nearby medical facility.'" ...

... CW: No, people you killed or injured are not "collateral damage." They're people, dead or barely alive. Own up to what you do in words, not in insulting euphemisms. ...

     ... Guardian Update: "A US airstrike appears to have hit a hospital run by Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) in the Afghan city of Kunduz, killing nine staff members and injuring up to 37 people." CW: So we're now killing genuine heroes. What a catastrophe.

The Commentariat -- October 2, 2015

Internal links removed.

Afternoon Update:

This is fairly hilarious. Laurie Goodstein & Jim Yardley of the New York Times: "The church distanced itself on Friday from the case of [Kim]. Davis, the Rowan County, Ky., clerk who defied a judge's order and refused to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples. It said 'the only real audience' Francis gave in Washington was to a former student of his. Contacted by phone, a former student of Francis, Yayo Grassi, said he had been granted a meeting with the pope. Mr. Grassi is an openly gay man living in Washington, and he said he had been accompanied by his partner of 19 years, Iwan Bagus, as well as four friends." Emphasis added. CW: Nice try, Kimmy.

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "Arne Duncan, the secretary of education and a member of President Obama's original cabinet, will step down in December after a long tenure in which he repeatedly challenged the nation's schools to break out of their hidebound ways." CW: Buh-bye.

*****

Joseph Hoyt, et al., of the Washington Post: "A shooter described as a 20-year-old man opened fire on a rural community college campus in Oregon on Thursday morning, killing multiple people and injuring even more. Ellen F. Rosenblum, the Oregon attorney general, said her office believed that 13 people were killed in the shooting and another 20 people were injured." ...

... Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post: "That brings the total of mass shootings this year -- incidents where 4 or more people are killed or injured by gunfire -- to 294." More than the number of days in the year. ...

Liam Stack of the New York Times has a sketchy profile of the gunman Chris Harper Mercer. Hey, he was a young loner who wore military garb, shaved his head, posted a picture of himself with a rifle, admired the Irish Republican Army, hated religion & after years of not speaking to people began yelling at them. Who would have thought he could become a mass murderer? ...

... The Guardian, via Raw Story, has more on Harper-Mercer: "a self-described conservative who loved guns and conspiracy theories."

... Steve M. "... the right will treat this massacre as an assault on Christianity -- and you know whose fault that is." ...

... Despite what you hear on CNN & certified right-wing media, Umpqua Community College is not a "gun-free zone." Judd Legum of Think Progress explains. ...

... The New York Times has updates here. The Oregonian is updating here. ...

Our thoughts and prayers are not enough.... Somehow this has become routine.... Each time this happens I'm going to bring this up. Each time this happens I am going to say we can actually do something about it. -- President Obama, on the Oregon shootings

... President Obama remarks on the shootings & on gun safety legislation:

... Sam Stein & Arthur Delaney of the Huffington Post: "To promote the general welfare, members of Congress have the power to craft laws, pass them and send them to the president for his or her signature. In the wake of instances of gun massacres, however, politicians reliably and reflexively reach for the most casual response possible: condolences of 140 characters or less to nobody in particular. Why even bother? The mass shooting at a community college in Oregon gave us this same rote reaction." Except Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.): "This is on us. Silence from Congress has become quiet endorsement of those whose minds unhinge and veer toward mass violence."

Coral Davenport of the New York Times: "The Obama administration on Thursday unveiled a major new regulation on smog-causing emissions that spew from smokestacks and tailpipes, significantly tightening the current Bush-era standards but falling short of more stringent regulations that public health advocates and environmentalists had urged. The Environmental Protection Agency set the new national standard for ozone, a smog-causing gas that often forms on hot, sunny days when chemical emissions from power plants, factories and vehicles mix in the air, at 70 parts per billion, tightening the current standard of 75 parts per billion set in 2008."

Carl Hulse & Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "A bipartisan group of influential senators on Thursday proposed a far-reaching plan to cut mandatory prison sentences for nonviolent offenders and promote more early release from federal prisons in what they described as the most important criminal justice reform effort in a generation."

Kelsey Snell of the Washington Post: "The government will reach its borrowing limit around Nov. 5, the Treasury Department said Thursday, setting up what promises be a tense round of negotiations over raising the debt ceiling just as House Republicans transition to a new leadership team with Speaker John Boehner set to step down at the end of the month. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew wrote Boehner (R-Ohio) on Thursday to inform Congress that the debt limit would need to be increased earlier than under previous estimates."

Julian Hattem, et al., of the Hill: "Republicans are scrambling to contain the damage from House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy's (R-Calif.) remarks about the Benghazi Committee amid a firestorm of criticism. Outgoing Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) was forced to defend the Benghazi panel on Thursday after McCarthy -- his presumed successor for the gavel -- linked the success of the investigation to Hillary Clinton's falling poll numbers." ...

...Mike Lillis of the Hill: "House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is threatening to pull Democratic participation from the select committee investigating the 2012 Benghazi attacks in the wake of Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy's (R-Calif.) comments linking the panel to Hillary Clinton's falling poll numbers. Pelosi said McCarthy's comments show the panel is political, 'unethical' and should be dismantled." ...

... ** Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.): "[Thursday], Benghazi Select Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy tried to explain away Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s confession on Fox News that the core Republican goal in establishing the Benghazi Committee was always to damage Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and never to conduct an even-handed search for the facts. As Chairman Gowdy said: 'I would just encourage people to look at what is done as opposed necessarily to what is said.' So, here are the facts about what the Select Committee has done to date." Do read Cummings' list. It's downright comical. Via Paul Waldman. See also Rucker & Costa's piece linked under Presidential Race below.

Kevin Drum: on manly Putin v. weakling Obama: "Like clockwork, every time another country hauls out its military -- the Egyptian airstrikes in Libya, Jordan's airstrikes against ISIS -- American conservatives go wild. Why can't Obama commit to that kind of serious action? But also like clockwork, this routinely ignores the fact that (a) the military action they're admiring is pretty small, and (b) Obama is already doing the same thing on a much bigger scale."

Scott Keyes of Think Progress: "... when ... asked about [President] Obama's plan to give shelter to thousands of refugees, [Rep. Mo] Brooks [R-Ala.] called it 'horrendous' and 'an abdication of responsibility.' 'I think it's an impeachable offense,' the Alabama Republican said. 'But we don't have the votes to even get articles of impeachment out of the House of Representatives or the Judiciary Committee.'... Such rhetoric is having an effect.... Donald Trump initially supported bringing in more Syrian refugees, telling MSNBC, 'It is a huge problem and we should help as much as possible.' However, after uproar on the issue from conservatives over the past month, Trump reversed himself at a town hall this week, saying of Syrian refugees, 'If I win, they're going back.'" ...

... CW: You do wonder why, after President Obama has committed so many "impeachable offenses," the majority-GOP House can't boot the guy. Why, way back in 2010, someone came up with 64 "impeachable offenses." I didn't know stuff a sitting president supposedly did in college or jobs his wife had before he was president were impeachable offenses, but apparently so. See what-all you can learn on the Internets?

Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post: "Despite the cutesy vehicular nickname, [the Cadillac] tax is actually on high-cost health insurance plans (those costing at least $10,200 for a single person and $27,500 for families). It's no wonder that [Hillary] Clinton, like other poll-sensitive or perhaps misguided politicians, has come out against it: This tax, like so many other taxes, has proved hugely unpopular, repelling an unholy alliance of unions, businesses and the public at large.... But here's a fun fact that might help turn the tide: This tax would probably help you get a raise." Rampell explains why.

Guardian: "The United States paved the way for the execution of a convicted serial killer in Virginia on Thursday night when the US supreme court denied his request for a stay and a federal judge separately rejected a concern that the drugs used to put him to death are unsafe. Attorneys for Alfredo Prieto, 49, wanted his execution delayed as they sought more information about the drugs, which were obtained from Texas's prison system, to ensure they will not bring about a painful death."

Samantha Vicent of the Tulsa World: "The Oklahoma Attorney General's Office is seeking a request for an indefinite stay of the state's three upcoming executions." ...

... Jonah Shepp of New York: "In [Richard] Glossip's case, an indefinite stay is welcome but insufficient, according to his supporters, who say abundant evidence suggests he is innocent."

Republicans on the Planned Parenthood Inquisition complained about Cecile Richards' high salary. BUT Margo Sanger-Katz & Claire Miller of the New York Times: "Her pay puts her in the top 1 percent of all earners in the United States. But her salary is actually on the low side when it is compared with executive pay at other large nonprofits. When compared with the pay for hospital executives running nonprofit health care organizations of similar budgets, it is actually well below the norm." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Chris McGreal of the Guardian: "In a lengthy speech to the UN general assembly, punctuated by long pauses in which he glared at delegates after denouncing them as 'obsessively hostile' to Israel, [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu said he hoped the shared threat posed by Tehran and Islamic State would remake the politics of the region. 'Common dangers are clearly bringing Israel and its Arab neighbours closer and as we work together to thwart those dangers, I hope we'll build lasting partnerships,' he said."

Just knowing that the pope is on track with what we're doing and agreeing, you know, it kind of validates everything. -- Kim Davis, to ABC News ...

Or not. ...

... Pope Walks It Back. Jim Yardley of the New York Times: "Pope Francis' encounter with Kim Davis last week in Washington, which was interpreted by many as a subtle intervention in the United States' same-sex marriage debate, was part of a series of private meetings with dozens of guests and did not amount to an endorsement of her views, the Vatican said on Friday.... 'Pope Francis met with several dozen persons who had been invited by the Nunciature to greet him as he prepared to leave Washington for New York City,' Father [Federico] Lombardi said in the statement, referring to the Vatican's term for its embassy. He added: 'Such brief greetings occur on all papal visits and are due to the pope's characteristic kindness and availability. The only real audience granted by the pope at the Nunciature was with one of his former students and his family.'" ...

... Fred Barbash of the Washington Post describes Lombardi's clarification as "a formal statement." ...

Mugshot of the perp.... CW: This comports with Charles Pierce's theory that conservo-archbishop & papal nuncio Carlo Vigano set up Francis. We discussed this in yesterday's Comments thread after contributor pat highlighted Pierce's post. I predict Francis will find Carlo another job where he won't be doing any nuncioing. ...

... Jay Levine of CBS 2 Chicago: "A highly placed source inside the Vatican claims the Pope was blindsided.... It is a meeting some charge was orchestrated by the man who lived there, the Pope's representative here, Carlo Maria Vigano. Not even the Papal Spokesman Federico Lombardi knew about it ahead of time. Nor did the leadership of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which would have opposed it.... A close advisor to Pope Francis tweeted that the Pope was, in his words, 'exploited' by those who set up what the CBS 2 source says was a 'meeting that never should have taken place.'"

Presidential Race

Philip Rucker & Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "Hillary Rodham Clinton's upcoming appearance before the U.S. House Select Committee on Benghazi ... may have turned into a political gift for Clinton following this week's suggestion by the likely next House speaker, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), that the taxpayer-funded Benghazi investigation was politically motivated. Clinton's allies say his comments will help recast Clinton's scheduled Oct. 22 hearing as a partisan inquisition rather than a fact-finding mission about the attacks in Libya.... With Clinton struggling to gain momentum in the Democratic nominating fight, McCarthy's comments amount to a unifying force for the party to rally to her defense, as well as give her an opening to do what she finds most comfortable: fight back against Republicans." ...

... Amy Chozick of the New York Times: "Hillary Rodham Clinton is scheduled to appear on 'Saturday Night Live' this weekend, the latest -- and highest stakes -- appearance of her current push to show her funny, personable side as the campaign heads into the critical first Democratic debate and she faces headwinds in Iowa and New Hampshire and a potential challenge from Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr." ...

... CW: Unfortunately, Hillary has repeatedly proved that as an actor & comedian, she is more like Al Gore than President Obama. Also too: Amy, maybe you should have mentioned Bernie Sanders by name. He not a "headwind." ...

... Paul Waldman: "... we've passed the point where the [Bernie] Sanders campaign is just a novelty. It doesn't matter whether he’s going to be the nominee or not. He should be getting more (and more comprehensive) coverage than he has gotten up to this point. He may not like all of it, but he's earned it." ...

... Gene Robinson: "Sanders's money haul has to worry Clinton, not just for its size but for the way it was achieved. The vast majority came in small donations -- Sanders's average contribution is less than $25. This means he can keep going back to these same supporters later in the campaign. Far more of Clinton's donors, by contrast, have already maxed out their allowable contributions for the primaries. ...

Who Do That Voodoo that Jeb! Do? They All Do. Paul Krugman: "So Donald Trump has unveiled his tax plan. It would, it turns out, lavish huge cuts on the wealthy while blowing up the deficit. This is in contrast to Jeb Bush's plan, which would lavish huge cuts on the wealthy while blowing up the deficit, and Marco Rubio's plan, which would lavish huge cuts on the wealthy while blowing up the deficit. For what it's worth, it looks as if Trump's plan would make an even bigger hole in the budget than Jeb's. Jeb justifies his plan by claiming that it would double America's rate of growth; The Donald, ahem, trumps this by claiming that he would triple the rate of growth. But really, why sweat the details? It's all voodoo.... But never forget that what it's really about is top-down class warfare."

Mark Salter, former John McCain chief-of-staff & campaign advisor, in Real Clear Politics: "I can't recall any senator who was as nearly universally loathed by his colleagues as [Ted] Cruz.... The heart of colleagues' contempt for him [is] ... belief that he is an imposter. He deliberately sets up conservatives to fail by goading them into empty gestures and self-defeating stunts like shutting down government, which make it harder to persuade more Americans to embrace conservative policies.... And Cruz bets on them to fail. He stokes the anger of grassroots conservatives in the hope that it devours everyone but him. He offers false hope and misinformation as a plan, stands defiantly in the imaginary breach, and scurries to blame others for his singular lack of success." CW: Tell us what you (and McCain) really think, Mark.

Update: Ben Carson Still a Bigot. Jonah Shepp: "Given his lower-than-Wikipedia-level understanding of Sharia (Islamic religious law) and how it applies to the everyday life of a practicing Muslim, it's no wonder [Ben Carson] wouldn't support a Muslim president of the United States. So it came as no surprise on Thursday when we learned that he would apply the same religious test to Supreme Court justices.... At [interviewer Hugh Hewitt]'s prodding, Carson also said he would investigate the background of federal judge Abdul Kallon, who was appointed to an Alabama district court in 2009. The U.S. Senate, including both of Alabama's Republican senators, confirmed Kallon unanimously, but apparently that's not good enough for Hugh Hewitt or Ben Carson.... Ben Carson himself could be obeying Sharia at this very moment and not even know it." ...

... CW: The Supreme Court has three Jewish members. Two have been on the Court for decades. But I keep watch, because at any moment they could impose Mosaic Law. First, it will be little things like banning shrimp & cheeseburgers. The next thing you know, you'll have to sacrifice a goat or at least a couple of turtle doves if you're caught wearing a linen-cotton-blend shirt.

Beyond the Beltway

Jim Crow Playbook. Chapter 2: How to Really, Really Make Sure a Voter ID Law Has the Desired Outcome. Tierney Sneed of TPM: "... Alabama has shuttered 31 driver's license offices, many of them in counties with a high proportion of black residents. Coming after the state recently put into effect a tougher voter ID law, the closures will cut off access -- particularly for minorities -- to one of the few types of IDs accepted. According to a tally by AL.com columnist John Archibald, eight of the 10 Alabama counties with the highest percentage of non-white registered voters saw their driver's license offices closed. 'Every single county in which blacks make up more than 75 percent of registered voters will see their driver license office closed. Every one,' Archibald wrote. Archibald also noted that many of the counties where offices were closed also leaned Democrat." ...

... John Archibald: "So roll out the welcome wagon to the Justice Department, and tell the world what it already so desperately wants to hear. That Alabama is exactly what they always thought she was. That Alabama refuses to pay for its own government, and used it as an excuse to keep black people from the polls. That Alabama hasn't changed a bit." ...

... AND, as Charles Pierce reminds us -- Thanks, John Roberts. ...

... PLUS, Steve M.: "A legal challenge to this law[, which is inevitable,] could well wind up in the Supreme Court. If it does, and if President Rubio or Bush or Fiorina or Carson has stacked the bench sufficiently, what Alabama is doing will almost certainly be declared constitutional. That will be an open invitation to the states to pull the same stunt.

Roberto Ferdman of the Washington Post: How asset tests to qualify for food stamps -- like the one recently passed by the nincompoops in Maine's state legislature & signed by Gov. Pepe LePew (RTP) -- keep the impoverished in poverty.

Veronica Rocha & Brittny Majia of the Los Angeles Times: "A fire Wednesday night at a Planned Parenthood facility in Thousand Oaks [northwest of Los Angeles] was determined to be arson, authorities said. Ventura County sheriff's Capt. John Reilly said Thursday someone likely used a rock to shatter a window at the Planned Parenthood facility in the 1200 block of West Hillcrest Drive, then threw gasoline inside the office and ignited it. The attack comes more than six weeks after the office was vandalized, he said."

Nathan Pemberton of New York: "The Stonewall Inn, the Greenwich Village bar 'Where Pride Began' is [now] a designated landmark, the first and only landmark to honor the gay-rights' movement in the city. The designation prevents it from being torn down or forced to renovate, unlike the rest of the relentlessly gentrifying Village these days."

News Ledes

Washington Post: "Russian warplanes have struck targets deep inside the Islamic State's heartland province of Raqqa for the first time, Russia's Defense Ministry said Friday."

AP: "U.S. hiring slowed sharply in September, and job gains for July and August were lower than previously thought, a sour note for a labor market that had been steadily improving. The Labor Department says employers added just 142,000 jobs in September, depressed by job cuts by manufacturers and oil drillers."

Weather Channel: "While Joaquin may go down as one of the more destructive hurricanes on record in the central Bahamas, the odds of the U.S. mainland seeing its first landfalling hurricane in 15 months are now very low as the forecast track continues to trend farther to the east."

The Commentariat -- October 1, 2015

Internal links & defunct video removed.

Afternoon Update:

Republicans on the Planned Parenthood Inquisition complained about Cecile Richards' high salary. BUT Margo Sanger-Katz & Claire Miller of the New York Times: "Her pay puts her in the top 1 percent of all earners in the United States. But her salary is actually on the low side when it is compared with executive pay at other large nonprofits. When compared with the pay for hospital executives running nonprofit health care organizations of similar budgets, it is actually well below the norm."

*****

David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "With only hours to spare on the last day of the fiscal year, Congress approved a temporary spending measure to avert a shutdown and keep the federal government operating through Dec. 11. In the House, the measure was approved only because of strong support by Democrats.... In one last display of their fury, House Republicans on Tuesday adopted another resolution to cut off government financing to Planned Parenthood. The resolution was to be sent to the Senate, where Democrats were certain to block it.... The temporary spending bill does nothing to resolve the core disputes between Republicans and the White House, setting up even bigger battles in the months ahead." ...

... David Lawder & Richard Cowan of Reuters: "President Barack Obama signed the spending extension into law later on Wednesday, the White House said in a statement."

Carl Hulse & Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "A long-awaited bipartisan proposal to cut mandatory prison sentences for nonviolent offenders and promote more early release from federal prisons is scheduled to be disclosed Thursday by an influential group of senators who hope to build on backing from conservatives, progressives and the White House. The comprehensive plan, which has the crucial support of Senator Charles E. Grassley, the Iowa Republican who heads the Judiciary Committee, is the product of intense and difficult negotiations between Republicans and Democrats who hope to reduce the financial and societal costs of mass incarceration that have hit minority communities particularly hard."

The Hypocrites Revolt. Manu Raju, et al., of CNN: "House Republicans on Wednesday sharply repudiated Rep. Kevin McCarthy's comments that suggested the Benghazi oversight committee had succeeded by tarnishing Hillary Clinton, saying it undermined their party's messaging on a key issue and raised questions about his ability to be the GOP's top communicator.... Speaking to CNN's Wolf Blitzer..., Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said McCarthy should apologize, saying the California Republican made an 'absolutely inappropriate statement.' Privately, Republicans were outraged by the remarks, saying the House majority leader had given Democrats unfounded ammunition to argue that the committee's investigation is squarely being driven by politics...." ...

... Steve M. on House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy's supposed gaffe, acknowledging that the Benghaaazi! investigations are nothing more than partisan strategy to undermine Hillary Clinton: "Beyond the acknowledgment of an obvious fact -- that the committee's goals are entirely political -- notice that McCarthy doesn't even bother with the right's usual phony sanctimony about Benghazi.... I guess the pretense that this is about lost lives is being dropped.... The conventional wisdom about McCarthy is that he's not one of the lunatic zealots, but in this interview he's certainly trying to establish his lunatic-zealot cred." See also Tom McCarthy's report linked under Presidential Race. ...

... Ed Kilgore: "The idea that Republican members of Congress will clutch their pearls in horror that McCarthy defended their performance is a big reach, in my opinion. These folks are so beyond the norms of behavior that you'd expect of your children that it's absurd to hold them to those kind of standards. When one of them gets caught in a lie, that's a badge of honor, and it's not even remotely problematic to get caught telling the truth if the truth is that you've been lying."

Jake Sherman & John Bresnahan of Politico: "Speaker John Boehner secretly met with Rep. Trey Gowdy Tuesday to encourage him to jump into the race for House majority leader, a dramatic attempt by the chamber's top Republican to try to influence the intraparty election.... But Gowdy (R-S.C.) said late Tuesday that he had no interest in running for the No. 2 position in House leadership, and he would prefer to remain atop the Benghazi select committee." ...

... Here's Rachel Maddow's segment on Kevin McCarthy's excellent verbal skills. Pathetic :

Jeff Toobin in the New Yorker: John Boehner's "failures, political and substantive, were due mostly to cowardice.... Boehner adopted an extreme version of the so-called Hastert rule, named for his predecessor as Speaker, Dennis Hastert, who is now under indictment for alleged financial crimes connected to blackmail payments (he has pleaded not guilty). The Hastert rule holds that the Speaker should never allow a vote on a bill unless it's supported by a majority of the Republican caucus. But Boehner's approach was to keep bills off the floor that were opposed by a minority of Republicans -- the Tea Party caucus, which only numbers about fifty -- effectively giving them a veto over the work of the House.... And what did Boehner's cowardice in the face of the Tea Party stalwarts get him? They forced him out anyway. Boehner built his career around keeping his job, and he still failed." Thanks to Diane for the link.

The Chaffetz File. Carol Leonnig & Jerry Markon of the Washington Post: "An assistant director of the Secret Service urged that unflattering information the agency had in its files about a congressman critical of the service be made public, according to a government watchdog report released Wednesday. 'Some information that he might find embarrassing needs to get out,' Assistant Director Edward Lowery wrote in an e-mail to a fellow director on March 31, commenting on an internal file that was being widely circulated inside the service. 'Just to be fair.' Two days later, a news Web site reported that Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), chairman of the House Oversight Committee, had applied to be a Secret Service agent in 2003 and been rejected.... The report by John Roth, inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security, singled out Lowery, in part because of his senior position at the agency. The report also cited Lowery's e-mail as the one piece of documentary evidence... of the desire for the information to be public." Although dozens of Secret Service members knew about the info on Chaffetz, the agency's director Joseph Clancey claims he was not in the loop. CW: Oh, shame on the leaker(s) & ha ha ha.

Amanda Marcotte in Slate: "Despite all the hand-waving about fetal tissue, Tuesday's [Planned Parenthood] hearings were a confirmation that the attacks on Planned Parenthood are a proxy for the larger religious-right movement to reverse the sexual revolution brought to Americans by feminism and reliable contraception.... Deluging people with bloody fetus pictures isn't dissuading them from their enthusiasm for affordable contraception that makes stress-free recreational sex possible. Watching Republicans, mostly men, gang up on Cecile Richards indicates the deep contempt for women that drives the anti-choice movement." ...

... Gail Collins: "Richards was fine, whenever she could get a word in edgewise. She explained several times that Planned Parenthood's federal funding was mainly just Medicaid payments for treating low-income patients. However this is a concept that her opponents made it clear they plan to never get their heads around." ...

... Christine Hauser of the New York Times: "Daniel Handler, the author of children's books under the pen name Lemony Snicket, announced with his wife, Lisa Brown, an author and illustrator, that they are donating $1 million to Planned Parenthood.... Mr. Handler and Ms. Brown posted the announcement the day before the president of Planned Parenthood, Cecile Richards, testified on Capitol Hill over what she called 'outrageous accusations' by Republicans who said that her organization profits from the sale of fetal tissue." Thanks to contributor mae f. for the link.

Dana Milbank: "Fresh from her triumph Tuesday over the Brookings Institution in which she forced the ouster of a corporate-backed scholar..., [Elizabeth Warren] was at Lutheran Church of the Reformation on Capitol Hill, firing up a crowd of housing activists Wednesday afternoon.... Warren blasted the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Federal Housing Finance Agency, both run by Obama appointees, for selling troubled mortgages to hedge fund investors at a discount...."

Donald McNeil of the New York Times: "Everyone who has H.I.V. should immediately be put on antiretroviral triple therapy and everyone at risk of becoming infected should be offered protective doses of similar drugs, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday as it issued new H.I.V. treatment and prevention guidelines."

Annie Lowrey of New York on how systemic tax evasion by large corporations fuels inequality. And makes a mockery of the "free market."

Linda Greenhouse: Nobody likes Chief Justice John Roberts.

The Quiet Bigotry of the Pope. Laurie Goodstein & Jim Yardley of the New York Times: "For nearly eight hours, Vatican officials refused to confirm or deny that the meeting [with Kim Davis] had occurred, before finally confirming it on Wednesday afternoon.... The episode added a new dimension to an American tour in which the pope drew rapturous throngs and surprised admiration from liberal Americans thrilled to hear a pope stake out left-leaning positions on poverty, the environment and immigration. Suddenly, on Wednesday, religious conservatives were cheering....,putting the Davis visit together with the pope's subtle speech on religious freedom on Saturday and his unscheduled stop in Washington to see the Little Sisters of the Poor, an order of nuns that is suing the federal government over the Affordable Care Act's contraception mandate." ...

... Charles Pierce: "Given this pope's deft gift for strategic ambiguity and shrewd public relations, it's hard for me to understand how he could commit such a hamhanded blunder as picking a side in this fight.... This is, obviously, the dumbest thing this Pope ever has done. It undermines everything he accomplished on his visit here. It undermines his pastoral message, and it diminishes his stature by involving him in a petty American political dispute. A secret meeting with this nutball? That undermines any credibility he had accrued on the issue of openness and transparency. Moreover, it means that he barbered the truth during the press conference he held on his flight back to Rome, in which he spoke vaguely about religious liberty, and freedom of conscience...." ...

... Patrick Scott in the Hill: "... whose liberties were truly under attack in this scenario? The county official who refused service to a portion of her community, or those members whose right to marriage, legally upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, was being denied? Conscientious objection, it's true, is a right of an individual citizen. But when employed by the government, the role of 'citizen' is subjugated by the obligations that come with representing the local, city, state or federal government. In this capacity, the individual is no longer a single voice, but the voice of an entire institution." ...

... Pete Williams of NBC News: "Kentucky Gov. Steven Beshear, urging a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit filed against him by Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, says her legal claims 'demonstrate the absurdity' of her position. In court documents filed late Tuesday, Beshear argued that because he never ordered county clerks to do anything in issuing marriage licenses, her lawsuit against him has no merit."

Presidential Race

Matea Gold & John Wagner of the Washington Post: "Former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton's front-runner status in the Democratic presidential primary fight was jolted Wednesday by a new and unexpected vulnerability: a financial one. The more than $28 million that Clinton's campaign announced Wednesday it had raised in the third quarter was nearly matched by the $26 million that Sen. Bernie Sanders brought in, thanks to small contributions that came in for him at a faster clip than even in President Obama's campaigns." ...

... Natalie Andrews of the Wall Street Journal (not firewalled): "With hours to go before the third quarter campaign finance filing deadline, the campaign of Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders said it reached its goal of one million individual online contributions. He is the first candidate of the 2016 campaign to announce it had reached this number -- and he reached it faster than President Barack Obama did in 2008 and 2012."

Tom McCarthy of the Guardian: "A day after a top Republican touted the impact on Hillary Clinton's poll numbers of a congressional probe into the 2012 Benghazi attacks, the former secretary of state condemned the comments as 'deeply distressing'. House majority leader Kevin McCarthy said in an interview Tuesday night that the House select committee on Benghazi was part of a Republican 'strategy to fight and win'....'When I hear a statement like that, which demonstrates unequivocally that this was always meant to be a partisan political exercise, I feel like it does a grave disservice and dishonors not just the memory of the four that we lost, but of everybody who has served our country,' Clinton said, according to a transcript of [an] interview [with Al Sharpton to air Sunday on MSNBC]." ...

... Jennifer Epstein of Bloomberg: "Hillary Clinton and her fiercest defenders couldn't have said it better themselves. Instead, the Republican leading the race to replace John Boehner as House speaker said it for them, boasting Tuesday that his party has spent nearly three years dragging her through investigations of the Sept. 11, 2012, attack in Benghazi in hopes of doing serious damage to her presidential campaign.... Earlier, Clinton campaign press secretary Brian Fallon called McCarthy's words 'a damning display of honesty by the possible next speaker of the House,' who has 'just confessed that the committee set up to look into the deaths of four brave Americans at Benghazi is a taxpayer-funded sham. This confirms Americans' worst suspicions about what goes on in Washington.'" ...

... Michael Shear & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "Three emails sent to Hillary Rodham Clinton in 2011 when she was secretary of state contained information that should have been considered 'secret,' the government's second-highest classification, according to a State Department review of about 6,300 pages of her emails made public on Wednesday." ...

... Nick Gass of Politico: "The latest trove of Hillary Clinton's emails show how the former secretary of state dealt with with major geopolitical events.... But the messages made public by the State Department also show the more personal side of Clinton.... Here are a few of the must-read emails...." ...

... Rachel Bade, et al., of Politico: "Hackers tried to target Hillary Clinton's homemade personal system at least five times in one day while she served as Secretary of State, according to new emails released Wednesday under a court order. Clinton received on Aug. 3, 2011, at least five messages that appear to contain virus-laden attachments.... Another email released Wednesday suggests that even before the August 2011 phishing scam bombarded her inbox, Clinton was aware of hacking problems with personal email accounts.... 'NO ONE uses a State-issued laptop and even high officials routinely end up using their home email accounts to be able to get their work done quickly,' she wrote, suggesting they use that argument to make the case for more State technology funding in the budget. State budget cuts, she said, would 'make matters much much worse.'... Clinton agreed with her former aide's suggestion that they tell the public about how State officials routinely use their own accounts.... The RNC pounced on the chain released Wednesday, arguing that the messages suggests Clinton and her staff were well aware of the threats posed to their use of personal email systems."

Jeff Zeleny of CNN: "Vice President Joe Biden has extended his window for deciding whether to jump into the 2016 presidential campaign, several Democrats say, allowing the contest to play out even longer before he answers one of the biggest questions hanging over the race for the White House. He is not preparing for the first Democratic debate on October 13 in Las Vegas and is not expected to participate, people close to him say...."

More than everything you ever wanted to learn about Melania Trump in the New York Times (here) & the Washington Post (here.) CW: Also, People magazine has Melania on the cover, but I forget where I saw the link, & I'm not looking for it. ...

Last week, in an effort to invent some proof that Carly Fiorina had seen something that doesn't exist, her superPAC made its own YouTube video. Dahlia Lithwick (Sept. 25): "The [Fiorina superPAC] video uses spliced footage from the Grantham Collection, an unsourced image of a stillborn, and a CMP image of a Pennsylvania woman's stillborn baby, used without her permission.... The very meta nature of the enterprise stunned me -- trying to doctor doctored videotapes and still failing to produce an image that corresponds to Fiorina's narrative. It's truthiness elevated to almost cosmic levels."

... CW: Yesterday, we linked to posts suggesting that the fetus in the Center for Medical Progress was probably stillborn. Heather of Crooks & Liars: The mother -- who opposes abortion -- has confirmed that the fetus was hers & that it was stillborn at 19 weeks, & she strongly objects to use of his image in the video, which she did not authorize. ...

... David Edwards of the Raw Story, that "David Daleiden, the project lead Center for Medical Progress' anti-Planned Parenthood campaign, admitted on Wednesday that an alleged fetus on a table that GOP presidential candidate Carly Fiorina described during a graphic anti-abortion rant was actually from a miscarriage." But so what? "'It's the same kind of fetus,' Daleiden continued to insist." Chris Cuomo is the questioner here:

... digby, in Salon: "Just like Dick Cheney, [Carly Fiorina] makes outrageously dishonest claims, refuses to admit it when she's caught and stubbornly barrels ahead confidently insisting that her claims are true even when presented with proof that they are not.... The right actually appreciates this unwillingness to ever say you're sorry. It shows commitment to the cause." ...

... Ana Marie Cox in the Daily Beast: "Call it Car-lying. Describing things into reality is a trademark of Fiorina's, a style of mendacity that sets her apart from career politicians. Indeed, the reason she doesn't come off as a politician is she's still in marketing. At Hewlett-Packard, employees said she 'embellished' the company's 'future products, strategy and even history,' adding a fictitious personal visit from Walt Disney to the true story about Disney Studios being an early client." She even advised then-CIA Director Michael Hayden on how to lie. "... by sheer force of articulated will she has fabricated her own reality, to the point that her Super PAC spliced together a different video to illustrate just what it is she said she saw."

Lawrence Krauss of the New Yorker on "Ben Carson's scientific ignorance.... While many may debate whether his lack of public-service experience disqualifies him from serious consideration in this race, Carson's ideas about religion, science, and public office, as revealed in the past week, suggest that there are far deeper reasons to be concerned about his candidacy for the highest office in the land." Thanks to Diane for the link.

Turns out Mitt Romney cares about poor people (the 47 percent), minorities (Obama giftees) & immigrants (self-deportation). Also says Donald Trump won't win the nomination.

Beyond the Beltway

Carol Cole-Frowe & Manny Hernandez of the New York Times: "Richard E. Glossip, the death row inmate who challenged the constitutionality of Oklahoma's lethal injection protocol before the Supreme Court, was granted a stay of execution shortly before he was scheduled to be put to death here Wednesday.... 'Last minute questions were raised today about Oklahoma's execution protocol and the chemicals used for lethal injection,' [Gov. Mary] Fallin said. 'After consulting with the attorney general and the Department of Corrections, I have issued a 37-day stay of execution while the state addresses those questions and ensures it is complying fully with the protocols approved by federal courts.' A new execution date was set for Nov. 6."

AP: "An Oklahoma sheriff quickly decided to resign on Wednesday after he was indicted by a grand jury called to investigate his office following the fatal shooting of an unarmed man by a volunteer deputy. Tulsa sheriff Stanley Glanz was indicted on two misdemeanor counts. The grand jury accused the longtime law enforcement officer of refusing to perform his official duties for not promptly releasing documents in an internal investigation related to the volunteer deputy, Robert Bates, one of Glanz's longtime friends."

He Should Go Eat Worms. Nick Gass: "Scott Walker remains unpopular among Wisconsin voters in the first poll conducted since the Republican governor ended his presidential campaign. More than six in 10 Wisconsin voters, 62 percent, do not want Walker to run for a third term as governor in 2018, according to the results of a new Marquette University Law Poll out Wednesday. Just 35 percent said he should seek a third term. Walker's approval rating slid to a new low: 37 percent, with 59 percent of voters disapproving."

The Chinese Are Killing Us! Joseph Berger of the New York Times: "The New York Military Academy, a 126-year-old boarding school whose graduates include the Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump, was bought on Wednesday for close to $16 million at a bankruptcy auction by a nonprofit group controlled by Chinese investors, who told academy officials that they would keep it open as a high school." CW: Ha ha. Evidently the Donald couldn't afford to keep his beloved alma mater alive, but the Chinese could.

News Ledes

NBC News: "Twelve people, including five American service members, were killed early Friday when a U.S. C-130 transport plane crashed while taking off from an airport in Afghanistan, a U.S. military official said."

Weather Channel: "Hurricane Joaquin strengthened to major hurricane status as a Category 3 storm Wednesday night, and is now hammering the central Bahamas. Prospects remain worrisome for the U.S. mainland as the official forecast continues with a chance of the East Coast seeing its first landfalling hurricane in 15 months." ...

     ... Update: "Hurricane Joaquin intensified to an extremely dangerous Category 4 storm Thursday afternoon, and continues to hammer the central Bahamas with hurricane-force winds, storm surge flooding and torrential rain. The odds of the U.S. mainland seeing its first landfalling hurricane in 15 months are dwindling as the forecast track continues to trend farther to the east. The best chance for an East Coast landfall is now shifting toward New England, but if Joaquin's center should reach land there, it would likely do so as a tropical storm rather than a hurricane."

New York Times: "In a second day of raids in Syria, Russian warplanes carried out a new round of airstrikes on Thursday that -- contrary to Moscow's assertions -- appeared to be targeting not the Islamic State but a rival insurgent coalition." ...

... New York Times: "Russian aircraft carried out a bombing attack against Syrian opposition fighters on Wednesday, including at least one group trained by the C.I.A., eliciting angry protests from American officials and plunging the complex sectarian war there into dangerous new territory. Russia's entry into the Syrian conflict, foreshadowed by a rapid military buildup in the past three weeks at an air base in Latakia, Syria, makes the possibility of a political settlement in Syria more difficult and creates a new risk of inadvertent incidents between American and Russian warplanes flying in the same area."

Washington Post: "Afghan troops punctured the Taliban's grip on the northern city of Kunduz Thursday, pushing into the center of the city as part of a U.S.-backed counter-offensive aimed at restoring public confidence in the country's beleaguered military."