The Commentariat -- Dec. 26, 2014
Internal links removed.
Christmas Eve Docu-dump. David Lerman of Bloomberg News: "The National Security Agency [Wednesday] released reports on intelligence collection that may have violated the law or U.S. policy over more than a decade, including unauthorized surveillance of Americans' overseas communications.... The heavily-redacted reports include examples of data on Americans being e-mailed to unauthorized recipients, stored in unsecured computers and retained after it was supposed to be destroyed, according to the documents. They were posted on the NSA's website at around 1:30 p.m. on Christmas Eve. In a 2012 case, for example, an NSA analyst 'searched her spouse's personal telephone directory without his knowledge to obtain names and telephone numbers for targeting,' according to one report. The analyst 'has been advised to cease her activities,' it said." The NSA's link to the reports, released in response to an ACLU FOIA lawsuit, is here. ...
... Zandar in Balloon Juice: "... it's entirely possible to hold the position that both the NSA needs massive reform to prevent civil liberties abuses, and that Edward Snowden went about exposing these abuses in a way that damaged national security. The ACLU on the other hand requested this information through FOIA, and got it. No espionage or skulduggery was required, and the information clearly shows the NSA isn't following its own procedures. This was the right way to get evidence of these massive abuses and does so in a manner that's both responsible and powerful."
Oh, They Knew. Richard Oppel of the New York Times: "Long before revelations in the spring that the Veterans Affairs hospital in Phoenix had manipulated waiting lists to hide that veterans were facing long delays to see doctors, senior department officials in Washington had been made aware of serious problems at the hospital, according to filings before a federal administrative board.... Susan Bowers, the executive in charge of dozens of hospitals and clinics from West Texas to Arizona..., said that when she submitted a report stating that the Phoenix hospital was out of compliance, she was pressured by other officials to say that it was compliant. She also said that beginning in 2009, she briefed Eric K. Shinseki, then the Department of Veterans Affairs secretary, and other top officials several times a year about the patient backlog and other problems in Phoenix.... When she briefed Mr. Shinseki about problems, she added, he would say, 'There's a process, and we need to follow through on the process.'" See also News Ledes in the December 24 Commentariat.
Emily Wax-Thibodeaux of the Washington Post: "Thousands of female veterans are struggling to get health-care treatment and compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs on the grounds that they suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder caused by sexual trauma in the military. The veterans and their advocates call it 'the second battle' -- with a bureaucracy they say is stuck in the past."
Liz Sly of the Washington Post: "The Islamic State's vaunted exercise in state-building appears to be crumbling as living conditions deteriorate across the territories under its control.... Services are collapsing, prices are soaring, and medicines are scarce in towns and cities across the 'caliphate' proclaimed in Iraq and Syria by the Islamic State, residents say, belying the group's boasts that it is delivering a model form of governance for Muslims. Slick Islamic State videos depicting functioning government offices and the distribution of aid do not match the reality of growing deprivation and disorganized, erratic leadership, the residents say." ...
... CW: Who would have guessed that a band of rabid, murderous, fundamentalist revolutionaries would not make good bureaucrats? This does not suggest that the so-called Islamic state would naturally implode. Totalitarian states throughout history have maintained their control for decades even when their other social & economic policies were terrible failures.
Paul Krugman: "You'll never hear this on Fox News, but 2014 was a year in which the federal government, in particular, showed that it can do some important things very well if it wants to.... On multiple fronts, government wasn't the problem; it was the solution. Nobody knows it, but 2014 was the year of 'Yes, we can.'" ...
... CW: If Krugman is right -- that "Christmas seemed unusually subdued this year" because "All year Americans have been bombarded with dire news reports portraying a world out of control and a clueless government with no idea what to do" -- you can lay this somber holiday directly at the feet of a very effective Republican noise machine. The Party of Nope, with their constant stream of downers, many of them lies, trumped the Party of Hope. ...
... George Packer of the New Yorker on the same topic. Packer does manage to lay direct blame on Republicans -- & on Democrats "too spooked to utter the simple truth that government in competent hands can be a tremendous tool for advancing the good." ...
... "Let's Screw the 1 Percent." Paul Rosenberg in Salon: President Obama should raise the mandatory overtime salary to cover at least the adjusted-for-inflation salaries that were mandated in a 1975 law.... [The move] would not just make those workers better off, it's money that would fuel the rest of the economy as well.... Firing the supply-siders in his own administration -- would be the smartest thing President Obama could do right now, to ensure that the economy keeps on growing, regardless of what congressional Republicans try to do in the next two years." Unfortunately, Rosenberg asserts, Obama himself "thinks like Ronald Reagan." ...
... CW: This seems like such an obvious fix. It would specifically help the middle-class, & many would feel the positive effects with their next paycheck. Thus, as a political move, it's a no-brainer. Republicans might wail, but I doubt they'd be calling it ObamaPay. ...
... Erika Eichelberger of Mother Jones: "One often-overlooked factor ... [contributing to wealth inequality] is that 16.7 million poor Americans don't have a bank account. Lack of access to this basic financial tool cramps poor Americans' ability to prove credit-worthiness and build assets, and forces them to rely on expensive alternative financial services, trapping them in a cycle of debt and instability."
Rebecca Leber of the New Republic: "Investigators have traced the gun Ismaaiyl Brinsley used to kill two New York City police officers and wound his ex-girlfriend to a Georgia strip mall 900 miles away. The Arrowhead pawn shop, which bills itself as a 'family-owned business dedicated to good prices, good customer service and good vibes,' as of 2010 was the fifth-largest source of guns used in crimes nationally and the number-one source of out-of-state guns seized by the New York Police Department.... Brinsley was barred from owning a gun because he had committed multiple felonies.... Weak federal laws and disparate state laws enable a black market where felons and domestic abusers can get their hands on guns. Georgia is among many southern states whose lax gun laws effectively supply firearms for criminal activity in states with stricter laws." ...
... CW: So if you're looking around for somebody to blame for the deaths of those policemen -- besides the shooter himself -- I'd say the NRA & their stable of cowardly politicians trumps people righteously protesting racially-biased policing.
Sam Eifling of the New Republic: "... 2014 was the year we learned that no matter what scandals befall individual players or even the front office of the country's most powerful sports league, fans don't really care -- at least, not enough to stop watching football. Americans were mad as hell, right until the Monday Night Football theme, that testosterone lullaby, coaxed them back onto the couch.... Pro football games weren't just the most-watched cable shows -- they were some of the most-watched cable shows ever."
Josh Lederman of the AP: "President Barack Obama marked the end of more than a decade of combat in Afghanistan by paying tribute to America's military, telling troops on Christmas Day that their sacrifices have allowed for a more peaceful, prosperous world to emerge out of the ashes of 9/11." ...
... Josh Lederman: President Barack Obama celebrated Christmas in Hawaii by singing carols at home before spending the afternoon on the beach."
British Queen Elizabeth's Christmas message is surprisingly touching -- and political:
Mark Bittman of the New York Times: This Christmas day marked "the 100th anniversary of the 'Christmas truce' of World War I, when soldiers from both sides left their weapons in the trenches and met in neutral territory to embrace, play soccer and no doubt drink to excess in the spirit of humanity. Although the acts were officially condemned, these 'live and let live' moments were repeated throughout the war.... If every day were Christmas, if we lived as if the golden rule mattered, if every day were a truce -- well, that is a reality we have never approached, but should aim for."
Here's a 1981 BBC documentary about the 1914 Christmas truce, with first-hand accounts:
Presidential Election
Anne Gearan of the Washington Post: "Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Democratic front-runner for president, is working hard to shore up support among liberals in hopes of tamping down a serious challenge from the left in the battle for the 2016 nomination." CW: In other words, one more fake Hillary. I can't keep up.
Joseph Tanfani of the Los Angeles Times: "... as he considers a run for president in 2016, [Jeb] Bush has begun to unwind some of his financial affairs, apparently to avoid the kind of criticism that hobbled fellow Republican Mitt Romney in his unsuccessful bid for the White House in 2012.... Bush is quitting Tenet Healthcare Corp. -- a company that has profited from Obamacare -- and is ending a consulting contract with Barclays Bank.... Aides say he also has stopped giving highly paid speeches.... Last year, he took a step into the rarefied world of private equity and offshore investments, joining with former banking executives and a Chinese airline company to make bets on natural gas exploration and shipping. One of the funds was set up in the United Kingdom, a structure that allows the company to shield overseas investors from U.S. taxes." ...
... Matea Gold, et al., of the Washington Post: "... all the e-mails [Jeb] Bush will release [from his terms as governor of Florida] have long been available through a records request to the Florida Department of State. What's more, the former governor is expected to release only documents already required to be made available under state law, which allows exemptions for legal communications and personnel matters, among others. And the e-mails that he will release show a somewhat filtered version of operations within his administration, in part because Bush was keenly aware that his correspondence could one day become public."
Nancy Benac of the AP: "There are more than 300 million people in America, yet the same two families keep popping up when it comes to picking a president.... It turns out that even though Americans profess to reject dynasties, in politics they're quite comfortable with familiar names.... Dynastic politics, in which multiple family members hold elected office, are more common than people might think in the U.S."
Peter Grier of the Christian Science Monitor: "n a hypothetical general election matchup Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton would crush Republican Chris Christie in his home state of New Jersey, according to a new Rutgers-Eagleton poll."
Beyond the Beltway
** Adam Nagourney of the New York Times: Gov. Jerry "Brown [D-Calif.] is again seeking to remake [the California state supreme] court that to this day is viewed by legal scholars as among the most influential in the nation, with one study proclaiming it the state court most followed by other appellate judges. And once more, the ever-unconventional Mr. Brown is roiling the waters with a series of head-snapping ... choices for this tribunal.... Of the three people Mr. Brown has nominated to the seven-member Supreme Court -- the latest confirmed on Monday -- not one had a day of judicial experience: Two are law professors and the third is an associate attorney general in the Justice Department." ...
... Judy Lin of the AP: "Continuing a Christmas Eve tradition, Gov. Jerry Brown issued pardons to 105 people Wednesday, before retracting one to a man hours later after learning he had not disclosed recent discipline by financial regulators, a spokesman said."
AP: "Demonstrators took to the streets for a second night after a white police officer in Berkeley, Missouri, killed a black 18-year-old who police said pointed a gun at him."
Here's a detail I didn't know about the police killing of Antonio Martin in Berkeley, Missouri. Ed Pilkington of the Guardian: "An attorney for the police officer, Brian Millikan, confirmed that the officer was handed a body cam at the start of his shift but had been distracted and had not put it on. There was a second police recording device on the dashboard of his marked patrol vehicle, but that too was not turned on at the time of the shooting." CW: An officer too "distracted" to turn on either of two cameras is too distracted to be sent out on patrol.
News Ledes
Washington Post: "Security forces on Friday killed an alleged organizer of last week's school massacre, the latest sign that the government and military are stepping up their assault on the Pakistani Taliban and other Islamist militant groups."
New York Times: "Under intense pressure from the government of Sudan, the United Nations is planning to shrink its floundering peacekeeping force in Darfur, even though renewed fighting there has chased more people from their homes this year than during any other in the past decade. The withdrawal plans come right after the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Fatou Bensouda, announced that she had decided to suspend the genocide case against Sudan's president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, because world powers have done nothing to secure his arrest."
Washington Post: "Revelers opening brand-new Playstation 4 or Xbox One video game consoles on Christmas Day were disappointed to find the gaming networks offline, due to an alleged attack. As of Friday morning, the situation has improved, but the problems are not completely over: XBox Live is mostly up and running, albeit with 'limited' functionality, according to its service status site. Playstation's network PSN, meanwhile, is still down for the count, according to its status page." See also yesterday's News Ledes.
New York Times (Dec. 24): "A blizzard of millions in cash paralyzed a road in Hong Kong on Wednesday afternoon, when a security van spilled bundles of Hong Kong 500 dollar notes, presenting onlookers with a Christmas Eve test of whether to be good for goodness' sake. The police estimated that the equivalent of about $2 million was missing, local news reports said...."
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Reader Comments (6)
Limbaugh also notes as an analogy that George Clooney couldn't play Obama. Apparently he is unaware that Obama is not a fictional character.
@Marvin Schwalb: You raise a metaphysical conundrum. If Obama is an "illegitimate" president, is he real or fictional?
Marie
" ... CW: Who would have guessed that a band of rabid, murderous, fundamentalist revolutionaries would not make good bureaucrats? " You talking about the Islamic States and I was thinking about the Tea Baggers. Upon reflection, couldn't the same quote (maybe leave the word murderous out) be applied to the orthodox Jews who want all the money and services without the responsibilities in Israel? Or the inept "Christians/Southern Baptists/fundamentalists in the US who can't govern their way to a non-racist, non self-centered view of the world?
Got such a kick from the Downton Abby parody. What a hoot it must have been for the actors.
Here's another cap on "the most wonderful time of the year" by a friend of mine:
The Political Atheist's Lament
The carols tell the story wrong,
And so does every Christmas song:
It wasn't on twelve twenty-five,
That baby Jesus did arrive.
It wasn't even in a manger,
But in the home of friends, not stranger.
Were shepherds there, "their watch to keep,"
Each with a Rolex and a sheep?
Three kings most likely didn't come
With gifts and such for Mary's son.
But if they did, is it not shocking
That they forgot his Christmas stocking?
The sales, the shops, the buying sprees,
They are just the one percenters' wheeze,
To get us to spend all our cash
On needless rubbish, waste and flash.
But "to him who has, more shall be given"
(the poor, instead, will go to heaven).
We know there's nothing that we need,
But we must shop to satisfy the greed
Of that one percent who praise the Lord,
As they amass their profit's hoard.
Then, after Christmas, big surprise:
It's all for sale at half the price!
You've had your gifts, your Christmas roast,
Perhaps you got what you want most?
Here's what I want, for my enjoyment,
Less poverty and more employment,
And, worldwide, what I want to see
Is more empowered democracy.
(©Ann M. Altman 2014)
And the Queen's message was inspirational as well as quite heartfelt.Amazing how works of art speak to us all–––although how some interpret them is not always how we might wish.
Agree with P.D. Pepe and CW about the Queen's message. It was powerful, articulate and beautifully delivered. I never thought I'd be saying this (as a Yank and a skeptic) but, God save the Queen! What a treasure.
Thanks to Marie for the link.