The Commentariat -- February 9, 2012
My column in the New York Times eXaminer is on Nicholas Kristof's riff on Charles Murray's book Coming Apart, etc. The NYTX front page is here. You can contribute to NYTX here.
Sarah Kliff of the Washington Post: The White House thinks the contraception battle is a political winner. Here's why:
... NEW. BUT Jessica Yellin & Brian Keilar of CNN: "... the White House is working on a way to thread the needle on a new health care policy which will require all employers-including religious institutions to cover contraception in their health insurance plans.... The administration is especially interested in the Hawaii model, in which female employees of religious institutions can purchase contraceptive coverage directly from the insurer at the same price offered to employees of all other employers." ...
... Gail Collins: "Okay.... The church is not a democracy and majority opinion really doesn’t matter. Catholic dogma holds that artificial contraception is against the law of God. The bishops have the right — a right guaranteed under the First Amendment — to preach that doctrine to the faithful. They have a right to preach it to everybody.... The problem here is that they’re trying to get the government to do their work for them. They’ve lost the war at home, and they’re now demanding help from the outside.... What happens if an employer belongs to a religion that forbids certain types of blood transfusions? Or disapproves of any medical intervention to interfere with the working of God on the human body?" ...
... "Whose Conscience?" Linda Greenhouse: The aggressive objections to requiring church-affiliated, quasi-public institutions to provide equal healthcare insurance for its female workers, "it’s important to be clear that the conscientious objection to the regulation comes from an institution rather than from those whose consciences it purports to represent."
Democracy in America at the Economist: "... nothing has made me as optimistic recently about the prospects for a broadly international, pro-human-rights, anti-authoritarian foreign policy that brings together America, the democratic world, and many of the emerging-market/non-aligned countries as what's happening right now around the Syria question. The complete isolation of Russia and China in the Security Council vote on sanctions last week is a watershed moment."
I know this goes in Infotainment, but the bigger the better:
Hayley Tsukayama of the Washington Post: "Steve Jobs, being considered in 1991 for an appointment under President George H.W. Bush, underwent a thorough background investigation by the FBI, according to newly released files from the agency. The FBI amassed a lengthy and often unflattering file on Apple’s co-founder, with more than 30 interviews of friends, neighbors, family, former business associates and Jobs, that revealed his early drug use and concerns that the then-head of NeXT was neglecting his daughter born out of wedlock with his high school girlfriend." Ned Potter of ABC News has a story here.
Right Wing World
Jonathan Martin & Manu Raju of Politico: "A day after Romney was convincingly defeated by Rick Santorum in non-binding contests in Minnesota, Colorado and Missouri, high-profile Republicans voiced long-simmering worries that the would-be standard-bearer lacks a compelling message for conservatives — and must be bolder to capture the party’s nomination.... The admonition came from outspoken conservatives and members of Congress who typically stay out of party spats" like Jon Kyl & Jim DeMint.
Rick Santorum goes ballistic on Prop 8 decision. Santorum's take: The government should be more tolerant of bigots. I like the setting, too -- right in front of an altar. The stained glass windows add a nice touch. Thanks to Dave S. for the link:
Jake Sherman of Politico: "Three initiatives with wide, bipartisan support — banning insider trading on Capitol Hill, a massive tax cut for the middle class and rebuilding the nation’s roads — are staggering like a beaten boxer in the final round, with their ultimate fate uncertain. It raises an inevitable question on Capitol Hill: Can this Congress get anything done?"
If they can't run their own elections, no wonder they can't run the country (sorry, forgot to run this yesterday):
Drill, Baby, Drill. Travis Waldron of Think Progress: Economist Rick Santorum tells a Colorado audience that the real cause of the 2008 financial crisis and resulting recession was high oil prices. CW: luckily he has abandoned his alternate theory that the financial crisis was the result of Americans -- especially blah Americans -- having sex for the fun of it.
Greed Is Still Good. Think Progress: "House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) has made several changes to the [Senate version of the STOCK Act] legislation which appear intended to at least weaken the final product, if not to kill it outright." The STOCK Act is supposed to prevent some insider trading by Members of Congress. CW: hey, what's the point of public "service" if not to enrich yourself with impunity?
Local News
What's happening in the NH legislature is a pretty good preview of what would happen if the Tea Party ran Washington. -- Michael Cohen (tweet) ...
... Republicans Do the Damndest Things. Pat Garofalo of Think Progress: a New Hampshire state representative, J. R. Hoell (RTP), has introduced a bill to repeal the law requiring employers to provide lunch breaks for employees. The rationale: aah, employers will do so anyway. Garofalo cites a bit of evidence to refute the notion that employers have goodwill toward all hungry employees.
News Ledes
New York Times: "After days of dramatic talks, Greek political leaders reached a deal on Thursday to support a package of harsh austerity measures demanded by Greece’s financial backers in return for the country’s latest bailout."
New York Times: "President Obama will waive central provisions of the No Child Left Behind federal education law for 10 states that have embraced his educational agenda and promised to raise standards, and improve accountability and teacher effectiveness, the White House announced on Thursday morning."
New York Times: "The House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill on Thursday to ban insider trading by members of Congress and to impose new ethics requirements on lawmakers and federal agency officials. The 417-to-2 vote came less than three weeks after President Obama demanded such action in his State of the Union address. The Senate approved a similar bill by a vote of 96 to 3 on Feb. 2, but the lopsided votes concealed deep disagreements over the details of the legislation." Washington Post story here.
New York Times: "After months of painstaking talks, government authorities and five of the nation’s biggest banks have agreed to a $26 billion settlement that could provide relief to nearly two million current and former American homeowners harmed by the bursting of the housing bubble, state and federal officials said in Washington on Thursday." Here's a new government Website that is supposed to tell you how you might benefit from the deal.
AP: "The Pentagon is unveiling plans Thursday to allow women to serve in thousands of military jobs closer to the front lines, reflecting the realities of the last decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan."
New York Times: "Amid mounting tensions over whether Israel will carry out a military strike against Iran’s nuclear program, the United States and Israel remain at odds over a fundamental question: whether Iran’s crucial nuclear facilities are about to become impregnable."
Los Angeles Times: "A program that lets preapproved air travelers zip through faster security lines will be expanded this year to 35 of the nation's largest airports, Transportation Security Administration officials announced Wednesday. The pilot program, dubbed PreCheck, lets travelers who get TSA clearance avoid what have become the most annoying steps of post-9/11 screening: removing shoes, belt and coats."
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Reader Comments (7)
Santorum had a whopper of a quote today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=48t25kjIrBA
Apparently if a federal court enforces equal rights its showing intolerance toward bigotry. Because bigotry is basic human right I suppose.
Let us all pray for Rick. Just what this country needs is a dose of religious principles of the finest kind. I can look forward to all the fast girls having a large A hanging from their neck.
Water boarding began in the sixteen hundreds as a way to get confessions from witches. Must have been successful because I have seen very few witches lately. I can see all kinds of potential for the pracrice. We could certainly speed up the court system.
Following Rick Santorum to the roaring 1600s should be a great adventure and will put this society in tune with God,s will.
Wait - did Santorum actually cite "nature" and "reason" in his argument? Weren't those aspects of the Enlightenment, which brought us people like Galileo, Mary Wolstonecraft, and Charles Darwin?
Rick Sanitarium has a new phone number: 1-800-JESUS. You can call anytime, all the time, and you will always get an answer. And if you vote for Ricky, you will get an extra bonus. You. dear sinner, will be SAVED. There are lots of rooms in heaven, and Ricky has first dibs on all of them.
Just remember, eat your peas and NO BIRTH CONTROL. Sex is to procreate. Period. Besides, if we end up with too many people, war will take care of that. Always has. Com'on, this is a win-win.
Hard to believe there is a person out there-- oh, wait...a candidate for POTUS--an "educated" man--who inhabits such an internal dichotomy. Universe save us from him and his nasty Jesus!
I'm sorry, I missed the first part of Demoron's comment. Was he defending slavery? What scares me the most is that he really does not get the basic irrationality of his argument. Government must defend bigotry if it based on religion.
Memo to rick santorum:
Congrats, you have just alienated millions of LGBT voters, and
a lot of us have sympathetic family and hetero friends, so multiply
that by millions. Then there are the 'blahs' from one of your previous rants, so add a few more millions. And what about
women's rights? More millions alienated. And here's hoping
you get the nomination. Laughter is the best medicine!
I think of all these millions of dollars spent on these candidates, mostly for ads that reveal the ugly, the greedy, the slipshod antics of all of them––what a waste! Today is Ricky's turn––finally–-this earnest seeming, sincere seeming candidate whose right shoulder has Jesus perched and ready to whisper sweet nothings, urging Ricky to convince the populace that he has the truth and that to follow him will not only bring salvation but a bang-up economy. There's something sad about all this, pitiable really, because in the end he will lose and all his prayers will go for naught plus all that money–––gone with the wind and then what would Jesus say?