The Commentariat -- June 27, 2014
Internal links removed.
NEW. Josh Lederman of the AP: "Blasting the GOP as wilfully indifferent to American struggles, President Barack Obama issued a rebuke Friday to Republican attempts to thwart his economic agenda, offering a stark contrast that Democrats hope will yield electoral success in November. Obama's remarks at a picturesque lake in Minneapolis were billed by the White House as a speech on the economy. But as Obama ripped into his political foes before 3,500 cheering supporters, the political undertones were less than subtle":
Adam Liptak, et al., of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court issued a unambiguous rebuke to President Obama on Thursday, saying he had overreached in issuing recess appointments during brief breaks in the Senate's work. The court was unanimous in saying that Mr. Obama had violated the Constitution in 2012 by appointing officials to the National Labor Relations Board during a break in the Senate's work when the chamber was convening every three days in short pro forma sessions in which no business was conducted. Those breaks were too short, Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote in a majority opinion joined by the court's four other more liberal members. At the same time, the court largely reinstated an uneasy, centuries-long accommodation between the executive branch and the Senate, in which recess appointments were allowed during more substantial breaks. Justice Breyer said such appointments generally remained permissible so long as they were made during a break of 10 or more days." The ruling is here. ...
... Amy Howe of ScotusBlog explains the decision "in plain English." ...
... Lyle Denniston of ScotusBlog: "Leaning heavily upon a long history of Congress and presidents finding ways -- sometimes clumsy -- to make the federal government work, and perhaps silently wishing for a day when they might do so again, a sharply divided Supreme Court on Thursday embraced a practical constitutional solution to filling temporary vacancies in U.S. government posts. Refusing to strip presidents of nearly all power to make such appointments, as four dissenters would have, the majority set some limits but still kept that authority mostly intact." ...
... David Atkins of Hullabaloo: "Honestly, recess appointments are antiquated holdover from the days before telecommunications and air travel. Allowing appointments during recess that cannot be accomplished during regular business should probably go the way of the telegraph. That said, an obstructionist Congress will now have an even easier time not only derailing a president's choice and agenda, but of hamstringing entire departments of government by simply not allowing appointments to be made at all. Which means that control of Congress is now an even bigger deal than it was before."
Adam Liptak: "The Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously struck down a Massachusetts law that barred protests near abortion clinics. The law, enacted in 2007, created 35-foot buffer zones around entrances to abortion clinics. State officials said the law was a response to a history of harassment and violence at abortion clinics in Massachusetts, including a shooting rampage at two facilities in 1994. The law was challenged on First Amendment grounds by opponents of abortion who said they sought to have quiet conversations with women entering clinics to tell them about alternatives to abortion. The court was unanimous about the bottom line but divided on the reasoning. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote a relatively narrow majority opinion. He was joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. He suggested that the state could pursue other alternatives. Justice Antonin Scalia, in a concurrence joined by Justices Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas, said the majority's approach was too tentative. The law, he said, is 'unconstitutional root and branch.' Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. filed a separate concurrence." Roberts' decision & other opinions are here. ...
... Lyle Denniston: "The lead opinion by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., in McCullen v. Coakley went to considerable lengths to suggest ways that cities or states could pass new laws to protect patient' access to abortion facilities. But all of those approaches, it appeared, would be to thwart actual obstruction, physical intrusion, or actual intimidation of patients, not the kind of 'counseling' that the Court found threatened by the Massachusetts law." ...
... Federal Appellate Judge Richard Posner (a conservative), on this & other recent cases: ".. .the opinion fetishizes First Amendment rights.... Who wants to be buttonholed on the sidewalk by 'uncomfortable message[s],' usually delivered by nuts? Lecturing strangers on a sidewalk is not a means by which information and opinion are disseminated in our society.... (Has Chief Justice John Roberts, the author of the opinion, ever done such a thing?) The assertion that abortion protesters 'wish to converse' with women outside an abortion clinic is naive. They wish to prevent the women from entering the clinic, whether by showing them gruesome photos of aborted fetuses or calling down the wrath of God on them. This is harassment of people who are in a very uncomfortable position; the last thing a woman about to have an abortion needs is to be screamed at by the godly."
... In-Your-Face. Tara Culp-Ressler of Think Progress: "Protesters will be allowed to crowd the sidewalks around the clinic and speak directly to patients -- something that can make people feel uncomfortable enough to avoid the clinic and skip out on the health services they need."
Laurence Tribe in Slate: "Even when the court agrees 9–0 over a case's holding, it can divide, sometimes sharply, over the reasoning and rule to be applied. And it is precisely this sort of division that we see in both Noel Canning and McCullen. A look at the two cases together illustrates the need to dig deeper to understand what this week's unanimous decisions are really all about." Justice Scalia's "concurrences," one of which he read from the bench, are really dissents.
Kate Nocera of BuzzFeed: "One year after the Supreme Court struck down section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, Congress is nowhere near close to moving forward with restoring a federal approval requirement for certain voting process changes. While Democratic leaders rallied this week to urge Congress to pass the Voting Rights Amendment Act (VRAA) -- a law to rewrite the section 4 formula -- a top House Republican [-- Judiciary Chair Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) --] said Thursday the bill wasn't going to move quickly, if at all."
The suit is a stunt. -- President Obama, on Boehner's lawsuit
... Benjamin Bell of ABC News: "Despite Republican House Speaker John Boehner's threat this week to sue President Obama over his use of executive orders, the president refused to apologize for his actions during an exclusive interview with ABC News and took the Republican Party to task for what he described as its attempt to interfere with the basic functions of government.... 'I'm not going to apologize for trying to do something while they're doing nothing,' the president added later." ...
... Update: Here's the interview, as broadcast this morning:
... ** Steve M.: "Why do you think Boehner got through primary season without a scratch this year, while Eric Cantor lost his job and Thad Cochran nearly did? It's because Boehner knows how toss the ravenous rubes large chunks of red meat." Also, Boehner's lawsuit against Obama, besides being made of red meat, "could be taken very, very seriously in the federal courts." Steve provides a history lesson on why. ...
... Paul Waldman, in the American Prospect, is not as impressed with Boehner's suit as are Jonathan Capehart of the WashPo (see links in yesterday's Commentariat) & Steve M.: "... it'll be an intensely partisan document whose purpose is to shake a fist at the president Republicans so despise, and it'll get tossed out of court and thrown in the dustbin where it belongs, one more futile, angry gesture from an opposition that has lost the ability to offer anything else."
Elias Isquith of Salon: "Speaking with NBC's David Gregory during an interview that will run in full during this Sunday's edition of 'Meet the Press,' former President Bill Clinton argued that there is something 'unseemly' about former Vice President Dick Cheney's willingness to criticize President Obama for the chaos and dysfunction that's still plaguing Iraq.... Clinton emphatically rejected the question's premise, saying, 'If [the second Bush administration] hadn't gone to war in Iraq none of this would be happening'":
... Philip Rucker, et al., of the Washington Post: "How the Clintons went from 'dead broke' to rich: Bill earned $104.9 million for speeches. Bill "Clinton has leveraged his global popularity into a personal fortune. Starting just two weeks after exiting the Oval Office, Clinton has delivered hundreds of paid speeches, lifting a family that was 'dead broke,' as wife Hillary Rodham Clinton phrased it earlier this month, to a point of such extraordinary wealth that it is now seen as a potential political liability if she runs for president in 2016." ...
... "Out of Context"/Out of a Job. Jon Herskovitz of Reuters: "Johnny Rhoda, who was chairman of the Republican Party in the Second Congressional District in Arkansas ... has resigned after telling a magazine former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would 'probably get shot' if she returned to the state where she was a lawyer and served as first lady, officials said on Thursday.... U.S. Representative Tim Griffin, a Republican who represents the district, labeled Rhoda's comments offensive and inappropriate and called for his resignation."
Tim Egan: Land of the free. Where a Washington state family & friend (the husband is 70) may go to jail for 10 years under mandatory sentencing laws for growing pot for medicinal purposes -- in a state where growing pot is legal.
David Stout of the New York Times: "Howard H. Baker Jr., a soft-spoken Tennessee lawyer who served three terms in the Senate and became known as 'the great conciliator' in his eight years as the chamber's Republican leader, died on Thursday at his home in Huntsville, Tenn. He was 88." ...
... The Washington Post obituary, by James Gerstenzang, is here. ...
Matt Lauer of NBC News demonstrates how to ask a successful woman a series of sexist questions. Lesson 1: Begin with "Some people say...." See, it's not your fault. Hell, you hadda ask. People are talking. Lesson 2: Imply you're not a raving chauvinist. Say something like, "I want to tread lightly here," before asking the next blatantly sexist question. Lesson 3: After the fact, think up a lame defense for this shit & post it on Facebook. Pretend you "relate." ...
... And Matt, sweetie-pie, never you mind that digby awards you Moron o' the Day status & labels your lame defense bullshit. It's just outrageous the way powerful women like digby pick on men who are only trying to "relate."
Right Wing World
The Boundless Intellectual Dishonesty of Right Wing World. Brian Beutler of the New Republic: Whether or not those missing Lois Lerner e-mails are retrieved, & no matter what is in them, the right will cry Scandal! Coverup! "Heads I win, tails you lose." Beutler calls this "maddening illogic." ...
... Boundless Intellectual Dishonesty, Ctd. Jonathan Chait: "A couple months ago, conservatives had an aha! moment when an initial report suggested that health-care spending had spiked in the first quarter of 2014. A one-time jump in health-care spending had been expected all along, but its arrival brought a chorus of triumphant cries from the right.... But the ... revised data shows that health-care spending actually shrank in the first quarter." So now right-wing pundits -- including the Wall Street Journal editors -- are screaming that the reduction in healthcare costs are ruining the economy. No matter what the facts are, ObamaCare is destroying America! ...
... Paul Krugman: "The Affordable Care Act has receded from the front page, but information about how it's going keeps coming in -- and almost all the news is good.... What's interesting about this success story is that it has been accompanied at every step by cries of impending disaster.... While it has been funny watching the right-wing cling to its delusions about health reform, it's also scary. After all, these people retain considerable ability to engage in policy mischief, and one of these days they may regain the White House. And you really, really don't want people who reject facts they don't like in that position. I mean, they might do unthinkable things, like starting a war for no good reason. Oh, wait." ...
... CW: In fairness to right-wing loons, I should add that, to a much lesser extent, this illogical, conspiracy-laden mindset exists on the left, too. The other day I was directed to a blogpost that asserted that President Obama was secretly the brains behind the recent media rollout of Iraq War hawks because he figured they would make a good case for getting the U.S. involved in military ops in Iraq again, which is what he really, really wants. Uh-huh. Maybe Obama is also the brains behind the reputed Armenian who hacked my Google account because he wants to rile up Americans to support an American-military-led Armenian coup.
CW: Ha! In a comment in yesterday's Commentariat, Kate M. wrote that as a boy, Ken Cuccinelli was a lousy soccer player. I replied, "Well, soccer is kind of a sissy European-y sport, anyway. These days, Cooch [i.e., Ken Cuccinelli] is more into manly GOP pursuits; like shooting doves at one of those phony Cheney-type hunting farms." ...
... Sure, enough, comes now the lovely Ann Coulter to back me up. And then some. Elias Isquith: "In her latest syndicated column right-wing troll and pundit Ann Coulter rails against the growing popularity of soccer in the U.S., which she blames on a pro-soccer liberal media and America's millions of immigrants. 'Any growing interest in soccer can only be a sign of the nation's moral decay,' Coulter writes before listing all of the reasons why she thinks soccer sucks.
... CW: I am getting way too good at channeling crazy bigots. ...
... Update. Well, not as smart as I thought. Apparently one can become a Doctor of Conspiracy, which trumps me. Dr. Keith Ablow (no idea what kinda doctor he actually is) said on a Fox "News" show that he suspected the purpose of all the hoo-hah over the World Cup matches was to district Americans from paying attention to all of President Obama's problems.
Beyond the Beltway
James Hohmann of Politico: "A Wisconsin special prosecutor clarified Thursday that GOP Gov. Scott Walker was not the target of his investigation into what he described in earlier court papers as a 'criminal scheme.'"
Eric Russell of the Portland Press-Herald: Maine Gov. Paul LePage (RTP), unhappy because federal stats show Maine had the worst income-growth rate in New England & one of the worst in the nation, largely because Maine refuses to accept the ACA Medicaid expansion, simply eliminated federal payments from the stats -- payments from Social Security, Medicare, unemployment insurance, etc., called them all "welfare, pure and simple," then recalculated the income figures -- a "welfare-free" recalculation that made Maine appear to be in line with other New England states. CW: I wonder if LePage's old fart Tea Party backers will be upset to find out he considers them welfare moochers. His opponents hope s & are milking his remarks.
Legal Corruption/Business as Usual in New Jersey. Jon Swaine of the Guardian: "Corporations that contributed millions of dollars to the Chris Christie-led Republican Governors Association and other GOP campaigns have received public funding deals worth almost $1.25bn from his New Jersey administration in less than two years. A review of the 30 biggest corporate subsidies awarded by the state of New Jersey since Christie appointed one of his closest allies as head of the state's 'bank for business' found that 21 went to ventures involving firms that made significant donations to Republicans, or had senior executives who did.... The Guardian's findings prompted calls from Democratic state legislators and watchdog groups for reforms to the New Jersey economic development authority (EDA), which awards the subsidies and is led by Michele Brown, a close friend and veteran aide to Christie."
Monica Davey of the New York Times: "In a city that desperately needs to hold onto residents, there is a virtual pipeline out [of Detroit]. At least 70,000 foreclosures have taken place since 2009 because of delinquent property taxes. And more than 43,000 properties -- more than one in 10 in this city -- were subject to foreclosure this year, some of them headed for a public auction where prices can start as low as $500.... Several factors have brought the city to the point that crucial revenues are not being collected and thousands of houses are being taken away each year -- not by banks..., but by the government, for failure to pay taxes. Contributing are soaring rates of poverty, high taxes despite painfully diminished city services and a long pattern of lackadaisical tax collection by the city." ...
... Liz Dwyer of Take Part: "Detroit's Water and Sewerage Department has begun turning off the taps of 150,000 residents who are at least two months behind on payments. People are being left without a drop to drink and no ability to bathe or use the toilet. Now a coalition of water and human rights activists has banded together to ask the United Nations to step in and end the disconnections."
News Ledes
Detroit Free Press: "General Motors late Friday said it will recall 446,066 four-wheel drive pickups and SUVs to prevent them from rolling away when the transfer case accidentally shifts into neutral. These are among the company's best-selling and most profitable vehicles, including the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups, GMC Yukon and Chevrolet Tahoe and Suburban SUVs from the 2014 and 2015 model years. It's the 48th recall for the company so far this year, covering more than 20 million vehicles, a record." CW: None of this would have happened if GM CEO Mary Barra were a better mother.
New York Times: "Iraq's top Shiite cleric on Friday urged the country's divided political factions to select a prime minister by early next week in a public call for a political solution that increases the pressure on the embattled prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. Speaking from the holy city of Karbala, Abdul Mehdi al-Karbalaie, a cleric representing Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, called on Iraq's political blocs to select a new leader before the recently elected Parliament sits on Monday."
AP: "President Barack Obama is seeking to bolster U.S. efforts to train and arm select members of the Syrian opposition, a move that comes amid increased U.S. concern that the conflicts in Syria and Iraq are becoming an intertwined fight against the same Sunni extremist group. Obama sent Congress a $500 million request Thursday for a Pentagon-run program that would significantly expand previous covert efforts to arm rebels fighting both the Sunni extremists and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad."
AP: "Ukraine's new president signed a trade and economic pact with the European Union on Friday, pushing his troubled country closer into a European orbit and angering Russia, which warned of unspecified consequences."
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I am re-posting P. D. Pepe's opinion, which appeared in yesterday's Commentariat, here because it relates to the Massachusetts decision. Burns concurs with Pepe:
I never had an abortion, but I can, very easily, walk in the shoes of those women who have and will have. It's for many women a difficult decision, even though a decision well thought through and certain it's the best thing to do for myriad reasons. So there you are walking into a facility for the procedure and because of the Supreme Court ruling today you will be bombarded with pleas from those "protectors of all things fetal" not coming from a distance of 35 ft. but up close and personal so that THEIR freedom of speech is not curtailed in trying to convince you––no, to SHAME you––to change your mind. What a travesty! What a goddamn travesty!
P. D. Pepe
PD: Agree completely. It is a "goddamned travesty."
Even though I'm not a woman, I can empathize with a woman already facing difficult circumstances having nutjobs yelling at her.
As a male bystander, I have some observations on abortion.
The love of my life called me one day (we were living apart at the time) and said she needed a bit of help. She was going, she said, in the morning to have an abortion and she needed a ride to and from afterward.
It wasn’t me or mine—vasectomies prevent that sort of participation in the creation cycle. I said sure. I don’t remember what I thought, if anything.
In the early morning, I picked her up and drove her to the local Planned Parenthood clinic.
This was in a civilized part of the world. There were no yahoos, rubes, or christers parading and posturing around the clinic.
Later, when the procedure was over and she had adequately rested, I picked her up and drove her home.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“More or less,” she said.
We never spoke of it again.
I heard the Massachusetts decision while driving yesterday. After I invoked the "you can't see me picking my nose because, I'm invisible in my car rule" and made a spectacle of myself yelling really bad words. I was aghast at the decision being unanimous and I found myself thinking about organizing a like "conversation" outside a gun show. Unfortunately, like the pictures used by anti-abortion protestors, supporting visuals would be pornography. I also wondered how such up close contact comports with Federal medical privacy laws. Clearly, a woman seeking this medical treatment enjoys no privacy with protestors in her face.
When I saw the Coulter blurb I felt quite good that I've been positively wallowing in moral decay for several days and enjoying the hell out of it. I expect I'll be completely dissipated by the conclusion of the World Cup.
There are any number of counter examples that demonstrate the lack (once again) of real world considerations in the Supremes' discounting of the need for buffer zones around abortion clinics.
As Diane says, what would Alito think about making attendees to a gun show run a gauntlet of gun control advocates who shoved pictures of children murdered by crazies supported and enabled by NRA policies that have become law? Well, I suppose in that case they would have no problem if those people were shot down because "Freedom" and "Stand Your Ground". But how about a group supporting communism surrounding investment banks hectoring anyone walking up to the door? The Paddy wagons would be there in seconds.
And leave us not forget that the Supremes have their own buffer zone. No one is allowed to picket or demonstrate on the building grounds. John Roberts is in no mood for "conversations" on issues of national import. I guess First Amendment considerations aren't important if it will inconvenience one of the high and mighties.
Polling places have their own buffer zones. Why? Because voting is a private affair and elections can be contentious and emotional. I found a PDF from the National Association of Secretaries of State that list the size of these zones for every state (I'd link it but the link I found from a Google search simply downloads the document) which run from 50 ft to 200 ft in Alaska. Voting is a private affair. Medical procedures are private affairs. Does anyone think that John Roberts would think it was okay for hecklers to surround someone going into an eye clinic to have cataracts removed and shove papers at them and demand that they listen to what they have to say about the dangers of eye surgery? Fuck no. He'd think it was insane. And he'd be right.
The Supremes have become expert at ignoring the real world when it comes to their decisions. Unlike the founders who at every step kept reality firmly in mind, even in situations they found difficult to intolerable (Jefferson must have cursed the idea of a First Amendment many times as he was excoriated in the press). But not these guys. These guys sniff around and find cracks they can hide in. Laws upholding voting rights supported numerous times by congress and the public? Sorry, we found a loophole: unconstitutional. Corporate money kept from perverting the electoral process? Supported by Supreme Court decisions, congress, and voters? Nope. Loophole. Unconstitutional. Crazed religious loons imposing their personal beliefs on women pursuing a private and in many cases, personally difficult and emotional issue, kept a mere 35 feet away? Loop-Hole.
And here's a perfect example of how these guys ignore the real world when making their decisions. It's not like the anti-choice crowd is comprised of polite little old ladies who just want to "chat". This group has bombed abortion clinics, murdered doctors, threatened (and carried out) vicious attacks, and burned down clinics. John Roberts' suggestion that the rights of these people trumps the rights of others is flat out ignorant of real world conditions and the lengths these people will go to force others to bend to their will.
So what else is new?
I read the Ann Coulter trash. What a piece of work. I find it revealing that right-wingers are so constantly in need of outrages, are so paranoid, so fearful, and have such a huge inferiority complex that they will stoop so low and reach so far to find a way to make themselves feel better about their status and to "prove" their superiority. But to do it, they always--always--have to run other people down.
Picking on soccer is only one of the funnier (and stupid) examples.
So, what, really, is Coulter suggesting? That soccer is just for weenies, unlike, say, American football?
Okay, let's look at it like this. I don't believe there are more than a handful of professional football players who can sprint non-stop for an hour and a half. The most commonly measured distance in football is 40 yards. In soccer, it would be more like 4,000.
I read a great story not long ago about a fan of Manchester United, the famous British soccer club, who spotted the Man U players' bus. He started running alongside the bus, waving at the players. He kept this up even as the bus picked up speed. He ran along with the bus for over 7 miles until the players started chanting "sign him up, sign him up". They stopped the bus and he got on to wild cheers. Obviously this guy was in great shape and very likely a soccer player himself. (Could Coulter do this?).
She also complains, in one of her sillier reaches, that soccer players don't use their hands. For anyone who's tried it, this only makes it much harder. You have only your body, your head, your legs and your feet to control the ball. That's much more difficult than being able to pick it up with your hands. The funny thing about American "football" is how little the feet are involved.
Soccer is a demanding sport requiring skill and endurance. This is no sissy sport. But soccer doesn't need me to defend it.
How about a truly democratic test? I realize wingnuts are closet haters of democracy, but bear with me.
The last Super Bowl broke viewership records. Over 111 million people watched it. Of course, it's a big game, everything on the line, etc.
The World Cup finals in 2010, Spain v Netherlands? 909 million.
But okay, if you think that's unfair, because it's such a big match, how about this? The last Manchester Derby (Man U v. Manchester): 650 million viewers.
But really, the problem for wingnuts is exactly the fact that soccer is played and watched by people Coulter would rather spit on than sit next to at a sporting event. People who speak other languages, look different, have differently colored skin. Who don't think the NRA is a gift from god.
So really, in addition to being fearful, paranoid, and sporting an enormous inferiority complex, we can add racist and hateful to the list of Coulter style wingnut properties.
But you already knew that, right?
Next, Coulter attacks chess as being un-American. Christ, Russians love it! What more do you need to know?
@Akhilleus: All of the Supremes have cell phones. None will need an abortion.
Marie
INTERVIEW WITH MAN WHO WAS MADE HEAD OF A CORPORATE ENITY.
Matt L: Thanks for being here, Ted, I'm about to ask you some sensitive questions here––hope you won't mind.
Ted: Ask away.
Matt: So–-is it your understanding that you got this job because you have a reputation of being such a good Dad, can bake a mean macaroni and cheese casserole, and without prodding from the missus, take out the garbage?
Ted: Gee, Matt, all those things are true, but I think I got the job cuz I'm a wizard at electronics.
Matt: Well, I understand that, but as a man don't those other factors factor in the decision?
Ted: Exactly how would they?
Matt: I really don't have any idea––I'm just following a script here and it looks like good copy.
Ted: Asshole!
Matt: Hmmm–––that's exactly what that guy Digby called me. Thanks for coming on Ted, always such a blast to expose my expertise, asshole wise.
FADE OUT–––followed by a commercial hawking medication for hemorrhoids followed by that hunk of a guy saying, "Man UP with Gold Bond."
Re: the story of the family that might go to jail for growing Mary Jane in their back yard in a state that has legalized pot is puzzling as well as outrageous––doesn't make any sense.
And kudos to Posner–-love his position.
Re: Soccer.
Many years ago (1968-69), I attended the Infantry Officers' Advanced Course at Ft. Benning, GA. One of the games we played was soccer. Naturally, we Americans were outclassed by our foreign officers, among them South Vietnamese. I recall during one game a South Vietnamese captain (5' 5", approx 145 lbs) kicked a ball so hard that it knocked one of our team off his feet. As Ak has already alluded to, their endurance was truly impressive.