The Commentariat -- July 12, 2014

Internal links, photo removed.

White House: "Expanding opportunity -- it's time for Republicans to do their part":

... Worth noting: the gloves are off.

"Taxpayer-Funded Bigotry." New York Times Editors: "President Obama should resist a pressure campaign by some religious groups to weaken a promised executive order that would prohibit federal contractors from discriminating against gay men, lesbians and transgender people in their hiring practices.... The Civil Rights Act gives religious groups some leeway to favor members of their own faith in hiring. In 2002, President George W. Bush extended that leeway to faith-based service organizations receiving federal money, and Mr. Obama has failed to keep a campaign promise to rescind Mr. Bush's order." The Cheneys' Weekly Standard piece is here. It is titled, ironically, "The Truth about Iraq."

Warren Bass of the Wall Street Journal & a former 9/11 Commission staff member: "Former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz, a former U.S. Senate candidate, have written a piece on Iraq in the Weekly Standard that resuscitates an old argument about Saddam Hussein's links to al Qaeda.... The Cheneys write: 'It is undisputed, and has been confirmed repeatedly in Iraqi government documents captured after the invasion, that Saddam had deep, longstanding, far-reaching relationships with terrorist organizations, including al Qaeda and its affiliates.' In fact, the 9/11 Commission disputed it 10 years ago." ...

     ... CW: Isn't it rich that Cheney tries to rehabilitate himself with an essay in which he claims to be imparting the "truth" & which is based on at lease one obvious lie. Even if you think Saddam & bin Ladin were BFFs, to claim that the supposed Saddam-al Qaeda relationship is "undisputed" is an undisputed lie:

     ... Paige Lavender of the Huffington Post documents a few others: "In 2002, the New York Times claimed the Bush administration was 'sowing a dangerous confusion' by saying al Qaeda had a relationship with Hussein's regime.... And a 2008 military report released by the Pentagon also showed no connection between the two." ...

... Ed Kilgore: "The Cheneys have seen nothing, heard nothing, and learned nothing since 2002. And they don't even seem to understand they are undermining the credibility of Obama's legion of Republican critics. The word 'incorrigible' comes to mind. Gaze in awe."

Gail Collins has some advice for political candidates, based on the stupid tricks & remarks by politicians around the country. For instance, take your own photos for your campaign ads instead of using various European people (or pigs) to illustrate how great the locals are.

Annals of "Journalism," Megyn Kelly Edition

Megyn Kelly of Fox "News" booked Breitbart's radical winger columnist Ben Shapiro to talk about the Obama administration's response to the violence between Israel & Palestine & specifically the murder of three Jewish teens -- after Shapiro had written a post titled "The Jew-Hating Obama Administration" in which he opined on Obama's response to the murder of the teens, one of whom, Naftali Frenkel, was an American. Here's an excerpt from Shapiro's post:

Presumably Frenkel did not look enough like Barack Obama's imaginary son [a reference to Trevon Martin] for him to give a damn.... Jewish blood is cheap to this administration.... Jew hatred is as old as the Jewish people. It's just found a new home in the White House.

     ... During the Kelly segment, Shapiro said, "It's borderline a Jew-hating administration," to which Kelly responded, "Wow! That's strong," as if she had no idea Shapiro might say something like that. Then her staff tweeted out Shapiro's remark on Kelly's Twitter feed. Oddly enough, some criticized the tweet, & Kelly responded, via Twitter, "Critics have point-@benshapiro quote tweeted by staff during show; not a cmt I wish 2 recirc which is why I challenged on air& deleted tweet." Tom Kludt of TPM has the story. Here's the thing, Megyn. When you book a guy like that who's written crap like that, you invite him to go there on the air, then publicize his remarks, IT'S ALL YOU FUCKING FAULT. You can't "distance yourself" (Kludt's characterization) from sentiments you did everything to encourage & air.

Kendall Breitman of Politico: "Fox News host Megyn Kelly is charging House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) with being 'guilty' of sexism after her comments on the Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby ruling. 'The latest installment of misleading hysteria comes from the House minority leader,' Kelly said Thursday.... Kelly's comments came after Pelosi called the ruling in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby 'a frightening one.... We should be afraid of this court, that five guys are determining which contraceptions are legal or not,' Pelosi said Thursday." ...

     ... CW: Yo, Megyn, to claim a woman suffers from "hysteria" is way sexist, too. You could look it up.

Beyond the Beltway

Fernanda Santos of the New York Times: Arizona Attorney Gen. Tom Horne (R), who has a Koch-backed primary challenger in his bid for re-election, "has been caught by F.B.I. agents leaving the scene of a parking-garage fender-bender after a lunchtime tryst, a mishap that exposed not only the affair, but also a federal investigation into alleged campaign finance violations, which ended unceremoniously and without any charges.... The Arizona secretary of state's office said this week that there was enough evidence to support a full investigation of accusations that Mr. Horne used his staff in his re-election campaign." But he can play the piano (begins about 4 min. into the video)!

Senate Race

McDaniel Wins Mississippi Primary! Daniel Strauss of TPM: "Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel (R) said Friday that his campaign and his supporters have found 'over 8,300 questionable ballots cast' in the runoff election for U.S. Senate, which Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) won.... Cochran won the runoff by 7,667 votes.... McDaniel, in the Friday statement, also called on the Mississippi Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann (R) to allow McDaniel's campaign access to voting records which McDaniel said they have not had access to yet." CW: Uh, how do you know the ballots are "questionable" if you haven't seen the voting records? ...

Presidential Election 2016

Nicole Lafond of TPM: "The Republican Party of Virginia denied on Friday that it was behind a bumper sticker that appeared to take a shot at Hillary Clinton by describing her as 'Monica Lewinsky's X-Boyfriend's Wife.' The bumper sticker was discovered by Reuters political correspondent Gabriel Debenedetti, who tweeted a photo of it on Friday morning and said he found it in Fairfax County, Va. In fine print beneath the Lewinsky line were the words 'Authorized By Republican Party Of Virginia.'" ...

... Update. Nicole Lafond: "A Virginia woman told TPM on Friday that she recently discovered a stack of anti-Hillary Clinton bumper stickers at a local GOP office, despite denials from the state party that it had anything to do with the stickers. Carole Donoghue, a retired journalist, said she found the bumper stickers at Fairfax County Republican Committee headquarters in Fairfax, Va. The bumper stickers read 'Monica Lewinsky's X-Boyfriend's Wife for President.'" Donoghue said that last Sunday she came upon a GOP campaign worker who was ill, so she drove him to the campaign office, where she saw the stack of bumper stickers. "Donoghue said she wanted to speak out about her discovery after the state party denied being involved. 'They are just cheap and stupid, and if you are going to be cheap and stupid at least be honest about it,' Donoghue told TPM. 'The denial was dishonest.'"

Marie's Sports Report

Chris Fedor in the Cleveland Plain Dealer: "LeBron James stunned the NBA on Friday around noon when he announced his long-awaited free agency decision, choosing to return to the Cleveland Cavaliers and leaving the Miami Heat. According to reports, he will sign a four-year, $88 million max contract." ...

... James explains why he's "coming home" in a Sports Illustrated "as told to" sports writer Lee Jenkins. ...

... Michael Powell of the New York Times: "... even taking into account that he was working with the skilled and guiding hand of the Sports Illustrated writer Lee Jenkins, James offered a rather stunning display of soul-baring from a man who should, by reasonable expectation, possess a dirigible-size ego."

News Ledes

AP: "U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry says both of Afghanistan's presidential candidates are committed to abiding by the results of the 'largest, most comprehensive audit' of the election runoff ballots possible."

Los Angeles Times: "Israel and Palestinians continued to trade airstrikes and rocket fire Saturday with the death toll in the Gaza Strip climbing to 121 on the fifth day of Israel's military offensive targeting Palestinian militants." (CW: As far as I can tell, & I may be wrong, all of those killed were Palestinians.) ...

... New York Times: "As Israel's air war against Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters in Gaza entered its sixth day on Saturday, a pair of bombings threw the difficulties of the campaign into painful relief: Israel bombed a mosque, which its aerial photos indicated was harboring a weapons cache, and a center for the handicapped, killing two handicapped patients and wounding three, as well as a caretaker."

New York Times: "After potentially serious back-to-back laboratory accidents, federal health officials announced Friday that they had temporarily closed the flu and anthrax laboratories at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta and halted shipments of all infectious agents from the agency's highest-security labs."

Guardian: "US authorities have charged a Chinese businessman with hacking into the computer systems of companies with large defence contracts, including Boeing, to steal data on military projects including some of the latest fighter jets, according to officials. Su Bin worked with two unnamed Chinese hackers to get the data between 2009 and 2013, then attempted to sell some of the information to state-owned Chinese companies, prosecutors said."

AP: "Tracy Morgan has sued Wal-Mart over last month's highway crash that seriously injured him and killed a fellow comedian. The lawsuit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in New Jersey, claims Wal-Mart was negligent when a driver of one of its tractor-trailers rammed into Morgan's limousine van."

Guardian: "Germany is determined to extract a public commitment from the US over future spying activity during talks with John Kerry this weekend, despite a White House preference to try to mend their battered diplomatic relationship behind closed doors."

The Commentariat -- July 11, 2014

Internal links removed.

In 2013, the president changed the health care law without a vote of Congress, effectively creating his own law by literally waiving the employer mandate and the penalties for failing to comply with it. That's not the way our system of government was designed to work. No president should have the power to make laws on his or her own. -- Speaker John Boehner, Wednesday ...

Think about that. You're going to use taxpayer money to sue me for doing my job while you don't do your job. -- President Barack Obama, Wednesday, to a crowd in Austin, Texas

... Jonathan Weisman of the New York Times: "Speaker John A. Boehner's lawsuit against President Obama will focus on changes to the health care law that Mr. Boehner says should have been left to Congress, according to a statement issued Thursday by the speaker's office. By narrowly focusing the legal action on the Affordable Care Act, Mr. Boehner will sidestep the more politically problematic issue involving Mr. Obama's executive action offering work permits for some illegal immigrants who were brought to the United States as children." ...

... CW: This is hilarious. They're suing Obama for temporarily waiving the part of a law they hated most -- the employer mandate -- in a law they despised so much they attempted to repeal it 50 times. Kinda like suing the neighbor for trespass because he ran into your yard to save you from a rabid dog who was attacking you. ...

... digby: "So, the Republicans are going to court to enforce a mandate which they voted against and to which they are completely opposed? ... Also too, the great black whale of Obamacare is just irresistible. They're going to go after it even if it makes no sense at all." ...

... Jed Lewison of Daily Kos: "Yep, it's back to Obamacare, and it's ironically for doing something that Republicans claim they wanted. Which means that if they're successful in their lawsuit, their victory will have achieved ... a faster implementation of Obamacare. Bunch of geniuses, they are." ...

... Tony Pugh of McClatchy News: "Some 9.5 million Americans gained health coverage during the recent marketplace enrollment period as the uninsured rate for working-age adults fell from 20 percent to 15 percent, according to a new national survey by the Commonwealth Fund." ...

... Jenna Levy of Gallup: "The uninsured rate has decreased sharply since the Affordable Care Act's requirement for most Americans to have health insurance went into effect at the beginning of 2014." ...

... Ed Kilgore: "Since most opponents of Obamacare cannot admit even partial success, you won't read those number in the conservative media unless it's part of an effort to deny them." ...

... Jonathan Chait documents how the libertarian Peter Suderman of Reason has accidentally shown "how ObamaCare is succeeding." ...

... Scott Lemieux posts a funny "Shorter Peter Suderman." ...

... Paul Waldman in the American Prospect: "One of the arguments conservatives have made is that people who ended up changing plans will hate the new ones they had to get because of Obamacare. Well, it turns out that among people who previously had insurance but are on a new plan they got through the exchanges or Medicaid, 77 percent say they're satisfied with their new plan, compared to only 16 percent who aren't satisfied, and the results are almost exactly the same for those who were previously uninsured. Not only that, 74 percent of Republicans with new plans say they're satisfied.... [But] no matter how much data we get demonstrating that the law is working well, those voters [in red states] will still get angry every time the word is spoken. So it's in the candidates' interest to keep on talking about it, in the same apocalyptic terms." ...

... Timothy Jost, in the Washington Post, says the federal courts will not rule for litigants attempting to destroy the ACA with the argument that individuals who live in the 2/34ds of the states which do not have their own exchanges cannot receive the tax credits which are critical to enrollment. "Judge Harry T. Edwards of the D.C. Circuit panel ... called the plaintiff's argument 'preposterous.'" (Edwards is a Carter appointee.) ...

... Joan McCarter of Daily Kos isn't so sure, given that the Supreme majority has "already proven that it's perfectly willing to make bullshit decisions about the law." ...

... MEANWHILE, winger Jonathan Keim of the National Review thinks Jost might be right, but only because "President Obama has packed the D.C. Circuit." CW: "Packed the D.C. Circuit" is winger-speak for "filled normally-occurring vacancies on the Court of Appeals." These people really cannot stop themselves even long after the phony "outrages" have died their natural deaths. ...

... AND Many Thanks to Chuck & Dave, the Amazing Koch Brothers, for Spending Millions to Sell ObamaCare to the Yahoos. Niam Yaraghi, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, runs the numbers & discovers that "after controlling for other state characteristics such as low per capita income population and average insurance premiums," ObamaCare enrollment was higher in states that ran more anti-ObamaCare ads. Yaraghi notes that people in these states also were "more likely to believe that Congress will repeal the ACA in the near future..., [so] could have a greater willingness to take advantage of [what they believed was] this one time opportunity."

Colleen Nelson of the Wall Street Journal: "Insisting that he's not really a partisan guy, President Barack Obama on Thursday again criticized Republican lawmakers for inaction as he challenged them to 'do something.' The president mocked Republican suggestions that he should be sued or impeached for taking executive actions and said he would not let partisan gridlock in Washington deter him for pressing ahead with his own agenda.... On the last leg of a two-day swing through Texas, the president summed up what he had accomplished during the first six months of the year, saying that he had taken more than 40 executive actions that didn't require Congressional approval. Still, he said that GOP complaints about overreach were unfounded":

Ashley Parker of the New York Times: "Congressional Republicans pushed back Thursday at President Obama's request for nearly $4 billion to help stem the surge of young migrants from Central America to Texas and to deal with the humanitarian crisis there, signaling that they expected concessions for their legislative approval. The Republicans said that at the very least they planned to amend a 2008 law that affords migrant children from Central American countries extra legal protections when they cross the border. That measure, signed by President George W. Bush, has inadvertently made it more difficult to quickly return these children home." ...

... The Boner Theater Presents Another Dramatic One-Man Performance by Matinee Idol John Boehner. Sarah Mimms of the National Journal: "House Speaker John Boehner had some harsh words for President Obama on the border crisis, raising his voice and slamming the podium during a press conference Thursday. When asked if Congress needed to approve a $3.7 billion request from the president to help ease a recent surge of unaccompanied minors, Boehner repeatedly said that the House would not grant Obama a 'blank check.' The speaker added that the children should be taken care of and then sent back. Pressed on the issue, Boehner appeared to get heated. 'This is problem of the president's own making. He's been president for five years! When is he going to take responsibility for something?' he shouted."

... Greg Sargent: "GOP Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida, a key player in the House on immigration, just met with the House GOP leadership to make one final plea that Republicans act on immigration reform in the face of the current crisis. He was told that it is dead for the year. In an interview with me just now, Diaz-Balart confirmed the meeting, and said he is 'very disappointed' in his party's decision not to move forward. Crucially, he cast the GOP leadership's refusal to move forward as the key obstacle to reform. He said he had legislation ready to go, and that his conversations convinced him that a solid number of Republicans and Democrats would have supported it." ...

"Words Do Matter." Kate Bolduan of CNN confronts Gov. Rick Perry on his conspiracy theory that President Obama had purposely created the border crisis:

Tom Kludt of TPM: Mainstream pundits & the usual suspects go nuts over a "quotation" that Obama didn't say. ...

... Jed Lewison is just not taking seriously enough the reactions to the fake Obama quote -- "I don't do photo-ops."

Ramsey Cox of the Hill: "The Senate voted 75-22 Thursday to confirm Shaun Donovan as director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Donovan was secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), but was tapped to replace Sylvia Mathews Burwell at the OMB after she took the helm at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).... Budget Committee ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said he opposed Donovan's nomination because he didn't think he had the credibility to stand up to the administration and rein in spending.... Sessions said, 'He was chosen because he has a good personality, people skills, and is politically loyal and would defend administration goals and priorities even when the result would be unfavorable to the country's fiscal health.' CW: Also, Sen. Sessions said he couldn't abide anyone with a good personality & people skills, & might have voted to confirm a perpetually-peeved little jerk like himself.

Alison Smale & Melissa Eddy of the New York Times: "Germany's relations with the United States plunged to a low point Thursday, with the government demanding the expulsion of the chief American intelligence official stationed here because, it said, Washington has refused to cooperate with German inquiries into United States intelligence activities."

Benghaaazi! Conspiracy Theory Fizzle Redux. AP: "The testimony of nine military officers undermines contentions by Republican lawmakers that a 'stand-down order' held back military assets that could have saved the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans killed at a diplomatic outpost and CIA annex in Benghazi, Libya.... Transcripts of hours of closed-door interviews with the military leaders by the House Armed Services and Oversight and Government Reform committees were made public for the first time on Wednesday.... Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the Oversight panel, has suggested Hillary Rodham Clinton gave the order, though as secretary of state at the time, she was not in the military chain of command." ...

These transcripts definitively show that Republican attacks against our nation's military servicemembers and former Secretary of State Clinton are completely unfounded and utterly offensive. -- Rep. Elijah Cummings, ranking member of the House Oversight Committee ...

... Steve Benen: "In reality, there was no real need to debunk the right's 'stand-down' Benghazi conspiracy theory again. The argument was thoroughly discredited a while ago, and though some congressional Republicans occasionally still throw it around, in all likelihood, even they probably don't believe it. But just in case someone -- perhaps, say, a Fox News host, for example -- might still be unsure about whether the theory has merit, let's note the new evidence that confirms the old evidence."

Jesse Holland of the AP: "A powerful government workers' union will end its support for the United Negro College Fund after the group accepted $25 million from the conservative powerhouse Koch brothers and the college fund's president appeared at a Koch event.... AFSCME President Lee Saunders said the actions of the college fund's president 'are not only deeply hostile to the rights and dignity of public employees, but also a profound betrayal of the ideals of the civil rights movement.'" ...

... Lisa Graves of the Progressive: "... billionaire oil industrialist Charles Koch was an active member of the controversial right-wing John Birch Society during its active campaigns against the civil rights movement.... The echoes of his past role reverberate along with the millions he and his brother David Koch have spent fueling a John Birch Society-like 'Tea Party' peopled with right-wingers like Birchers of decades past.... In many ways, the playbook deployed by the Kochs today through myriad organizations resembles a more sophisticated (and expensive) playbook of the John Birch Society back then. Even the recent announcement of the Kochs to give a $25 million gift to the United Negro College Fund (with strings attached requiring the recruitment of free market African American college students) echoes that past. In 1964, in the face of criticism for its assault on the civil rights movement, the John Birch Society also funded a scholarship program to give college funds to African Americans who were not active in the civil rights movement...." Via Charles Pierce.

Paul Krugman: "... why should right-wing sentiments go hand in hand with inflation paranoia? One answer is that using monetary policy to fight slumps is a form of government activism. And conservatives don't want to legitimize the notion that government action can ever have positive effects.... But there's also a much more direct reason for those defending the interests of the wealthy to complain about easy money: The wealthy derive an important part of their income from interest on bonds, and low-rate policies have greatly reduced this income." Krugman has several recent blogposts backing up this column.

Paul Krugman: Oh, those prominent "reformacons" who are going to turn the Republican party away from Stupid? The big guns, Ramesh Ponnuru & Yuval Levin, "both did indeed strongly defend [Paul Ryan']s smoke-and-mirrors budgets." Then Levin lied about what his & Ryan's positions on austerity were: "It's one thing to get a major issue wrong, and rely on the wrong research. It's something else, and much worse, to pretend after the fact that you did no such thing."

James Ball of the Guardian: "General Keith Alexander, the then director of the NSA, was briefed that the Guardian was prepared to make a largely symbolic act of destroying documents from Edward Snowden last July, new documents reveal. The revelation that Alexander and Obama's director of national intelligence, James Clapper, were advised on the Guardian's destruction of several hard disks and laptops contrasts markedly with public White House statements that distanced the US from the decision."

Congressional Races

Republican political consultants or operatives did in fact conspire to manipulate and influence the redistricting process. They made a mockery of the Legislature's proclaimed transparency and open process of redistricting by doing all of this in the shadow of that process, utilizing the access it gave them to the decision makers, but going to great lengths to conceal from the public their plan and their participation in it. -- Judge Terry Lewis, in an opinion invalidating Florida's congressional redistricting map ...

... Mary Klas of the Miami Herald: "A judge threw out Florida's congressional redistricting map Thursday, ruling that the Legislature allowed for a 'secret, organized campaign' by partisan operatives to subvert the redistricting process in violation of the state Constitution. Leon County Circuit Court Judge Terry Lewis ruled that two of the state's 27 districts are invalid and must be redrawn, along with any other districts affected by them, to bring the map into compliance with the state's new Fair District amendments."

Senate Race

Every time I get an opponent -- uh, I mean, every time I get a chance -- I'm home. -- Veteran Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kansas), speaking on a Kansas City radio show. Roberts "owns a Washington-area home while his official residence in Dodge City is rented space in a home owned by two supporters. Not so long ago, Roberts joked about having full access to a recliner there." Roberts has a Tea party primary challenger.

News Ledes

Guardian: "The death toll in Gaza has risen as international pressure builds on Israel to end its four-day conflict with Hamas and Palestinian militant groups in the enclave. A Gaza health ministry spokesman said two Palestinians were killed and three injured in an Israeli strike on Friday that brought the death toll to 100. Rocket fire continued at Israeli cities, which have so far avoided fatalities.... The White House said Barack Obama had phoned the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, to offer to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas." CW: So it's 100-0.

Washington Post: "U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in the Afghan capital Friday to push for a resolution to a weeks-long political crisis centered on the country's fraud-hit presidential election. The dispute over last month's run-off has U.S. officials worried Afghanistan, already roiled by a Taliban-led insurgency, could collapse before its first democratic transfer of power."

The Commentariat -- July 10, 2014

Internal links, graphic removed.

Jackie Calmes & Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Obama vowed Wednesday after meeting with Texas officials to secure the state's border with Mexico while treating the surge of Central American children with compassion." AND, yes, Gov. Rick Perry met him at the airport....

... Katie Zezima & David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "President Obama on Wednesday forcefully defended his decision not to visit the Texas border with Mexico to view a burgeoning humanitarian crisis, saying he's 'not interested in photo ops' and challenging Congress to give him new authority to respond to the situation":

... Dana Milbank: Ted Cruz, following Sarah Palin, accuses President Obama of lawlessness for enforcing a law passed by unanimous consent before he came into office. CW: Ted Cruz has finally quit twisting the truth; he prefers outright lies. ...

... Kevin Drum of Mother Jones: "The crisis along the border is tailor made for Republicans. It makes their base hopping mad, it juices their campaign fundraising, and anytime the government is unable to address a problem it makes Obama look bad. Why on earth would Republicans want to do anything to change any of this? As long as Obama is president, chaos is good for Republicans. After all, most voters don't really know who's at fault when things go wrong, they just know there's a crisis and Obama doesn't seem to be doing anything about it." ...

... BUT. Mike Lillis & Bernie Becker of the Hill: "Republicans will take the political fall if they don't provide emergency funds to address the immigrant crisis at the southern border, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) warned Wednesday."

Joey Bunch & Kurtis Lee of the Denver Post: "President Obama, speaking to a crowd of hand-picked guests in Denver Wednesday at Cheesman Park, touted gains made in the economy following the recession that challenged the start of his presidency":

... Joey Bunch: "President Obama heaped criticism on Republicans at a private fundraiser in Denver Wednesday for U.S. Sen. Mark Udall. Obama claimed success in improving the economy but blamed Republicans for a lack of further progress." CW: He also criticized Republicans during his public speech. ...

...Mark Matthews & Kurtis Lee of the Denver Post: "President Barack Obama opened his Denver trip Tuesday evening by dining with five Colorado residents who wrote the White House and shared their stories of trying to make it in today's economy. Then he strolled Lower Downtown, shaking hands and eventually playing pool with Gov. John Hickenlooper." ...

... "Want a hit of this?":

... In his speech, President Obama wouldn't say who won the pool game, but the answer is here:

You don't bring a lawsuit to a gunfight. There's no place for lawyers on the front lines. -- Sarah Palin, on "Hannity," criticizing Speaker Boehner's impending lawsuit against President Obama & once again invoking gun violence & combat as means to end the Obama presidency ...

I disagree. -- John Boehner, responding to a query about Palin's call for Obama's impeachment

Reactions ...

... to the Glenn Greenwald/Murtaza Hussain story on Muslim-American leaders apparently targeted by the NSA & FBI (also linked here yesterday):

Joint Statement by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Justice on Court-ordered Legal Surveillance of U.S. Persons: "It is entirely false that U.S. intelligence agencies conduct electronic surveillance of political, religious or activist figures solely because they disagree with public policies or criticize the government or for exercising constitutional rights." ...

     ... CW: (1) They don't deny they were targeting Muslim-Americans. (2) But they imply there was some good reason to target these men; ergo, they smear these guys. In fact, they explicitly suggest that each of these men "is an agent of a foreign power, a terrorist, a spy, or someone who takes orders from a foreign power." This statement is quite a piece of work.

Nihad Awad, director & co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), in Time, on his reactions to learning he was a target for NSA surveilliance.

ACLU: "In response to a report in The Intercept about NSA spying on five prominent American Muslims, a coalition of 45 civil rights, human rights, privacy rights, and faith-based organizations sent a letter to President Obama asking for 'a full public accounting of these practices.' The coalition, organized by the American Civil Liberties Union, also repeated its call for the Justice Department to strengthen its official Guidance Regarding the Use of Race by Federal Law Enforcement Agencies." The post includes the full letter & list of signators.

Katherine Fung of the Huffington Post: "Speaking on HuffPost Live, [Glenn] Greenwald said that it was necessary to identify the five men in order to 'put a human face on what this surveillance is about and the way in which people are targeted and affected.' The government insisted that the reporters not publish the names, he said, but they chose to do so because 'it's so clearly in the public interest.' Greenwald added that the five individuals -- two of whom also spoke to HuffPost Live -- had no 'conceivable relationship' to terrorism." With video.

Charlie Savage of the New York Times: "The article raised questions about the basis for the domestic spying, even as it was condemned by the government as irresponsible and damaging to national security.... The government refused to confirm whether any of the five had indeed been subjected to surveillance or, if so, what the basis for it was. A group of several dozen civil liberties and rights organizations sent a letter to President Obama on Tuesday expressing concerns about the potential for 'discriminatory and abusive surveillance,' but also acknowledged that 'we don't know all the facts,' and asked for an explanation."

digby: "Back in the 1960s they listened in on African Americans. Some, like Martin Luther King, they tried to blackmail. Now it's Muslim Americans. From what I'm seeing around the internet today, the NSA apologists are unmoved by their plight. If Americans don't want to be surveilled by the government they should probably not have a heritage associated with Muslim nations."

Elias Isquith of Salon: "The FBI -- which is listed as the 'responsible agency' for surveillance on the five men -- has a controversial record when it comes to the ethnic profiling of Muslim-Americans. According to FBI training materials uncovered by Wired in 2011, the bureau taught agents to treat 'mainstream' Muslims as supporters of terrorism, to view charitable donations by Muslims as 'a funding mechanism for combat,' and to view Islam itself as a 'Death Star' that must be destroyed if terrorism is to be contained."

Margaret Hartmann of New York: "In addition to igniting more debate about alleged discrimination and privacy abuses by U.S. intelligence agencies, the revelations could mark a significant turn in the legal challenge to government surveillance programs. In the past, such cases have been dismissed because the plaintiffs could not prove that they were personally targeted by the government, but now there are at least five specific examples." ...

... Marcy Wheeler says the same in her usual long-winded, convoluted, detail-dense way.

Mark Mazzetti & Mark Landler of the New York Times: "When President Obama placed a call to Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany last Thursday, he ... did not know was that a day earlier, a young German intelligence operative had been arrested and had admitted that he had been passing secrets to the Central Intelligence Agency. While Ms. Merkel chose not to raise the issue during the call, the fact that the president was kept in the dark about the blown spying operation at a particularly delicate moment in American relations with Germany has led frustrated White House officials to question who in the C.I.A.'s chain of command was aware of the case -- and why that information did not make it to the Oval Office before the call.... According to German news media reports, the agency may have been aware three weeks before the arrest that the German authorities were monitoring the man."

** Ezra Klein on the myth of the moderate voter: "What happens, explains David Broockman, a political scientist at the University of California at Berkeley, is that surveys mistake people with diverse political opinions for people with moderate political opinions.... The idea of the moderate middle is bullshit: it's a rhetorical device meant to marginalize some policy positions at the expense of others.... 'When we say moderate what we really mean is what corporations want,' Broockman says.... 'Moderate' [has] become little more than a tool the establishment uses to set limits on the range of acceptable debate."

Jennifer Haberkorn of Politico: "With an eye on the November elections, congressional Democrats on Wednesday introduced a bill that would overturn the Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby contraception decision. Democrats and women's health groups believe they have a powerful campaign weapon in pushing back on the Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling that Hobby Lobby and other closely held for-profit companies don't have to comply with the health law's contraceptive coverage requirement if it violates the owners' religious beliefs." ...

Dahlia Lithwick: "What is missing from the Hobby Lobby decision altogether -- beyond the economic disparity and public health arguments I mention above -- is the very notion of the woman herself ... as an agent of her own ethical choices and preferences, whose decision to obtain an IUD, or a condom, or a morning-after pill is a fully autonomous moral choice that supplants the spiritual choices of her employer. Again, it's almost impossible to escape the conclusion that Hobby Lobby, McCullen, and Harris all rest on the idea that women are in effect children with (partial) paychecks, and that their choices are to be second-guessed and gently redirected." ...

... Mark Stern of Slate here, and Jay Michaelson of the Daily Beast here on why LGBT are winning civil rights as women lose theirs. They're both right. CW: In 2012, when Rick Santorum said contraception was "not okay," I thought he was a crazy outlier. I had no idea the anti-abortion absolutists were also against, well, sex. But two short years later, the anti-contraception gang has come so far into the light that it has captured a clique of five of the most powerful men in the U.S. The anti-abortion movement was never about fetal rights; it was always about curbing women's rights. Now the Supremes have used other people's First Amendment rights -- both freedom of speech & of religion -- to batter women right back into the 1950s where "Father Knows Best." ...

... Frank Rich on Hobby Lobby, immigration reform & Warren Harding's letters to his mistress. Overall theme: Republicans are reprobates. " The 'religious freedom' argument of those who want to restrict access to contraception is a fig leaf -- an all too literal fig leaf, in this case -- coming from an American constituency that has had a long history of fighting women's rights whether they involve the womb or the workplace (or in this case, both). Now Hobby Lobby has opened the door for [religious freedom' to be the pretext for turning back gay civil rights." Thanks to MAG for the link. ...

... Gail Collins rants about various Republican tricks. Overall theme: Republicans are reprobates. "... if the impeachment idea caught on it would be the best possible thing for the White House. Modern history suggests there is nothing the American public hates more than Congress trying to impeach the president. Except maybe a Congress trying to sue the president. And then leaves for vacation."

Hey, Todd Akin is back, and he's sorry he said he was sorry about claiming women's bodies naturally "shut down pregnancy" in the case of rape. CW: Let's just hope his book tour lasts all campaign season to remind voters everywhere that the Republican party thinks all you pregnant ladies were "asking for it."

Beyond the Beltway

Allen Johnson & Campbell Robertson of the New York Times: "C. Ray Nagin, the former mayor of New Orleans, was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Wednesday on federal corruption charges, ending a case that began with the rebuilding of the city after Hurricane Katrina. The sentence was less than the recommended 15 years, but Judge Ginger Berrigan of United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana told the court that the evidence failed to show that Mr. Nagin had organized or had been a leader of a corruption scheme.... Prosecutors objected to the sentence, a move that could set up an appeal. Mr. Nagin, who will remain out on bond, hugged family and friends after the sentencing, and was quickly driven away from the courtroom." ...

... The Times-Picayune story, by Jenny LaRoe, is here. Andy Grimm of the Times-Picayune has more on the sentencing. The front page of the Times-Picayune is covered with related stories (as of Tuesday evening).

Jordan Steffen of the Denver Post: "An Adams County District Court judge on Wednesday declared Colorado's ban on same-sex marriages unconstitutional, but he immediately stayed his ruling. Judge C. Scott Crabtree pulled no punches in his 49-page ruling, saying the state's voter-approved ban 'bears no rational relationship to any conceivable government interest.'"

News Ledes

Washington Post: "The Mississippi girl born with HIV who was believed to be cured after aggressive early treatment has tested positive for the virus, a disappointing setback for HIV/AIDS research."

HazMat. Hill: "The House side of the U.S. Capitol is closed due to an industrial spill, according to U.S. Capitol Police." CW: Aw, shucks. Now they won't be able to do anything. ...

     ... Politico Update: "Most of the House side of the U.S. Capitol has been re-opened, after an asbestos scare. The East Grand Staircase, a major staircase in the Capitol, remains closed." CW: Whew! Just in time to sue the President.

New York Times: "Chinese hackers in March broke into the computer networks of the United States government agency that houses the personal information of all federal employees, according to senior American officials. They appeared to be targeting the files on tens of thousands of employees who have applied for top-secret security clearances."

Houston Chronicle: "Six members of a Spring family, including four children and two adults, were shot to death Wednesday after an apparent domestic dispute at their Spring home and a relative was arrested hours later after a police chase and a tense standoff in the cul-de-sac of a nearby neighborhood. Authorities held a news conference about 5:30 a.m. Thursday to announce that Ron Haskell, 33, had been captured and charged after a slow-speed chase and standoff."