The Commentariat -- May 12, 2014

Internal links, obsolete audio & video removed.

Paul Krugman: Ask any winger -- all attempts to mitigate climate change & reduce pollution are part of a tyrannical Marxist plot.

I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it And I do not believe that the laws that they propose we pass will do anything about it, except it will destroy our economy. -- Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who says he's ready to be POTUS

I do not believe Marco is ready for the fourth grade. -- Constant Weader

Steve M. at No More Mister Nice Blog, takes Krugman to task for not taking into account wingnut obsession with Ayn Rand bullshit. Krugman wonders what the problem would be for Republicans who believe that capitalism can handle any problem thrown at it, even climate change. This might be a reasonable question in a sane world where an entire party didn't base its policy decisions on a god-awful novel by a hypocritical ideologue, but not in Red State World. "Right-wingers love the notion that they're arrayed against what seems to be an all-powerful, seemingly unstoppable enemy; in the real world we all actually live in right now, capitalism has won everything, but right-wingers would rather believe it's under assault, because then capitalists (and, by extension, their champions) are superheroes." The problem with never really graduating from 9th grade.

Frank Rich, in the wake of an exhaustive climate change report released last week from by the White House, points out that Republicans have no intention of allowing the dire outlook from global warming to show up on conservative radars. Why? In his first sentence, Rich gives the game away: "The report confirms in no uncertain terms what sentient Americans already knew...". "nuff said.

Benjamin Wallace-Wells in New York: The popularity of Thomas Piketty's book reflects both a new national preoccupation with economics & the data-driven life. Thanks to MAG for the lead.

Fat & Jobless. Michael Rosenwald of the Washington Post: "A subject long ignored by policymakers, and one that unemployment counselors are too sheepish to raise with job seekers, the link between bulging waistlines and joblessness is now of intense interest to researchers studying the long-term effects of the country's economic malaise."

Adam Liptak of the New York Times on the ideologically & politically polarized Supreme Court: It's worse than ever. "The perception that partisan politics has infected the court's work may do lasting damage to its prestige and authority and to Americans' faith in the rule of law." Thanks to MAG for the link.

What to Do When Your Incessant Dire Predictions Don't Come True. Elise Viebeck of the Hill: "House Republicans have no scheduled votes or hearings on ObamaCare, signaling a shift in the party's strategy as the White House rides a wave of good news on the law. Not a single House committee has announced plans to attack the healthcare law in the coming weeks, and only one panel of jurisdiction commented to The Hill despite repeated inquiries." CW: So I guess it's all Benghaaazi! all the time. ...

And Andy Borowitz, in the New Yorker, says "Benghazi all the time, just in time!" According to Mr. Borowitz, out of work Americans and those needing serious answers to problems of jobs, housing, and other dire quality of life issues, are adamant that congress do nothing until every Benghazi question has been answered. And asked again. And again: "In the House of Representatives, Speaker John Boehner released the following statement: 'I want to reassure the American people that, until we have completed our Benghazi investigations, there will be absolutely no action on job creation, infrastructure, immigration, education housing, or food.'"

... Asked & Answered. Sam Stein of the Huffington Post: "Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) said on Sunday morning that ... one of the biggest questions he would like to ask former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is why the United States was still there.... other members of Congress have asked [the questions Gowdy wants answered], and they've actually asked them of Clinton." With video & transcripts. ...

     ... CW: Apparently the purpose of the Gowdy hearings is to let Republicans do a replay. But, hey, somebody else is asking the questions so it's "news," a la Fox "News."

Lucy McCalmont of Politico: "Some clear tension arose between Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann during a segment Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union," as the two went head to head on a handful of issues, starting with the new Benghazi select committee in the House." ...

... Charles Pierce recaps some other Sunday shows. Bill Kristol stands by his "guess" that Hillary Clinton engineered the Monica Lewinsky Vanity Fair piece.

Los Angeles Times: "L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling on Sunday broke his silence, apologizing for racial comments that prompted the National Basketball Assn. to ban him for life. 'I'm a good member who made a mistake and I'm apologizing and I'm asking for forgiveness," he told CNN's Anderson Cooper. 'Am I entitled to one mistake, am I after 35 years?' ... In [an] ABC interview [with Barbara Walters], Shelly Sterling also suggested Donald is suffering from dementia, which she said could explain comments caught on tape. (Donald Sterling did not address his health in the interview material CNN released Sunday.)"

Boer Deng & Dahlia Lithwick of Slate: "... the reason lethal injection has become more gruesome and violent in recent years is at least partly a result of opposition to the death penalty.... As American physicians sideline themselves and European pharmaceutical firms (and American ones wit global ties) decline to supply the most known and efficacious lethal injection drugs, corrections officials have been pushed to use inferior methods and substandard providers. In other words..., the real culprit in the death of Clayton Lockett is opposition to the death penalty. In pushing for outright abolition of capital punishment, we have undermined the counterveiling effort to make it as clean and painless as possible. The perfect has become the enemy of the good-enough execution."

Haley Edwards of Time: Sen. Al Franken on the FCC's proposed rules governing/destroying net neutrality & the proposed Time-Warner/Comcast merger -- he's against 'em.

James Hamblin in the Atlantic: Something else to worry about: artificial intelligence may take over the Earth. And climate change. And biological warfare. And asteroids.

Conservatives and Those Pesky Poors.

In 1919, as the leaders of the allied powers sat down to decide the fate of nations after WWI, it was brought to their attention that the French were still blockading food and supplies to help 20 million civilians, mostly women and children, starving in Germany. Georges Clemenceau's response was that that was 20 million Germans too many. This is pretty much how right-wingers seem to feel about poor people in this country. But they're trying to change. Oh, not their policies, just the message. The Kochs are on top of this problem: "They're still firmly wedded to their beliefs that government assistance programs engender laziness and that the federal government should be slashed down to just the army and the patent office. What they're trying to do is find a way to convince the less fortunate that cutting taxes for billionaires and blocking minimum wage increases will lead to the sort of shared prosperity that will lift them out of economic hardship." Because this has always worked before. And less than two weeks ago, Republicans demonstrated their concern for poor people in the way they know best. Killing a minimum wage increase. But it's all of a piece with Paul Ryan's "concern" for the poor: 'I want to figure out a way for conservatives to come up with solutions to poverty. I have to do this.' In the meantime, there are still a few social programs left to cut. Republican senate candidate in North Carolina, Tom Tillis has an answer if Paul Ryan doesn't: "...you’re on your own." His plan is to divide and conquer those pesky poors.

Construction on a Maginot Line to keep those poor people at bay and away from decent hard working wingnuts begins any day now.

GOP Heroes.

By way of Tom Tomorrow from Daily Kos.

Congressional Race

Philip Rucker & Dan Balz of the Washington Post: Joni Ernst's "edgy"/(CW: stupid-disgusting) ads have made her a contendah in the Iowa GOP Senate race, despite her relatively meager spending & lack of name recognition. (Obsolete video removed here.)...

... And if Joni Ernst's request to "give me a shot" isn't enough, there are plenty more ads like this out there in Right-Wing World. Dave Weige' at Slate offers a full clip of videos of Republicans shooting at shit to prove their worthiness to lead. Or something.

Presidential Election

Jonathan Chait: "Ben Highton, a political scientist at the University of California-Davis, has identified a trend that hardly anybody in Washington has noticed yet. In a pair of blog posts, Highton persuasively makes the case that the Electoral College has taken on a strong pro-Democratic tilt. That is, the states in the center of the Electoral College distribution lean more strongly Democratic than the electorate as a whole." CW: Well, let's hope that's true.

Amy Davidson of the New Yorker on why the Monica Lewinsky scandal is still relevant. "We seem doomed to repeat our decades, even when they were farcical the first time around. But is Lewinsky the problem? Or is it, as Barbara Bush said recently, that 'if we can't find more than two or three families to run for high office, that's silly.' She had been asked about her son Jeb, and the possibility of four out of five Presidents in a row being named either Bush or Clinton. It's our apparent poverty of political choices, not our taste for scandal, that has us caught in an endless loop."

CW: Didn't have time to read it all, But Glenn Thrush's account of his covering the Hillary Clinton primary campaign of 2008 looks like a promising light read.

"Run, Joe, Run." Peter Beinart of the Atlantic: "While a[n Elizabeth] Warren candidacy would spark one valuable debate inside the Democratic Party -- about government's role in the economy -- a Biden candidacy would spark another: about America's role in the world."

The Commentariat -- May 11, 2014

Graphic removed.

Ezra Klein on wealth inequality. Thanks to Ken W. for the link:

Jenna Portnoy of the Washington Post: "Just a few miles from his family home, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) felt the wrath of the tea party Saturday, when activists in his congressional district booed and heckled the second-most powerful House Republican. They also elected one of their own to lead Virginia's 7th Congressional District Republican Committee, turning their back on Cantor's choice for a post viewed as crucial by both tea partyand establishment wings in determining control of the fractured state GOP."

Russell Berman of the Hill: "Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is stacking the House select committee on Benghazi with lawyers as he looks to demonstrate that the panel will be a serious investigation and not a partisan exercise." ...

... CW: Uh-huh. I guess that's why the Orange Man announced the names of the members of the so-called select committee in a Twitter image. What could be more serious than a Twitter image?

Maureen Dowd: "Pope Francis appears guilty of condoning that most base Vatican sport: bullying nuns.... Women, gays and dissident Catholics who had fresh hope are going to have to face the reality that while this pope is a huge improvement on the last, the intolerance is still there."

Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "Top Secret Service officials ­ordered members of a special unit responsible for patrolling the White House perimeter to abandon their posts over at least two months in 2011 in order to protect a personal friend of the agency's director [Mark Sullivan], according to three people familiar with the operation." CW: Apparently protecting this particular president & his family is not all that important.

Presidential Race

Peter Hamby of CNN: "Vice President Joe Biden appeared at a closed-door fundraiser in South Carolina Friday and delivered what one attendee called 'an Elizabeth Warren-type speech' about the struggles of America's middle class, remarks that were well-received by a room full of influential primary state Democrats.... Another Democrat in the room said the vice president 'talked about how the system was rigged against the middle class....' Biden did not mention his own White House ambitions. But several Democrats at the event were struck by one remark he made about Bill Clinton's presidency: Three sources there told CNN that Biden said the fraying of middle-class economic security did not begin during President George W. Bush's terms, but earlier, in the 'later years of the Clinton administration.'" ...

... James Hohmann of Politico: "GOP leaders reconsider Rand Paul."

Jonathan Alter on the five Roman Catholic justices who think explicitly Christian prayer in public meetings is constitutional: "With judicial temperaments abstracted to the point of indifference, they seem incapable of imagining themselves even in the shoes of their own grandparents, much less people different from themselves. This is among the worst judicial traits imaginable."

Beyond the Beltway

Christina Huynh of the AP: "Two women were married on a sidewalk outside a county courthouse in Arkansas on Saturday, breaking a barrier that state voters put in place with a constitutional amendment 10 years ago. A day after Pulaski County Circuit Judge Chris Piazza said the ban was 'an unconstitutional attempt to narrow the definition of equality,' Kristin Seaton, 27, and Jennifer Rambo, 26, exchanged vows at an impromptu ceremony, officiated by a woman in a rainbow-colored dress."

Matt Lee-Ashley of Think Progress: "An illegal all-terrain vehicle (ATV) ride planned this weekend through Recapture Canyon in Utah is ... is already drawing criticism from the Navajo Nation, putting American Indian burial sites and cultural resources at risk.... Yet San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman (R-UT) and his supporters appear determined to defy federal law by riding their ATVs through Recapture Canyon, an area of southeast Utah known as a 'mini-Mesa Verde' because it contains one of the highest densities of archaeological sites in the country. Cliven Bundy ... has reportedly urged his supporters -- who include armed militia members -- to join Lyman in Utah this weekend."

News Lede

Washington Post: "Residents of two regions of eastern Ukraine turned out in significant numbers Sunday to vote in support of self-rule in a referendum that threatens to deepen divisions in a country already heading perilously toward civil war."

The Commentariat -- May 10, 2014

Obsolete audio removed.

Neil MacFarquhar of the New York Times: "Putting his personal seal on the annexation of Crimea, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia arrived in the naval port of Sevastopol on Friday, where he used the anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany to assert that Moscow had the right to take over the Black Sea peninsula." ...

... Shaun Walker, et al., of the Guardian: Meanwhile, "the gravity of the crisis gripping the rest of Ukraine was underscored by more deadly clashes in the southern city of Mariupol."

Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "President Obama on Friday stood between patio lights and women's blouses in a Walmart [in Mountain View, California,] as he unveiled his latest executive actions aimed at increasing energy efficiency. Mr. Obama said that he had ordered $2 billion in upgrades to federal buildings to increase their energy efficiency, adding that the Department of Energy would also be adopting new standards that would be the equivalent of taking 80 million cars off the road":

Wesley Lowery of the Washington Post: "As Congress left Capitol Hill for a two-week recess on Friday night, it remained unclear whether Democrats will participate in the newly minted House committee to investigate the Obama administration's handling of the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya. House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) announced a roster of seven Republicans -- primarily comprised of members loyal to the GOP leadership -- who will serve on the committee, which is charged with determining whether the State Department responded to the attacks properly.... The Republicans named to the committee were Reps. Susan Brooks (Ind.), Jim Jordan (Ohio), Mike Pompeo (Kan.), Martha Roby (Ala.), Peter Roskam (Ill.) and Lynn A. Westmoreland (Ga.). The roster notably excludes many of the Republican caucus's most vocal members when it comes to the controversy over the Benghazi attacks. Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) will chair the panel." ...

... Paul Waldman watches some YouTube videos & finds out why Boehner pegged Gowdy to prosecute investigate the State Department's handling of Benghaaazi! "To call Gowdy prosecutorial would be an understatement. Uniformly angry and outraged, these videos show Gowdy always seemingly on the verge of shouting, he's so damn mad. Like any good lawyer, he never asks a question to which he doesn't already know the answer. But when a witness gives him an answer other than the one he expects, he repeats his question at a slightly louder volume and angrier pitch, as though the question hadn't actually been answered." ...

     ... CW: Waldman's discovery is more confirmation of the obvious: we're going to see fake outrage over a fake scandal. At this point, the only thing authentic about the Republican party is that some of its members -- including legislators -- are too dumb to know their outrage is fake. Gowdy, however, apparently knows what he's doing.

... The New York Times Editors wrote a scathing rebuke of the whole "Benghazi kangaroo court, also known as the Select House Committee to Inflate a Tragedy Into a Scandal." ...

... OR, as Andy Borowitz puts it, "A new poll indicates ... millions of Americans who need jobs want Congress to get to bottom of this Benghazi thing first."

Robert Costa & Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "Several leading Republicans have called for raising the federal minimum wage and others are speaking more forcefully about the party's failure to connect with low-income Americans -- stances that are causing a growing rift within the party over how best to address the gulf between the rich and poor.... The latest GOP fissure came Friday and involved the party's 2012 presidential nominee, Mitt Romney.... Appearing on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe,' Romney said he parts company 'with many of the conservatives in my party on the issue of the minimum wage' and thinks 'we ought to raise it.'"

Jeremy Peters of the New York Times: In an interview, "Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky on Friday broke with fellow Republicans who have pushed for stricter voting laws as a way to crack down on fraud, saying the party was alienating and insulting African-Americans.... In the interview, Mr. Paul stressed his commitment to restoring voting rights for felons, an issue he said black crowds repeatedly brought up whenever he visited them."

If You Don't Agree with Ted Cruz, You're a Criminal. Dana Milbank: "Sen. Ted Cruz, in a speech to fellow conservatives at the Federalist Society this week, provided detailed evidence of what the right calls the 'lawlessness' of the Obama administration. The Texas Republican, in his latest McCarthyesque flourish, said he had a list of '76 instances of lawlessness and other abuses of power.' ... An examination of the accusations reveals less about the lawlessness of the accused than about the recklessness of the accuser.... Cruz disagrees with Obama on just about everything. But this doesn't make Obama a criminal."

Congressional Races

Gail Collins write a hilarious column about the GOP's ridiculous candidates, especially their ridiculous females candidates.

Beyond the Beltway

Andrew DeMillo of the AP: "A judge has struck down Arkansas' ban on same-sex marriage, saying the state has 'no rational reason' for preventing gay couples from marrying. Pulaski county circuit Judge Chris Piazza ruled on Friday that the 2004 voter-approved amendment to the state constitution violates the rights of same-sex couples. The ruling came nearly a week after state attorney general Dustin McDaniel announced he personally supports gay marriage rights but that he will continue to defend the constitutional ban in court. McDaniel's office said he would appeal Friday's ruling."

Josh Israel of Think Progress: "Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz (R), one of the nation's most enthusiastic voter suppressors, released a report on Thursday outlining the results a two-year investigation into possible voter fraud, conducted by the Iowa Department of Public Safety's Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) at his request. But while Schultz has frequently scared Iowa voters with allegations of thousands of possible non-citizens voting in the state and living people showing up at the polls to cast ballots in the name of dead voters, the investigation revealed found an infinitesimal number of illegal votes cast and zero cases of impersonation at the polls." ...

... Nicole Flatow of Think Progress: "Since Pennsylvania's embattled law requiring photo ID at the polls was passed two years ago, it has not been in effect during an election. Officials blocked the photo ID law from going into effect during the 2012 election, after estimates that some 750,000 did not have the required ID. And in January, a trial court struck down the law, calling the burden imposed by the requirement 'so difficult as to amount to a denial' of the right to vote. On Thursday, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett (R) announced he would not appeal the ruling, meaning that trial court's ruling will stand, and the law remains invalidated. Corbett, however, stood behind the idea of a photo ID requirement...."

Something is happening to Tuck Chodd. He's trying to do his job. Here he questions "Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted (R) on Thursday over the state’s recent decision to reduce the amount of time available to voters in the state to cast their votes":

     ... BUT Tuck lets Husted get away with a whopper. Josh Israel: "Husted, who has been one of the nation's strongest advocates of measures to suppress voter participation, attempted to deflect the blame to the state legislature -- even though it acted on his own recommendations." (Emphasis added.) Here's the exchange, much abbreviated:

Tuck: Why did you make the decision to round down, right? You could have rounded up and said, 'I want fair and uniform elections and the standard has been Sundays, we're going to do these two Sundays, expand the hours, and make sure every voting jurisdiction has the same set of hours.'

Husted: ... Actually, the legislature shortened the early voting period... But that's not me, Chuck. That's the legislature. I have clashed with the legislature.

Tuck: Do you think they made a mistake? Do you wish they didn't do that?

Washington Post: "The Pledge of Allegiance does not discriminate against atheists and can be recited at the start of the day in public schools, Massachusetts' highest court ruled Friday. The Supreme Judicial Court said the words 'under God' in the pledge reflect patriotic practice, not a religious one. The court acknowledged that the wording has a 'religious tinge' but said it is fundamentally patriotic and voluntary."

News Ledes

AFP: " Israeli Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz on Saturday angrily denied the latest media charge of Israeli spying on its US ally and said that someone was trying to sour bilateral relations. Newsweek magazine on Thursday said that during a 1998 visit to Israel by then US vice president Al Gore a Secret Service agent surprised an intruder emerging from an air duct in Gore's room, before his arrival."

Guardian: "A hastily organised referendum on creating the quasi-independent statelet of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine will go ahead on Sunday, as violence and chaos rage in the region in what increasingly resembles the beginning of a civil war. At least seven people died in the southern port city of Mariupol on Friday when the Ukrainian army entered the city in armoured vehicles, apparently to regain control of the city's police HQ, where separatist fighters were exchanging fire with barricaded police."

New York Times: "A United States Special Operations commando and a Central Intelligence Agency officer in Yemen shot and killed two armed Yemeni civilians who tried to kidnap them while the Americans were in a barbershop in the country's capital two weeks ago, American officials said on Friday. The two Americans, attached to the United States Embassy, were whisked out of the volatile Middle East nation within a few days of the shooting, with the blessing of the Yemeni government, American officials said."

New York Times: "On the granite plaza of the World Trade Center memorial, families of Sept. 11 victims gathered on Saturday morning beneath mist-shrouded skyscrapers to watch as the unidentified remains of people killed there nearly 13 years ago were moved to what may be their final resting place. A slow-moving procession transferred the remains on their short journey across from a city medical examiner's office on 26th Street, near the East River, to a specially built repository at ground zero, between the footprints of the old Twin Towers."