The Commentariat -- July 2

The President's Weekly Address: Cutting the deficit & creating jobs:

     ... Mark Landler of the New York Times: "President Obama on Saturday repeated his challenge to Republicans to accept higher taxes on wealthy people and corporate interests, as part of a plan to reduce the budget deficit." ...

     ... ** Krugman writes a very short, must-read post on the President's address. I'd copy the whole right thing if it weren't illegal. Here's the closer: "This is truly a tragedy: the great progressive hope (well, I did warn people) is falling all over himself to endorse right-wing economic fallacies." CW: I've written to Krugman via a comment on this post, begging him to request an audience with the great progressive hope. Why don't you do the same?

** NEW. Prof. Suzanne Mettler, in the Washington Monthly, on the government benefits Americans, especially wealthy Americans, receive through what she calls "the submerged state," a/k/a "tax loopholes." Mettler has published some of these data before, & I've linked the reports, but I highly recommend this article which reader Trish Ramey called to our attention. A sample:

As a matter of budgeting ... there is no difference between a tax break and a social program: both have to be paid for, either by raising tax rates or by adding to the deficit. Eugene Steuerle, a tax economist and political appointee in the Reagan administration, said of the distinction between tax expenditures and direct social spending, 'One looks like smaller government; one looks like bigger government. In fact, they both do exactly the same thing.'

CW: I'm not sure how accurate this is since it's a case of the White House tooting its own horn, but the Council of Economic Advisers released a report (pdf) asserting that the stimulus (American Recovery & Reinvestment Act) raised GDP by as much as 3.2 percent as of the first quarter of 2011 and added as many as 3.6 million jobs over its lifetime. According to the claim re: the GDP rise, "These estimates are very similar to those of a wide range of other analysts, including the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office."

Matt Duss of the Center for American Progress: "It appears the U.S. government may finally be getting smarter after decades of failure to develop a coherent approach to the phenomenon of political Islam in the Middle East. Speaking in Budapest, Hungary, on Thursday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States was seeking 'limited contacts' with members of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood ahead of elections later this year, as well as with Tunisia’s Islamist Ennahda." ...

... BUT, gosh, not everybody agrees this is a good idea. Adam Serwer of American Prospect: "Andrew McCarthy [of the right-wing National Review] is claiming that the news ... is ... proof that [President Obama] is secretly a part of their plan to establish a global caliphate (a plan in which killing Osama bin Laden is a key step!) While Karl Rove ... claims that engagement makes the U.S. 'look weak,' a description that presumably does not apply to Rove's former boss when he also communicated with the Brotherhood."

** Jeffrey Rosen of The New Republic: "The Supreme Court term that ended this week would have looked very different if Justice Sandra Day O’Connor were still on the bench. Twenty percent of the cases were decided by a 5-4 vote, and, in many of those cases, Justice O’Connor would have voted to swing the result the other way."

It was an instance of extreme injustice. I thought that the court was not just wrong but egregiously so. -- Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, on the Supremes' 5-4 Connick v. Thompson decision, in which conservative Justices rescinded a $14 million verdict for former death-row inmate John Thompson who was convicted largely because prosecutors illegally withheld exculpatory evidence ...

... Joan Biskupic of USA Today interviews Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Michael Powell of the New York Times: "Some day soon — today, perhaps? — an observant bookie might ask: Who faces longer election odds? Dominique Strauss-Kahn or the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr.? The new district attorney’s string of losses and/or embarrassments in high-profile cases has become perversely impressive." ...

... Legal analyst Andrew Cohen of The Atlantic: "The New York Times' story Thursday night ... is a devastating bit of business. Even if portions of it are inaccurate -- and I am not claiming that they are -- the piece virtually guarantees that prosecutors would lose the case if they were to proceed to trial. This is so because the alleged victim's credibility now is forever shattered...." Cohen writes a follow-up post here.

George Will enjoys blaming Democrats for everything, but this time he might be right. ...

... NEW. Contra Will -- ergo contra Morgenson & Rosner -- reader Trish Ramey recommends this May 21 post by Paul Krugman. CW: I would love to see a symposium featuring Krugman & Morgenson.

Tim Egan has a pretty hilarious post on Michele Bachman even if he does make a serious point. Here's a sample:

From her contention that eliminating the minimum wage would mean full employment to her assertion that 'almost all' people in the 'gay lifestyle' have been abused, these things can be explained. Bachmann has a worldview that requires constant reshaping in the face of real life. However, if God is writing the script for her campaign, as she says, He needs a fact-checker.

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Chokehold Prosser just can't keep his hands to himself. Yesterday he grabbed the mic of a local reporter who was attempting to question him about the incident in which he allegedly put a chokehold on Justice Ann Walsh Bradley after a heated discussion:

Alexander Burns of Politico: Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain's New Hampshire AND Iowa staff quit. CW: Maybe they're going to work for a more serious candidate, like Newt Gingrich.

Lots of Cash but Less than Zero Class:

America needs a president who understands the special sauce of what it is that makes this country great. The fact of his personal story of being half black and all that is a wonderful, inspiriting story. But it doesn’t qualify him to be president. -- Lynn Forester de Rothschild, Jon Huntsman fundraiser & former Hillary Clinton fundraiser

Alexander Burns: "The most valuable asset [former Gov. Tim] Pawlenty [R-Minn.)] has left is his reputation as a solidly conservative governor who balanced budgets without raising taxes. Now, that reputation is drawing new scrutiny amid the spending showdown in St. Paul.... Throughout the day [yesterday], Democratic Party committees and independent groups pummeled the former governor, using the shutdown to intensify a favorite line of attack: that Pawlenty managed the Minnesota budget through a long string of gimmicks and short-term fixes that have now come home to roost." CW: see Star-Tribune story below on the Minnesota state government shutdown.

Local News

Los Angeles Times Editors assail the California legislature's decision to cut the state sales tax by one cent & cut other taxes at the expense of important programs like higher education funding.

Take the Weekend Off, Kids! Baird Helgeson of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: "There won't be any holiday weekend resolution to Minnesota's government shutdown. State leaders spent Friday cooling off from the drama and bitter words with which they ended days of negotiations Thursday without an agreement for tackling Minnesota's projected $5 billion budget deficit. And Republican legislative leaders and DFL Gov. Mark Dayton had no plans to talk again until after Independence Day, giving both sides time to regroup and reassess."

News Ledes

Reuters: "Rhode Island's governor [Independent Lincoln Chafee] on Saturday signed into law a controversial bill legalizing same sex civil unions, but said it does not go far enough toward legalizing gay marriage."

New York Times: "Greece will get a vital loan installment by July 15 while work continues on a second bailout for the struggling country, euro zone finance ministers said Saturday. The ministers agreed to their portion of the 12 billion euro ($17.39 billion) loan installment in an evening conference call. The International Monetary Fund is expected to approve its part of the loan next week."

New York Times: "The clandestine American military campaign to combat Al Qaeda’s franchise in Yemen is expanding to fight the Islamist militancy in Somalia, as new evidence indicates that insurgents in the two countries are forging closer ties and possibly plotting attacks against the United States, American officials say."

Los Angeles Times: "With marijuana sold openly at retail stores throughout California, some advocates, pot growers and even city officials believed authorized commercial cultivation could be next. But the Obama administration dashed that notion this week, making clear it will not allow such operations."

AP: "Syrian President Bashar Assad dismissed the governor of the key central city of Hama on Saturday after one of the largest protest gatherings to demand an end to Assad's authoritarian regime."

Reuters: "The U.S. government has sued a former NASA astronaut to recover a camera used to explore the moon's surface during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission after seeing it slated for sale in a New York auction. The lawsuit, filed in Miami federal court on Wednesday, accuses Edgar Mitchell of illegally possessing the camera and attempting to sell it for profit."

The Commentariat -- July 1

Paul Krugman: President Obama has been "clueless" about Republican motives. "It’s hard to avoid the suspicion that G.O.P. leaders actually want the economy to perform badly. Republicans believe, in short, that ... for practical purposes his presidency is already over. It’s time — indeed, long past time — for him to prove them wrong." ...

... I've posted a comments page on Krugman's column on Off Times Square and have added my comment.

Republicans aren't just opposing the president any more, they are opposing the economic recovery itself and all that means for America's working and middle class families. -- Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) ...

... Steve Benen: "One of Congress’ most prominent Democrats has effectively accused Republicans of trying to sabotage the nation’s economy, and Republican officials aren’t expressing any outrage, and aren’t even calling for an apology.... And why not? Because to do so would be to engage in the very debate the GOP is desperate to avoid. The lesson for congressional Democrats, then, is to follow Schumer’s lead."

I find it ironic that at times people who continually attack the president, beat him up not only on policy, personality, a whole bunch of things, the minute he takes a tone that is a little more direct, and it was not personal, it was direct in that the leaders of Congress in both parties and especially those who are saying that revenue are off the table period..., that somehow that’s going to hurt the feelings of people. This is not a time to worry about feelings, this is a time to get results. -- White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley ...

... Prof. Jack Balkin on the history of the Fourteenth Amendment re: the Republican-generated debt crisis:

The original purpose of Section Four [of the Fourteenth Amendment], which is reflected in its text, was to prevent political disruption and party wrangling over the public debt following the Civil War. However, the language of the Amendment went beyond this particular historical concern. It was stated in broad terms in order to prevent future majorities in Congress from repudiating the federal debt to gain political advantage, to seek political revenge, or to try to disavow previous financial obligations because of changed policy priorities. ...

Stan Collender of Capital Gains & Games: "Tim Geithner was thinking about the 14th Amendment over a month ago, and ... Geithner absolutely wanted to make sure that others knew about it.... The White House wants to make sure that invoking the amendment won't be a shock if it is used and that the bond market will be comfortable buying debt issued without specific congressional approval.... The White House clearly wants to show congressional Republicans that their plan to demand ransom for the debt ceiling might well be based on a completely incorrect assumption that they can hold the borrowing limit hostage."

New York Times Editors: "The framers of the Constitution envisioned law as having authority apart from politics. They gave justices life tenure so they would be free to upset the powerful and have no need to cultivate political support.... The justices must address doubts about the court’s legitimacy by making themselves accountable to the code of conduct." ...

... Dana Milbank: "The real campaign-finance abuses are more horrible than [Stephen] Colbert’s fiction. The Supreme Court, in five straight campaign-finance decisions, has largely wiped out post-Watergate campaign reforms and, in the case of corporate contributions, undone nearly a century of law. Adding to the anarchy, Congress has been unable to agree on legislation requiring donors disclosure. For those who violate what’s left of the law, there is little risk of punishment, because the FEC, paralyzed by a partisan split, has been unable to agree on much enforcement." ...

... Colbert reports on his grueling FEC hearing. See also yesterday's Ledes for an updated video of his speech following the hearing:

The President of the United States set up an officially authorized system of off-the-book, extralegal prisons and a regimen of government-sanctioned torture; and the consequences of this dark period will be -- at most -- two criminal prosecutions. -- David Kurtz of TPM on the news that the DoJ is conducting criminal investigations into the deaths of two prisoners who were in CIA custody

In preparation for today's David Brooks column, read Driftglass on Brooks' last column. CW: what these "moderate" Republican hacks, like Brooks & Mark Obama-Was-Sort-of-a-Dick Halperin, are doing is attempting to coax Obama to accommodate the right-wing loon-o-garchy. Don't be aloof, Mr. President, don't be direct, Mr. President, roll the fuck over & take it like a wimp. It makes me think Obama has been taking their advice all along, & Wednesday's surprise (to us) presser was an expression of his frustration with the ineffectiveness of his Republican pundit-buddies' sagacious counsel. ...

     ... Update: okay, I really couldn't finish reading Brooks today. He writes something about mediocre teachers, testing & Diane Ravitch. and finishes off with an opinion on a subject about which he seems to know almost nothing. In other words, standard Brooks. This is so not recommended reading.

Cash-In Time for Turbo-Boy. Hans Nichols of Bloomberg: "Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner has signaled to White House officials that he’s considering leaving the administration after President Barack Obama reaches an agreement with Congress to raise the national debt limit, according to three people familiar with the matter.

CW: According to my own winger buddies, today is Glenn Beck's last regular show on Fox "News." Media Matters produces this fine commemorative video of Glenn's Greatest Hits, or what David Ferguson of the Raw Story calls a "Beck-quiem":

     ... Remember this isn't dubbed. Beck really said this stuff. ...

     ... Update: guess Beck's last show was yesterday. Well, how would I know? And how sad to have missed it. Just as I missed every single other Glenn Beck Show.

Right Wing World *

The President's failed. He did not cause this recession, but he made it worse. -- Mitt Romney, June 27

When he took office, the economy was in recession, and he made it worse, and he made it last longer. -- Mitt Romney, June 2 in his annoucement address

The "I Didn't Say What I Said" Fallacy. Mark Murray & Matt Loffman of NBC News: "Over the last few weeks, Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has argued that President Obama's policies have made the economy worse.... When NBC producer Sue Kroll asked the former Massachusetts governor why he believes that Obama's policies have made the economy worse..., Romney gave this answer:

I didn't say that things are worse. -- Mitt Romney, June 30 ...

... Lying about Lying. Steve Benen: "It was amusing when Michele Bachmann falsely characterized John Quincy Adams as a Founding Father, but Romney getting caught telling a blatant falsehood about one of the central themes of his presidential campaign is infinitely more important." ...

... AND this from Dave Weigel on Romney's attacking Obama because Allentown (Pennsylvania) Metal Works went out of business. But, as Weigel writes, "AMW's only chance for survival was an infusion of capital from the government into local projects, something Romney opposed. Its collapse was classic creative destruction -- there simply wasn't business for the plant to do anymore. If you're against bailouts, as Romney is, and you're for bankruptcies and restructing in failing industries, as Romney is, how exactly were you going to save AMW? You weren't."

* Where facts never intrude.

Local News

St. Pete Times: "In an affront to his tea party base and to backers of a Florida bullet train he killed earlier this year, Gov. Rick Scott on Friday gave the green light to SunRail, a controversial Orlando-area commuter rail project on hold since he took office. Critics characterized the move as hypocritical in light of Scott's high-speed rail decision and stated principle of limited government spending, but he defended it by saying SunRail was in the works before he became governor and was so far along he had no choice but to approve it."

News Ledes

New York Times: "The House Ethics Committee confirmed Friday that it is investigating two lawmakers, Representatives Gregory W. Meeks, Democrat of New York, and Jean Schmidt, Republican of Ohio."

New York Times: "A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction on Friday preventing new regulations from taking effect that would have forced the closing of two of the state’s three abortion clinics."

New York Times: "The sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn is on the verge of collapse as investigators have uncovered major holes in the credibility of the housekeeper who charged that he attacked her in his Manhattan hotel suite in May.... Senior prosecutors met with lawyers for Mr. Strauss-Kahn on Thursday and ... the parties are discussing whether to dismiss the felony charges." ...

     ... Update: "Dominique Strauss-Kahn was released from house arrest on Friday as the sexual assault case against him moved one step closer to dismissal after prosecutors told a Manhattan judge that they had serious problems with the case." ...

     ... New York Times: "The release of Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Friday from house arrest in New York represented a startling turnaround, sharpening the focus of political debate [in France] on a central and potent issue: with the weakening of sexual assault charges against him, will he be able to resume a potentially stellar career that could lead to the presidency of his country?" ...

     ... Here's a reproduction of the letter from the Manhattan D.A. to the defense in the Strauss-Kahn case. ...

     ... Don’t worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I’m doing. -- Alleged Strauss-Kahn rape victim, to a prison inmate, 28 hours after the incident; trans. from a dialect of Fulani

New York Times: "Fulfilling the wishes of local political leaders, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced on Friday that a special election to fill the seat of former Representative Anthony D. Weiner would be held on Sept. 13. The special election means that party leaders will select the candidates to represent the Ninth Congressional District...."

New York Times: "Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said Thursday that he planned to stay in his job 'for the foreseeable future.'”

New York Times: "The Cuomo administration is seeking to lift what has effectively been a moratorium in New York State on hydraulic fracturing, a controversial technique used to extract natural gas from shale, state environmental regulators said on Thursday. The process would be allowed on private lands, opening New York to one of the fastest-growing — critics would say reckless — areas of the energy industry. It would be banned inside New York City’s sprawling upstate watershed, as well as inside a watershed used by Syracuse, and in underground water sources used by other cities and towns. It would also be banned on state lands, like parks and wildlife preserves."

AP: "Minnesota's state government is closed for business. It shut down at 12:01 a.m. CDT Friday, the victim of an ongoing dispute over taxes and spending between Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton and Republican legislative majorities.... Even before the final failure, officials padlocked highway rest areas and state parks, herding campers out. The full impact will hit Friday morning as thousands of laid-off state employees stay home until further notice and a wide array of services are suspended."

AP: "Kansas still has one abortion provider, but two others that don't have state licenses were hoping to persuade a federal judge to block a new licensing law and health department regulations they consider burdensome."

AP: "Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez revealed that he is fighting cancer after having a tumor removed in Cuba, raising uncertainty about his political future even as he assured his country he expects to fully recover. Chavez was noticeably thinner and paler as he appeared on television Thursday night...."

Today there are new democracies fighting for life, there are vicious autocrats clinging to power. This is an hour or need. And every democracy should stand up and be counted. -- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in a speech in Lithuania today

AP: "Monaco's reigning prince, Albert II, wed Charlene Wittstock of South Africa on Friday in a long-awaited civil ceremony that transformed the one-time Olympic swimmer into the Princess of Monaco.... On Saturday, the new royal couple is holding an elaborate religious wedding ceremony and a star-studded wedding gala." The civil ceremony:

The Commentariat -- June 30

I've added an Open Thread for today's Off Times Square.

On the President's Press Conference

Now is the time to go ahead and make the tough choices. That’s why they’re called leaders…. They’re in one week, they’re out one week. And then they’re saying, ‘Obama has got to step in.’ You need to be here. I’ve been here. I’ve been doing Afghanistan and bin Laden and the Greek crisis. You stay here. Let’s get it done. And so, this thing, which is just not on the level, where we have meetings and discussions, and we’re working through process, and when they decide they’re not happy with the fact that at some point you’ve got to make a choice, they just all step back and say, ‘Well, you know, the president needs to get this done.’ They need to do their job.
-- Barack Obama

Bravo! This is the fight House Democrats have been making for the last six months under the Republican Majority as they move to end Medicare and continue tax breaks for Big Oil. -- House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi

This was Obama as he ought to be. -- Dana Milbank (good column by Milbank)

Ron Fournier of the National Journal: "In Obama's world, Democrats are for kids and Republicans are for corporate jets. That is a sharp distinction that could help put the GOP on defensive, but it may not be enough to persuade Republicans to change their posture on the debt-ceiling talks."

Greg Sargent: "President Obama ... mounted a surprisingly aggressive moral case for ending high end tax cuts, casting it as a test of our society’s priorities, and argued — crucially — that anyone who fails to support ending them is fundamentally unserious about the deficit."

Ezra Klein sees the President's sharp language today as evidence that negotiations with Republicans have failed.

Jed Lewison of Daily Kos: "If you don't ask the wealthy to pay their share, the money is going to come from children and the elderly. And that's not morally defensible."

E. J. Dionne: "... President Obama put a question to congressional Republicans that should be asked over and over and over until they blink: Are they really willing to risk the nation’s credit and economic turmoil in order to preserve tax breaks for corporate jets, outlandishly low tax rates for hedge fund managers and loopholes for the oil companies?

The Weather Service Matters. Stephen Stromberg of the Washington Post: "The biggest danger on debt is that our leaders don't do enough to balance America's books. The next biggest is that, whether guided by ideology, ignorance or desperation, our leaders decide to shortchange the cost-effective investments that will sustain my generation's standard of living, relegating us to crumbling infrastructure, poor education, pathetic government services — and, perhaps, sloppy weather reports."

CW: Andrew Sullivan could be right here: "By staying ever so slightly above on this issue, Obama is doing the right presidential thing -- while presiding over what may well be the most seismic period for gay equality in history." Still, I find it more than a little dismaying that gay Americans are denied many rights the rest of us enjoy, and I would like to see the POTUS speak out against such nonsensical discrimination.

Dear Jim, You are unbelivably ignorant, but I will try to set you straight for the umpteenth time. Love, Tim. Or words to that effect. The Wall Street Journal publishes an epistolary exchange on the debt limit between Sen. Jim DeMint (Radical Right-Wing Tea Party R-S.C.) and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner (Just Plain R).

CW: Okay, now I get why Washington doesn't care about jobs. In a post about on-line headhunters TheLadders.com, Annie Lowrey of Slate cites a February 2010 Northwestern U. study that found

The recession hit all workers, but it did not hit them equally . According to the study, the unemployment rate topped 30 percent in the lowest income decile. For workers in the second-highest decile, those making about $100,000 a year, the unemployment rate was only 4 percent. And those in the highest-income bracket, making more than $138,700 a year, the jobless rate was just 3 percent. In short, unemployment was 10 times worse for those in the bottom rung of the income ladder than for those at the top of the ladder....

Steve Benen: "... as frustrated as Americans are, they’re not blaming Obama for the mess."

The New Harold Koh. Glenn Greenwald on how low a respected law school dean will go when corrupted by power. Oh, yeah: pay no attention to what Barack Obama says.

Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) speaks on the Senate floor on Monday:

     ... Full transcript of his remarks here. Thanks to Karen Garcia for posting this link on Sardonicky.

Adam Serwer of American Prospect on the significance of the 6th Circuit's ruling for the Affordable Care Act. Although one of the three judges disagreed that the individual mandate was consititutional, they all agreed that the right's "activity/inactivity" distinction was ridiculous. Serwer also notes that this is the first case in which a Republican-appointed judge decided the individual mandate was constitutional. CW: It was also the first appelate-level decision on the ACA.

One of Ezra Klein's readers highlights a way anti-abortion Congressional jerks are likely to effect an increase health inequality, "possibly eradicating these diseases [detected in fetuses] among the affluent and concentrating them among the poorest of society." CW: the test that is the subject of this post has not been administered yet, but the writer's point is well-taken & should make you even sicker about being governed by stupid, sexist bigots.

"Memoirs of Torturers." David Swanson: President Obama's decision not to prosecute Americans involved in torture allowed for a boomlet of books by those advocating for & committing torture. Swanson reviews The Interrogator: an Education by former CIA agent Glenn Carle. "This is the story of how a none-too-bright, self-centered, insecure, careerist bureaucrat with weak principles, a fragile ego, a troubled marriage, and no interrogation experience, but the ability to actually speak Arabic, was chosen to lead the interrogating (or 'interviewing') of an innocent man the CIA boneheadedly believed to be a 'top al Qaeda terrorist' when they kidnapped him off a street and flew him to an undisclosed location outside any rule of law."

Right Wing World *

Sarah Bufkin for Think Progress: Rep. Michele Bachmann's husband Marcus Bachmann calls gays "barbarians" who "need to be educated" and "disciplined."

The People's Encyclopedia. Matthew Desmond of Addicting Info finds that Bachmann's supporters -- in a futile & hilarious effort to make one of her latest gaffes seem less loony (see yesterday's Commentariat) -- altered the Wikipedia entry for John Quincy Adams to designate him "a founding father." With screengrab of the altered page. CW: The Wiki page has since been corrected.

* Is downright disgusting.

News Ledes

Stephen Colbert's victory speech:

The FEC's decision on ColbertPAC:

Washington Post: "In a meeting devoid of anything beyond a gentle chuckle, the FEC decided that [Stephen] Colbert could go ahead with his plans to form a self-titled 'super PAC' that could raise and spend unlimited money on the 2012 elections. But the panel also concluded that the television host’s employer, Viacom Corp., would have to report any help it gives to Colbert for political activities outside the 'Colbert Report' show. The FEC’s 5-1 decision came as something of a relief to campaign-finance reformers, who feared the panel might go further by allowing Viacom — and thus any other media company — to spend unlimited resources in elections without having to disclose the spending." The Hill story here.

Washington Post: "A federal prosecutor has expanded his inquiry into harsh CIA interrogation practices during the Bush administration and is conducting a full criminal investigation into the deaths of two detainees, U.S. officials said Thursday. At the same time, Assistant U.S. Attorney John Durham has concluded that no charges will be filed in the interrogations of 99 other detainees who were in U.S. custody after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said. At Holder’s request, Durham has been examining the actions of CIA interrogators and contractors at 'black site' prisons for nearly two years."

The Hill: "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) announced Thursday morning that he will cancel the July 4 recess so that lawmakers can continue to focus on deficit-reduction negotiations. Reid will schedule a vote on Tuesday, July 5, forcing senators to cancel their plans and show up to the Senate floor. Reid said lawmakers will also work on legislation to create more jobs...."

     ... Washington Post: "President Obama surprised Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates on Thursday with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, paying tribute to his four decades of public service at a regal farewell ceremony outside the Pentagon. The honor came on Gates’s last day as defense secretary after four and a half years in the job. The citation for the medal — the highest civilian honor the commander in chief can bestow — said that Gates had 'selflessly dedicated his life to ensuring the security of the American people.'”

New York Times: "Hundreds of thousands of teachers and public-sector workers across Britain walked off their jobs on Thursday to protest the government’s proposed changes to their pension plans. Union officials warned that this could be the beginning of a wave of strikes this summer and fall over pensions and public-sector budget cuts."

** New York Times: "In a decision that could have far-reaching effects on immigration cases involving same-sex couples, federal officials have canceled the deportation of a Venezuelan man in New Jersey who is married to an American man, the couple’s lawyer said Wednesday. The announcement comes as immigration officials put into effect new, more flexible guidelines governing the deferral and cancellation of deportations, particularly for immigrants with no serious criminal records." CW: one reason to have a Democratic president.

Washington Post: "The Federal Election Commission ... finds itself the target of a very public joke by television comedian and provocateur Stephen Colbert, who is set to testify Thursday on his tongue-in-cheek bid to form an eponymous 'super PAC' for the 2012 election season."

Reuters: "The United States would immediately have its top-notch credit rating slashed to 'selective default' if it misses a debt payment on August 4, Standard & Poor's managing director John Chambers told Reuters. Chambers, who is also the chairman of S&P's sovereign ratings committee, said on Tuesday that U.S. Treasury bills maturing on August 4 would be rated 'D' if the government fails to honor them. Unaffected Treasuries would be downgraded as well, but not as sharply, he said."

Reuters: "President Barack Obama's plan for pulling U.S. troops from Afghanistan will intensify risks in the thick of next year's fighting season, but Obama was right to factor in waning support at home for the war, outgoing Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Reuters."

Reuters: "Greece's parliament is expected to pass a second austerity bill on Thursday to enable the country to avert bankruptcy by securing a 12 billion euro ($17 billion) loan tranche from the EU and IMF. After two days of violent protests just meters (yards) from where deputies passed initial austerity legislation on Wednesday, they began debating detailed measures to implement 28 billion euros in spending cuts, tax hikes and privatizations." ...

     ... New York Times Update: "Greek lawmakers on Thursday passed legislation allowing for the rapid implementation of new austerity measures, a day after voting to sharply reduce government spending and sell off an array of national assets, staving off default on the country’s debt and easing, for the moment, a crisis among countries that use the euro."

New York Times: "Afghan officials said on Thursday that they have arrested two former executives involved in the collapse of Kabul Bank. According to Rahmatullah Nazari, the deputy attorney general, authorities arrested Sherkhan Farnood, the former chairman of Kabul Bank, and Khalilulah Frozi, its former chief executive officer, on Wednesday in connection with what he said was hundreds of millions of dollars in fraudulent loans to bank officers and insiders."