Month: June 2009

Whip It Good

by digby

Most of you are probably aware of Jane Hamsher’s whip operation to get the House to vote down the war supplemental, but if not, go over to FDL and check it out. She’s trying to keep progressives who have previously voted against funding for Iraq to stay with the program now that it’s a Democrat in the White House who is asking for the money. That’s not easy, but she’s making headway:

I just want to take a minute to thank everyone who is taking time out of their day to make calls and stand by their commitment to end the war. When I look over the lists and read about the thousands of calls people are making to the offices of members of congress, and I see people like Toby who called 25 offices in one day, it makes it all worthwhile.

We really appreciate the efforts of everyone who has called, and who continue to call. It’s a highly fluid situation, and Rahm Emanuel is furiously horse trading for votes. Sources on the Hill say that they’ve never seen this kind of full-court press from the White House. Members are being bribed, bullied and cajoled into abandoning their commitment to vote against any war funding that doesn’t include a time table to bring the troops home.

I’ve updated the Whip Tool to include the latest information we have on the vote count. Please keep the calls coming.

Now, this is obviously about more than the war funding. If the administration hadn’t put the IMF request in the war supplemental, Rahm wouldn’t be having this problem. They want that money. Here’s Mark Weisbrot of CEPR:

[A]s any Member of Congress or staff can tell you, the Administration attached the IMF money to the war supplemental because the chances of getting the House to vote for it on a straight up-or-down vote were slim to none. By attaching the IMF money, which has nothing to do with war spending, to this bill, the Administration was putting Members of Congress who want to vote against the IMF money in a position where they could be accused of “voting against money for the troops.” It should be noted that there is no urgency for this money; the IMF has hundreds of billions of dollars available for any emergencies that might arise during the time it would take to approve this funding through a normal legislative process.

Read on for the full rundown of why this bail-out for European banks by the American taxpayer is such a bad idea that they had to attach it to a “support the troops” emergency supplemental in order to get it passed. Jane is working to get progressives to stick to their guns on the war, which will make it much harder for the administration to pass their IMF bailout. I frankly didn’t think there was much chance of getting these folks to do that but she’s having surprising success. It’s still a long shot, but not as long as it was a few days ago.
If you want to join in this effort, go over to FDL and use their handy whip tool. It’s easy. Give Rahm some left-sided heartburn.

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One More Great Reason To Avoid Coca-Cola

by tristero

When I was a kid, my sister and I performed a gruesome scientific experiment. We dropped two of our baby teeth into a glass of Coke. After a week or thereabouts (I’m guessing here, it was a long time ago), they started to rot. I never drank Coke, or any sugared soda, again.

If that isn’t enough, here’s another reason to avoid Coke’s crummy products. Coke is “partners officially” with Ken Ham’s insane Creation “Museum”. That’s right: Coke sponsors creationists.

But what should you substitute when you’re feeling thirsty? My advice: try plain water. It works. Oh, and make it tap water. In the States, at least, it’s usually pretty good.

h/t Pharyngula.

UPDATE: You’d think I’d know this already: Never, ever believe anything a christianist says.

Reader MS points to this clarification in the comments to PZ’s original post:

This is hysterical– This means they signed a contract with Coke saying they will only sell Coke products, so Coke gives them a discount.
Thats it.
Contract that says only us–>discount.
Coke isnt ‘supporting’ the Creation museum. Theyre just taking TARD money, not really ‘giving’ Ham anything they dont offer everyone else. But Ham is so desperate for ‘support’ hes even looking to carbonated sugar water for an argument from authority.
ROFL!

Even so, please drink water instead.

Despair

by digby

Many gasbags on TV seem to have concluded that the root cause of the Holocaust Museum shooting is “economic despair.” Since the shooter was a product of right, the obvious way to solve the problem is to cut taxes so that these despairing white guys don’t have to shoot black people in order to stop the jewish conspiracy from stealing all their money.

Oh, and we should have made sure that all the tourists were well armed before they went into the museum.

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Frightening

by digby

Shepard Smith tells it like it is about Fox Viewers:

It would be really nice if the designated “liberals” on Fox (which Shep is not) would be this honest. Instead you get Juan Williams genuflecting before the Falafel King like he’s a 16th century papal supplicant. It’s humiliating.

Good for Shepard Smith. And good for Fox for letting Shep be Shep.

Update: Little Green Footballs recognizes the obvious as well:

With the Tiller shooting and now this — the DHS report that caused such an uproar has been vindicated.

The report was a heads-up to law enforcement, warning of a risk of increased attacks from right wing extremists, and with two attacks in two weeks (in addition to the cop killer in Pittsburgh, the white nationalist with components for a dirty bomb, the plot by skinheads to assassinate Obama, and more) it looks like the heads-up was well warranted.

If anyone’s interested in the relationship between these violent extremists and the mainstream, David Niewert’s book is a good place to start:

And, by the way, I’m sure David is available for interviews, if anyone on TV or radio would like an expert to weigh in on this current spate of violence. Nobody can connect the dots on this subject like he can.

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Your Leaders

by digby

Here’s a voice of the people for you:

Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said Wednesday that he is “frankly not terribly interested” in what the major health care reform coalition thinks and is pushing ahead with a proposal the group rejects.

“I am unaware that HCAN has any votes on the floor of the United States Senate,” said Conrad when told that the coalition Health Care for America Now opposed his plan to create regional health care co-ops instead of allowing consumers to have access to a public plan option.

“They have no votes on the floor of the United States Senate. And I am dealing with votes in the finance committee and the floor of the United States Senate. I am frankly not terribly interested in what these myriad groups all think. I am interested in what people who vote think,” he said, flailing his arms and knocking a Politico reporter’s recorder to the marble floor.

“I don’t even respond to that kind of thing. I think it is just chatter. What matters is results, legislative results at the end of the day,” he said.

But aren’t the “myriad groups” he’s referring to the base of the Democratic Party? Shouldn’t he give some weight to their position?

Conrad wasn’t having it. “What is it that they want to get? Are they interested in the name of something or are they interested in getting a result that delivers on what is behind the name? I am interested in actually achieving a result. Not a label, but an alternative to the delivery model of for-profit insurance companies,” he said. “The great thing about democracy is we get to debate. It’s healthy. It’s good to have a debate.”

He’s obviously interested in what Republican voters think. They are the control group. And never let it be said that your Democratic leaders are elites who would prefer to listen to health industry lobbyists (who you can bet are pounding down the doors and crowding the hallways) than their own constituents. They figure we’ll take whatever scraps they feed us and be thankful for them.

You know what is so amazing about that? Apparently, they think that eight years is ancient history? After all, it was only that long ago that a large enough chunk of the left found a voice in Ralph Nader that it effectively gave an election to the Republicans. That shit does happen.

They can play games with health care and pretend that the details don’t matter and that nobody will figure out that they’re selling out the people on behalf of their owners once again and health care reform turns into yet another bail out for big business. But you can bet that the right will be right there “explaining” why things didn’t work out. (And the left will probably be demobilized if not actively looking elsewhere for leadership.)

Let’s be clear here. Conrad’s brilliant idea for “health care co-ops” is meaningless. There are already a bunch of non-profits in the marketplace and it’s done absolutely nothing to control costs. The only thing that will (short of single payer which was written out of the debate by the presidential candidates) is for millions of people to sign up for a public plan that has the clout to influence pricing and efficiency. Anything short of that is a gift to the insurance companies who are undoubtedly ecstatic that Conrad has put this “compromise” on the table.

The only people who are engaged in the details of the health care debate on the merits are liberal interest groups and the activists. The great stressed out middle is too confused to believe anything will ever change and the right and the Medical Industrial Complex (for various reasons) are determined to defeat reform by any means possible. Why do the Democrats think it’s a good idea to dismiss and deride their only allies in a situation like this? Is it too cynical to entertain the thought that they are actively courting failure?

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Losing by Winning

by digby

I’ve been as much of a defender of Sotomayor’s nomination as anyone, particularly in light of the vicious attacks right out of the box from Boss Limbaugh and the boyz. But as I watch this unfold, I realize that we all may have been played a little bit by the right wing into reacting in a way that benefits them as much as ourselves. Or, perhaps we simply failed once again to see how our defenses were actually advancing conservative values.

I first got an inkling of this when I saw liberals coming out of the woodwork to defend Sotomayor by pointing out that she had actually ruled against discrimination claims 86 out of 96 times. I understand that reaction, but it’s actually counterproductive to the larger argument about discrimination. It validates the assumption that discrimination claims are mostly bogus and that even “wise Latina” liberals like Sonya Sotomayor agree. Now, maybe that’s true in terms of the cases she heard and ruled on, but it’s not useful for liberals to be in a position of saying that the mark of a good judge is one who rules against discrimination claims.

And now we have this story in the NY Times which will probably do her a world of good. Unfortunately:

Imprisoned at the age of 16 for the killing of a high school classmate, Mr. Deskovic, now 35, filed a habeas corpus petition in 1997 in Federal District Court contesting his conviction. The court denied the request because the paperwork had arrived four days late. Mr. Deskovic and one of his lawyers — who he said had been misinformed about the deadline for filing — appealed the decision to the federal appellate court on which Ms. Sotomayor sat.

Ms. Sotomayor, along with the other judge on the panel, ruled that the lawyer’s mistake did not “rise to the level of an extraordinary circumstance” that would compel them to forgive the delay. There was no need to look at the evidence that Mr. Deskovic insisted would affirm his innocence, they said.

Mr. Deskovic spent six more years behind bars, until DNA found in the victim not only cleared him, but connected another man to the crime.

Habeas corpus petitions are rarely granted, and Mr. Deskovic knew that all along. Federal judges routinely deny them, including for purely procedural reasons. But he listened as President Obama, in seeking a new Supreme Court justice, talked about how he wanted a judge with not only great intellect, but also great empathy, a judge who knew how the real world worked and who could apply some common sense.

And so Mr. Deskovic is angry. All over again.

“When we filed the appeal, I thought for sure that she and the other judge were going to see the facts of the case, that this wasn’t an error of my doing and that upholding a ruling like that would be a miscarriage of justice,” Mr. Deskovic said.

I have no idea about the merits of the case or the underlying details. It’s entirely possible that Sotomayor was just following the law and did the right thing. But I am uncomfortable that this case, like the discrimination statistics, will undoubtedly be used to defend her from charges of being too liberal and will help her get confirmed. This is not an argument I want to make.

Someday we’re going to have to make the argument that justice is as important as being tough and unyielding. The balance is way out of whack in our culture.

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Just Don’t Call It Terrorism

by digby

You’ve undoubtedly heard by now that a white supremacist tried to shoot up the Holocaust Museum today.

It’s pretty clear that the right wing has lost whatever restraint it had and that the ongoing paroxysms of violent, extreme rhetoric are having their effect. The crocodile tears of the anti-abortion forces after the Tiller assassination notwithstanding, it’s also pretty clear that they know this violence is effective. If you want to paralyze a society and force people to capitulate out of fear of random violence, nothing beats terrorism.

And once the right gets everybody looking over their shoulders, they’ll misdirect the citizenry and run to the rescue with calls for “law and order.” (Recall that the violence of the 60s didn’t originate with the left — it originated with racist cops unleashing hell on non-violent protesters.) It’s working great with the deficit.

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No Brainer

by digby

I’ve been musing for some time about the logic of using torture on terrorist suspects but not criminal suspects and wondering when that line was going to break down. (In my view, the indiscriminate, reflexive use of tasering is the first sign that it already is…)

Apparently, in the UK it’s happened:

Six Scotland Yard officers could face assault charges after being accused of inflicting torture by ‘waterboarding’.

Four suspects are said to have been subjected to simulated drowning during searches of two properties for drugs.

These suspects were allegedly selling pot, by the way.

Waterboarding is illegal in the UK, so the officers will be dealt with if these charges are true. And there have been similar cases in the US in the past. But one has to wonder if it’s going to become more common — after all, half the country thinks it’s sometimes necessary and many of the authorities seem to think it works.

It’s hard to put these genies back in the bottle.

“She made a very simple interaction with the police into a difficult task”

by digby

I wrote a post about the 72 year old grandmother who’d been tasered a few days ago. They’ve now released the dashcam video which shows that she was argumentative and rude to the police officer.

Here’s the thing. the man was dealing with an unarmed, cantankerous elderly woman who'[d been speeding. And instead of handling the situation as cops would have done forever — calming the person, talking her down, being reasonable (after all she wasn’t dangerous to him in the least) he escalated it with threats of violence and anger. And then he shot that woman with 50,000 volts, not because she was dangerous to herself or others, but because she was belligerant and he didn’t know how to handle it.

I know that there are people out there who believe she deserved it and that police don’t have any obligation to use skills other than brute force on anyone who doesn’t immediately comply with their requests. A police officer viewing the video in this news report matter-of-factly says that the problem was that “she made a very simple interaction with the police into a difficult task.” In America today that deserves electrocution.

This crap is un-American. We have made it so that citizens of this country are now subject to 50,000 volts for being belligerent to authorities. If you think that’s freedom, you’ll love living in China or Saudi Arabia.

And by the way, the woman is lucky the taser didn’t kill her like it killed this guy a few days later:

The son of a prominent KSL employee died Tuesday in Washington County after a police officer deployed a Taser when the man ran down a road in what authorities called an “agitated” state.

Brian Layton Cardall, 32, was traveling with his wife south on State Road 59 near Hurricane on Tuesday afternoon. According to KSL.com, the vehicle pulled over to the side of the road when Cardall, who recently had been struggling with mental health issues, began having an “episode.”

Cardall left the car and ran down the road, and his wife called police, said Washington County Undersheriff Jake Adams. A Hurricane police officer who responded to the scene deployed a Taser on Cardall, who lost consciousness, Adams said.

Cardall was treated at the scene but he was pronounced dead after being transported to Dixie Regional Medical Center in St.George, Adams said.

The Washington County Sheriff’s Office did not immediately release further details about the incident.

Cardall is the son of KSL Editorial Director Duane Cardall, according to KSL.com. Attempts to reach Duane Cardall for comment Tuesday afternoon were unsuccessful.

Duane Cardall’s administrative assistant said he and his wife, Margaret, were traveling to St.George late Tuesday to be with his son’s wife, who is six months pregnant.

Adams said the Washington County Critical Incident Task Force is investigating Cardall’s death.

The Hurricane Police Department did not return a phone call requesting comment on the officer who deployed the Taser.

A family statement released by Paul Cardall, Brian’s brother and a renowned pianist from Sandy, read, “Brian is a wonderful son, brother, father, and husband who loved being with people. He was full of personality and wanted to make a difference in this world. He was working on his Ph.D. in Molecular Ecology at Northern Arizona University. He loved being in the outdoors and with his daughter Ava and beautiful wife Anna. We will miss Brian but are comforted by our faith.”

Update: here’s TASER’s statement on the Cardell death:

Until all the facts surrounding this tragic incident are known, it is inappropriate to jump to conclusions on the cause of death. We believe that TASER® technology protects life and if called upon we are prepared to help the investigation of this unfortunate incident.

Although, no use of force device is risk free including TASER technology, when used properly, medical and law enforcement experts have concluded that TASER technology is among the most effective response to resistance available to law enforcement officers to halt potentially violent situations that may pose a safety risk to an officer, suspect or innocent citizens.

For the past two years, National Institute of Justice (NIJ) has conducted a review and study of in-custody deaths which have occurred following the use of a TASER brand devices. The interim report, release last summer concluded in its findings that:

“Although exposure to CED is not risk free, there is no conclusive medical evidence within the state of current research that indicates a high risk of serious injury or death from the direct effects of CED exposure. Field experience with CED use indicates that exposure is safe in the vast majority of cases. Therefore, law enforcement need not refrain from deploying CEDs, provided the devices are used in accordance with accepted national guidelines.”

“While we continue to acknowledge that TASER® technology is not risk free, the NIJ report speaks volumes affirming our previous statements concerning the safety of TASER devices and provides an invaluable independent report to our critics.

STATS: As of March 31, 2009 TASER International has sold approximately 406,000 TASER® brand electronic control devices (ECDs) to more than 142,200 law enforcement and military agencies. There are 177 law enforcement agencies in Utah that deploy our TASER technology.

Sincerely,
Steve Tuttle
Vice President of Communications

Except for all the deaths and the horrible pain it’s completely safe.

Canadian media have done extensive study on tasers and one of their investigations turned up the fact that TASER is, unsurprisingly, paying off coroners and rigging the data. These guys are following in the fine tradition of the tobacco companies.

h/t to various readers

Hearts And Minds

by digby

I wonder how we’d feel if it happened to us?

Meanwhile:

WaPo: The Obama administration objected yesterday to the release of certain Bush-era documents that detail the videotaped interrogations of CIA detainees at secret prisons, arguing to a federal judge that doing so would endanger national security and benefit al-Qaeda’s recruitment efforts.

Bombing civilians doesn’t benefit al Qaeda’s recruitment efforts?
So continues the assault on reason.
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