Month: September 2014

Wasting valuable cannon fodder

by digby

Steve at No More Mister Nice Guy makes an important point that seems to have eluded all the hysterical gasbags on TV today. Referring to the shocking news that the American recently revealed to have been killed fighting for ISIS in Syria had once been an airline worker in Minneapolis (and therefore all of our airports are under siege from ISIS, runferyerlives!) he writes:

Think about it for one second: You’re the leadership of ISIS. You make a big effort to recruit foreign fighters, and one of those fighters turns out to have access to secure areas at a major U.S. airport. What do you do?

Well, if you’re serious about conducting terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, you don’t put this guy on the front lines as cannon fodder. You send him to a training camp far away from the field of battle. Then you send him back to Minnesota in one piece. You don’t squander an asset like this by getting him killed like any random soldier …

One would think that any American, in fact, would be kept off the front lines in their war if they were intent upon attacking the US any time soon. Even if they don’t have access to airports they surely would have value to a terrorist group planning attacks on US soil.

Yes, it could happen. It’s certainly a possibility. But they are very busy right now committing atrocities and scaring the living hell out of everyone they come in contact with in Iraq and Syria. We don’t appear to be at the top of their list of priorities at the moment. Their threats against us are to kill American they capture, a terrible thing to be sure. But unless you are an American in Iraq or Syria right now you probably don’t have to stay up nights worrying about ISIS sneaking into your home and killing you in your bed.

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It must have something to do with the beards

by digby

WWJD? “Convert ’em or kill ’em” of course:

“Duck Dynasty” patriarch Phil Robertson put forward a strategy Tuesday for combating militants with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria: “convert them or kill them.”

Robertson was asked to opine on Fox News’ “Hannity” about how to combat radical Islam and anti-Christian behavior, after ISIS militants released a video showing the beheading of a second American journalist.

“In this case, you either have to convert them — which I think would be next to impossible,” Robertson said. “I’m not giving up on them, but I’m just saying either convert them or kill them. One or the other.”

“I’d much rather have a Bible study with all of them and show them the error of their ways and point them to Jesus Christ … however, if it’s a gunfight and a gunfight alone, if that’s what they’re looking for, I’m personally ready for either one,” Robertson later added.

Yeah, I’ll bet he is …

Here we go folks ….

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The ad war has begun

by digby

Here are just a couple of GOP ads in Red States against Democratic incumbents:

From Dave Weigel:

Greg Sargent noticed this month, Arkansas Sen. Mark Pryor went on air with an ad describing how he battled cancer and his weak-kneed insurer.

“No one should be fighting an insurance company while they’re fighting for their life,” said Pryor in the ad. “That’s why I passed a law that prevents insurance companies from canceling your policy if you get sick, or denying coverage for pre-existing conditions.”

Here’s the answer to that ad:

It looks as though American Crossroads didn’t get the memo to nix the anti-Obamacare ads that everyone in DC has been yammering about.

Meanwhile, on the Western Front in the War on Women, there’s this:

“She’s not independent — she just votes the party line,” the voice in ad says. “Ann Kirkpatrick: too much baggage.”

Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Ariz.) doesn’t have a head in the latest attack ad against her — just a pair of legs, some high heels, and a lot of “baggage.”

The ad’s main charges seem to be that Kirkpatrick is a woman and that she supports President Barack Obama. It includes soundbites of Kirkpatrick noting that she likes the Affordable Care Act and is “not going to second guess the President.”

This attack should be a lesson to Democrats like Kirkpatrick . No matter how often they vote with the Republicans (and she votes with them as often as possible) they will be called doctrinaire, partisan Democrats by the GOP. There’s really no margin in it.

So far, we’re seeing anti-Obamacare and sexist, dishonest attacks. One would assume the Democrats are more than prepared for that.

Right?

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No free lunch


by Tom Sullivan

Our friends on the right get almost gleeful whenever they see an opening to use their superior command of economics to explain to liberals how the world really works.

Yet, the basic concept they themselves have trouble wrapping their brains around is “no free lunch.”

Gov. Sam Brownback’s tea party-driven economic experiment in Kansas is taking a toll. The latest poll shows him trailing his Democratic opponent, Paul Davis, by 8 points. The Kansas City Star says Brownback is “paying a political price for bold leadership.” This is what bold leadership looks like:

Brownback has slashed income taxes, cut thousands off welfare, curbed abortion rights, tried gaining control of judicial appointments and made a failed attempt to cut arts funding.
When the moderate wing of his party stood in the way, Brownback successfully campaigned for conservatives more in step with his political philosophy so he could exert a tighter grip on the statehouse.

The result? His state’s economy is headed into the tank after slashing income taxes at Brownback’s urging, with more cuts scheduled and growth below projections. Standard & Poors downgraded Kansas’ credit rating in August. Davis charges that another Brownback term will bring cuts to Kansas schools.

Five hundred women from across the state gathered last week at the Taking Back Kansas convention in Wichita, put on by Women for Kansas and chaired by Lynn Stephan. The bipartisan group aims to turn out Brownback, Secretary of State Kris Kobach, and U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts in November. Most of the candiidates they support are Democrats.

“Women in this state are scared,” Stephan said. “We’re going broke” under the leadership of Brownback’s tea-party fiscal ideas. Schools and hospitals in some small towns may have to close, she said, and then “the town will dry up and blow away.”
Although she considers herself a moderate Republican, Stephan said that “the Republican party abandoned me 10 years ago.”

That’s about two decades after the party abandoned reality for the magical thinking of trickle down economics and started worshiping the Market as a deity.

As much as conservatives discuss curtailing entitlements, many of them behave as if they are entitled to kick ass on any country they feel is stepping out of line, and to doing so without paying for it. They feel entitled to beat their chests about how exceptional America is, and entitled to the public infrastructure their parents and grandparents built with their taxes and sweat in making it a world power. Yet they seem to have no sense of pride in maintaining it. Not their responsibility. They’re taxed enough already.
They complain their taxes are too high, and all the while the country is running a budget deficit that proves they are not paying enough to cover its costs and to keep it from crumbling.

A report last year ranked U.S. highways 18th in the world, behind Korea, Luxembourg, and Saudi Arabia. Point this out, and conservatives insist that the problem is government is spending too much. That we need to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse — the bane of Republicans’ perpetual motion economy.

See, America could maintain its infrastructure, fund top-notch schools, and support a costly global empire indefinitely without raising taxes just by eliminating the friction of waste, fraud, and abuse.

And by installing this simple device — one that big oil companies have tried to suppress — your car can get 500 miles per gallon. Order now!

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Tasers, Electro-shock in the courtroom and “Don’t do stupid stuff”

by digby

I’ve got some pieces up today in other venues you might be interested in checking out. (I guess I’ve been busy …)

Over at Salon I discuss a terrible case of a judge ordering a defendant who is representing himself in court to be zapped with an electronic bracelet he was wearing — for making an argument the judge doesn’t like:

“Stop,” Judge Nalley said.

“… principles of common right and common reason are …” King said.

“Mr. Sheriff … ” Nalley said

“… null and void,” King continued.

“… do it,” Nalley ordered. “Use it.”

“(DEFENDANT SCREAMS).”

That’s a passage from a transcript of a trial in a Maryland courtroom last week in which a judge ordered a deputy sheriff to administer electroshock to a defendant who was representing himself in a case before him. The defendant was not charging the bench or threatening violence in any way. He was simply saying things the judge did not want to hear.

For unknown reasons, this defendant had been outfitted with an electronic device, presumably something having to do with the fact that he was representing himself and would be moving freely about the courtroom. When he asserted some dicey “sovereign citizen” legal doctrine, the judge told him to stop and when he didn’t, the judge ordered the deputy to shock him. He fell to the ground, screaming in pain, and after he was calm a medic was called to make sure his vital signs were OK. Then they went back to jury selection as if nothing had happened. The defendant, as you might imagine, was somewhat subdued after the electroshock treatment.

Apparently charging him with contempt wouldn’t have sufficed.

Over at BillMoyers.com Joshua Holland published an interview I did with him about tasers and the new generation of crowd control devices.

And finally, here are some thoughts I jotted down for The New York Times‘ discussion group Room for Debate about President Obama’s “Don’t do Stupid Stuff” Doctrine. (I’m for it …)

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Should Obama just issue those executive orders?


by digby

Brian Beutler makes a good point about the administration’s apparent decision to put off its immigration executive orders until after the election:

The political drawbacks of immediate action are overstated. The best political argument I can think of for waiting until after the midterms is that it’d place immigration and deportation right back at the center of the national policy debate just as the political media turns its exclusive attention to the 2016 election and the GOP primary. But Republican presidential hopefuls are making disqualifying statements about immigration right now, all on their own, and will continue to do so whether Obama acts in the fall or in the winter.

Beutler thinks the administration should just do it now and I think he’s probably right that doing it earlier rather than later won’t make a difference. But that means that it is also unlikely to help, which greatly influences such a decision in the September before an election. (I also can see the logic in saying, “for a couple of months difference, why take the chance?”)  In any case, I can understand why the administration would not want to be blamed, rightly or wrongly, for the loss of the Senate because they refused to hold off on some executive orders until after the election.

There are only two months to go.  As long as they do issue the orders soon after the election it’s hard to see it as a serious betrayal. As long as they do issue those orders ….

QOTD: An ignorant creep

by digby

Ted Cruz’s daddy lecturing African Americans on their own history:

“I said, as a matter of fact, ‘Did you know that Civil Rights legislation was passed by Republicans? It was passed by a Republican Senate under the threat of a filibuster by the Democrats,’” Cruz said. “‘Oh, I didn’t know that.’ And then I said, ‘Did you know that every member of the Ku Klux Klan were Democrats from the South?’ ‘Oh I didn’t know that.’ You know, they need to be educated.”

Somebody needs to be educated but it’s not African Americans.

This truly is the stupidest right wing trope out there, and that’s saying something. This silly thing ran over the week-end on the same subject.I don’t know if they’re idiots or think everyone else is an idiot but the idea that black people don’t understand that the parties switched places– due to civil rights! — in the 1960’s and 1970’s is mind-boggling.

Here’s a little friendly reminder of how the pre-eminent Republican strategist of the Reagan years explained the Southern Strategy and the evolution of the GOP on these issues:

You start out in 1954 by saying, “Ni**er, ni**er, ni**er.” By 1968 you can’t say “ni**er”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “Ni**er, ni**er.”

And here’s the President of the United States in 1965 exhorting the Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act. A little hint: he wasn’t a Republican:

Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, Members of the Congress:

I speak tonight for the dignity of man and the destiny of democracy.

I urge every member of both parties, Americans of all religions and of all colors, from every section of this country, to join me in that cause.

At times history and fate meet at a single time in a single place to shape a turning point in man’s unending search for freedom. So it was at Lexington and Concord. So it was a century ago at Appomattox. So it was last week in Selma, Alabama.

There, long-suffering men and women peacefully protested the denial of their rights as Americans. Many were brutally assaulted. One good man, a man of God, was killed.

There is no cause for pride in what has happened in Selma. There is no cause for self-satisfaction in the long denial of equal rights of millions of Americans. But there is cause for hope and for faith in our democracy in what is happening here tonight.

For the cries of pain and the hymns and protests of oppressed people have summoned into convocation all the majesty of this great Government—the Government of the greatest Nation on earth.

Our mission is at once the oldest and the most basic of this country: to right wrong, to do justice, to serve man.

In our time we have come to live with moments of great crisis. Our lives have been marked with debate about great issues; issues of war and peace, issues of prosperity and depression. But rarely in any time does an issue lay bare the secret heart of America itself. Rarely are we met with a challenge, not to our growth or abundance, our welfare or our security, but rather to the values and the purposes and the meaning of our beloved Nation.

The issue of equal rights for American Negroes is such an issue. And should we defeat every enemy, should we double our wealth and conquer the stars, and still be unequal to this issue, then we will have failed as a people and as a nation.

For with a country as with a person, “What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” …

I don’t think a Republican would have said this either:

Somehow you never forget what poverty and hatred can do when you see its scars on the hopeful face of a young child.

I never thought then, in 1928, that I would be standing here in 1965. It never even occurred to me in my fondest dreams that I might have the chance to help the sons and daughters of those students and to help people like them all over this country.

But now I do have that chance—and I’ll let you in on a secret—I mean to use it. And I hope that you will use it with me.

This is the richest and most powerful country which ever occupied the globe. The might of past empires is little compared to ours. But I do not want to be the President who built empires, or sought grandeur, or extended dominion.

I want to be the President who educated young children to the wonders of their world. I want to be the President who helped to feed the hungry and to prepare them to be taxpayers instead of taxeaters.

I want to be the President who helped the poor to find their own way and who protected the right of every citizen to vote in every election.

I want to be the President who helped to end hatred among his fellow men and who promoted love among the people of all races and all regions and all parties.

I want to be the President who helped to end war among the brothers of this earth…

By the way, Republican avatar Ronald Reagan opposed every major piece of civil rights legislation adopted by Congress, including the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. But he was cheery about it.

I know this is overkill. It’s obvious to any sentient being that the racist Southerners who had been Democrats out of tradition stemming from the Civil War were disillusioned and adrift once the leadership of the Democratic Party endorsed civil rights for African Americans. And anyone with a 6th grade education knows that the Republicans then took advantage of that opening and grabbed on to that racist faction with both hands. Maybe Ted Cruz’s daddy really doesn’t know that. Somebody should tell him. He sounds like a fool.

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Yearning for ancient power

by digby

This piece in the New Republic explains why ISIS is so barbaric. They are throwbacks to over a thousand years ago:

In June 29, 2014—or the first of Ramadan, 1435, for those who prefer the Islamic calendar to the Gregorian—the leaders of the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS) publicly uttered for the first time a word that means little to the average Westerner, but everything to some pious Muslims. The word is “caliph.” ISIS’s proclamation that day formally hacked the last two letters from its acronym (it’s now just “The Islamic State”) and declared Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, born Ibrahim ibn Awwad ibn Ibrahim ibn Ali ibn Muhammad al-Badri al-Samarrai, the Caliph of all Muslims and the Prince of the Believers. For Muslims of a certain hyper-antiquarian inclination, these titles are not mere nomenclature. ISIS’s meticulous use of language, and its almost pedantic adherence to its own interpretation of Islamic law, have made it a strange enemy, fierce and unyielding but also scholarly and predictable. The Islamic State obsesses over words like “caliph” (Arabic: khalifa) and “caliphate” (khilafa), and news reports and social media from within ISIS have depicted frenzied chants of “The Caliphate is established!” The entire self-image and propaganda narrative of the Islamic State is based on emulating the early leaders of Islam, in particular the Prophet Muhammad and the four “rightly guided caliphs” who led Muslims from Muhammad’s death in 632 until 661. Within the lifetimes of these caliphs, the realm of Islam spread like spilled ink to the farthest corners of modern-day Iran and coastal Libya, despite small and humble origins.

Muslims consider that period a golden age and some, called Salafis, believe the military and political practices of its statesmen and warriors—barbaric by today’s standards but acceptable at the time—deserve to be revived. Hence ISIS’s taste for beheadings, stonings, crucifixions, slavery, and dhimmitude, the practice of taxing those who refuse to convert to Islam.

Well, they certainly are doing a good job of freaking out the West with this return to the dark ages. It would be very wise if the west resisted their provocations and kept things in perspective. This method of execution is meant to be barbaric and horrifying. But the fact is that journalists in war zones and other chaotic environments have a very dangerous job and are far too often victims of violence:

The annual toll of journalists killed in connection with their work was again very high in 2013, although this year’s number, 71, was a slight fall (-20%) on last year’s, according to the latest round-up of freedom of information violations that Reporters Without Borders issues every year.

There was also a big increase (+129%) in abductions and the overall level of violations affecting news providers continued to be very high.

“Combatting impunity must be a priority for the international community, given that we are just days away from the 7th anniversary of UN Security Council Resolution 1738 on the safety of journalists and that there have been new international resolutions on the protection of journalists,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Christophe Deloire said.

The regions with the largest numbers of journalists killed in connection with their work were Asia (with 24) and the Middle East and North Africa (with 23). The number of journalists killed in sub-Saharan Africa fell sharply, from 21 in 2012 to 10 in 2013 – due to the fall in the number of deaths in Somalia (from 18 in 2012 to 7 in 2013). Latin America saw a slight fall (from 15 in 2012 to 12 in 2013).

Syria, Somalia and Pakistan retained their position among the world’s five deadliest countries for the media (see below). They were joined this year by India and the Philippines, which replaced Mexico and Brazil, although the number of journalists killed in Brazil, five, was the same as last year. Two journalists were killed in Mexico, while three others disappeared. The return of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) to power and new government pressure on the media contributed to a sharp increase in self-censorship in Mexico. An increase in self-censorship was probably also the reason for the fall in the number of journalists killed in other countries.

39% of the deaths occurred in conflicts zones, defined as Syria, Somalia, Mali, the Indian province of Chhattisgarh, the Pakistani province of Balochistan and the Russian republic of Dagestan. The other journalists were killed in bombings, by armed groups linked to organized crime (including drug trafficking), by Islamist militias, by police or other security forces, or on the orders of corrupt officials.

Of the 71 journalists killed in 2013, 37% worked for the print media, 30% for radio stations, 30% for TV and 3% for news websites. The overwhelming majority of the victims (96%) were men.

The number of journalists killed in connection with their work in 2013 fell by 20% compared with 2012, but 2012 was an “exceptionally deadly” year with a total of 88 killed. The numbers were 67 in 2011, 58 in 2010 and 75 in 2009. The fall in 2013 was also offset by an increase in physical attacks and threats by security forces and non-state actors. Journalists were systematically targeted by the security forces in Turkey, in connection with the Gezi Park protests, and to a lesser extent in Ukraine, in connection with the Independence Square (“Maidan”) protests.

None of that is offered by way of excusing ISIS or not recognizing the particular horror of these deaths. But it’s important to realize that these people are using these acts as propaganda and recruiting devices as much as fulfilling some demented plan to go back to the 7th century.

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Nixon Wouldn’t have Authorized Torture, Suggests John Dean
by Spocko

I asked John Dean a few questions about his new book, The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It, during a Book Salon at Firedoglake.

1) After listening to hundreds hours of all conversations did President “Sock it to me” Nixon tell any good jokes? Were they dirty? Racist or sexist? His answer was, “Bottom line: Richard Nixon had almost no sense of humor whatsoever.” My suspicion, confirmed!

2) What did he think Cheney and Rumsfeld learned from the Watergate Scandal? His reply:

Rumsfeld and Cheney volunteered to help Nixon when he was sinking, but Nixon did not trust Rumsfeld (he didn’t know Cheney). Needless to say, it is pure speculation as to what Rummy and Dick “learned” from Watergate. I gave my views on the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld presidency in “Worse Than Watergate,” explaining how they imposed secrecy way beyond Nixon. This was how they got away with blatant violations of law that make Watergate look like little league. I am not sure that Richard Nixon in one of his darkest moods would have authorized torture!

That last sentence surprised me. So I asked for more insight.

What would Nixon’s reasons have been for not torturing people? Was he close enough to WWII and the Nuremberg trials to remember war crimes? Was it about American ideals? Religious ideals? Did he not have a John Yoo writing legal memos for him?

John Dean August 30th, 2014 at 4:58 pm

In response to spocko @ 114 (show text)
Nixon served in the South Pacific during WWII, and was familiar with the horrors of Japanese torture, so I cannot believe he would have lowered the USA to tolerate such horrific behavior. With foreign policy, Nixon seemed to understand what today we call “blow-back” and that by our engaging in torture he would expose Americans soldiers (if not all Americans) to torture, just as we are seeing with Americans being captured by ISIL. Bush/Cheney have subjected any and every American kidnapped or captured to torture by the likes of ISIL. It is a decision that is going to haunt us and the world for untold decades.

Had the Book Salon not ended, my next question to Dean would have been, “How did we go from Nixon’s views on torture and why he understood it was wrong, to Cheney being proud of ‘enhanced interrogation‘ techniques? Also, why won’t Obama’s admission, ‘We tortured some folks.’ lead to prosecution?” Maybe another interviewer will ask Dean this or Digby’s friend Rick Perlstein can take a crack at answering the question.

The answer to this question could probably fill several books, luckily I just happened to read a great one that helps explain part of it. Rebecca Gordon has a new book out called Mainstreaming Torture: Ethical Approaches in the Post – 9/11 United States. Gordon walks the reader through the problem, how we think and talk about torture and how institutionalized state torture is carried out by the United States.

I tend to get very worked up when talking about torture, so much so that it gets in the way of my conversation at parties. “Look out, Spocko wants to talk about torture accountability and the Taguba report again, hide!” Fortunately for me, Mrs. Spocko knows I have this interest, and she bought me Gordon’s book for my birthday. She also knows that understanding isn’t enough for me, I want to do something about the problem.

Fortunately, unlike a number of books that are great at describing the problem, this book has some suggestions on what to do about it in the short, medium and long term. She also emphasizes the personal importance of individuals doing something about torture. In my case I started pushing back at the torture supporters on right wing radio.

If we look at why Nixon, one of our nastier Presidents, didn’t authorize overt torture, but other Presidents did, we might see how it was made acceptable and then develop and reestablish the ethical, intellectual, legal and practical reasons to stop it.

“I have often thought that the entire content of this book could be expressed in five words: Torture is wrong. Stop it.” –Rebecca Gordon, Mainstreaming Torture

Taint that a shame

by digby

So Grover Norquist went to Burning Man to troll for libertarian converts to Republicanism. And he learned a lot:

As we stroll past rows of parked RVs on Gold Street, we pass a large tent that advertises “Free Taint Washes.” A man approaches us from inside, carrying a jug of water with a misting attachment.

“Would you like a spray?” the man asks.

“Not today,” Norquist says.

The man smiles. “Well, would you like a taint wash?”

Norquist has been at Burning Man for less than a day, but he’s already learning lots of new things — including the word taint, which, after a moment of confusion, he asks me to define. (Hmm, how to put this to the godfather of modern American conservatism?) Sheepishly, I inform him that it’s the colloquial term for the patch of skin between the genitals and the anus, properly known as the perineum. People call it the taint, I say, because it taint one part and it taint the other, either.

“Okay, I did not know that,” Norquist says. “Is that a recent slang?”

Are you as anxious for the Stephen Colbert treatment of this story as I am?

You can read more about Grover’s Big Adventure from Elias Isquith here.

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