Month: October 2014

QOTD: Frankly Scarlett edition

by digby

This Week did some substantive and informative television on ISIS and Ebola this morning. And then they turned to the political panel.

God help us:

RADDATZ: Trending right now: our Facebook find of the week. What’s burning up news feeds? A high stakes faceoff over the ISIS threat.

California Congressman Duncan Hunter alleging members of the terror group were apprehended trying to sneak across our southern border.

REP. DUNCAN HUNTER, (R) CALIFORNIA: I know that at least 10 ISIS fighters have been caught coming across the Mexican border in Texas.

RADDATZ: A stunning claim, but is it true? Not according to the Homeland Security Secretary

JEH JOHNSON, SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY: We have no credible, specific intelligence to that effect. Let’s not unduly create fear and anxiety.

RADDATZ: But Hunter insists he’s right. His spokesman firing back, “it makes sense that the left hand of the DHS doesn’t know what the right hand is doing. It’s been that way for a long time.”

Did Congressman Hunter go too far with his new claims? Let’s take on our Facebook find of the week.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RADDATZ: And the roundtable is here. Bill Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard. Democratic Strategist Donna Brazile. And ABC political analyst Matthew Dowd. Welcome everyone.

No one seems to have any evidence to back up Hunter’s claims. Is he just seizing on people’s fears? They are pretty high this morning.

MATTHEW DOWD, ABC NEWS POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, yeah, they’re very high this morning. And I — I don’t want to conflate the two things with Ebola and this, but many times fear doesn’t have to be real to be powerful. And in the context of it, we don’t often have to have facts to back up our fears. We respond to our fears.

I think everybody has the right to say what they want to say, but they have the responsibility to say what may be they believe to be factually correct. The congressman says he believes it to be factually correct. But at a time like this with terrorism and, as you say, with the Ebola thing, we should counsel our fears and look for the fact sets.

“Is it true?” There’s no evidence that it is. But let’s “ask the question” as if there’s a possibility. Matthew Dowd certainly didn’t disabuse anyone of it, did he?

According to him, Hunter says he believed this to be factually correct and that he has a right to say what he thinks he believes but he should only say it if he believes it to be true, which he does. But we should look for fact sets. (And by the way, Kristol immediately conflated ISIS with Ebola when they turned to him…)

They all know they are being irresponsible. But they just don’t give a damn.

Update: Chuck Todd was much better on this on Meet the Press. Instead of talking about it as if it’s a fun little twitter sidebar he took it seriously:

MIKE HUCKABEE (ON TAPE):

We’ve seen our borders routinely ignored. So if someone with Ebola really wants to come to the U.S., just get to Mexico and walk right in.

THOM TILLIS (ON TAPE):

Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve got an Ebola outbreak. We have bad actors that can come across the border. We need to seal the border and secure it.

SCOTT BROWN (ON TAPE):

And that’s one of the reasons why I have been so adamant about closing our border, because if people are coming in through normal channels, can you imagine what they can do through our porous border?

CHUCK TODD:

We know the saying, “It’s all fair in politics.” But as you just say, there are politicians aren’t being shy about pushing the panic button as the midterms approach. Our panel is back to discuss. Sara Fagen, Robert Gibbs, you guys are campaign advisors. I understand the politics of fear can be good politics, but it can be irresponsible.

SARA FAGEN:

It can be irresponsible. And this Ebola outbreak is a serious national security issue that particularly political-elected leaders need to think very carefully before they make statements like that.

CHUCK TODD:

I was just going to say, you think that making statements about, “Oh my God, Ebola can come across the border through Mexico,” is a little bit irresponsible?

SARA FAGEN:

I think it’s irresponsible. I would take it a step further, which is to say it’s also wrong. Sure, the United States government should take precautionary measures at our borders. But unless you’re planning on eliminating all flights into the United States, you cannot contain the risk of the spread of Ebola. I mean, think about it. You’re going to build a wall in Mexico but then people are going to fly all over the globe?

CHUCK TODD:

You build a wall and a bubble right now.

SARA FAGEN:

Right.

CHUCK TODD:

You know, Robert, one of the reasons where I think Republicans are going to this issue is they want to keep nationalizing the elections. The more nationalized they are, the better for Republicans. Do you buy that?

ROBERT GIBBS:

Well, I think so. And we see that the inconvenience of having an election during a public health emergency gives you the types of–

CHUCK TODD:

You call it an inconvenience. Is that–

ROBERT GIBBS:

Well, I’m being horribly sarcastic there. I think the notion, look, we’ve got to be careful. Everybody has to be careful about what we say to enter that into the political sphere is potentially a mess. And I think quite frankly, it has the real chance of turning off independent or voters that haven’t made up their minds are going to look at these candidates and say, “That’s just crazy.” And I think that could help somebody else other than the Republican in that race.

CHUCK TODD:You know, Tom, one of the reasons why I think politicians have felt so comfortable playing the sphere card is the media’s gone right in.

TOM BROKAW:

They have. I mean, and–

CHUCK TODD:

We say “they.” You know, we can’t be too dispassionate.

(And yes, Robert Gibbs is just as glib and shallow as he’s always been. With friends like these …)

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Kicking the hornet’s nest

by digby

Josh Holland over at BillMoyers.com has conducted a very interesting interview with terrorism expert Thomas Hegghammer, director of terrorism research at the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment. There’s a lot of interesting analysis, much of it stuff you don’t hear from the usual suspects on TV, but this struck me as particularly salient:

Holland: You have argued that this campaign may increase anti-Western terrorism. Why do you think that?

Hegghammer: The Islamic State and its sympathizers haven’t systematically targeted the West so far. There have been a few plots here and there, but they seem to have come from free agents — people who are just vaguely affiliated with the group. But the group isn’t maxed out on the capability side in the way that Al Qaeda has been. Now that we’re attacking them, it’s quite likely that both sympathizers and the Islamic State itself might want to carry out attacks to avenge the offensive. So I’ve called the air raids in Syria “kicking the hornet’s nest,” because by doing that, we make them very angry and more likely to attack us. And if they do, there will be intense pressure to deepen our involvement in the conflict.

Holland: You’ve argued that the US has had an unspoken, yet in your view, effective policy of deterrence against Islamic terror groups, and that this campaign is getting away from that policy of deterrence. Can you explain that?

Hegghammer: For the past seven or eight years the US has had a counterterrorism strategy based on deterrence. The idea is to only really go after those groups that attack the homeland, and use less force against those groups that don’t attack the homeland, those who operate only in the Middle East, for example. And this strategy stems from the fact that you just cannot fight all the groups at the same time. It’s simply impossible. So to maximize domestic security at minimum cost, the US has sent a message to jihadi groups around the world that if you come here, if you attack the homeland, then we will come after you. If you don’t, the pressure will be lighter. That’s why the heaviest repression has been in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where Al Qaeda Central is based, and in Yemen, where Al Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula is based. These are the groups that have systematically tried to attack the West.

So by attacking the Islamic State before it has started to systematically attack the West, we’re diverging from that strategic principle and I think that’s problematic in the long term.

Holland: What kind of alternative policies do you think we might have adopted that wouldn’t include these risks?

Hegghammer: I think one alternative would be something more like containment, which basically means you encircle the enemy and cut off its sources of funds and weapons and hope that internal tensions will make it sort of rot from within. That seems like an unattractive option with the Islamic State given all the terrible things it does in the areas it controls. But I think it could be the least bad option. Use military force, for example, to stop the Islamic State near Kurdistan or keep it from expanding, and then target its financial operations — its oil sales, etc. — more systematically, and then use other, more subtle means to make it more difficult for the Islamic State to govern its territories, in the hope that the population eventually turns against them.

But it may be too late for that now that we’ve started bombing its headquarters. I think the important thing now is to create what I call “offramps” — to define circumstances in which the mission can be ended. If we proceed with the Islamic State’s complete destruction as our only goal, then I think it could be a very long war. We need a range of more limited objectives that we can actually reach.

We reacted to the spread of ISIS the way we always seem to react — by lashing out wildly in ways that are basically designed to inflame the situation sheerly to soothe the emotional needs of the country.

I’ve been very critical of the clandestine drone war and I think it’s been destructive.  But it’s nothing compared to dropping bombs on large populations and bragging about it while hysterically freaking out about non-existent “infiltration”  inside our country. A little finesse would go a long way toward puncturing the myth of ISIS’ alleged super-powers and depleting its strength.  But the pressures brought to bear by the hawks, the liberal interventionists and the media are working against that and pushing everything we have toward a counterproductive strategy. It’s taking on a life of its own — as these actions always tend to do.

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Fox News on upskirt

by digby

I don’t know about you but I find everything about this conversation really creepy:

I wonder how the women of Fox News feel about this. They are the endless subject of “upskirt” leering on the internet mainly because Roger Ailes insists that they wear tight, short skirts that show off their legs and they get caught in compromising poses when leering leering men take screenshots of them just trying to cross their legs.

They aren’t allowed to wear pants:

According to anchor Bob Sellers, Ailes once phoned the control booth to complain during a weekend news broadcast (haha!) that he was upset with the camera’s view of former Fox reporter Kiran Chetry: “Move that damn laptop, I can’t see her legs!”

Ailes had some very important advice for former Fox host Catherine Crier, too:

“He had admiration for her legs,” a senior executive said. In one meeting, Ailes barked, “Tell Catherine I did not spend x-number of dollars on a glass desk for her to wear pant suits.”

When Karl Rove insisted that it was way too early to call Ohio, and hence the election, for Barack Obama on election night 2012, Megyn Kelly was sent on an epic march through the studio to the “Decision Desk”:

On her trek, Kelly said that the Decisioneers used to be on the same set as the election anchors, but “then for some reason, they moved them down the hall.” But there were two excellent reasons, according to a Fox employee who told Sherman, “This is Fox News, so anytime there’s a chance to show off Megyn Kelly’s legs they’ll go for it.”

Sherman also has this story about the brain-storming that went into the creation of afternoon chat show The Five. It’s because the man is a lover of the legitimate theatre:

“Whenever he can, he gets into the conversation that he produced Hot l Baltimore,” a senior Fox executive said. Creating the Fox News afternoon show The Five, Ailes found his inspiration on the stage. “He said, ‘I’ve always wanted to do an ensemble concept,’” a close friend said. “He said, ‘I wanted a Falstaff, and that’s Bob Beckel. I need a leading man, and it’s Eric Bolling. I need a serious lead and that’s Dana Perino. I need a court jester and it’s Greg [Gutfeld], and I need the leg. That’s Andrea Tantaros.”

Ugh.

It’s not the little things

by digby

This storyify essay by Helaine Olen about the alleged “latte factor” which says that if we only stop buying those little “extras” we’ll all be rich, rich, rich — the implication being that we’re all a bunch of spoiled brats who don’t understand how to save a buck.

Olen’s essay blows that up by showing that what’s killing us isn’t the “extras” it’s the essentials. It boils down to this:

Now it’s true that you could save a little cash by not drinking those lattes every day. I stopped doing that a long time ago simply because I realized I could make my own coffee cheaper and more conveniently at home. But I still buy high quality coffee when I’m sure I could save a few more pennies by buying Folgers at the grocery store. In fact, I could give up coffee altogether. And I could live on a pot of beans and rice all week as millionaire Sean Hannity advises and put the extra money in my retirement account. Lord knows it needs it.

But as Olen points out, it won’t make much of an impact because the real problem is this:

Remember this next time some joker remarks that poor people shouldn’t have cell phones and TVs. What they are really saying by perpetuating this myth of the profligate poor is that poor people shouldn’t have housing and food.

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Killing the messenger over and over again

by digby

Dennis wrote about the new film called “Kill the Messenger” yesterday and made me really want to see the movie. I have been following the Gary Webb story for a long time and it’s good to see it getting into the mainstream. It’s also interesting to see the mainstream media ignore their own complicity.

This story is one that truly opened my eyes to the reality of the political establishment’s continued unwillingness to entertain the notion that the secret intelligence agencies are operating outside of our values and often in ways that are not only illegal but downright destructive and are doing it without any accountability and without even delivering the “protection” they are assigned to deliver. They have been out of control for decades and we have little reason to believe it’s getting any better.

Anyway, Ryan Grim has a great piece up at Huffington Post about the movie and the story that you should read if you aren’t familiar with this. It’s a disgusting low point in our checkered history of disgusting low points: our government was instrumental in creating the crack epidemic of the 1980s and the media helped them cover it up:

Douglas Farah was in El Salvador when the San Jose Mercury News broke a major story in the summer of 1996: The Nicaraguan Contras, a confederation of paramilitary rebels sponsored by the CIA, had been funding some of their operations by importing cocaine into the United States. One of their best customers was a man named Freeway Rick — Ricky Donnell Ross, then a Southern California dealer who was running an operation that the Los Angeles Times dubbed “the Wal-Mart of crack dealing.”

“My first thought was, Holy shit! because there’d been so many rumors in the region of this going on,” said Farah 12 years later. He’d grown up in Latin American and covered it for 20 years for The Washington Post. “There had always been these stories floating around about [the Contras] and cocaine. I knew [Contra leader] Adolfo Calero and some of the other folks there, and they were all sleazebags. You wouldn’t read the story and say, ‘Oh my god, these guys would never do that.’ It was more like, ‘Oh, one more dirty thing they were doing.’ So I took it seriously.”

The same would not hold true of most of Farah’s colleagues, either in the newspaper business in general or at the Post in particular. “If you’re talking about our intelligence community tolerating — if not promoting — drugs to pay for black ops, it’s rather an uncomfortable thing to do when you’re an establishment paper like the Post,” Farah told me. “If you were going to be directly rubbing up against the government, they wanted it more solid than it could probably ever be done.”

Read on. It’s no whacked out conspiracy theory, it’s real. And the mainstream media still won’t cop to its part in it. It’s hard for me to believe that anyone who knows this story could ever treat the clandestine agencies in our government without skepticism again and it’s why I get so nuts at the assurances the political establishment and most of the media offer up whenever another yet another revelation somehow manages to bubble up to the surface. The record is terrible going all the way back to the 1950s and they either just keep pretending it’s not happening or they don’t think it matters. Either way, they are abdicating their responsibility.

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Sunday Funnies

by digby

Brian McFadden in the New York Times:

Via Daily Kos:

Lukovich:

I would add the transcripts of the Sabbath Gasbag shows but they weren’t that funny this morning.  Just depressingly hysterical.

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Every breath you take, Every move you make

by Tom Sullivan

I woke up in the middle of the night with that line in my head, sat down at the piano and had written it in half an hour. The tune itself is generic, an aggregate of hundreds of others, but the words are interesting. It sounds like a comforting love song. I didn’t realize at the time how sinister it is. I think I was thinking of Big Brother, surveillance and control.

—Sting

As other states across the country, North Carolina is looking at ways to implement legislation that would allow drone use in the state. The FAA is still attempting to define how they might safely share the skies with other aircraft. Equipped with a GoPro camera, small drones seem like nifty tools for photographers and hobbyists. But given the growing surveillance state revealed by Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning, it is natural that civil liberties groups –
and even the T-party – are wary of their use by the government against civilians. It didn’t help that one of the sites chosen for early testing in the state belongs to the private security company formerly known as Blackwater.

This morning, the Winston-Salem Journal begins a 3-part series on how drones have been promoted in North Carolina, and by whom.

Imagine: You’re having an open-invitation BBQ in your own backyard. Friends can bring friends. Anyone can come. Thanks to newly enacted legislation, local and state law enforcement agencies are allowed to show up, too, without a warrant, to spy on you with drones.

It seems an unlikely scenario. Yet, a staff attorney at the state General Assembly’s Research Division, confirmed that it could happen. At a BBQ, “a Moral Monday planning session at a friend’s house” or “a conservative Tea Party gathering.”

Barry Summers, an Asheville-based activist, had attended earlier committee meetings on the legislation. As he described it, he was the only civilian in the room. The rest – the players – tended to be industry, military, ex-military, and Booz Allen (Snowden’s former employer). And, of course, ALEC wants to Open the Sky for Innovation and
Entrepreneurship. Over the summer, the North Carolina legislation was slipped quietly and anonymously into a must-pass budget bill:

The drone legislation was never the subject of a debate in the House or Senate.

The standalone drone bill – House bill 1099 – passed unanimously in the second hour of a marathon four-hour session in the House in June. Next, it died in the Senate before appearing in August, not as a standalone bill but as a section of the lengthy $21 billion budget bill, which contained more pressing items, such spending on education, Medicaid and roads, for example.

When asked, several sponsors of the language did not respond to questions. (One sponsor earlier denied it had passed after voting for it.)

Other local reports that the police video Moral Monday rallies where no arrests were made have angered civil liberties activists. Even the local T-party president:

“I think there’s a transparency issue,” she said. “If they are taking these pictures in a public place we have a right to know where are they being stored, who’s storing them, why aren’t they being destroyed. I think these are legitimate questions we need to ask.”

The Winston-Salem Journal asked principal sponsor Rep. John Torbett, R-Gaston, about privacy issues:

Asked by email whether he and other supporters of the drone legislation “espouse the notion that people should not have an expectation of privacy when having an open-invitation gathering at their home — when having, for example, a backyard BBQ to which anyone is invited?” he said: “They could do no more with a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) then they can do with the help or Cessna. … If folks feel we need additional language next session, then we can always adjust for absolute clarity.”

I know I feel more secure now.

Saturday Night at the Movies

Secrets and lies: Kill the Messenger & The Two Faces of January 

By Dennis Hartley

Capitol offense: Kill the Messenger

‘Member back in the ’80s, when the CIA was in league with the crack cocaine trade, and they were all like, funneling the drug profit to the Nicaraguan Contras?

(*sigh*) Ah, the Reagan era. Morning in America…mourning in Central America.

 Good times.

Sometimes, all you have to do is tell the truth, and nobody will believe you. That’s what happened to San Jose Mercury investigative journalist Gary Webb, who published a number of articles in 1996 that blew the lid off of this “dark alliance”. I’m ashamed to admit that while I remember hearing something about it back then, I somehow got the impression (at the time) that it was just some kind of urban legend; the kind of thing that the SNL sketch character “Drunk Uncle” might blurt out at the dinner table while everyone snickers or hides their head in embarrassment. “Hey everybody…I heard that the CIA was responsible for the crack cocaine epidemic in the African-American community!” Yeah…right, uncle.

Here’s the thing. The CIA actually did (sort of) cop to it, a few years after Webb’s newspaper expose. Normally, that would (should) have become a fairly major news story in and of itself. Unfortunately, the MSM was a little preoccupied at the time with a shinier object…the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Also by this time, Webb had lost his credibility, thanks to a concerted campaign by same aforementioned MSM to make Webb look like some nut yelling at traffic. Tragically, it “worked” too well; he became a pariah and ended up killing himself.

This largely forgotten debacle has been dramatized in a new film from Michael Cuesta called Kill the Messenger. Jeremy Renner delivers a terrific performance as the tenacious and impassioned Webb. We follow him on a journey that begins with a relatively innocuous tip from a player in the local drug trade, which leads to a perilous face-to-face meet with an imprisoned kingpin in Nicaragua (a great cameo from Andy Garcia) and eventually to the belly of the beast in D.C., where he’s implicitly advised by government spooks to cool his heels…or else. Naturally, this only makes him want to dig deeper. He hits pay dirt, and the exclusive story is published. His editors appear to have his back; that is, until the backlash begins.

The story about how Webb got “the story” is relegated to the first act; and I think this was a wise choice by screenwriter Peter Landesman (who adapted from Nick Shou’s eponymous book and Webb’s Dark Alliance). While most of this political thriller’s “thrills” (and the snippets you see in the trailers) are derived from this first third of the film, that’s not necessarily the most crucial takeaway from Webb’s story. Granted, the actions of the CIA were bilious enough, but even more distressing is how eager the MSM was to sink their talons into a fellow journalist.

In this respect, Kill the Messenger parallels Oliver Stone’s JFK, in that both center on idealistic truth seekers (Jim Garrison and Gary Webb) who got crucified for their troubles…by the very parties who should be championing and joining them on their quest (now that I think about it, that’s human history in a nutshell). It’s interesting, I was listening to Democracy Now the other day while driving in to work, and Amy Goodman did a fascinating segment about Webb and his legacy. She was talking to investigative journalist Robert Parry, who observed:

“…there’s no question that this was one of the most important stories of the 1980s and really the 1990s, when you get to the end of this and the CIA confessing. But it’s also a story about the failure of the mainstream press that extends to the present, goes through the Iraq War, the failure to be skeptical there, and goes right on to the present day. So it’s not an old story; it’s very much a current story.” 

All I can say is thank the gods for the likes of Amy Goodman, Matt Taibbi, Glenn Greenwald, Vice News and others following in Webb’s footsteps. And for this movie, which is one of the first fall season releases that have any true substance.

My life in ruins: The Two Faces of January

There’s something that Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, Wim Wenders’ The American Friend, Rene Clement’s Purple Noon (and Anthony Minghella’s 1999 remake, The Talented Mr. Ripley) all share in common (aside from being memorable thrillers). They are all based on novels by the late Patricia Highsmith. Hossein Amini’s directorial debut, The Two Faces of January, is the latest Highsmith adaptation…but that may be all it has in common with the aforementioned. Then again, perhaps only time will tell us that for sure (and it wouldn’t be the first time that History has proven me an ass; but I digress).

While Highsmith’s pet recurring character Tom Ripley is absent in this outing, we do have our requisite Young American Abroad Who Becomes Ensnarled In Intrigue (bet you’re glad I didn’t say that he “gets caught in a web of deceit”). His name is Rydal (played by Inside Llewyn Davis star Oscar Isaac), an Athens-based tour guide/con man who scams tourists. He may have more than met his match when he runs into Chester (Viggo Mortensen), an apparently well-to-do American who is travelling through Europe with his young wife Colette (Kirsten Dunst). The three become quick friends. Too quickly. From the outset, Rydal and Chester circle each other warily, in such a way that telegraphs to the viewer that Someone’s Gonna End Up Dead. But who is conning who?

Don’t worry, I harbor no spoilers. If you’re an old-school mystery fan, and you’ve already read enough to be intrigued, I won’t stop you from buying a ticket. Just be forewarned: while this all sounds very Hitchcockian…don’t expect another Strangers on a Train here. The performances are good (Mortensen in particular) and the location filming is lovely, but there is something curiously static about the production. Maybe it’s because feels like something you might stumble across on PBS while channel-surfing on a Sunday night? I just can’t put my finger on why it didn’t work for me. It’s a mystery…

Saturday Night at the Movies review archives

The president wants to close Gitmo before he goes. Good luck.

by digby

Oh boy:

The White House is drafting options that would allow President Barack Obama to close the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, by overriding a congressional ban on bringing detainees to the U.S., senior administration officials said….

The administration hopes to tamp down controversy by reducing the inmate population by at least half through quickly transferring Guantanamo detainees cleared for release….

Nonetheless, administration officials say the detention center can’t be closed without sending at least some of the remaining inmates to the U.S. mainland.

Unilateral action “would ignite a political firestorm, even if it’s the best resolution for the Guantanamo problem,” said American University law professor Stephen Vladeck. Republicans are sure to oppose it, while Democrats could be split, he said.

Uh yeah. Democrats will definitely be split — about 60-30 if history is any guide, maybe even worse considering the ISISisgoingtosneakovertheborderandkillyouallwithebola scare. And the Republicans are already losing — their —shit:

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) on Friday vowed to block all legislation in the Senate with a prolonged filibuster if President Obama tries to transfer detainees from Guantanamo Bay to the United States….

Roberts made a similar threat back in 2009, when Obama originally signaled he wanted to relocate detainees to the United States. At the time, the disciplinary barracks at Fort Leavenworth, as well as a maximum-security prison in Obama’s home state of Illinois were being considered to house the prisoners….

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who is traveling through the state this week on Roberts’s campaign bus, said he would join the filibuster. Roberts predicted he would have broad support from his colleagues.

“I will have help on this. I can see John McCain there and I can see Lindsey Graham there and I can see Kelly Ayotte there and I can see a whole bunch of other people there,” Roberts said.

Yeah, I think they’ll be there.

I admire Obama for doing it. Perhaps it’s something he really doesn’t want to leave office without having made a serious effort. But I’ll be surprised in the current environment if he can get it done. The presidential race is starting and we’ve got a full blown GWOT panic underway. This timing doesn’t strike me as auspicious.

On the other hand, maybe he knows something we don’t know — that members of congress have found a thread of sanity on this issue for obscure reasons. It would be smart if they did; that insane prison camp really does place us in the line of fire. But I’ll believe it when I see it.

In fact, it’ so bizarre that he would bring this up right at this moment makes me wonder if they aren’t throwing it out there for the express purpose of allowing Democrats to distance themselves from him. That’s certainly the only political reason they would do this. But hey, maybe they’re doing it out of conviction which is admirable. That hideous hellhole is a festering sore on our “exceptionalism” and we should all be ashamed that it goes on.

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Outlawing abortion is now the compromise position

by digby

If you’re not against banning birth control you can now call yourself a moderate:

Congressman Cory Gardner, who has been hammered for his position on social issues ever since he jumped into the U.S. Senate race, dropped a political bombshell Friday with his revelation that he was wrong to have supported previous personhood efforts.

He said after learning more about the measures, which have the impact of outlawing abortion, he realized that proposals also could ban certain forms of contraception, a prohibition he does not support.

“This was a bad idea driven by good intentions,” he told The Denver Post. “I was not right. I can’t support personhood now. I can’t support personhood going forward. To do it again would be a mistake.”

Gardner, a Yuma Republican who has represented the conservative 4th Congressional District since 2011, late last month jumped in the U.S. Senaterace to try to unseat Democrat Mark Udall.

He did not say when he changed his mind on personhood, but said he began examining it more closely after voters rejected it by 3-to1-margin in 2010.

“The fact that it restricts contraception, it was not the right position,” Gardner said. “I’ve learned to listen. I don’t get everything right the first time. There are far too many politicians out there who take the wrong position and stick with it and never admit that they should do something different.”

Udall’s campaign spokesman, Chris Harris, pointed out that Gardner in the last two years co-sponsored the Life Begins at Conception Act, which defines a human being as “a member of the species homo sapiens” at the moment of fertilization. He said it was basically a federal version of the personhood amendment, a position with which Gardner’s campaign disagrees.

He’s obviously a right wing zealot. Let’s hope Coloradan’s aren’t fooled.

Notice that he’s fine with the banning of abortion part of the personhood gambit.And that’s an extreme position among the American electorate. But now that they’ve brought birth control into the mix outlawing abortion entirely is paradoxically spun as a mainstream compromise. Just as it was meant to do.

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