Month: February 2015

Cantor’s triumphant return

by digby

Politico reports today that Eric Cantor returned to his old Washington stomping grounds to

1) restart his political career

2) help others with their political careers

Eight months ago Eric Cantor was forced out of office amid charges that he had lost touch with his Virginia constituents, derailing the political career of the man who was in line to be the first Jewish speaker of the House.

Now he’s back.

At a reception celebrating the D.C. office opening of his investment banking firm Tuesday night, it was like he had never left House Republican leadership. Speaker John Boehner (Ohio) held court among the guests, including now Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) and Majority Whip Steve Scalise (La.), Deputy Whip Patrick McHenry (N.C.), Conference Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (Wash.), plus a few House Democrats and a handful of GOP senators.

The high powered event for Moelis & Co. is just the latest sign of Cantor’s reemergence as a political and fundraising force. The former House majority leader had practically dropped off of the Beltway radar after unexpectedly losing his primary to Tea Party candidate Dave Brat. His reputation as a political savant was battered after Brat, a virtual unknown, trounced him despite Cantor outspending him by millions of dollars.

Now, Cantor is lending his name to events for 2016 candidates, reconnecting with his strong donor network, giving counsel to former colleagues and hiring advisers to brief him on political happenings on Capitol Hill.

Funny thing. The article leaves out the likely real reason he’s hobnobbing with all his former friends in government and politics: it’s what he’s being paid by his investment firm to do! They don’t even hint at the fact that Eric Cantor was hired by Moelis and Company for no other reason. It’s not as if he had any experience as a banker. He’s not sitting in an office somewhere running spreadsheets. He’s using his experience as a politician and a legislator on behalf of the people who now sign his paycheck and he’s openly exchanging political favors and using fundraising as currency to do it.

It’s so normal that the top political news site in Washington doesn’t even think it’s worth mentioning.

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Bow your heads as we pray the Pledge of Allegiance
by Tom Sullivan

The reason business interests want to undermine public education, I argue, is to get their hands on the largest portion of the annual budget in all 50 states. At Salon this morning, Thom Hartmann argues that conservatives hate public education because “it’s hard to sell the Conservative brand” to people who know their own history:

So now, thanks to the war on education that began with Ronald Raegan, we have come to that remote period in time Jefferson was concerned about. Our leaders, ignorant of or ignoring the history of this nation’s founding, make a parody of liberty and flaunt their challenges even to those rights explicitly defined in the Constitution. And, perhaps worse, they allow monopolistic corporations to do the same.

Our best defense against today’s pervasive ignorance about American history and human rights is education, a task that Jefferson undertook in starting the University of Virginia to provide a comprehensive and free public education to all capable students. A well-informed populace will always preserve liberty better than a powerful government, a philosophy which led the University of California and others to once offer free education to their states’ citizens.

As Jefferson noted in that first letter to Madison: “And say, finally, whether peace is best preserved by giving energy to the government, or information to the people. This last is the most certain, and the most legitimate engine of government. Educate and inform the whole mass of the people. Enable them to see that it is their interest to preserve peace and order, and they will preserve them…. They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.”

Hartmann argues that the erosion of constitutional and natural rights we’ve seen in the last couple of decades would not have been possible had not public education been undermined along with them. Nor might we have seen the spread of authoritarian and Dominionist ideology, I might add.

On Tuesday, Digby cited a Public Policy Polling survey in which 57 percent of Republicans “support establishing Christianity as the national religion.” Another piece by Ed Kilgore quotes Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, speaking before a gathering of “constitutional conservatives.” Bundy asks the crowd, “If our (U.S.) Constitution is an inspired document by our Lord Jesus Christ, then isn’t it scripture?” A chorus from the crowd answers, “Yes.”

They probably weren’t polled by PPP, but they seem to fit the profile.

My wife and I attended a graduation ceremony awhile back at a private, evangelical high school in north Georgia. They began by pledging allegiance to the U.S. flag, followed by a pledge of allegiance to the “Christian flag.” We looked at each other — WT? Wouldn’t it have shortened the program to just combine the two? Efficiency, and all that. For some of your neighbors, that is the program.

George W. Bush the anti-American

by digby

This happened one week after 9/11:

September 17, 2001:

“Islam is Peace” Says President

Remarks by the President at Islamic Center of Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.

3:12 P.M. EDT After addressing the media, President George Bush talks with his hosts during his visit to the Islamic Center of Washington, D.C. Sept. 17, 2001. “And it is my honor to be meeting with leaders who feel just the same way I do. They’re outraged, they’re sad,” said the President during his remarks. “They love America just as much as I do.”. White House photo by Eric Draper.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all very much for your hospitality. We’ve just had a — wide-ranging discussions on the matter at hand. Like the good folks standing with me, the American people were appalled and outraged at last Tuesday’s attacks. And so were Muslims all across the world. Both Americans and Muslim friends and citizens, tax-paying citizens, and Muslims in nations were just appalled and could not believe what we saw on our TV screens.

These acts of violence against innocents violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith. And it’s important for my fellow Americans to understand that.

The English translation is not as eloquent as the original Arabic, but let me quote from the Koran, itself: In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil. For that they rejected the signs of Allah and held them up to ridicule.

The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That’s not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace. These terrorists don’t represent peace. They represent evil and war.

When we think of Islam we think of a faith that brings comfort to a billion people around the world. Billions of people find comfort and solace and peace. And that’s made brothers and sisters out of every race — out of every race.

America counts millions of Muslims amongst our citizens, and Muslims make an incredibly valuable contribution to our country. Muslims are doctors, lawyers, law professors, members of the military, entrepreneurs, shopkeepers, moms and dads. And they need to be treated with respect. In our anger and emotion, our fellow Americans must treat each other with respect.

Women who cover their heads in this country must feel comfortable going outside their homes. Moms who wear cover must be not intimidated in America. That’s not the America I know. That’s not the America I value.

I’ve been told that some fear to leave; some don’t want to go shopping for their families; some don’t want to go about their ordinary daily routines because, by wearing cover, they’re afraid they’ll be intimidated. That should not and that will not stand in America.

Those who feel like they can intimidate our fellow citizens to take out their anger don’t represent the best of America, they represent the worst of humankind, and they should be ashamed of that kind of behavior.

This is a great country. It’s a great country because we share the same values of respect and dignity and human worth. And it is my honor to be meeting with leaders who feel just the same way I do. They’re outraged, they’re sad. They love America just as much as I do.

I want to thank you all for giving me a chance to come by. And may God bless us all.

Why did he hate America so much?

Looks like Papa Bear didn’t just lie about his “combat” experience

by digby

He’s pretty much lied about his whole career:

O’Reilly has claimed he has “seen guys gun down nuns in El Salvador” and “was in El Salvador and I saw nuns get shot in the back of the head” during his time as a CBS correspondent. The incident that O’Reilly appears to be referring to is the well-documented execution of four churchwomen by the Salvadoran national guard in December 1980. After this event, experts say that there were no priests or nuns killed in the country for more than eight years.

But in his book The No Spin Zone, the host writes that he did not begin covering the civil war in El Salvador until “a few weeks” after he began as a CBS News correspondent in 1981 — the year after the execution took place.

“Before I went to El Salvador in 1981, I talked with some experienced Latin American experts, people who had seen the brutal wars down there for themselves,” O’Reilly said on “The O’Reilly Factor” in February 2002. “I had never been in a war zone before, so I wanted some prep.”

The Fox host also said during a 2009 interview on WVVH-TV’s American Dreams Show that he arrived in El Salvador “right after” the murders.

Check out the video where he says he saw nuns shot in the back of the head.

Again, no biggie for him. This will just make him more of a hero on the right. Still, worth noting.

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3 Easy Steps to Change the Media’s Views on War & Torture

by Spocko

These days I’m like Mr. Spock in the dark, parallel universe of Star Trek. I see our leadership going down the wrong path regarding the use of war and torture. It’s an illogical, fear-based path, and it’s presented as the only alternative.

Therefore I’ve come up with some fun, easy steps to change that.

In our country fear rules people and acquiring resources has trumped all ethical considerations.  The power structure and media viewpoint has rejected non-violent solutions as weak and ineffective. The discussion of other solutions are mocked,  marginalized and the proponents cast as naive or terrorists lovers.

In the Mirror Mirror universe Captain Kirk challenged the waste of lives, potential, resources and time of an Empire that ruled by fear and violence.

The goateed Mr. Spock could see the illogic of that Empire but says, “One man cannot summon the future.”  Kirk replies, “But one man can change the present.”

There are powerful groups and people who support war and torture. They are smart, organized, well-funded and know how to use strategic propaganda and specific appeals to ego, power and corporate monetary gain to get what they want.

How to you overcome these groups, people and their views?

In the episode Spock said, a man has to have power to change the present.  Kirk tells him of a button that makes opponents disappear. A button like that has been used on the voices and images of anti-war, anti-torture people in the media.

I could try to use that button on the opposition, but I’d prefer to push the button that can make us appear.

I’ve listed three methods today to help us appear and change attitudes toward torture and war. Most are focused on the “news” media but some on other media creators.

Now a fun part.  Listen to the Jimmy Dore Show. Jimmy and his writers, set up issues woth jokes like Stewart or Colbert.  This week was about the media’s selling the ISIS war with no push back and how Fox News has become ISIS’s PR agency. He describes Chris Matthews’ strange “moral” compass and his love for war.

Changing Minds on Torture 


Since going to the Symposium on Torture and Security at Boalt Hall at Berkeley, I’ve been thinking about ways people can change the present on this issue.

I’ve been talking to people in various communities because I was puzzled by torture’s support (68 percent!). My Vulcan logical brain agreed with Mark Danner. We have all the facts, why won’t minds change?  My human emotional brain knows how people make decisions based on emotions as well as data. Facts about torture and the war were suppressed. Evidence of success was falsified.

What to do?

1) Get experts refuting the lies in front of the media and the public. 

Schmaht as whips

by digby

Apparently a whole lot of Republicans are having a hard time grappling with reality because if they did they would not be having daily hissy fits about immigration or standing up and cheering the police when they shoot down unarmed black kids:

“The fundamental challenge for my side is the seemingly inexorable change in the composition of presidential electorates,” Republican pollster Whit Ayres, whose clients include Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), said during a panel discussing the report. “And there’s no reason to believe that that’s going to stop magically.”

The demographic change poses little problem for the GOP in midterm elections, when young and minority voters are far more likely than older, white voters to stay home. But in the run-up to 2016, the demographic trend has some Republicans citing a need for change.

In 2004, Republicans’ most recent presidential victory, George W. Bush won 58 percent of the white vote, and 26 percent of the non-white vote — numbers that would lose him the White House today, Ayres said.

‘”That’s the stunning part for me in running these numbers — to realize that the last Republican to win a presidential election, who reached out very aggressively to minorities, and did better than any Republican nominee before or since among minorities, still didn’t achieve enough of both of those groups in order to put together a winning percentage” for 2016, Ayres said.

That is stunning. George W. Bush went out of his way not to appear to be racist, a smart move considering how very wobbly so many liberals had been during the “law and order” Sistah Soljah years of the New Democrats. It worked for him too. He did better than any Republican could have hoped. And after 9/11 he went out of his way to ensure that there was as little Muslim bashing as possible. The GOP had spent years courting the American Muslim community and had deep ties there.

Now we have the GOP doing everything it can to antagonize racial minorities and Muslims even though they need to do much better with those communities than Bush did 15 years ago. It would appear they either don’t believe the numbers or are gearing up for a long era of congressional dominance. I’m betting on the latter. They aren’t that dumb.

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Clinton’s base


by digby

I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite like this. As I’ve written before, I think this was subliminally decided back in 2008 when the primary was pretty much a tie and the party collectively agreed that Obama would go first and Clinton would go second. Her numbers are those of an incumbent:

The key to Clinton’s early leads over the Republican field is that in addition to having the Democratic base strongly unified behind her, she’s also getting a substantial amount of support from GOP voters. Anywhere from 15 to 20% of Republicans say they’d vote for Clinton in match ups with everyone except Rand Paul right now, against whom she gets 12% of the Republican vote. She only loses 9-10% of the Democratic vote in every match up except the one against Christie, who gets 12%. There are more Democrats than Republicans in the country to begin with, and when you combine that with having a more unified party it gives Clinton her solid early leads. Whether Clinton will be able to hold on to that Republican support once the party gets behind a candidate remains to be seen but she has it for now.

Clinton also remains dominant in the Democratic primary field. 54% of the party’s voters want her to be their candidate to 16% for Joe Biden, 12% for Elizabeth Warren, 5% for Bernie Sanders, 2% for Jim Webb, and 1% for Martin O’Malley. If Biden and Warren don’t end up making the race Sanders appears to have a little bit of separation from the bottom tier that could make him Clinton’s leading rival.

Clinton has more than 50% support for the Democratic nomination with liberals, moderates, women, whites, Hispanics, African Americans, younger voters, and seniors. The only 2 demographic groups we track where she falls a little bit short of that mark are men and middle aged voters.

She falls a little bit short with men and middle aged voters? Actually, a large majority of middle aged voters support her (67%), just a slightly smaller majority than other age cohorts. But she doesn’t get even a majority of men in the Democratic Party:

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Nation building by dummies

by digby

The dummies, by the way, are us:

“During my first night there the [Afghan National Police] village commander and 15 other [policemen] beat me with cables,” one detainee, arrested in Kandahar in May 2014 because of his brother’s suspect ties to insurgents, told the U.N. “They pulled and squeezed my testicles until my urine had blood. They kicked me in the stomach. Then they gave me pen and paper and ordered me to testify against my brother. About 10 days later I was given electric shocks on my feet three times, using power from a wall socket.”

The report’s descriptions were confirmed by a resident of Kandahar province who asked to be identified as Abdul Mosawer for his personal safety.

Mosawer was recently released after spending four years in prison; Afghan forces had accused him of having ties to the Taliban — a charge he denies. Suspected insurgents or others accused of political crimes bear the brunt of the abuse, he told Stars and Stripes, because security forces want to elicit information.

For the first three weeks of his detention, Mosawer said he endured beatings, starvation, sleep deprivation and extreme temperatures.

“After they found nothing, they stopped,” he said.

That’s from a UN Report of torture in Afghanistan. I can’t help but wonder if the US might be in a better position to condemn such acts if we didn’t do the same things ourselves. In fact, we probably coached them:

In the years since 2001 when the United States and its allies toppled the Taliban in reaction to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Afghanistan has been the site of some of the most controversial American detention facilities. A report released last year by the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee detailed myriad abuses at four CIA-run centers in the country. The revelations led Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to call the American practices “shocking” and “inhumane.”

The United States closed its last detention centers in Afghanistan in December, three weeks before the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force declared an end to its combat mission in the country.

Prior to that, the U.N. documented several reports of abuse tied to international forces. Seven detainees said they were mistreated, and the U.N. reported two credible accounts of torture, one in a U.S. facility in Maydan Wardak in September 2013 and the other in a U.S. Special Forces facility at Baghlan in April 2013, during which detainees said they were repeatedly beaten.

Coalition officials told the U.N. that the reports were investigated but could not be substantiated.

Of course not.

The torture debate is over. Western civilization takes one giant step backwards.

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What nice people

by digby

Wow:

Jesus that’s depressing. As much as I may have loathed the policies of some presidents in my life I never doubted their love of country. But I’ll be honest.  I’m beginning to doubt the essential decency of about 70% of my fellow Americans who identify as Republican. That’s just a terrible thing to believe.

Update:

Democrats, however, are more willing to extend goodwill to the other side. Although just 26 percent have a favorable view of Giuliani, a full 54 percent say they believe he loves America, and just 12 percent say that he does not.

A flash of sanity in a weary world
by Tom Sullivan

Willy Wonka: [touching the gobstopper Charlie has just set on his desk] So shines a good deed in a weary world.

Liberals may not be ready to hand her the chocolate factory over it, but on MSNBC’s All In last night, Chris Hayes literally applauded Laura Ingraham for speaking sanity to Fox & Friends star power. Mediaite as the clips:

“I don’t think we should jump every time the freaks with the ACE bandages around their faces put out videos,” Ingraham told the Fox hosts on Tuesday, adding that the U.S. should not be reacting “emotionally” to threats from ISIS, Al-Shabab or other terrorist groups.

“Amen, sister,” Hayes replied, literally applauding Ingraham’s commentary. The host said he was “incredibly gratified” to see Ingraham make the same arguments he’s been making on his show all along, that “everyone needs to keep calm and stay rational in the face of what is obvious emotional manipulation” through use of propaganda.

The ability of those terrorists groups to “murder people they have captured and even make videos of those murders does not correlate in any meaningful way to the actual threat they pose to Americans here in the U.S.,” Hayes reminded his viewers.

Ingraham’s pro-clearheadedness comments bookended her seeming to approve allowing Mall of America shoppers to come packing AR-15s. But I guess Hayes figured, these days you take your sanity where you can find it.