Month: September 2015

Simply the best

by digby

If you want to make America great again this is the man you’ll vote for:

It makes you want to sing God bless America, doesn’t it?

.

You sues, you lose
by Tom Sullivan

Republicans lost a major foreign policy fight yesterday when Democrats in the Senate filibustered a resolution to disapprove President Obama’s nuclear treaty with Iran. Over in the Animal House, Speaker John Boehner stood up and declared that the situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody’s part: Frivolous lawsuit!

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) promised Thursday that House Republicans will “use every tool at our disposal to stop, slow and delay this agreement from being fully implemented” up to and including suing President Obama to keep him from enforcing the agreement.

Maybe someone else is keeping better count, but that would make at least three times Boehner has gone to the judicial bench after being humiliated in the Congress. The Washington Post report continues:

If Republicans pursue a legal strategy, it wouldn’t be the first time they tried to check an Obama-driven law (see: Obamacare) in the courts. But the tactic wasn’t terribly successful: the Supreme Court sided with the Obama administration on major portions of the health-care law, though lawsuits are still ongoing and Republicans won one legal battle on Wednesday that may embolden them.

The House’s new approach will undoubtedly fail, given that seemingly all Republicans are opposed to the agreement. But while the exercise allows critics to register their discontent — and claim purity-of-purpose points by not legitimizing the idea that the Obama administration fulfilled its end of the bargain — it won’t do anything to block the deal’s implementation.

The legal battle Republicans won yesterday was simply that they had standing for their Obamacare lawsuit to proceed. U.S. District Court Judge Rosemary M. Collyer allowed the portion to go forward that would challenge whether the Obama administration had spent monies on health subsidies that Congress had not appropriated. She disallowed challenges to White House changes to the employer mandate.

“The president’s unilateral change to ObamaCare was unprecedented and outside the powers granted to his office under our Constitution,” Boehner said in a statement. “I am grateful to the Court for ruling that this historic overreach can be challenged by the coequal branch of government with the sole power to create or change the law.”

In other futile gesture news, outside the Capitol on Wednesday the Stop the Iran Deal Rally “felt more like a coda for a failed summer campaign to scuttle the deal than a useful means of accomplishing anything,” writes Jim Newell at Slate. T-partiers at the rally will likely transfer their anger towards Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for “allowing” the deal to go through.

Newell found this colorful character at the rally:

“Obama is a black, Jew-hating, jihadist putting America and Israel and the rest of the planet in grave danger,” said Bob Kunst of Miami. Kunst—pairing a Hillary Clinton rubber mask with a blue T-shirt reading “INFIDEL”—was holding one sign that accused Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry of “Fulfilling Hitler’s Dreams” and another that queried, “DIDN’T WE LEARN ANYTHING FROM 1938?” His only reassurance was that, when Iran launches its attack on the mainland, it’ll be stopped quickly by America’s heavily armed citizenry.

And he votes, ladies and gentlemen.

Salad for dinner

by digby

The Queen of all the Arctic:

Hooah!

Disapproving the disapproval and kabuki hissy fits to come

by digby

So the Dems successfully filibustered the Senate’s formal disapproval of the Iran deal which means the deal is going through and the president will not have to veto it. (I know it’s stupidly convoluted but that’s how the thing was set up.) Anyway, huzzah.

But that doesn’t mean the House isn’t going to stage a kabuki hissy fit so their wingnuts can make fiery speeches into the void:

Late Wednesday, Boehner managed to quell a budding revolt among the House Republicans by agreeing to table a disapproval resolution vote in favor of a vote on an approval resolution. The switch was made to let the deal’s many critics in the House state, in no uncertain terms, that they believe Obama didn’t hold up his end of the bargain and, Boehner said, hold “every member accountable for their vote.”

A group of House Republicans successfully pressed leaders to change plans after arguing that the 60-day window for Congress to consider the Iran deal never started, because Obama never gave lawmakers the text of two confidential side agreements between Iran and the the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which will help enforce the agreement.

Administration officials have argued they can’t hand over those side deals, because they never had them. But House Republicans insist that stance puts the administration in breach of the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act enacted earlier this year, which obligated Obama to hand over all materials pertaining to the deal with no exceptions for those the United States isn’t a party to or doesn’t have in its possession.

Republicans across Congress have taken up the complaint that without the side agreements, they can’t be expected to respect the Sept. 17 deadline for Congress to consider the deal. But in the Senate, some Republican leaders aren’t supporting the House’s new approach.

“The best way to express concerns about the documents, but also concerns about the deal itself, is to vote to disapprove the deal,” Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said Wednesday.

As I said, the Dems filibustered the disapproval bill and that’s that. But the show must go on.

And speaking of shows, you have to read this article by Stan Collender about the wingnut plans to shut down the government.  Yes, they are doing that gambit again and this time it’s going to be a real circus. Here are their demands:

1. Increase military spending
2. Decrease domestic spending
3. Defund Planned Parenthood
4. Put restrictions on the Iran deal

Sure, why not?  Read the whole thing to get an idea of the various sideshows and high wire acts they are thinking about. In a presidential election year.

They’re kamikazes.

.

The other invisible primary

by digby

I wrote about the evangelical primary today for Salon. It’s getting very interesting. Here’s an excerpt:

Trump scares everyone, even the king of the bullies

by digby

Would you like to see a right wing bully cower in the face of Donald Trump? Check out Rush “graciously” suggest that maybe, just maybe, Trump should talk more about issues instead of slamming Ben Carson because Carson really is a good doctor — before launching into an apologia for assholes that will make you laugh out loud:

Look, I know that for Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina, having Trump go after you is a plus. It’s name recognition. It’s name ID, and it is validation. And all this, of course, is a gigantic ratings gift for CNN. ‘Cause after Trump went out there and said whatever he was about Ben Carson. He says he’s an “okay doctor.” Now in the Rolling Stone interview, Trump sort of mocked Carly Fiorina’s face.

“‘Look at that face! Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?’ Trump reportedly bellowed while watching his Republican presidential rival on the news. ‘I mean, she’s a woman, and I’m not s’posedta say bad things, but really, folks, come on. Are we serious?'” Now, I know what some Trump people are gonna say. I can predict it. They are going to say, “Hey, wait a minute, Rush! He’s not gonna hurt himself with any of this because, you know, he’s just being honest.

“And we’ve got so much political correctness running things… I mean, how many people in this country look at somebody else and judge their appearance one way or the other? Nobody ever says anything about it, because it’s supposedly rude and impolite. But Trump doesn’t have those boundaries. And don’t forget, Rush: Carly Fiorina hit him first, and it’s Trump playing to type. You attack him, he’s gonna come back at you.” So I fully expect to have people defend Trump. People are gonna try.

They’re gonna do it under the rubric of political correctness and how he’s continuing to blow that up, but don’t feel sad for Carly Fiorina. My point is: She loves this, and Carson probably does, too, because Carly Fiorina has just had her awareness level raised significantly. Especially with low-information voters. I mean, here’s Trump out there talking about this ugly woman, with whatever else he said. (paraphrased) “I mean, God, are you kidding? Would anybody vote for that? Can you imagine that’s the face of our next president?”

Can you imagine low-information voter?

“Who’s he talking about? Wow! Wow! Wow! That’s…” They go and they find out. And, voila! A whole bunch of people who never heard of Carly Fiorina now know who she is. She’ll take that any day. She’s an adult. She can handle this kind of stuff. See, this is the point. The point is, her feelings aren’t hurt. And I don’t know her. Maybe her feelings are hurt. My guess is this woman has been at the top of the rough-and-tumble high-tech business world. She had a job where a lot of people thought she had no business having a job, trying to undermine her every day.

This is small potatoes. It may be impolite, it may be rude, it may be all those things that people say about polite society. It may be totally inappropriate, but “appropriate” and American politics have been strangers for who knows how long now. Appropriate and American politics or inappropriate and American politics. But don’t feel bad for Carly. Don’t misunderstand. I’m not endorsing anything here. As usual, I’m objectively analyzing what has happened since we were last together. And I would probably say the same thing Ben Carson. Don’t feel sorry for him.

The Democrats have said worse about both of these people. It’s just Trump’s happened to be personal. But the Democrats and the media have said far worse things about Ben Carson, far worse things about Carly Fiorina. Nobody gets mad at them. Nobody gets… This is chump change compared to the kind of insults and character assassination the media engages in against Republicans every day, and what are we told when that happens?

It goes on and on and on. I have never heard Limbaugh being so careful or judicious in his language. But he has to be, doesn’t he? This is, after all, the original Trump, the guy who famously made fun of a 12 year old girl’s looks and said Hillary Clinton wasn’t allowed to join the Marines because “they didn’t have uniforms or boots big enough to fit that butt and those ankles”. That is, of course, just a tiny drop in the bucket of disgusting sexist smears and crude insults about women he doesn’t like. Trump is just doing what Limbaugh’s been doing for years — and making a very tidy profit at it.

Now he has to try to find a way to disarm the nuclear weapon he’s responsible for creating. It’s not going well.

.

Out of step, once again

by digby

I’m talking about myself:

On average, since the beginning of last year, 50 percent of Americans have disagreed with Obama’s handling of foreign policy, while only 38 percent have approved of it. Fifty-four percent of Americans don’t think Obama is tough enough on foreign affairs and national security, and 48 percent say the United States is less important and powerful than it was a decade ago. On the Iran deal, 49 percent disapprove of the plan to monitor Iran’s nuclear facilities and lift international sanctions, while only 21 percent approve. Thirty percent don’t know enough to say either way.

It’s always helpful to be reminded when you’re beliefs are clearly in the minority. It makes you less likely to say some stupid things under the assumption that everyone agrees with you.

For me, the second term foreign policy has been the best thing about the Obama administration. In fact, I thought it was his best characteristic in 2008 too, and it had nothing to do with his phantom Iraq war vote. I believed that many of his views on engaging the rest of the world were forward thinking, sophisticated and pragmatic. And in his second term he’s delivered on quite a bit about that, as much in what he refused to do as in what he’s done.

The administration is far from perfect. It’s too in love with secrets and spies and relying on something like the drone war is morally suspect and has consequences that don’t seem to have completely thought through. But on the whole I’ve been impressed with his willingness to resist the most hawkish elements of the government from time to time. It’s quite rare in a president.

That excerpt above is from a piece by Jamelle Bouie about Clinton’s speech yesterday. He surveys the foreign policy field as it is today making the point that Clinton has to sell herself in the environment that exists within those numbers. He looks at the Republicans:

Despite the advantage in public opinion, they’ve had a hard time offering a sharp foreign policy critique, in part because they refuse to budge from the worst ideas and strategies of the last GOP administration.

Iran is instructive. At every step of the argument over the nuclear agreement, Republicans have pushed maximum confrontation at the expense of diplomacy, rejecting the deal without offering an alternative. If elected president, for example, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio would renege on the deal and reimpose sanctions, as would Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton thinks we should reject the deal in favor of a “credible threat of military force,” and Illinois Sen. Mark Kirk compared the Iran deal to Nazi appeasement. “This is the greatest appeasement since Chamberlain gave Czechoslovakia to Hitler,” he said. The most flamboyant assault on the Iran deal came Wednesday, when Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz gathered with hundreds of supporters to blast the administration. If the deal goes through, Cruz argued, Obama would “quite literally be the world’s largest financier of radical Islamic terrorism.”

Yes, the public wants a more active foreign policy. But it isn’t interested in reckless confrontation. People remember the last war, and aren’t thrilled with the chance for another one. To that point, 59 percent of Americans still think the Iraq war was a mistake, and 55 percent oppose putting ground troops back in the country. What’s more, about half of Americans are wary of too much foreign involvement. Put differently, the public wants an alternative, and it isn’t the GOP.

That’s the situation Clinton is supposed to finesse. And it’s not a simple task. Due to a number of factors, not the least of which is the already “genderized” nature of the two parties’ identification in the public mind, going after Clinton as a weak sister on national security was already baked into the cake. These numbers make it all the more likely that she will take an aggressive posture in foreign affairs. And that’s not good. Clinton has a fighting spirit that domestic partisans often admire. She is battled hardened from years of fighting spurious attacks by Republicans. But that characteristic is worrying when it comes to foreign policy.

Obviously, compared to any Republican in the field she’s Mahatma Gandhi. And as Bouie points out in his article there really are political considerations — peaceniks like me are in a distinct minority. The American people obviously want a president who is less “nuanced” than Obama has been. One can only hope that if she is nominated and then elected to the office that Clinton will be skilled enough to navigate these treacherous waters wisely.

Bouie concludes with this:

Clinton’s approach may be the right tack for a general election. Again, voters want change. But they support diplomacy and don’t want another war or occupation. Clinton offers a third way: Obama-style policies merged with hawkish rhetoric. It satisfies the public but keeps Clinton to the left of the Republican Party, and clears her path for attacks on GOP candidates. Which, incidentally, is what she did. “That’s not leadership, that’s recklessness,” said Clinton of Republican rhetoric. “It would set us right down the very dangerous path we’ve worked so hard to avoid. … Great powers can’t just jump agreements and expect the rest of the world to go along with us.”

This is one situation where one really hopes that it’s just all talk.

Update: I should make it very clear that Clinton gave a compelling defense of the Iran deal in her speech. Any hawkish rhetorical flourishes added to the rest of it don’t undermine her clear support for peace in this extremely important agreement.

.
.

Just an old country doctor

by digby

Gail Collins humorously surveyed the GOP field today and made this observation about Ben Carson:

Ben Carson has been surging! It’s easy to understand his popularity. He has a compelling life story about raising himself up from poverty to become a brain surgeon, and he was the least needy-looking candidate in the first Republican debate. On the other side, it is kind of unnerving that he doesn’t believe in evolution. Most Republican candidates try to fudge that one, by changing the subject or saying something like “I am not a scientist.” But Carson really doesn’t believe in evolution. And he is, you know, a scientist.

Here’s what Carson says about evolution:

In an interview for the Discovery Institute, “ID the Future” host David Boze asked Carson, “What things come to mind when people ask you, why do you question the theory of materialist evolution?”

“Well, the first thing is, how does something come out of nothing?” said Carson, who has written mroe than 100 neurosurgical publications. “And the second thing is, how does life evolve from non-life? Which, if you want to talk about fairy tales, those are incredible fairy tales.”

Boze also asked Carson how work on the human brain has influenced his thoughts on the issue of intelligent design.

Carson, who was the first surgeon to successfully separate twins conjoined at the head, said, “Well, just knowing how incredibly complex our brains are – billions of neurons, hundreds of billions of interconnections, the ability to process more than 2 million bits of information in one second. That is an amazingly complex organism.”

“And to say that that just came about sort of randomly by various mutations over the course of time, when as I just said mutations tend to lead to degeneration rather than improvement, just doesn’t make any sense,” said Dr. Carson. “So, the very things that they claim are evidence for evolution are the very things that damn the theory.”

“And the other thing is there are no intermediate species,” said Dr. Carson. “Where are they? It shouldn’t just evolve up to a certain point and then leap to the next species. There should be something in between at all given points of time, and there aren’t, and no one’s ever found them.”

A little earlier in the interview, which took place in February 2013, host David Boze asked, “What about the diversity of life here. How has your examination of life here influenced your view on the theory of evolution and whether or not there’s an intelligent designer?”

Carson, who was the director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital and co-director of the Johns Hopkins Craniofacial Center, said, “Well, the evolutionists look at the similarities that you see in the various life forms and they say, because this creature and this creature share the same type of digestive system or the same type of structures in their head, that clearly one evolved from the other.”

“I don’t know how clear that is,” he said. “Because if you have an intelligent designer, why wouldn’t he use a basic structure that works on multiple different creatures? Just like an automobile manufacturer. General Motors, same basic chassis as Chevrolet, a Buick, a Pontiac, or a Cadillac. And yet, they’re all different. And one did not evolve from the other.”

“And why would you have to go and completely change the motor, the chassis, and all the other infrastructure because you’re creating a different model?” said Carson. “That doesn’t make any sense to me. I think one of the most damning pieces of evidence against evolution is the human genome.”

Continuing with his point about the human genome, Dr. Carson said, “You can see that you have a very complex, sophisticated coding mechanism for different amino acids and various sequences that give you millions of different genetic instruction – very much like computer programming, which uses a series of zeros and ones and different sequences, it gives you very specific information about what that computer is to do.”

“Well this [human genome] is at least twice that complex,” he said. “Instead of just 2 digits, we’ve got 4 digits, repeating in different sequences but always resulting in the same thing unless there is a mutation. And if there is a mutation, it tends to be toward degeneration rather than improvement.”

Just like an automobile manufacturer. General Motors, same basic chassis as Chevrolet, a Buick, a Pontiac, or a Cadillac. And yet, they’re all different. And one did not evolve from the other.

What. The. Hell.

QOTD: the Great Whitebread Dope

by digby

He lets loose the dogs of war on Washington. Or something:

Hookay…

Update: Paul Waldman has a more thoughtful take on Walker’s idiocy, here.

.

All things post-September 11 are new again
by Tom Sullivan

After building a party’s political brand (and several of its presidential hopefuls’brands) on whipping up anti-immigrant fervor, here we are, the once and future empire, standing by with our thumbs up our animus as a refugee crisis sweeps across Europe. If the people were Russian tanks, well, hot damn, CNN and Fox News would already have branded the news event with crawlers worthy of a summer blockbuster trailer and they’d have commissioned James Horner to write the score.

Patrick L. Smith writes bitterly of the crisis at Salon, “Washington’s fingerprints are all over the tragedy unfolding across the Atlantic.” But with Trumpism rising along with world sea levels, it is hard to see how America can move to resettle fleeing Syrians here in any more than a grudging manner that would put a scowl on the Statue of Liberty’s serene face. We make the messes. Other people have to clean them up.

There will be tensions in Europe among locals, to be sure, as refugees attempt to assimilate. If they were to come here in this atmosphere, you can bet those tensions would be immediately palpable. Maybe in Chicago:

“Terrorist!” “Bin Laden!” “Go back to your country!” came the shouts from the other car.

Inderjit Singh Mukker, a father of two on his way to the grocery store in his Chicago suburb, pulled over when the vehicle in front kept tailgating him, according to the Sikh Coalition. The 53-year-old Sikh man, who wears a beard and turban, expected that the person in the other car would just drive past.

Mukker wound up in the hospital after a severe beating. For all we know, his assailant was home earlier on Tuesday cheering as Kim Davis left her Kentucky jail cell to the applause of supporters of “religious freedom.”

Mukker is lucky, I guess. He could have been killed like Balbir Singh Sodhi in the aftermath of 9/11. He was the first of many Sikhs killed in the wake of the 2001 attacks. Americans mistook them for Muslims in a country that went on to precipitate the 2015 refugee crisis because we mistook Iraq for a country that had something to do with 9/11.

The Syrian refugees might actually be better off elsewhere. Perhaps that was the nativists’ plan all along.