Lazy Saturday Reads
Posted: November 14, 2015 Filed under: morning reads, U.S. Politics | Tags: CBS Democratic debate, Paris attacks, terrorism 21 CommentsStop It. Chris Delias
Good Morning.
It’s a sad day today as the world processes the horrendous terrorist attacks in Paris. It seems this is the “new normal.” We are in a world war against non-state terrorists who are willing to kill innocent people along with themselves in support of goals that I personally do not understand.
The AP, via The Boston Globe: At least 127 killed in Paris attacks.
PARIS (AP) — French President Francois Hollande vowed to attack the Islamic State group without mercy as the jihadist group admitted responsibility Saturday for orchestrating the deadliest attacks inflicted on France since World War II.
Hollande said at least 127 people died Friday night in shootings at Paris cafes, suicide bombings near France’s national stadium and a hostage-taking slaughter inside a concert hall.
Hollande, who declared three days of national mourning and raised the nation’s security to its highest level, called the carnage ‘‘an act of war that was prepared, organized, planned from abroad with internal help.’’
The Islamic State group’s claim of responsibility appeared in Arabic and French in an online statement circulated by IS supporters. It was not immediately possible to confirm the authenticity of the admission, which bore the group’s logo and resembled previous verified statements from the group.
As Hollande addressed the nation, French anti-terror police worked to identify potential accomplices to the attackers, who remained a mystery to the public: their nationalities, their motives, even their exact number.
Against Terrorism and War, Julia Olivari
There’s much more at the link. The Globe also published a gallery of photos from the Paris attacks. More links to check out:
Wall Street Journal video: France Tried to Bolster Security Before Attacks.
The New York Times: Paris Attacks Were an Act of War by ISIS, Hollande Says.
BBC News: Paris attacks: A new terrorism and fear stalks a city.
Euro News: Le Bataclan, famous Paris music venue, turns into ‘bloodbath.’
LA Times: Paris attacks: Islamic State claims responsibility; French president decries ‘act of war.’
The New York Times: Americans are among the injured in Paris.
Tonight’s Democratic Debate
There will be a Democratic debate tonight at 9PM, and we plan to post a live blog here before it begins. The debate is on CBS, and they have pay-only streaming. I can’t even get it on my Comcast live site. But Time Magazine is offering free live streaming: How to Watch the Democratic Debate Free Online.
Watching the second Democratic presidential debate on Saturday will be simple, with a free live-stream on TIME.com.
CBS News is hosting the debate along with local CBS affiliate KCCI-TV and the Des MoinesRegister. The debate will air on CBS and will also be live-streamed on TIME.com, in collaboration with CBS News. Check back here closer to the 9 p.m. E.T. start time to see the live stream.
Blood of Terror, Li Li Tan
According to Time, CBS and Twitter will also keep track of social discussions of the debate using the hashtag #DemDebate.
In the wake of the Paris attacks, CBS has decided to change the emphasis of the debate. The NYT reports:
DES MOINES — In the hours after the deadly attacks in Paris, CBS News significantly reworked its plans for the Democratic presidential debate it is hosting here on Saturday night to focus more on issues of terrorism, national security and foreign relations.
Steve Capus, the executive editor of CBS News and the executive producer of “CBS Evening News,” said in an interview late Friday that he was in the middle of a rehearsal for the debate when news broke about the slaughter in Paris.
The CBS News team immediately shifted gears and reformulated questions to make them more directly related to the attacks. Mr. Capus said it was important for the debate to go on because the world looks to the American president for leadership during international crises.
“American leadership is put to the test,” Mr. Capus said. “The entire world is looking to the White House. These people are vying to take over this office.”
“This is exactly what the president is going to have to face,” he added.
Mr. Capus said the news team had planned a different debate, but “there is no question that the emphasis changes dramatically.”
“It is the right time to ask all the related questions that come to mind,” he added. “We think we have a game plan to address a lot of the substantive and important topics.”
More stories on the upcoming debate:
Mumbai Terror painting, by Subodh Kerkar
Politico: With just three on stage, Democratic debate moderator plans to dive deep.
This Saturday’s second Democratic debate will be a much smaller affair than the first. With only three candidates on stage, CBS News plans to delve deep into the issues with each candidate and have taken advantage of the smaller pool by doing some intense research.
Moderator John Dickerson and his team met with each of the campaigns for more than an hour to discuss the major issues at play in the race, sources on the campaigns said, describing the pre-interview as “informational in nature.” Dickerson is not giving candidates previews of his questions for the debate….
A CBS News official said Dickerson’s outreach to the campaigns was the same type of research he conducts for his weekly show, “Face the Nation.” The official said Dickerson talked with three dozen people and organizations beyond the campaigns to “immerse himself” in the issues.
Alongside Dickerson will be CBS News correspondent Nancy Cordes; Kevin Cooney, anchor for KCCI-TV, the local CBS affiliate; and Des Moines Register political columnist Kathie Obradovich.
“Our goal is to ask the candidates questions that help to illuminate for primary voters their differences on key issues — the way they would work to make life better for average Americans. So we’re going to be focusing, as we’ve always planned, on the issues that people care about,” Cordes said.
Terrorism No Comment, by Sebastian Placzek
This New York Times published a piece on Bernie Sanders’ debate prep that is really interesting. I guess he decided he needed to actually do some studying and practicing this time. Bernie Sanders’s Debate Strategy: Attack Hillary Clinton, if Asked. You’ll have to read it at the the link, because I can’t seem to copy and paste any of the text. I highly recommend this one.
One more must-read article from FiveThirtyEight: Hillary Clinton Is The Most Establishment-Approved Candidate On Record.
It’s become a running joke that I’m in the tank for Hillary Clinton. Whenever I’ve written anything that suggests Clinton has a very good chance of winning the Democratic presidential nomination, fans of the other Democratic candidates have let me hear it on email, Twitter and Reddit. I’ve written these pieces not because I’m rooting for Clinton or am in the pocket of “the corporations,”1 but because Clinton is in a strong position to win — a historically strong position.
On the eve of the second Democratic debate, taking place Saturday, here’s the latest evidence for that fact: Clinton has amassed a higher share of intra-party support before the Iowa caucuses than any presidential candidate2 since 1980, as far back as our data goes.
FiveThirtyEight tracks the endorsements of members of Congress and governors because they are highly correlated with the outcome of the primary. In the book “The Party Decides” — where the strong correlation between endorsements and primary outcome was clearly demonstrated — the authors point out that there are basically two types of primaries: Ones in which a single candidate wins the party over before Iowa (like in 2000 on both the Democratic and Republican sides) and ones in which most party actors stay on the sidelines until voting begins (like in 2008 on both sides). The former is very predictable; the latter is far more unpredictable and can produce a number of possible winners.
The 2016 Democratic contest is clearly in the more predictable camp (this year’s GOP race, of course, is not). Clinton already has 71 percent of all possible endorsement points3 on the Democratic side.
Go read the whole thing. You won’t regret it.
What stories are you following today? Please post your thoughts and comments below, and I hope you’ll come back tonight for the Democratic debate live blog.
Thursday Reads: Will It Come Down to Rubio Vs. Cruz?
Posted: November 12, 2015 Filed under: morning reads, Republican politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: 2016 Republican nomination race, immigration, Marco Rubio Ted Cruz 32 Comments
Good Morning!!
I’m beginning to get the feeling that Marco Rubio will be the GOP nominee. He seems to be the favorite of the money men, the “establishment” Republicans, and the corporate media. The only problem for him is that he’s still not very popular with voters.
But honestly, who else are the Republicans going to nominate? Trump is a know-nothing, egotistical blowhard, Carson is fabulist who spouts bizarre biblical fantasies and nutty conspiracy theories, Cruz is hated by just about everyone who has ever met him, Bush is the worst candidate evah, and Paul and Kasich are also-rans.
Rubio is young, baby-faced, and clean cut–never mind the fact that he is corrupt, ignorant, inexperienced, and would change any of his beliefs or policies and, if necessary, attack his own mother in order to win. Just look how he has treated his own mentor, Jeb Bush.
The latest media narrative is that Rubio and Ted Cruz are on a collision course.
Politico: The coming fight between Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz.
Going into the week, Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio seemed to be the rivalry to watch in the GOP primary. After the fourth Republican debate, that’s been replaced by a new and perhaps more consequential storyline: the coming collision of Rubio and Ted Cruz.
The two Cuban-Americans, both 40-something, first-term senators with tea party credentials, continue to trail outsider candidates Donald Trump and Ben Carson in the polls. But they’re increasingly viewed as the candidates to beat in their respective lanes — Rubio as the new establishment front-runner and Cruz beginning to consolidate support from the party’s more conservative wing. The consensus view that they outperformed their rivals Tuesday has served only to cement that impression.
“There’s this growing sense that Rubio’s the best candidate and that people are getting pretty comfortable with him,” said Bruce Haynes, a Republican strategist. “You can feel Carson and Trump losing support. Cruz is a quiet tide in the night that is beginning to wash out the base on Donald Trump. Now, I think, people are looking at Cruz as the candidate who’s best positioned in a lane to run with Rubio and give him a real fight.”
Both Cruz and Rubio are incredibly mean and ambitious, but I have to believe that Rubio will win out in the long run because Cruz is already the most hated man in DC. I have to believe that event Republican voters will hate him once they get to know him better.
At the NYT, Jeremy W. Peters writes: Confrontation Brews as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio Vie for Conservative Vote.
That fight, which could be the most decisive but unpredictable element of the nomination contest, increasingly appeared to be heading toward a confrontation between two first-term senators both elected with Tea Party support but who have since taken different paths: Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida.
Each made his pitch in subtle but unmistakable ways during the debate and afterward, as they left Milwaukee for a day of campaigning across the country.
The most glaring difference between the two that surfaced during the debate — and continued in interviews each gave in the hours afterward — was over the issue of immigration policy. Mr. Cruz tried to portray Mr. Rubio as a moderate beholden to the Republican establishment, while Mr. Rubio argued that his approach was the most reasonable and workable conservative solution.
Yesterday as Cruz was campaigning in New Hampshire, Peters asked him to distinguish between his immigration policies and Rubio’s.
“It is not complicated,” Mr. Cruz said, then paused before adding, “that on the seminal fight over amnesty in Congress, the Gang of Eight bill that was the brainchild of Chuck Schumer and Barack Obama, that would have granted amnesty to 12 million people here illegally, that I stood with the American people and led the fight to defeat it in the United States Congress.”
Mr. Cruz said: “In my view, if Republicans nominate for president a candidate who supports amnesty, we will have given up one of the major distinctions with Hillary Clinton and we will lose the general election. That is a path to losing.
“And part of the reason the debate last night was so productive is you started to see clear, meaningful policy distinctions, not just between what people say on the campaign trail. Talk’s cheap. But between their records. When the fight was being fought, where did you stand? That speaks volumes about who you are and where you will stand in the future. And we’re entering the phase now in the presidential race where primary voters are starting to examine the records of the candidates.”
Peters also notes that Rubio tried to clarify his immigration views yesterday on Fox News.
“The lesson I learned from that is the people of the United States do not trust the federal government on immigration,” Mr. Rubio said as he listed a tough set of policies he said would “realistically but responsibly” address the problem.
“If you’re a criminal, you’ll be deported,” he said. “If you’re not a criminal, and have been here longer than 10 years, you have to learn English. You have to start paying taxes. You’re going to have to pay a fine. And then you’ll get a work permit.” He did not mention the question that enrages so many conservative voters: whether to eventually grant citizenship to undocumented immigrants.
The problem Rubio has is that he hopes to get support from some Latinos and from moderate Republicans; Cruz is only interested in the right wing nuts.
Reihan Salam at Slate: Where Does Marco Rubio Stand on Immigration?
Back in the 1980s, Pat Schroeder, a liberal congresswoman from Colorado, dubbed Ronald Reagan “the Teflon president” for the way he managed to avoid any blame for the scandals that erupted around him in his second term. One wonders whether Rubio is emerging as the Teflon candidate. With the possible exception of the silver-tongued Carly Fiorina, no Republican presidential candidate has helped himself more over the course of the first four debates than Rubio. On Tuesday night, Rubio fared well again. He wasn’t quite as strong as Ted Cruz, who, as Slate’s Josh Voorhees argues, was the night’s biggest winner. More than usual, Rubio seemed to be drawing on his stock references to his hardscrabble upbringing and his immigrant parents, and his optimistic homilies about the healing power of the American Dream. What was really striking about Rubio’s performance, however, is the way he dodged, yet again, getting drawn into a debate over immigration policy….
It would be one thing if Rubio only avoided talking about comprehensive immigration reform on the debate stage, but the Florida senator has soft-pedaled the issue throughout his campaign, only occasionally explaining why he decided to abandon his comprehensive immigration reform bill, which offered a path to citizenship to unauthorized immigrants and substantially increased legal immigration, among other things. Instead of repudiating the months he spent crafting an immigration compromise, Rubio emphasizes that he couldn’t trust President Obama as a partner, or that the timing wasn’t right. He insists that he pushed the comprehensive immigration reform bill in as conservative a direction as he could.
Yet we don’t have a clear sense of where, in an ideal world, Rubio would like U.S. immigration policy to go. On his nattily designed website, Rubio excerpts a passage from American Dreams, his biography, in which he makes the case for securing the border first, a conservative-friendly stance. He calls for moving from an immigration policy that emphasizes family ties to current U.S. citizens to one that is instead based on skills, which is sensible and broadly acceptable to the Republican right. What we don’t know is what this would mean in practice. Can we really say that we have a skills-based immigration policy if we also have a guest worker program for less-skilled workers, and if guest worker status can be renewed indefinitely? One assumes that guest workers will form families on U.S. soil and that many of them will be reluctant to leave the country once their guest worker visas run out. And though Rubio discusses immigration policy in broad strokes, he doesn’t really tell us about numbers. Will we admit more immigrants under the approach he favors? Or fewer? Even after abandoning comprehensive immigration reform, Rubio has backed legislation that would dramatically expand the H-1B visa program. What does he think about the evidence that the H-1B program is being gamed by offshoring companies with less than sterling records? These are questions I’d like to see Rubio answer at a future debate.
Other elements of Rubio’s immigration approach are likely to prove even more controversial. For example, he makes it clear that he intends to offer some form of legal status to unauthorized immigrants who already live in the U.S., a position that puts him at odds with many Republicans.* If Rubio intends to stick with this position, as I think he does, he’s going to have to actually make the case for it.
It’s difficult for me to understand the Republicans’ attitudes toward immigration, but it does appear that it is one of the most important issues for their base.
Another problem Rubio has is his possible past financial indiscretions. Has he continued this kind of dishonesty in Washington? Will Rubio’s “Teflon” work on this issue too?
The Miami Herald via Raw Story: New info raises more questions: Did Marco Rubio use his GOP credit card to subsidize his life?
For five years, Marco Rubio has tried to put behind him the controversy of his spending on a Republican Party of Florida credit card, taking the unusual step over the weekend of making public nearly two years of American Express statements to show how he spent the party’s money.
In some ways, however, the statements, which he previously refused to make public, raise more questions about how Rubio used the card, rather than laying them to rest.
Some big-ticket expenses he rang up on the card — $1,625 at the St. Regis Hotel in New York, $527 for food and drinks at Disney, $953 for a meal at Silver Slipper, the Tallahassee steakhouse — are the kind of eye-catching charges expected for someone doing party business.
But a slew of small charges at gas stations and for cheap meals — at a time when Rubio was struggling with his personal finances — suggest Rubio made the most of the ample leeway and little oversight party leaders gave employees and lawmakers to spend the party’s cash.
The Florida GOP issued corporate cards, intended for business use, during flush years a decade ago. A spending scandal threw the party into crisis five years later, around 2010, when some of the AmEx statements — including Rubio’s from 2007-08 — were made public. Rubio’s presidential campaign released the remaining two years of statements from 2005-06 on Saturday to show Rubio had repaid the party when he misused the card for personal charges.
An analysis by the Herald/Times of the new statements, however, found Rubio spent freely on the sort of items that are difficult to prove — or disprove — as party business expenses.
There’s much more at the link, and it makes Rubio look like a petty crook. Is there more to this story?
Although I see Rubio as a lightweight, it looks like the “very important people” see him as their best shot to get a Republican in the White House. I think he’s scary because he comes across as so sweet and innocent.
What do you think? Please post your thoughts and links on any topic in the comment thread.
Live Blog: Clash of the Clowns IV
Posted: November 10, 2015 Filed under: Republican politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: 4th GOP primary debate, live blog 130 Comments
Good Evening Politics Junkies!
Are you ready for the Tuesday night fights? The undercard begins at 7PM Eastern and will include Chris Christie, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum, and Bobby Jindal. The main event at 9PM will include the above eight candidates: John Kasich, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Donald Trump, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, and Rand Paul.
The moderators, according to the LA Daily News:
The “undercard” debate will be moderated by Fox Business Network anchors Trish Regan and Sandra Smith and Wall Street Journal Washington Bureau Chief Gerald Seib.
The prime-time debate will be moderated by Fox Business Network anchors Maria Bartiromo and Neil Cavuto and Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Gerard Baker.
Where to watch:
The Nov. 10 GOP debates — both the prime-time and “undercard” contests — will be broadcast live from the Milwaukee Theatre in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on the Fox Business Network. They will also be streamed live over the Internet at Foxnews.com and Foxbusiness.com.
No cable subscription is required to watch the live stream.
Fox Business Network says it is working with cable and satellite providers to give access to the channel to as may subscribers as possible for tonight’s debates.
The debates will be broadcast on the Fox News Radio network with a live audio stream over the Internet at radio.foxnews.com.
What the media has been saying in the lead up to tonight’s action:
NBC News: High Stakes, Calm Atmosphere Ahead of GOP Debate.
MILWAUKEE, Wisc. — The fourth GOP primary debate will feature fewer candidates than the first three, but likely just as many — if not more — fireworks.
Fewer candidates means more time to speak — and more opportunity to screw up, as the moderators have telegraphed plans to drill candidates on policy specifics and hold them tightly to time constraints.
And with just over 80 days to go until the first primary contest, in Iowa, candidates will be jockeying for that last burst of momentum
heading into the winter campaign season where voters start to tune in, and more candidates will likely drop out.But at the Milwaukee Theater, where the debate is set to take place, the atmosphere was was largely the calm before the storm. On the chilly but bright day, few reporters were seen outside doing live reports. It was similarly quiet in the sleepy press file, with a few dozen staffers and reporters milling about but most elsewhere.
From NBC News’ Chuck Todd and friends: Bush Vs. Rubio Sets The Stage For Tonight’s Debate.
Another Bush-vs.-Rubio fight sets the stage for tonight’s GOP debate: Tonight’s fourth Republican presidential debate picks up where the last one left off — with Jeb Bush in desperate need of a strong showing, and with his team (this time his Super PAC) picking a fight with Marco Rubio. The Right to Rise Super PAC “has filmed a provocative video casting his rival Marco Rubio as ultimately unelectable because of his hard-line stand against abortion,” the New York Times reported last night. “That group, which has raised more than $100 million, has asked voters in New Hampshire how they feel about Mr. Rubio’s skipping important votes in the Senate. And the group’s chief strategist has boasted of his willingness to spend as much as $20 million to damage Mr. Rubio’s reputation and halt his sudden ascent in the polls, according to three people told of the claim.” In response, the Rubio campaign has released a brand-new online ad in response to the New York Times article, and it’s full of instances where Bush has praised Rubio. “I’m a huge Marco fan,” Bush says at the ad’s end.
Is the Bush Super PAC telegraphing its attack on Rubio? Or is it internal sabotage? Why would the Right to Rise folks leak this story out, especially before tonight’s debate? It was our understanding that — after the last debate — Jeb World acknowledged that they couldn’t take Rubio on again until Bush had improved his poll position. Given that this New York Times story feels more damaging to Jeb than to Rubio, we wonder if there’s some internal sabotage going on. Did someone with knowledge of Right to Rise’s abortion video on Rubio give the story to the Times? Or did it come from pro-Rubio folks who knew about the video? Regardless of the source, that Times article only puts more pressure on Bush tonight.
More speculation and analysis of other possible candidate clashes at the link. A few more stories to check out:
John Feehrey at the Wall Street Journal: 5 Questions for the GOP Debate on the Job of Being President.
Jonathan Martin a the New York Times: What to look for in the Republican debate.
Amber Phillips at the Washington Post: The top 9 issues ahead of Tuesday’s GOP presidential debate.
Please add any good stories you’ve read in the comment thread and document the atrocities as you watch.
Tuesday Reads: Clash of the Clowns IV
Posted: November 10, 2015 Filed under: morning reads, Republican politics, U.S. Politics 10 Comments
Good Afternoon!!
The passengers in the GOP clown car have another date with destiny tonight. Yes, another Republican debate, this time hosted by Fox Business Network. It should be worth watching just to see if the rest of the other clowns beat up on Ben Carson after his first week of “serious” media scrutiny.
There will only be eight participants in the main debate tonight. Chris Christie and Mike Huckabee have been demoted to the kid’s table, so we won’t have to listen to their fulminating in prime time. Sad sacks Lindsey Graham, George Pataki, and Jim Gilmore didn’t even make it into the kiddie debate. The participants in the main event are Donald Trump, Ben Carson, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina, John Kasich and Rand Paul.
I’ll put up a live blog tonight for you to post your reactions if you’re watching. I plan to watch at least the first hour. If it’s entertaining I’ll try stick it out for the whole thing.
The debate will be streamed on the Fox Business Network and Wall Street Journal websites. Lindsey Graham still isn’t quitting, according to CBS News.
Graham will be weighing in during the debate on an app called Sidewire, which bills itself as a mobile-based social platform. The Wall Street Journal notes that posting on Sidewire “is limited to about 300 ‘newsmakers.'” App users will be able to see Graham’s running commentary, but only those newsmakers will be able to ask Graham questions.
Here are three the five things Politico thinks we should watch for in tonight’s debate. Read the details on each at the link.
A Bush-Cruz tag-team?
Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz are starkly different candidates – one an establishment favorite with a patrician pedigree, the other a tea party bomb-thrower who’s made a career out of antagonizing leaders of his own party.Yet, on Tuesday night, they may end up being debate partners….
Trump vs. Carson
Those who’ve followed Donald Trump’s debate style closely have noticed a distinct pattern. Near the start of each debate, the real estate developer and television celebrity will open with a “big blast” against one of his rivals. In the first showdown, it was directed at Rand Paul. In the second, at Jeb Bush. And in the third go-round, at John Kasich.This time, his target seems certain: Ben Carson….
Fox Business’s time to shine
Nearly two weeks after CNBC stumbled, Fox Business, a newer and less established business network with a smaller viewership, has an opportunity to prove itself as a debate host.Those who have been briefed on the network’s plans say it wants its debate to be what CNBC’s wasn’t: Policy-focused and chaos-free….
The other two items are about whether Christie can make any impact in the undercard debate and whether the reduced number of candidates in the main event will mean more “fireworks” among the participants.
There’s a good op-ed at The Washington Post by Matthew Jordan, an associate professor of media studies at Penn State: Ratings-driven presidential debates are weakening American democracy.
Televised presidential debates originated in the 1960s, during TV’s golden era. But back then, networks ran news divisions at a loss in exchange for being granted a licensed monopoly over public airways by the FCC. Candidates, in exchange for the publicity, answered hard questions posed by moderators.
Today, the rules of the debate game have shifted to reflect a new media reality, one in which broadcasters have a powerful financial interest in promoting debates centered on entertainment, rather than substantive discussions of policy issues.
In fact, today’s debates can be likened to World Wrestling Entertainment: there are heroes and villains, winners and losers, entrance themes and announcers, drama and intrigue (will Biden show?) — even an “undercard.”
Like it or not, the democratic process has been usurped by an endless, ratings-driven spectacle. And for networks — with the debates’ stripped-down production costs and high ratings — it’s like hitting the mother lode.
Check out the rest at the WaPo.
The Guardian also has an interesting article on tonight’s debate: Republican debate: TV moderators face candidates after media-bashing debacle.
Recent attempts by some Republican presidential candidates to control the questions they are asked in televised debates has been likened to the behavior of Russian and Syrian presidents Vladimir Putin and Bashar al-Assad by a senior adviser to rival GOP contender John Kasich.
With tension still running high between several of the top Republican hopefuls and mainstream media outlets ahead of Tuesday’s presidential debate in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, John Weaver, the chief strategist of the Kasich campaign, has accused rivals for the party’s nomination of in effect adopting dictatorial tactics. “I don’t think it’s for the candidates to dictate how the moderators frame questions – that would be comparable to Vladimir Putin or Assad,” he told the Guardian.
Weaver said that in his personal opinion some of the questions that had been put to candidates in previous Republican debates could have been worded differently. “But at the end of the day, candidates are competing to be president of the United States, not for a post in the Boy Scouts. If you can’t handle questions from moderators – whether they are easy or tough – then what are you doing here?”
Tuesday’s GOP debate at the Milwaukee Theatre will open at 8pm CST as the fallout of the last such debate hosted by CNBC last month continues to reverberate in conservative circles. Following on from feisty exchanges betweenMegyn Kelly of Fox News and Donald Trump in the first Republican TV debate in August, the CNBC event erupted into open hostility from several of the candidates in response to what were perceived as “gotcha” questions from the moderators.
Ted Cruz complained that the candidates were being treated as if they were in a “cage match”, and Marco Rubio dubbed the media “Hillary Clinton’s Super Pac.”
I think “cage match” is a pretty good characterization of what we’ve seen so far in the GOP debates.
I’m still fascinated by the Ben Carson phenomenon. The latest media focus has been on his tale of getting fooled by a parody article that appeared in a Yale humor newspaper when he was a student there. I really wish reporters would focus more on Carson’s cluelessness about government and policy, but I have to admit it’s interesting to see what a fabulist this brilliant brain surgeon is. Here are some of the links I’ve been saving.
Mediaite: Sh*t Ben Carson Says: The Complete Collection, by Tommy Christopher.
Mediaite: Why Is the Conservative Media So Unwilling to Admit That Carson Has a Brian Williams Problem?
Kevin Drum: Ben Carson’s Psychology Test Story Gets Even Weirder.
Ana Marie Cox: Ben Carson Thinks You’re the Crazy One.
Buzzfeed: Yale Classmate: We Did The Prank Test That Ben Carson’s Talking About.
Politico: Christie on Carson scrutiny: ‘I don’t have a whole lot of sympathy.’
Think Progress: Ben Carson Blames Drug Addiction On ‘Political Correctness.’
I also want to call attention to a story at Politico today; it’s about a Ben Carson obsession I hadn’t heard about before.
Ben Carson’s Roman fixation, by Nahal Toosi.
Ben Carson doesn’t have a detailed foreign policy platform, but he does have a clear worldview: the evangelical precept that the greatest danger facing America is moral and spiritual decline at home — a decline he often compares to a Roman Empire collapsing under the weight of its own perfidy and corruption.
“If we continue our fiscally irresponsible ways, coupled with our arrogance, there exist no other possibility than self-ruination,’’ Carson wrote in a column last year. “As was the case with the Roman Empire, our fate is in our hands.”
In another discussing the re-emergence of Russia, he wrote: “While we Americans are giving a cold shoulder to our religious heritage, the Russians are warming to religion. The Russians seem to be gaining prestige and influence throughout the world as we are losing ours. I wonder whether there is a correlation.”
Just last month, during a rally in West Memphis, Arkansas, Carson again mentioned the Romans in warning against fiscal irresponsibility and running up the national debt.
Carson’s views may be simplistic — Rome did not fall in a day, after all, and its long decline was caused by a wide array of interlocking factors, including overexpansion, an East-West split and attacks by outside forces. Yet his explanations strike a chord with conservative Christians already attracted to the retired pediatric neurosurgeon for his compelling life story and opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage. Those same voters also appreciate other foreign policy mantras espoused by Carson: that the U.S. must hold fast to its Christian ideals, always lead on the world stage, and use overwhelming force against Islamists who threaten its way of life.
Read the rest at Politico.
I’m going to end there, because I’m really late today. This time it’s my car–the exhaust system has to be fixed/replaced. I had to take it to my mechanic this morning and I won’t get it back till tomorrow morning. Plus, I think I’m coming down with a cold. Ahhhhhhhhhhh!
I’ll have a live blog up before 8PM. Now, what stories are you following today?
Friday Reads: “It Doesn’t Take a Brain Surgeon . . .”
Posted: November 6, 2015 Filed under: morning reads, Republican politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: 2016 GOP nomination race, Ben Carson, Donald Trump, Rand Paul 36 Comments
Good Morning!!
I’m filling in for Dakinikat today, because her supposedly repaired cable wires were pulled down again yesterday. She really needs to get a break from whomever is in charge of the Universe.
Since GOP presidential candidate Ben Carson has been doing so well in the polls, the media has been focusing on vetting him; and they are coming up with some certifiably crazy stuff. Suddenly that old cliché, “It doesn’t take a brain surgeon” no longer seems applicable; because Carson is a retired brain surgeon and he is clueless about science, history, the health care system, and even basic logic.
If–heaven forbid–this freak were to end up in the White House, this country would be doomed. Therefore, I’m going to focus this post on Carson and his bizarre conspiracy theories and his strange “campaign.” Yesterday we discussed the Buzzfeed piece that revealed a 1998 video in which Carson claimed that the pyramids were built by the biblical character Joseph to store grain.
“My own personal theory is that Joseph built the pyramids to store grain,” Carson said. “Now all the archeologists think that they were made for the pharaohs’ graves. But, you know, it would have to be something awfully big if you stop and think about it. And I don’t think it’d just disappear over the course of time to store that much grain.”
“And when you look at the way that the pyramids are made, with many chambers that are hermetically sealed, they’d have to be that way for various reasons. And various of scientists have said, ‘Well, you know there were alien beings that came down and they have special knowledge and that’s how—’ you know, it doesn’t require an alien being when God is with you.”
Dr. Ben Carson addresses the Republican National Committee luncheon Thursday, Jan. 15, 2015, in San Diego. (AP Photo/Lenny Ignelzi)
At The National Memo, Eric Kleefeld wrote about some of Carson’s other wacky beliefs, The Conspiracy Theories of Ben Carson: A Brief Introduction. Read the whole thing–and watch the videos–at the link. Here’s just a taste.
In 2014, Carson declared that President Obama and then-Attorney General Eric Holder were acting out roles in a decades-long communist conspiracy to subvert America.
In doing so, he cited a book from the 1950s by fringe right-wing conspiracy theorist Cleon Skousen, The Naked Communist. (Skousen was also a major racist, even defending the honor of antebellum Southern slavery and the Supreme Court’s 1857 Dred Scott decision.) [….]
In a 2011 speech to a church group, Carson declared: “I personally believe that this theory, that Darwin came up with, was something that was encouraged by the Adversary.”
Carson elaborated on this point: “Now this whole creation vs. evolution controversy has been raging on, really since the beginning. Because what is Satan’s plan? To get rid of God — to disparage God, to mischaracterize God….
In a 2014 speech to the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage, Carson again referenced the aforementioned Cleon Skousen — and said that “neo-Marxists” had “systematically attacked” the family in order to bring down the United States.
In mid-October, Kevin Drum wrote about some of Carson’s other weird ideas at Mother Jones: Ben Carson Is a Paranoid Nutcase.
A few days ago Carson peddled a conspiracy theory about Vladimir Putin, Ali Khamenei, and Mahmoud Abbas all being old palsfrom their days together at Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow in 1968. He refused to divulge his source for this, but instead explained it this way: “That’s what I call wisdom,” Carson said. “You get these pieces of information. You talk to various people. You begin to have an overall picture. You begin to understand why people do what they do.
He insisted that Hitler’s rise to power was accomplished “through a combination of removing guns and disseminating propaganda”—despite the plain historical fact that Hitler didn’t remove anyone’s guns during the period when he took power.
Asked if the “end of days” was near, he said, “You could guess that we are getting closer to that.”
He has suggested that being gay is a conscious choice because “a lot of people who go into prison go into prison straight and when they come out they’re gay. So did something happen while they were in there? Ask yourself that question.”
Last year, before the November elections, he predicted that President Obama might declare martial law and cancel the 2016 elections. “If Republicans don’t win back the Senate in November, he says, he can’t be sure ‘there will even be an election in 2016.’ Later, his wife, Candy, tells a supporter that they are holding on to their son’s Australian passport just in case the election doesn’t go their way.”
Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson speaks at the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) convention in Las Vegas, Nevada June 17, 2015. REUTERS/Steve Marcus
This is the guy who is leading the GOP presidential field and is supposedly tied with Hillary Clinton nationally? Here’s more from Steve Benen at MSNBC today: Carson blasts ‘secular progressives,’ defends bogus claims.
It was an amazing trifecta for Republican presidential hopeful Ben Carson: he made three ridiculous claims, about three very different subjects, all over the course of about half a day. But it was his defense for one of the three that continues to stand out.
The retired neurosurgeon said, for example, “Every signer of the Declaration of Independence had no elected office experience.” This, of course, is ridiculously untrue. Carson soon after made some specific claims about Medicare and Medicaid, which were also demonstrably wrong.
But it’s hard to look past Carson’s beliefs about the Egyptian pyramids. As the GOP candidate sees it, archeological and physical evidence should be ignored because, in Carson’s mind, the pyramids were built by the biblical Joseph to store grain.
And yesterday, the Republican presidential hopeful continued to defend his alternate version of reality.
“Some people believe in the Bible, like I do, and don’t find that to be silly at all, and believe that God created the Earth and don’t find that to be silly at all.” Carson told reporters in Miami during a stop on his book tour. “The secular progressives try to ridicule it any time it comes up and they’re welcome to do that.”
In other words, as Carson sees it, there should be two competing versions of historical and archeological facts. One can be based on evidence, research, and scholarship, though Carson looks down on such an approach, leaving it to “secular progressives,” as if reality has some kind of liberal bias.
Can you believe this guy? Even certified right wing conspiracy theorist Rand Paul is laughing at Carson. From TPM:
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) is the latest GOP presidential candidate to jump on 2016 frontrunnerBen Carson’s theory that the pyramids were created by the biblical figure Joseph to store grain.
“I’’m really big into conspiracy theories, so I think they were probably built by the aliens as grain silos, don’t you think,” Paul joked, when asked about Carson’s idea on 1110AM WBT, as reported by Buzzfeed.
Donald Trump is also capitalizing on the media reports of Carson’s beliefs, according to Politico:
Donald Trump is fully on the attack against Ben Carson, his top Republican rival in the polls, as journalists have called into question the retired neurosurgeon’s anecdotes about his violent past.
“With Ben Carson wanting to hit his mother on head with a hammer, stabb [sic] a friend and Pyramids built for grain storage – don’t people get it?” Trump added in a follow-up tweet, referencing the retired neurosurgeon’s past claims that he tried to harm his mother and friend before seeking redemption, as well as his belief that the biblical figure Joseph built the Great Pyramids of Giza to store grain and not pharaohs’ tombs.
He also took a major swipe at Carson on Thursday evening, as Carson defended himself against the network investigating his stories.
“The Carson story is either a total fabrication or, if true, even worse-trying to hit mother over the head with a hammer or stabbing friend!” Trump tweeted.
The next Republican debate should be interesting.
Carson also thinks transgender people should have their own separate bathrooms. From Think Progress: Ben Carson: Trans People Don’t Deserve ‘Extra Rights,’ Like Using Bathroom.
A week after claiming his anti-gay positionsdidn’t make him homophobic, Ben Carson has suggested that transgender people should be segregated to their own separate restrooms.
Speaking with Fusion’s Jorge Ramos, Carson explained that he doesn’t think it’s fair that the only way to accommodate transgender people is with “extra rights” to make everyone else “uncomfortable.”
Answering a question about this week’s defeat of the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, Carson suggested, “How about we have a transgender bathroom?”
“It is not fair for them to make everyone else uncomfortable,” he explained. “It’s one of the things that I don’t particularly like about the movement. I think everybody has equal rights, but I’m not sure that anybody should have extra rights — extra rights when it comes to redefining everything for everybody else and imposing your view on everybody else. The way that this country was designed, it was ‘live and let live,’ and that’s the way I feel.”
I wonder if Carson knows about what happened to the old Southern policy of “separate but equal” for black people?
More interesting Carson-related links:
ABC News: Ben Carson Lashes Out at Media Over Questions About Violent Childhood.
The Atlantic: Where Is Ben Carson’s Money Going?
Kevin Drum: Is Ben Carson a Liar? Or Does He Just Not Care?
Christian Science Monitor: How Ben Carson became leader in war against ‘political correctness.’
Washington Post: Ben Carson’s stories of violence in his past questioned.
Forbes (via Dakinikat): Archaeologists To Ben Carson: Ancient Egyptians Wrote Down Why The Pyramids Were Built.
Steve Benen: Carson sees a political significance to Noah’s Ark
LA Times: Can Ben Carson expand his base beyond evangelicals and stay on top of the GOP field?
CBS News: Ben Carson misstates political experience of founding fathers.
Jonathan Chait: Is Ben Carson Running for President?
What else is happening? Let us know in the comment thread, and have a great weekend!
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