Tuesday Reads
Posted: February 1, 2011 Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Barack Obama, Central Intelligence Agency, Egypt, Foreign Affairs, U.S. Politics | Tags: Ali A. Mohammed, Anwar Sadat, Barack Obama, Egypt, Jimmy Carter, Jon Huntsman, Keith Olbermann, Morning reads, snow, Tom Brokaw, Wael Ghonim, weather 33 Comments
Oh no! Not another giant snowstorm!
Good Morning!!
Have you heard about the gigantic winter storm that is affecting 29 states?
National Weather Service advisories and warnings are in effect in more than 20 states as a powerful storm gets organized in the Midwest. A blizzard warning is in effect for Chicago, where 12 to 20 inches of snow is possible. Other cities which may experience blizzard conditions include Tulsa, Wichita, Kansas City, and Detroit. Snow is expected to begin tonight and tomorrow from southwest to northeast and continue into early Wednesday.
The Chicago Tribune’s Weather Center cautions: “Snowfall totals in excess of 12 inches coupled with winds of 25 to 40 mph will make long distance travel extremely dangerous if not impossible.”
Wednesday morning into Thursday, the heavy snow moves through central New York, northern Massachusetts,southern Vermont, New Hampshire and southeast Maine.
Weather.com says the storm may be historic, due to the areal coverage of snow forecast – with upwards of 1 foot likely across a “2100-mile long swath from the Southern Plains to coastal New England.”
We’re supposed to get 18 inches in the Boston area, plus it will be mixed with ice pellets on Wednesday. I can’t take it anymore!!!!! All this snow is really getting to me.
In other news, the Republicans are all a-twitter over some guy named Jon Huntsman who is probably going to run for President. I admit I never heard of him and couldn’t care less what he does, but it seems to be the talk of the Village. To top it off, this guy has been working for Obama. Does he have any Democrats working for him?
Jon M. Huntsman Jr., the U.S. ambassador to China, sent a resignation letter to President Barack Obama on Monday, the White House said. Huntsman now is likely to explore a Republican presidential bid, according to supporters.
In a letter hand-delivered to the White House, the former Utah governor said that he wants to return to the United States by May. The letter thanks Obama for the opportunity to serve the country and praises the U.S. embassy staff in Beijing.
If Huntsman won the GOP nomination, he would be challenging the reelection of his former boss. White House officials are furious at what they consider an audacious betrayal, but know that any public criticism would be likely to benefit Huntsman if he enters the primaries.
Huntsman boasts the most foreign policy experience of any of the likely GOP candidates, and would be a formidable entry to the unformed GOP field. He had a fiscally conservative record as governor, opposes abortion and is a strong supporter of gun owners’ rights.
Yep, sounds like Obama’s type.
If you haven’t read Joseph Cannon’s latest, you should rush right over and do so. He has a fascinating, well-researched post up about Ali Abdul Saoud, a.k.a. Ali A. Mohammed, a muslim double agent who worked for both the CIA and al Qaeda and may have been involved (along with Omar Suleiman?) in the assassination of Anwar Sadat.
It’s a fascinating read, and I’m not just saying that because Cannon linked to my post on Suleiman.
This is a frightening story out of Egypt: Google Executive Missing in Wake of Egypt Protests.
An executive for Google Inc. is missing in the wake of Egypt’s tumultuous protests, according to his brother. Wael Ghonim, whose LinkedIn profile says he is head of marketing for the Middle East and North Africa at Google, hasn’t been heard from since Friday at 6 p.m., his brother Hazem said.
[….]
Wael Ghonim’s web postings suggest a deepening engagement with politics. His Facebook page lists opposition figure Mohamed ElBaradei as a person he admires, along with Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Steve Jobs. In mid-January he tweeted that he was traveling to Qatar to participate at an Internet freedom forum hosted by network Al Jazeera.
Later, he sent a tweet that said he was going to join the Egyptian protests despite “all the warnings I got from my relative and friends.”
[….]
On Friday, he tweeted: “Very worried as it seems that government is planning a war crime tomorrow against people. We are all ready to die.”
I think a lot more people are probably dead and missing in Egypt than we are being told. I hope Ghonim will be found.
The Christian Science Monitor asks, “Did Jimmy Carter just throw Obama under the bus?”
Commenting on the week’s tumultuous events in Egypt from the Maranatha Baptist Church near his home in Plains, Ga., the former president who brokered the 1979 peace accord between Egypt and Israel gave a candid personal assessment of Egypt’s embattled leader and said his “guess is Mubarak will have to go.”
President Mubarak has “become more politically corrupt” in recent years and has “perpetuated himself in office,” he told a Sunday school class of 300, according to the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer. Assessing the popular uprisings sweeping across the region, he said: “This is the most profound situation in the Middle East since I left office” more than 30 years ago.
I sure hope it’s a different bus than the one we’re under, because I don’t want Obama down here with us.
Speaking of throwing people under the bus, Tom Brokaw made a critical reference to Keith Olbermann in an interview with the Chicago Tribune. Here’s Huffpo’s gossipy take on it.
He told the Tribune’s Phil Rosenthal that NBC was better placed than its rivals because of MSNBC.
“Where it got sticky is when our commentators were anchoring political coverage,” he said, in a clear reference to Olbermann. Brokaw was widely known to have complained about Olbermann’s anchoring of campaign coverage during the 2008 race. “Those are, in some ways, incompatible roles,” Brokaw continued. “We worked our way through that.”
Rosenthal then asked Brokaw what he thought of Olbermann’s exit. “You’re not going to get me to go there,” Brokaw said. But when pushed, he said that MSNBC will weather the storm.
He went there.
Did you hear that Mayor Bloomberg arranged for an undercover investigation of the recent Arizona gun show? The New York Times has the skinny.
The investigation, part of an effort by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s administration to crack down on illegal gun sales nationwide, took place Jan. 23 at the Crossroads of the West Gun Show in Phoenix, officials said.
“The background check system failed in Arizona, it failed in Virginia and it fails in states around the country,” said John Feinblatt, an adviser to Mr. Bloomberg. “If we don’t fix it now, the question is not whether another massacre will occur, but when.”
Private, unlicensed sellers are not required to run federal background checks, but it is a violation of federal law to sell guns to people if sellers suspect they are felons or mentally ill or are otherwise prohibited from buying. In the case of Jared L. Loughner, who is accused of opening fire on the crowd in Tucson on Jan. 8, the gun used in the shootings was bought at a licensed gun dealer, and he passed a background check, the authorities said.
In two instances, the New York undercover officers specifically said before buying a gun, “I probably couldn’t pass a background check,” but were still sold guns, city officials said.
Finally, here’s a fluffy story to go along with the white stuff that a lot of us will be seeing outside our windows today and tomorrow: How Meditation May Change the Brain
…researchers report that those who meditated for about 30 minutes a day for eight weeks had measurable changes in gray-matter density in parts of the brain associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress. The findings will appear in the Jan. 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging.
M.R.I. brain scans taken before and after the participants’ meditation regimen found increased gray matter in the hippocampus, an area important for learning and memory. The images also showed a reduction of gray matter in the amygdala, a region connected to anxiety and stress. A control group that did not practice meditation showed no such changes.
I’m not particularly surprised, but the woman who wrote the article is. Check it out.
Sooooo…. What are you reading and blogging about this morning? Please share!
Axelrod explains it all …
Posted: January 27, 2011 Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Barack Obama, Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, John Birch Society in Charge | Tags: access bloggers, axelrod road table, Chamber of Commerce Agenda, chris bowers, digby, State of the Union Confusion 14 Comments
A tweet and facebook post from Digby alerted me to an Axelrod/Blogger “roundtable” where he explained the semantics game in the SOTU. I just found the SOTU contradictory and rather schizophrenic. Except for the fact he still appears to know nothing about economics, Obama was full of on the one hand on the other hand kinds of policies. It was full of dichotomous metaphors along the lines of building up things while tearing them down and defunding things down while investing them up.
Chris Bowers has further coverage here at the Giant Talking Cheeto. It appears the usual “neoliberal” apparatchiks were there. Digby calls it a matter of semantics. Digby also believes we’re about to see a campaign of ‘strengthening Social Security’ argument by doing things that actually weaken it. She calls it “strength through weakness”. It’s that old Reagan game of labeling offensive, deadly missiles ‘peacekeepers’ to make them sound less offensive and deadly. She’s got a really good list of examples where the language mixes up the intent of the actions. At least some one else is noticing the schizophrenic policy and language.
As far as I can tell from Axelrod’s conversation with the bloggers and everything we’ve seen and heard from the political establishment, the only real “principle” here is bipartisanship. Obama gets high marks from the Villagers and Democrats when he forges a bipartisan deal with the Republicans — no matter what the deal is. That he was praised and rewarded for cutting taxes for the wealthiest Americans in a time of deficit fever tells you how far the American people have fallen down the rabbit hole. Don’t think he doesn’t get that.
Here’s the bottom line on Social Security from Chris Bowers who–at the moment–is less than enthusiastic. Let’s see how long that lasts.
The answers that we received are not answers that will make anyone entirely happy. Here is what I took from them:
- The Obama administration is not willing to repudiate the “crisis” narrative surrounding Social Security that dominates the national political media.
- President Obama explicitly repudiated privatization of Social Security in his speech last night, and David Axelrod reaffirmed that repudiation today.
- If there is going to be a “bi-partisan” agreement to alter Social Security, it will be brokered by President Obama himself. Congress is not going to pass a deal to which President Obama has not given his prior approval.
- President Obama strikes generally strong notes in defense of Social Security when it comes to other possible ways to cut the program. However, other than privatization, both he and his administration are unwilling to get too specific about where the line is drawn.
At least now, there’s a general realization that this doublespeak means we’re going to clearly get the pro-business, highly Republican alternatives for the next two years. Obama has gone full throttle on the Chamber of Commerce agenda and language. At this point, however, I think there’s also a general recognition that that the access bloggers will eventually throw their hands up and throw in the towel behind Obama because of the usual deal. That is the Republicans are clearly bug fuck nuts so we can do worse. The Republicans seem hell bent at showing exactly how worse they can be right now. Even Bohenerella couldn’t shut up Michelle Bachmann and her twisted sister audiovisuals and crazy delivery to some camera some where stage right. Don’t even get me started on her revisionist history of slavery and the founding fathers. She’s a good example of what you get when you dumb down education via religication.
All you had to do was listen to Paul Ryan and Michelle Bachmann to see that both have a less than firm grasp on reality and the facts. They are deniers of history, economic theory, science, math, and facts. The more they speak, the more those independent voters flip the approval switch on the Presidential mumbo jumbo policy gumbo. This just puts the president in the catbird seat to continue the Corporate Takeover of America and its institutions.
State of the Union Address Live blog (Continued) Blah, Blah, Blah …
Posted: January 25, 2011 Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Live, SOTU, The Bonus Class | Tags: blah, blah response, Paul Ryan, Republican Blah, Schizophrenic SOTU 83 CommentsThis is our generation’s Sputnik moment. Two years ago, I said that we needed to reach a level of research
and development we haven’t seen since the height of the Space Race. In a few weeks, I will be sending a budget to Congress that helps us meet that goal. We’ll invest in biomedical research, information technology, and especially clean energy technology – an investment that will strengthen our security, protect our planet, and create countless new jobs for our people
SusieMadrak Susie Madrak
How will we pay for all this innovation and infrastructure creation with a DOMESTIC SPENDING FREEZE? #bullshit#sotu
ddayen David Dayen
“Let’s fix what needs fiing and move forward” just like torture! #sotu
rickklein Rick Klein
big shout-out for malpractice reform from the president.
SusieMadrak Susie Madrak
Oh, the tort reform crap again. Even though it’s been proved it’s a myth. #sotu
PaulRieckhoff Paul Rieckhoff
We must remember we still have troops in Iraq–and some dying. The war is not over. #SOTU#NonCombatMyAss
Let’s make kissy face with the SPEAKER!!!
That dream is why I can stand here before you tonight. That dream is why a working class kid from Scranton can stand behind me. That dream is why someone who began by sweeping the floors of his father’s Cincinnati bar can preside as Speaker of the House in the greatest nation on Earth.
It’s the birth of BOEHNERELLA!!!!
owillis Oliver Willis
that was a b- speech for obama #highbar
digby56 digby
Borger:” It wasn’t a transformational speech…I’m not sure that by not talking more about the deficit and jobs they got that done.”
Now Up Paul Ryan who is also politicizing Congresswoman Giffords.
More about how reducing spending during high unemployment actually isn’t actually flat earth economics.
More blah blah blah … I wonder if he reads his kids old Ayn Rand newsletters to his kids to put them to sleep at night?
Transcript from NPR here.
What we already know about the President’s health care law is this: Costs are going up, premiums are rising, and millions of people will lose the coverage they currently have. Job creation is being stifled by all of its taxes, penalties, mandates and fees.
Businesses and unions from around the country are asking the Obama Administration for waivers from the mandates. Washington should not be in the business of picking winners and losers. The President mentioned the need for regulatory reform to ease the burden on American businesses. We agree — and we think his health care law would be a great place to start.
Last week, House Republicans voted for a full repeal of this law, as we pledged to do, and we will work to replace it with fiscally responsible, patient-centered reforms that actually reduce costs and expand coverage.
Health care spending is driving the explosive growth of our debt. And the President’s law is accelerating our country toward bankruptcy.
Our debt is out of control. What was a fiscal challenge is now a fiscal crisis.
We cannot deny it; instead we must, as Americans, confront it responsibly.
Some one needs to tell him it’s not trust in government, it’s trust in politicians that’s at an all time low. Well, I’m depressed now.
Just take a look at what’s happening to Greece, Ireland, the United Kingdom and other nations in Europe. They didn’t act soon enough; and now their governments have been forced to impose painful austerity measures: large benefit cuts to seniors and huge tax increases on everybody.
Potential Republican Presidential Contenders 101
Posted: January 13, 2011 Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Republican presidential politics | Tags: Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Newt Ginrich, Sarah Palin, Tim Pawlenty 22 Comments
Just a few items came to light today on future presidential contenders from the Republican Party. (Be afraid. Be very afraid.) Three of them are in the news today for something other than discussion concerning ramped up rhetoric.
First up, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty makes a pledge to repeal DADT. In this video, Pawlenty self identified as a ‘social conservative’ to right wing talk show host and spokesjerk for the American Family Association Bryan Fischer. Bryan Fischer is a well known for his hate speech and “openly hostile bigotry against gays, Muslims, and all those who do not share his radical worldview”. The video and article come via People For The American Way.
Pay attention closely or read the transcript because you’ll hear Pawlenty use all the code words like “strict constructionist” for a discussion of Roe v. Wade. If you are not familiar with the winks and nods that extreme right wing candidates use to signal how extreme they really are to their key constituencies, you really should take the time to learn.
The Grand Forks Herald announces the governor is undecided but is just touring around promoting his book. Does any one else see a theme here? Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin have also been touring around the country fund raising and getting some face time using book tours. I am definitely sensing a theme here. Pawlenty says his book highlight his ‘faith’. He has a blue collar upbringing and has republican populists roots like Palin and would have to fight Huckabee and Palin for the religious right/’Reagan Democrat’ crowd.
Little known compared to rivals Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich and others, Pawlenty uses the book to trace a path from a boyhood handling rotten meat in a stockyards town to a political career that made him a vice presidential contender in 2008.
And Pawlenty, who was raised Catholic and later converted to an evangelical church with Baptist roots, heavily emphasizes religion. It’s befitting a book from Christian publisher Tyndale House Publishers and a possible political calculation for someone sizing up a White House bid since ruling out a third term as governor.
Social conservatives have an outsized voice in the GOP nominating process, especially in Iowa, where Pawlenty has focused much of his campaign-building work.
An entrance poll done during the 2008 Iowa caucuses found that more than half of the Republicans who turned out described themselves as evangelical Christians, and more than eight in 10 of caucus winner Mike Huckabee‘s supporters described themselves as born again or evangelical.
I’m sensing we’re going to get heavily doused with that old time religion as we get closer to the Iowa primaries. Can some one hand these people a copy of the constitution and tell them to stop skipping number 1 in favor of number 2?
Another possible Republican candidate is the corporate ex-CEO of the pizza chain Godfather’s. I used to hang out on Fridays afternoons with the University of Nebraska’s University Women’s Action Group at Godfather’s when it was the second location of two pizza parlors run by one man. Herman Caine now lives in Georgia and is a popular talk show host. (Do all of these right wingers eventually do a stint as talk show hosts?)
The announcement came on his website, where Cain wrote:
“The American Dream is under attack. In fact, a recent survey found 67% of the American People believe America is headed in the wrong direction. Sadly, this comes as no surprise to those of us who have watched an out-of-control federal government that spends recklessly, taxes too much and oversteps its Constitutional limits far too often.”
Cain, an African-American Republican, holds a master’s degree in computer science from Purdue University and was a corporate vice president for Burger King before running Godfather’s Pizza. Previously, he served as chairman of the board of directors for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City — and was chairman of the board for the National Restaurant Association.
Caine has been omnipresent in Republican Fund raising. Does he have an appeal outside the business base? That will be a big question. He’s got far more gravitas than most of the other Republicans that are running since he’s always held a job outside of politics. Folk are implying that he may have a solid base in the conservative blogosphere. Frankly, I think he’d be a formidable candidate. I’ve heard him talk back when he took over Godfather’s and back in his Fed Days too. Those were business talks but he knows his stuff.
But though Cain has himself admitted that he would be a “dark horse” candidate, he will be greatly aided by the fact that he is a full-spectrum conservative with solid fiscal and social credentials. Christian conservatives love him, and The Club for Growth endorsed him for Senate in 2004. Cain is also close with fiscal conservative and two-time presidential candidate Steve Forbes. Depending on the field, there is great potential for him to rally conservative activists and bloggers to his cause.
For months now, Cain has been rumored to be seriously considering a presidential run. Perhaps not coincidentally, RedState’s Erick Erickson recently announced the launch of a new radio show, “The Erick Erickson Show” on Atlanta’s WBS radio — a station which also broadcasts Cain’s popular radio show.
Finally, we’re seeing Romney solidifying his campaign to move the helmet hair tradition of the Richie Rich side of Republican party forward in this RCP piece. He’s hiring staff.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has secured both a pollster and a political director for his near-certain presidential bid this coming cycle, according to sources connected to Romney’s 2008 presidential effort.
Rich Beeson, a Republican operative who has worked as a political director at the Republican National Committee and was most recently a partner at the voter contact firm FLS Connect, will be Romney’s political director. Beeson has already moved his family to Massachusetts for his new role.
A GOP source who worked against Romney in the last campaign said Beeson was a savvy hire for Romney’s team, as he brings an outsider perspective to Romney’s Boston inner circle.
Romney’s political director for his last bid was Carl Forti, who now has a high-profile job at the Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie GOP group, American Crossroads.
There’s no news up today on Gingrich but you can be assured that ol’ Georgia Bull Dog is up to something. It’s going to be an interesting few years.
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