Sunday Roundup
* Cheney and neocons gnash teeth as Fred Hiatt’s (!) editorial page skewers claims that Obama is soft on terror.
* Obama terrorism czar John Brennan pushes back hard on comparisons between the foiled underwear bombing and 9/11.
* Terse statement on the Web site of the U.S. embassy in Yemen announces that it has been closed indefinitely due to “ongoing threats by Al-Qaeda” to “attack American interests” there.
* David Shuster points out that the closing follows meetings David Petraeus held yesterday with Yemeni officials, so Petraeus “clearly heard something bad.”
* Indeed, counter-terror chief Brennan clarifies that the embassy was closed due to “indications al-Qaida is planning to carry out an attack against a target inside of San’a, possibly our embassy.”
* Which brings me to the question of the day: If there continues to be a lack of a successful terrorist attack, at what point does the refusal by conservatives to credit Obama for it enter the media narrative, given that this is precisely the yardstick they use to extoll Bush’s counter-terror record?
* Legal scholars tell Ben Pershing that the coming last-ditch effort to block health care reform in the Supreme Court will be a bust.
* Avi Rabin-Havt suggests some good national security questions that should, but won’t, be asked of Jim DeMint and Pete Hoekstra on the Sunday shows today. Yglesias has another one for Hoekstra.
* Mike Allen debunks the claim that Obama was briefed on an imminent terror attack, and Steve Benen notes conservative desperation for an Obama terror-briefing failure to compare to Bush’s pre-9/11 warning.
* Dems and liberals target Rasmussen.
* And Rush Limbaugh embraces health care reform! For himself, at least.
What else is happening?
This blog’s homepage is here. RSS feed here. Twitter feed here. Email me here.
Good morning, greg, and happy new year.
May I just say off the bat here that I’m a serious fan of whoever came up with “underpants bomber”.
@Greg – Is there any way to find out who penned that WP editorial?
Hey Bernie — happy new year to you, too. Re who wrote the editorial, that’s a tough one. Whoever it was, you have to assume that it’s likely Hiatt signed off on it and perhaps even ordered it up.
From DKos diarist devilstower. This is worth remembering and engraving into our political psyche.
“Don’t forget the naughts, because this decade, no matter what anyone on the right might say, was conservatism on trial. You want less taxes? You got less taxes. You want less regulation? You got less regulation. Open markets? Wide open. An illusuion of security in place of rights? Hey, presto. You want unlimited power given to military contractors so they can kick butt and take names? Man, we handed out boots and pencils by the thousands. Everything, everything, that ever showed up on a drooled-over right wing wish list got implemented — with a side order of Freedom Fries.
They will try to disown it, and God knows if I was responsible for this mess I’d be disowning it, too. But the truth is that the conservatives got everything they wanted in the decade just past, everything that they’ve claimed for forty years would make America “great again”. They didn’t **** around with any “red dog Republicans.” They rolled over their moderates and implemented a conservative dream.
What did we get for it? We got an economy in ruins, a government in massive debt, unending war, and the repudiation of the world. There’s no doubt that Republicans want you to forget the last decade, because if you remember… if you remember when you went down to the water hole and were jumped by every lunacy that ever emerged from the wet dreams of Grover Norquist and Dick Cheney, well, it’s not likely that you’d give them a chance to do it again.
Because they will. Given half a chance — less than half — they’ll do it again, only worse.”
Yglesias calls out Krauthammer and WaPo:
If Charles Krauthammer wants to write a column in which he lies about Barack Obama, why would the Post print it? I mean, here’s Krauthammer on January 1:
And just to make sure even the dimmest understand, Obama banishes the term “war on terror.” It’s over — that is, if it ever existed.
Obama may have declared the war over. Unfortunately, al-Qaeda has not. Which gives new meaning to the term “asymmetric warfare.”
And here’s Obama giving an address in May about his policies on al-Qaeda: “we are indeed at war with al Qaeda and its affiliates.”
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2010/01/what-business-is-the-washington-post-in.php
Brennan on Cheney and the claim that the president is pretending we are not at war:
BRENNAN: It’s disappointing to me that either the vice president or others have willfully mischaracterized President Obama’s position and actions or they’re just ignorant of the facts. I think in either case, it doesn’t speak well to sort of the reasons why they sort of went out and said these things. I came back into government for the express purpose of making sure that we can make this country safer than its ever been in the past. I have worked with the president over the past 12 months now and he is as determined as anybody I’ve worked with. I’m neither Republican nor Democrat. I’ve worked with the previous five administrations and this president is determined. And I think he has demonstrated in his language. He says we’re at war with al Qaeda. Were going to destroy al Qaeda the organization and we’re going to demonstrate through our actions, whether it be in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and other places that al Qaeda might be able to run, but they’re not going to be able to hide.
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/01/03/brennan-cheney/
Greg
Your “top five online stories of 2009″ videos is still making news. It’s the lead at FDL right now:
Just before Christmas, Greg Sargent released his list of the top five online stories of 2009—he did it in video form, with screenshots instead of links (which is kind of a drag), but his cursory summary post lists the following:
1) The release of the torture documents and Cheney’s response
2) The heath care town hall wars of August
3) The “birther” controversy
4) The campaign to force a public option into the health care reform proposal
5) The war on the left over whether to kill the Senate bill
What struck me, and what might strike you, is that, one through five, Firedoglake played an important, and often central, role.
http://firedoglake.com/2010/01/03/2009-if-you-were-here-you-were-there/
Hey Greg, love your acerbic sense of humor. We missed you!
You beat me to it Andy on the FDL post.
lmsinca
Haha. Have a good Sunday, I am off to work but I’ll check in later.
The only traditional (US) outlet I now have any modicum of trust in is the New York Times, and by trust I mean I actually look at what is written there (and this is a recent development after several solid stories). Everyone else has demonstrated that they have zero credibility when viewed outside of my Village spectacles.
As far as I know Yemen has always had some degree of terrorist camps there, in fact I remember reading Tom Clancy in grade school in elementary school and a number of his books had IRA and other groups training in Yemen (among other places). The point of saying that is this place has always been unstable, although it has obviously become a bigger target because of the underpants bomber.
To touch on the topic dominating this blog last week, I think Steve Benen sums up what some of us were trying to say here. Republicans have cried too often, and been too shifty by leapfrogging what makes this administration “the worst” to be effective anywhere outside a 24 hour news media that loves pivots and hates boring and staid narratives.
I didn’t notice if anyone caught this yesterday.
“As Steve Benen points out, it seems Michael Chertoff along with The Washington Post are having some conflict of interest problems–PAGE 7 VS PAGE 15:
The Washington Post reports today, on page A7, that Michael Chertoff, the former DHS secretary, has been playing a little fast and loose with the public trust.
Since the attempted bombing of a U.S. airliner on Christmas Day, former Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff has given dozens of media interviews touting the need for the federal government to buy more full-body scanners for airports.
What he has made little mention of is that the Chertoff Group, his security consulting agency, includes a client that manufactures the machines. The relationship drew attention after Chertoff disclosed it on a CNN program Wednesday, in response to a question.
An airport passengers’ rights group on Thursday criticized Chertoff, who left office less than a year ago, for using his former government credentials to advocate for a product that benefits his clients.
“Mr. Chertoff should not be allowed to abuse the trust the public has placed in him as a former public servant to privately gain from the sale of full-body scanners under the pretense that the scanners would have detected this particular type of explosive,” said Kate Hanni, founder of FlyersRights.org, which opposes the use of the scanners.
As Steve notes, that same paper allowed Chertoff a 736-word op-ed calling for expanding the whole-body imaging technology. No, it’s not just you Steve. There is a huge disconnect between pages A15 and A7. It seems the Washington Post has as bad a case of dissociative identity disorder as the rest of our corporate media.”
“Re who wrote the editorial, that’s a tough one. Whoever it was, you have to assume that it’s likely Hiatt signed off on it and perhaps even ordered it up.”
Drat. I’d hoped you had used your compelling sexuality to gain access into the inner sanctum there.
There surely are instances where I would like to be a fly on the wall even if it would mean that I’d live only a day, not be able to tell anyone what I’d seen, and thus my only serious joy in the situation would come from taking a quick poop on quarterback’s hamburger.
Bernie–wait a minute, are you objectifying Greg? That’s *my* job!
” Which brings me to the question of the day: If there continues to be a lack of a successful terrorist attack, at what point does the refusal by conservatives to credit Obama for it enter the media narrative, given that this is precisely the yardstick they use to extoll Bush’s counter-terror record?”
IOKIYAR.
Still.
lfo – LOL!
“Because they will. Given half a chance — less than half — they’ll do it again, only worse.””:
O hell yeah. They’ve done it more than once.
The first decade of the 21st century belongs to the GOP. It was one of the worst 10 years of my life, seriously. Watching them dismantle this country was absolute hell and I never want to see that again.
I’m glad to see the pushback on fear mongering on oh, noez, teh terror.
Your question of the day… what took you so long to ask it, Greg ?
The goopers, as is their wont, overplayed their hand and dance their way to irrelevancy.
Andy:
And here’s Obama giving an address in May about his policies on al-Qaeda: “we are indeed at war with al Qaeda and its affiliates.”
If Obama believes that we are at war with AQ and its affiliates, why, when he captures them, does he treat them like criminals with all of the legal protections that doing so entails?
Tena, I agree. The GOP clearly owns the 2000s. It really was horrific what they did to this country in so many ways. The record is there staring us all in the face.
But I think the Right is now completely terrified that the economy is going to come back. I just get the sense that people are done with 2009 and starting to exit the scary feeling of the economy grinding to a stop from utter free-fall and beginning to make that turn towards growth and stability. The Dems will have a lot of work to do, but with the turn-around that most people are suspecting will happen starting in the Spring latest, and if they can adequately explain the individual positive reforms in HCR, the Dems will be fine in 2010. As long as they can make those arguments and continue to paint the GOP as not credible, they will do fine in 2010 and beyond, imho.
And Happy New Year all!
Well Scott, Bush is the one who created the “enemy combatant” designation, yet his DOJ tried the Shoe Bomber as a criminal, not a POW, so why don’t you start by asking the Bush Administration to explain why.
lmsinca, thanks for that DKOS post. Great stuff.
2 things to add.
– It couldn’t have happened without a media who became complicit through (to be generous) a willingness to be credulous in the wake of 9/11. Subsequently I think it just became easier not to report too hard when the GOP was so good at providing a narrative (see Rove, Karl). I’m not sure which was the cause and which the effect, but over the decade much of the media was evolving (devolving?) from mainstream print and broadcast to electronic (radio on the right and blogs, HuffPost, etc., on the left). This meant that all the real substantive discussion was taking place online, while the big news orgs set the terms of discourse. There is a really big disconnect there that is only now coming into view and won’t be sorted out for several years.
– The idea of the government as “investing” in the future is an idea the Dems need to seize, soon. Compare what the GOP did over the last 10 years to what Clinton did and what Obama is trying to do. Stabilize and invest, look toward the long-term and greater good and capitalize on the potential of the whole country, not the top 1% and the trickly economic dregs that make a lousy situation.
When GOP decry “big deficits,” Dems need to be ready to say “Bush ran huge deficits, and what sort of future investment were they?” Then point out that we run a deficit just like a family runs one when they buy a house: debt has a purpose if managed well.
BGinCHI – I honestly am not as worried as so many seem to be about the off year elections. I think Ethan is right – the economy is recovering. It’s slow but hell, it was broken totally and ready to collapse when Obama took over.
As Wanda Sykes said: there’s Bush pee all over everything in this country.
I mean, everything. Bush peed all over every damn thing he got near.
For 8 solid years, it didn’t rain – that was Bush pee. It’s all over everything.
According to the Washington Post the last decade was the first since the 1930’s where job growth was less than 20% (it was 0%). It also was the first time since at least the 1960’s, when they first began measuring the statistic, where median household income fell (after adjusting for inflation).
I agree with pretty much all that Ethan, BiginChi, Tena, Lmsinca and others have said. If you saw the WashPo piece yesterday about the 00’s being the lost decade in terms of growth, social mobility, etc you know without a doubt that it was the decade Republicans got to try all their brilliant economic ideas and left us in a ditch.
“etc you know without a doubt that it was the decade Republicans got to try all their brilliant economic ideas and left us in a ditch.”
Their economic ideas were hardly their most brilliant plan -look at the utter genius of Iraq and the PNAC plan.
Smashing success, yo?
it was the decade Republicans got to try all their brilliant economic ideas and left us in a ditch
Unless you were one of the 400 wealthiest Americans.
oddjob–great minds…
yep Tena, but they seem to be trying really really hard to make it seem the economic catastrophe has *nothing* to do with the pure conservatism they embrace in economic terms. They tried them, they failed. That they failed in everything else is just the cherry on top.
When you recall their obsession with bringing back the Gilded Age it all makes sense.
“Unless you were one of the 400 wealthiest Americans.”
Well yeah – why do you think they threw all the money at Bush, and fought so hard to keep the GOP in power?
The 400 wealthiest people never really feel any pain no matter what the government does – that’s what is so maddening about it. They don’t pay taxes no matter what the level is because they an afford not to.
IT’s a question of whether they are going to be billionaires under the Democrats or trillionaires under the GOP and really,what difference does it make? None. They are stinking rich regardless.
“but they seem to be trying really really hard to make it seem the economic catastrophe has *nothing* to do with the pure conservatism they embrace in economic terms.”
I know. I think it’s getting a bit harder for them to do that even though one would think that with a little time and distance they could manage to put Obama between themselves and the disaster they created. I don’t think so. People know what happened and who was to blame.
Since watching the Sunday morning talkies makes blood run out of my ears, I always read Jason Linkins’ LiveBlog on HuffPost. Smart and hilarious.
A couple of snippets (first Fox then ABC):
“Panel time! Brit Hume doesn’t like the idea that we’re not beating the **** out of Captain Crotchfire, and the whole idea that restoring our reputation of our nation is a terrible, terrible idea, and it means we’re being lax. “They’re treating it as a law enforcement issue!” he raves. Law enforcement professionals out there, you have my sympathies, how it came to pass that you all became thought of as pussies is beyond me. I think our law enforcement agencies are great, and have an important — and tragically undersung — role to play in our counter-terror efforts.”
“Susan Collins says that Janet Napolitano’s comments that “the system worked” were “bizarre” and “baffled” her. The news here: Susan Collins is apparently too stupid to understand that she’s taking those words in the exact wrong context, even after all this time. Even after I’ve read people correct this misconception. So, Susan Collins is either an idiot, or her staff is filled with idiots, or they are all dissemblers. I’m inclined to believe a combination of all three. But at this point, she may as well be claiming that the Bearcats beat the Gators. THAT’S HOW INCORRECT AND/OR MISINFORMED AND/OR DUMB SHE IS. Terry Moran just sits there, saying nothing.”
Oh, for a good Sunday morning host…… Greg, please get a Sunday show.
Terry Moran just sits there, saying nothing.
The whole Sunday morning news talk show format is a waste of time unless you only want to listen to the latest Beltway propaganda and posturing. The whole thing’s nothing but a big kabuki production.
Of course the journalists don’t challenge anyone. If they made them look like the dissembling hacks they are they’d stop appearing on the shows altogether.
Meh.
BGinCHI – Word on Linkins and thanks for posting him. I love him and Bob Cesca dearly.
Rather obviously, the situation with terrorist threats has gotten completely crazy. For example, that they might want to install sharia law across the planet. The real chance of this happening, or anything even near to it, are less than us getting clobbered by an asteroid shaped like Bill O’Reilly’s head. As others have noted, any American citizen is thousands of times more likely to be killed in his Chevy than by a terrorist.
But creating and promoting such fearfulness serves various functions and existing power structures, not least being the American military and related corporate institutions. There’s not a lot of money to be made in peacetime by these folks. War is incentivized.
The idea “they hate us for our freedoms” is a pretty good illustration of denial. Portraying the other as completely evil and uncivilized and dirty (they live in caves) facilitates a firm blindness to anything and everything about ourselves.
Israel hasn’t gotten very far with this sort of strategy and neither will we. But it does suit the purposes of some.
I’ll hand this to Abdulmutallab (sp?) – he sure engendered some awesome knicknames:
Captain Crotchfire
The Crotch Bomber
the Underpants Bomber (I love that too for all the same reasons)
etc.
lol
You could also make a case for awarding him Upper Class Twit of the Year…….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSqkdcT25ss
“The idea “they hate us for our freedoms” is a pretty good illustration of denial. Portraying the other as completely evil and uncivilized and dirty (they live in caves) facilitates a firm blindness to anything and everything about ourselves.”
Bernie, did you miss my story about that phrase? I think I told you about this one day, already,but it’s the honest to god truth and it made every hair on my body stand up when I read it.
Carlo Levy was an Italian Jew who was exiled to far southern Italy during Mussolini’s time in power. While he was there, Mussolini invaded Abyssinia – Ethiopia. Mussolini went on Italian radio to announce his decision to invade and he told the people of Italy, word for frakking word, the following about the Abyssinians:
They hate us for our freedoms,.
Levy’s book: ‘Christ Stopped at Eboli,’ was published in 1947.
Word for bloody goddamn word, Bush quoted Mussolini more than once.
I agree, oddjob, on the kabuki nature of Sunday shows (though with the caveat that kabuki is pretty smart, in and of itself). But geez, is it too much to ask for there to be someone who asks perceptive questions of guests? If the format is now a controlled press release, then no, but if one of the networks wants to produce a show that can allow journalism to look like it has a purpose in the world, then there ought to be a way to transcend this way of doing business. Sadly, the op-ed pages are the same and that’s what I was alluding to above: the old media is replicating itself in a boring death-spiral of vapidity. I want a show where a guest comes on and there are three smart interviewers who ask questions with, gasp, probity.
“On today’s show we have John Brennan, Leon Panetta, and Janet Napolitano, interviewed by our panel: Jeremy Scahill, Dahlia Lithwick, and Rachel Maddow.”
There’s a start.
“You could also make a case for awarding him Upper Class Twit of the Year…”
O I second that. All he managed to do was to burn his d*i*c*k off and end up in custody in the US and he’ll never see the light of day again once it is all said and done.
What a 1000% fool he is – he had things other Nigerians would literally kill for: money, eduction, A CHANCE. Fool fool fool fool fool – for a stupid religious-political notion which he would have grown out of, no doubt.
I agree with everyone up top, except for Scott C, but I think we need to be wary of the lingering effects of this economic disaster. Not all of the policies of Obama and team are working out that well for middle class Americans, one example is the Foreclosure disaster relief. By most accounts it has been a failure to a large degree.
And I know most of you don’t agree with me that the HCR bill hasn’t accomplished the ultimate goals we all aspired to. Maybe it will be improved, but I’m not getting that feeling yet.
Until jobs come back and the foreclosure crisis is dealt with effectively there is an awful lot of populist anger simmering and Dems need to deal with it better IMO.
In the meantime, I’m happy to blame conservative policy decisions for the mess we’re in.
People this is why I do not trust extremism of any form or direction, left, or right.
I do not trust extremists who will go to any lengths to accomplish their extreme ideas.
OMG – talk about fools:
Fox News’ Brit Hume gave Tiger Woods some personal advice Sunday morning, telling the scandal-plagued (and Buddhist) golfer to ‘turn to Christianity’ to make a full recovery.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/03/brit-hume-to-tiger-woods_n_409720.html
“And I know most of you don’t agree with me that the HCR bill hasn’t accomplished the ultimate goals we all aspired to. Maybe it will be improved, but I’m not getting that feeling yet.”
Imsinca – I do not think HCR is the perfect goal we were aiming for. I think it’s quite a ways from what we were trying to get. But I also think it’s a start and the only HCR we’re likely to get to begin with.
People are stubborn about change and this is huge. I think doing it in stages was a better idea to start with, personally. I wish they’d started out with that in mind.
It’s also not a completed bill yet – it hasn’t gone through reconciliation yet.
“I think doing it in stages was a better idea to start with, personally.”
So you agree with the Repubs and Lieberman who called for incremental changes to HC?
Just because this is what I do I’ll get personal with it:
I live with a man who is so change-resistant that it can take up to 9 years to wait him out as he changes his view on something. Multiply that by millions and you have the American mind-set. Added to that we have an entrenched industry that is wound through our entire economic system.
Anyone who thought radical change of our health care system was going to be even doable was I think naive. It’s just too huge a change for most Americans to deal with all at once IMO.
Sbj, no, I agree with the plan someone linked to here one night that a health care professional had come up with that had increments of change.
I do not agree with the GOP’s idea of “change” in any respect and quit putting words in my mouth.
I am fed up with that tactic.
No one put words in your mouth, tena – you just can’t seem to remember from one day to the next what you want. In the end, you support Obama and the Dems no matter what they do.
“No one put words in your mouth, tena – you just can’t seem to remember from one day to the next what you want. In the end, you support Obama and the Dems no matter what they do.”
Yeah I know – I’m hopeless. So why bother?
Just ignore me as the hopeless idiot I am. Don’t read my stuff. I don’t like responding to you.
I avoided insulting you again for a very long time but I am really tired of you. You smell like Bush pee.
The naughts was the decade of conservatism. Even though the Dems controlled the House 2001-2002, and the Dems controlled the House AND Senate 2007, 2008, 2009, and the Dems had the Presidency 2000 and 2009. Other than that…
There you again, sbj, being your usual dishonest self. Repubs’ definition of incremental change is never. Witness their despicable and pathetic behavior as the opposition party in the last one year.
You smell like Bush pee?
ROTFLMAO!
“Witness their despicable and pathetic behavior as the opposition party in the last one year.”
I don’t think much of the GOP but I wish they had won a few more of the battles that they fought this past year.
sbj – there you go again. In one post you hail the republican obstructionism and then in the next, claim dishonestly, that “I don’t think much of the GOP”.
“sbj – there you go again. In one post you hail the republican obstructionism and then in the next, claim dishonestly, that “I don’t think much of the GOP”.”
O no – sbj is PERFECTLY CONSISTENT in every single syllable it posts.
While squelching around in Bush pee.
I didn’t do that from one post to the next – it was all in one post.
????
Oh, Bush pee.
Eees funny!
“Even though the Dems controlled the House 2001-2002, and the Dems controlled the House AND Senate 2007, 2008, 2009, and the Dems had the Presidency 2000 and 2009. Other than that…”
Excuse me, Dems controlled the Senate 2001, 2002, not the House. So the Dems had the Senate for a mere half the decade of the naughts – even though it was the decade of conservatism. Strange that.
SBJ’s line of attack is so 2000s.
Apologies for beating this drum today, but go over and check out Linkins’ HuffPost LiveBlog on this morning’s MTP. Excellent stuff.
Including this:
“Now they are getting into the history and the decade and some cartoon that David Gregory saw that leads him to say:
But, Doris, a lot made about the notion of this being a lost decade–lost opportunities, lost wealth not just for the rich, but for Americans all over the country with the stock market going down so far.
Not just for the rich! Why, David Gregory is concerned about how the extreme wealth of the extremely wealthy is affecting the rest of Americans who are heavily involved in the stock market! Why, that even includes the moderately wealthy! The entire MEET THE PRESS prism of humanity is refracting the bejeezus out of history!”
I know, I know….what should we expect….. Can’t the BBC just buy an American network?
Bernie:
For example, that they might want to install sharia law across the planet. The real chance of this happening, or anything even near to it, are less than us getting clobbered by an asteroid shaped like Bill O’Reilly’s head.
Well, let’s start a little bit smaller. What are the Chances According To Bernie that Sharia gets installed into, say, the United Kingdom? Before you answer, you may want to know a few facts:
Sharia courts have already been set up, albeit extra-legally, throughout Britain.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has argued that the UK adopt parts of Islamic Sharia law in order to maintain “social cohesion” because some UK citizens simply do not relate to the British legal system.
The UK’s top judge, Lord Phillips, agrees with Williams.
Over the last 4 years, the Muslim population in Britain has grown 10 times faster than the rest of the nation. The growth is attributed to immigration, a far higher birth rate than the rest of the nation, and conversions.
So, Bernie, what are the odds of an Islamic Britian in the next, say, 100 years? What about the rest of Europe, where the Muslim demographics are even worse (or better, I suppose, depending on your perspective)?
Ah, another ugly side of scott c is emerging. As if his bed wetting isn’t ugly enough.
“So, Bernie, what are the odds of an Islamic Britian in the next, say, 100 years? What about the rest of Europe, where the Muslim demographics are even worse (or better, I suppose, depending on your perspective)?:”
No the real question is: why does this bother you so much, Scott? You sound ever so much like Lou Dobbs talking about our “brown immigration problem” coming from south of our border.
Why in the hell should White Jesus run the world all the time everywhere?
Tena:
You smell like Bush pee.
Ah yes. Another example of the outstanding quality of commentary here on which Greg was congratulating all his acolytes a week ago.
If you look at the thing from an historical perspective, White Jesus has had quite a run and it should be about over. White Jesus conquered the globe, pretty much. Right now, we’re engaged in cleaning up after White Jesus, in the guise of the British Empire.
Israel-Palestine – BE
India-Pakistan – BE
Afghanistan – BE
Iraq – BE
White Jesus managed to mess things up very thoroughly.
Scott – *sniff* *sniff*
ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
Scott C.: If you don’t mind, please list the accomplishments of the Bush presidency in terms of the economy, with special attention to jobs, income across the spectrum (real wages, personal debt, unemployment), the national deficit, and investment in infrastructure (US infrastructure only, not Iraq).
Once we have something to work with we can begin perhaps to debate the merits of different parties’ fiscal policies.
Tena:
No the real question is: why does this bother you so much, Scott?
Because basing societal law on any religious law is a recipe for the destruction of freedom, and that is especially true of Islamic sharia.
Why in the hell should White Jesus run the world all the time everywhere?
Who said he should?
BGinCHI – I wouldn’t hold my breathe waiting for a straight answer out of SC.
sbj: “I don’t think much of the GOP but I wish they had won a few more of the battles that they fought this past year.”
Which battles have they fought over the past year that you think they should have won? “Just say no” or did you have something else in mind? I haven’t noticed any policy debates, or did I miss it? They got their Afghanistan surge and I didn’t notice any other policy they advocated that didn’t just maintain the status quo. CBO annhilated their HCR plan.
“Who said he should?”
Ok, if the dominant culture is the culture of White Jesus and it is, and you are arguing that it is under assault from the culture of Islam, then you are saying it, Scott C.
BGinCHI:
If you don’t mind…
I do. I am not that interested in talking about Bush’s accomplishments or failures. Bush is no longer president, and is fairly irrelevant at this point. I think Obama can and should be judged on the merits, not relative to someone else.
But, just to assuage you a little bit, I think that Bush’s fiscal policies were fairly atrocious. He did little or nothing to reign in government spending, which is unfortunate.
Actually Bush expanded the government at a pace not seen since the Johnson administration.
Tena:
Ok, if the dominant culture is the culture of White Jesus…
It’s not.
Have you been to the UK recently? Or ever, for that matter? Do you know the slightest thing about it? There is almost nothing about UK culture that could be characterized as the culture of White Jesus. (Well, to the extent that the term holds any meaning at all, anyway.)
Because basing societal law on any religious law is a recipe for the destruction of freedom, and that is especially true of Islamic sharia.
Agreed.
The United Kingdom is a Christian nation in a way that the USA is not. It will be interesting to see how they resolve this particular challenge.
odd:
It will be interesting to see how they resolve this particular challenge.
I predict that they will slowly succumb to it, unless it happens to mainland Europe first (a real possibility) and shakes them out of complacency.
That will depend upon how willing those not in favor of sharia are willing to accommodate “equal rights for me, but not for thee”.
I posted this the other night when comments were disappearing and reappearing and, given that fact and that incrementalism has been raised again in this thread (and that it takes me some effort to crank these things out these days), I hope it’s all right for me to post it again:
The Syfry article and the earlier comments on community organizing reminded me of an observation I’ve wanted to make about Obama’s approach to governance. In the first place, he is clearly a consummate big picture thinker. I also think, however, that his broad outlook is wedded to a belief in seeing the importance of the kaleidoscope of experiences at the grass roots. I thought about this both when he announced his Afghanistan policy and when I read the Atul Gawande New Yorker essay on health care reform–”Testing, Testing.” http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/12/14/091214fa_fact_gawande
There was a report (sorry I don’t have the reference) at the time of Obama’s Afghanistan speech that the policy would largely bypass the Karzai government in Kabul and focus on the building blocks for governing in smaller towns away from the capital. That is, American troops and advisers would focus on creating police forces and on education and, I think, changes in agriculture. Obviously, there’s only a small amount that might be achieved in the timeframe Obama is considering. I suspect, though, that part of the policy is to try to plant seeds of things that will work and be emulated over time.
The Gawande article reinforced my feeling about this when I read that the health care reform bill the Senate passed is filled with all sorts of pilot projects. Again, the clear intention is to see what works in hopes that the best reforms will be imitated so that eventually the health care system itself will become much more efficient. The recognition that different things work well in different communities and different parts of the country is part of what seems savvy. (Here’s one example: we’ve heard from sbj how happy he is with Kaiser Permanente as his insurer, but the article points out that they’ve struggled to duplicate their California success in North Carolina.) Gawande’s discussion of how the agriculture of a hundred years ago changed for the better in the U.S. as a result of a variety of demonstration projects that helped farmers learn for themselves what worked (and in a way that other farmers were eager to duplicate) is a really powerful analogy to what could happen in health care.
All of this is a gamble to some extent and uncertain of success. But I think it’s important to note that Obama’s eclectic approach means that he’s encouraging a lot of new ideas and that he thinks of democracy as both a workshop and a work in progress.
Happy New Year, everybody! And I agree with the vote for less infighting.
Obamacare is unconstitutional?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703278604574624021919432770.html
Right wing liars like “Scott C.” wouldn’t know the Constitution if it was lasiked on their eyeballs.
After Republicans shredded the Constitution and the Bill of Rights they’ve decided to continue to misinterpret the Constitution with weak, ignorant, self-serving justifications to rationalize just about anything.
I’ll agree that forcing Americans to buy corporate-insurance is malignant, but it is Constitutional.
Though it’s true that the right-wing activist Judges on the Supreme Court are brilliant at falsely rationalizing their predetermined conclusions.
After all, these were the activist right wing Judges who anti-democratically stole an election, told women that their employers could steal from them as long as they got away with it for more than 180 days, and even bizarrely think “corporations” are people.
Hey ABC, I noted your post when you originally made it and made a note to myself to complement you on it. But I’m a dedicated Obot, part of the O-youth that are something like 70-80% still in approval of the President… so what do I know?
“The Gawande article reinforced my feeling about this when I read that the health care reform bill the Senate passed is filled with all sorts of pilot projects. Again, the clear intention is to see what works in hopes that the best reforms will be imitated so that eventually the health care system itself will become much more efficient.”
That is my optimistic take as well, the ship of state turns slowly… and that is “a feature and not a bug.” Thanks for the input.
1. Collect underpants.
2. ???
3. Kaboom!
# Scott C. | January 3rd, 2010 at 12:16 pm
Andy:
And here’s Obama giving an address in May about his policies on al-Qaeda: “we are indeed at war with al Qaeda and its affiliates.”
If Obama believes that we are at war with AQ and its affiliates, why, when he captures them, does he treat them like criminals with all of the legal protections that doing so entails?
_________
They are criminals aren’t they? As far as the “legal protections that doing so entails” that would depend on which legal route is taken (although I am not a lawyer). John Brennan said this morning:
Brennan declined to say what criteria are used to decide whether a prisoner should be taken into criminal court or before a military commission. “There are no downsides or upsides in particular cases,” he said. “What we’re trying to do is make the right determination in particular cases.”
Sounds to me like they weigh each circumstance and then decide whether criminal court or military commission is more appropriate.
Riffing off of the loneliness that one sometimes feels in the webs as an Obama defender (and I would like to think I am not reactionarily so, I respond to criticism with as much fact/logic as possible), I can basically feel the weary sigh of John Cole when he says:
“More of the same. Once again the WH is going it alone, with their “allies” nowhere to be found or, as is the case with Feinstein, working against them. About the only thing missing from this narrative from the rest of the year is the left flank vocally attacking him for not caring about civil liberties enough. I’m sure that will be coming shortly, as well as new ActBlue accounts and fundraising letters.
And meanwhile, lost in the whole process, is that the WH is cleaning up yet another mess not of their creation. This is yet another one of George and Dick’s Augean stables.”
Cole talks about our own Greg Sargent here before that, so this is kind of a circle jerk (but only because this is one of about half a dozen sites that allow refuge from the symptoms Cole describes). This is going to be an exhausting fight over the next 3 years by Obama to get sh*t done when the left is eager to throw him under the bus and the right wants to take the wheel of the bus and run us off a cliff.
If it wasn’t for video games and the Daily Show I dunno how I would keep optimistic.
Andy:
They are criminals aren’t they?
War criminals, sure. But certainly not domestic criminals.
Sounds to me like they weigh each circumstance and then decide whether criminal court or military commission is more appropriate.
Sounds to me like either he doesn’t know or he doesn’t want us to know why they make the determinations they make.
“Sounds to me like either he doesn’t know”
I am not sure why he wouldn’t. He’s worked for the past five administrations and has a lot of experience in the intelligence area:
# Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA)
# Interim director, National Counterterrorism Center[7]
# Director, Terrorist Threat Integration Center
# Deputy Executive Director, CIA
# Chief of Staff to Director of Central Intelligence, CIA
# Chief of Station, Middle East, CIA (1996 – 1999)
# Executive Assistant to the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, CIA
# Deputy Director, Office of Near Eastern and South Asian Analysis, CIA
# Daily Intelligence Briefer at the White House, CIA
# Deputy Division Chief, Office of Near Eastern and South Asian Analysis, CIA
# Chief of Analysis, DCI’s Counterterrorism Center, CIA
# Middle East Specialist and Terrorism Analyst, Directorate of Intelligence, CIA
# Political Officer, U.S. Embassy in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, Department of State
# Career Trainee, Directorate of Operations, CIA.
“he doesn’t want us to know why they make the determinations they make.”
Why do you say that?
Paul W. (quoting Cole):
And meanwhile, lost in the whole process, is that the WH is cleaning up yet another mess not of their creation.
This is really getting to be a tiresome meme. The world is a messy place. Every president spends time cleaning up someone else’s “mess”, at least as far as he sees it. Never have I seen one spend so much time reminding everyone about it, though.
I wonder how that would have gone over with the electorate if he had campaigned on this platform. “Elect me, and I will solve all these problems. But if I’m not quite up to the task, just remember: It wasn’t my mess.”
Andy:
Why do you say that?
Because he hasn’t told us a thing.
“What we are trying to do is make the right determination in particular cases.” Who would have guessed?
But you said…
“or he doesn’t want us to know why they make the determinations they make.”
What’s his motivation to not tell us?
Thanks, Paul W. I’ve thought your comments add a lot to the conversation here. (Of course I agree with most of them.)
@Scott C – re the threat of Sharia law…
You ought not to allow yourself to be so sloppy in thinking as it will likely do damage to your fan base here.
You conflate a number of things and misrepresent others. First, The notion actually forwarded by Rowan Williams is that in very limited situations (eg marital courts) it might be a good thing to allow aspects of sharia law to be applied.
“But Dr Williams said the argument that “there’s one law for everybody” was “a bit of a danger” and called for “a constructive accommodation” with some aspects of Muslim law.
He said the Church of England was allowed to operate its own courts, as were Orthodox Jews, and the anti-abortion views of Roman Catholics and other Christians were taken account of within the law.”
Here’s another view…
“Stephen Green, the national director of Christian Voice, said: “This is a Christian country with Christian laws. If Muslims want to live under Sharia law then they are free to emigrate to a country where Sharia law is already in operation.”
Both quotes from a good piece by the Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1577928/Archbishop-Williams-sparks-Sharia-law-row.html
In Canada, the citizens of Quebec have lived with Brit criminal law but also with French civil law. Native Indians in Canada are afforded their own legal systsms in limited spheres. I’m sure there are many more such examples and there’s nothing unprecedented or weird about such compromises.
More importantly, where someone like Williams makes such a proposal, it involves Muslims who wish to do so making use of such alternate systems. Not Muslims who do not wish it and certainly not the anglo-saxon hordes. Not a big take-over threat here.
Secondly, you conflate the above, that is, the great majority of Muslims living in the West who live there happily and peacefully but might wish some very limited accomodation legally with the small minority of extremists who demand more. What do you think the chances are that Westernized Muslims themselves would permit pervasive adoption of Sharia even if such a thing were imaginable in France or Holland or England?
Thirdly, the insinuation or claims from elements of the American rightwing (Coulter, Limbaugh, etc) that there is any potential threat of western legal codes being subsumed from the efforts of a few thousand serious terrorists is so obviously foolish that it is difficult to imagine why anyone might grant these people further credibility as speakers of truth.
Oh, and the above does not even get into any address to the demonized cartoon version of Sharia as forwarded by those who wish to foment hatred. http://www.archbishopofcanterbury.org/1575
@jzap – those three question marks above are intriguing. Chemistry was always my worst subject thus I can’t replace the question marks with a chemical equation though I’m sure there is one (bisquick + WD40 + burning flag + underpants?)
Andy:
What’s his motivation to not tell us?
I have no idea. But it’s pretty clear he hasn’t.
“War criminals, sure. But certainly not domestic criminals.”
Excuse me, but how do you figure that? Bush very decidedly did not designate terrorists as POWs which war criminals, by definition, are.
You are totally wrong from a legal standpoint.
John Cole on brit humes’ ‘advice’ to Tiger Woods (humorless hume must be thinking of preeks like ensign, foley, sanford)
“Apparently Fox News is no longer content being the voice of the GOP, and has decided to become the voice of Christianity, as well….
Tell me again- why don’t the other networks go after Fox news on a daily basis? Shouldn’t it be in their interest to expose these hacks and frauds for what they are? Wouldn’t it just make sense from a competition standpoint, if pride in the profession is not enough?”
amk – That was one of Brit’s more totally outrageous statements, alright.
Following on an argument/observation from Ezra Klein, Yglesias makes a fine point…
“In most political systems, it doesn’t really matter that the minority has no incentive to help the majority. What the minority does is outline an alternate policy dynamic, try to make hay out of scandals, and generally wait in the wings to seize the opportunity to take over if the majority can’t deliver the goods. But the US political system actually affords the minority substantial opportunities to prevent the majority from delivering the goods.” http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2010/01/polarization-supermajority-disaster.php
Most of us here understood when Limbaugh said he hoped Obama would fail and when DeMint talked about Obama’s Waterloo and when Kristol said in ‘93 and again recently that if Clinton or Obama were to succeed with progressive legislation which citizens came to value that Repub electoral chances would be seriously damaged that we were listening to truthful statements from people who only rarely make them.
This present dynamic is pathological in its self-destructiveness.
Talking of talibans and palibans – One believes in 72 virgins will please him while the other believes that a virgin can give birth without pleasing anyone.
even bizarrely think “corporations” are people.
There’s nothing recent about this, and it’s not an interpretation that’s solely the province of the Court’s present conservatives.
I couldn’t explain why other than fear of losing access to their sources (like those lovely anonymous WH advisors that have suddenly gone silent), and somehow being shunned by the village. They care more about the people they report on than the ones who they are supposedly reporting for.
Paul W. and ABC
Don’t misinterpret angst from the left as antagonistic to Obama. Most of us are just trying to push the Administration to live up to Democratic ideals. When he gets it he totally gets it. HCR was not his finest hour IMO but I still have hope it can be improved.
The problem with incrementalism, which I totally agree with as a concept, is that this bill is not incremental to get us where we want to end up. A weak PO or 55+ buy into Medicare would have been the incrementalism you’re looking for.
Don’t get too hung up on criticism, that’s what progressives do, it doesn’t mean they won’t get out the vote or don’t appreciate the difference between 2008 and 2009 and then some. Remember that blogs aren’t necessarily representative of the average voter.
That brings me to my final point, as ruk would say, “it’s jobs stupid”. The middle class is suffering and if their situation improves over the next 8-10 months we won’t have much to worry about as far as elections go.
I got a lot of criticism from the right by saying that Repubs are irrelevant, but I believe that their lack of ideas and constant attack mode is not playing well and unless they come up with something substantial they will be doomed at the polls in all but the most conservative districts or states.
lmsinca
The economy and jobs picture will be better in 2010 but will that be enough? I am not sure it will be enough to make a significant impact on the middle class or maybe more importantly the folks who are specifically hurting now. I think the turnaround we’re going to see in the economy and jobs in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th qtrs of 2010 will mostly help the upper middle class and wealthy. The longer term effects (early 2011) WILL help the middle class.
Bernie:
…as it will likely do damage to your fan base here.
Hah. Good one.
First, The notion actually forwarded by Rowan Williams is that in very limited situations (eg marital courts) it might be a good thing to allow aspects of sharia law to be applied.
I don’t know what you think I misrepresented about Williams. I characterized his view in precisely the same way that your beloved BBC did in its article on the event. In any event, my only point was that certain areas of non-Muslim British society are already becoming more amenable to the introduction of Sharia. That is a fact.
More importantly, where someone like Williams makes such a proposal, it involves Muslims who wish to do so making use of such alternate systems.
Yes. And Williams has a special method of knowing when, say, a Muslim woman “wishes” to be subject to Sharia rather than being pressured to do so by her parents, her husband, her immediate community?
Secondly, you conflate the above, that is, the great majority of Muslims living in the West who live there happily and peacefully but might wish some very limited accomodation legally with the small minority of extremists who demand more.
No I have not. I would guess that most places that labor under Sharia law have only a minority of extremists. Why should you assume it would have to be different in the UK?
What do you think the chances are that Westernized Muslims themselves would permit pervasive adoption of Sharia even if such a thing were imaginable in France or Holland or England?
Higher than you, apparently.
Oh, and the above does not even get into any address to the demonized cartoon version of Sharia as forwarded by those who wish to foment hatred.
And then to edify us you link to a speech in which the speaker admits up front that “This lecture will not attempt a detailed discussion of the nature of sharia, which would be far beyond my competence.” Good one, Bernie.
Would you or, perhaps more notably, Mrs. Bernie ever want to be subject to Sharia? If not, why not?
Andy
If you’re right, and I posted today about foreclosures, we may lose some seats in 2010 unless Obama can spin it somehow. Have you read the figures on Food Stamps, I think it was 1 in 8 adults and 1 in 4-5 children are using them. And I know CA is basically destitute and the shi# is going to hit the fan pretty soon.
Anecdotally, the school system from K-12 and all the colleges are really taking it in the shorts. My youngest can’t even find a school in CA to do her Master’s because of huge cutbacks.
Let’s pray that long term will make the grade for people, or that they instinctively know the Repubs have absolutely nothing to offer.
Tena:
Bush very decidedly did not designate terrorists as POWs which war criminals, by definition, are.
Is Bush now the gold standard of propriety and legal correctness? Is there no end to your obtuseness?
A person does not have to be a POW to be a war criminal. A war criminal is someone who commits war crimes. Deliberately targetting civilians is a war crime.
Also Andy,
This is from Reuters:
“Speaking at American Economic Association’s mammoth yearly gathering, experts from a range of political leanings were in surprising agreement when it came to the chances for a robust and sustained expansion:
They are slim.
Many predicted U.S. gross domestic product would expand less than 2 percent per year over the next 10 years. That stands in sharp contrast to the immediate aftermath of other steep economic downturns, which have usually elicited a growth surge in their wake.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6021LK20100103
lmsinca
Yeah, I saw you’re post about the foreclosures. That was a smart idea with not much chance of succeeding for too many reasons to list. I have also seen the food stamp numbers and they are very disappointing. However, it’s proof that the impoverished will be the last to feel the effects of the recovery, unfortunately. Of course if you listen to some on the right, the impoverished will be rich in no time due to the president’s plan to redistribute the wealth in our country. I guess they won’t need those food stamps for too long.
This is the kind of thing that I believe Obama really gets.
I just found this from Susie Madrak at Crooks and liars:
“I’m hoping this isn’t another “yeah, we thought about it but then Newt Gingrich called us weenies” kind of thing. Because it would be really good news if it isn’t:
The review is shaping up to be a major showdown for Obama this year. It is taking on some of the most sacred cows of the nuclear program. For the first time, influential voices, including a former top nuclear commander and senior Obama advisers, are proposing that one leg of the nuclear arms “triad’’ – a $30 billion-a-year enterprise made up of land-, air-, and sea-based weapons – be eliminated.
Another historic change under consideration is adopting a “no-first-use’’ policy, a public declaration stating the United States would not use nuclear weapons first, a step long advocated by arms control advocates who believe it would reduce the incentive for other nations to develop nuclear weapons.
Also on the table, the officials say, is explicitly limiting the nuclear arsenal’s mission to deterring other nuclear weapons – not chemical or biological attacks or halting a massive conventional military assault, as current policy stipulates.
“The US-Soviet standoff that gave rise to tens of thousands of nuclear weapons is over, but the policies developed to justify their possession and potential use remain largely the same,” said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, a Washington think tank and leading advocate of disarmament. “Unless the United States reduces its reliance and emphasis on nuclear weapons, other states will have a cynical excuse to pursue or to improve the capabilities and size of their nuclear forces.”
Imsinca, I think you do a very good job of keeping everybody aware of the serious expectations of the leftiest parts of the spectrum, and that that’s an important thing to do. I’ll also add that I believe what’s happened to the wonderful California education system should make us all weep.
Andy
Oh yeah, I forgot he was a “socialist”, what was I thinking? I’m sure food stamps are awesome!!!!!
And that’s really interesting from Crooks and Liars. Lot of good ideas there that would make Dick Cheney’s hair stand on end if he had more of it.
lmsinca, you and I both agree criticism is necessary and helpful so of course I welcome your input. I would only like to make the distinction that I lambaste those that call themselves “progressive” when I think that A) the tactics they are using aren’t effective B) while pushing from the left is good, it doesn’t need to come at the expense of eviscerating your leaders who are trying to accomplish them.
lmsinca
Wow, I had not seen that report out of Atlanta, good catch. I have to believe there will be some challenges to that “less than 2% GDP growth over then next ten years” statement. From what I have read that’s been on the very conservative side of predictions. Besides, does anyone want to predict GDP for the next ten years?
Thanks ABC, I really appreciate it. I try not to get overly zealous but keep the pressure on and keep it real. I realize I’m irritating sometimes so I’m grateful for your patience.
Luckily, my kids all made it through the school system here very successfully but I worry about my grandkids and my twin nephews. The twins just applied to several CA colleges and have no clue whether they’ll get in or not.
My oldest daughter teaches at a Jr. College and is only able to get one class with about 23 students, an overage of about 8 as she’s teaching Photoshop (computer classes are generally smaller).
My youngest will probably be accepted to several out of state colleges as she is smart, accomplished and already has two degrees. CA doesn’t know what they’re missing.
The sub-prime housing market destroyed CA for the forseeable future. Next up are cuts to Fire Depts., Police Depts. and all the safety net programs that haven’t already been cut.
Paul W.
We really do agree most of the time. I for one don’t want to do anything to undermine the Dem majority, just want to keep the pressure on and call out when I think something seems a little funky, as in too corporatist and not enough populist. That’s really my main concern.
ABC
I don’t think it takes much to make Cheney’s hair stand on end. I really wish he’d quit sucking up so much of the Oxygen.
Oh yeah, California used to scare me as being more successful than Texas (seeing as how we compete in terms of both population and economies), but good lord they have dragged themselves down by their bootstraps. I expect that TX passes them in the next decade if the two keep their same trajectories.
lmsinca
Nice catch on the C&L story. This dovetails nicely into the Iran nuclear effort. If this story pans out the administration will get a lot of leverage, with the world community, against Iran to curtail its nuclear ambitions.
I was born and raised a Californian and have never seen it this bad before and it really pisses me off. We normally lead in so many area, environmental, education, technology, etc. it’s getting pretty depressing around here. But, we’ve bounced back before and I’m sure we’ll do it again.
Thanks for all the feedback all. Have a good night.
Don’t worry lmsinca, I love having you on the blog as a left bookend (well at least one you can debate with, News Ref being another story). I’d be really interested to know what it is that keeps your family in CA given some of the grim news there? I’m assuming that you have significant roots there?
Andy, one of the things not really appreciated about the Obama administration is that when they commission a review (Afghanistan, nuclear arms treaties, EPA gas emissions, etc) they really mean to reassess strategy. It is not like, for instance, when John McCain calls for a commission to look into the Lehman collapse during fall 2008 he really mean “Oh sh*t, I don’t understand I need time”.
While the Obama team has had to come out swinging, and found that their punches lacked the oomph they had hoped or missed their targets, it would be foolish to think they are not adjusting strategies and planning how to better execute and handle problems going forward.
I think lmsinca is right, that even though this President has a better ear to the grassroots than normal.. we have to continually make efforts to get our voices heard over the clamor of the Village.
Paul W.
I know it sounds crazy but we are ocean people, and not just to look at. We’re all swimmers, surfers, sailors and fishermen and women. I’ve been bodysurfing since I was about 7 and my Dad and I were born at the same Los Angeles hospital. We love the weather and besides the ocean we have the mountains and the desert. The traffic sucks but once you get to your destination it’s glorious.
lmsinca
You will always lead in weather. Our high today was 4 degrees. PLUS you have wine country, Hollywood, Monterey, Pacific Grove (I asked my wife to marry me there), San Diego, Yosemite, Muir Woods etc.
Have a good night!
Paul
Well Said!
I meant to note this story earlier. I cannot stand the hate against LGBT. This story illustrates the kind of hatred being advanced against **** and lesbians through the passage of laws:
“After Americans Visit, Uganda Weighs Death for ****”
“For three days, according to participants and audio recordings, thousands of Ugandans, including police officers, teachers and national politicians, listened raptly to the Americans, who were presented as experts on homosexuality. The visitors discussed how to make gay people straight, how gay men often sodomized teenage boys and how “the gay movement is an evil institution” whose goal is “to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity.”
Now the three Americans are finding themselves on the defensive, saying they had no intention of helping stoke the kind of anger that could lead to what came next: a bill to impose a death sentence for homosexual behavior.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/04/world/africa/04uganda.html?hp
“* Which brings me to the question of the day: If there continues to be a lack of a successful terrorist attack, at what point does the refusal by conservatives to credit Obama for it enter the media narrative, given that this is precisely the yardstick they use to extoll Bush’s counter-terror record?”
Well let’s see. Your party, Obama included, viciously attacked GW Bush and the GOP for years for supposedly making the country “less safe,” for betraying it, for misleading it, etc. They still do it virtually every day.
So when exactly did the Democrats’ refusal to credit Bush for actually protecting us from further attacks “become part of the media narrative”? Answer: It never did.
Would you like to say whether you think it should have? Should it now?
Then there are the inconvenient facts that we had the Ft. Hood massacre, and the Northwest bomber, whose attack the Obama Admin did nothing to prevent. I haven’t jumped to “blame” Obama for these, nor have I seen other conservatives do so, but if Dems want to play a political game of demanding recognition of Obama’s success in preventing any terrorist attacks, the fact that we have had terrorist attacks is rather an awkward fact.
QB, you’re repeating yourself. You said that way up thread already. And no, >95% of Democrats/Liberals/whoever didn’t blame Bush right away, they rallied behind him and said “save me”. Instead we got a President distracted by the unfinished war of his father and being misled in terms of tactics by advisers like Cheney and Rumsfeld who proved wildly incompetent at prosecuting wars or fight terror. Where’s OBL?
DeMint’s Waterloo
Jonathan Cohn is reporting that democrats are certain to “ping pong” health care bill to beat Republican procedural obstructions. Great news!!
http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-treatment/exclusive-dems-almost-certain-bypass-conference
@ABC – happy new year, smart lady.
I like the fundamental notion you’ve expressed in your post above and I think it gets very close to the mark. I think Obama clearly recognizes that he has four or eight years to not only turn back the enormous and profound damage done to the country via the Reagan and Bush administrations but also to steer a new way forward. He’s an extremely rational fellow (which seems in great part why Glenn Beck – the exact antithesis of rationalism – has now risen up as a faux populist opponent).
Scott C said: “I don’t know what you think I misrepresented about Williams. I characterized his view in precisely the same way that your beloved BBC did in its article on the event. In any event, my only point was that certain areas of non-Muslim British society are already becoming more amenable to the introduction of Sharia. That is a fact.”
It’s an absolutely uninteresting and insignificant fact as demonstrated by other such precedents which didn’t bring down or even noticeably alter extant legal systems. So why bother to say it or repeat it other than as a means of fomenting fear and hatred re an immigrant population (The Irish are ruining everything!) or as a means of fomenting fear and hatred as a propaganda adjunct to war-mongering?
“Yes. And Williams has a special method of knowing when, say, a Muslim woman “wishes” to be subject to Sharia rather than being pressured to do so by her parents, her husband, her immediate community?”
I don’t know enough about Sharia to ascertain whether your proposition has actual merit. It might. But clearly Williams understands this far more completely and intimately than either you or I. And, your plaint here has more than a whiff of the anti-Muslim demonology so common to the stupid ends of the Christian right and the Machiavellian center of the neoconservative propaganda against Muslims and Arabs. They are barbaric where we are civilized. Abu Ghraib and torture and perhaps a half million killed because they happened to be below the bombs we dropped not withstanding, of course.
In any case, as is obvious, there is no imaginable threat to the continuation of our traditional and preferred legal systems in either Europe or here from Muslim immigration nor from those smelly terrorists.
Just watched the Brit Hume bit with his personal version of “my god is stronger than their gods”. Stupid man.
Bernie:
So why bother to say it or repeat it other than as a means of fomenting fear and hatred re an immigrant population (The Irish are ruining everything!) or as a means of fomenting fear and hatred as a propaganda adjunct to war-mongering?
Why? Because that was the issue we were discussing. If you reach back into the recesses of your memory (um, yesterday morning), you may recall that the issue under discussion was the chance that Sharia could be adopted in the UK. Call me crazy, but the fact that such an idea has already been discussed and advocated in some quarters of the UK seems highly relevant to that question.
And, your plaint here has more than a whiff of the anti-Muslim demonology so common to the stupid ends of the Christian right and the Machiavellian center of the neoconservative propaganda against Muslims and Arabs.
Rubbish. I am not anti-Muslim. I am anti-Sharia. It is the imposition of religious doctrine on the public sphere, and it stands in direct opposition to Western values and traditions, which I hold quite dear.
You never answered my question: Would you and your wife be happy to be subjected to Sharia law, and if not, why not?
All, Monday morning roundup posted:
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/terrorism/the-morning-plum-41/
Merci, Bernie. I see you’re starting the new year as a night owl.
Paul W,
What is the distinction you are making? That it’s okay to demonize a President for “making us less safe” and exposed to terrorist attacks if you wait some arbitrary decent interval before doing it?
It became “okay” to blame Bush personally for 9/11 after you waited a few weeks or months? But it’s absolutely unconscionable for conservatives not to praise Obama for preventing further attacks, which he arguably hasn’t even done?
You are making no sense, because you are trying to defend the indefensible. You can also spare me your revisionist history and caricature of Bush.
Speaking of OBL, yes, where is he? Your POTUS has been in charge for a year now. Is he finding that talk is cheap?
Who would have thought that Bernie would find sharia unobjectionable and opposition to its imposition a matter of prejudice. Each day here brings a new revelation of lunacy.
qb:
Each day here brings a new revelation of lunacy.
It’s not all that surprising, really. The relativism of the left,and the inherent contradictions of that relativism, has always made it difficult for the left to place negative value judgments on other cultures (who are we to tell them what is “right” for them?) even as they condemn others within their own culture for not having “correct” values (you’re a bigot!). I am quite confident that Bernie’s estimation of the harmlessness of Sharia is largely correlated to its distance from his own life. The closer it gets to him, the less benign he would find it.
RIGHT WING MORAL RELATIVISM includes but is not limited to:
Right wingers believe torture is fine, unless someone else does it.
Right wingers believe lying US into a war is fine, even though it’s criminal.
Right wingers think ‘deficits don’t matter’ when Republicans increase the debt.
It’s ALWAYS The Right Wing’s First Rule: Rules Are For Other People.
Or more simply:
IOKIYAR (or RW) It’s OK If You’re A Republican (or Right Winger).
@Scott – Actually, the discussion began with me pointing to the complete idiocy of common rightwing fear-mongering that our legal system (or our culture more broadly) was in any danger of being subsumed by the Muslim faith or the legal codes of Sharia, as in “They want to impose Sharia on the world”. As Williams and I have pointed out, there are other precedent examples of religious (eg Judaic) or cultural (eg native indian) compromises made by nation states to accomodate diversity. So there’s nothing new in what Williams proposes as a possible means of accomodation for a growing portion of a nation’s population. “Sharia” has a current boogey-man status for some in the west but that is preceded by other such examples, eg Catholicism as the Irish and Italians poured into New York; or, for many current evangelicals, Mormonism. We aren’t looking at a unique danger from sharia here, as we see the fear and demonization expressed currently, we are seeing the typical and predictable response to change where old norms and traditions and believes are placed in conflict with new ones. In British Columbia, laws against spitting on the sidewalk were instituted coincident with the inflow of Asian populations (who hold rather different notions about health and what we ought to do with our mucous).
Again, you get sloppy through conflating different issues. I hold, as do you apparently, that merely because a religious group holds a thing to be true or who hold that a specific set of values is supported by a sacred scripture (or an interpretation of such a scripture) that therefore the thing or value gains an over-riding authority. The members of that faith group might believe it but there’s no reason any of the rest of us ought to accept this valuation. That’s the theocratic totalitarian thing neither you nor I wish to have as determinative in our community.
But rather too obvious for words is the fact that in Britain or here in North America, the true threat of such comes not from Muslims but from a certain sort of Christian dominionist. And these folks are not only to be found, in vast majority, in your party but they’ve also managed to gain significant influence in your party. Which I’ve not seen you speak to, um, ever. Citizens in America or Britain or Canada are far far more likely to find themselves facing strictures to their personal choices that arise out of Christians imposing their scriptural directives (eg abortion) than from anything found in Sharia.
So, placing Sharia as the most important or most likely threat to liberty issues is delusional in the extreme AND this is happening because of the conflation of all things Muslim and terrorism. Your concentration on it doesn’t speak well for the integrity of your libertarianism, Scott.
As to the comment to qb on relativism, the arguments which I suppose you are alluding to here come initially from Bloom in “The Closing of the American Mind”. I read the book when it was published and quite liked the first half or so of it. He gives a wonderful example (of the thing you’d validly protest if you were thinking more clearly) of a particular lecture he’d give on Brits in India who insisted that Brit laws take precedence of local laws in the matter of dowry – it was OK to stone a wife to death if the dowry was insufficient. This lecture, and the moral component of it, would commonly put Bloom’s students into cognitive dissonance (where they held no code ought to be considered superior to any other code). Their usual out, as Bloom tells it, would be to evade with a comment such as, “The Brits should never have been there in the first place”.
And it seems clear that Bloom was onto something in this. That something 1) was young people who had yet to have their culturally-absorbed assumptions questioned and 2) an emerging cultural reflection on the negatives that attend empire building. The first is a predictable consequence of intellectual growth (eg kids raised in a fundamentalist Christian home school who go to university and get a good biology prof or a good philosophy prof…and then the shitt hits the fan). The second is, for me, more interesting. Brits have now come rather more to terms with the grave injustices which attended their domination of other cultures than have you Americans. It’ll happen but it will take more time. Have you read Twain on America’s role in the Phillipines? It ain’t Norman Rockwell.
An unthinking, unreflective and absolutist moral relativism (any code equal to any other code) is as untenable to me as it was to Bloom. But what sits on the converse? Well, that’s where we find many on the modern American right – an unthinking and unreflective assertion/belief that Western (particularly American) moral codes sit at the apogee of a hierarchy of moral codes. American = the Good.
@ABC – my sleeping/napping schedule now seems to be dominated by work needs and by our two Persian cats’ arbitrary and compelling demands for food.
Restrictions on abortion actually have broad support across religions and even among the irreligious. Hardly an eccentricity of “Christian dominionists.”
Anyone who doubts the threat to the West from Islam and sharia, or who thinks sharia benign, would do well to start learning about it. Jihad Watch is a good starting place.
Actually, it would be in the running for the worst starting place.