December 2007 Archives

Harpers' Scott Norton reminds us that tomorrow, January 1, 2008, marks the bicentennial of the United States ban on the importation of slaves. He is right, this should be a more publicly acknowledged event.

Norton also urges us to read this excellent op-ed on the anniversary by historian Eric Foner.

Wow. The music industry just hates the people who, um, allow it to exist. You may think the music "titans" are just trying to stop illegal downloading. Ah, you give those music executives and lawyers far too much credit.

As the Washington Post's Marc Fisher reports, the Recording Industry Association of America is now making legal arguments that would affect most of the people I know who a) own CDs or records and b) own a computer:

Now, in an unusual case in which an Arizona recipient of an RIAA letter has fought back in court rather than write a check to avoid hefty legal fees, the industry is taking its argument against music sharing one step further: In legal documents in its federal case against Jeffrey Howell, a Scottsdale, Ariz., man who kept a collection of about 2,000 music recordings on his personal computer, the industry maintains that it is illegal for someone who has legally purchased a CD to transfer that music into his computer.

The industry's lawyer in the case, Ira Schwartz, argues in a brief filed earlier this month that the MP3 files Howell made on his computer from legally bought CDs are "unauthorized copies" of copyrighted recordings.

"I couldn't believe it when I read that," says Ray Beckerman, a New York lawyer who represents six clients who have been sued by the RIAA. "The basic principle in the law is that you have to distribute actual physical copies to be guilty of violating copyright. But recently, the industry has been going around saying that even a personal copy on your computer is a violation."

RIAA's hard-line position seems clear. Its Web site says: "If you make unauthorized copies of copyrighted music recordings, you're stealing. You're breaking the law and you could be held legally liable for thousands of dollars in damages."

Wow. Such refined idiocy is rare to witness. The RIAA just does not get it. They continue to blame consumers for their years of not understanding the changes in the market for their product.

The RIAA's legal crusade against its customers is a classic example of an old media company clinging to a business model that has collapsed. Four years of a failed strategy has only "created a whole market of people who specifically look to buy independent goods so as not to deal with the big record companies," Beckerman says. "Every problem they're trying to solve is worse now than when they started."

The industry "will continue to bring lawsuits" against those who "ignore years of warnings," RIAA spokesman Jonathan Lamy said in a statement. "It's not our first choice, but it's a necessary part of the equation. There are consequences for breaking the law." And, perhaps, for firing up your computer.

There are also consequences for industries who do not evolve with the times and show utter contempt for consumers. Like, um, not getting any more money from them and going bankrupt.

Just how stupid can the leaders of this industry be? Alas, based on this story, I guess we have not learned to what depths they will go before they are left behind by the market.

Update: Is the RIAA going to sue President George W. Bush, who has pre-iTunes available Beatles songs on his iPod, so they must have been ripped from a CD? Will the RIAA stand for such illegal activity?

The Big Picture excerpts Doug Kass' list of 20 Surprises for 2008. If you have an interest in what may happen to the economy over the next year, it is worth a look.

Doug Kass is out with his annual list of long shot events that have a better chance of occurring than most people expect. They are, as always, quite intriguing and thought provoking.

Interestingly, almost half of Kass' last year's improbable surprises came to pass (up from 33% in 2006 and 20% in 2005).

This is not something about which people who claim to believe in the Constitution should be proud. As ThinkProgress reports:

In the recently released annual survey of worldwide privacy rights by Privacy International and EPIC, the United States has been downgraded from "Extensive Surveillance Society" to "Endemic Surveillance Society." As Glenn Greenwald notes, this is "the worst possible category there is for privacy protections, the category also occupied by countries such as China, Russia, Singapore and Malaysia."

That is good campany for this supposedly Constitutional Republic to be a part of, isn't it?

This "big brother" society we are creating should be a major issue in the on-going presidential campaign.

Slate's Dahlia Lithwick looks only at the last year of judicial arguments from the Bush Administration, and has compiled a stunning list of outrageous legal arguments presented on behalf of the Bush Administration.

From "Scooter Libby's sentence was commuted because it was excessive" and "the vice president's office is not a part of the executive branch" to "water-boarding may not be torture" and "the United States does not torture" this has been quite the year for judicial "reasoning" from the Bush Administration.

It will take far too long for our nation to overcome this kind of putrid legal reasoning, if we are ever able to do so.

It sure is interesting how the CEO class makes sure it has a safety net, while working to destroy the middle classes. CNBC's Mary Thompson reports:

Other CEOs walked away much richer men (yes they were all men). Unofficially, they may have been fired, but the official word from many of their former employers was they "retired."

For these CEOs, "retirement" means they get a lot more than a gold watch, they get to keep the money they've socked away in retirement and executive savings plans, and in many cases, the stock options the boards gave them for performances in years past.

As a result, according to an analysis of SEC filings by the compensation consultant James F. Reda & Associates, the remaining 13 former CEOs left with golden parachutes ranging from the $858,000 given to Jet Blue's former CEO and co-founder David Neelman, to the $165,000,000 Bob Nardelli walked away with when he left Home Depot. The numbers jump significantly when you add in the stock these men already owned in the companies they used to run, with Neelman leaving with $118,000,000, and Nardelli $209,000,000.

Meanwhile, of course, benefits for middle class workers continue to be cut, or out-of-pocket costs rise. Perhaps we should not be surprised by this when the senior management of these companies is getting hundreds of millions of dollars in stock benefits that are conveniently there when the CEO "retires."

(Hat tip: Americablog)

Matthew Yglesias points us to one of the most sane analyses I have read of the questionable airline security protocols that have been forced on passengers since the September 11 terrorist attacks.

New York Times' Patrick Smith's deserves great credit for this clear-eyed analysis.

Six years after the terrorist attacks of 2001, airport security remains a theater of the absurd. The changes put in place following the September 11th catastrophe have been drastic, and largely of two kinds: those practical and effective, and those irrational, wasteful and pointless.

The first variety have taken place almost entirely behind the scenes. Explosives scanning for checked luggage, for instance, was long overdue and is perhaps the most welcome addition. Unfortunately, at concourse checkpoints all across America, the madness of passenger screening continues in plain view. It began with pat-downs and the senseless confiscation of pointy objects. Then came the mandatory shoe removal, followed in the summer of 2006 by the prohibition of liquids and gels. We can only imagine what is next.

Take, for example, the 3-ounce limit on gels and liquids -- the reason why you cannot carry a bottle of water on the plane, but can pay astronomical prices on water after you pass through the security area.

Among first to express serious skepticism about the bombers’ readiness was Thomas C. Greene, whose essay in The Register explored the extreme difficulty of mixing and deploying the types of binary explosives purportedly to be used. Green conferred with Professor Jimmie C. Oxley, an explosives specialist who has closely studied the type of deadly cocktail coveted by the London plotters.

“The notion that deadly explosives can be cooked up in an airplane lavatory is pure fiction,” Greene told me during an interview. “A handy gimmick for action movies and shows like ‘24.’ The reality proves disappointing: it’s rather awkward to do chemistry in an airplane toilet. Nevertheless, our official protectors and deciders respond to such notions instinctively, because they’re familiar to us: we’ve all seen scenarios on television and in the cinema. This, incredibly, is why you can no longer carry a bottle of water onto a plane.”

The threat of liquid explosives does exist, but it cannot be readily brewed from the kinds of liquids we have devoted most of our resources to keeping away from planes. Certain benign liquids, when combined under highly specific conditions, are indeed dangerous. However, creating those conditions poses enormous challenges for a saboteur.

“I would not hesitate to allow that liquid explosives can pose a danger,” Greene added, recalling Ramzi Yousef’s 1994 detonation of a small nitroglycerine bomb aboard Philippine Airlines Flight 434. The explosion was a test run for the so-called “Project Bojinka,” an Al Qaeda scheme to simultaneously destroy a dozen widebody airliners over the Pacific Ocean. “But the idea that confiscating someone’s toothpaste is going to keep us safe is too ridiculous to entertain.”

There's more, and it is excellent. I doubt it will lead to many changes, but at least someone is casting a rightly skeptical eye at the nonsense being thrown our way at the airport. Just because something is being done, does not mean what is happening is actually improving our security as we fly.

And if I were to suggest such a safety net for mere middle class Americans, I would be branded a socialist. The Associated Press' Deborah Yao reports:

The 87-year-old founder of Comcast Corp.'s pay will keep going to his beneficiaries for five years after his death under a new agreement.

...clip...

Roberts, whose son now heads the company, sits on the board of directors and is chairman of its executive and finance committee.

In 2006, Roberts was paid a salary of $1.8 million. His full 2007 salary and benefits will be disclosed when the company files its proxy statement next year.

The new agreement gives Roberts' beneficiaries his 2007 salary for five years after his death. It also gives the beneficiaries his annual performance-based cash bonus, whatever has accrued but not yet paid out, after his death.

His wife, if she survives him, will get health and welfare benefits for life.

As Comcast is a publicly traded company, I really wonder how the shareholders are served by this deal and how the Board of Directors can justify it.

(Hat tip: Americablog)

Given all of the things Bill Kristol has said about the New York Times in the past, I am shocked he would accept a job with the newspaper. ThinkProgress runs down Kristol's previous attacks on his new employer.

Of course, for all of their hateful works about the "mainstream media," conservatives like Kristol accept every opportunity to appear on its vehicles. See Coulter, Ann, for another example of this phenomenon.

That could make one wonder whether all of those radical conservative attacks on the media are based more on propaganda value than anything substantive.

If only our nation could have the foresight to implement such improvements to our rail systems.

At some point in this coming Century, peak oil, or a similar energy crisis, will require a national and comprehensive rail strategy. We will regret not getting a jump on that process.

(Hat tip: IFTF's Future Now blog.)

Hello, Congress? Hello?

The President of the United States appears to have just attacked one of your Constitutional prerogatives. Oh, he's done it in such a way to muddle the issue, but he has declared that he decides when you are in session -- which is a major issue.

Kagro X catches the president making this startling claim in his "Memorandum of Disapproval" of the Defense Authorization Bill. The president writes:

The adjournment of the Congress has prevented my return of H.R. 1585 within the meaning of Article I, section 7, clause 2 of the Constitution. Accordingly, my withholding of approval from the bill precludes its becoming law. The Pocket Veto Case, 279 U.S. 655 (1929). In addition to withholding my signature and thereby invoking my constitutional power to "pocket veto" bills during an adjournment of the Congress, I am also sending H.R. 1585 to the Clerk of the House of Representatives, along with this memorandum setting forth my objections, to avoid unnecessary litigation about the non-enactment of the bill that results from my withholding approval and to leave no doubt that the bill is being vetoed. (emphasis added)

Catch the first sentence of that statement. "The adjournment of the Congress..." Except, um, the Congress is not adjourned. The Senate remains in session -- yes, pro forma sessions, but legal sessions nonetheless.

In other words, the president cannot use his "pocket veto" authority. For him to claim so is another attack on our proper Constitutional order.

If these sessions do not count for pocket vetoes, then the president may be planning to attack their legitimacy in terms of his desire to recess appoint several objectional individuals.

Now, the president also appears, in his statement above, to go through the motions of properly vetoing the bill -- by returning it to the Congress with a list of his objections. I think this is done to satisfy the letter of the veto provisions of Article I, Section 7, clause 2.

But the attack on the "adjournment" of the Congress is there. Above the president's signature. If the Congress attempts to override the veto, is it then accepting the president's determination that he decides when the legislature is, and is not, in session? Is that the game plan here?

Will anyone defend the Constitution? Bueller? Bueller?

So, President Bush just announced that he is going to veto the defense authorization bill he browbeat the Democratic Congress into passing before they left for their holiday break.

Of course, as Digby notes, the president did not object previously to the provisions of the bill that he now claims forces him to use his veto pen. How convenient.

One is forced to wonder just how many times the Democratic leaders in Congress are going to fall for the president's political games. Alas, little about the Democratic response to the president over the past year gives me much confidence in the answer.

Over at Crooks and Liars, Steve Benen highlights just how hypocritical it is for Sen. John McCain to use his Vietnam experience on the campaign trail:

To be sure, by any reasonable measure, McCain’s experience in the military during the war in Vietnam was heroic and demands respect. If he wants to use this part of his biography in the presidential campaign, it makes perfect sense — like John Kerry, that’s what war heroes do.

But let’s not forget that, during the last presidential campaign, when Kerry reminded voters of his own heroic service, McCain criticized him for it.

Brad DeLong points us to John Scalzi's report on the latest example of style over substance from our cable news media:

A multi-billionaire industrialist donates 97% of his fortune to help fund clean water in Africa, education for blind children, and housing for the mentally ill, and it’s presented by one of the largest news organizations in the world in terms of what it means for Paris Hilton.

Scalzi titles his observation, "Why We’re All Going to Hell, Part 54,302." That number just seems low to me.

Al Qaeda may indeed be behind the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. But No Quarter's Larry Johnson explains why we may want to resist a rush to judgment.

I do not rule out Islamic radicals who are not part of the government as possible culprits. But they are not the only folks with motive and access. In fact, the Government of Pakistan’s rush to pin this on Al Qaeda smacks of scape goating. There are longstanding ties between Al Qaeda and elements of the military and the intelligence service.

The virtual absence of any uniformed security detail around her gives further credence
to the belief that elements within the military and ISI did away with her. There was no doubt that Benazir was a high risk for an assassination attempt. Why were Pakistani authorities so passive when it came to her security? It would be one thing if she resisted efforts to cover her. But the opposite is true. She had specifically and repeatedly asked for more security. At least she was not suicidal.

AQ is always a convenient boogeyman, but there is a pretty significant gap between what they claim to do and what they have actually accomplished over the last two years. Talking a good game and doing something are two different things. President Musharef and his crowd have some explaining to do.

Indeed.

The Washington Note's Steve Clemons posts an initial analysis by the Nelson Report's Chris Nelson about Pakistan in the aftermath of Benazir Bhutto's assassination. As Clemons writes:

Chris Nelson is correct that while the world is debating the state of democracy in Pakistan -- the military and intel elites are worried about what they should be concerned about -- the nukes.

Per usual, Nelson's analysis is worth reading.

The former Pakistani prime minister was assassinated following an election rally, just 12 days before scheduled parliamentary elections.

It is hard to overstate just how bad this news could prove to be. While we do not focus on the country much, it is an important nation on the world stage, as Professor Juan Cole explains:

Pakistan is important to US security. It is a nuclear power. Its military fostered, then partially turned on the Taliban and al-Qaeda, which have bases in the lawless tribal areas of the northern part of the country. And Pakistan is key to the future of its neighbor, Afghanistan. Pakistan is also a key transit route for any energy pipelines built between Iran or Central Asia and India, and so central to the energy security of the United States.

One cannot easily overstate what is at stake in Pakistan over the next few hours, days, and weeks.

This is what happens when we fail to have a serious conversation about scientific matters in this nation. From Think Progress:

Shortly after taking office, President Bush announced a policy allowing federal funding of research only on existing stem cell lines, despite the urging of several of his advisers and the scientific community for expanded funding. Bush has nevertheless remained stubborn, twice vetoing legislation that would have lifted the restrictions.

In a new piece in Commentary magazine, Jay Lefkowitz — who advised Bush on stem cells — reveals how the President formulated his 2001 policy. While Bush heard from a variety of groups on both sides of the issue, the turning point appeared to come when Lefkowitz read from Aldous Huxley’s fictional novel, Brave New World, and scared Bush

Those 1932 books sure are scary. Well, then. I'm trying to be glad our federal government is basing its scientific decisions on such background materials. Somehow I just cannot muster the enthusiasm for such pathetic work.

This would also be a good time to support the call for an actual debate on scientific matters by the presidential candidates in 2008.

Professor Juan Cole offers a compelling list of the top ten myths about Iraq as we end the year 2007. Here's one of the really important ones:

5. Myth: Some progress has been made by the Iraqi government in meeting the "benchmarks" worked out with the Bush administration. Fact: in the words of Democratic Senator Carl Levin, "Those legislative benchmarks include approving a hydrocarbon law, approving a debaathification law, completing the work of a constitutional review committee, and holding provincial elections. Those commitments, made 1 1/2 years ago, which were to have been completed by January of 2007, have not yet been kept by the Iraqi political leaders despite the breathing space the surge has provided."

The Washington Post once again appears to use Matt Drudge's sensibilities as part of their article assignments.

Just another day for your so-called liberal media.

That didn't take long. Just three days ago, I complained that my local newspaper had a bad habit of publishing editorials arguing that we need to focus on "overspending" in California government on one day -- while calling for more spending on others.

I decided to highlight this propensity because it is an important example of one of the key problems in California government: people who say the state has an overspending problem at the same time they demand more and more services. It should probably go without saying that few people want the state to take a look at all of the tax cuts enacted over the past 13 years -- tax cuts that amount of $11 billion less annually into the state's coffers.

As our current president once so infamously said, "The math doesn't work."

Today provides not one, but two new examples of this phenomenon. Even more impressive, in one of the articles calling for new spending today, the editorial writers even make note of California's budget deficit before saying that the spending would be worthwhile.

That's quite a feat of mental gymnastics.

One editorial calls for reform and more oversight of California's State Compensation Insurance Fund. That's a good idea. But oversight cannot be done with volunteers.

Today's second editorial, which does not appear on-line at the moment, discusses early-warning systems for earthquakes (obviously a big issue here in the Bay Area) and argues:

It goes without saying that California and the Bay Area, which is undermined by a honeycomb of faults, should install such a system. The problem, says [University of California, Berkeley seismologist Richard] Allen, is that we would need a network of at least 650 newly remotely operated seismometers, which would cost $10 million to $30 million.

We would also have to upgrade 250 or so existing seismic stations at an as-yet-undetermined cost. Although $50 million to $100 million may not seem like much in this era of multi-billion-dollar projects and programs, state government is strapped with heavy debt and faces a $14 billion deficit next fiscal year. Adopting a proven, sophisticated seismic early warning system would, however, be well wroth the investment.

Why, yes. It would.

But California has an "overspending" problem, remember? The paper just argued this three days ago. No word yet on what spending the Contra Costa Times would cut or what tax cuts from the past 13 years (remember, they add up to $11 billion annually) the paper would like to see reversed to fund these worthwhile investments.

It has now been 1,700 days since President George W. Bush stood on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln under a "Mission Accomplished" banner and declared "In the Battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

Since that day, about 3,757 U.S. soldiers have died.

And I am still quite unsure what "winning" in Iraq means.

While I am not a person filled with the most holiday spirit, there is one tradition that I have loved for years. On the last Late Show with David Letterman before the holiday break, Darlene Love will appear to sing her classic song, Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home).

Yep, I'm a sap, at least for this holiday tradition. It's a short list (one admittedly that has grown longer since I had kids) but this is on there for a long time.

This year, alas, we could not see Darlene Love preform the song because Letterman is not showing new episodes. A consequence of the movie and television producers decision to run away from the negotiating table while members of the Writers Guild of America are striking to try to ensure their viability in a 21st Century economic environment.

Well, thanks to Digby, I realized that I could still have a part of the tradition, thanks to YouTube. There is a great collection of Love's performances on Letterman, and it brought a smile to me to see and remember these performances.

This performance, from 2000, is one of my favorites. It includes the Air Force's Singing Sergeants on background vocals -- a nice touch, for me anyway, given my dad's long service in that branch of our military.

President Bush clearly believes that the American people are stupid and do not have any memories of the previous six years. Alas, I am hardly surprised at his audacity. Budget expert Stan Collender writes about the president's new-found aversion to earmarks:

There are times that George W. Bush's audacity on budget matters is truly breathtaking.

The president last week said that Congress hadn't done enough to slow the growth of earmarks and had directed OMB Director Jim Nussle to consider ways not to spend the designated funds.

Never mind that this is the same president who over the previous six years signed every appropriations bill sent to him by the Republican Congress and, therefore, explicitly approved of and presided over the largest increase in earmarked spending in U.S. history. Never mind that, when he was chairman of the House Budget Committee, Nussle did nothing to stop earmarks from happening. And never mind that when he ran for governor in Iowa, Nussle boasted about the earmarks he obtained for projects in that state.

Apparently, that was then and this is now.

It is just stunning that it is acceptable in our mainstream political discourse for candidates to argue that there are no meaningful checks on a president's power.

But, not only does Mitt Romney argue this, based on answers to questions posed by the Boston Globe's Charlie Savage, Romney even appears willing to go beyond the horrific precedents set by the Bush/Cheney administration. As Glenn Greenwald writes:

But by far the most extraordinary answers come from Mitt Romney. Romney's responses -- not to some of the questions but to every single one of them -- are beyond disturbing. The powers he claims the President possesses are definitively -- literally -- tyrannical, unrecognizable in the pre-2001 American system of government and, in some meaningful ways, even beyond what the Bush/Cheney cadre of authoritarian legal theorists have claimed.

Charlie Savage, who has done a bunch of tremendous reporting about the Bush Administration's expansion of executive power, explains well in his article why these questions should be closely considered by very voter next year.

In 2000, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney were not asked about presidential power, and they volunteered nothing about their attitude toward the issue to voters. Yet once in office, they immediately began seeking out ways to concentrate more unchecked power in the White House - not just for themselves, but also for their successors.

Bush has bypassed laws and treaties that he said infringed on his wartime powers, expanded his right to keep information secret from Congress and the courts, centralized greater control over the government in the White House, imprisoned US citizens without charges, and used signing statements to challenge more laws than all predecessors combined.

Legal specialists say decisions by the next president - either to keep using the expanded powers Bush and Cheney developed, or to abandon their legal and political precedents - will help determine whether a stronger presidency becomes permanent.

The stakes are high. Are we going to return to a more proper Constitutional order of coequal branches and checks-and-balances? Or are we going to continue down the path blazed by Bush/Cheney and their advisors?

I want a major course correction.

Since all politics is local, it's time I called out the Contra Costa Times editorial page for calling for state budget cuts in some editorials, while demanding more government spending in others.

Today, my local paper editorializes on California's on-again state budget crisis. Ignoring the fact that there would be no budget crisis without the more than $11 billion in taxes that have been cut since 1994, including the $6 billion tax cut that Governor Schwarzenegger imposed during his first minutes in office, the Contra Costa Times editorial page argues today:

Any solution to the budget crisis should focus on its root cause -- overspending.

But, when it comes to specific projects, the Contra Costa Times' editorial board will call for increased spending by state agencies. For example:

• December 18, 2007: Conduct caffeine study
  
• December 17, 2007: Theft of Elder Nation: An editorial series: Time for action, funds
  

So, going forward I will be looking at the editorials of my local paper to see if the page continues to call for additional spending on specific issues, while condemning spending in general. It is not a very nice habit.

Unsurprisingly, Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) is facing criticism for his courageous stand to filibuster a FISA bill that included retroactive immunity for the telecom companies.

Alas, as Glenn Greenwald explains, the attacks against Dodd come not just from the president and his allies, but from the Democratic leadership.

Notice, too, who is smearing Dodd's motives here. It isn't Dick Cheney or Mitch McConnell. Instead, it's Harry Reid and anonymous, cowardly Democrats whispering in Paul Kane's ear about Dodd's manipulative "grandstanding" and proclaiming that Dodd will ultimately fail, dismissing the notion that he achieved anything other than delaying their well-laid plan to ensure that the President has everything he wants.

So here we have one of the very few acts of the last year by a Democrat in Congress which has actually engaged and energized people; made them feel as though someone was listening to them and taking a stand for what they believe; something that enables actual citizens to have some influence on the political process; and, most of all, an effort that at least disrupted the relentless Congressional march to capitulate to all of Bush's demands.

And in response, Harry Reid and his mewling anonymous Democratic allies immediately recruit the Washington Post's Congressional reporter to attack what Dodd has achieved, demean his motives with a ferocity that they never display in opposing George W. Bush, and assure everyone that their will to do the President's bidding will be realized despite Dodd's temporary interference.

It's one thing to watch Congressional Democrats fail to stand up to any of the Bush abuses. It's another thing entirely to watch as they actively enable them. But they've now moved beyond even that to actually perceiving as their Enemy anyone -- such as "Dodd and his allies" -- who seeks to disrupt their Bush-enabling efforts and, worst of all, who infects their rituals with any dirty, outside riff-raff, such as actual citizens.

Greg Sargent finds your so-called liberal media hard at work including only the president's talking points and ignoring what the Democrats had to say about Congressional earmarks.

Yes, it should not be surprising at this point when the Bush Administration decides its political needs are more important than science and the law, but it is still worth noting. The Los Angeles Times' Janet Wilson reports:

The head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ignored his staff's written findings in denying California's request for a waiver to implement its landmark law to slash greenhouse gases from vehicles, sources inside and outside the agency told The Times on Thursday.

"California met every criteria . . . on the merits. The same criteria we have used for the last 40 years on all the other waivers," said an EPA staffer. "We told him that. All the briefings we have given him laid out the facts."

EPA administrator Stephen L. Johnson announced Wednesday that because President Bush had signed an energy bill raising average fuel economy that there was no need or justification for separate state regulation. He also said that California's request did not meet the legal standard set out in the Clean Air Act.

But his staff, which had worked for months on the waiver decision, concluded just the opposite, the sources said Thursday. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk with the media or because they feared reprisals.

California Air Resources Board Chairwoman Mary Nichols said she was also told by EPA staff that they were overruled by Johnson.

She said Johnson's decision showed "that this administration ignores the science and ignores the law to reach the politically convenient conclusion."

Nichols, who served as assistant EPA administrator overseeing air regulations under President Clinton, said she had helped write waiver decisions there, and "I know California met all the criteria on this one."

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has vowed to fight in court to overturn the decision.

Technical and legal staff also concluded that if the waiver were denied, EPA would very likely lose in court to the state, the sources said.

But if Johnson granted California the waiver and the auto industry sued, "EPA is almost certain to win," said two sources quoting the briefing document. They advised him to either grant the waiver outright or give California a temporary one for three years.

Instead, three sources said, Johnson cut off any consultation with his technical staff for the last month and made his decision before having them write the formal, legal justification for it.

It really does amaze me to see how the American automotive industry insists on using our government to help it commit long-term business suicide. ThinkProgress recounts the vice president's efforts to thwart action on the climate crisis and to fight environmental regulations.

Wishing will not make the climate crisis or peak oil go away, Detroit.

If Dick Cheney were a real leader, and not a pseudo-lobbyist for the oil industry, he would be working to provide federal support for research into new technologies to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. To make our nation's manufacturers the world leaders in alternative energies.

Alas, that would not help his oil buddies quite as much. We all know the national interest is not nearly as important as big oil.

Dear Political Reporters:

Add me to the list of people who does not give a bleep about how a candidate eats a pizza or drinks a beer.

While this may be important to you and your buddies on the campaign bus, it really does not matter to the voters of this nation. Really. How one eats a pizza or pours a beer also is not a window into how well a candidate would serve in office. Really. Seriously. Yeah.

If you want to write such stories and make such observations, do us all a favor and get jobs in the style section, so we can find people who care about policy and its impact on this nation to write about the politics and the campaigns.

This is something I found this really interesting: the October 2006 NASA Technical Publication "Five Millennium Canon of Solar Eclipses: -1999 to +3000":

During the 5,000-year period from -1999 to +3000 (2000 BCE to 3000 CE), Earth will experience 11,898 eclipses of the Sun. The statistical distribution of eclipse types for this interval is as follows: 4,200 partial eclipses, 3956 annular eclipses, 3173 total eclipses, and 569 hybrid eclipses.

Detailed global maps for each of the 11,898 eclipses delineate the geographic regions of visibility for both the penumbral (partial) and umbral or antumbral (total, annular, or hybrid) phases of every event. Modern political borders are plotted to assist in the determination of eclipse visibility. The uncertainty in Earth's rotational period expressed in the parameter delta T and its impact on the geographic visibility of eclipses in the past and future is discussed.

(Hat tip: The Long Now Foundation Blog)

Congratulations, Senate Republicans! The Campaign for America's future notes:

WASHINGTON—The Republican Senate minority today filibustered an omnibus budget bill, setting a modern-day record for blocking the most legislation during a congressional session. A new report released today by the Campaign for America's Future details the 62 times conservatives have used the filibuster to block legislation (or force modification of bills) in the first session of the 110th Congress. In just the first year of this two-year Congress, their use of the filibuster in the Senate topped the previous record, reached during the entire 107th Congress.

Don't worry. I'm sure the radical conservatives will be on your televisions and radios soon to tell you about how little the Democratic Congress is getting down. Probably while forgetting this little filibustery detail.

The baby boom generation lost one of this giants today, with the passing of William Strauss.

It has been my honor to work with Bill as a web consultant for one of his companies. He was a thoughtful and active person.

A co-founder of the Capitol Steps, noted generational historian, co-founder of the Cappies (a high school “Critics and Awards” program), author of three musicals, co-author of important books like Generations, Millennials Rising, and The Fourth Turning, Strauss accomplished so much -- he was a true leader.

I am sad that he is gone. I send my best wishes to his wife and family.

Update: The Washington Post's obituary of Bill Strauss can be found here.

It may only prove to be a temporary victory, but this is a victory nonetheless. Congratulations, Senator Chris Dodd, for showing us all what leadership can look like on the floor of the United States Senate.

Click here to watch a discussion of Dodd's victory on the Senate floor from today's Countdown program, guest hosted by Alison Stewart.

Yes, I'm linking to Dodd's web site post about this. He deserves the traffic after his work today.

Speaking of opposition party failures, Matthew Yglesias looks at a new CBS/New York Times poll that shows that nearly half of Americans want us out of Iraq within a year, with another quarter wanting us out within one to two years and wonders, then, why our political leaders are largely planning on our being there much longer:

At the same time, everyone who's paying close attention to what David Petraeus says, or what gets written on the Small Wars Journal Blog, or what the cool kids in the think tanks are saying, or what the Counterinsurgency Field Manual says, understands that the current strategy envisions us being in Iraq for much much longer than the 1-2 years that the American public seems willing to contemplate. In other words, completely apart from the question of whether or not the surge is "working," the architects of the surge understand themselves to be engaged in an undertaking -- setting the stage for over a decade of intensive, Northern Ireland-style policing and reconstruction of Iraqi society -- that public opinion overwhelmingly and correctly believes to be an unacceptable allocation of national priorities.

And yet, this fact is being kept pretty well obscured from the American public. Part of the fault there lies with the press. But a big part of the fault lies with the opposition party which is simply declining to present the public with a clear strategic alternative. The nit-picking over whether the fact that conditions in December 2007 are more like those of December 2006 (unbearably shitty!) or more like those of December 2004 (merely awful!) pales in comparison to the fundamental choice of whether our troops should come home within the next year or two, as the American people want, or whether they should stay in Iraq for an indefinite period of time definitely lasting over ten years, as the current strategy indicates.

Can someone explain to me why the Democratic Party refuses to fight on issues where nearly three-quarters of the American people agree with them? That wouldn't even be leading (which can help change minds, believe it or not).

It is not often when the politically right thing to do is also just the right thing to do. It is insane not to take advantage of those opportunities.

It is just pathetic that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has stacked the deck in today's FISA debate in favor of those who believe the telecom companies should be excused for their potentially illegal behavior. As Senator Russ Feingold explains:

By choosing the Intelligence Committee bill over the Judiciary product, Senator Reid has made things much tougher for those of us who think the courts -- not Congress -- should decide whether the companies deserve immunity. He's also made it an uphill struggle of those of us who want more court oversight of the broad new surveillance powers included in the bill.

And that's just unconscionable.

Atrios summaries the positions of the Democratic front-runners in three short sentences.

Obama: The system sucks, but I'm so awesome that it'll melt away before me.

Edwards: The system sucks, and we're gonna have to fight like hell to destroy it.

Clinton: The system sucks, and I know how to work within it more than anyone.

Right now, I prefer door number two.

Senator Chris Dodd is preparing to filibuster the FISA bill if it contains provisions to provide retroactive immunity to the telecom companies.

Good for him. Really. I admire this move, and thank Dodd for taking this step.

This is an important point to make, and I am glad that Dodd is willing to stick to his principles and fight this battle.

It is more than a little shame that Dodd is being put in this situation because, for one thing, Majority leader Harry Reid refuses to honor Dodd's hold on this legislation (even while he allows GOP holds on important legislation) and won't force the Republicans to filibuster on any of the plethora of items they are holding up in the Senate.

A real filibuster being conducted by a Democrat. Nice job, Mr. Majority Leader. Nice job.

I wish this were not true, but I fear that Digby takes an all-too-prescient look at the future:

What Atrios says here is absolutely true. A Democratic president, no matter who it is, is going to pay for the Republicans' sins. But it won't be just because the Republicans and Blue Dogs in congress suddenly "realize" they have co-equal power. I predict that the right wing noise machine will shout far and wide that the election was stolen (probably with the help of "illegal aliens.") The new president will not be allowed to weed out even one right wing plant anywhere in the executive branch without being accused of politicizing it. There will be no executive privilege as the courts rediscover their "responsibilities." Scientists and experts will all be accused of being shills for the liberal special interests. The president will be accused of violating Americans' civil liberties and destroying the constitution. There will be widespread accusations of fraud and corruption and non-stop investigations.

In other words the Republicans are going to accuse the Democratic president of everything we know the Bush administration did. And because it was never fully investigated or even fully discussed, people will lay the sins at the feet of the Democratic president and feel a sense of relief that the balance of power is being restored and Washington is finally being cleaned up.

The media, who know the real story (they helped cover it up, after all) will lead the charge. The GOP will feed them juicy stories with just the right amount of sexy detail and they will rush to tell the American people, gravely intoning their deep concern for the integrity of the office and "their town." (And the children...)

Democrats have largely failed, when in those instances where they have tried, to explain just how extreme the Bush Administration has been. They will in all likelihood pay for this. But, as Digby and Atrios say, it is far better than the alternative of another GOP presidency.

Ah, our elite political pundits act in such odd ways. To quote Greg Sargent:

Specifically, I'm talking about the fact that pundits and commentators have a strange and widespread tendency to talk about their profession's collective failings -- but without displaying any desire to change them, without showing any awareness that these failings could be changed with a little effort, and even without betraying any awareness or concern that they themselves might be contributing to the problem.

Kevin Drum discusses reports that the Bush Administration is seeking to take control over promotions of military lawyers, clearly because they are not pleased that some of them are following their duty to the law rather than follow the dictates of the political leaders.

The Bush, Cheney, Addington axis continues to try to stomp out anyone who dares stand up to them. This gang of political leaders are now trying to politicize military attorneys -- especially since some of them have had the gall to suggest that Guantanamo detainees deserve a fair hearing.

I guess this is more of that infamous support for the troops, eh?

Harper's Scott Norton has an important post that seeks to put all we learned about the Bush Administration's use of torture -- and the convenient destruction of tapes showing that torture -- into context.

We should be very clear about this. The Kiriakous of the world are not blameless. But they are not much more than tools in the hands of those who drive the torture machine. Real moral and legal culpability lies with those in leadership positions who sanction and approve this system. The use of torture—waterboarding, hypothermia, long-time standing, and other extreme practices—is a criminal act. If the Justice Department has blessed it—and we now know this for a fact—then figures in the Justice Department, including the Attorney General, have made themselves accessories to a serious crime. Since the end of World War II at least, the use of these torture practices has been universally recognized as a criminal act subject to the most severe sanction.

This is not an academic argument. It goes beyond the political. These people have stained the honor of this nation--permanently--with their use and sanction of such practices.

Norton also reminds us that waterboarding has a long history:

This resurrects the process of official cruelty under the Stuart monarchs in seventeenth century England. Persons accused of state crimes very frequently were interrogated with the use of specific techniques, including the rack, the thumbscrew, and waterboarding. King James I personally described the process in The Kings Booke (1606). He would, on the advice of his officers, “approve no new torture,” but he would certainly avail himself of the existing practices. In ascending order of severity they were: thumbscrews, the rack and waterboarding. That’s right. Waterboarding was considered the most severe of the official forms of torture. Worse than the rack and thumbscrews.

This is the action that Republican Senator Kit Bond has compared to swimming strokes. That radical conservatives refuse to call torture.

These people need to be voted out of power.

Via Brad DeLong, quoting from Gawker:

Correction Of The Day: We misspelled the word misspelled twice, as mispelled, in the Corrections and Clarifications column on September 26, page 30.

Howard Kurtz is getting some required scrutiny after his effort to virtually ignore the recent major media controversy that began with Time columnist Joe Klein's claim that the Democrats "would give terrorists the same legal protections as Americans" in the FISA legislation. Given his position as the most-read media critic in the nation, Kurtz's silence was more than a little odd.

Media Matters' Eric Boehlert kicks over some rocks and exposes some uncomfortable truths about how Kurtz operates.

Attentive readers of Howard Kurtz's washingtonpost.com weekday media column may have noticed that on the fifth and final page of his 3,000-word December 6 post, Kurtz finally addressed the media controversy that erupted when Salon.com blogger Glenn Greenwald highlighted an egregious error made by Time magazine columnist Joe Klein. Klein had mocked a supposed Democratic legislative maneuver in Congress for being "well beyond stupid" and stressed how Democrats remain soft on the war on terror.

Greenwald's original fact-checking quickly set off an embarrassing chain of events in which Klein at first refused to forthrightly acknowledge his error, confused the issue further with additional updates online, and then threw up his hands and declared, "I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who's right." Meanwhile, as the story unfolded online, a Time magazine editor rudely hung up on a blogger who called to ask about errors in the column. And when Time eventually published a timid, misleading correction,

Democratic members of Congress took the unusual step of publicly complaining about the column and demanding a chance to rebut Klein's false and malicious claim that Democrats weren't serous about fighting terrorism; that they wanted to give suspected terrorists the same legal protections as everyday Americans.

We now know that the error was fed to Klein by an anonymous Republican operative, who later revealed himself to be arch-conservative Republican Congressman Peter Hoekstra.

The story, which raged online for more than two weeks and was commented upon by virtually every major liberal blogger, unfolded at the intersection between politics and media -- the same intersection that Kurtz writes about for a living as perhaps the most-read media writer in the country. Yet for weeks Kurtz remained silent about the Klein story; nothing in the Post, nothing in his online daily column, and nothing on CNN's Reliable Sources, the weekly media program that he hosts.

The Brigadier General who is the legal advisor at Guantanamo Bay is unable, or unwilling, to offer an answer to the question as to whether waterboarding is torture. You can see the video at ThinkProgress.

Any legal advisor who cannot answer this question should be fired. Immediately.

Larry Johnson makes clear something that should be obvious to everyone: waterboarding is torture. He even recounts a 1968 incident that landed on the front page of the Washington Post and led to the court-martial of an U.S. soldier in Vietnam.

Most important, since the United States is a signatory to the Convention Against Torture & Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, Johnson is correct to explain that:

Since the United States is a signatory to this Convention, it is not up to President Bush to declare waterboarding is okay. It is not. It is torture. Plain and simple.

Indeed.

The United States should be better than this. Why do radical Republicans continue to hold such a low opinion of this great nation through their continuing support of such practices?

I am happy that there are some people out their pushing our presidential candidates to have a debate about scientific and technological issues. I fully support Sciencedebate2008's "Call for a Presidential Debate on Science and Technology":

Given the many urgent scientific and technological challenges facing America and the rest of the world, the increasing need for accurate scientific information in political decision making, and the vital role scientific innovation plays in spurring economic growth and competitiveness, we call for a public debate in which the U.S. presidential candidates share their views on the issues of The Environment, Health and Medicine, and Science and Technology Policy.

For more information, visit the Sciencedebate2008 web site.

Humans are still evolving, and studies indicate the evolution is getting faster.

Kevin Drum explains the radically contradicting stories CIA sources have now have told about the torture, through waterboarding and other techniques, of Abu Zubaydah.

Was Zubaydah, as sources to Ron Suskind claimed, an "insane, certifiable, split personality" who had "almost nothing "operational" in his portfolio"? Or was he "highly thought of in al Qaeda...one of the intellectual leaders of the group"?

We don't know. Someone may want to investigate this. Congress? Hello?

Also important, as Drum points out: the person who claims that Zubaydah was "highly thought of," now says we should not torture "Because we're Americans, and we're better than that."

In that last statement, finally, I find something with which I can agree unreservedly.

The only thing that seems to bother Washington Post Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. about his newspaper's pathetic front page treatment of rumors of Barack Obama's being a Muslim, rumors the article did not bother to point out were false, is that a media website would dare give a someone the opportunity to criticize the paper.

As Greg Sargent writes:

It's really telling that Downie was able to work up so much outrage about this but was unable to find anything to say about the piece itself. His newspaper publishes a major front-page story recycling rumors about a leading candidate without declaring them false or including widely-reported information debunking them? No comment. One mean and vicious blogger indulged in some over-the-top language? The outrage pours forth in torrents.

Let me know when Downie gets off the fainting couch and wants to try to restore his newspaper's ever-dwindling credibility.

Chris Wallace is upset that some Democrats are refusing to go on Fox "News" Channel. Crooks and Liars provides just one example of why people would be wise to treat FNC as the partisan outlet it clearly strives to be.

Rarely will I cheer a person losing clients. But Chris Lehane today provides the rare exception.

Supposed liberal Lehane decides to take a job with the AMPTP right as the movie producers walk out of contract talks with the striking writers guild, and right as the AMPTP puts on the table some obvious union busting tactics.

Now Lehane's union clients are firing him. As Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher writes:

There is a limit to what you can do and still work for progressive organizations. In contracting out as a strike buster for the AMPTP, Lehane has definitely crossed it.

Indeed.

Kevin Drum clearly summarizes what the destroyed CIA torture enhanced interrogation technique tapes would have shown us:

So here's what the tapes would have shown: not just that we had brutally tortured an al-Qaeda operative, but that we had brutally tortured an al-Qaeda operative who was (a) unimportant and low-ranking, (b) mentally unstable, (c) had no useful information, and (d) eventually spewed out an endless series of worthless, fantastical "confessions" under duress. This was all prompted by the president of the United States, implemented by the director of the CIA, and the end result was thousands of wasted man hours by intelligence and and law enforcement personnel.

Nice trifecta there. And just think: there's an entire political party in this country that still thinks this is OK.

In the aftermath of today's revelation that leading Congressional Democrats were briefed on waterboarding and other activities, an important conversation has begun about just what those Members of Congress could have done once they learned the information.

The Bush Administration, after all, has not been kind to whistleblowers.

Well, our Constitutional system does provide some options -- granted, options that include potential political problems, but there were ways the Democrats could have warned the world that something was amiss (assuming, perhaps generously, that those briefed believed something to be wrong).

Law Professor Michael Froomkin offers this excellent analysis of the Constitution's important -- and powerful -- Speech and Debate clause. Digby notes that if this story is true, it makes the Democrats complicit in these crimes. Glenn Greenwald reminds us that the reason we have secret Congressional Intelligence Committees is not so that they can get briefed on programs and accept them meekly, they are to allow Congress to do its job of providing oversight over the Legislative Branch.

We need to have this conversation, because it could determine just what kind of government this nation has over the next decades.

The Los Angeles Times' Tim Rutten has an excellent column analyzing the media's inability to address in anything but a superficial way the impact religion has in politics. Mitt Romney's repellent speech on religion this week is just the latest example of our media's inability to put these questions into context or wrestle with the significant issues such speeches raise.

Start with the fact that nearly all this week's political coverage focused on former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and the speech he gave in Texas on Thursday, asking voters not to reject his candidacy because he's a Mormon. Much of the media response to that address was built on superficial, mostly misleading comparisons to John F. Kennedy's landmark 1960 address before Protestant clergymen hostile to his Catholicism. What was missing was any discussion of the numerous and very legitimate questions that ought to be asked about religion and the candidacy of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, whose surging popularity in Iowa sent Romney to the podium in the first place.

(Hat tip: The Washington Note)

At the end of an excellent post on the Bush Administration's use of torture, Digby attaches an update that gets at an important part of today's politics, one that the major media is either ignoring or complicit in allowing to fester. After recalling then-Governor George W. Bush's sadistic mocking of condemned prisoner Karla Faye Tucker, Digby writes:

And I would suggest that there is ample evidence that the Republican candidates for president this time, in different ways, have all shown a similar penchant for a nasty, simple-minded meanness or outright sadism. But the press is ignoring that once again in favor of predigested GOP spin which explores in detail such character revelations as Clinton's "brittleness" and Obama's "aloofness" and Edwards' "inauthenticity." Never mind the people who say they want to start deporting massive numbers of people because they are all diseased criminals or those who want to "double Gitmo." As far as the press is concerned, their biggest problem is figuring out which ones are the most Christian.

Because Jesus would approve of torture, rendition, and holding people without charge indefinitely. Yep, that's all over the New Testament.

Harper's Scott Norton points out that Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) made some important remarks about the Bush Administration's authoritarian view of its powers on Friday. Whitehouse was able to get some of the Administration's legal "justifications" for its actions declassified, and he read them into the Senate record and discussed their implications.

In a nutshell, these three Bush Administration legal propositions boil down to this:

1. “I don’t have to follow my own rules, and I don’t have to tell you when I’m breaking them.”
   
2. “I get to determine what my own powers are.”
   
3. “The Department of Justice doesn’t tell me what the law is, I tell the Department of Justice what the law is.”

When the Congress of the United States is willing to roll over for an unprincipled President, this is where you end up. We should not even be having this discussion. But here we are. I implore my colleagues: reject these feverish legal theories. I understand political loyalty, trust me, I do. But let us also be loyal to this great institution we serve in the legislative branch of our government. Let us also be loyal to the Constitution we took an oath to defend, from enemies foreign and domestic. And let us be loyal to the American people who live each day under our Constitution’s principles and protections.

You can watch this important speech in two parts below.

Well, this is one reason why "impeachment if off the table." The Washington Post reports that leading Congressional Democrats were briefed on the CIA's torture enhanced interrogation techniques. Joby Warrick and Dan Eggen report:

Yet long before "waterboarding" entered the public discourse, the CIA gave key legislative overseers about 30 private briefings, some of which included descriptions of that technique and other harsh interrogation methods, according to interviews with multiple U.S. officials with firsthand knowledge.

With one known exception, no formal objections were raised by the lawmakers briefed about the harsh methods during the two years in which waterboarding was employed, from 2002 to 2003, said Democrats and Republicans with direct knowledge of the matter. The lawmakers who held oversight roles during the period included Pelosi and Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) and Sens. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), as well as Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan).

The Democrats today may be trying, at least rhetorically, to stop the Bush Administration's excesses. But, as Glenn Greenwald points out:

Whether it's the war in Iraq or illegal surveillance or the abolition of habeas corpus and now the systematic use of torture, it's the Bush administration that conceived of the policies, implemented them and presided over their corrupt application. But it's Congressional Democrats at the leadership level who were the key allies and enablers, never getting their hands dirty with implementation -- and thus feigning theatrical, impotent outrage once each abuse was publicly exposed -- but nonetheless working feverishly the entire time to enable all of it every step of the way.

Greg Sargent takes a look at Washington Post ombudsperson Deborah Howell's analysis of the paper's recent botched story about the rumors that Barack Obama is a Muslim -- rumors that are false, but that the story refused to identify as such. Howell seems to agree that the story was not well done.

Stories about rumors are tricky and easily misconstrued. A Nov. 29 story and headline that explored Barack Obama's "connections to the Muslim world" and rumors that he is Muslim were met with a swift Internet reaction that left some staffers stunned at its ferocity. Even Post editorial cartoonist Tom Toles was "so upset" that he took the unusual step of taking potshots at the story in an editorial page cartoon.

My problems with the story by National Desk political reporter Perry Bacon Jr. and the headline ("Foes Use Obama's Muslim Ties to Fuel Rumors About Him") were that Obama's connections to Islam are slender at best; that the rumors were old; and that convincing evidence of their falsity wasn't included in the story.

Bill Hamilton, the editor of the story, alas, seems more concerned about the tenor of the complaints he received about this inexcusable story than the fact that he really failed in his duty to his readers. Yes, he got some nasty e-mails. Gosh, how traumatic for Mr. Hamilton. Please get him the smelling salts. And perhaps a new job that does not require public accountability.

Sargent puts all of this into its important context:

Look, let's not let a bunch of nasty emails distract us from the true nature of what really happened here. If people got a bit bent out of shape, it's because the piece seemed to capture a lot about what's wrong with the way journalism is practiced today. The real reason this episode touched such a nerve wasn't just about this one article. It triggered people's pent-up frustration with the larger failings of political journalism-as-usual.

It's really not too much of a stretch to say that the traditional media's mass and sometimes willful refusal to label falsehoods what they are -- false -- was largely responsible for bringing us the Bush era. The story's been told too often to rehash here, but there's no longer any real doubt that this press failing is one of the primary reasons George Bush was able to prevail in the 2000 and 2004 elections. When people read pieces like the Obama Muslim one, they quite properly worry that, you know, the same thing is well on its way to happening again. And this puts them on edge a bit.

Do some people overreact? No question -- after all, there's a lot to be pissed off about. But when editors complain about people sending them mean emails presuming bad motives on their part, they're just ducking the real issue here, which is one of execution. This isn't complicated: If something is false, say so clearly and directly -- and provide the necessary info to contradict it. No more euphemisms. No more timidity. No more averting your eyes when one side is lying. Tell your readers the truth. That's all there is to it.

Over at TAPPED, Kate Sheppard approvingly quotes Sen. Biden's reply to the Vice President's prediction that Iraq will have a functioning democracy by the end of his term:

It’s no wonder the Vice President would say that. Between the hidden meetings with Halliburton on energy, the warrantless wiretapping of Americans, and the vague definitions of torture he uses, Vice President Cheney wouldn’t know a working democracy if he fell over it.

More like this, please.

Sometimes it is best to find the easiest-to-explain motives for nations acting on the world stage. Via the Energy Bulletin, Thomas Whipple offers this analysis of what is really motivating OPEC's members:

When OPEC gathers in a closed room to discuss a production increase, only one country (the Saudis) can do much about increasing production. Most of the rest just want to see higher and higher prices, in some stable currency, so as to get the most real return for their oil before it runs out. Thus, it is the Saudis who carry the trump card for only the Kingdom (or so they would like us to think) can increase production. The other 12 are really just there for window dressing that gives the appearance of a “group” decision.

Note that desire for higher prices "in some stable currency." United States residents may want to be a little concerned about this, since the U.S. dollar has been anything but stable recently.

Kevin Drum is right to have such an angry reaction to Mitt Romney's speech about religion.

To be clear, Mitt, no person should serve in elected office who claims that without religion, freedom isn't possible; that without religion, having a conscience isn't possible; and that without religion, understanding the law isn't possible.

Oh, and the incredible hypocrisy of a person demanding religious tolerance for himself just a few days after disqualifying all Muslims from holding cabinet positions really ranks off the charts.

Nice language sometimes can hide offensive thoughts. Today, however, was not one of those days for Mr. Romney.

What Glenn Greenwald says:

The College Republicans at the University of Massachusetts are hosting an event called "All I am Saying is Give War a Chance." It is devoted to the "costs, necessities, consequences, and benefits of war." The speaker is grizzled warrior Jonah Goldberg. Is there anything more outright ludicrous than a bunch of combat-avoiding, prime-fighting-age College Republicans and Jonah Goldberg sitting around in Amherst chatting with each other about the Glories and "benefits of war"?

Former White House Communciations Director Dan Bartlett explains how the radical right wing blogs work:

I mean, talk about a direct IV into the vein of your support. It’s a very efficient way to communicate. They regurgitate exactly and put up on their blogs what you said to them. It is something that we’ve cultivated and have really tried to put quite a bit of focus on.

A new high point for these so-called citizen journalists.

(Hat tip: Talking Points Memo)

Why this headline? Remember this highlight from the president?

BBC News Science Reporter Helen Briggs looks at the 50-year history of the Keeling Curve:

Its name - the Keeling Curve - may be scarcely known outside scientific circles, but the jagged upward slope showing rising carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the atmosphere has become one of the most famous graphs in science, and a potent symbol of our times.

It was 50 years ago that a young American scientist, Charles David Keeling, began tracking CO2 in the Earth's atmosphere at two of the world's last wildernesses - the South Pole and the summit of the Mauna Loa volcano in Hawaii.

His very precise measurements produced a remarkable data set, which first sounded alarm bells over the build-up of the gas in the atmosphere, and eventually led to the tracking of greenhouse gases worldwide.

I had a wonderful opportunity to meet with Keeling's son, Professor Ralph Keeling, at Scripps Institute of Oceanography earlier this year to learn more about this research and this legacy.

(Hat tip: The Oil Drum)

Rep. John Conyers describes what is actually in the FISA legislation, rather than what Joe Klein's radical Republican sources think is in it.

Ezra Klein highlights another example of our so-called liberal media at work:

By the way, lets be really clear about what's going on in this Kit Seelye piece: In evaluating a policy debate between two Democratic candidates for president, Seelye went to a right wing think tank (AEI) and asked them to adjudicate. They picked the more conservative plan. Proof!

And the actual reasoning of the piece is, and excuse my intemperance, absolutely idiotic. It's so bad, that I'm betting Seelye misquoted the AEI guy, because think tank employees at least know how to sound rigorous. Here's how Seelye comes to the conclusion that Clinton's plan may cover more people than Obama's: First she says, "Mandates have not worked with auto insurance. While all drivers are required to have it, 15 percent of the nation’s drivers have none, according to the Insurance Research Council."

Then she wanders over to AEI where she hears, "Mr. Obama’s health plan could actually have a better compliance rate. The 15 million who would supposedly be left out equal about 5 percent of the population — a smaller portion than are going without auto insurance, said Joseph Antos, a health policy expert at the American Enterprise Institute, a nonpartisan[!] group."

So start with a fallacious comparison -- health mandates to auto insurance -- and assume perfect equivalency. Then, take the number without auto insurance, so a number from data set X. Then, take the number who'll possibly lack health coverage in Obama's plan, from data set Y. Then compare the two. I almost can't express how ridiculously innumerate the logic is. Suffice to say, Seelye could have called an actual health care expert and asked what the modeling on the two plans showed.

What? Call an actual expert instead of a person at a think tank that is part of the right-wing noise machine? How droll.

It is situations like this that almost make me wish I had a subscription to Time magazine so I would have the opportunity to cancel it. Glenn Greenwald continues his essential reporting and analysis on the aftermath of Joe Klein's inaccurate reporting about what Democrats were including in the FISA bill. It does not speak well of those in charge at Time:

Let's just ponder for a second how lowly Time's behavior here is. It refused the requests of two sitting members of Congress, both of whom are members of the Intelligence Committees and have played a central role in drafting the pending FISA legislation, to correct Klein's false statements in Time itself. What kind of magazine smears its targets with patently false statements and then blocks them from responding?

Making matters much worse is the fact that, as we now know, Klein's false statements about the House Democrats' FISA bill were basically ghost-written by GOP Rep. Pete Hoekstra. Klein never quoted a single Democratic proponent of that bill -- not in his original false article, nor his multiple Swampland posts, nor the three separate "corrections" published by Time.

The whole episode was a GOP-fueled smear on Democrats. Yet Time nonetheless refused to allow Congressional Democrats with the greatest knowledge of this matter to bring to the attention of Time's readers how false Klein's statements were, and how false the subsequent "corrections" were. To describe Time's behavior is to illustrate how profoundly unethical it is.

Time refuses to print rebuttals by Members of Congress. Time refuses to print letters it has received on the issue. This scandal even goes so far as to include supposed media analyst Howard Kurtz, who refuses to take questions on the issue. (As Greenwald points out, this refusal probably has nothing to do with the fact that Kurtz has a program on CNN -- a corporate partner of...you guessed it...Time magazine.)

Your so-called liberal media, still hard at work.

...for using the filibuster to stop bills.The failure of the Democratic Party's leadership to make this point clear to the American people is one of their greatest failures.

The Republicans are employing the filibuster as a routine tactic. It's an easy story to tell. An occasional real all-night session would also help make sure the voters know just what is happening on Capitol Hill.

The national debt is now rising by $1 million a day. Heck of a job, Mr. President.

At least, that's the claim of the Bush Justice Department in a British Court. As Harper's Scott Norton explains:

Continuing its recent spree of criminality in the alleged pursuit of law enforcement, the Bush Justice Department formally advised a British Court last week that it is fully entitled to kidnap foreigners (i.e., Britons) off the street around the world and carry them off to secret prisons. The claim was formerly thought to relate to terrorists. But no longer. Now the Bush Justice Department asserts the right to kidnap anyone it suspects of a crime.

This is being done in our name. Angry yet?

That's the conclusion about the United States even our allies are reaching. Harper's Scott Norton examines the situation, including a Canadian court that makes a decision that would have been unthinkable before George W. Bush entered the White House. As Norton quotes Professor Jaya Ramji-Nogales:

In assessing the constitutionality of the agreement, the Canadian Court found that the United States does not comply adequately with Article 33 of the UN Refugee Convention, which prohibits return to persecution, or Article 3 of the Convention Against Torture, which prohibits return to torture — specifically naming the Maher Arar case as an example of the United States’ failure to protect.

Caught as a liar after his claim that it was the Democrats, and not the Bush Administration, that pushed for the Iraq force authorization vote before the 2002 midterm elections, Karl Rove decides to continue lying.

I hope Newsweek is proud of its newest columnist (perhaps so, since its corporate sister publication, the Washington Post, once again refuses to call a Republican's lie a lie).

I am sure Rove will continue playing it just as straight as he analyzes the election.

Happy 1,675th day since President George W. Bush stood on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln and proclaimed:

"In the Battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

Gee, I wonder why we are still fighting that battle, then.