In Memoriam: Stephen Schneider
In Memoriam: Stephen Schneider
Dr. Stephen Schneider, one of the greatest minds of the science of climate change, has died at the age of 65. Schneider advised every presidential administration since Nixon, founded the journal Climatic Change, was a lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and authored or co-authored over 450 scientific papers. He was also a unique voice, clearly expressing the threat of manmade global warming to the general public for over three decades. As he said in a 1979 appearance as a young scientist with an Eric-Bogosian mop of hair:
We’re insulting our global environment at a faster rate than we’re understanding it.
Watch it:
On September 2, 2005, as the Gulf Coast reeled from Hurricane Katrina, Dr. Schneider appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher:
Every time we try to talk about getting a tax on these emissions, we’re told it’s an interference in the free market, as if we should get our garbage collected for free.
Watch it:
In one of his last media appearances, the oft-smeared Dr. Schneider participated in a podcast with ClimateScienceWatch about his recent paper, “Expert Credibility in Climate Change,” co-authored with blogger Jim Prall, Jacob Harold, and lead author William Anderegg. A moon-faced Schneider vehemently explained that credible expertise is a life-and-death matter:
It really matters what your credentials are. If you have a heart arrhythmia, as I do, and I also have a cardiologist — and you also have an oncological problem, as I do, I’m not going to my cancer doc to ask him about my heart medicine and my cardiologist to ask about my chemo, I’m going to the experts. Who is an expert really matters. People with no expertise, their opinion frankly doesn’t matter much on complex issues, and in my opinion, shouldn’t even be quoted about complex details of science.
Watch it:
His most recent book, Science as a Contact Sport, is a delightful work reminiscent of Richard Feynman’s memoirs, full of amusing anecdotes and remarkable breakthroughs that reveal both a diamond-hard scientific mind and an effervescent joy for life.
I tried to catch him for an interview at the Copenhagen climate conference last December, but we couldn’t make our schedules mesh. Fortunately for myself and the rest of the human race, Dr. Schneider will live on through his great opus of work. Sadly, time is running out for us to honor his legacy by turning back the black tide of global warming.
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Blaming The Health Care Law For Everything
Blaming The Health Care Law For Everything
In his latest Kaiser Health News column, Jonathan Cohn points to two health care trends in today’s papers (”Firms Cancel Health Coverage“) and (“Insurers Push Plans Limiting Patient Choice of Doctors“) and explains why reform is not to blame:
Insofar as the articles report broader trends–and they may not–they actually chronicle the same basic process at work. Health care is getting more expensive; the economy is still sputtering. Employers who provide and help pay for employee coverage can react to this in one of two ways. They can stop offering insurance altogether, which is what the Globe reports some small Massachusetts firms are doing. Or they can simply offer less generous policies, which is what the Times suggest will happen in those three cities. [...]
But what about the people who watch as employers whittle down coverage, restricting which doctors and hospitals they can see? Again, this happened before and was bound to happen again–only now, thanks to health reform, the law will limit how plans can do it. They can’t impose cost-sharing for basic preventive care. They can’t impose annual or lifetime dollar caps on benefits. And while they can limit beneficiaries to certain doctors and hospitals, they have to offer beneficiaries the right to appeal treatment denials–and the right to get treatment out-of-network if it’s not available in-network.
And that’s perhaps one of the ironies of reform: critics and the general public will blame the law for causing the very same long-existing problems that it seeks to ameliorate. (Remember when conservatives faulted the new grandfather regulations for forcing Americans out of their existing insurance plans, when in reality the regulations discourageed employers and insurers from stiffing beneficiaries with very higher costs?)
Over the short term, any anxiety about the changing insurance market or the shift from employer-based coverage will be blamed on the Democrats and reform. Stories like this one about businesses anxieties and loss of employer-sponsored coverage are and will continue to dominate the media. Only successful implementation of reform and time will change this narrative.
New Study Confirms That Poverty Is Feeding AIDS Epidemic
New Study Confirms That Poverty Is Feeding AIDS Epidemic
A new report commissioned by the CDC and presented this morning at the International AIDS Conference in Vienna finds that “[p]overty is perhaps the most important factor in whether inner-city heterosexuals are infected with the AIDS virus.” The report, which excluded men who have sex with men and drug users, examined 9,000 heterosexual adults living in some 23 cities and detected HIV “in 2.4 percent of the people who were living below the federal poverty line” and a significantly lower 1.2 percent of people “who made more money than the federal poverty guideline.”
From CDC’s press release:
Prevalence was especially high in those with the lowest socioeconomic status. Within the low income urban areas included in the study, individuals living below the poverty line were at greater risk for HIV than those living above it (2.4 percent prevalence vs. 1.2 percent), though prevalence for both groups was far higher than the national average (0.45 percent)….The absence of race-based differences in this analysis is likely due to existing high prevalence of HIV in poor urban areas, which – regardless of race or ethnicity – places individuals living in these areas at greater risk for exposure to HIV with each sexual encounter.
Authors note that other factors associated with poverty also likely contribute to high HIV prevalence in these settings. Some of these factors include limited health care access, which can reduce utilization of HIV testing and prevention services; substance abuse, which can increase sexual risk behavior; and high rates of incarceration, which can disrupt the stability of relationships.
Of course, the absence of race-base differences doesn’t mean that they don’t exist; it suggests that black people are disproportionately affected by AIDS not because they are disproportionately poor. In fact, given that black and Hispanic Americans are more likely to live in neighborhoods with concentrated poverty than other racial and ethnic groups, the study’s participants were 77% black, 15% Hispanic and only 4% white.
As the Black AIDS Institute put it, “We believe this is essentially a difference without a distinction.” The gap in AIDS rates have been “driven by social determinants of health: socioeconomic status, high rates of sexually transmitted diseases, high rates of incarceration, man sharing (knowingly and unknowingly) due to gender imbalances, lack of access to healthcare, lack of a regular health provider and low HIV literacy.” Black people “are disproportionately poor” and “when Whites and Latinos live in poor Black communities, they are negatively impacted by the same social determinants that undermine the health of their Black neighbors.”
“Black people still bare the brunt of the AIDS epidemic in America today,” the organization notes. “This study demonstrates one of the reasons why. Race matters and so does poverty. Black people are disproportionately impacted by HIV; Black people are disproportionately poor. ‘You say tomato; I say tomato.’” The CDC’s own statistics demonstrate this reality:
Obama’s new AIDS initiative re-allocates “more attention and resources” to “populations at highest risk of HIV infection,” including Black and Latino Americans — many of whom are living in poverty. The initiative also instructs federal agencies to consider additional efforts to support housing assistance and community clinics and notes that under the health law, poorer Americans will be eligible for Medicaid coverage.
Kyl Obstructs Small Business Tax Cuts In Order To Protect Small Businesses From Imaginary Tax Increase
Kyl Obstructs Small Business Tax Cuts In Order To Protect Small Businesses From Imaginary Tax Increase
Today, President Obama pressed Congress to approve a pending bill that provides tax credits to small businesses and sets up a lending fund to get credit to businesses that are having trouble finding loans. “We must continue our efforts to do everything in our power to spur growth and hiring. And I hope the Senate acts this week on a package of tax cuts and expanded lending for small businesses,” he said.
One of the reasons that the bill Obama referenced hasn’t made its way through the Senate is that Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) has been threatening to bog it down with his proposed cut in the estate tax, which would send $91 billion in tax cuts to the richest of the rich. But Kyl is claiming that his obstruction of the small business bill is actually an attempt to protect small businesses from tax rates that he says are “going to skyrocket”:
If the Small Business Lending bill is intended to help small business create jobs, wouldn’t it make sense to provide small business owners with the certainty that their tax rates aren’t going to skyrocket at the beginning of next year?
It definitely does make sense to ensure that tax rates don’t “skyrocket” on small businesses, and Kyl is presumably worried that allowing the estate tax to reset to its 2001 level, as current law stipulates, will do just that. But even if we grant Kyl’s premise, all that’s needed to avoid that outcome is for the Senate to approve a bill to approve a bill which has already passed the House that will permanently set the estate tax at the 2009 level. However, it was Kyl himself who blocked that plan, in his zeal to cut taxes for the super rich.
In fact, just like Kyl’s position on the Bush tax cuts proves that he doesn’t really care about deficits, his position on the estate tax proves that he doesn’t really care about small businesses. After all, at the 2009 level, just 0.25 percent of estates will have any estate tax liability at all. And just 1.3 percent of that 0.25 percent will be composed of estates with significant small business assets.
The Tax Policy Center estimates that at the 2009 level, just 110 small businesses in the entire country will owe any estate tax in 2011. Of these, all but a handful will have sufficient assets to pay the tax, and the exceedingly few that don’t “have other options — such as spreading their payments over a 14-year period — that would allow them to pay the tax without selling off any” assets.
In all, less than one quarter of one percent of the total cost of Kyl’s tax cut would actually end up in the hands of small businesses; the rest would simply go to further enriching the rich. So either Kyl has no idea what the practical implications of his stated policy preference are, or he’s using small businesses as a convenient prop to knowingly push through tax cuts for the rich. Either way, his professed concern over an imaginary tax hike on small businesses is getting in the way of small businesses receiving actual relief.
‘Ex-Gay’ Life Coach Forced Patients To Touch Themselves
‘Ex-Gay’ Life Coach Forced Patients To Touch Themselves
Right on the heels of Family Research Council’s George Rekers scandal, Truth Wins Out has a new video exposing how a major figure in the so-called ex-gay movement forced his male clients to touch themselves during “therapy” sessions:
Truth Wins Out (TWO) released an exclusive video statement today from two former clients of “ex-gay” life coach Alan Downing. The clients, Ben Unger and Chaim Levin, alleged that during individual therapy sessions, Downing (pictured) made them undress in front of a mirror and touch their bodies while the significantly older therapist watched. Unger and Levin call the sessions a “psychological striptease” and believe they were harmed by what they consider unprofessional behavior and sexual misconduct.
Downing, who admits he is still attracted to men, is a major player in the “ex-gay” industry and a practitioner of so-called “reparative therapy”. He is the lead therapist for Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality (JONAH) and is listed on the People Can Change website as a “Senior Trainer” for Journey into Manhood, which is a controversial “ex-gay” backwoods retreat designed to supposedly make gay men more masculine.
Watch the testimonials:
Major medical associations have condemned the ex-gay movement. “The potential risks of ‘reparative therapy’ are great,” the American Psychiatric Association warns, “including depression, anxiety and self destructive behavior, since therapist alignment with societal prejudices against homosexuality may reinforce self hatred already experienced by the patient.” “There is simply no sufficiently scientifically sound evidence that sexual orientation can be changed,” the American Psychological Association has concluded.
According to Truth Wins Out, the anti-gay movement grew in response to the flourishing gay communities in New York and San Francisco, which “presented a challenge to conservative churches.” “Influenced by the miracle-seeking Jesus Movement, the ex-gay ministries adopted name and claim theology. Essentially, this meant if you kept repeating you had “changed” — even if you had not — God would eventually grant you the miracle of heterosexuality as a reward for your faith.” Almost every ex-gay group has been rocked with scandal when their supposedly converted “straight” success stories are caught having sexual relations with other men. As Unger says in the video, “I’ve literally never met somebody coming out of that therapy who turned straight.”
In April, CNN invited “ex gay” Richard Cohen to ask if “homosexuality, is a problem in need of a cure.” After a grassroots campaign by LGBT bloggers and activists, the network admitted that “Richard Cohen was not the most appropriate guest to have on” and interviewed a psychologist who debunked the notion of reparative therapy.
Today, “the main financier and facilitator of ex-gay ministries is Focus on the Family, which hosts a quarterly symposium called Love Won Out.”
Gregg On The GOP Blocking Extended Jobless Benefits: We ‘Caught Up With’ Bunning
Gregg On The GOP Blocking Extended Jobless Benefits: We ‘Caught Up With’ Bunning
Back in February, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY), backed by a handful of Republican Senators, took a well-publicized stand against an extension of unemployment benefits, repeatedly objecting to motions to move the extension and telling Democrats trying to approve the benefits, “tough sh*t.”
One month later, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) expressed regret that Republicans hadn’t supported Bunning en masse, saying, “we didn’t give him as much help as we probably should have.” And the Senate GOP seems to have taken that to heart, as today Bloomberg details how “almost every Republican” in the Senate is now jumping aboard the Bunning express:
It turns out U.S. Senator Jim Bunning was ahead of the curve. Four months after the Kentucky Republican made colleagues squirm by blocking an extension of unemployment benefits for Americans out of work long-term, the party has adopted his cause as its own…“Our party caught up with the people Bunning was already with,” said New Hampshire Republican Judd Gregg.
“This is the issue across the country,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX). “We’ve had a few primaries and elections along the way and people understand the ferocity of the public’s view on this.”
Actually, it would seem that people don’t understand the “ferocity of the public’s view” when it comes to this issue, as a recent Gallup poll showed that 60 percent of Americans favor additional government spending in order to boost job creation. Just today, a group of leading economists released a “manifesto calling for more government stimulus and tax credits to put America back to work.” “The urgent need is for government to replace the lost purchasing power of the unemployed and their families and to employ other tax-cut and spending programs to boost demand,” they wrote.
The Republicans blocking these extensions claim to be doing so because they don’t want to add to the deficit. But even deficit hawks aren’t buying that rationale. “Attacking that is not attacking the real deficit issue,” said Bob Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition (which does nothing but advocate for balanced budgets). “Unemployment benefits seem to have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Due to the Republican filibuster, almost 3.2 million Americans have seen benefits that they expected to receive unceremoniously yanked away, at a time when there are five workers for every job opening and 45.5 percent of the unemployed have been out of work for at least six months. Never before has Congress allowed benefits to lapse with unemployment so high.
Fortunately, Carte Goodwin, who is replacing the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) in the Senate, will be sworn in tomorrow, and with his vote, Democratic leaders are “optimistic” that they can “break the impasse and restore the benefits.” Today, President Obama pushed for the GOP to give up on its obstruction. “For a long time, there’s been a tradition – under both Democratic and Republican presidents – to offer relief to the unemployed. That was certainly the case under my predecessor, when Republican Senators voted several times to extend emergency unemployment benefits. But right now, these benefits – benefits that are often a person’s sole source of income while they’re out of work – are in jeopardy,” he said.
Daschle: GOP Must Choose Between Mitt Romney Or The U.S. Military
Daschle: GOP Must Choose Between Mitt Romney Or The U.S. Military
In a powerful and hard-hitting address at the Center for American Progress this morning on the New START treaty, former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle took treaty opponents to task for playing politics with America’s nuclear security.
The New START treaty — which needs 67 votes to be ratified — is entering a critical phase as a vote is expected soon with hearings having concluded in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Daschle noted that Republicans in the Senate face a stark choice in their upcoming votes between politics and governing, between Mitt Romney or “the entire U.S. military establishment“:
There is no clearer example of plain and simple short-term politics at play than on New START, and we can’t afford to let that rule the day, especially when it comes to nuclear weapons. … But New START is so widely acknowledged to be the right move that it presents conservatives in Congress with a clear choice: They can choose politics, or they can choose governing. They can choose Mitt Romney, or they can choose the entire U.S. military establishment. They can choose a world with a greater risk of nuclear disorder, or one with less. On this issue, there is simply no in between. Some have already decided that denying the President a victory is more important than America’s national security interests. But I know there are many who don’t share that view, and to them, I say that the consequences of choosing politics over governing are real.
Watch it:
In his 25-minute address, Daschle also called out by name the seven Republican Senators who voted for the original START treaty, which passed 93-6. He noted that “common sense says they should be consistent,” since the reasons for continuing with the START treaty framework have only grown. He also pointed out that any Republicans that are suspicious of Russian intentions should vote for the treaty, because the New START treaty allows the US to put boots on the ground to monitor and inspect Russia’s nuclear weapons arsenal. Therefore, every day that goes by without New START our military is losing valuable intelligence. This is why the senior leadership of the US military unanimously endorsed the treaty.
Daschle also explained why the failure to ratify new START could have huge consequences. He noted that there is an asymmetry in the treaties impact. While New START is modest and largely maintains the nuclear status quo, its failure in the Senate could have tremendously dire implications for our national security – potentially leading to an international state of “nuclear anarchy.” He explained:
What international unity currently exists to stop nuclear proliferation, to counter nuclear terrorism, and to confront Iran would fray and possibly even collapse. Should New START fail… American credibility on nuclear issues would evaporate. Countries belonging to the NPT would then ask a very simple question: If the U.S. is unwilling to live up to its commitments, why should we live up to ours? And if the U.S. is unwilling to ratify even a modest arms-control treaty, what obligation do we have to maintain the status quo and not pursue nuclear weapons ourselves?
That is how we fall past the nuclear tipping point – the point at which the nuclear dam breaks and countries large and small, from Latin America to Southeast Asia, from the Middle East to Africa, decide that their national security interests would be enhanced by possessing the bomb… Rejecting New START has real potential to push the world into a state of nuclear anarchy.
Republicans Don’t Think Government Should Help Poor People Afford Health Insurance
Republicans Don’t Think Government Should Help Poor People Afford Health Insurance
In yesterday’s Republican Radio Address, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) reiterated the GOP’s attacks against Obama’s appointment of Dr. Don Berwick to head CMS, accusing the nominee of planning to redistribute the wealth:
ROBERTS: Now, as we all return to work after our Independence Day celebrations, we learn President Obama – again – has gone behind closed doors to appoint a health care czar without public debate.
President Obama gave a recess appointment – avoiding a public hearing and a vote in the Senate – to Dr. Donald Berwick, making him the Administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. [...] He said, ‘any health-care funding plan…must—must—redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and less fortunate.’ Well, the obvious fear is Dr. Berwick will in fact use this position to redistribute the wealth in our country, cementing Obamacare as a giant, but stealthy, income transfer machine.
Watch it:
Roberts can talk about redistributing the wealth in all kinds of malicious tones, but I don’t think you can do health reform without it. Currently, poor Americans — particularly those without access to employer based coverage and those suffering from chronic conditions — are priced out of the system. They can’t find insurance to cover their chronic condition and so they go uninsured or seek uncompensated care in the emergency room once their condition becomes unbearable. The costs of their treatments are shifted throughout the system and contribute to higher premiums.
To eliminate these cost shifts and control health care spending, you have to bring everyone into the health care system. The health care law does this by establishing exchanges and providing subsidies for lower income Americans, while eliminating the tax exemption for so-called Cadillac health care plans. Republicans have proposed a more radical version of the same basic concept: giving everyone a one-size-fits-all tax credit to purchase health insurance on the individual market, while eliminating the tax exemption for all employer-based coverage. Now, I would argue that “the poorer and less fortunate among us” would do much better under the current health care law than the GOP’s scheme, but both plans would give poorer people money to buy health coverage and take away money from richer people (to varying degrees).
Covering people costs money, even under the Republican plan, and the fact that most of our nation’s dollars are concentrated among the very very wealthy (income inequality is the worst it has been since 1928, and according to the latest data, “the gaps in after-tax income between the richest 1 percent of Americans and the middle and poorest fifths of the country more than tripled between 1979 and 2007“) means that both Republicans and Democrats have to take those dollars from the top. What else can you do when the “top 1 percent of families now receive nearly 25 percent of the country’s income, after earning less than 10 percent in the 1970s?”
Roberts only has the GOP redistributive policies (from poor to rich) to blame.
Dismissing Predictions Of U.S. Military, Weekly Standard Exhorts Israel To Attack Iran
Dismissing Predictions Of U.S. Military, Weekly Standard Exhorts Israel To Attack Iran
A few months ago, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol dismissed as “silly” Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Mike Mullen’s view — a view shared by a pretty substantial majority of the U.S. military and foreign policy establishment — of the wide-ranging negative consequences that would likely ensue from any military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
As I noted at the time, this was reminiscent of the tendency among neocons during the run-up to the Iraq invasion to dismiss the views of key military leaders, analysts, and academics in regard to the likely consequences of such an invasion, and the forces required to deal with those consequences. (When those predictions turned out to be entirely correct, the neocons simply turned on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and then carried on as if they’d never been wrong.)
In the current Weekly Standard, Reuel Marc Gerecht presents what is essentially a longer version of Kristol’s “silly” argument — entitled, in one of the most transparently pointless rhetorical gestures ever, “Should Israel Bomb Iran?” After a cursory examination of the various post-strike scenarios offered, Gerecht simply asserts that these concerns are ““mostly overblown“:
Some of the alarmist scenarios are the opposite of what would more likely unfold after an Israeli attack. Although dangerous for Israel, a preventive strike remains the most effective answer to the possibility of Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards having nuclear weapons. Provided the Israeli air force is capable of executing it, and assuming no U.S. military action, an Israeli bombardment remains the only conceivable means of derailing or seriously delaying Iran’s nuclear program and — equally important — traumatizing Tehran. [...]
What the Israelis need to do is rock the system. Iran’s nuclear-weapons program has become the third pillar of Khamenei’s theocracy (the other two being anti-Americanism and the veil). If the Israelis, whom the regime constantly asperses as Zionists ripe for extinction, can badly damage Iran’s nuclear program, the regime will lose enormous face. Khamenei and Ahmadinejad have said repeatedly that the Israelis wouldn’t dare strike the nation’s nuclear program; if the Israelis do dare, it will be a stunning blow. And military defeats can be deadly for dictatorships—historically, there’s nothing deadlier.
While there is no guarantee that an Israeli raid would cause sufficient shock to produce a fatal backlash against Khamenei and the senior leadership of the Guards, there is a chance it would, and nothing else on the horizon offers Israel better odds.
So there it is. Yes, this article was actually published: Predictions of disaster are silly — there’s a very good chance that disaster won’t happen! (Based on what? Shut up!) What the Israelis need to do is pound Iran into submission. Of course, this may not work. But it might! Anybody have any better ideas?
Back in the reality-based world, a new report from the UK Oxford Research Group says in some detail what I think most intelligent people already understand — that an Israeli attack on Iran “would lead to a sustained conflict and regional instability that would be unlikely to prevent the eventual acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran and might even encourage it”:
While an Israeli military strike could not be initiated entirely without the knowledge of the United States, it could avoid over-flying US-controlled airspace. The operation would target a wide range of nuclear and missile facilities and would also be aimed at the technical support, including factories, research centers and university facilities that would underpin the rebuilding of the facilities after attack. There would be significant civilian casualties.
An Iranian administration under attack would experience considerable national unity and would work rapidly to redevelop its weapons programs, withdrawing from the NPT [Nonproliferation Treaty] and prioritizing nuclear weapons. This would lead to further Israeli military strikes, resulting in prolonged conflict — the start of a long war with potential regional and global consequences. Iran could, if it chose, take many other actions, including operations to affect world oil markets and to increase instability in Iraq and Afghanistan. Prospects for regional stability and wider global security would be very seriously damaged.
The report concludes that “military action against Iran should be ruled out as a means of responding to its possible nuclear weapons ambitions.” These findings are generally in keeping with what we’ve seen from other reports from the Council on Foreign Relations, and comments from retired Gen. Anthony Zinni. But Gerecht thinks they should all just relax and not be such negative Nellies.
Gerecht is equally cavalier about the consequences of a military strike on Iran’s democracy movement:
Since 1999, when the supreme leader quashed student demonstrations and put paid to any chance that the Islamic Republic would peacefully evolve under the reformist president Mohammad Khatami, Iran has calcified into an ever-nastier autocracy. An Israeli strike now—after the rise of the Green Movement and the crackdown on it—is more likely to shake the regime than would have a massive American attack in 2002, when Tehran’s clandestine nuclear program was first revealed. And if anything can jolt the pro-democracy movement forward, contrary to the now passionately accepted conventional wisdom, an Israeli strike against the nuclear sites is it.
Gerecht’s presentation of Iran’s new authoritarian era as an unbroken line back to 1999 conveniently ignores the extent to which the Bush administration’s “axis of evil” rhetoric kneecapped moderates within the Iranian regime and bolstered the arguments of Iran’s hardliners, who claimed that negotiation with the U.S. was pointless, as the Americans only understand strength. (Sound familiar?)
You’ll also notice that in dismissing the conventional wisdom that a strike on Iran would Iran’s democracy movement, he doesn’t bother to include any quotes from actual Iranian democrats to this effect. That’s probably because he hasn’t been able to find any. At a recent conference on Iran in Europe, I had a chance to talk to a number of Iranian democracy activists, many of them who very recently exited Iran, and I thought it was notable that, even though there were a range of views on how best to deal with the current Iranian government, there was complete agreement among them that a strike by either the U.S. or Israel would be a death blow to their movement, and that those who support war with Iran not be allowed to pose as friends of Iranian democracy.
Template, indeed.Could a war with Iraq compromise America's war on terrorism? It would appear that many in the foreign policy establishment believe so...
But these fears for the war on terrorism are unfounded. A war against Iraq will reinforce, not weaken, whatever collective spirit has developed among intelligence and security agencies working against Islamic radicals. Indeed, without the war to remove Saddam, it is likely that the counterterrorist efforts of "allied" intelligence and security services in the Muslim world will diminish, if not end entirely. And it shouldn't be that hard to understand why. Self-interest and fear of American power, not feelings of fraternity and common purpose, are what will glue together any lasting international effort against terrorism. [...]
[I]t should be obvious that if the Bush administration now fails to go to war against Saddam Hussein, we will lose enormous face throughout the region. President Bush has defined himself and America by his axis-of-evil, regime-change policy toward Iraq. Without a successful war to remove Saddam, we will return to the pre-9/11 pattern of timidity that Osama bin Laden so effectively underscored in his writings and speeches. In the eyes of the young men who live with the purpose and promise conferred by the hope of martyrdom, we will have shown that Osama was right--that indeed we are no longer "the strongest horse." And these young men will, sooner rather than later, brutally reveal to us that an attempt to prosecute a "global counterterrorist campaign" in the absence of awe at American power is bound to fail.
Robert Samuelson Doesn’t Think We’ll Control Health Spending…Ever
Robert Samuelson Doesn’t Think We’ll Control Health Spending…Ever
Washington Post's Robert Samuelson
The lesson from Massachusetts is that genuine cost control is avoided because it’s so politically difficult. It means curbing the incomes of doctors, hospitals and other providers. They object. To encourage “accountable care organizations” would limit consumer choice of doctors and hospitals. That’s unpopular. Spending restrictions, whether imposed by regulation or “global payments,” raise the specter of essential care denied. Also unpopular.
In other words, health care spending may be swallowing up the budget, but so long as doctors and hospitals oppose moving towards an outcome-based reimbursement system, policy makers will twiddle their thumbs or pass legislation to shield the medical community from the tough cuts.
Samuelson is wrong on several fronts. First, as Cohn points out, unlike the Massachusetts bill, the national law includes important cost containment provisions like “an independent board to calibrate and ratchet down Medicare spending. It imposes a tax on high-end benefits, to push down private insurance rates. And then it introduces a host of smaller delivery reforms–everything from penalizing hospitals with high infection rates to encouraging the formation of more efficient group medical practices–that should make it possible to lower spending without lowering quality.” “The Congressional Budget Office, which takes a skeptical view of these changes, still estimates that health reform will reduce the rate of growth in health care spending–which, as Samuelson knows, is the key to controlling costs long-term.”
Second, many hospitals and doctors may lobby against these changes, but in an era of ever growing health costs and deficits it’s not certain that they’ll succeed. For instance, the AMA has been trying to pass a permanent fix to the SGR for years, but has found itself rebuffed by lawmakers who have yet to find a way to pay for the overhaul. This same economic reality has contributed to the diminished clout of the AMA and has encouraged other providers to adopt the kind of outcome based reimbursement systems that Samuelson believes are so politically unfeasible.
Geisinger Health System, a physician driven system that has led the nation in delivery and payment reform, estimates that its advanced medical home model for the care of chronically ill Medicare patient has “bent the cost curve and lowered projected spending by up to 7 percent” and it has successfully adopted many of the new law’s delivery reforms without sacrificing profit. “We don’t know if the Geisinger experience is scalable or generalizable through U.S. health care, but we do think that the way our country pays for and delivers health care nationally will need to move to something that looks a little bit more like Geisinger in a relatively short period of time,” Geisinger’s CEO told Health Affairs. Indeed, other systems across the country are now adopting similar measures.
So Samuelson is undoubtedly right about the political challenges to controlling health care spending but he’s underestimating the extent to which economic necessity shapes reality for politicians and providers.
Rubio: Extending Jobless Benefits Must Be Paid For, But Tax Cuts For The Rich Will Pay For Themselves
Rubio: Extending Jobless Benefits Must Be Paid For, But Tax Cuts For The Rich Will Pay For Themselves
Last week, a handful of Republicans tried to claim — despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary — that tax cuts inevitably pay for themselves, so the $678 billion extension of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans does not have to be offset. At the same time, Senate Republicans are standing pat against a $33 billion extension of unemployment benefits, because they say that it is too expensive.
As Michael Linden wrote, “Senate Republicans unanimously opposed extending jobless aid one day, citing concern over the deficit, but then turn right around and push for huge tax cuts for the very richest people in the country, which would cost more than 20 times as much.” And this crazy double-standard is also being espoused by the GOP’s candidate for Senate in Florida. Marco Rubio appeared on Chuck Todd and Savannah Guthrie’s MSNBC show today to say that an extension of jobless benefits must be paid for, but that extending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy does not. “They will be paid for because they create economic growth,” he said:
RUBIO: I would vote for [a jobless benefits extension] if it’s paid for. You’d have to show how its going to be paid for and I think Republicans have been working to do that in Washington and certainly I would be part of trying to find that. [...]
GUTHRIE: So you mentioned that you want the unemployment extension to be paid for. Would you take that principle to other issues? For example, there’s talk, of course, among Republicans that the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest of Americans should be extended, but it sounds like there’s not necessarily a plan to pay for those. Would you draw the line there?
RUBIO: Well, let’s understand what the bigger picture is and it’s about the debt. [...] We definitely need growth if we want to pay down the debt, and that’s why you need policies like making permanent the ‘01 and ‘03 tax cuts.
TODD: Okay, but I’m confused, would you support them if they were not paid for, if they were not balanced out by spending cuts?
RUBIO: Well, the question is they will be paid for because they create economic growth, especially in the long-term.
Watch it:
Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) has said that “you should never have to offset” tax cuts for the rich, and it would appear from these comments that Rubio wholeheartedly agrees.
However, as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has pointed out, the claim that tax cuts inevitably pay for themselves “is contradicted by the historical record.” Even President Bush’s own economists don’t believe that tax cuts are free, as Andrew Samwick, Chief Economist for the Council of Economic Advisers in 2003-2004, said that “no thoughtful person believes that this possible offset [the Bush tax cuts] more than compensated for the first effect of these tax cuts. Not a single one.” Edward Lazear, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers in 2007 added, “I certainly would not claim that tax cuts pay for themselves.”
As Paul Krugman wrote, “the notion that tax cuts pay for themselves has no empirical support. And yet the GOP leadership — which claims to be oh so worried about the deficit — is willing to stake America’s solvency on its belief that tax cuts are free.” In fact, the path of revenues following the Bush tax cuts is “pretty much what you would have expected if the Bush cuts had no supply-side effect at all.”
The WonkLine: July 19, 2010
The WonkLine: July 19, 2010
Welcome to The WonkLine, a daily 9:30 a.m. roundup of the latest news about health care, the economy, national security, immigration and climate policy. This is what we’re reading. Tell us what you found in the comments section below. You can also follow The Wonk Room on Twitter.
National Security
The Washington Times reports that “U.S. and Western intelligence agencies assess that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is terminally ill, and the Obama administration is closely watching the expected transition of power in a nation that for decades has been an anchor of stability in the volatile Middle East and a key U.S. ally.”
“Speaking at a news conference Monday in Pakistan [Secretary of State] Clinton said the U.S. wants to lay what she called a ‘foundation of assistance‘ for Pakistan, enabling its people to enjoy the “peace and prosperity” they desire.”
“About 50 people were killed Sunday in three Iraq suicide bombings that targeted members of anti-Al Qaeda militias formed during the so-called Sunni Awakening, some of whom had lined up to collect paychecks outside a military base.”
Economy
A new study conducted for the Labor Department found that workers who went through federally financed worker training “wound up earning little more than those who did not.” “It appears possible that ultimate gains from participation are small or nonexistent,” the study said.
Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) “is looking to gather senators behind a possible nomination of Elizabeth Warren as first head” of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, but Republicans are gearing up to oppose her.
According to a new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “poverty is perhaps the most important factor in whether inner-city heterosexuals are infected with the AIDS virus.”
Immigration
The American Bar Association joins the legal battle over Arizona’s harsh immigration law, filing two briefs with a federal court in Phoenix last week that argue the “Arizona law is a ‘clear attempt to usurp exclusive federal authority‘ in violation of the Constitution. ”
Influential evangelical Christian leaders continue to align “with the president to support an overhaul that would include some path to legalization for illegal immigrants already here.”
Armed with assault rifles, body armor, and gas masks, Jason “J.T.” Ready — a reputed neo-Nazi — and his friends are taking immigration issues into their own hands, “declaring war on ‘narco-terrorists’ and keeping an eye out for illegal immigrants.” The county sheriff, however, worries that “an untrained group acting without the authority of the law could cause ‘extreme problems,’ and put themselves and others in danger.”
Health Care
“The relentlessly rising cost of health insurance is prompting some small Massachusetts companies to drop coverage for their workers and encourage them to sign up for state-subsidized care instead, a trend that, some analysts say, could eventually weigh heavily on the state’s already-stressed budget.”
“When Congress required most Americans to obtain health insurance or pay a penalty, Democrats denied that they were creating a new tax. But in court, the Obama administration and its allies now defend the requirement as an exercise of the government’s ‘power to lay and collect taxes.’”
“Abortion foes have scored a victory and traditional allies of the Obama administration are grumbling about a decision to ban most abortion coverage in insurance pools for those unable to purchase health care on their own.”
Climate Change
With a tighter cap blocking the flow of oil from the Deepwater Horizon blowout, oil has begun seeping from cracks in the seabed, raising concerns about the “weak points” detected within the damaged wellbore.
Heat waves have hit “fish breeders in central Russia,” “street performers at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre,” beachgoers in Boston, and triathletes in New York City.
A “number of major socially responsible funds and indexes included BP PLC on April 20.”
Conservative Congressmen Enter Alliance With Anti-Gay Governments In Effort To Protect Homophobia
Conservative Congressmen Enter Alliance With Anti-Gay Governments In Effort To Protect Homophobia
Reps. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Trent Franks (R-AZ) are opposing a U.S. effort to convince the “U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) to grant ‘consultative status’ to the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), a group “dedicated to human rights advocacy on behalf of people who experience discrimination or abuse on the basis of their actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or expression.” In a letter to the UN, the two Congressmen say that the group’s belief that freedom of speech should not “violate the rights and freedoms” of gay people could impugn the rights of anti-gay groups or governments and are resisting a U.S. led campaign to bypass the NGO-approval committee and hold a vote before the 54-member ECOSOC.
Anti-gay countries like Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Egypt and Pakistan — where homosexuality is illegal and punishable by imprisonment, whipping, or death — have stalled the IGLHRC’s application in the NGO-approval committee for the last three years, which Smith and Franks support. From their letter:
Serious questions regarding the IGLHRC’s support for the internationally recognized rights to freedom of religion and freedom of express remain outstanding in the NGO Committee. Consequently, a forced, premature action in ECOSOC to approve the IGLHRC would potentially undermine these important rights, as well as the long established due process for NGO review. [...]
As per its responsibilities, the NGO Committee is currently reviewing the application of IGLHRC for “promotion and protection” of human rights, including those listed above. In previous answers, the IGLHRC has stated before the Committee that States should, “Ensure that the exercise of freedom of opinion and expression does not violate the rights and freedoms of persons of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities,” quoting the controversial Yogyakarta Principles, of which the IGLHRC is a strong advocate. Given this answer, the NGO Committee has asked the IGLHRC to clarify its position on the freedoms of religion and expression by asking the following question:
If a religion teaches that sexual relations other than between a man and a woman within wedlock is wrong, would the IGLHRC support the prosecution of a religious preacher for what he or she preaches against homosexuality, and would that be, in the organization’s view, consistent with the Articles 18 and 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights?
The IGLHRC has yet to answer this extremely important question that goes to the heart of human rights protected by the United Nations system.
A representative from IGLHRC told TPMDC on Wednesday that “the group has time and again affirmed that, as a human rights organization, they support human rights — including freedom of religion and freedom of expression. She also said the group respects countries’ rights to make their own laws.” That speech only becomes indefensible when it incites violence against gay people.
The blog gay in public notes that “the irony in Rep. Smith’s invocation of freedom of speech to try to quash just that is hard to swallow. IGLHRC, which does important work throughout the world protecting sexual minorities, deserves to be treated just like every other human rights organization that seeks consultative status.” Smith and Franks have done their best resist civil rights legislation in Congress, voting against repeal of Don’t Ask, Dont’ Tell, hate crimes legislation, and ENDA.
Bloomberg Poll: 61% Don’t Want To Repeal Health Law
Bloomberg Poll: 61% Don’t Want To Repeal Health Law
Yesterday, I speculated that support for repeal will diminish as benefits like the new preventive care guidelines are rolled out and people actually realize what’s in this bill and now the Huffington Posts’ Sam Stein reports that this already seems to be happening:
A Bloomberg News poll released on Wednesday shows that a full 61 percent of respondents don’t have interest in repealing the health care legislation that Congress passed earlier this year (47 percent want to see how it works, 14 percent say it should be left alone). Just 37 percent want the bill repealed (as is the wish of the Republican leadership).
The numbers underscore increasing public approval of the health care reform law. It also illustrates the potential dangers the Republican caucus assumes by make the repeal agenda a major plank of its campaign platform.
I think these results generally mirror what we’ve been seeing in other focus groups around the country. People may not understand what exactly is in the bill but they’re also confused by the GOP’s knee-jerk repeal it now campaign. As the early benefits are being rolled out, taking away dependent coverage and high risk pool insurance will become politically unpopular positions and Republicans need to be asked if they support repealing those benefits. Already, polls have shown that this will be a tough question to answer as an increasing number of Americans are coming out in favor of the health law (even Rasmussen agrees).
The GOP leadership has thrown its weight behind two discharge petitions offered by Reps. Steve King (R-IA) and Wally Herger (R-CA) as recently as last month. The petitions will need to attract 218 members to force the House to take up repeal legislation that would eliminate the entirety of the health law. As of Thursday, 133 members have signed on to King’s petition and Herger’s repeal and replace bill has 42 co-sponsors.
Banks Take Aim At CFPB Director: ‘This Is Akin To A Supreme Court Nominee For Financial Services’
Banks Take Aim At CFPB Director: ‘This Is Akin To A Supreme Court Nominee For Financial Services’
Potential hard feelings between Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Elizabeth Warren aside, the financial services industry is already gearing up to influence the next stage of financial regulatory reform, which is the design of new rules reining in Wall Street and the actual construction of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. There are plenty of regulations that have to be made, and plenty of discretion for regulators in crafting them, so bank lobbyists will have ample opportunity to influence a process that will be nowhere near as high-profile as was the regulatory reform fight on Capitol Hill.
But, first things first, the financial service industry is trying to influence who becomes the inaugural nominee for CFPB director:
“This is akin to a Supreme Court nominee for financial services,” Richard Hunt, president of the Consumer Bankers Association in Arlington, Virginia, said in an interview. “We are taking this very seriously.”
“All of that power is in the hands of one person. It’s going to be the closest approximation to a czar that Washington has ever seen,” said Joseph Lynyak, a law partner at Venable LLP who represents financial services companies. This conveniently leaves aside that the CFPB’s rules can be vetoed by the newly created Financial Stability Oversight Council — which is composed mostly of bank regulators — but it’s true that the CFPB’s director is going to have a lot of influence over in which direction the agency sets its initial course.
As Matt Yglesias wrote, “effective, high-prestige public agencies (the United States Navy, the Federal Reserve) attract a lot of motivated applicants and thus get on a self-reenforcing path of effective personnel and high prestige. But when you start something new, everything is wide open.” And as the Bush administration ably demonstrated, appointing heads of regulatory agencies who have no interest in actually regulating anything can turn those agencies into nothing more than a punchline.
For instance, remember SEC Chairman Chris Cox? Under him, the agency meant to be on the front lines of policing financial fraud became an afterthought and then released a laughable response plan long after the financial crisis was already well underway. But that was just par for the course for administration that had no interest in reining in financial services industry excess. The CFPB has the potential to be a game-changer for consumers, but only if it does not come under the thumb of the bank regulators or have a director unwilling to stand up to the banks themselves.
“’There’s always that possibility‘ that Wall Street lobbyists will succeed in weakening the bill’s provisions during the rule-making process,” said Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT). So in that sense, the work of financial reform is still very much underway.
Right-Wing Judges Suggest Reviving Discredited Bush-Era Detention Policies
Right-Wing Judges Suggest Reviving Discredited Bush-Era Detention Policies
The Supreme Court rejected President George W. Bush’s claim that a president may lock up anyone he wants without giving them a meaningful opportunity to prove that they are wrongfully detained on four separate occasions. Nevertheless, a panel of conservative judges on the right-wing D.C. Circuit recently suggested that they will carve a hole in these four decisions that is so big as to render them absolutely meaningless.
One of the most important questions in any lawsuit is what “evidentiary standard” applies. In criminal cases, for example, the government cannot win unless they prove their case “beyond a reasonable doubt,” thus requiring them to present a very convincing case in order to achieve a conviction.
Shortly after the Supreme Court’s last major detention case, all of the judges on the DC federal trial court charged with hearing detainee hearings met and decided that these cases should be decided under a “preponderance of the evidence” standard, and the Justice Department agrees that this is the proper standard. In English, this means that the government may only detain an individual if it can demonstrate that it is more likely than not that the detention is justified.
This week, however, in a case called Al-Adahi v. Obama, a panel of three right-wing appeals court judges claimed that this “preponderance” bar should be replaced by one that is so low that it would be almost impossible for a detainee to be released:
[W]e are aware of no precedents in which eighteenth century English courts adopted a preponderance standard. Even in later statutory habeas cases in this country, that standard was not the norm. For years, in habeas proceedings contesting orders of deportation, the government had to produce only “some evidence to support the order.” In such cases courts did not otherwise “review factual determinations made by the Executive.” In habeas petitions challenging selective service decisions, the government also had the minimal burden of providing “some evidence” to support the decision. Habeas petitions contesting courts martial required the government to show only that the military prisoner had received, in the military tribunal, “full and fair consideration” of the allegations in his habeas petition. And in response to habeas petitions brought after an individual’s arrest, the government had to show only that it had probable cause for the arrest.
Many of the standards listed here would turn detainees’ right to challenge their detention into an empty charade. If the government, for example, only had to show “some evidence” proving that a person was a terrorist, then even the weakest case against a detainee would be sufficient to keep them locked up forever.
There are, of course, many open legal questions concerning detainees’ habeas rights. If a person who was previously associated with a terrorist group convincingly reputates that group and its tactics, for example, must they be freed? One thing is clear, however. All detainees must be given a meanful opportunity to challenge they detention. Al-Adahi is simply wrong to suggest that a detainee’s tribunal can be nothing more than a sham.
Utah Republican Attorney General Rejects Arizona Law, Seeks Support Of Mormon Church
Utah Republican Attorney General Rejects Arizona Law, Seeks Support Of Mormon Church
Last night, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff (R) told On the Record host Greta Van Susteren that though he shares Arizona’s frustration with the broken immigration system, he does not support the state’s new immigration law, SB-1070. Shurtleff echoed many of the arguments often made by police chiefs who oppose SB-1070 on the basis that it will make communities less safe by using scarce resources to pursue people who aren’t a threat to public safety and hurt local law enforcement’s relationships with immigrant communities:
And as the chief law enforcement official in the state of Utah, and speaking on behalf of most law enforcement officers, we don’t want to be put in the position of doing the job for the feds. But we do have to have a role in security and public safety. [...] And quite frankly, we need the cooperation of other undocumented aliens as confidential informants to work with us so that we can get rid of the worst of the worst. And something like Arizona makes it more difficult for us to do that job. So that’s the security part of this issue.
Watch it:
While many police chiefs and local citizens support his position, Shurtleff is largely bucking a large segment of the Republican party. State Rep. Stephen Sandstrom (R-UT) is currently drafting a bill for the 2011 Utah legislative session that’s modeled after Arizona’s. “It is imperative that we pass similar legislation here in Utah,” Sandstrom said. “In the past, when we’ve seen tougher legislation in Arizona … a lot of illegal immigrants just move here.” Sandstrom plans on moving ahead with the legislation, despite the federal lawsuit that is currently challenging SB-1070. Utah is also the state where citizen vigilantes sent a witch-hunt list of 1,300 suspected undocumented immigrants, including social security numbers and pregnancy due dates to state authorities.
However, Shurtleff has been seeking the support of a powerful potential ally: the Mormon Church. While many leaders of other faiths have come out against the Arizona law, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has remained relatively neutral. “I think that would help stop an Arizona style law here, if they would definitely come out against the Arizona style law,” said Shurtleff in a separate interview. It appears fellow Mormon lawmakers have accused Shurtleff of defying his faith by standing against the Arizona law. “They consistently get on me saying if I’m not out there rounding up every illegal alien in the state, then I’m not obeying my own article of faith,” said Shurtleff.
Sandstrom appears confident that the Mormon Church will remain neutral on the issue, but he shouldn’t be so sure. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints if often said to be the fastest growing religion in Latin America with 5.2 million members and 5,500 chapels. The number of Spanish-speaking Mormon congregations nationwide has grown by 90 percent in the past decade, up to more than 700. Meanwhile, the majority of Latinos in the U.S. bitterly oppose the Arizona law. In fact, Mormon Latinos launched a letter-writing campaign to Latter Day Saints Church President Thomas S. Monson, asking him to define the church’s official position on immigration. “This is affecting our families,” Tony Yapias, who launched the campaign, stated. “Where’s the church in this? The longer they stay quiet, the more political it gets, the more divisive.”
In some ways, some of the damage is already done. The sponsor of SB-1070, state Sen. Russell Pearce (R-AZ), is a devout Mormon. The Arizona Republic reported that his association with SB-1070 has “tarnished the Mormon Church’s image among many Latinos.” Pearce has repeatedly said his anti-immigration efforts have been guided by the Mormon Church’s 13 Articles of Faith, which includes obeying the law. In the past, the Mormon church has also faced criticism over the “racist doctrine” found in Mormon texts and the lack of a diverse leadership that reflects its heterogeneous membership.
While Shurtleff agrees with the federal government on immigration, his support stops there. He is part of the dozen other states who have filed a lawsuit challenging the health care reform package passed earlier this year.
Massey Miners Disabled Methane Monitors Before Killer Explosion
Massey Miners Disabled Methane Monitors Before Killer Explosion
Directed by supervisors, miners at Massey Energy’s Upper Big Branch Mine commonly disabled monitors that could detect methane gas before the explosion that killed 29 in April. An investigation by NPR has “documented an incident in February 2010 in which an Upper Big Branch electrician was ordered to circumvent the automatic shutoff mechanism on a methane detector installed on a continuous mining machine.” Ricky Lee Campbell, a 24-year-old coal shuttle driver and roof bolter who witnessed the incident, told NPR they circumvented the safety device so that they could “continue to run coal”:
Everybody was getting mad because the continuous miner kept shutting off because there was methane. So, they shut the section down and the electrician got into the methane detector box and rewired it so we could continue to run coal.
There were dozens of such incidents, NPR reports. Maintenance foreman Clay Mullins told NPR he “believed miners could run mining machines temporarily with disabled monitors because that’s what the mine’s foreman and superintendent told him.”
Don Blankenship, the CEO of Massey Energy, was caught with a 2006 memo that told workers faced with safety rules, “you need to ignore them and run coal” because “coal pays the bills.”
Gov. Joe Manchin’s (D-WV) special investigator has found that the April 5 explosion “was so large and powerful that it ripped through more than 2 1/2 miles of underground tunnels ‘in an instant.’” No charges have yet been brought against Massey Energy or its management for the fatal incident.
Meanwhile, four activists — 22-year-old Kathryn Huszcza, 22-year-old Colin Flood, 20-year-old Sophie Kern and 22-year-old James Tobias — “are in jail following a protest in which two chained themselves to a highwall miner at a Massey Energy surface mine in Raleigh County.” Massey Energy is the largest mountaintop removal company in the United States.
Whatever Geithner’s Feelings, Warren Is A Good Choice To Lead The New Consumer Protection Agency
Whatever Geithner’s Feelings, Warren Is A Good Choice To Lead The New Consumer Protection Agency
Yesterday, the Senate passed the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory reform bill on a 60-39 vote, meaning that, among many other things, a new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will come into being. The agency fixes a critical gap in the regulatory framework, as there is no regulator specifically tasked with policing consumer products and ensuring that banks can’t rip off consumers with (usually highly profitable) predatory products.
A handful of names have been tossed around in the media as to who will be nominated to be the CFPB’s first director. The most oft-mentioned name is Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard Law professor who is currently heading the Congressional Oversight Panel for the Troubled Asset Relief program.
It was a 2007 journal article written by Warren that motivated lawmakers to propose creating the new agency in the first place. “Clearly, it is time for a new model of financial regulation, one focused primarily on consumer safety rather than corporate profitability. Financial products should be subject to the same routine safety screening that now governs the sale of every toaster, washing machine, and child’s car seat sold on the American market,” Warren wrote.
Last night, it was reported that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is opposed to Warren heading the agency. Assistant Treasury Secretary Michael Barr refuted that notion today, saying “I don’t know where that (report) came from.” “I believe and Secretary Geithner believes that she’s exceptionally well-qualified to run it,” he said.
Whetever Geithner’s personal feelings on the matter, Warren is eminently qualified to lead the CFPB. She explained her philosophy regarding the regulation of consumer products to me during an interview back in May 2009:
We need to think at the product level. All these lousy mortgages got sold, one family at a time. These were crummy mortgages, like selling plastic spoons that have carcinogens in them or toys that put out little children’s eyes. We sold them one product in a time. If we had had just basic safety standards in place from the beginning, then we never would have fed these into the front end of the financial system, where they then would have been bundled up and then sliced into tranches and rated and rebundled and sold and rated again.
House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) backed Warren, saying “she is a brilliant advocate. She is sensible. She has a good sense how to operate. She is not some windmill-tilting ideologue.”
Barr himself has also been mentioned as a potential CFPB head, and would be an excellent choice, as he’s been intimately involved with the regulatory reform bill since the beginning. Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, who was one of the first public officials to try to crack down on subprime lending, has also had her name tossed into the ring, but said that she preferred Warren. “She has long understood the need for such an agency to ensure that another financial crisis doesn’t devastate the futures of millions of hardworking Americans,” Madigan said.
The Differing Views On The DADT Survey Seem Irreconcilable
The Differing Views On The DADT Survey Seem Irreconcilable
Rachel Maddow’s interview with Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, who has spent 19 years as a fighter pilot in the Air Force and is in the process of being discharged from the military because he’s gay, is the personification of the failure of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy and a test case for the Pentagon’s new “more humane” approach towards discharging gay and lesbian servicemembers:
FEHRENBACH: And we also don`t know if they`re taking extra time because Secretary Gates, as you know, announced new, more lenient, more humane enforcement standards in March. So maybe they`re taking the extra time to apply those standards. We hope so. As you know, those standards – some of the things you now see, my case meets all those standards. For instance, it was not credible information that was presented. It was not from a reliable source. And my chain of command did not take into consideration how that information was gained.
And then finally, it was clearly malicious intent involved by the person who outed me. So my case should be, you know, basically the poster case for the new enforcement standards. My case meets every one of those criteria. So really, the Air Force has the opportunity to do the right thing here, to dismiss my cases and retain me. And I hope they do that under these new enforcement standards.
Watch it:
On Monday, Pentagon spokesperson Geoff Morrell couldn’t understand why some gay troops would find the survey or its questions insulting. Here, Fehrenbach explains: “[Y]ou know, there are things in combat that we just don`t think about. You think about where your next meal is going to come from. You think about your next mission. You think about your family back home. And you just don`t think about who`s showering next to you.” “Questions like that – they got specific – seem somewhat insulting.”
Fehrenbach also argued that polling the troops was not effective way of ensuring effective implementation. “You know, if we wanted to see if everybody was comfortable, you know, we could ask them if they wanted to go home for Christmas or stay in a tent in Afghanistan. You`d probably get 90 percent that said they`d rather go home for Christmas,” he said. “And nobody asked me if I was comfortable while I was getting shot at eight times over Baghdad. Nobody if I was comfortable in my 13-hour mission over Afghanistan.”
The Pentagon however, insists that these questions are necessary for effective repeal. “Do you want us to put our head in the sand and ignore concerns that have been voiced to us by the force?” Morrell asked me. “It is better for us to ask some of these questions up front in as candid a manner as possible, to get as much information as possible, so we are prepared for this eventuality. It would be irresponsible of us to do otherwise.”
These two views seem irreconcilable: gay service members believe that some of the assumptions made about “homosexuals” are offensive, but the military believes that it needs to make these assumptions to garner enough information to implement repeal effectively. For now, it seems like gays will just have to feel offended.
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