Madness - One step beyond

And old classic. After a long but good week in London (no rain!), we're now on the way down south for the week. We're on a painfully early morning TGV which was, of course, about the only one available. Paris is definitely not an early morning city, which is perhaps one of the reasons why I love the city so much. It's a normal work week for me outside of Thursday, but Jojo is taking the week off. Unfortunately it's rainy along the coast but hey, a change of location is always nice. Read the rest of this post...

The Kremlin is trying to rehabilitate Stalin, just like conservatives are doing with McCarthy

It's interesting to read that the Russian government is trying to polish Stalin's image. For the past several years, some conservatives have been trying to rewrite the history of Joe McCarthy's anti-communism, in order to suggest that he wasn't all that bad of a guy either. Kind of ironic that the rewriting is happening on both ends of the political spectrum, from the communists to the anti-communists. What do they hope to achieve? it is troubling that either side feels that the black mark somehow hampers their efforts, as though they'd like to be more like Stalin, or McCarthy, if the public were just more amenable. Read the rest of this post...

How the media almost screwed up the Times Square bomber arrest

It's a shocking story, and brings to the fore all sorts of issues regarding freedom of the press, but also journalistic ethics. As a reporter, when do you not report something you know, something that's newsworthy, because by reporting it you'll actually be endangering people (or in this case, helping a terrorist slip away)? This is one of the topics I'll be discussing on Howie Kurtz's CNN show, Reliable Sources, Sunday morning at 11am Eastern.

From NPR:

TEMPLE-RASTON: Well, I was aware that they were surveilling the suspect. And I knew if I reported it, it could cause problems for the investigation. For example, on Monday afternoon, basically a day and a half after the attack, a news organization reported that law enforcement officials were looking for an American Pakistani of Pakistani descent from Shelton, Connecticut. And I saw that report and I was shocked when it came out. I mean I knew the information but I had decided not to report it since he hadn't been arrested.

MONTAGNE: Is it possible that Shahzad himself saw that report?

TEMPLE-RASTON: It's a great question. Yes, in fact, after he was in custody he told the arresting officers that was the moment, when he saw that report, that he knew it was only going to be a matter of time before they would all close in on him. He assumed after seeing that report that he was under surveillance. And thats a big deal because surveillance really is only effective if people don't know they're being watched.

Several law enforcement officials talked to me about this. And one in particular told me it was like watching an episode of "24' in real time. And the only problem was that Shahzad was able to see it too.

And then it even got worse. You know, reporters actually started showing up at Shahzad's house in Shelton, Connecticut, waiting for the arrest to happen. And in fact he was actually in Bridgeport, Connecticut, up the road where he'd rented a small apartment. But apparently at that location reporters started showing up because that was leaked too.

MONTAGNE: So what you're saying is if Shahzad is seeing a reporter, then the police can't be far behind and he must have known that.

TEMPLE-RASTON: Exactly. Exactly.

As an activist journalist, I've been in similar, albeit less life threatening, situations. Joe and I know a lot of people in Washington, DC, and we hear things that Democrats are doing, things that are definitely newsworthy, but if we reported on what was happening, the thing we reported on might get totally screwed up. Why is that a problem? Take gay rights for example. Joe and I know a lot of things happening on that front, in the Congress, with the administration, and with the groups, and the activists. If we were to report on an upcoming protest before it happened, the White House, for example, might find a way to stop the protesters before they arrive. Or we reported on a White House or congressional effort to get ENDA passed, or DADT repealed, before it was ready for the story to be public, our reporting could actually endanger that effort.

In this case, since we are not just journalists, but also activists, we have a stake in the outcome of the story, and therefore we sometimes choose not to report on things so that we don't screw them up. For a traditional reporter, it's not really there job to worry about legislative outcomes being influenced by their story, but when they know a story could let a terrorist get away, that's a rather big deal. So the question remains, where should the media draw the line between keeping a secret and reporting it as news? Read the rest of this post...

Kiss the phone book goodbye

Good riddance. When I was five years old in the late 1960s, the phone book made a great high chair. Now, calling it a door stop is being generous. I haven't used a phone book in a good ten years. It's long since time that they retired it, or at least stopped delivering it to every household unless someone specifically requests it, then it should be available for those without Internet access, people who don't like dealing with computers, etc. NYT:

The residential White Pages, those inches-thick tomes of fine-print telephone listings that may be most useful as doorstops, could stop landing with a thud on doorsteps across New York later this year.

Verizon, the dominant local phone company in the state, asked regulators on Friday to allow it to end the annual delivery of millions of White Pages to all of its customers in New York. The company estimates that it would save nearly 5,000 tons of paper by ending the automatic distribution of the books.

Only about one of every nine households uses the hard-copy listings anymore, according to Verizon, which cited a 2008 Gallup survey. Most have switched to looking up numbers online or calling directory assistance. The phone book for many people, it seems, has gone from indispensable tool to unavoidable nuisance.

Read the rest of this post...

White House doesn't rule out sabotage in Thursday's wild Wall Street plunge

From The Hill:

President Barack Obama has not ruled out sabotage in Thursday afternoon's Wall Street panic.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Obama's economic team was jolted by the news and met Obama shortly after the market plunged.

The president announced a full review Friday, and Gibbs said Obama is waiting to hear the results before ruling out possible causes, including sabotage.

Read the rest of this post...

Al Gore: Why the oil spill could change everything

Al Gore writing in the New Republic:

Just as the oil companies told us that deep-water drilling was safe, they tell us that it’s perfectly all right to dump 90 million tons of CO2 into the air of the world every 24 hours. Even as the oil spill continues to grow—even as BP warns that the flow could increase multi-fold, to 60,000 barrels per day, and that it may continue for months—the head of the American Petroleum Institute, Jack Gerard, says, "Nothing has changed. When we get back to the politics of energy, oil and natural gas are essential to the economy and our way of life." His reaction reminds me of the day Elvis Presley died. Upon hearing the tragic news, Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker, said, “This changes nothing.”

I am far from the only one who believes that it is not too much of a stretch to link the ongoing wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and northwestern Pakistan—and even last week’s attempted bombing in Times Square—to a long chain of events triggered in part by our decision to allow ourselves to become so dependent on foreign oil.

Here at home, the illusion that we can meaningfully reduce our dependence on foreign oil by taking extraordinary risks to develop deep reserves in the Outer Continental Shelf is illuminated by the illustration below. The addition to oil company profits may be significant, but the benefits to our national security are trivial.

Read the rest of this post...

Saturday Morning Open Thread

This has been a quite a week. KarenMrsLloydRichards captured some of the highlights and lowlights in her haikus. This is my favorite:

A rentboy's taut flesh---
(Sometimes--there's God--so quickly!)
Exquisite long strokes---

And on GOP hysteria over the Times Square attempted bombing:

McCain, King holler:
"Mirandize brown citizens?!!!"
It's "Sh*t My Dad Says."

And, capturing the over-the-top WH Correspondents Dinner:

Obama's stand-up
Just killed the ugly people!
And Hollywood, too.

Says so much in just 17 syllables.

For anyone interested, Obama's weekly address is here. He's talking up the benefits of the health insurance reform law.

What's on the weekend agenda? Read the rest of this post...