Congress delays recess, will stay in session this weekend

Maybe the Iraqis could learn something from the Democratic leaders in Congress. When the job isn't finished, you keep working:

The House of Representatives will remain in session on Saturday to consider an energy bill, delaying the start of the August recess by a day.

The House plans to consider the rule and the energy bill, according to a statement from Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) sent to reporters. The bad news for members and staffers awaiting the start of their August vacation comes hours after the House erupted in chaos during a vote on the agriculture appropriations bill.

However, that does mean Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid will miss the YearlyKos convention:

UPDATE [9:42pm, Chicago Time]: - It has now been confirmed that all of the Meet the Leaders panelists are not going to make their previously scheduled panel. There will be no 8am keynote Saturday. The regular schedule picks up again at 9am. Sleep in, Kossacks! - Nolan

Work on Saturday? Only our favorite politicians in Washington who must be there this weekend for a vote.

It's too bad they won't be here. Reid gave the keynote at last year's YearlyKos and was really well received.

But, hey, at least Pelosi and Reid are making the decision to work this weekend. We don't have to be afraid of the legislation they'll pass.

UPDATE: We shouldn't have to be afraid of any legislation the Democrats would pass, however, the Senate approved the FISA bill tonight. Reuters calls it the "Bush-backed spy bill." That just can't be good. Read the rest of this post...

Desperate McCain flips on immigration position

The right wing has been flogging John McCain incessantly for his support of the failed immigration proposal on the Hill. Now that his campaign is in a death spiral and the fundraising is drying up, he's had a "change of heart."

Republican presidential hopeful John McCain on Thursday backed a scaled-down proposal that imposes strict rules to end illegal immigration but doesn't include a path to citizenship.

The move away from a comprehensive measure is an about-face for the Arizona senator, who had been a leading GOP champion of a bill that included a guest worker program and would have legalized many of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants living in the U.S. It failed earlier this year.

McCain's immigration position has been a campaign liability among Republican voters and hurt his efforts to raise money. Other GOP presidential candidates, fellow Arizona Republicans and immigration opponents throughout the country have loudly decried his position.

Observers said McCain's switch was political. "He recognizes his position on the issue is killing him," said Steven Camarota, research director at the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors vigorous immigration enforcement.

I hate to break it to The Tool, but this shift isn't going to make one iota of difference to the fundraisers -- or the Freepi. One choice comment:

McCain has been insane for some time now. He needs to be put in a place where there are no sharp objects and people will look after him, give him three nice meals a day and change his diapers.

Read the rest of this post...

Pelosi And Reid Getting It Done

Quietly, very quietly, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are getting things done. Now, it's been overshadowed by the Hillary-Obama tiffs, the Gonzalez fiasco, the Petraeus report, even Fred Thomspon's campaign being run by his wife. But still, things seem to be moving in the right direction.

Last night, the Senate passed the S-CHIP health care expansion and the Ethics bill, both with veto proof majorities. These bills are not only good policies, but they make for excellent politics. And now, Democrats can head into the recess with major accomplishments (and momentum) under their belt.

I have to admit, I'm impressed. There were some rough patches in the beginning, but both leaders have really got it together. Democrats having effective leadership? What's next, the Cubs winning the World Series (Sorry John, that's a cheap shot)? Read the rest of this post...

Gingrich says Bush's war on terror is "phony"

Wow. When John Edwards said basically the same thing, he got fried. So does Gingrich think 3500 US troops gave their lives for a "phony" war, or just a phony president?

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said Thursday the Bush administration is waging a "phony war" on terrorism, warning that the country is losing ground against the kind of Islamic radicals who attacked the country on Sept. 11, 2001.

A more effective approach, said Gingrich, would begin with a national energy strategy aimed at weaning the country from its reliance on imported oil and some of the regimes that petro-dollars support.

"None of you should believe we are winning this war. There is no evidence that we are winning this war," the ex-Georgian told a group of about 300 students attending a conference for collegiate conservatives....

"We were in charge for six years," he said, referring to the period between 2001 and early 2007, when the GOP controlled the White House and both houses of Congress. "I don't think you can look and say that was a great success."

Read the rest of this post...

YKos media panel

The posts are coming fast and furious today, thanks in no small part to all the entertainment of YearlyKos.

Right now I'm taking in a panel on the mainstream media and blogs, which seemed like it would be more combative than it's actually been. The panelists are Jay Carney of TIME, Mike Allen of Politico, Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com, and Jill from Feministe. Mike lavished praise upon Glenn and the TPM enterprise, among others, and Jay was complimentary to the panel and the crowd. Glenn threw some grenades, making the point that there *really are* differences between blogs and MSM, and many structural failings of the latter, despite the initial love-in, and now the questioners are laying into Jay and Mike a little bit.

But you know what? The only person on the panel whose work I was previously unfamiliar with, Jill, is perhaps the most impressive. She's being bypassed a little now that the audience is challenging the MSM representatives (who, I should note, are being great sports and savvy reporters by doing the panel), and the topic is turning toward security issues (which Glenn has covered extensively) but every time she talks I find myself nodding. For example, it's a basic but overlooked point, which she made clearly, that the left wants the media to be accurate, and the right wants the media to be conservative.

So while I listen I'm going through the Feministe archives, and it's some really good stuff. I'm pretty interested in feminist issues, as everybody should be, and my regular feminism read is Salon's excellent "Broadsheet." Another one for the ever-growing RSS feed, I guess. For a sample, here's a very thoughtful discussion about the YKos conference in the context of feminist priorities.

UPDATE: Jill wins more points by making the (unpopular in this crowd but nonetheless accurate) point that it's unfair to trash the MSM for reporting White House statements -- that stuff *is news,* it just needs to be reported in context (i.e., "White House says whatever . . . experts and facts belie the statement).

UPDATE II: Allen is just getting creamed by questioners, but he's holding his own, rhetorically at least. Politico is pretty crappy; why does the guy who runs the political reporting sound so reasonable in this context? [Note from John: Because Mike Allen is a real journalist with a damn good resume working for an online publication that's a bit yellow.]

FINAL UPDATE: For those here at the conference, I'll be on the foreign policy panel starting at 2:30 (CDT) in room 404a-c. Read the rest of this post...

White House spokesman Tony Snow wrote for "vile" hate site

Bill O'Reilly has a problem with "hate sites" like, he says, FreeRepublic.com. Then why doesn't O'Reilly call out White House spokesman Tony Snow who posted on FreeRepublic.com for years? Read the rest of this post...

Friday AM Yearly Kos: Wesley Clark's keynote; Clinton to do candidate breakout session

I headed down to the main ballroom at 8AM to hear 2004 presidential candidate General Wesley Clark rip the administration a new one (politely, of course) regarding the mess in Iraq. The crowd went wild. Some video for you (it's fixed now):


Watch the whole speech at the YK site.

It was an impressive keynote and he didn't hold back with some real quotables:

"Mr. President, the failure in Iraq is not the troop strength, it is not the surge, it is not how good our men and women in uniform are, it is the failure of your leadership in the region."

and...

"We are not questioning the generals. Mr. President, we are questioning you! Stop hiding behind Dave Petraeus."

and...

"Bush always listens to the generals -- when he gets tired of listening to them he replaces them."

***

Also, Clinton campaign internet director Peter Daou announced today that she has decided to attend the breakout session. Organizers announced last night after Howard Dean's speech that she wouldn't be holding the individual candidate session (more here on the flap).

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I have more miscellany over at my pad (I meet Amanda of Pandagon and talk about religious hypocrites with Sam Seder of Air America). Read the rest of this post...

Best boss in the world

As I've mentioned before, I'm a Fellow with the National Security Network, a burgeoning organization committed to progressive policy and politics in foreign policy. And it's things like this that make me so proud to be part of NSN.

Rand Beers, NSN's president, spent 35 years as a civil servant, from his time in the Marines to his last government job, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Combating Terrorism in the Bush White House. He resigned on the eve of the Iraq war, seeing clearly what so many failed to understand about the tragic foolishness of that endeavor, and has since worked to help correct the failing policies of the current administration. In the wake of false claims of improvement in Iraq this week, Rand wanted to set the record straight, and he does so in a pointed but accessible way.

And where did he correct the misconceptions? As a full-fledged member of the D.C. establishment, one might think it was at a CFR speech, or perhaps an op-ed somewhere, right? But NSN understands where so much of these issues play out, and where people are paying attention and interested in the facts, so Rand posted online at HuffPo.

He lays out the problems with the argument over military progress, clarifying the overall picture in the face of war-supporting obfuscation:

As a young lieutenant [in Vietnam], I was taught that a failing strategy demanded alternatives. Committing one's forces to costly frontal assaults in the Iraqi quagmire is better replaced by a strategy allowing flexibility and economy of force. The time for more time has passed. It's time for Iraq's neighbors to join the political reconciliation process in Iraq or, at minimum, to contain the violence to Iraq. It's time for serious U.S. involvement in the Middle East Peace Process. And it's time to focus on the real Al Qaeda along the Pak-Afghan border. But only beginning the U.S. disengagement from Iraq will allow such alternatives to prosper.

Precisely. Read the rest of this post...

House GOP minority leader Boehner caught revealing classified info on FOX News, tells al Qaeda how to avoid intercepts

Why do House Republican leader John Boehner and FOX News hate the troops? Read the rest of this post...

House passed the Webb pro-troops bill that GOP Senators filibustered

Now we can watch the Republican Senators filibuster Jim Webb's bill again. Yes, filibuster. That's all Republican Senators do these days.

Of course, almost the entire GOP House caucus stood with their Senate counterparts and voted against the troops -- yet again -- yesterday. Despite almost no GOP support, the House passed their version of Senator Webb's bill per The Gavel:

The House has just passed H.R. 3159, Ensuring Military Readiness Through Stability and Predictability Deployment Policy Act by a vote of 229-194. The bill mandates troop rest times equal to their deployment times, similar to an amendment by Senator Jim Webb, D-Va supported by 56 Senators as an amendment to the defense authorization bill. It would require active duty forces to be guaranteed that their time at home match the length of their deployment. National Guard and reservists would be home for three times the length of the deployments. The bill would allow the President to waive these requirements to meet the national security needs of the country, and allow Service Chiefs of Staff to allow for the voluntary mobilization of members. These requirements would apply to those serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom. The bill also expresses a sense of the Congress that the goal for the time between deployments for regular components should be one year deployed to two years at home station, and the goal for the reserve components should be one year deployed to five years at home station.

Yeah, this is such a horrible thing to do, isn't it? Just because the Republicans say "support the troops" sure doesn't mean they actually do support the troops. It's astounding, really, how the Republicans have undermined the military. Read the rest of this post...

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff nominee: DADT should be revisited

When Bush announced Admiral John Mullen as his nominee to succeed General Peter Pace as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, it wasn't clear whether he would be in favor of lifting the ban on gays and lesbians openly serving in the military.

The first hint of change came when I located a transcript of a speech Admiral Mullen gave at The Brookings Institution in April of this year. He said: "If it's time to revisit that policy, the American people I believe -- and we live in a country -- the American people ought to raise that issue and we'll have the debate."

In a hearing the other day, he reiterated that belief. (SLDN):

Admiral John Mullen, President Bush's nominee to succeed General Peter Pace as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was questioned about the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" ban on lesbian, gay and bisexual personnel during a Senate hearing Tuesday. Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine queried Mullen on the continued dismissal of gay troops under the ban. While confirming that he would implement the current law, Mullen also told Collins that "I really think it is for the American people to come forward, really through this body, to both debate that policy and make changes, if that's appropriate." He went on to say that, "I'd love to have Congress make its own decisions" with respect to considering repeal. Mullen's remarks follow a firestorm of controversy surrounding comments by Pace referring to gay personnel as "immoral" during a March interview with the Chicago Tribune.

..."Admiral Mullen's remarks are a welcome change of pace among military leadership, where there has long been an adversity to encouraging debate on opening the services to lesbian and gay patriots," said Sharra E. Greer, director of law and policy for Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN). "As Senator Collins rightly pointed out, there is growing concern among the national security establishment that the loss of talented gay troops is having a detrimental impact on our armed forces. Admiral Mullen should be applauded for his willingness to take part in a national conversation about that issue, and for his open-minded approach to working with Congress as they consider the future of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.'"

Ah, do you hear the sounds of fundie heads exploding. Expect a shrill press release from homophobe Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness shortly.

Also:
* They didn't ask, he didn't tell -- they assumed he was gay and targeted him

Flashback to prior posts:
* Former AFA columnist blasts the org over its defense of Pace's 'immorality' comments
* Advocacy groups turn up the heat on Clinton and Obama
* Obama and Clinton botch the 'immorality' question; Edwards answers it directly
* ACT UP protest of General Pace's comments
* Republican Senator Warner trashed by WND columnist, Freepers for condemning Pace
* Sam Brownback 'commends Pace's leadership, personal commitment to moral principles'
* Faith, morality and a message to General Pace
* Former Sen. Simpson crushes Gen. Pace, DADT in op-ed
* Anti-gay military hack Elaine Donnelly surfaces to comment on Pace 
* Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: gays are 'immoral'
* Gen. Pace: no apologies for calling gays immoral Read the rest of this post...

Dodd obliterates O'Reilly; O'Reilly denies he welcomed al Qaeda attack on San Francisco

I was going to post an open thread, which is Joe's tradition at this hour, but then I figured you all could really use a pick-me-up first thing in the morning. This video is it. Once you click through, you have to then click the video on the right hand side to view it.


You really have to watch this video. It's wonderful. Senator Dodd (D-CT), who is running for president, goes on O'Reilly to talk about DailyKos and O'Reilly's own hate speech. Dodd was simply amazing. I really like the guy. Always have. Like him even more now.

Best part: O'Reilly denying that he welcomed al Qaeda blowing up San Francisco. Dodd called him on it, and O'Reilly, as always, denied saying exactly what he actually said. Here is what O'Reilly actually said about al Qaeda and San Francisco:

And if Al Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you, except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead.

You want to blow up the Coit Tower, go ahead? Imagine had any Democrat said such a thing. BMW and jetBlue would pull their relationships pronto. Yet BMW and jetBlue have no problem associating themselves with those who would welcome al Qaeda terrorism. Read the rest of this post...

Murdoch to buy Wall Street Journal, kiss that paper goodbye

The WSJ is actually a good paper. Their editorial policy is wacked out to the right, but the news side has always been fairly independent. With Murdoch now buying the paper, you can kiss the news side of the WSJ goodbye. Just as Murdoch has done at FOX and elsewhere, the only news you'll get to see in the Journal is the news that fits Murdoch's own far-right warped view of the world. It's one thing for FOX to lie the American people into a war and to lie the American people into supporting a failed American president, but it will be quite another should FOX start packaging propaganda to American's business community under the guise of the Wall Street Journal's good name (and it will). That's not just bad for the country, it's bad for business. Read the rest of this post...

Bush disses the 9/11 families -- again

What more can George Bush to do screw with the 9/11 families? It's bad enough that Bush stayed on vacation even after learning on August 6, 2001 that Bin Laden was "determined to attack in US." No, now he's trying to rub salt in their wounds by not inviting any of the families to the signing of the bill implementing the 9/11 Commission recommendations. (That's legislation the GOP Congress would never ever enact.)

Christ, even Lieberman tried to reason with his best friend to no avail. CQ Today (sub. req.) has the story:

Family members of Sept. 11 victims are unhappy they were not invited to Friday’s signing ceremony for legislation implementing recommendations of the commission that investigated the terrorist attacks.

Lawmakers who steered the measure through Congress will be on hand for the White House event, but expressed concern that family members who lobbied for the legislation will be absent.

“We would very much like to be by the president’s side as he shows his support by putting his signature on the bill,” said Carie Lemack, president of Families of Sept. 11. Her mother, Judy Larocque, was killed when the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center.

Joseph I. Lieberman, D-Conn., chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, appealed unsuccessfully to the White House on Thursday for a last-minute invitation to family members, according to Leslie Phillips, a spokeswoman for the senator.

No wonder Bush very much doesn't want to be anywhere near the 9/11 families. After all, Bush never caught the guy who masterminded the attacks. And, Al Qaeda, which Bush promised to destroy, has only gotten stronger.

We've all learned that invoking "September the 11th" and Al Qaeda are just political lines for Bush. Read the rest of this post...

Howard Dean's keynote at Yearly Kos, plus a bit of Clinton news

Democratic National Committee Chair Howard Dean gave the keynote speech tonight about the influence of the netroots, and the restoration of democracy that George Bush has undermined, federal election reform (Bill HR811), the effect of the YouTube debate, and Iraq. Here's a snippet of Dean (I shot this from my table) comparing this Congress to the do-nothing Republican-controlled Congress.


You can watch the full video of Dean's speech here, at the YearlyKos site.

Dean announced a new initiative by the Democratic Party to go out to every county in the country (down to the precinct level) and identify voting problems in advance of the 2008 election, looking at how vote counting and administration is handled, and whether an adequate number of voting machines is available for voters in those precincts.

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Hillary Clinton to skip breakout session

Breaking news out of the convention -- Hillary Clinton will appear at the Presidential Leadership Forum on Saturday night, but it was announced by YK organizers after Dean's speech that Clinton will not appear in a breakout session (that includes taking questions from attendees). All of the rest of the candidates will attend the forum and breakout sessions (except Joe Biden, who couldn't make YK). In her place will be senior advisor Ann Lewis. That announcement brought a lot of boos in the room from attendees, who had to pick in advance which presidential breakout session they were going to attend. The Hillary attendees are now understandably unhappy because it's not possible to trade in access wristbands for different presidential breakout session at this point because the other top tier candidate sessions are already full, I believe.

There's a lot of banter about it in this DKos diary.

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As A.J. mentioned earlier, Air America's Sam Seder moderated tonight's dinner. Seder wants to interview some of the bloggers here, and I've been tapped for a slot. (I do it tomorrow, but I think it will air Sunday). Read the rest of this post...