The Hill: 'Dems split over Bush cuts, Obama plan, and a millionaire compromise'

Well well well. First, Peter Orszag floats a "compromise" to the Bush tax cut problem — the problem being how to hand more billions to the billionaires without stirring up the peasants.

His compromise? Hell, extend them all, temporarily of course. Everybody wins, even the peasants (sorry, voters). See, couldn't be more fair.

At the same time, Obama is traveling the country sounding like a retro version of his 2008 self, conveniently timed to the 2010 election. "We should not hold middle-class tax cuts hostage any longer," etc.

You might think that a newly exited Obama official (Orszag) would not be speaking for the administration, or even floating trial balloons for them. And you might be right.

Or not. Here's The Hill's astute analysis (h/t David Dayen):

Division in the Democratic Party over whether to extend expiring tax rates has led to several different scenarios that could play out this fall.

President Obama on Wednesday doubled down on his position, personally calling for the phasing out of tax cuts for the rich in a high-profile speech in Cleveland. ...

But many vulnerable Democrats in the House and Senate aren’t as sure as Obama. They oppose raising any taxes, even on the rich, given the sluggish economy. Others want middle-class tax cuts only; while some are prepared to accept the "millionaire compromise" or let the cuts expire. ...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has signaled that he will move a tax package that aligns with Obama when Congress returns next week, but it is far from clear whether he has the 60 votes necessary to pass it.

Ah, the Senate and their 60 votes. Can you smell it? I can. It has that "public option" aroma, with a generous helping of post-election lame-duck trickery ladeled in. It's almost time for Ben Nelson — oh:

I support extending all of the expiring tax cuts until Nebraska’s and the nation’s economy is in better shape, and perhaps longer, because raising taxes in a weak economy could impair recovery.

Ben Nelson of the Senate Appropriations committee is opposed. Darn. What's a post–2010-election president to do? The pragmatic thing, I guess, even in a post-Rahm world.

Look, I'll make it simple for 60-vote Reid and Mr. Pragmatic in the White House. The default is no tax cuts for anyone. That means they have to find 60 votes. You bring a clean bill to Congress; tax breaks for the under $250,000 crowd and no other compromises. You defeat all amendments.

You've now kept your word. If the bill passes, you win. If the bill fails, everyone who voted No, loses big. It's not on you if it loses. There's no other way not to look bad — like either a fool or a tool.

It's your move, Mr. President. And December 2010 is your month. If you betray real Dem values one more time, the base could sit on its hands all through 2012. How's that for pragmatic?

GP Read the rest of this post...

More problems with airport X-ray scanners and the TSA

So besides not being nearly as effective as the sales literature likes to claim, travelers are being harassed if they don't use the machines. Weren't people supposed to have choices? And having a choice doesn't mean being treated like a terrorist if one opts out of the X-ray scanner. The TSA has been horrible since the beginning and it doesn't ever improve. What a great moment for democracy. NY Times:

“It definitely didn’t feel optional at all,” said Drew Hjelm, an Army veteran who recently encountered the X-ray machine at O’Hare Airport in Chicago. After asking to go through the metal detector, being turned down and even speaking with a supervisor, he was given other choices.

“The officer said, either you go through the body scanner or you leave the airport or we’re going to call the police and they’re going to come and arrest you,” Mr. Hjelm said. “After I went through the body scanner, they still patted my pants down.”

Since other passengers have said they weren’t given a choice, or were subjected to an aggressive pat down if they declined to be X-rayed, the Electronic Privacy Information Center has created an online form for travelers to report problems.

The advocacy group has also filed a motion in court to suspend the body scanner program, saying that it violates the Fourth Amendment (and other statutes) by imposing search procedures that are more intrusive than the courts have allowed for routine screening.

Read the rest of this post...

BREAKING: Federal Judge finds DADT is unconstitutional

Just posted at AMERICAblog Gay. Big news from California.

The judge in the Log Cabin Republican's case against Don't Ask, Don't Tell has issued her ruling. DADT is unconstitutional:

A federal judge in Riverside declared the U.S. military’s ban on openly gay service members unconstitutional Thursday, saying the “don't ask, don't tell” policy violates the 1st Amendment rights of lesbians and gay men.

U.S. District Court Judge Virginia A. Phillips said the policy banning gays did not preserve military readiness, contrary to what many supporters have argued, saying evidence shows that the policy in fact had a “direct and deleterious effect’’ on the military.

Phillips issued an injunction barring the government from enforcing the policy. However, the U.S. Department of Justice, which defended “don’t ask, don’t tell” during a two-week trial in Riverside, will have an opportunity to appeal that decision.

Have to offer congrats to LCR. Wow.

And, is Obama's DOJ, which lost this case, really going to appeal this ruling? Really.

Get this law off the books. It's not only discriminatory. It's unconstitutional.

UPDATE: The Judge ruled that DADT violates the First and Fifth amendments and the plaintiffs are entitled to a permanent injunction "barring its enforcement." LCR has seven days to submit a "Proposed Judgment." The DOJ will have seven days to submit its objections to that. Here's an idea for Obama's DOJ (maybe the DOJ's so-called LGBT liaison Matt Nosanchuk can shop it around): Don't object to the proposed judgment. Don't ask for a stay of the judgment or the injunction. And don't appeal this decision. Let DADT die.)

And, here's the decision:
Decision finding DADT is unconstitutional. Read the rest of this post...

Politico: Is a Goldman Sachs consultant likely to replace Rahm?

Now that the rumor of Rahm Emanuel leaving the White House has reached full flower, come the buds of the follow-on rumor — who will replace him as Obama's chief of staff?

Politico suggest that Thomas Donilon is the "most likely candidate" and Huff Post agrees sufficiently to write a story with that as the lead.

Are they sniffing each other's fumes, or does somebody know something? I guess we'll find out.

In the meantime, I found this on Mr. Donilon. It's widely acknowledged that he's a lobbyist, with strong ties to Fannie Mae. You have to go googling, however, to find his ties to Goldman Sachs. Here's the WSJ online, from April 2009:

Deputy National Security Advisor Tom Donilon earned $3.9 million as a partner at the law firm of O'Melveny & Myers LLP, where his clients include Citigroup, Inc., Goldman, Sachs & Co., and Obama fundraiser and heiress Penny Pritzker.

The google led to this Kos diarist, which led to that story. Wikipedia also has the info, and Timothy Carney at the Washington Examiner has the financial disclosure forms (pdf). The year in question is 2008, not quite dinosaur days.

So let's cut to the chase. Is Barack Obama going to appoint another Wall Street insider, with ties to ... let me find the quote ... "Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and Apollo Investments" as Rahm ("UAW") Emanual's replacement?

This story needs a little rebranding, don't you think? I'd call it a Goldman story — yet another one.

GP Read the rest of this post...

Beck and Palin cash in on 9/11

What patriot doesn't try to raise money on the backs of thousands of dead Americans? Surely just a coincidence.

The two conservative rock-stars are set to appear together in Alaska on the ninth anniversary of the September 11 attacks in an event that costs a minimum of $65 to attend.

"We can count on Glenn to make the night interesting and inspiring, and I can think of no better way to commemorate 9/11 than to gather with patriots who will 'never forget,'" said Palin on her Facebook page earlier this week. "Hope to see you there!"

But in sharp contrast to the free event in Washington last month, tickets to this latest Palin-Beck affair run as high as $225 – a price tag that some Democrats are making hay about given the somber timing of the event.

But Christopher Cox, the Anchorage-based promoter of the event, told the Anchorage Daily News the date is purely coincidental and was originally scheduled for a week earlier.

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Stop The Press

They shouldn't.

TVNewser:

ABC News says that it will have people there to cover the event, and afterward producers and executives will meet to decide what images to show on-air.

A CBS News spokesperson says: "We will cover the story with the appropriate context, as we would any other news story"

An NBC News spokesperson says: "Our policy is to cover news events as they take place, and report on them with context and perspective. The determination about what images are appropriate and will be broadcast will be made by NBC News management after the event happens."

A CNN spokesperson says: "We will dedicate resources to the story and provide coverage as news warrants."

I went out for a run and came back to the "news" that the burn may be off. But as I type, the whole circus continues, and will he or won't he is still unclear.

What is totally obvious, however, is that we've just witnessed a big fat media fail.

I don't have kids, but this sure seems like Parenting 101. Don't give a delinquent child attention. Ignore the tantrums, and eventually they stop. Just because someone does something inflammatory doesn't mean it's news or needs to be covered. Let the crazies be crazy in a vacuum. Without an audience, they're not significant. They're just crazy. The media creates madness when it rewards bad behavior with attention. The Pastor is nothing more than a bratty 3-year-old in a toy store, and the press never should have turned down that aisle.

When I worked for CNN, the higher ups were cautious about putting blog content on the air without our vetting and revetting. The argument was - and rightly so - that CNN is a megaphone, and the power of that megaphone should not be underestimated. The network's ratings were higher back then and there were more true journalists in house than there are now, but that's no reason for the standard to slip so dramatically.

This isn't national news. It's a bad local story on a slow day, and even then, a good News Director would refuse to send a crew on the grounds that it's batsh*t insanity.

Where is the good to come of burning a holy book? Any holy book? Why encourage it?

I would have more respect for the network that didn't budge than the hordes that do. That's a station I'd watch, and if I were an advertiser, it's where I'd spend my money. I'd also make a point of publicizing why.

Of course the networks will argue they have to cover the burning (if it happens) because it's news, ignoring the fact that they made it news. They shouldn't have given this moron a microphone - let alone a megaphone - in the first place. Read the rest of this post...

Florida wingnut won't be burning Qurans on Saturday

UPDATE: Secretary Gates intervened. He called the wingnut. Got this via twitter from Mark Knoller of CBS News:

Pentagon says Def Secy Gates phoned Pastor Jones this afternoon to urge him to cancel the Koran book burning Saturday.

_____________________
This afternoon, we got the news from Florida that wingnut Terry Jones won't be burning Qurans on Saturday:

The Gainesville pastor behind the Quran burning scheduled for Saturday announced Thursday afternoon that he plans to cancel the event.

Imam Muhammad Musri, president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida in Orlando, made the announcement with the Rev. Terry Jones at a press conference outside the Dove World Outreach Center, a tiny nondenominational church.

The two announced they would fly to New York City this weekend to talk to Imam Feisel Abdul Rauf, the Muslim cleric behind the proposed mosque being built near ground zero. Jones said that Muslim leader has agreed to relocate the mosque, but that had not been confirmed.

Hmm. Does anyone trust anything Jones says? (UPDATE: They shouldn't. It's not true about the NYC mosque, of course.) Read the rest of this post...

Jobless claims fell last week

It's a small bit of good news. If the trend can continue for the entire month, that would obviously be much better news.

New claims for unemployment benefits fell more than expected last week to a two-month low, while the trade deficit narrowed sharply in July, hopeful signs for the stuttering economic recovery.

Analysts said the reports on Thursday helped to calm fears growth was slowing sharply and implied the economy could soon pull out of a recent soft patch.

"We were expecting that things would slow down in the third quarter and start to pick up in the fourth quarter, but now it seems like the slowdown in the third quarter wasn't as severe as we feared," said David Sloan, an economist at 4CAST in New York.

Read the rest of this post...

OECD: more stimulus needed if global economy sputters

And yes, it's probably sputtering. What the OECD report also suggests that fiscal consolidation (in the United Kingdom, for example) is not a wise move during this delicate economic period.

The global recovery looks to be slowing more than expected as growth weakens in the world's rich economies, and monetary stimulus should be extended or stepped up if the slowdown proves more than momentary, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said on Thursday.

The OECD forecast growth across the G7 group of major economies to average an annualised 1.4 percent in the third quarter and 1.0 percent in the fourth, down from 3.2 and 2.5 percent in the first and second quarters respectively.

It forecast annualized U.S. growth rates of 2.0 and then 1.2 percent in the third and fourth quarters, after 1.6 percent in the second quarter and 3.7 percent in the first quarter.

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Castro: 'The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore'

That must have been quite a lunch discussion. The Atlantic:

"The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore," he said.

This struck me as the mother of all Emily Litella moments. Did the leader of the Revolution just say, in essence, "Never mind"?

I asked Julia to interpret this stunning statement for me. She said, "He wasn't rejecting the ideas of the Revolution. I took it to be an acknowledgment that under 'the Cuban model' the state has much too big a role in the economic life of the country."

Julia pointed out that one effect of such a sentiment might be to create space for his brother, Raul, who is now president, to enact the necessary reforms in the face of what will surely be push-back from orthodox communists within the Party and the bureaucracy. Raul Castro is already loosening the state's hold on the economy. He recently announced, in fact, that small businesses can now operate and that foreign investors could now buy Cuban real estate. (The joke of this new announcement, of course, is that Americans are not allowed to invest in Cuba, not because of Cuban policy, but because of American policy. In other words, Cuba is beginning to adopt the sort of economic ideas that America has long-demanded it adopt, but Americans are not allowed to participate in this free-market experiment because of our government's hypocritical and stupidly self-defeating embargo policy. We'll regret this, of course, when Cubans partner with Europeans and Brazilians to buy up all the best hotels).

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Obama on Quran burning: 'Look, this is a recruitment bonanza for al-Qaeda.'

Not that anyone expects that right-wing nut to listen to the President, but Obama's message is important:

Obama added his voice to a chorus of criticism of the proposed Koran-burning in an interview broadcast Thursday on ABC's "Good Morning America" program. He urged Terry Jones, pastor of a small evangelical church in Gainesville, Fla., to listen to his "better angels" and cancel his plan to burn copies of the Muslim holy book on the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"If he's listening, I hope he understands that what he's proposing to do is completely contrary to our values as Americans, that this country has been built on the notion of freedom and religious tolerance," Obama said. "And as a very practical matter, I just want him to understand that this stunt that he is talking about pulling could greatly endanger our young men and women who are in uniform."

Obama added: "Look, this is a recruitment bonanza for al-Qaeda. You could have serious violence in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan. This could increase the recruitment of individuals who would be willing to blow themselves up in American cities or European cities."

What kind of person pulls a stunt that " could greatly endanger our young men and women who are in uniform"?

Chris asked yesterday: Why isn't the GOP protecting the troops and criticizing Quran burning pastor? Still not many answers on that. Read the rest of this post...

GOP press aide, Andy Seré, publishes home addresses of Democratic campaign aides

What's really appalling is that the last time Republicans published the home address of the aides' boss, Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA), someone severed the gas line to the house - something commonly referred to as an act of terrorism. Yet that didn't stop a rather notorious NRCC staffer from going ahead and taking another shot at the congressman and his staff. This time he's publishing the staff's home addresses.

At what point do the Republicans show some balls and fire this jerk? Read the rest of this post...

Slate: A historical look at Income Inequality in the U.S.

A new series on income inequality in the U.S. is starting in Slate, and it's excellent. I hope to write more about it as time goes on, but this will get you started.


From the intro, Timothy Noah (my emphasis):

In 1915, a statistician at the University of Wisconsin named Willford I. King published The Wealth and Income of the People of the United States, the most comprehensive study of its kind to date. The United States was displacing Great Britain as the world's wealthiest nation, but detailed information about its economy was not yet readily available; the federal government wouldn't start collecting such data in any systematic way until the 1930s [pdf]. One of King's purposes was to reassure the public that all Americans were sharing in the country's newfound wealth.

King was somewhat troubled to find that the richest 1 percent possessed about 15 percent of the nation's income. (A more authoritative subsequent calculation puts the figure slightly higher, at about 18 percent. [pdf])

This was the era in which the accumulated wealth of America's richest families—the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts, the Carnegies—helped prompt creation of the modern income tax, lest disparities in wealth turn the United States into a European-style aristocracy. The socialist movement was at its historic peak, a wave of anarchist bombings was terrorizing the nation's industrialists, and President Woodrow Wilson's attorney general, Alexander Palmer, would soon stage brutal raids on radicals of every stripe. In American history, there has never been a time when class warfare seemed more imminent.

That was when the richest 1 percent accounted for 18 percent of the nation's income. Today, the richest 1 percent account for 24 percent [pdf] of the nation's income. What caused this to happen? Over the next two weeks, I'll try to answer that question by looking at all potential explanations—race, gender, the computer revolution, immigration, trade, government policies, the decline of labor, compensation policies on Wall Street and in executive suites, and education. Then I'll explain why people who say we don't need to worry about income inequality (there aren't many of them) are wrong.

If I sussed the code right, you can see the embedded slide show by clicking here. It looks like three parts are already posted. I'm really looking forward to the whole thing.

(Hmm. From the chart, the divergence really gets going in the early 1980s. Wonder what happened in the early '80s? Could it have been those Reagan tax cuts? Stay tuned.)

GP Read the rest of this post...

Report: Rupert Murdoch's UK newspaper widely used phone tapping

So far the story is isolated only on the News of the World newspaper. If News Corp management failed to stop the practice there, who knows if it was done elsewhere? The Guardian:

A former senior News of the World journalist has gone public to corroborate claims that phone-hacking and other illegal reporting techniques were rife at the tabloid while the prime minister's media adviser, Andy Coulson, was deputy editor and then editor of the paper.

Paul McMullan, a former features executive and then member of the newspaper's investigations team, says that he personally commissioned private investigators to commit several hundred acts which could be regarded as unlawful, that use of illegal techniques was no secret at the paper, and that senior editors, including Coulson, were aware this was going on.

"How can Coulson possibly say he didn't know what was going on with the private investigators?" he asked.

Read the rest of this post...

Thursday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

The President has had a busy week. He's been out on the campaign trail sounding almost like the Obama of 2008. He's engaging and challenging the GOPers. And, he's even calling out John "the tan who would be Speaker" Boehner by name. We need to see more of that Obama. We could have used more of that Obama over the past twenty months. Wondering if the White House has finally figured out the Republicans don't care about bipartisanship. They've wanted to destroy the Obama presidency and get back in power.

I'm really worried about the legislation future of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell compromise, which is currently in the Senate's version of the Defense Authorization bill. It looks like the Senate won't be taking up the Defense bill in September after all. That's not good. The decision rests with Majority Leader Harry Reid. Delay will put consideration of the Defense bill into the lame duck session -- and that puts the DADT language at great risk. It's already a compromised bill. But, it's the best chance we may have for years if the GOPers take control of the House. If any of the professional Democrats (those true insiders like long-time staffers, pollsters, media consultants and senior staff at CAP) are wondering why the base isn't enthusiastic -- the failure of the Democrats to actually repeal DADT and to not even vote on ENDA provide clues from the LGBT community.

Today is Rosh Hashanah. In North America, Eid Al-Fitr, which marks the end of Ramadan, is tomorrow. Read the rest of this post...

Goldman fined $31 million by UK Financial Services Authority

It sounds shocking that Goldman failed to disclose important information to the FSA, but these are indeed shocking times. BBC:

Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs has been fined £20m ($31m) by the UK City regulator, the Financial Services Authority, the BBC has learned.

The fine is for failing to tell the FSA it was under investigation for fraud by the US financial watchdog this summer.

In July, Goldman settled the fraud charge with the Securities and Exchange Commission by paying $550m (£356m).

The £20m is one of the heaviest fines ever imposed by the FSA, said the BBC's business editor Robert Peston.

Read the rest of this post...

And yet another Blair book signing event canceled

Sounds like Blair can't run away from his own history. First he was pelted with eggs and shoes in Dublin then he canceled an book signing event in London. Now that protesters discovered he was preparing for a party at the posh Tate Modern in London, he canceled his showing there as well.

A book-launch party for former British Prime Minister Tony Blair at London's top modern art venue has been postponed following a threat by protesters to picket the event.

Blair spokesman Matthew Doyle said the Wednesday party at the Tate Modern had been pushed back, but would not say until when. He also refused to comment about why the party had been put off.

Blair's book, "A Journey," has reawakened the controversy over his decade at the top of British politics, particularly his decision to take the country to war in Iraq.

Read the rest of this post...

Sean-Paul Kelley on the 'enthusiasm gap' and liberal values

Sean-Paul Kelley at The Agonist, a guy with good liberal cred, is on a slow boil. I'll give you his seven-point reasoning shortly.

But first, I want to say I'm not showing this just to pile on. The goal is never that the current Dem administration, Rahm-driven though it be, should lose.

The goal is always that real Dem values, liberal values, should win. All of us who are making these noises are on that Dem team. (Admin Dems, you're more than welcome to join! We'd welcome you with open arms.)

That said, here's Sean-Paul (h/t Ian Welsh; my emphasis):

First, some conservatives are embracing gay marriage. Obama is not, steadfast in his opposition. A solid and consistent block of Democratic voters alienated.

Second, our elected officials are working to prevent the decriminalization of marijuana and thus keep the drug war in Mexico raging, further destabilizing our next door neighbor. A foreign policy disaster in motion Democrats should do better with.

Third, Latino voters are ticked at the Democrats on immigration. Another solid and consistent block of Democratic voters alienated.

Fourth, the Deficit Commission is fixed. They are going to raid Social Security, even after running an election on the premise of saving it. A core liberal value and aspect of the social contract betrayed.

Fifth, Obama is actively working against Unions. Another solid and consistent block of Democratic voters alienated.

Sixth, our prosecution of a child soldier (yes, a child f'g soldier) was a crime. Another core liberal value betrayed.

Seventh, unemployment remains staggeringly high, no matter if you calculate it via workers in the labor market, or those who have dropped out.

Hard to argue with them apples. He goes on to detail what dealing with admin counter-arguments (and pushback) has been like. Kelley points to this post by Glenn Greenwald, for further expansion of the seven points he lists. Check it for support links on each one.

Real Dem values, sir; that's all we want.

By the way, I'm beginning to think that headlines like these, from Sam Stein at HuffPost:

David Axelrod: Republican Congress Could Be 'More Extreme' Than Bush (EXCLUSIVE)

Might also be aimed at us, Obama's merry band of gadflies, and not just at frightened indie voters. Just a thought.

GP Read the rest of this post...