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MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
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By Karen McVeigh in New York, guardian.co.uk, 16 October 2012
The parents of Trayvon Martin have launched a website and a political action committee aimed at fighting the proliferation of stand-your-ground laws.
Change For Trayvon will collect funds to be "distributed to candidates, elected officials and efforts which support the mission of … revising stand-your-ground laws across the nation to ensure there is judicial or prosecutorial oversight". [....]
By Charlie Savage, New York Times, October 16/17, 2012
FORT MEADE, Md. — Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-described architect of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and two men accused of being co-conspirators were absent from a military commission hearing on Tuesday as a military judge took up a dispute over whether the defendants will be permitted to wear camouflage clothing to the courtroom at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. [....]
Clothing dominated the morning session, which was watched by reporters at the base and was also shown at several viewing centers in the United States, including at Fort Meade. [....] The defendants are accused of being unlawful combatants, meaning they do not get the same legal immunities as regular soldiers under the laws of war. One important factor in making someone a lawful combatant is that he wears clothing that distinguishes himself from a civilian. The lawyers said that refusing to let their clients wear military-style clothing would help prosecutors make that case. [....]
CBS News, October 16, 2012
Billionaire former presidential candidate H. Ross Perot announced his support of Mitt Romney Tuesday, saying voters are faced with "a serious choice."
"We can't afford four more years in which national debt mushrooms out of control, our government grows, and our military is weakened," Perot wrote in an op-ed in the Des Moines Register. [....]
By Peter Jeary, NBC News, October 16, 2012
LONDON - A British computer hacker has won his 10-year fight against extradition to the U.S. with the U.K. government saying he was unfit to face the charges against him.
In a statement to the House of Commons on Tuesday, Britain’s Home Secretary Theresa May said that the extradition of Gary McKinnon, a 46-year-old computer administrator from London, "would give rise to such a high risk of him ending his life that extradition would be incompatible with Mr. McKinnon’s human rights. There is no doubt that Mr. McKinnon is accused of serious crimes, but there is also no doubt he is seriously ill," she said.
McKinnon, who suffers from Asperger’s syndrome – a high-functioning form of autism – admits hacking into U.S. military computers, but claims he was looking for evidence of extraterrestrial life. Warrants for his arrest were issued in New Jersey and Virginia in late 2002 [....]
President Obama’s first challenge in tomorrow night’s town hall debate has been crystal clear ever since he allowed Mitt Romney to Etch A Sketch his way through their first encounter: Follow Joe Biden’s lead by calling out Romney on his inconsistencies and lies, while highlighting the radicalism of the Republicans’ real agenda. The Prospect’s Paul Waldman offers some sage advice: “He needs a single phrase that he will repeat every time he's refuting a Romney falsehood. It could be something slogan-y, like ‘That's another Romney Reinvention,’ or could be something simple, like ‘Once again, Governor Romney thinks he can fool you and get away with it.’ It almost doesn't matter what it is, so long as he repeats it every time.”
But there’s another, broader challenge for Obama—and it’s one that relates to the central flaw of the president’s entire campaign. While some voters understand what will be lost if Romney wins (Medicaid, Medicare, health-care reform, sane foreign policy, the list goes on), even Obama’s own supporters don’t have a clear sense of what would be gained by four more years. The campaign slogan is “Forward.” But to what and where, exactly? As a study released today by pollsters Stan Greenberg and James Carville shows, Americans are itching to hear something bold, something "changey" if not "hopey": “By more than a 2-to-1 margin (67 percent to 29 percent) voters say we need to make major changes to solve America’s problems—62 percent agree with that strongly.”
There’s at least one big idea up Obama's sleeve that he could gainfully re-launch tomorrow night: The American Jobs Act, a mini-stimulus that according to Moody Analytics would create 1.9 million jobs and add two percent to the gross domestic product. The bill was blocked by Senate Republicans last fall, which makes it a doubly appealing proposal for Obama to inject into the campaign. It’s a way to indicate that he does have some big stuff in mind, while simultaneously refreshing people's memories about the wages of Republican obstructionism. But whatever second-term plans he chooses to highlight, the bottom line is this: Obama can't regain the momentum in this campaign merely by exposing Romney's B.S.; he also has to bring his own ideas and core convictions back into the mix.
Bob Moser and Jaime Fuller, American Prospect online, October 15.
Like that grapefruit-sized blue eye that washed up in Florida, no one knows where the Social Security surplus came from.
Oh wait, it's part of the program design - how could we have missed that?
Female moderator proves she can be a Beltway hack spouting conventional wisdom too - major breakthrough for feminism.
If millionaires were a political party, that party would make up roughly 3 percent of American families, but it would have a super-majority in the Senate, a majority in the House, a majority on the Supreme Court and a man in the White House. If working-class Americans were a political party, that party would have made up more than half the country since the start of the 20th century. But legislators from that party (those who last worked in blue-collar jobs before entering politics) would never have held more than 2 percent of the seats in Congress.
First off, just as we all should be innocent until proven guilty, so should be the Oakland police. Just because of past action of some of the Oakland police force, the officers involved in this incident should not be immediately characterized as thugs. Another Trope
It is exactly this kind of unwillingness to accept any kind of responsibility for unacceptable behavior by some of the protestors which undermines the force of accusations against the police. Another Trope
Surprise, surprise, not only did past actions of the Oakland Police characterize recent actions by the Oakland Police, but the lame excuse of 'unacceptable behavior by some of the protestors' did not result in exoneration for the cops! The IAD of the Oakland PD has reviewed the evidence, and the results include disciplinary action against 40 Oakland PD officers, including 15 suspensions, and two terminations of officers. These were the Occupy protests that, among other beatings, gassings, and assaults on citizens, Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen had his skull busted, and then was ignored by the police while laying barely conscious on the street. Perhaps in their demonstrations, OWS 'loosened the chains' just a little bit for the rest of us, whether we agree with them or not. "Those who do not move, do not notice their chains". Rosa Luxemburg
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Toward the end, when his opponent's adrenaline rush seemed to ebb a little, Ryan scored some more points. In a closing statement that was clearly better than Biden's, Ryan succinctly laid out the Republicans' central message: "This is not what a real recovery looks like. You deserve better. Mitt Romney and I want to earn your support."
Afterward, the pundits—Democrat and Republican—were virtually unanimous that Ryan had given a good account of himself. But he came in an honorable third. The silver medal went to Martha Raddatz, of ABC News, who asked pointed questions all night, and generally did a good job of keeping the two men on track. Some Republicans, Karl Rove included, were complaining about her failure to stop Biden from interrupting Ryan. That was just a sign that they thought their man was struggling. Whichever side loses usually blames the moderator.
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(John Cassidy, The New Yorker, October 12.)
One response to Ryan on "this is not what a real recovery looks like" might be (not the right words surely) "We haven't hit full stride yet but under this Administration we are adding jobs and moving in the right direction. Under the Bush Administration we had 8 years with zero net new jobs--and you and Governor Romney are peddling that same old, same old trickle down that continues to crush the middle class and destroy jobs."
Two actors which have been, if not entirely missing in action, then not emphasized in the presidential race are a) George Bush, an almost unbelievably unpopular president whose deficit-exploding, no new jobs economic philosophy was identical to R&R, and b) the critical importance of electing a constructive Congress if the voters actually want the branches of government to work more and better together to solve problems, it being impossible to do that when one branch is openly dedicated to bringing about the destruction of the other, the country be damned.
BOSTON (WHDH) -- Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has agreed to stop sharing a story about his encounter with Winchester Navy SEAL Glen Doherty who was killed in the attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya after Doherty’s mother said she was upset Romney was using the story for his political agenda. Glen Doherty was one of four Americans killed in the September 11 attack on the U.S. consulate....
From ThinkProgress: According to Glen Doherty’s longtime friend, Doherty said Romney had introduced himself four times in the span of less than 30 minutes, saying it was 'pathetic' that Romney didn’t know the two had just met...
From Juan Cole: Romney on the campaign trail started telling the story of an ex-Navy Seal who died in the attack, who had been stationed in a facility a mile from the consulate, wand who ran toward the danger. Romney praised his courage and Americanness, attempting to appropriate some of it for himself.
But Romney never ran toward danger in his life. He dodged the draft for Vietnam by trying to convince French people not to drink coffee or wine....
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Once the Bush tax cuts expire, there's no more bargain to be made. In objective budget terms, that's not a bad thing—there's no actual problem that a grand bargain would solve. But the pursuit of the grand bargain for its own sake has become very important to a lot of people and Peterson's succeeded in turning it into a mid-sized industry in DC. So the pursuit will continue.
Matt Yglesias, October 5, Slate's Money Box
Lawrence O'Donnell in the Last Rewrite highlights this story.
So tonight, on the eve of the United Nations International Day of the Girl, we'll tell you her story.
Check it out.
1st: October 10, 2012 "Rolling Stone" -- Well, it's over. Or almost over, thank God. It looks like Obama will probably win, which I guess is good news, compared to the alternative – a Mitt Romney presidency would have felt like four straight years of waking up with a naked Lloyd Blankfein sitting on your face. But it's not so much the result that matters – it's the quiet.
Explain this, Jack Welch. On Wednesday, reports Gallup, the unemployment rate in the United States fell to an amazing 7.3 percent. That’s lower, by a large margin, than the 7.8 percent mark announced by the government on Friday — and greeted with such suspicion by conservatives and former chief executives of General Electric.
Strange, huh?
Nation of Change - Scott Keyes is reporting billionaire threatens employees if Obama Wins:
David Siegel, who owns Florida-based Westgate Resorts, sent an email to all his employees yesterday to discuss the upcoming election. “The economy doesn’t currently pose a threat to your job,” Siegel wrote, noting that the company is “the most profitable [it's] ever been.” “What does threaten your job however, is another 4 years of the same Presidential administration.” He went on to say that although he “can’t tell you whom to vote for,” if Obama is re-elected, it would mean “fewer jobs, less benefits and certainly less opportunity for everyone.”
Here are a few select paragraphs from the email:
Subject: Message from David SiegelDate:Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:58:05 -0400 (EDT)From: [David Siegel]To: [All employees]
To All My Valued Employees,
As most of you know our company, Westgate Resorts, has continued to succeed in spite of a very dismal economy. There is no question that the economy has changed for the worse and we have not seen any improvement over the past four years. In spite of all of the challenges we have faced, the good news is this: The economy doesn’t currently pose a threat to your job. What does threaten your job however, is another 4 years of the same Presidential administration. Of course, as your employer, I can’t tell you whom to vote for, and I certainly wouldn’t interfere with your right to vote for whomever you choose. In fact, I encourage you to vote for whomever you think will serve your interests the best.
However, let me share a few facts that might help you decide what is in your best interest.
After the last decade of military failures, stand-offs, and frustrations, you might think that this [inability to bend other countries too our will] would be apparent in Washington. After all, the U.S. is now visibly an overextended empire, its sway waning from the Greater Middle East to Latin America, the limits of its power increasingly evident. And yet, here’s the curious thing: two administrations in Washington have drawn none of the obvious conclusions, and no matter how the presidential election turns out, it’s already clear that, in this regard, nothing will change.
By Rachel Donado, New York Times, October 7/8, 2012
[....] Nothing embodies the failures of the Italian state more neatly than the highway from Salerno to Reggio Calabria. Critics see it as the rotten fruit of a jobs-for-votes culture that, nurtured by the organized crime that is endemic in southern Italy, has systematically defrauded the state while failing its citizens, leaving Calabria geographically and economically isolated.
The highway is also a symbol of what some Northern European countries say they fear the most about the euro zone: its development into a welfare system in which they are expected to support a sluggish Southern Europe, where grants and subsidies too often vanish in graft that the governments appear unable — or unwilling — to prevent. And it helps illustrate how the financing has yielded relatively little of the productive investment that might now be helping Southern Europe as it tries to climb out of an economic ditch [....]
“A barista spends 3 minutes making you a $6 latte, you tip her. A writer spends a year writing a book; and you complain that $4.99 is too high”. That line is from a tweet that has gotten over – get this — 4000 responses.
After the debate, the PPP on Virginia, probably sums up Romney's problem in Ohio, Wisconsin, and Iowa:
Much of the improvement in Romney’s image is people going from hating Romney and voting for Obama to respecting Romney but still voting for Obama.
President Obama leads 50 percent to Romney’s 47 percent, and more voters continue to trust Obama on the economy. That represents little change from PPP’s last poll of the state, when Obama held a 51 percent to 46 percent advantage over Romney in mid-September.
“We’ve been calling Virginia Obama’s firewall state the entire cycle and this is just more evidence for it,” Dean Debnam, president of PPP, said in a statement. “Even after one of his worst weeks of the campaign Obama continues to hold the lead there.”
Pew Research Center for People and The Press, September 28, 2012
Young voters are significantly less engaged in this year’s election than at a comparable point in 2008 and now lag far behind older voters in interest in the campaign and intention to vote. The share of voters younger than 30 who are following campaign news very closely is roughly half what it was at this point four years ago (18%, down from 35%). Just 63% of young registered voters say they definitely plan to vote this year, down from 72% four years ago.
Not only are young registered voters less engaged, but fewer young people are registered to vote [....]
The Editorial Board, Washington Post, October 7, 2012
THE REPORTS OUT of northern Mali are more appalling by the day. A vast, arid swath of Africa has fallen under the control of radical Islamists who are imposing a strict form of sharia and building a new stronghold for al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. As punishment for robbery, the Islamists have hacked off people’s hands and feet. A man told the Economist that the top of his ear was sliced off for smoking. “For drinking, they cut off your head,” he said.
The radical Islamists have also destroyed ancient landmarks in the north and become entrenched in an area larger than France or Texas. Two groups affiliated with al-Qaeda have carved it up among themselves, controlling Timbuktu and Gao. What they will do with this prize is anyone’s guess, but it seems likely to become a bastion for extremists to train and thrive with impunity.
There has been no shortage of alarms.[....]
Also see:
Islamists shoot in air to disperse protest by Timbuktu women
Reuters, October 6, 2012
BAMAKO - More than 100 women marched against the imposition of strict Islamic law in the northern Malian town of Timbuktu on Saturday, but were dispersed by gunmen linked to al Qaeda firing shots in the air, witnesses said.
[....] "Life has become more and more difficult with these people," Cisse Toure, one of the protesters, told Reuters by telephone. "We are tired. They impose veils on us and now they are hunting us like bandits for not wearing them," she added.
Estimates for the number of women who took part ranged from 100-300 [....]
