Time Magazine Thinks Americans Are Not Serious People

And if you listen to the Tea Party too much, you'll start thinking they're right.

Time covers this week, from around the world:



 H/T to Imgur, who hints: "One of these things is not like the other ones."

Steve Benen

Regular readers will know that I think highly of the work of Steve Benen, currently at the Maddow Blog, but formerly the lead blogger at the Washington Monthly's Political Animal. There's no question that Benen is one of the most influential bloggers in America today. Even Paul Krugman is a regular reader.

Today I came across a short video profile of Benen produced in 2008, which may as well be 100 years ago in the digital universe. If you're at all interested, here it is.

Syria Again

Kevin Drum gives a summary of the Syria situation so far, and asks, "Epic botch or brilliant diplomacy?"

I am eagerly waiting for some plugged-in White House reporter to write a definitive tick-tock about the whole Syria thing. The beginning of the story is pretty well known. I don't think there's much question that President Obama initially failed to grasp the level of opposition to his plan for air strikes, and that this forced him into a series of clumsy reverses and foolish statements. It was a pretty embarrassing fubar.

But despite the endless petulance from the usual suspects, the past two weeks have been different. By hook or by crook, Obama (a) raised the issue of Assad's chemical weapons to an international level, (b) got Vladimir Putin (!) to take a lead role in reining them in, (c) got Assad to join the chemical weapons ban and agree to give up his stockpiles, and (d) do it all while keeping military pressure as an active option, but without ever firing a shot. Carrying out the inspections and destruction of Assad's weapons will obviously be a Herculean task, but still, this is a good start.

So here's what I want to know: was this all just a lucky accident? I've heard a couple of rumors lately that John Kerry's "off the cuff" remark about Assad giving up his chemical weapons wasn't unintended at all. In fact, he was authorized by the White House to bring it up when an opportunity presented itself, and that opportunity came last Monday. Kerry's actual choice of words may have been a little awkward, but it was no accident. Putin expected it; Kerry knew what he was doing; Lavrov called to coordinate a few hours afterward; and the Russians then made their proposal. But this has all been kept under strict lock and key because the whole point was to make this a Putin initiative, one that he'd have ownership of. If it's his baby, he'll fight for it instead of coming up with endless reasons to nitpick an American proposal to death.

Is this how things went down? I have no idea. But I'd sure like to find out. If it's true, it would be one of the most fascinating pieces of diplomatic legerdemain in recent years. And it would demonstrate an almost unheard-of willingness in a U.S. president to accept mountains of abuse because secrecy was essential to getting the job done.

So: crackpot rumor or actual fact? Someone with good White House sources needs to figure this out.

 [My emphases.]

Addendum: The NY Times certainly isn't taking this tack. According to them:

Secretary of State John Kerry had just made an offhand remark about how President Bashar al-Assad of Syria could avoid a military strike — and now Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s hard-charging foreign minister, was on the phone.

Mr. Lavrov was not about to let the moment pass.

What aides to Mr. Kerry were already trying to roll back, Mr. Lavrov seized on, telling Mr. Kerry he would immediately go public with a Russian-led proposal to dismantle the Syrian chemical weapons arsenal. That prompted a sharp response from Mr. Kerry who warned in the 14-minute call, “We are not going to play games.”

By the time Mr. Kerry’s plane landed back in Washington, the ground had shifted and on Saturday, not a week later, Mr. Kerry and Mr. Lavrov completed the plan sitting by the pool at a Geneva hotel.

It is a pact that American arms control experts have scrambled to shape and that the White House believes may be the best way to the uphold prohibitions against the use of poison gas without resorting to military force.  But it is also one that the Kremlin clearly thinks serves the interests of Russia and the Syrian government. 

As the diplomatic technician for his boss, President Vladimir V. Putin, Mr. Lavrov maneuvered to hem in the United States, averting a unilateral military strike and reasserting Russia’s role — all while Russia was continuing to provide weapons to Mr. Assad and diplomatic cover for his effort to suppress an uprising.

More broadly, though, Mr. Lavrov has sought to force the United States into a conversation that the Kremlin hopes will set a precedent, establishing Russia’s role in world affairs based not on the dated cold war paradigm but rather on its own outlook, which favors state sovereignty and status quo stability over the spread of Western-style democracy. 

[snip]

A senior State Department official said the American side was surprised at a lack of specificity in an opening statement by Mr. Lavrov in Geneva, which prompted American experts to insert detailed provisions and deadlines to try to turn it into a workable plan.

So was it as it appeared? A mistake by Kerry, seized upon by the Russians, then seized upon by the Americans?

Mixed Feelings

Larry Summers has pulled his name from consideration as the next Federal Reserve Chairman.

Hoo-RAY!

The only disquieting thing about this is that President Obama was ever seriously considering him for the post. That's a VERY bad sign.

Musical Interlude

Via Andrew Tobias comes this little music lesson about a composer named Jacob Gershowitz. Less than 5 minutes, and worth it.

Benobos?

If you grew up dusting off fossils in Kenya (with your father, Richard Leakey), you might not be the best public speaker. But you might have some very interesting things to say, anyway.

Like: We white guys are only about 3,500 generations away from our ancestors in Africa. And I mean ONLY.

Braggin' Time

I've got three nephews in the music biz, and all three are doing great.

How did that gene skip over me? I struggled for months to learn three guitar chords, and my fingers hurt like the dickens.

But this isn't about me.

My solo musician nephew, Jason Charles Miller, made a big change a couple of years ago: from industrial goth to country. And he's made the transition really well. I got a chance to catch his show when he was in Chicago recently, and he was really happy about how things were going. No wonder.

Check out this article.

Calling him a Renaissance man may be going a bit far. That's a term I usually reserve for ... um ... well .......................... myself.

But he sure is good.

From the article:

Getting back to Miller’s album, Natural Born Killer, I have to ask the obvious question: Woody Harrelson or Dexter inspired? Neither. “The title track is a song from the perspective of a bourbon bottle. It’s a cautionary tale of the devil inside of alcohol.” The lyrics are dark and foreboding, foreshadowing a grave finality: “I’m a natural born killer. I don’t need no gun, I like to take my time, there ain’t no need to run, so don’t be scared if you see me there, just throw back another one. I’m a natural born killer, Kentucky’s oldest son.”

I've written before about Chromatics, the band my two other nephews are in.

Chromatics

This month they're playing at the Hollywood Bowl.  Enough said.

[You can click the picture for a better look – at my nephews, of course. (They're on the left.)]

Syria

What to do? Ugh.

The NY Times' columnists had at it today. For the sake of those who don't subscribe, I'll provide below what I think are the best bits. This is a pretty long post, and you're entirely justified in not reading it; after all, what we think about this will have absolutely no effect on what happens. None at all. But the political scientist in me still tries to understand the issues and search for something called wisdom. Unfortunately, as Tom Friedman writes, a perfect solution to Syria "is not on the menu."

First Frank Bruni:

Our country is about to make the most excruciating kind of decision, the most dire: whether to commence a military campaign whose real costs and ultimate consequences are unknowable.

But let’s by all means discuss the implications for Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Iowa, New Hampshire and 2016. Yea or nay on the bombing: which is the safer roll of the dice for a Republican presidential contender? Reflexively, sadly, we journalists prattle and write about that. We miss the horse race of 2012, not to mention the readership and ratings it brought. The next election can’t come soon enough.

So we pivot to Hillary Clinton. We’re always pivoting to Hillary Clinton. Should she be weighing in on Syria more decisively and expansively? Or does the fact that she authorized the war in Iraq compel restraint and a gentler tone this time around? What’s too gentle, and what’s just right? So goes one strand of commentary, and to follow it is to behold a perverse conflation of foreign policy and the Goldilocks fable.

The media has a wearying tendency — a corrosive tic — to put everything that happens in Washington through the same cynical political grinder, subjecting it to the same cynical checklist of who’s up, who’s down, who’s threading a needle, who’s tangled up in knots, what it all means for control of Congress after the midterms, what it all means for control of the White House two years later.

And we’re doing a bit too much of this with Syria, when we owe this crossroads something more than standard operating procedure, something better than knee-jerk ruminations on the imminent vote in Congress as a test for Nancy Pelosi, as a referendum on John Boehner, as a conundrum for Mitch McConnell, as a defining moment for Barack Obama. 

You know whom it’s an even more defining moment for? The Syrians whose country is unraveling beyond all hope; the Israelis, Lebanese and Jordanians next door; the American servicemen and servicewomen whose futures could be forever altered or even snuffed out by the course that the lawmakers and the president chart.

The stakes are huge. Bomb Syria and there’s no telling how many innocent civilians will be killed; if it will be the first chapter in an epic longer and bloodier than we bargained for; what price America will pay, not just on the battlefield but in terms of reprisals elsewhere; and whether we’ll be pouring accelerant on a country and a region already ablaze. 

Don’t bomb Syria and there’s no guessing the lesson that the tyrants of the world will glean from our decision not to punish Bashar al-Assad for slaughtering his people on whatever scale he wishes and in whatever manner he sees fit. Will they conclude that a diminished America is retreating from the role it once played? Will they interpret that, dangerously, as a green light? And what will our inaction say about us? About our morality, and about our mettle?  [My emphasis.]

These are the agonizing considerations before our elected leaders and before the rest of us, and in light of them we journalists ought to resist turning the Syria debate into the sort of reality television show that we turn so much of American political life into, a soap opera often dominated by the mouthiest characters rather than the most thoughtful ones. 

Last week, in many places, I read what Sarah Palin was saying about Syria, because of course her geopolitical chops are so thoroughly established. A few months back, I read about Donald Trump’s thoughts on possible military intervention, because any debate over strategy in the Middle East naturally calls for his counsel.

 Ross Douthat (a lost soul):

It is to President Obama’s great discredit that he has staked this credibility on a vote whose outcome he failed to game out in advance. But if he loses that vote, the national interest as well as his political interests will take a tangible hit: for the next three years, American foreign policy will be in the hands of a president whose promises will ring consistently hollow, and whose ability to make good on his strategic commitments will be very much in doubt.

This is not an argument that justifies voting for a wicked or a reckless war, and members of Congress who see the Syria intervention in that light must necessarily oppose it.

But if they do, they should be prepared for the consequences: a damaged president, a potentially crippled foreign policy and a long, hard, dangerous road to January 2017.

 Tom Friedman (actually from Wednesday's paper):

... [T[he most likely option for Syria is some kind of de facto partition, with the pro-Assad, predominantly Alawite Syrians controlling one region and the Sunni and Kurdish Syrians controlling the rest. But the Sunnis are themselves divided between the pro-Western, secular Free Syrian Army, which we’d like to see win, and the pro-Islamist and pro-Al Qaeda jihadist groups, like the Nusra Front, which we’d like to see lose.

That’s why I think the best response to the use of poison gas by President Bashar al-Assad is not a cruise missile attack on Assad’s forces, but an increase in the training and arming of the Free Syrian Army — including the antitank and antiaircraft weapons it’s long sought. This has three virtues: 1) Better arming responsible rebels units, and they do exist, can really hurt the Assad regime in a sustained way — that is the whole point of deterrence — without exposing America to global opprobrium for bombing Syria; 2) Better arming the rebels actually enables them to protect themselves more effectively from this regime; 3) Better arming the rebels might increase the influence on the ground of the more moderate opposition groups over the jihadist ones — and eventually may put more pressure on Assad, or his allies, to negotiate a political solution. 

By contrast, just limited bombing of Syria from the air makes us look weak at best, even if we hit targets. And if we kill lots of Syrians, it enables Assad to divert attention from the 1,400 he has gassed to death to those we harmed. Also, who knows what else our bombing of Syria could set in motion. (Would Iran decide it must now rush through a nuclear bomb?) 

But our response must not stop there.

We need to use every diplomatic tool we have to shame Assad, his wife, Asma, his murderous brother Maher and every member of his cabinet or military whom we can identify as being involved in this gas attack. We need to bring their names before the United Nations Security Council for condemnation. We need to haul them before the International Criminal Court. We need to make them famous. We need to metaphorically put their pictures up in every post office in the world as people wanted for crimes against humanity.

Yes, there’s little chance of them being brought to justice now, but do not underestimate how much of a deterrent it can be for the world community to put the mark of Cain on their foreheads so they know that they and their families can never again travel anywhere except to North Korea, Iran and Vladimir Putin’s dacha. It might even lead some of Assad’s supporters to want to get rid of him and seek a political deal.

When we alone just bomb Syria to defend “our” red line, we turn the rest of the world into spectators — many of whom will root against us. When we shame the people who perpetrated this poison gas attack, we can summon the rest of the world, maybe even inspire them, to join us in redrawing this red line, as a moral line and, therefore, a global line. It is easy for Putin, China and Iran to denounce American bombing, but much harder for them to defend Syrian use of weapons of mass destruction, so let’s force them to choose. Best of all, a moral response — a shaming — can be an unlimited response, not a limited one.

A limited, transactional cruise missile attack meets Obama’s need to preserve his credibility. But it also risks changing the subject from Assad’s behavior to ours and — rather than empowering the rebels to act and enlisting the world to act — could make us owners of this story in ways that we do not want. “Arm and shame” is how we best help the decent forces in Syria, deter further use of poison gas, isolate Assad and put real pressure on him or others around him to cut a deal. Is it perfect? No, but perfect is not on the menu in Syria.

Finally, there's Nicholas Kristof. Kristof is the most humanitarian reporter I know of. I really respect him. Where there's war and misery, Kristof is there, finding out what he can about it, and how to stop it, and letting us know. And here's what he has to say:

As one woman tweeted to me: “We simply cannot stop every injustice in the world by using military weapons.” 

Fair enough. But let’s be clear that this is not “every injustice”: On top of the 100,000-plus already killed in Syria, another 5,000 are being slaughtered monthly, according to the United Nations. Remember the Boston Massacre of 1770 from our history books, in which five people were killed? Syria loses that many people every 45 minutes on average, around the clock. 

The rate of killing is accelerating. In the first year, 2011, there were fewer than 5,000 deaths. As of July 2012, there were still “only” 10,000, and the number has since soared tenfold. 

A year ago, by United Nations calculations, there were 230,000 Syrian refugees. Now there are two million. 

In other words, while there are many injustices around the world, from Darfur to eastern Congo, take it from one who has covered most of them: Syria is today the world capital of human suffering. 

Skeptics are right about the drawbacks of getting involved, including the risk of retaliation. Yet let’s acknowledge that the alternative is, in effect, to acquiesce as the slaughter in Syria reaches perhaps the hundreds of thousands or more. 

But what about the United Nations? How about a multilateral solution involving the Arab League? How about peace talks? What about an International Criminal Court prosecution? 

All this sounds fine in theory, but Russia blocks progress in the United Nations. We’ve tried multilateral approaches, and Syrian leaders won’t negotiate a peace deal as long as they feel they’re winning on the ground. One risk of bringing in the International Criminal Court is that President Bashar al-Assad would be more wary of stepping down. The United Nations can’t stop the killing in Syria any more than in Darfur or Kosovo. As President Assad himself noted in 2009, “There is no substitute for the United States.” 

So while neither intervention nor paralysis is appealing, that’s pretty much the menu. That’s why I favor a limited cruise missile strike against Syrian military targets (as well as the arming of moderate rebels). As I see it, there are several benefits: Such a strike may well deter Syria’s army from using chemical weapons again, probably can degrade the ability of the army to use chemical munitions and bomb civilian areas, can reinforce the global norm against chemical weapons, and — a more remote prospect — may slightly increase the pressure on the Assad regime to work out a peace deal.

If you’re thinking, “Those are incremental, speculative and highly uncertain gains,” well, you’re right. Syria will be bloody whatever we do. 

Mine is a minority view. After the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, the West is bone weary and has little interest in atrocities unfolding in Syria or anywhere else. Opposition to missile strikes is one of the few issues that ordinary Democrats and Republicans agree on.

[Snip]

Some military interventions, as in Sierra Leone, Bosnia and Kosovo, have worked well. Others, such as Iraq in 2003, worked very badly. Still others, such as Libya, had mixed results. Afghanistan and Somalia were promising at first but then evolved badly. 

So, having said that analogies aren’t necessarily helpful, let me leave you with a final provocation. 

If we were fighting against an incomparably harsher dictator using chemical weapons on our own neighborhoods, and dropping napalm-like substances on our children’s schools, would we regard other countries as “pro-peace” if they sat on the fence as our dead piled up?

So, what would you do if you were in charge?

An aside:  I sometimes wonder if my NY Times online subscription is worth the $35/month I pay for it. The answer is always: I would be lost without it.

Syria – Let's Be Smart (and fool everybody)

Kevin Drum pointed me to this video from Fareed Zacharia. It contains a short history of the Middle East, and a short history of American intervention in the Middle East. It's pretty simplified, but pretty much on target.



Unfortunately, President Obama has pretty much painted himself into a corner by saying Assad's use of chemical weapons would be a "red line" that would have "consequences." As Assad has apparently used chemical weapons, it looks like there will be consequences. But what?

Drum quotes the LA Times:

In two major episodes in 1998, the U.S. government unleashed a combination of bombs and cruise missiles against its foes — Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's government in Iraq. In a more distant third case, in 1986, the U.S. bombed Moammar Kadafi's Libya.

The bombs and missiles mostly hit their targets, and the U.S. military at the time declared the attacks successful. But in the end, they achieved little. Two years after the U.S. bombed Tripoli, Pan Am Flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 passengers and crew. Investigators later concluded that the U.S. attack was a primary motive for Kadafi to support the Lockerbie bombing. Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people in attacks in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. Hussein kicked out international weapons inspectors and survived despite sanctions until a U.S.-led invasion deposed him in 2003.

...."If the U.S. does something and Assad is left standing at the end of it without having suffered real serious, painful enough damage, the U.S. looks weak and foolish," said Eliot Cohen, a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a former State Department official in the Bush administration, who has long been skeptical about reliance on air power.

"This is the fundamental problem," Drum says.

All the evidence suggests that Obama is considering the worst possible option in Syria: a very limited air campaign with no real goal and no real chance of influencing the course of the war. You can make a defensible argument for staying out of the fight entirely, and you can make a defensible argument for a large-scale action that actually accomplishes something (wiping out Assad's air force, for example), but what's the argument for the middle course? I simply don't see one. It's the act of a president who's under pressure to "do something" from the know-nothings and settles on a bit of fireworks to buy them off and show that he has indeed done something. But it's useless. The strike itself won't damage Assad much and it won't satisfy the yahoos, who will continue to bray for ever more escalation.

 John McCain and Linsey Graham, who never saw an intervention they didn't like (and think we should still be in Iraq),  are among those yahoos.

[Sigh]

Perseid

Was up early this (Monday) a.m., so stuck my head out the front door to see the Perseid meteor shower. Overcast skies. (Sigh)

But there's still tonight and tomorrow morning, when I'll be 80 miles from downtown Chicago. The weather forecast is for generally clearing skies, so tomorrow morning looks good.

Perseid is considered an intense meteor shower, because it produces 90-100 meteors per hour. This is a good year for watching it, because the moon is not full. Here's a video of the 2010 shower.

Critical Thinking

A couple of years ago, a young woman from Texas announced to me that she was "against critical thinking." Noting the look of dumbfounded confusion that is a sort of trademark of mine, she explained further, "I think people are too critical about things, and always finding fault. The world would be a better place if we weren't so critical."

Ah. Just so. I had no idea where the comment came from, but was content to let it rest there.

It wasn't until months later that I learned that "critical thinking" was a political issue in Texas, and the state Republican Party had actually taken a position against it. As the woman's husband was active in GOP politics, her remark suddenly had a context. In the Texas GOP's view, critical thinking had "the purpose of challenging the student's fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority."

Well, it depends on the parents, I guess. As a child, our dinner table was a debate club, and I think my parents liked it that way. Somebody who had opinions had better watch out – there was bound to be somebody at the table who had facts! It was no holds barred, but I can remember only one low blow. I had just shredded my sister Kay's position on a critical issue of the day (was it Quemoy and Matsu?) when she leaned across the table, studied my face, and asked, "Do you know you have a booger hanging from your nose?"

I mean, really. Talk about an ad hominem attack.

I've been thinking a lot about critical thinking lately. Let me just say that, contrary to Texas, I think critical thinking is a good thing, generally. Actually, I don't think there is any other kind that actually qualifies as thinking. There are articles on the internet about it, and a Wikipedia entry that purports to list its components. Several of them are useful.

I got to thinking about critical thinking again when I saw this remarkable interview [below] of the author Reza Aslan about his new book, Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth. If you haven't seen it, you must. Thanks largely to the interview, the book is now #1 on the Amazon best-seller list, which is a good thing.



Although Aslan admits there are no new ideas or insights in his book, his popularization will bring a lot of people up-to-date on the last 200 years of fascinating scholarship about Jesus. For many, it will challenge their fixed beliefs and undermine their parents' authority.

The interviewer, Lauren Green, is a former Miss Minnesota who attended the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. It would be very embarrassing if they actually gave her a degree.

By the way: Am I the only one who thinks it's kind of funny that the lion that represents Jesus in C.S. Lewis' book, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, is also named Aslan?

This Guy's a Real Piece of Work

From Talking Points Memo, an altercation between Anthony Weiner and his Republican opponent for New York City mayor, George McDonald:

Weiner and McDonald, a 69-year-old entrepreneur, got into it prior to the forum, and local news station NY1 captured footage of a portion of their exchange. 

"Don't put your hands on me ever again," said McDonald.

"Really? What's going to happen if I do? You're a tough guy now?" Weiner asked.

"I am. I can defend myself," McDonald responded. 

Weiner then told McDonald to get his "anger issues under control."

"I don't have any anger issues," McDonald said. 

"But you do, grandpa," said Weiner.

The AARP objects to Weiner calling McDonald "Grandpa," but it's offensive way beyond that.  I half expect the next Weiner campaign video to look like this.

I wish Anthony Weiner would just go away. Aside from that, I hope his wife's friends are planning an intervention.

David Brooks' Meritocracy

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Most Amazing Video, Redux

Just want to make sure everybody sees Virginia Ted's response to the space shuttle blast-off video:

http://www.space.com/21881-spacex-grasshopper-rocket-highest-test-flight.html.

Just like Buck Rogers.

On the Personhood of Corporations

As you know, the Supreme Court held that corporations have the right to spend as much money on political contributions as they'd like, because they have a right to free speech just like people. This was a twisted interpretation of a long-established principle in law that allows corporations access to the law as though they really are people. They can make contracts, sue, and be sued, basically. Oh, yes – and be taxed!

Of course, this is a convenient legal fiction that moves things along for all of us. But corporations do not vote (yet), get drafted, get executed for murder, make love, or go to the bathroom (except into our drinking water).

The question of where to draw the line between the legal fiction of corporate personhood and "Hey, let's get real!" is under dispute. The Roberts Court, which has been busy lately limiting the voting rights of real American persons will likely be heard from again as it champions the rights of corporations to freedom of religion.

Steve Benen has a good take on current developments:

At issue is a cabinet-making company called Conestoga, whose Mennonite owners oppose birth control on religious grounds. They filed suit challenging the contraception provisions in the Affordable Care Act, arguing that their faith applies to their for-profit business -- the Hahn family, which owns Conestoga, doesn't like birth control, so the family wants to leave contraception access out of the company's health plan.
As of yesterday, that argument didn't go over well in court.

A federal appeals court said Friday that the owners of a private company could not challenge the contraception mandate in President Obama's healthcare law.

The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals said the owners of Conestoga, a cabinet-making company, could not challenge the mandate because of their personal religious beliefs.

It's a pretty straightforward decision -- corporations may be people (my friend), but according to the 3rd Circuit, the Hahn family can have its religious beliefs, but the cabinet-making company does not have religious beliefs of its own.

"We simply conclude that the law has long recognized the distinction between the owners of a corporation and the corporation itself," wrote Judge Robert Cowen. "A holding to the contrary -- that a for-profit corporation can engage in religious exercise -- would eviscerate the fundamental principle that a corporation is a legally distinct entity from its owners.

The ruling added, "The [contraception provision] does not impose any requirements on the Hahns. Rather, compliance is placed squarely on Conestoga. If Conestoga fails to comply with the Mandate, the penalties ... would be brought against Conestoga, not the Hahns."

This may seem like common sense, but the arts-and-crafts chain Hobby Lobby has filed a nearly identical lawsuit -- its owners don't like birth control for religious reasons, either -- and as Sarah Posner recently explained, this company has had far more success at the 10th Circuit.

And when two federal appeals courts disagree on the same question, the U.S. Supreme Court generally intervenes to settle the dispute. We may, in other words, soon see a major legal showdown over whether corporations have their own distinct freedom of religion that affords businesses the right to block their employees' access to contraception.

With six Roman Catholics on the Court (and no Protestants), how do you feel about the corporations' chances of getting religious freedom?

Mitch McConnell May Be in Trouble

The NY Times' 538 blog lists Kentucky's U.S. Senate seat as "likely" to remain Republican in 2014, but that's a step down from "safe".  Some interesting things are happening there. First, the incumbent Mitch McConnell could be upended in the Republican primary by an extremist Tea Party candidate. If he survives that, he still has to face a Democratic challenger.

Like Alison Lundegan Grimes:

Probably the Most Amazing Video I've Ever Seen

I'd need someone who's more space shot-savvy to tell me what's going on most of the time, but all-in-all, it's incredible. Make sure you watch it full screen.



Via Talking Points Memo.

Managing Your Money

Andrew Tobias

Long-time readers will know that I'm a fan of Andrew Tobias, author of The ONLY Investment Guide You'll EVER Need and My Vast Fortune. He's my second-favorite money guy.

But when he linked to this 1987 video of his interview by Werner Erhard, I was skeptical of how interesting it could be. Let's face it: most advice on money and investing has a shelf life of 2 or 3 years. I was wrong. Good, basic stuff, but with a sense of humor.

Example: Tobias says if you invested just 1 penny at 2% the day Christ was born, in 1987 you would have $198,000,000,000,000,000. He says this illustrates two things:

• Slow and steady does indeed win the race.

• No wonder the Catholic church has so much money.

[I'm not sure of Tobias' math there. Did he really mean only one penny invested, or one penny a day, or one penny a year?]

Anyway, it's two hours long, and I haven't finished it yet (neither, in fact, has he) but you might enjoy it, too.

You'll find it here.

Update: [A friend did the math. He does indeed mean just one penny invested. Now all you have to do is live 2014 years to collect.]

Musical Interlude

Ed Kilgore over at The Washington Monthly posts this video of Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood doing "Can't Find My Way Home." Kilgore says: "I have a distinct memory of listening to this tune on a tiny hi-fi in the hallway of the school where I worked part-time as a janitor. Hard times, good times."

My memory is of listening to it while washing dishes for Saga Foods in the college cafeteria. Though I can't claim they were hard times, they were definitely good times. Enjoy.

I ♥ Elizabeth Warren

Let me steal a couple of things from an article I'm going to link you to later. First, this graph:

You know what happened. In 1999, Congress repealed the Glass-Steagall Act, which separated commercial and investment banks. Suddenly, your conservative (in a good way), sober, dull local bank started using your life savings to buy the Wall Street version of lottery tickets. By the time things hit the fan in 2008, the banks were "too big to fail," and Uncle Sam had to choose between letting them collapse – which would throw the country into depression – and bailing them out.

Since this fit of Phil Gramm-induced idiocy (signed by Bill Clinton, I might add), just about everybody who wasn't pocketing money from it – and many who have – has called for the return of Glass-Steagall in some form.


Massachusetts' Senator Elizabeth Warren (the Goddess of Due Diligence and Patron Saint of Sanity) has introduced the 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act, with co-sponsors John McCain [!], Angus King, and Maria Cantwell.

Why isn't your senator a co-sponsor? (Cape Cod Bob is justified in smirking at this point.)

Oh, yes. The article I was going to link to. It's at a site called The National Memo, which is new to me but appears to have a political slant towards facts.

Health Care in America (Sigh)

The Journal of the American Medical Association has published a study that compares health care outcomes in America to those in 34 rich countries. The United States came in 28th.

As Kevin Drum puts it: "We don't have the best healthcare in the world. We just don't. We have the most expensive healthcare in the world and the best-paid doctors in the world, but that's it. On pretty much every other measure, we suck."

Take a look at the chart. It's scary.

Sober Up, Kansas

Per Talking Points Memo EMC, the insurance company that covers 85 to 90 percent of Kansas schools, has confirmed it will not provide coverage for schools that allow staff to carry concealed weapons. A new Kansas law, effective July 1, allows teachers and school staff to carry concealed weapons to protect children.

A vice president of the Iowa-based company says:

"We’ve been writing school business for almost 40 years, and one of the underwriting guidelines we follow for schools is that any on-site armed security should be provided by uniformed, qualified law enforcement officers. Our guidelines have not recently changed.”

Actuaries to the rescue!

The Problem with Women These Days

From the Associated Press, via Talking Points Memo:

“Prominent art collector Charles Saatchi said Sunday he is divorcing his celebrity chef wife Nigella Lawson because she did not publicly defend his reputation after images emerged of him grasping her throat in a posh London restaurant.”

"Listen to the Gentiles"

I really enjoyed Paul Krugman's essay on "How I Work," especially his Rules for Research, which are:

1. Listen to the Gentiles
2. Question the question
3. Dare to be silly
4. Simplify, simplify

While the essay is really addressed to other economists, and includes a lot of language I just have to bleep over because it's from another [i.e., economist] world, he tells a story that seems useful for other worlds. A couple of outtakes:

"What I mean by [Listen to the Gentiles] is 'Pay attention to what intelligent people are saying, even if they do not have your customs or speak your analytical language.'”

and, from his explanation of "Dare to be silly":

If you want to publish a paper in economic theory, there is a safe approach: make a conceptually minor but mathematically difficult extension to some familiar model. Because the basic assumptions of the model are already familiar, people will not regard them as strange; because you have done something technically difficult, you will be respected for your demonstration of firepower. Unfortunately, you will not have added much to human knowledge.

What I found myself doing in the new trade theory was pretty much the opposite. I found myself using assumptions that were unfamiliar, and doing very simple things with them. Doing this requires a lot of self-confidence, because initially people (especially referees) are almost certain not simply to criticize your work but to ridicule it. After all, your assumptions will surely look peculiar: a continuum of goods all with identical production functions, entering symmetrically into utility? Countries of identical economic size, with mirror-image factor endowments? Why, people will ask, should they be interested in a model with such silly assumptions — especially when there are evidently much smarter young people who demonstrate their quality by solving hard problems?

What seems terribly hard for many economists to accept is that all our models involve silly assumptions.

Egypt

It's hard to know what to think about what's going on in Egypt right now. As I'm writing this, a military coup seems certain.

Morsi, political leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, is the democratically elected President of Egypt. And he has screwed up, royally. Seemingly less interested in improving the nation's high unemployment and crime rates than in solidifying his own position, he has been taken by surprise. The NY Times reports:

The Egypt that Mr. Morsi and the Brotherhood inherited was in a state of political and economic chaos that would have challenged any established government, yet they have sometimes seemed their own worst enemies. Even as the clock ticked on an ultimatum from the top generals — to meet the demands of the protesters or face military intervention, they remained deeply reluctant to acknowledge errors in governing or the depth of popular discontent. They saw only a conspiracy to topple the Islamists in the face of a new conflict with the generals.

“There were so many streams, and the bulk of them may be legitimate, but behind it is still the same old forces of the old regime trying to come back up,” said Gehad el-Haddad, a senior Brotherhood official close to the group’s most influential leader, Khairat el-Shater. [My emphasis.] Mr. Morsi echoed that accusation in a speech late Tuesday night.

Since I'm no fan of Morsi, it's easy to see the demonstrations as a good thing. And I do. But there are  a lot of things to be worried about. Do we really want a military coup? What does that say about our committment to democracy?

Luckily, neither Morsi nor the the Egyptian opposition have called me to ask what they should do.

Watch it all live here.

The NY Times quote above is from an article titled Depth of Discontent Threatens Muslim Brotherhood and Its Leader.

A good companion article is Morsi and Military Prepare for Collision in Egypt.

If you are tempted, even for a second, to think this is all a good thing, better read the corrective Report: Sexual Assaults Rampant in Egypt Protests. From Sunday to Tuesday, there were "86 reports of sexual assault at the Egyptian protests in Tahrir Square". Quite a place, Egypt.

McClatchy, which always has something worth reading, asks Will military intervention end hopes for a democratic Egypt?

Fasten your seat belt.

Addendum: Be sure to read How Did the U.S. Lose the Egyptian People? It's a complicated mess, isn't it?

Second Addendum: The NYTimes has a new story up: Egypt's Military Moves Tanks Near Palace; Morsi Aide Sees Coup. A quote:

By 6:30 p.m. military forces began moving around Cairo. Tanks and troops headed for the presidential palace — although it was unclear whether Mr. Morsi was inside — while other soldiers ringed the nearby square where tens of thousands of the president’s supporters were rallying.

Many of the Islamists had armed themselves with makeshift clubs, shields made of potcovers or metal scraps and plastic hard hats, and there were small scuffles with the better-armed soldiers. Some soldiers fired their weapons in the air. But the military forces held back.

Mr. Morsi’s senior foreign policy adviser, Essam el-Haddad, issued an open letter Wednesday afternoon on his official Web page lamenting what he called the imminent takeover of Egypt’s first freely elected government.

“As I write these lines I am fully aware that these may be the last lines I get to post on this page,” he wrote. “For the sake of Egypt and for historical accuracy, let’s call what is happening by its real name: Military coup.”

 I'm sitting here in my home office, safely watching a revolution in Egypt. In real time. We live in amazing times.

The Politico Crowd

From Steve Benen:

* Last week, the president unveiled a major new initiative to combat the climate crisis, and the combined coverage of all five major Sunday shows was zero minutes and zero seconds. Wow.

Remember the IRS Scandal?

George Will, who is a conservative – not in the former sense of cautious, sober, and traditional, but in the modern sense of irresponsible, mean, and cultic – was ready to talk impeachment when the IRS "scandal" first hit the news.



My, how things change in just a few weeks. Steve Benen has the round-up:

Over the years, the political world has seen plenty of scandals come and go, but I can't think of the last time a controversy flamed out as quickly and thoroughly as the IRS story. When the issue first broke in early May, we immediate [sic] talk about a Nixonian crisis that could bring down the White House, with pundits and politicians eagerly comparing it to the worst political scandals in history.

And then, all of a sudden, reality intruded and the controversy evaporated.
For Republicans, the problem is every central claim has been discredited. They said conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status were singled out for excessive IRS scrutiny, but we now know that wasn't true. They said conservative groups faced delays that liberal groups didn't have to endure, but that wasn't true, either. They said President Obama's critics were unfairly targeted, and that's ridiculously untrue.

Indeed, the irony of this week is that the previous allegations have not only been answered in a way that ends the discussion, but also that there are new allegations that turn the tables -- those who pushed the scandal are suddenly the ones who need to explain themselves.

The Treasury inspector general (IG) whose report helped drive the IRS targeting controversy says it limited its examination to conservative groups because of a request from House Republicans.

A spokesman for Russell George, Treasury's inspector general for tax administration, said they were asked by House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) "to narrowly focus on Tea Party organizations."

This is important. The IG's report helped create the scandal, pointing to special scrutiny applied to Tea Party groups, but ignoring comparable scrutiny of progressive organizations that didn't fully come to light until this week. Why didn't the Inspector General provide a fairer, more accurate, and more encompassing report? Because according to the IG himself, Republicans told him to paint an incomplete picture on purpose.

The whole story, the IG's office said yesterday, "was outside the scope" of the audit requested by Republican lawmakers.

And with that in mind, in an unexpected twist, the congressional Republicans who relied so heavily on the IG's office to help create the controversy suddenly find themselves at odds with their ostensible ally.

House Republicans on Wednesday pushed back on an inspector general's suggestion that the GOP asked for a limited inquiry into the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups, a statement Democrats have jumped on in recent days.

GOP lawmakers and staffers acknowledge that they reached out to Treasury's inspector general for tax administration (TIGTA) after hearing that Tea Party organizations seeking tax-exempt status felt they were being mistreated by the tax agency.

But Republicans also say that it made no sense for them to try to limit the inquiry to the Tea Party, because a broader inquiry would be needed to determine whether the IRS was treating conservative groups more harshly than other groups.

So the IG's office is blaming Republicans and Republicans are blaming the IG's office. Seven weeks after the political world pondered the prospect of president impeachment as a result of this story, it appears the only folks who aren't accused of doing anything wrong are President Obama, his staff, and Democrats.

It's funny how these things turn out, isn't it?

Of course, the next question is who's right about the party responsible for screwing up so badly: the Inspector General or congressional Republicans. At this point, it's difficult to say with certainty, but it's probably best not to reflexively blame GOP lawmakers.

Garance Franke-Ruta had a very interesting report on Tuesday on J. Russell George, the George W. Bush appointee who leads the IG's office and who helped Republicans create the controversy with his misleading report. George now appears eager to pass the buck, but as Garance reported, the inspector general "might not be the impartial arbiter he successfully presented himself to be," and may not have given accurate answers during his sworn testimony.

In May, George declined to answer questions about whether progressive groups were targeted, a kind cageyness that now raises questions about his impartiality in presenting findings about what went on at the IRS.

At the May 22 House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing "The IRS: Targeting Americans for Their Beliefs," Chairman Darrell Issa asked George point-blank about "be on the lookout" orders: "Were there any BOLOs issued for progressive groups, liberal groups?"

"Sir, this is a very important question," the courtly George replied. "Please, I beg your indulgence .... The only 'be on the lookout,' that is BOLO, used to refer cases for political review were the ones that we described within our report."

"There were other BOLOs used for other purposes," he added -- such as "indicators of known fraud schemes" and, for "nationwide organizations, there were notes to refer state and local chapters to the same reviewers."
He did not mention the one now revealed for progressive groups.

Making matters worse, the Huffington Post's Sam Stein also reported this week that Gregory D. Kutz, one of the main authors of George's IG report, "had been relieved of" his previous position as head of the special investigations unit at the Government Accountability Office when he wrote an incomplete report and was accused by a colleague of "pursuing overly sensationalist stories."*

So, there may be a legitimate controversy here after all. It's just not the one the political world was obsessed with since early May. The trajectory is eerily similar to Benghazi: Darrell Issa and Republicans make serious charges, the charges are debunked, and the only remaining questions deal with allegations of Republican wrongdoing.

As for the pundits and politicians who spent seven weeks breathlessly speculating about Obama using the IRS as a political weapon to punish his enemies, we're still waiting for those corrections.

Feel-Good Video

Here's an interesting video of Jon Stewart interviewing George Carlin before Stewart had even started shaving.

Elena Kagan Goes Hunting with Antonin Scalia

I am not kidding.

Read about it here.

Man Bites Dog: Krugman Admits He Was Wrong

Paul Krugman on the Obama "scandals":

When Barack Obama was elected, I was sure that it would be the Clinton years all over — that he would be subjected to an endless series of claims of “scandal”, creating the sense of a tainted administration even though all the alleged scandals would turn out to be either trivial or nonexistent. Remember, after all those years of front-page headlines and $70 million in public funds, the Whitewater investigation came up dry.

In fact, however, none of that happened during Obama’s first term. But would the second term be different? For a little while it looked as if the old scandal machinery was finally springing back to life, with Benghazi, the IRS, and more. You could almost hear the sigh of contentment from a certain part of the press corps.

But now it has all evaporated. Benghazi never made sense; it turns out that the IRS was targeting conservative as well as liberal groups. And as Chait says in the linked article, the NSA stuff is a policy dispute, not the kind of scandal the right wing wants.

Of course, the absence of any fire behind the smoke didn’t stop the Clinton witch hunts. But this time seems to be different. Maybe the news media have actually learned something; maybe they’re effectively disciplined, this time around, by the blogosphere. Anyway, the narrative of a scandal-ridden presidency seems to be evaporating as we speak.

So I was wrong. And I’m glad I was.

Why Not a $15/hr Minimum Wage?

Nick Hanauer, a very rich man, makes the capitalist case for a $15/hr minimum wage. Via Andrew Tobias.

Musical Interlude

Okay, it's 40 minutes long, so I'd be dreaming if I thought you'd actually watch this. But if you did, you'd see Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade conducted by Valery Gergiev, who puts on quite a show.

One commenter said, "He always looks like he crawled out from some sleazy bar someplace – but my God, he is a conducting genius !!"

I'd say he's sort of a cross between George Carlin and Joe Cocker.

Full screen a must.

The NSA

Okay, I need help with this NSA spying-on-Americans thing.

• What, exactly, is new about this? The NSA was doing this during the Bush Administration, there was an uproar, Congress passed laws permitting it and providing for Congressional oversight, and it continued. Our elected representatives okayed this, having decided it was necessary for national security. What am I missing?

• Google has bots reading my mail. There's no Congressional oversight of that. Shouldn't I be more concerned about what unsupervised outfits like Google and Facebook are doing?

• And the thing that really gripes me: if the NSA can do this, why can't the Federal Trade Commission stop the 10+ scam calls I receive almost every day, even though I'm on the Do Not Call Registry?

The Colbert Report
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Update:

Looks like the Washington Post's Tom Toles had the same thought about Google.

 

It's a Guy Thing

A WWII vet sees film of his crash landing 60+ years later:

"I figured my dance card wasn't filled until I'd been to Berlin."

Michelle, We Hardly Knew Ye

Michelle Bachmann first came to our attention about six years ago when, at the conclusion of GWB's State of the Union Address, she grabbed him and wouldn't let go.



Since then she's set a new standard for loopiness, been a major face of the New Republican Party, and embarrassed Minnesota to heck and back.

Now, she's gone – or at least, leaving.



What's with the background music on that?

Anyway, it's got to be good for America.

Update: Gail Collins surveys Michelle's loopiness.  The Light Bulb Freedom of Choice Act! Thank you, Michelle, for guarding our freedoms.

Something Completely Different

I just loved this guy's video.

Richard Wagner

Today is Wagner's 200th birthday. Not something I celebrate, I assure you.

This post isn't about him, but about Anna Russell's wonderful satire of his Ring Cycle. I'd heard it from time to time on the radio, but today discovered there's actually a YouTube video of it.

If you don't have 20 hours over 4 evenings "at those prices" to see "The Ring," (or the inclination to do so) you might enjoy 30 minutes of Anna Russell telling you the story.

The Age of Miracles and Wonders

The Oklahoma tornado is still terrifying the next day. Climate-change denier Senator James Inhofe says it's "hard to explain." He's apparently going to make sure Oklahoma gets disaster assistance from the federal government, even though he voted against disaster assistance for states hit by Hurricane Sandy. Of course they'll get it (and should).

I'm disgusted with myself for getting political about this, but politics is not just a distasteful parlor game. Lives are lost or wasted when we make bad policy decisions, we've been making terrible ones for 33 years, our survival depends on turning that around, and the chances of doing that look very bleak.

But just to prove I'm human, let me share some joy amid the sorrow:

The Amazing Human Brain

Well, mine isn't, but this guy's is, anyway. It's in German, but you'll have no problem figuring out what's going on.



Via Americablog.

Health Care American Style

In the United States we have some of the best doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals in the world.

Unfortunately, we probably have the worst health care system in the First World. Some day I'm going to do a long post about this (I've been telling myself for at least two years), but for now let me just refer you to this New York Times article about the prices different hospitals charge to treat the same illness.

To quote from the article:

A hospital in Livingston, N.J., charged $70,712 on average to implant a pacemaker, while a hospital in nearby Rahway, N.J., charged $101,945.

In Saint Augustine, Fla., one hospital typically billed nearly $40,000 to remove a gallbladder using minimally invasive surgery, while one in Orange Park, Fla., charged $91,000.

In one hospital in Dallas, the average bill for treating simple pneumonia was $14,610, while another there charged over $38,000. 

Data being released for the first time by the government on Wednesday shows that hospitals charge Medicare wildly differing amounts — sometimes 10 to 20 times what Medicare typically reimburses — for the same procedure, raising questions about how hospitals determine prices and why they differ so widely.

The data for 3,300 hospitals, released by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, shows wide variations not only regionally but among hospitals in the same area or city.

The article says, "Government officials said that some of the variation might reflect the fact that some patients were sicker or required longer hospitalization." Yeah, I guess they might. But on the other hand, we're talking about average bills here, not individual bills.

Find your area hospitals on this interactive map. Do they charge more, less, or about average? This is a Must Visit web site.

The Mayo Clinic charges less than the U.S. average. The Cleveland Clinic charges 1 to 2 times the U.S. average.

The Kaiser Foundation Hospital in San Diego is the only area hospital that charges less than the national average.  All the rest charge 1 to 2 times the national average, except Sharp Chula Vista, which bills more than 2 times the national average.

Department of "Why Bother? We're Doomed!"

Via Andrew Tobias:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The New Spock and the Real Spock

Here's today's laugh – an Audi commercial:

Same Batch of Wackadoodles

Jon Stewart on the freak show known as the NRA National Convention:

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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A Recipe for Disaster

A "fusion paranoiac" plans an armed march on Washington D.C.

What could go wrong?

Talking Treason

Ed Kilgore at Political Animal talks about James Porter, the new president of the extremist National Rifle Association:

... Porter seems to be highly representative of the amazingly common type of contemporary “conservatives” who combine extremist language about their political opponents with violent language about their political options—who in effect point their guns at “liberals” while making it known they and they alone will decide what “liberties” to surrender, democracy or laws be damned.

It makes it worse that Porter is one of the old boys who thinks it ha-larious to refer to the American Civil War as the “war of northern aggression” (as “we” put it “down south,” he said to a New York crowd recently). Since that war, whatever else it represented, was without question an armed revolution against the government of the United States, you have to wonder if the Confederacy—or as it was commonly referred to in the north for many decades, “the Rebellion”—is Porter’s model for defense of oneself against “tyranny” (you may recall that John Wilkes Booth shouted “Sic semper tyrannus“—“thus always to tyrants”) after shooting Lincoln.

Am I perhaps being unfair to these people in suggesting that they are behaving like America-haters and are flirting with treason? I don’t think so. Porter and those like him could dispel this sort of suspicion instantly, any time they wanted, by just saying: “Let’s be clear: the kind of ‘tyranny’ we are arming ourselves to forestall is something entirely different from anything Americans have experienced since we won our independence—a regime engaged in the active suppression of any sort of dissent, and the closure of any peaceful means for the redress of grievances. We’re not talking about the current administration, or either major political party, as presently representing a threat of tyranny.”

I’m not holding my breath for any statements like that to emerge from the NRA, or indeed, from the contemporary conservative movement. It’s ironic that people who almost certainly think of themselves as patriots—perhaps as super-patriots—are deliberately courting the impression that loyalty to their country is strictly contingent on the maintenance of laws and policies they favor, to be achieved if not by ballots then by bullets. Republican politicians should be repudiating such people instead of celebrating them, accepting their money and support, and even adopting their seditious rhetoric. [My emphasis.]

Did You Hear about This?

You sure would have if the guy was a Muslim.

Two Middletown police officers attempted to enforce the Obama police state by stopping a guy for running a stop sign. Not to be cowed by the oppressors, he came out shooting. One police officer lost a finger, the other had minor thigh wounds. The police cruiser's dash-cam caught it all.

There are some real twisted characters out there – with 40 round magazines.

Others are sitting in Congress.

Too Late Now, Sad to Say

Sandra Day O'Connor thinks maybe the Supreme Court should not have heard Bush v Gore.

Or maybe they should have decided that votes determine the winners elections.

The result, she allowed, “stirred up the public” and “gave the court a less than perfect reputation.”

After nearly 13 years, the stench is just as strong.

But, as Pope Antonin I says, "Get over it."

A Train Passes Through a Bangkok Slum

Via Americablog, which advises "Wait for it."

By which he means "Watch it to the end (41 seconds, total), and you'll have a new understanding."

What the Heck's the Matter with Kids Today?

Is it nature or nurture that creates kids like this? Both, probably. Despite the snickering of one of these guys about his biology teacher, I have no doubt that there were some great teachers in their lives.

Fascinating talks from teenagers.

A safer, cheaper nuclear reactor:



This kid won a science fair by developing a 100% accurate, 3-cent test for pancreatic cancer. I was going to enter my model of an erupting volcano, but wanted to give him a chance.



If you have a teenager yourself, here are nine impressive TED Talks by kids that might inspire them.

These kids are bright, but something or somebody inspired them to take themselves and their passions seriously.

Update: Sorry, the earlier version of this post did not include the video of Jack Andraka's talk about how he developed a test for pancreatic, ovarian, and lung cancer.