Month: January 2014

In the emerging Republican civil war, it’s difficult to root for either side. The Establishment is sick and tired of losing elections, while the Tea Baggers are done with empty rhetoric and broken promises. In Virginia, the Establishment is striking back in an interesting way. Their problem has been that the state’s GOP likes to nominate their candidates in a convention dominated by looney-toon freakazoids. The result has been candidates like Ken Cuccinelli and E.W. Jackson. So, how to get rid of these damn conventions and let the voters decide?

The answer is to make it all about the troops. Troops deployed abroad or lying injured in Walter Reed cannot attend the convention and, therefore, cannot have a say in who is nominated. And the nominee may get elected and one day vote to send them to war. That’s not fair!

So, the Virginia legislature is pushing out a bill that would disallow any nominating procedure that would deny the participation of “activity-duty military, reservists and other defense personnel.”

Who can vote against that? In Virginia?

The Tea Baggers are understandably disgruntled:

Backers of the legislation say the bills are designed to prevent the disenfranchisement of service members. But critics argue the measures are trying to put a stop to grassroots activists from nominating conservatives like Cuccinelli and Jackson.

“Outlawing conventions is really about a class of political insiders, consultants and career politicians who want to control the process,” Susan Stimpson, a 2013 lieutenant governor candidate, said in a recent email, according to the Pilot.

“They believe by outlawing conventions entirely, they will have eliminated all ability for the people to really hold them accountable,” she said.

It’s a strange logic that “the people” are best represented by a coterie of buffoons in tri-corner hats.

In any case, I’m torn between my desire to see the Republican Party return to sanity and my desire to beat the tar out of them.

Help me decide if I want this bill to pass.

In the main, I agree with Scott Lemieux’s argument:

In other words, in the context of whisteblowing (as opposed to elections), opponents of the contemporary national security state are allies of liberalism even if they themselves aren’t liberals. [Edward] Snowden may have all kinds of nutty and objectionable political views, but that doesn’t make him wrong about the NSA, and unlike Rand Paul he actually did something about it. As Henry [Farrell] says, until Snowden runs for Congress it’s those actions we should evaluate. [Sean] Wilentz’s conflation of the national security state with the “liberal state,” conversely, does liberalism no favors.

I’m not really interested in Sean Wilentz’s wanking, but the relationship of liberals to the national security state is an interesting topic. On the one hand, there is the progressive critique of U.S. foreign policy, as well as a near-universal consensus that we spend too much on “national security” in all its permutations, and not enough on social welfare (broadly interpreted) and infrastructure.

On the other hand, liberals need to make a convincing argument that they should be entrusted with our nation’s foreign policy and defense. And that’s been a theme for me over the years, because my goal is not for liberals to perpetually be locked in the counterculture, on the outside looking in, pointing disapproving fingers at the state. My goal is for liberals to reestablish themselves as The Establishment. We want to run this country, not bash it.

But the countercultural habits the left has developed work against us, both for how we are perceived by others (as untrustworthy and weak), and for the goals we set for ourselves (lacking sufficient ambition and vision).

We need to remember, the goal is to run this country, and run it well.

Louisiana politics, going all the way back to Huey Long, seem to have always been a dispiriting (if often entertaining) exercise in corruption and disappointment. It will be no different when Sen. David Vitter gears up his gubernatorial campaign. The fact that the sitting governor, Bobby Jindal, actively loathes Vitter, and the fact that Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne is probably going to run, too, means that the state GOP will be at each other’s throats. If Vitter wins the nomination, Jindal will have to pretend to support him, but will he lift a finger to help?

Could Vitter actually lose the governor’s race to a Democrat?

Something to keep an eye on, for the chuckles if nothing else.

Someone has touchy feelings:

In a radio interview last week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) made some disparaging comments about pro-life conservatives, stating they had “no place in the state of New York because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

Those remarks drew the ire of conservative talk show host Sean Hannity, who on his Monday radio program declared he had enough and was abandoning his home state, where he hosts his widely syndicated radio show and his high-rated Fox News Channel television program.

Sean Hannity can take his staff and their votes and move south. He will not be missed.

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[Update] Syria ‘smoking gun’ report warrants a careful read – CS Monitor Tears Apart Qatar Funded Torture Report.

This report was funded by the Government of Qatar who gave a contract to the London law firm Carter-Ruck & Co. I read the report, I did not find any mention the funding by Qatar. The London law firm has represented the State of Qatar on numerous occasions. The firm also represented the late Russian oligarch Berezovsky.

Wikipedia: Carter-Ruck – The Libel Reform Campaign

The Libel Reform Campaign cite many instances where the application of the libel laws by Law Firms like Carter-Ruck is effectively gagging the freedom of expression and free speech in the England and Wales leaving only the wealthy anywhere in the world able to seek justice in the UK where it would be denied in their own country. The most recent example of Carter-Ruck acting on behalf of a client to stifle criticism was reported in the Guardian newspaper on 19 January 2011. Carter-Ruck on behalf of Midland Pig Producers issued a warning letter to the Soil Association threatening libel proceedings after the SA objected to a MPP planning application. Threatening such proceedings, which are rarely followed through, is a typical modus operandi of Carter-Ruck (and other law firms) to minimise scrutiny and adverse publicity of their clients.

I saw three “prominent” members of international fame in an interview by Amanpour on CNN.

Exclusive: Gruesome Syria photos may prove torture by Assad regime

(CNN – Amanpour) – A team of internationally renowned war crimes prosecutors and forensic experts has found “direct evidence” of “systematic torture and killing” by the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, the lawyers on the team say in a new report.

Their report, based on thousands of photographs of dead bodies of alleged detainees killed in Syrian government custody, would stand up in an international criminal tribunal, the group says.

CNN’s “Amanpour” was given the report in a joint exclusive with The Guardian newspaper.

“This is a smoking gun,” said David Crane, one of the report’s authors. “Any prosecutor would like this kind of evidence — the photos and the process. This is direct evidence of the regime’s killing machine.”

Continued below the fold with Syria War Crimes Report …

Confidential Report into the credibility of certain evidence with regard to Torture and Executions of Persons incarcerated by the current Syrian regime

The members of the inquiry team travelled to the Middle East from the United Kingdom and the United States of America to discharge a mandate given to them by the firm Carter-Ruck & Co. in the City of London.

The information available to the legal team prior to its arrival in the Middle East was that there was a defector from Syria who was then in a third country. Prior to his defection he had been in the military police. The legal team was further informed that there were some fifty-five thousand (55,000) photographic images of some eleven thousand (11,000) detained persons who had been tortured and killed by agents of the current Syrian regime since the beginning of the uprising against the Assad regime in March 2011.

It was also the understanding of the inquiry team that this defector had supplied thousands of photographic images of executed persons by making copies of the photographic images on a “flash drive” (memory stick.

The mandate entrusted to the inquiry team was to question this defector and to establish whwther he was a truthful and credible witness.

The interviewing of the defector, who was codenamed “Caesar” for his own protection, took place on the 12th, 13th, and 18th January 2014.

This report is making headlines as the Geneva II Conference is about to convene tomorrow in Montreux, Switzerland. For Public Relations of Qatar and Saudi Arabia, the report is also a distraction to this news item on the back-pages of newspapers – Qatar-linked charities ‘gave millions to Al Qaida’ – US. It made me feel uncomfortable to read another one-sided story about the sectarian/civil war in Syria, spreading across the borders into Lebanon and Iraq. At Juan Cole’s Informed Comment, the following headline … [He must be more certain of the facts than the panel members of the inquiry who authored the report!]

Massive War Crimes: Syrian Regime Tortured, Starved, Murdered 11,000 Prisoners

“Caesar” did not see the torture or executions himself, but photographed the bodies afterward. The report explains, “The reason for photographing executed persons was twofold: First to permit a death certificate to be produced without families requiring to see the body thereby avoiding the authorities having to give a truthful account of their deaths; second to confirm that orders to execute individuals had been carried out.”

That is to say, the Baath officials who ordered these 11,000 executions of prisoners of war were afraid that prison guards would take bribes to release the prisoners and just report them dead. The photographs were to prove to their superiors that they had actually followed through and polished the prisoner off. They were an anti-fraud measure.

The authors find that this bureaucratic rationale for the photographing, and the sophisticated numbering system used to keep track of the bodies, are strong evidence on the face of it that the regime ordered the deaths. Likewise, the assembly-line character of the photography work, with 50 bodies a day recorded, points to a systematic regime practice.

They write, “In the view of the inquiry team the need to photograph those who were killed is a strong pointer to the fact that the killings were systematic, ordered, and directed from above.”

My rebuttal @Informed Comment is awaiting publication due to moderation.

Curveball, I meant to say “Caesar” was interviewed just a few days ago. Of course the Assad regime is liable for war crimes, this report is timely and suspicious. Commissioned by London law firm Carter-Ruck with funds from the State of Qatar. To be clear, the three persons of the inquiry team are former prosecutors in special tribunals. David Crane now runs a consulting firm called CW Group International, recently used its expertise on behalf of the government of Guinea’s former military leader, Moussa Dadis Camara. Geraldine Finucane, the widow of the murdered lawyer, watched the debate on Sir Desmond de Silva’s report and called it a ‘sham’ – see The Guardian. Sir Geoffrey Nice, a supporter of the Human Rights Commission of the British Conservative Party, played a role in the  Iran Tribunal. The support for the tribunal fell apart when its neutrality was questioned and the organisers were exposed linked to the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).

○ Outsourcing regime change in name of democracy
○ Engineering a Colour Revolution and Beyond

I frankly don’t get all the controversy about Richard Sherman’s behavior at the end of the NFC Championship Game. He was excited and angry at the same time, and he talked a bunch of trash. So what? The way people were talking about it, I’d thought I’d missed him hurling racial anti-gay epithets and pushing reporters. I guess people think he lacked sportsmanship, but I don’t understand the intensity of the reaction.

The Massachusetts ACLU “PrivacySOS” blog has the following article summarizing and linking to Michael J. Glennon’s “National Security and Double Government”, a 114-page study of how the US through its legal and political blundering has backed into a separate and almost autonomous national security state with a dignified front.

Massachusetts ACLU PrivacySOS: When it comes to fighting the “double state”, knowledge is power

From Glennon’s study:

Large segments of the public continue to believe that America’s constitutionally established, dignified institutions are the locus of governmental power; by promoting that impression, both sets of institutions maintain public support. But when it comes to defining and protecting national security, the public’s impression is mistaken. America’s efficient institution makes most of the key decisions concerning national security, removed from public view and from the constitutional restrictions that check America’s dignified institutions. The United States has, in short, moved beyond a mere imperial presidency to a bifurcated system–a structure of double government–in which even the President now exercises little substantive control over the overall direction of U.S. national security policy.

Another sample:

The Trumanites have [many] incentives to keep information to themselves. Knowing that information in Washington is power, they are, in the words of Jack Balkin, both information gluttons and information misers. They are information gluttons in that they “grab as much information as possible”; they are information misers in that they try to keep it from the public. Potential critics, power competitors, and adversaries are starved for information concerning the Trumanite network while it feasts on information concerning them. The secrecy of Trumanite activities thus grows as the privacy of the general public diminishes and the Trumanites’ shared “secret[s] of convenience” bind them more tightly together.

Why are the Republicans who run North Carolina failing so spectacularly to thwart enrollment in ObamaCare?

North Carolina’s enrollment in the Affordable Care Act federal insurance exchange reached a level in December that was surprising given the state’s prior poor performance in signing people up.

According to federal statistics released last week, North Carolina had 107,778 people signed up by Dec. 28, up from a total of only 8,970 who had signed up by the end of November.

That’s after North Carolina’s exchange became the object of national ridicule when the state had only a handful of signups for all of October.

And when one compares North Carolina’s total to those in similarly sized states that also use the federal exchange, the results show the state has had some of the most robust enrollment activity in the country.

North Carolina’s enrollment figure exceeded Ohio’s total of 39,955, even though the Buckeye State has a larger total population, ranking seventh in the nation to North Carolina’s 10th.

And North Carolina’s enrollment surpassed that of other larger states, including Michigan, which had 75,511 completed signups, and Illinois, which had 61,111.

Both of those Midwestern states, however, have lower rates of uninsured residents than North Carolina does.

I think the legislature better get their act together and start harassing the navigators and in-person assisters. That strategy appears to be working in many states.

In North Carolina, the Department of Health and Human Services is not coordinating any enrollment activities. But Schmidt said it’s helpful that state government is not blocking the efforts of those who are attempting to get people enrolled, as is happening in other states.

Georgia, for instance, required navigators and other insurance counselors to obtain separate certification and licensing beyond the federal requirements, according to Schmidt’s Georgia counterpart, Dante McKay, the Georgia state director of Enroll America.

“North Carolina got up and running quicker than Georgia did,’’ McKay said.

And states such as Missouri, Montana, Texas and Florida have also created roadblocks for insurance-exchange navigators, in some cases restricting what navigators can ask and say in helping people to enroll, having them pay extra fees or restricting where they can work.

According to a study released last week by researchers from George Washington University, “In states with restrictive policies toward ACA implementation, health centers are confronting significantly greater outreach and enrollment challenges.”

The study listed Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Maine, Missouri, Montana Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin as “restrictive states.” North Carolina had more than 56 percent of projected enrollees signed up for insurance; of the “restrictive” states, all but Maine had far lower percentages of eligible enrollees signing up.

It looks like that crazy governor up in Maine is seriously screwing up, too. Before he knows it, he’ll be presiding over a Soviet Socialist Republic.

Under the scheme envisioned in a bipartisan bill to restore the Voting Rights Act of 1965, only states with five violations of federal voting laws over the last 15 years would be required to seek preclearance to change their voting laws. Without looking, can you guess which four states fail that test? I actually guessed correctly. Three states were obvious to me, although it was a toss-up on the last one.

Ed Kilgore:

I don’t have anything terribly original to offer this King Day about my hero’s historical significance. He held up a mirror to America and asked us all to live up to our own professed civic and religious values. For that he was feared and despised in the most “patriotic” and “Christian” part of the country—or at least among a majority of the white citizens of his home region—and was probably the most inevitable martyr of the twentieth century.

King matters today because so many Americans still want to deny the existence of injustice and inequality, and make the poor and the powerless offenders against the pride and self-satisfaction of the privileged. That these same people sometimes perversely pretend to be King’s disciples, suggesting he would today be in a rapture of color-blindness that would keep him from seeing anything other than a blessed land of opportunity, is all the more reason we need a day set aside each year to remembering what he actually represented. And it wasn’t some abstract, negative idea of “freedom” or “equality” that accepted mass unemployment or low wages as the product of a divinely instituted marketplace.

Read the rest of it.