You can watch it here. Originally they weren't going to post the video - something about needing to have political balance - but the folks at pkarchive convinced them otherwise.
A new round of partisan finger-pointing over who's to blame for misjudging prewar Iraq erupted Friday, as the top Democrat on the Senate Select Intelligence Committee said the panel's Republican chairman was trying to make the CIA the fall guy to deflect criticism from the White House.
The Senate Intelligence Committee is preparing a report evaluating why U.S. intelligence about the threat that Saddam Hussein's Iraq posed to U.S. interests exaggerated the severity of the threat. Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., the panel's chairman, was quoted Friday as saying the White House was served badly by the CIA, which provided "sloppy" prewar intelligence.
Sen. John "Jay" Rockefeller, D-W.Va., responded Friday by saying that Roberts was trying to "lay all of this out on the intelligence community and never get to any other branches of government; in particular the White House and associated high and visible government agencies."
...
A senior administration official, who agreed to speak only on the condition of anonymity, said Roberts' CIA comments were issued with Cheney's encouragement. The official said Cheney is trying to shift the blame for the lack of progress in Iraq, which is becoming an issue in next year's presidential and congressional elections, from the White House to the CIA. The Roberts aide denied that encouraged Roberts to criticize the CIA.
Anyway, I'm really a bit confused by this whole strategy. It seems to be that they're trying to claim that the CIA talked them into going to war while simultaneously saying that they were absolutely correct in their decision to go to war.
People are always wanting to means test things like Medicare. I suppose it's not a bad idea - you can let people lose their entire fortunes on medical bills and then let them qualify for insurance. But, why do they stop there? Why don't we means test police and fire protection? Why don't we means test public university tuition (aid formulas do that somewhat, but full tuition payers are still heavily subsidized)? All of these things, too, are "entitlements." Hey, how about we means test all government services, including national defense, by enacting a shockingly progressive tax system?
But, more seriously, all of these discussions about what to do about those expensive programs for old people are just fantasies. As I say over and over again, the reason that Medicare is going to get increasingly expensive is that a greater percentage of the population is going to be over 65. That also means that a greater percentage of the voting population is going to be over 65. If you think these programs are the "third rail"of politics now, just wait a few years. There will be more generous medical benefits. The only question is when and how we pay for it (before or after these people retire) and how it's administered. Seniors are going to get their Medicare and their prescription drug program. Odds are, they're going to get a whole bunch of other stuff too - huge expenditures on making communities more liveable for them. More expensive and better nursing homes. Free or subsidized taxi programs. A proliferation of golf cart paths. etc...
Jim Henley says James Taranto and I are soulmates. Haha. Actually, Jim's right, that aside from the inevitable "it's all the liberals fault" sniping, Taranto is roughly right on Easterbrook. Easterbrook was engaging in a particularly insidious form of "philo-Semitism," which isn't "anti-Semitism" in the sense that Easterbrook hates Jews. But, nonetheless, it's still a form of anti-Semitism in the general sense which, combined with his bizarre appeal to the historical stereotype of money-worshipping Jews, got him in well-deserved hot water. And, since Easterbook's apology ignored the main issue, and included his statement that he stands by all of the thoughts, it's unclear why he should be out of hot water.
But, Jim is only getting one half of the identity politics issue. He writes:
I should note that eventheliberal Atrios rebuked Easterbrook for placing group duties on individuals. That means Taranto is too hard on liberals as a class, and that Atrios and Taranto are secret soul mates.
What Taranto and Henley are missing is that when it comes to group identity and duties, such pressures come from two sources. The first is internal pressure and the second is external pressure. The external pressure is at worst extreme bigotry and at best inappropriate paternalism. This is the road that Easterbrook was walking down.
I'll admit that the paternalistic part comes from liberal quarters at times, but it's far less destructive than the bigotry-motivated version which mostly emanates from the Right. However, for minority groups "practicing" identity politics, the internal pressure to make their ethnic or racial identity an organizing principle and a centerpiece of a political movement is a response to the external grouping from the dominant power group (the exception perhaps being some extreme ethnic nationalist movements. And, no, that doesn't include MEChA).
Look, if you're an African-American you can close your eyes and put your hands of your ears singing "la la la"and pretend to ignore the fact that every single person you meet (black, white, asian, latino, whatever) is going to saddle you with a group identity, no matter how you live your life or who you choose to associate with, or you can recognize it as a fact of life and act accordingly.
Critics of "identity politics" seem to want minorities to experience all of the negative aspects of their race/ethnicity without allowing them the use their race to further either individual or group causes. Those who engage in it realize that right now, you can't escape your group identity, so you may as well try and use it. Whether or not that's a practical strategy or not is subject to debate, but critics seem to always blame the victims of bigoted identity politics for its existence. The biggest practioners of identity politics are white people, though one rarely hears it lablelled as such - being the dominant power group, what whites do is simply "normal,"as opposed to "special interest politics"or "identity politics."
Irish-Americans ran Boston for years. It isn't as if this never received any notice or criticism, but by and large it was recognized as the inevitable outcome given the demographics of the place.
One day, perhaps, with a bit more pro-creative racial deconstruction, a bit more blurring of the clear lines between racial/and ethnic groups, and most importantly a bit more enlightenment and a bit less racial demagoguery by politicians wanting to exploit bigotry, "identity politics" as such may go away. Plenty of immigrant groups who were lumped together - Poles, Hungarians, Irish, Italians - have largely transcended their original status as downtrodden ethnic groups. But until it goes away we should stop pretending it emanates from minority groups. It doesn't.
I know some people think this is an electoral loser, so Democrats should stay out of it. Now, I'm all for practical politics - if you can't win elections all the principles in the world don't matter much. But, it isn't Democrats who are making this an issue, frankly, it's Republicans. They're making immoral homos the centerpiece of their '04 election strategy. Democrats can either be on the right side of this issue, or the wrong side. If they're on the wrong side, it won't win them any votes. Just as MSNBC can't out-Fox Fox, the Democrats can't out-gaybait the Republicans. They should all fall in line behind John Lewis. Right now.
In a way it's like the crime issue. "Everybody knows" that Democrats are soft on crime, so the only way to counter that is to be a complete bastard - support the death penalty, increased minimum sentences, refuse to parole anyone (as Gray Davis did), etc... Likewise, "everybody knows" that Democrats are pro-buggery and the buggerers who bugger, so the only way to counter that perception would be to be somewhere to the right of Pat Robertson on this issue. They just can't do that, so they shouldn't try. Do the right thing, and explain why.
Caught your appearance on CNN with Rich Lowry of National Review. (Can I just say that the drop from Bill Buckley to him is like waking up one morning and finding out that Ferris Bueller is the pope?) I notice that Rich has paid a visit to Ye Olde Regnery Costume Shoppe and will be going out for Halloween dressed as A Historian. I guess all the Power Ranger suits were booked. Anyway, my favorite moment was he offered to show you the “documentation” that there was no plan to combat al Qaeda presented by Sandy Berger to the Gumball Rally when it took office. I’m sure that he’s delivered that documentation already, so I’ll be able to give him some candy when he stops by next week.
An amusing thing about the rabid states' rights crowd, is that they always think that the evil Fedrul Govmint is preventing them from enacting whatever theocratic nonsense they want. Dwight Meredith tells us what's in many state constitutions.
Posted October 24, 2003 -- Army Spec. Shoshana Johnson, the African American women who was held prisoner of war in the U.S. invasion of Iraq, was looking forward to a quiet discharge from the Army in a few days.
Battle scarred and weary, she has said not a word as her fellow POW comrade in arms Jessica Lynch cashes in with book and movie deals and a celebrity status in the media.
But it is the Army that is forcing Johnson to break her peace.
A few days ago, military brass informed her that she would receive a 30 percent disability benefit for her injuries. Lynch, who is White, was discharged in August and will receive an 80 percent disability benefit.
The difference amounts to $600 or $700 a month in payments, and that is causing Johnson and her family to speak out. The are so troubled by what they see as a "double standard," that they have enlisted Rev. Jesse Jackson to help make their case to the news media.
...
Johnson was shot in both legs and is still traumatized by her war experience. In addition to walking with a limp, she suffers from bouts of depression.
LOFTUS: Well, you know, it’s a funny story. About a year-and-a-half ago, people in the intelligence community came and said-guys like Alamoudi and Sami al-Arian and other terrorists weren’t being touched because they’d been ordered not to investigate the cases, not to prosecute them, because there were being funded by the Saudis and a political decision was being made at the highest levels, don’t do anything that would embarrass the Saudi government. So, of course I immediately volunteered to do it and I filed a lawsuit, against al-Arian charging him with being a major terrorist for Islamic Jihad, most of his money came from Saudi charities in Virginia.
Now, Alamoudi’s headquarters were in the same place, he was raided the same day, on March 20. An hour after I filed my lawsuit, the U.S. government finally got off its butt and they raided these offices. And, the stuff that they’re taking out of there now is absolutely horrendous. Al-Arian has now, finally been indicted, an along with Alamoudi, today.
But, who was it that fixed the cases? How could these guys operate for more than a decade immune from prosecution? And, the answer is coming out in a very strange place. What Alamoudi and al-Arian have in common is a guy named Grover Norquist. He’s the super lobbyist. Newt Gingrich’s guy, the one the NRA calls on, head of American taxpayers. He is the guy that was hired by Alamoudi to head up the Islamic institute and he’s the registered agent for Alamoudi, personally, and for the Islamic Institute.
Grover Norquist’s best friend is Karl Rove, the White House chief of staff, and apparently Norquist was able to fix things. He got extreme right wing Muslim people to be the gatekeepers in the White House. That’s why moderate Americans couldn’t speak out after 9/11. Moderate Muslims couldn’t get into the White House because Norquist’s friends were blocking their access.
OLBERMANN: How does this tie back into the thing that apparently pulled the stopper out of the drain, if you will-The developers at Guantanamo bay? How rotten is the system of the interpreters and the chaplains-the Muslim Chaplains that Alamoudi was involved in setting up?
LOFTUS: It’s as rotten as it gets. Think of the Muslim chaplain’s program that he set up as a spy service for al-Qaeda. The damage that’s been done is extreme. It wasn’t just sending home mom and dad messages from the prisoners. These guys, this network in Guantanamo, stole the CIA’s briefing books. Everything that the CIA knew about al-Qaeda is now back in al-Qaeda hands. That’s about as bad an intelligence setback as you can get.
OLBERMANN: John, how does this end up? How far will the investigation into this necessarily have to go to get to the bottom of it?
LOFTUS: There’s a lot more to go. Norquist had a lot of other clients. There’s a whole alphabet soup of Saudi agencies that funded terrorism in this country. They had an awful lot of protection. And, one of the things we may find about 9/11 is that people out in the field weren’t allowed to connect the dots and questions will be asked whether guys like Grover Norquist were part of the problem?
This Washington Post article tepidly touches on the funding sources of the opposition to the Episcopal "Gay Bishop." Mike Signorile got the ball rolling on this, and I and the Minneapolis Star-Tribune also wrote about it during the attempts to smear the guy.
It's a very tepid article because as usual it doesn't really tell us what the actual theocratic agenda of some of these people is.
HEMMER: Tell me why you think it is such a big deal.
JOHNSON: Was 9/11 a big deal? It's a big deal in part because we saw the planes crash into the buildings and we saw the images and horrible vision of people jumping from those towers. We saw it. If we didn't see it and didn't read about it, we wouldn't know it happened.
The problem with this is a lot of the damage that has occurred is not going to be seen. It can't be photographed. We can't bring the bodies out because in some cases it's going to involve protecting sources and methods. And it's important to keep this before the American people. This was a betrayal of national security.
HEMMER: Larry, tell me, what's the damage, though. Be specific, as best you can right now. Have lives been lost? Have people been sacrificed?
JOHNSON: I don't know if lives have been lost yet, but we have to start with the damage to Mrs. Wilson. Her life has been put at risk. The people that she was working with overseas who were spies, they are potentially at risk. You could potentially have people dead because of this. But the odds of finding that out as far as the CIA coming forth and detailing it, we are not likely to hear that because they have to protect the sources and methods.
HEMMER: Jim, you appeared before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday. Can you tell us what happened.
MARCHINKOWSKI: First off, the hearing was held by Senator Rockefeller and Senator Roberts on 72-hour notice. They were receptive to our request to have a closed session of the Intelligence Committee. Obviously it was a closed session, but I can say this. I believe all the members were very concerned. They were very sincere in their concern and I have confidence that they are going to do the right thing.
HEMMER: After listening to Larry, it sounds like, essentially the sky is falling in terms of the CIA around the world. Do you see it that way and did you get that sense in the hearing?
MARCHINKOWSKI: Yes, I did. I think the message is out there. This is an unprecedented act. This has never been done by the United States government before. The exposure of an undercover intelligence officer by the U.S. government is unprecedented. It's not the usual leak from Washington. The leak a week scenario is not at play here. This is a very, very serious event.
HEMMER: You are both registered Republicans, right? How concerned are you about the political gain that one side or the other may seek in this?
JOHNSON: That's what we have to get out of this. I don't know, Bill if you have any kids, they've gone to school on "opposite day" where they wear their clothes inside out and wear their shoes on the wrong feet. I feel like we're seeing opposite day. If a Democrat had done this, we would see the Republicans up in arms.
As a Republican, I think we need to be consistent on this. It doesn't matter who did it, it didn't matter which party was involved. This isn't about partisan politics. This is about protecting national security and national security assets and in this case there has been a betrayal, not only of the CIA officers there, but really a betrayal of those of us who have kept the secrets over the years on this point.
HEMMER: Do you think the leaker will be caught?
JOHNSON: I'm doubtful.
MARCHINKOWSKI: I have a little more hope. I hope that they will find this person and maybe they'll be exposed.
These guys don't quite get it. If a Democrat had done it - the press would be up in arms. Tweety would be on full-spittle mode. Fox News would trot out fancy news graphics and cool music (a lovely death march), etc...etc...
Many of Brad DeLong's commenters are unable (or simply being willfully obtuse) to understand his "alternative universe" post in which Scalia mocks his fellow justices for their Loving v. Virginia decision, which nullified miscegenation laws way back in 1967.
Brad's point, obviously, is that the legal principles that Scalia appeals to in order to mock the recent sodomy case would apply equally to Loving v. Virginia, and likely Brown v. Board of education and Dred Scott as well, at least according to this non-lawyer.
Conservatives rarely pipe up and say what they think about those decisions these days...
Okay, I know it's just a college paper, but on no planet does Hardball reach "millions per viewers" unless by that you mean "millions of viewers per month." But, good for Kucinich. All Democrats should boycott his show.
WASHINGTON - Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia (news - web sites) ridiculed his court's recent ruling legalizing gay sex, telling an audience of conservative activists Thursday that the ruling ignores the Constitution in favor of a modern, liberal sensibility.
The ruling, Scalia said, "held to be a constitutional right what had been a criminal offense at the time of the founding and for nearly 200 years thereafter."
Scalia adopted a mocking tone to read from the court's June ruling that struck down state antisodomy laws in Texas and elsewhere."
I'm sure some of my smarter readers can come up with some other fine examples of things which had been a criminal offense for a very long time but have since been ruled unconstitutional....
When black servants were reduced to slavery, the colonial governing classes redoubled their efforts to stamp out racial mixing. Miscegenation in this era was not only a serious breach of Puritan morality, but also a serious threat to slavery and the stability of the servile labor force.
The earliest record available against the cohabitation of black-white servants was the case of Hugh Davis, a white servant in Virginia who was sentenced to a public beating on Sept. 17, 1630, before an assembly of blacks and others for defiling himself with a Negro. It was required that he confesses as much the following Sabbath (Burger 10).
The first law to deter racial intermarriage was enacted in the early colonial period. The General Assembly of the Colony of Maryland in 1661 deplored the fact that there were many cases of intermarriage between white female servants and black slaves. It legislated that if any free born white woman intermarried with a black slave; she would have to serve her husbands master as long as the slave lived (Burger 10-11).
In 1681, a new Maryland law decreed that any freeborn white woman who married a black slave with the permission of the slave''s master could retain her freedom. However, the master or mistress of the intermarried slave and the clergyman performing the ceremony were to be penalized by a fine. This law was an attempt to deter racial intermarriage by shifting the penalty to those allegedly responsible for the action of slaves (Burger 11).
Some other colonies also legislated against black-white marriages. North Carolina in 1715 set up a heavy fine and a period of servitude for any white woman who married a Negro. It also provided a 50-pound fine to the clergyman who officiated. Massachusetts in 1705, and Pennsylvania in 1725 also passed similar legislation (Burger 11).
In the legislatures of several of the states which had no prohibitive laws to prevent black-white marriages, bills to prevent such, were introduced several times in states such as WI, MASS, CONN, WA, KS, MN, IA, IL, MI, OH, PA, NY. Congress also considered bills to prevent this in D.C. The states which had laws against black white marriages followed a similar pattern, mostly southern and western states, while northern ones had no laws. After the U.S. became a nation, eventually 33 states prohibited one or more forms of interracial marriage (Burger 13).
After the adoption of the 14th amendment to the constitution, July 28, 1868, the question immediately arose whether or not state laws prohibiting intermarriage denied colored people the equality guaranteed to them by the amendment. Most cases were decided in State courts and the laws were upheld (Burger 13).
In 1883, the United States Supreme Court upheld a state statute upholding a larger penalty for adultery or fornication when committed by members of different races (Pace vs. Alabama). A similar Florida statute was overturned in 1962, but even as late as 1964 (just 35 years ago folks), 19 states still had these laws existing (with Indiana and Wyoming being the two non-Southern states with laws against miscegenation) (David 1).
I look forward to Scalia reading from Loving v. Virginia in a mocking tone in front of Clarence and Virginia Thomas.
"And I'm not suggesting that single men -- heterosexual, homosexual -- [or] single women -- heterosexual, homosexual -- without children should get married. I mean that's -- if they want to get married, if that's the time of their life they want to do that, that's fine."
Finally, someone points out the obvious inconsistency in the moral posturing of the jeebofascists - their lack of care about fertility treatments:
None of this matters if you believe that a microscopic embryo is a human being with the same human rights as you and me. George W. Bush claims to believe that, and you have to believe something like that to justify your opposition to stem-cell research. But Bush cannot possibly believe that embryos are full human beings, or he would surely oppose modern fertility procedures that create and destroy many embryos for each baby they bring into the world. Bush does not oppose modern fertility treatments. He even praised them in his anti-stem-cell speech.
When he replaced Sen. Trent Lott (Miss.) as Majority Leader, Sen. Bill Frist (Tenn.) was supposed to usher in a new era of good relations between GOP leaders and black voters.
But Democrats are howling about an e-mail Senate Republicans sent out in advance of Wednesday’s confirmation hearing for Janice Rogers Brown, a black woman who has been nominated to a federal judgeship.
The e-mail invited “black journalists and reporters” to participate in a conference call on the nomination battle, according to The New York Post.
Apparently realizing the odd nature of limiting the call to scribes of one skin color, the GOP quickly fired off a slightly improved — but still tortured — e-mail inviting all “reporters on the judicial nominees beat as well as African-American journalists” to join the call.
The executive editor of the New York Times said Wednesday that the paper has no objection if the Pulitzer Prize board wants to revoke an award granted to one of its reporters 71 years ago.
Stepping into a simmering controversy over whether Walter Duranty deserved the prize for his largely favorable reporting on Joseph Stalin's Soviet Union, Bill Keller said the paper has notified the board that the Times considers Duranty's work "pretty dreadful ... It was a parroting of propaganda."
After a review conducted by a history professor, Keller said, the Times essentially told the board in a letter that "it's up to you to decide whether to take it back. We can't unaward it. Here's our assessment of the guy's work: His work was clearly not prizeworthy."
You sure don't hear much about the Chi-Coms anymore, do you. Bush says that "We see a China that...works to secure the freedom of its own people."
Aside from the absurdity of this, it shows how Bush thinks. He's talking about China's involvement in the "war on terra." As long as you are with us in the war on terra, you are working to secure the freedom of your people, regardless of the human rights abuses of your own government.
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