MotherJones.com | MoJoBlog - Social Issues and Political Commentary: June 17, 2007

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June 23, 2007

Title IX--35 Years Old And Still Misunderstood

Title IX is 35 years old today. The brainchild of former Congresswoman Patsy Mink, Title IX establishes equal opportunity for girls in all schools that receive federal funding. Unfortunately, the term "Title IX" is now associated with equal athletic opportunity, but the law covers much more than that.

Also unfortunately, many people who write and argue about Title IX, including many journalists who should know better, are clueless about how the law works.

The ACLU website, in recognition of the 35th anniversary, has an entire section devoted to Title IX. Here, you can learn about what the law means, look at actual Title IX case summaries, and find out what you can do to help promote the ideals of Title IX.

June 22, 2007

More on Our New Fourth Branch of Government

Ever-helpful White House spokesperson Dana Perino addresses the curious question of whether Dick Cheney is his own special branch of government:

Q: Do you agree with the contention that the Office of the Vice President is not part of the executive branch?

MS. PERINO: What I know -- and I am not a lawyer; and this is an interesting constitutional question that legal scholars can debate and I'm sure you'll find plenty of them inside the beltway -- is that the Vice President has a unique role in our United States government. He is not only the Vice President of the United States, but in that role he is also the President of the Senate. I will let him go ahead and --

Q: So there's a fourth branch of government.

MS. PERINO: -- I will let that debate be held.

So Cheney's not part of the executive because he's part of the legislative branch. Fascinating. And you gotta love Perino's deft use of the old "We've Made Up Our Minds, But You're Welcome to Debate This" move from the Bush Rhetorical Playbook.

Sheriff Obama To Clean Up Town -- On the First Day

The Obama campaign has released Barack Obama's plan to reform Washington -- a plan they say he will enact on his first day in office. Some of it goes a good bit further than the measures Democrats in Congress have enacted, some of it is short on details. Regardless, he definitely has his heart in the right place. Highlights from a fact sheet sent out by the campaign:

- Closing the revolving door: No political appointee in an Obama Administration would be able to lobby the executive branch during the remainder of the Administration. Huge change from the current way of doing things.

- Ending the abuse of no-bid contracts: Admirable, but no details given.

- Stopping the influence of lobbyists: President Obama would issue an executive order banning lobbyists from giving gifts in any form to executive branch employees.

- Ending politicization of the federal government: Tougher enforcement measures in the Hatch Act.

- Cute/nutty stuff: Obama would not sign any bill without giving the public an opportunity to comment on the White House website for five days. Cabinet officials would be required to host national broadband town halls. And there's this sort of Big-Brother-for-federal-employees thing: "Obama will require his appointees... to conduct the significant business of the agency in public, so that any citizen can see in person or watch on the Internet as the agencies debate and deliberate the issues that affect American society. Videos of meetings will be archived on the web, and the transcript will be available to the public." American citizens can watch in person as bureaucrats do their jobs?? How incredibly boring and ripe for trouble.

- Disclosure on earmarks and tax breaks: President Obama would ensure that any tax
breaks to special interests, or tax earmarks, are posted on the Office of Management and Budget's website.

- No more political operatives with sweet jobs: "Obama will issue an Executive Order requiring that political appointees possess relevant professional qualifications and experience related to the core mission of the agency for which they are nominated."

You can read more about Obama's plans for corruption, oversight, etc. at this campaign web page.

Media Donates Politically in Small Numbers -- But Mostly to Democrats

The investigative unit at MSNBC.com just published a long study of which journalists donate money to political candidates and causes. Campaign contributions by a journalist are often seen as acceptable things -- the assumption being that the contribution is part of the journalist's private life and the partisan support it implies won't affect his or her work. Some newsrooms don't care, some ban contributions by political reporters and editors (Abe Rosenthal, the former New York Times editor, is reported to have said, "I don't care if you sleep with elephants as long as you don't cover the circus."), and some ban donations altogether. But the workplace rules that govern or don't govern this issue are less interesting that the picture it paints of journalism as an industry.

Of the 144 journalists who made political contributions between 2004 and the first quarter of 2007, 125 gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Just 17 gave to Republicans, while two gave to both. There are some obvious ones -- a producer for Bill O'Reilly gave to Republicans -- but there are some surprises -- a researcher for Brit Hume gave to Democrats. (Penance?)

Salon.com loves Democrats, as do Newsweek and Rolling Stone. But perhaps no one helps out the left more than The New Yorker, which places no restrictions on donations and had fully 10 writers and staffer donate to Democrats (and none to Republicans). You can see the full list here. What is it about journalism as a business that attracts left-leaning folks? Or is there something about working in journalism that makes a lefty out of you over time? Speculation is welcomed in the comments.

Maybe the most valuable conclusion here, though, is that journalists mostly take pains to maintain objectivity -- the 144 who have donated represent less than one percent of the reported 100,000 journalists nationwide.

Redoing the Primary System: Rotating Regionals?

Lamar Alexander, like many people, is upset with the primaries-gone-wild fiasco we've seen recently: too many states are moving too far up the calendar, leading to a front-loaded campaign that favors big money candidates and necessitates frenetic campaigning years before the election. What's the alternative? A rotating regional primary system:

Alexander said the model for federal legislation is based on a 1999 bill that Lieberman co-wrote that would have created a regional primary system. That bill would have created a system of four rotating regions, with a cluster of 13 mid-Atlantic and Northeast states voting on the first Tuesday of March, with a southern group of states going the first Tuesday of April, a Midwest group the first Tuesday of May and a Mountain West and far West group going last, the first Tuesday of June.

The next election, the order would be rotated so that no region would always go first. That bill, which was referred to the Senate Rules and Administration Committee, went nowhere legislatively speaking.

The states would likely hate this idea, because it takes control away from them, and in a body where a single senator can hold up legislation, the lawmakers from New Hampshire and Iowa would make sure it doesn't go anywhere. But at least someone's doing some thinking on the issue.

June 21, 2007

Dick Cheney: Check and Balance This!

Quick, forget everything you learned in 5th-grade social studies (or Election) about the three branches of government. You know, the executive, judicial, and legislative. Now it turns out we actually have four branches of government. Like so many of the interesting new things we've learned about how the federal government is really supposed to work, this head-scratcher comes from Dick Cheney. Rep. Henry Waxman's government oversight committee has the details:

The Oversight Committee has learned that over the objections of the National Archives, Vice President Cheney exempted his office from the presidential order that establishes government-wide procedures for safeguarding classified national security information. The Vice President asserts that his office is not an “entity within the executive branch.” [emphasis mine]

So there you have it. There's a fourth branch of government, and its name is Dick Cheney. But what should the official name be? How about the "extracurricular branch"? Add your naming suggestions in the comments.

Finally, Some Answers on NSA Domestic Spying?

The Senate Judiciary Committee has made at least nine formal requests for documents regarding the NSA's domestic spying programs, but the Bush Administration has refused to hand anything over. The stonewalling may finally cease now that the committee has voted to issue subpoenas, with Chairman Leahy openly questioning what the Administration has to hide.

A list of the documents Leahy and the committee hope to uncover can be found here.

Look Who's Back

Ralph Nader is considering another run for president and if the early reviews are any indication, even the lefty blogs are against him. See Daily Kos, The Plank, AMERICAblog, and Obsidian Wings.

And you can add me to the list. Ralph, please, we've had enough.

Police Academy 8: Iraqi Edition

Yikes. AMERICAblog finds a startling comparison: it takes seven days of training to become a Starbucks barista. It takes just eight to become an Iraqi cop.

Well, not exactly a cop. A backup cop, part of an Anbar "provincial security force." You see, there aren't enough police academies in which to train police recruits properly, so the thousands of extra men who seek the uniform head out to dusty back lots with U.S. Marines and run obstacles courses for little over a week. When they're done, they keep the uniform and gun, do security operations occasionally, and wait until they get called for real police training.

Now this may come as a surprise, but this rigorous process isn't exactly inspiring confidence or creating a trustworthy police force. The governor of the province in which this is occurring says the police are unreliable and operate with their own agendas. Prime Minister Maliki is complaining that the Americans are artificially inflating the Iraqi police corps. Even American forces can see we're just arming random people, and possibly creating bigger problems than the ones we hope to solve.

Democrats' Plans for Universal Health Care Helps Red States Most

Let's say a Democrat wins the 2008 election and institutes universal health care. Who benefits the most? Republicans.

That's right -- a new study shows that the red states (mostly in the South) consistently rate at the bottom of the country in terms of health care for residents. The Commonwealth Fund report ranked states according to 32 indicators of health care access, quality, outcomes, and hospital use. Consider the political leanings of the top ten and the bottom ten.

States 1-10: Hawaii, Iowa, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, South Dakota.

States 50-41: Oklahoma, Mississippi, Texas, Arkansas, Nevada, Louisiana, Kentucky, West Virginia, Florida, Georgia.

This shouldn't be a surprise. States led by Republicans are more likely to have laissez faire attitudes towards health care and be less sympathetic to the plights of those who cannot afford it. It doesn't help that these states are often the most hostile towards workers' rights, thus driving down wages, and often have the highest number of single mothers, due to the nation's highest rates of divorce and out-of-wedlock births. Get all the details and schadenfreude at PERRspectives Blog.

Who Needs It? Only Tiny Percentage of Baghdad Embassy Employees Speak Arabic

We blogged a while back about how the U.S. ambassador to Iraq was complaining to Condi Rice about the quality of his people in the Baghdad embassy. Too young, he said. Or too inexperienced. Or couldn't find work elsewhere.

Maybe the fact that only 10 of his foreign service folks speak Arabic fluently has something to do with his griping.

June 20, 2007

Mike Bloomberg -- Can an Invisible Man be President?

With New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg announcing he's dropping his GOP affiliation in favor of independent status, people across the web are speculating about his presidential ambitions.

I'm not buying in. Even though Bloomberg's constituents think he would make a better president than his predecessor, Rudy Giuliani, and even though Mayor Mike has billions of his own cash to spend on an independent run, and even though the mainstream media falls in love with independents, and even though we've done a bit of speculating ourselves -- I can't shake the sense that Bloomberg, as a savvy businessman and manipulator of public attention, simply sees an opportunity to keep his name in the spotlight as term limits boot him out of office and is taking advantage. Maybe to further his business interests, maybe to secure the ambassadorship to France, maybe so he can be President Somebody's VP -- who knows? But not to run for president.

Bloomberg cannot possibly be so egomaniacal as to overlook the (incredibly salient) fact that the excited folks at New York- and DC-based news outlets have indeed overlooked -- outside of New York and elite media and government circles, no one really knows who Mike Bloomberg is. This is anecdotally true, no doubt, but confirmed by the only poll that appears to have tested the subject -- according to Forbes, only 23 percent of those interviewed are able to recognize Mike Bloomberg. That's compared to 70 percent or higher for some of the presidential frontrunners. Yes, Bloomberg's been astonishingly effective. Yes, he's made progress on issues the federal government won't take up. Yes, he's avoided partisan wrangling and done so to his constituents' advantage. But the vast majority of the country doesn't know who he is. Aren't we all getting a little carried away?

Late Update: Hmm. This Pew poll directly contradicts the Forbes poll. Maybe I'm way off base here...

They Made it in New York, But Not at Home

Wilton, Connecticut School Superintendent Gary Richards had this to say about the play, Voices in Conflict, that Wilton High School Students wrote and planned to perform at the school: "The student performers directly acting the part of the soldiers...turns powerful material into a dramatic format that borders on being sensational and inappropriate. We would like to work with the students to complete a script that fully addresses our concerns."

The students responded to Richards immediately by incorporating his statement into the play. Then their principal banned Voices in Conflict, so two weeks ago, the high school company performed the play off-Broadway. Voices in Conflict incorporates testimonials from soldiers, including letters, blogs, and taped interviews. It also uses Yvonne Latty's book, In Conflict, as a source for material.

Wilton principal Timothy H. Canty said he was concerned that the play might be hurtful toward families who had lost loved ones in the war or who had loved ones serving in the war. "It would be easy to look at this case on first glance and decide this is a question of censorship or academic freedom. In some minds, I can see how they would react this way. But quite frankly, it's a false argument."

Students tell a different story. They say that Canty told them that only someone who had served in the war could understand the experience, and that one student had complained about the play.

If Wilton High School sounds familiar, it should. That is the school that gained publicity for calling Gay-Straight Alliance posters a safety hazard, and for telling students not to wear bandanas because they were associated with gangs.

The Right Has its Own Marion Barry

The state treasurer of South Carolina and the state chair for Rudy Giuliani's presidential campaign, obviously a Republican, was indicted Tuesday for allegedly being a coke dealer.

That is all. Just thought you should know.

New White House Report Pokes Anti-Immigration Foes with Sharp Stick

The White House has released a report by the president’s Council of Economic Advisers that concludes, "Immigration has a positive effect on the American economy as a whole and on the income of native-born American workers."

People on our side of the debate appreciate the White House's efforts, but the report is unlikely to convince these folks. In fact, it'll probably make them more angry.

Bush Administration Under Investigation for Signing Statement Abuses

Two days ago, we wrote about a GAO report on presidential signing statements. While signing statements can be used legitimately to indicate how the executive branch interprets a law passed by Congress, the Bush Administration has used them to basically nullify laws without having to go through the embarrassment of vetoing them. Moreover, this president has used signing statements in unprecedented numbers. (For a couple examples of laws that were distorted or completely ignored because of this problem, see this article from our March/April 2007 issue.)

Democrats in Congress caught wind of the GAO report -- which is no shock because two Democrats in Congress commissioned it -- and will investigate. No law has been broken, just the spirit of the law violated, so it's unlikely that Congress's inquiry will lead to anything more than a reprimand. But add this to the list of very needed investigations that began only after the GOP lost control of both houses.

June 19, 2007

Bush Vows to Veto Stem Cell Bill

President Bush, pushing for more embryo "adoptions," has promised to veto a stem cell research bill that passed the House 247-176. Read more at The Blue Marble.

Good Job, You're Fired

The Bush administration's pattern of promoting imbeciles like Paul Wolfowitz while sacking competent lawmakers like Colin Powell continues, with the news that budget director Rob Portman will step down. (His stated reason—to spend more time with his family—suggests that the move was not voluntary.) The Washington Post reports that Portman "is one of the most popular Cabinet members on the Hill, and even Democrats speak highly of his intellect and affability." The timing of Portman's departure is odd, given that the next two years will require someone who can negotiate with the Democrats.

Enter Jim Nussle, who is known for his combative style. The AP reports:

As House budget chairman, Nussle helped draft the blueprint for Bush's signature 2001 and 2003 tax bills....Republican leaders and conservatives such as Nussle regularly rolled over Democrats - and took pleasure in doing so.

Asked what he thought of Nussle, House budget chair Steny Hoyer said, "What's the next question?" So why did this guy get the job, beyond the fact that the Bush White House seems to love to do things that throttle the democratic process?

He's a hawk.

With Friends Like Bush...

Imagine that somebody in power made it impossible for you to do your job, then watched as you were fired for not doing your job, then appeared on TV with your long-time nemesis, who had participated in making it impossible for you to do your job, and declared his support for you.

That's what President Bush has done to Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority. After free elections created a government divided between Abbas' moderate Fatah party and the radical Hamas party, Bush and his Israeli counterpart, Ehud Olmert, imposed such strict sanctions on the Palestinians that even those who had jobs weren't getting paid. Hamas would not and did not stand by and let this happen: The group overthrew Fatah in the Gaza Strip. Today, Bush and Olmert stood in the Oval Office together and declared their support for Abbas. Seriously? Here's the kiss of death: Bush called the emergency prime minister Abbas appointed "a good fella." Brownie, anyone?

Musharraf Gets Full U.S. Backing Despite Crackdowns

As I’ve pointed out before, the United States has refrained from directly criticizing General Musharraf’s assault on the judiciary and his crackdown on the Pakistani media. And once again, the Bush Administration is paying more lip service to its "commitment to democracy" while giving a military dictator full backing in the same breath.

This weekend, during his visit to Pakistan, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte gave Musharraf support by stating, "It is up to him (Gen Musharraf) to decide when to take off his uniform but we do want free, fair and transparent elections scheduled for this fall or early next year." Negroponte makes it clear where America stands: Despite the fact that Musharraf has locked up more than 1,000 opposition activists and shut down Pakistani TV channels that have been critical of him, it's really up to the good General to decide when to stop being a military dictator.

Negroponte and Musharraf also discussed strong U.S. support for Pakistan government's FATA Development Plan, "a $ 750 million five-year US support programme that we will begin implementing in the next few months" Money and political backing—what more could Musharraf ask for?

But the administration's actions certainly aren't winning us any hearts and minds of the people. As one Pakistani teacher puts it, "America is supporting Musharraf against the people...The reason people hate America here is that they always support dictatorship in Pakistan."

—Neha Inamdar

Hillary Clinton Makes Phenomenal New Campaign Vid -- To Introduce Crappy Song

Okay, I was all set to rip Hillary Clinton's choice of campaign song, but I can't anymore. She's really impressed me.

You probably know the story: supporters were allowed to suggest songs on the Clinton website and Clinton's top folks picked the one they liked best. Just today, they chose "You and I" by Celine Dion, which is great if you like shrieking Canadians and awful if you have taste. (You can hear the song at Clinton's campaign site.)

But boy, have they headed off criticism big time. The video introducing the pick is genius. Pure genius. I've watched it twice and smiled more the second time. It even has Bill Clinton saying, "My money's on Smashmouth!" Check it out here.

Note: After you've watched the video, come back and watch this one -- tell us which is better.

Bill Richardson Supports All-Muslim Peacekeeping Force in Iraq

Presidential candidate and hilarious ad-man Bill Richardson has frequently criticized Democratic frontrunners Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for being willing to leave a "residual" force in Iraq after the main pullout of American troops is over. Richardson says he would never support such a thing. "No airbases, no troops in the Green Zone, no embedded soldiers training Iraqi forces -- because we all know what that means -- it means our troops will still be out on patrol, with targets on their back."

But here's where it get interesting -- Richardson would leave some troops behind: "An all-Muslim peacekeeping force." I've never heard that before, but it could be interesting. I wonder if the Muslim peacekeepers would come from the region or from America. I also wonder if this idea has been seriously debated and fleshed out in think tanks and other places, or if Richardson is just pulling it out of thin air to gain a bit of publicity. Either way, interesting brain candy.

Update: An all-Muslim peacekeeping force has been considered before. Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf proposed it in May. Minus points for cribbing from a dictator, plus points for being open to ideas from around the world.

Mike Gravel Has the Only Campaign Focusing on "Light, Heat, Warmth"

Remember this video of Mike Gravel staring into your soul and then throwing a rock in a lake? It had a companion that consisted of (1) Gravel gathering twigs, and (2) a fire made of those twigs burning for seven minutes.

Weird and inexplicable, right? That's what I thought too until I found on MSNBC, via Wonkette, Gravel explaining the videos in brazenly cantankerous fashion.

"What people like you don’t understand — which I think is hilarious — is this is a metaphor," Gravel said Monday, lecturing guest host David Shuster during an appearance on MSNBC’s "Tucker."

You didn't understand two videos that looked like they were made by two dudes who got hopped up on acid, read a bunch of Foucault, and decided to make a crazy dreamscape campaign video? Listen closely to Mike Gravel: this means you're dumb.

Anyway, here's the explanations for the spots. Of the rock one, Gravel says, "The point of the spot is not the rock but the ripples it leaves in the water." Gravel is making waves. That doesn't explain the several minutes of staring directly into the camera, but whatevs.

Of the fire spot, the candidate says, "Branches are what people acquire in the way of wisdom... And then he reaches down and acquires a little more experience, a little more wisdom. Reaches down, picks up a little more wisdom. And then goes out and starts a fire."

"What does a fire represent?" Gravel asked rhetorically. "Fire represents light, heat, warmth. It’s the sustenance of life."

Makes sense, I guess. Except for the part about "branches are what people acquire in the way of wisdom." I always thought those were "degrees."

So, anyway, yeah -- how about Mike Gravel, everybody?

Massive Number of White House Emails Deleted

Quick follow up on the missing emails story. Here's what we know: the White House has been using nongovernmental email addresses, specifically ones administered by the RNC, in order to keep its correspondence out of the hands of investigators and historians. Congress caught wind of these nongovernmental email addresses through an entirely separate investigation, looked into the issue, and found that many of the emails sent through the RNC had been deleted.

Now we find that many, many more have been deleted than previously thought. The White House originally said that about 50 White House officials had RNC email accounts. But Henry Waxman and his supersleuth committee have found that there were at least 88 officials with secondary email addresses, and that emails for 51 of them have been completely lost.

While this shakes ones trust in our government -- what do they have to hide? -- the good news is that this is a potential violation of the Presidential Records Act, and officials scared of being indicted may take immunity in exchange for ratting out their superiors. Eighty-eight officials with nongovernmental emails is a coordinated, deliberate attempt to drive a stake through the heart of open government, and it must have been directed at the highest levels. Further investigation of Rove, anyone?

Unqualified Employees: State Dep't Repeating Pentagon's and CPA's Mistakes in Iraq

One of the problems that hampered reconstruction in Iraq was that the Bush Administration hired young loyalists with no foreign policy experience to do extremely important and difficult jobs. In his book Imperial Life in the Emerald City, Rajiv Chandrasekaran noted that potential employees seeking a position in Iraq were asked explicitly if they voted for George Bush in 2000, and some were even asked for their views on Roe v. Wade. Unsurprisingly, the people hired tried to implement tenets of conservative ideology instead of taking necessary and pragmatic steps.

So why stop now? The new U.S. ambassador to Iraq just complained to Condoleezza Rice in an unclassified memo that employees at the massive U.S. embassy in Baghdad are either too young for the job, are unqualified, and/or are "trying to save their careers" by taking an urgent assignment in Iraq.

"Simply put," wrote the ambassador, Ryan Crocker, "we cannot do the nation's most important work if we do not have the Department's best people." Sorry, Mr. Crocker. If this administration's track record is any indication, you'll be getting Bush-Cheney '04 opposition researchers and Heritage Foundation junior staffers. Good luck trying to protect America's interests in a failed state of our own making -- especially with those folks on your team.

The embassy in Baghdad is America's largest embassy in the world, with a 2007 budget of more than $1 billion and a staff that includes more than 1,000 Americans and 4,000 third-country nationals. It is due for a $1.3 billion remodeling, which would renovate the 100+ acre compound and add a new pool, tennis courts, basketball courts, and the like. Whoops, forget I mentioned that.

June 18, 2007

Quite Possibly the Stupidest Thing the Bush Administration Has Ever Said

I know: The bar is set high here. Before writing that headline, I asked myself, "Is this dumb thing so dumb that to call the administration a bunch of crackheads for saying it would be an insult to crackheads everywhere?" And I concluded, yes, it is that dumb.

This weekend, U.S. forces killed 7 children in Afghanistan and 100 died there in clashes between NATO and the resurgent Taliban. A new jihadist group continued fighting the Lebanese military from a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon. The more radical faction of the Palestinian government overthrew the more moderate Fatah in a five-day civil war in Gaza. The Iranian government—which by the way, is holding four American citizens with no charges—is engaged in a massive crackdown on civil liberties.

This morning, when asked if he thought the U.S. invasion of Iraq has helped stabilize the Middle East, White House spokesman Tony Snow said, "Hard to say....But it is pretty clear that a lot of people are putting their lives on the line for the cause of democracy in Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. And we support them."

Saner heads would have said something like this: "The Middle East is in flames....Everywhere you look, there’s deep trouble — Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinians, the peace process, Iran.…Are they linked? Of course they're linked." Saner heads like Lee Hamilton, who authored the Iraq Study Group report. The report correctly predicted that Bush's surge was a waste of time, money, and lives.

Jessica Lynch Tells Her Own Story

We've covered Jessica Lynch and her ordeal at some length here at Mother Jones. Now Lynch tells her own story, in Glamour.

MoJoBlog reads far and wide.

Coming Soon to a Courthouse Near You: The DOJ Scandal

Now the sh-t is really hitting the fan: In a spate of cases nationwide, defense attorneys are claiming that prosecutors brought charges against their clients for political reasons. Even minor instances of prosecutor misconduct notoriously create a rash of appeals. Given the scope of the Justice scandal, there is likely to be a waterfall of legal filings—some legit. and some far-fetched. For example, Missouri lawyers have referred to the DOJ's habit of charging Democrats with corruption to question a 2006 indictment of a company owned by a prominent Democrat. (The company was allegedly in violation of federal wage laws.) The case sounds fishy, to be sure:

The indictment, which came two months after the owner announced that she was running for political office, was obtained by a Republican U.S. attorney who also has been criticized because he charged workers for a left-leaning political group on the eve of the 2006 midterm election.

But defense attorneys have been known to grasp at straws, and for every legitimate charge of political shenanigans, there will be 10 accusations. The lawyer representing a man charged with child pornography has argued that the case is politically motivated. And attorneys for a prominent county-level Democrat in Delaware forced the Republican prosecutor in the case to respond with an inch-and-a-half thick brief denying partisan considerations before the judge determined that corruption charges against the Democrat were initiated before scandal-ridden AG AG took office.

We're likely to see more of these claims in the future, and judges around the country will be forced to weigh the merit of each and every one. Still further travesty of justice undertaken by the department charged with guarding against it.

Fred Thompson: Not Conservative Enough? Or Just Lazy?

Newsweek has gone hunting through Fred Thompson's eight years worth of Senate records that are stashed in a public archive at the University of Tennessee, and they've come to the conclusion that Thompson is not quite as conservative as his admirers on the right believe. Abortion is a big problem:

On a 1994 Eagle Forum survey, Thompson said he opposed criminalizing abortion. Two years later, on a Christian Coalition questionnaire, he checked "opposed" to a proposed constitutional amendment protecting the sanctity of human life. He struggled with the question of when life begins. "I do believe that the decision to have an early term abortion is a moral issue and should not be a legal one subject to the dictates of the government," he wrote...

[Thompson told the Conservative Spectator], "I'm not willing to support laws that prohibit early term abortions ... It comes down to whether life begins at conception. I don't know in my own mind if that is the case so I don't feel the law ought to impose that standard on other people."

Thompson told a different paper, "The ultimate decision on abortion should be left with the woman and not the government." But Big Fred likely won't have to make like Romney and disavow his previous stance. For all his ambivalence, Thompson maintained a straight pro-life voting record in the Senate. No matter what his personal beliefs, it seems he always knew what was good for him politically.

But what about campaign finance? The McCain-Feingold bill that irritated a number of conservatives and has badly hurt John McCain's fundraising was supported strongly by Thompson. In fact, he helped write the bill.

My response: eh. Thompson will have to flip-flop on that one. It's not like flip-flops are hurting anyone this campaign season -- king of the flip-flops, Mitt Romney, is in the lead. The more damaging claim against Thompson might be that he's too lazy to campaign for president, or serve as one. That's been getting a lot of traction. I mean a lot. Really, like, a ton.

Update: The Thompson-is-lazy links keep on coming. Here's one more. And another. This guy must really not like to work hard.

John McCain Trying to Dance the Big Money Dance, and Failing

The New York Times has an article today that focuses on how John McCain's uncompromising style of politics (until late, anyway) has created the presidential candidate's current fundraising woes.

For example, McCain has repeatedly hit defense contractors for being corrupt and wasteful, instead of using his position on the Armed Services Committee to become chummy with the industry. And he pays the price: his contributions from the military industry are less than half of what Chris Dodd has been able to pull in.

The problem is one McCain should have seen coming. One of his signature pieces of legislation is McCain-Feingold, which sought to limit the power of big money in politics. Now he has to do the big money dance, and no one with deep pockets wants to be his partner. Obama doesn't take money from lobbyists or special interests, so he would seem to be in the same position as McCain. So how does Obama raise so much while McCain is able to raise so little? One might argue that Obama has more momentum and a more magnetic personality. Or one might argue that Obama isn't America's single strongest supporter of a disastrous and badly unpopular war, and isn't alienating his own party over a surprisingly electric issue.

At Swampland, Joe Klein is getting sentimental over McCain's failings, and I can't quibble. I was victim to the same sort of thing when it was revealed in The Hill that McCain almost abandoned the GOP a few years back. I assumed that the news effectively meant the end of the McCain campaign, and I was sad to see McCain go. Klein disagrees with McCain's stance on the war but calls him an "essentially honorable man." I disagreed with McCain's stance on the war and lot of other stuff, but called him "decent." Surprisingly, Klein is taking worse jabs in his comments section than I did in ours.

A Justified but Tiring Hit Job on The New Republic

There seems to be nothing liberals inside the beltway and on the internet enjoy carping about more than The New Republic, which has certainly earned its share of criticism. It has provided Republicans with liberal cover for some of their most outrageous wrongdoings, the Iraq War being the most obvious. It's been a haven for an incredibly long list of conservative writers, and it has often taken more joy at being contrary and at slamming liberals than in defending the causes one would expect a liberal magazine to defend. Oh, and its long time owner and top editor who just sold the mag is an Arab-hating neocon who allowed a pro-Israel fever to overtake all else. We're all familiar with the problem.

Eric Alterman has a solid piece in the American Prospect arguing all of this and more. It's worth reading, but let me just say that while I get that deconstructing liberalism's past, and TNR's place within it, is important because it helps illustrate the present, pieces like Alterman's often feel like they are done for gossipy reasons, to draw stark lines and remind everyone that one or two influential people stood on the wrong side of divisive issues. We all know Marty Peretz is only ironically called a "liberal" and we all know that TNR has a nasty past. We all know they screwed up on health care in the '90s and screwed up the Iraq War in a horrible, horrible way. But if we focus on getting our pound of flesh instead of hitting the mutual foe we now share with a much-improved TNR, aren't we in a way committing the same sin as TNR did for many years?

I never thought I'd defend The New Republic. I guess my point is this. We all know the magazine has gotten better under Frank Foer and we all know the criticisms -- so what's the point in drudging up the old hits and slamming the magazine all over again?

June 23, 2007

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