October 2010 archive

How big government should be stirs debate

 

By Susan Page, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON – Americans are having a crisis of confidence in their government.

A majority in a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll disapprove of the jobs President Obama and Congress are doing and have unfavorable views of both major political parties. Only half express even a fair amount of trust and confidence in the people who hold or are running for public office. Just one in four are satisfied with the way the nation is being governed.

Meanwhile, six in 10 Americans say the government has too much power, and nearly half agree with this alarming statement: “The federal government poses an immediate threat to the rights and freedom of ordinary citizens.”

US Air Force Gen. (Ret.) Michael Hayden, former CIA Director and NSA chief under George W. Bush, was a guest on State of the Union with Candy Crowley. Naturally the discussion was about terrorism, the recent European travel alerts and the drone attacks in Pakistan that are perpetuating the cycle of terror threats from Al Qaeda. Naturally the discussion also turned to the possibility of another attack in the US and that Americans are on edge based on recent polling done by CNN.

CROWLEY: I want to show you a poll that we took between October 5 and 7, so a recent poll. And the question was, “Will there be acts of terrorism in the U.S. in the next few weeks? Forty-nine percent said it’s likely. Forty-eight percent said not likely. What does the former head of the CIA say?

HAYDEN: I’m not surprised that people are on edge. I’m a little surprised at the spread, particularly since you gave it a time frame in the next few weeks. I don’t think any of us inside government who have a chance to see the variety of information would attach that imminence to the — to the attack. But the probability, I think all of us would agree to. We’ve been quite good since 9/11. We’ve worked very hard. We’ve taken the fight to the enemy…

Keep that fear factor going.

Ms. Crowley then turned the conversation to Pakistan

CROWLEY: We of course, in order to make up for the lack of action in northern Waziristan, have been sending these drones in, record number in September.

There is a cost to it, of course, because the Pakistani populace, which in general doesn’t like the U.S. — the Pakistani government has to make sure that they don’t — there’s no uprising from them because it looks like the Pakistani government is cooperating too much with the U.S.

Do you think these drones have been excessive, and do you think they’re always helpful?

HAYDEN: Well, as you know, I’m not here to confirm or deny any specific operational activity.

. . . But I do know that taking the fight to the enemy, being able to take Al Qaida’s senior leadership off the battlefield, as we say, and that began about July of 2008, in the current effort has been, I think, the single greatest factor in keeping America and our friends safe. I know all activity…All activity that we do…to take the enemy off the battlefield is done very carefully. It’s great precision, high confidence in the intelligence. So I think it’s an appropriate course of action. In fact, it’s one that, in conscience, it would be very difficult for any administration to stop doing.

CROWLEY: You sound as though you believe President Obama is doing a good job on the terrorism front.

HAYDEN: There are some things that I disagree with, and I’ve disagreed with publicly.

CROWLEY: Such as?

HAYDEN: Making the CIA Office of Legal Counsel interrogation memos public, stopping the CIA interrogation program and not really replacing it with any other interrogation program, even to this date.

But, by and large, there’s been a powerful continuity between the 43rd and the 44th president, and I think that simply reflects the reality that both President Obama and President Bush faced in terms of the threat and the tools that are available to them.

(emphasis mine)

What digby said peas in a pod

Up Date: Glenn Greenwald picks this up today with this final comment:

Civil liberties and a belief in the need to check government power is something many people care about only when the other party is in control.  They seem to believe that there are two kinds of leaders — Good ones (their party) and Bad ones (the other party) — and it’s only when the latter wield power that safeguards and checks are necessary.  Good leaders, by definition, are entitled to trust and faith that they will wield power appropriately and for Good ends, thus rendering unnecessary things like accountability, transparency, oversight and even due process.  Of course, the core premise of our government from the start was that political power will be inevitably abused if it is exercised without constraints, that nothing is more irrational or destructive than placing blind faith in political leaders to exercise unchecked power magnanimously.  But the temptation to want to follow Leaders blindly — to believe in their core Goodness and to thus vest them with unverified trust — is almost as compelling a part of human nature as the abuse of power when exercised without checks and in the dark.

That’s why self-anointed defenders of the Constitution are instantly transformed into authoritarians and back again every time there is a change of party control:  many people don’t believe in these principles generally, but only when political leaders they dislike are in power. The problem, though, is that endorsing civil liberties abuses because one’s own Party is in power virtually ensures that those abuses will become permanent, available to future leaders from the other Party as well.  That was the argument which fell on deaf ears when made to cheering Bush supporters, and it’s barely more effective now.

(emphasis mine)

Do you hear this, Obama Loyalists? You CANNOT have it both ways.

Welcome to the third to last xx/xx/xx year in our lifetimes  Only next year and 2012 until we wait another 88 years for one.

Now that I have gotten your attention, actually MOST plastic bottles are not evil from a health and safety perspective, but the way that we use them certainly is evil.  I did say MOST, since by far the greatest number of plastic containers are made of polyethylene (PE, recycle code 2), polypropylene (PP, recycle code 5), or polyethylene terephthalate, (PET or PETE, recycle code 1).  These materials are not very apt to leach harmful materials into the contents.

Some plastics, notably polycarbonate (PC, recycle code 7 [7 is a catch all for “other”]) are apt to leach out harmful materials, particularly bisphenol A, strongly suspected as being an endocrine system disruptor because of its potential to mimic estrogen.  Polycarbonate containers are clear and usually thick, while PE and PP are translucent.  PETE is also clear, but usually quite a bit thinner than PC.  Just look at the recycle codes on the bottom.

Broadcast premiers.  The Amazing Race.  Sunday Night Throwball, Iggles @ 9ers.  You’d think Twins/Yankees on TBS, but the Yankees already closed out in 3 so you’ll have to settle for Phillies @ Reds on TNT.  No idea what TBS will fill with.

And how are our brackets doing?  Rays even up, told you the Rangers were not that good.  Braves even up against the Giants (pending this afternoon’s results, Giants 1 – 0 in the 7th as I write).  Phillies can close out.

• ABC Family– The Parent Trap
• AMC– The Kingdom, Rubicon and Mad Men (premiers)
• Food– Next Iron Chef (premier), Food Feud (Series Premier)
• FX– 27 Dresses, Baby Mama
• History– Ice Road Truckers, Swamp People (premiers)
• Lifetime– Ann Rule’s Too Late to Say Goodbye, The Client List
• Sci Fi– Silent Hill, Cold Creek Manor
• Turner Classics– Sweet Smell of Success, The Defiant Ones (Tony Curtis night)
• Toon– Sym-Bionic Titan, Clone Wars, Delocated (this week’s)
• USA– Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
• Vs.– Bull Riding (yesterday’s and today’s)

Later-

• Discovery– Life marathon
• FX– First Daughter
• Sci Fi– Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2, The Dunwich Horror
• Turner Classics– Trapeze, The Great Race
• USA– Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Childrens Hospital, Metalocalypse (premiers).  New Venture Brothers (last week’s episode Everybody Comes to Hank’s

Prepare every vessel that floats.  At dawn we go to war.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Rioters attack Serb police, ruling party HQ at Gay Pride

by Aleksandra Niksic, AFP

1 hr 6 mins ago

Rube Goldberg, himself, could not have designed a more convoluted method to, in fact, fuck us. . . . .

Thank you, President Obama. You know it’s crazy when getting back to square one feels like a victory

Where is the money to finance the campaign ads coming from to influence Americans elections? The campaign finance system is broken and no one wants to fix it.

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

October 10 is the 283rd day of the year (284th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 82 days remaining until the end of the year.

On October 10, 1935, George Gershwin’s opera Porgy and Bess premieres on Broadway.

Porgy and Bess is an opera, first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. It was based on DuBose Heyward’s novel Porgy and the play of the same name which he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy Heyward. All three works deal with African American life in the fictitious Catfish Row (based on the real-life Rainbow Row) in Charleston, South Carolina, in the early 1920s.

Originally conceived by Gershwin as an “American folk opera”, Porgy and Bess premiered in New York in the fall of 1935 and featured an entire cast of classically trained African-American singers-a daring and visionary artistic choice at the time. Gershwin chose African American Eva Jessye as the choral director for the opera. Incorporating a wealth of blues and jazz idioms into the classical art form of opera, Gershwin considered it his finest work.

The work was not widely accepted in the United States as a legitimate opera until 1976, when the Houston Grand Opera production of Gershwin’s complete score established it as an artistic triumph. Nine years later the Metropolitan Opera gave their first performance of the work. This production was also broadcast as part of the ongoing Saturday afternoon live Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts. The work is now considered part of the standard operatic repertoire and is regularly performed internationally. Despite this success, the opera has been controversial; some critics from the outset have considered it a racist portrayal of African Americans.

“Summertime” is by far the best-known piece from the work, and countless interpretations of this and other individual numbers have also been recorded and performed. The second best-known number is “It Ain’t Necessarily So“. The opera is admired for Gershwin’s innovative synthesis of European orchestral techniques with American jazz and folk music idioms.

Porgy and Bess tells the story of Porgy, a disabled black beggar living in the slums of Charleston, South Carolina. It deals with his attempts to rescue Bess from the clutches of Crown, her violent and possessive lover, and Sportin’ Life, the drug dealer. Where the earlier novel and stage-play differ, the opera generally follows the stage-play.

The Porgy and Bess original cast recording was included by the National Recording Preservation Board in the Library of Congress, National Recording Registry in 2003. The board selects songs on an annual basis that are “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”

On July 14, 1993, the United States Postal Service recognized the opera’s cultural significance by issuing a commemorative 29-cent postage stamp, and in 2001 Porgy and Bess was proclaimed the official opera of the State of South Carolina.

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

The Sunday Talking Heads:

This Week with Christiane Amanpour: Christiane Amanpour goes on the trail to Connecticut this week with two Sunday exclusives — Senate candidates Republican Linda McMahon and Democrat Richard Blumenthal and Pakistan’s former President Pervez Musharraf comes to “This Week” for an exclusive interview, shares his views on the growing crisis between the United States and a critical ally, and discusses his return to politics. Can the Islamic republic win the war against extremism? Can al Qaeda and the Taliban be defeated? Will Pakistan’s nuclear weapons be kept in safe hands?

Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer: Joining Mr. Schieffer on Sunday will be David Axelrod, White House Senior Adviser and Ed Gillespie, Chairman of the Republican State Leadership Committee and Former Chair of the Republican National Committee

The Chris Matthews Show: This Sunday on Mr. Matthews’ round table forum Andrea Mitchell, NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, Bob Woodward, The Washington Post Associate Editor, David Brooks, The New York Times Columnist and Helene Cooper, The New York Times

White House Correspondent. They will discuss these questions:

Is Obama’s National Security Team at war?

What’s the evidence Hillary Clinton might bump Joe Biden?

Are Voters Set to Elect Some Extremists to the Senate?

Meet the Press with David Gregory: David Gregory moderates the first showdown between the major party candidates vying for the U.S. Senate seat in Illinois: State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias (D) vs. Rep. Mark Kirk (R). Mr. Gregory will be joined by Joe Klein, a columnist for Time Magazine and Peggy Noonan, columnist for The Wall Street Journal, who will talk about the coming election and what voters greatest concerns

State of the Union with Candy Crowley: It’s an all-exclusive Sunday! As the midterm elections approach, we talk politics with two House leaders. First, we sit down with Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, and then Republican Chief Deputy Whip Kevin McCarthy of California joins us for his rebuttal. We then continue our discussion of the midterms by breaking down the numbers with pollsters Celinda Lake and Whit Ayres. Finally, we look at the landscape of current terror threats worldwide with the man who led the CIA under President George W. Bush, Retired General Michael Hayden.

Fareed Zakaris: GPS: This week on GPS: Fareed’s been saying for years that we need to talk to the Taliban. And now the Afghan government is in supposedly “secret” negotiations with them. Will this be the path to peace for Afghanistan? Fareed’s take: maybe, but don’t expect any miracles.

Then, Americans are gearing up to go the polls. The Tea Party is causing much tumult in the mid-term elections. But just what IS the Tea Party all about? And just what political tradition is it “steeped” in? A GPS panel of great historians and thinkers puts it in all context.

And if you think unemployment in the U.S. is bad then you won’t believe what is going on in South Africa. The World Cup was its coming out party but now that the party is over, will rampant unemployment and massive labor strikes cripple the country? And just who is to blame?

Next up, America’s “car czar”, Steven Rattner, with a behind the scenes look at the bailout of the automotive industry and the goings-on inside the White House. Were the car companies really worth saving at all?

And finally a last look at a politician topping the pop charts. You’ll be surprised to see who it is.

Breakthrough! Now for 33 very careful rescues

As they say all over Chile: ‘Fuerza mineros!’ – strength to the miners. Guy Adams reports from Camp Hope at San José mine

Sunday, 10 October 2010

Punching the air, as bells and car horns rang out over the San José mine, and grinning from ear to ear, Roxanna Gomez rose from the chair where she’d spent yet another nervous night waiting by the campfire and hugged her family in celebration of a moment they scarcely dared to believe had actually arrived.

Shortly after dawn, 66 days after a rockfall trapped her father, Mario, and 32 of his colleagues half a mile beneath the surface of a remote Chilean mine, a team of rescue workers rushed into the tent city they’ve been calling Camp Hope to announce that a drill had finally broken through to the cavern where the men are trapped.