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

THE GREAT COMET OF 1997. Above, the bright head of comet Hale-Bopp, called the coma, is pointed towards the Sun. The coma is composed of dust and gas, masking the solid nucleus of the comet made up of rock, dust and ice. Photo taken by Jim Young at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratories Table Mountain Observatory in March 1997.

The comet was discovered in 1995 by two independent observers, Alan Hale and Thomas Bopp, both in the United States. Hale had spent many hundreds of hours searching for comets without success, and was tracking known comets from his driveway in New Mexico when he chanced upon Hale-Bopp just after midnight. The comet had an apparent magnitude of 10.5 and lay near the globular cluster M70 in the constellation of Sagittarius. Hale first established that there was no other deep-sky object  near M70, and then consulted a directory of known comets, finding that none were known to be in this area of the sky. Once he had established that the object was moving relative to the background stars, he emailed the Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams, the clearing house for astronomical discoveries.

Bopp did not own a telescope. He was out with friends near Stanfield, Arizona observing star clusters and galaxies when he chanced across the comet while at the eyepiece of his friend’s telescope. He realized he might have spotted something new when, like Hale, he checked his star maps to determine if any other deep-sky objects were known to be near M70, and found that there were none. He alerted the Central Bureau of Astronomical Telegrams through a Western Union telegram. Brian Marsden, who has run the bureau since 1968, laughed, “Nobody sends telegrams anymore. I mean, by the time that telegram got here, Alan Hale had already e-mailed us three times with updated coordinates.”

The following morning, it was confirmed that this was a new comet, and it was named Comet Hale-Bopp, with the designation C/1995 O1. The discovery was announced in International Astronomical Union circular 6187.

“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.

David Sirota on Tax Cuts and Stupid Wars

In a terrific column for Tax.com, Pulitzer-Prize winner David Cay Johnston breaks down new government data and puts USA Today’s whole “lowest tax bills since 1950” revelation into dollars and cents we can all understand:

 

 In 1979 federal taxes for the median-income household totaled $6,100, but in 2007 taxes slipped to $6,000. That $100 decline, measured in 2007 dollars, understates what a bargain taxes have become. Back in 1979 federal taxes equaled 18.7 percent of comprehensive household income. By 2007 incomes had grown 28 percent in real terms, so the tax burden not only dropped in absolute dollars, it also fell as a share of median comprehensive income to 14.4 percent. So over 28 years median income has risen in real terms by $9,100 while federal taxes have fallen by $100.

As Johnston points out, this is not something you hear very much about from journalists — or as he puts it, “those who play journalists on television talk shows.” And you certainly don’t hear it from congressional Republicans or rank-and-file conservatives, who continue to bewail allegedly high taxes as our biggest problem, despite the real emergency of cash-strapped communities now slashing police forces, tear up roads and even outsource entire municipal workforces.

Robert Reich says We’re in a One-and-a-Half Dip Recession

We’re not in a double-dip recession yet. We’re in a one and a half dip recession.

Consumer confidence is down. Retail sales are down. Home sales are down. Permits for single-family starts are down. The average work week is down. The only things not down are inventories — unsold stuff is piling up in warehouses and inventories of unsold homes are rising — and defaults on loans.

The 1.5 dip recession should be causing alarm bells to ring all over official Washington. It should cause deficit hawks to stop squawking about future debt, blue-dog Democrats to stop acting like Republicans, and mainstream Democrats to get some backbone.

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

On this day in 1933, Wiley Post becomes the first person to fly solo around the world traveling 15,596 miles in 7 days, 18 hours and 45 minutes.

Like many pilots at the time, Post disliked the fact that the speed record for flying around the world was not held by a fixed-wing aircraft, but by the Graf Zeppelin, piloted by Hugo Eckener in 1929 with a time of 21 days. On June 23, 1931, Post and his navigator, Harold Gatty, left Roosevelt Field on Long Island, New York in the Winnie Mae with a flight plan that would take them around the world, stopping at Harbour Grace, Flintshire, Hanover twice, Berlin, Moscow, Novosibirsk, Irkutsk, Blagoveshchensk, Khabarovsk, Nome where his airscrew had to be repaired, Fairbanks where the airscrew was replaced, Edmonton, and Cleveland before returning to Roosevelt Field. They arrived back on July 1, after traveling 15,474 miles in the record time of 8 days and 15 hours and 51 minutes. The reception they received rivaled Lindbergh’s everywhere they went. They had lunch at the White House on July 6, rode in a ticker-tape parade the next day in New York City, and were honored at a banquet given by the Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce of America at the Hotel Astor. After the flight, Post acquired the Winnie Mae from F.C. Hall, and he and Gatty published an account of their journey titled, Around the World in Eight Days, with an introduction by Will Rogers.

His Lockheed Vega aircraft, the Winnie Mae is on display at the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, and his pressure suit is being prepared for display at the same location. On August 15, 1935, Post and American  humorist Will Rogers were killed when Post’s aircraft crashed on takeoff from a lagoon near Point Barrow, in Alaska.

It is fairly evident by now that the White House and the Treasury have been pushed into a corner and will have to nominate, or possibly appoint, Elizabeth Warren, currently the chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel created to investigate the U.S. banking bailout (TARP), to be the head of the newly created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. While she is eminently qualified and was the inspiration for the creation of the new agency, what is their objection? The Treasury Department and the President’s Council of Economic Advisors is a an “Old Boys’ Club” headed by an out right sexist, misogynist, Larry Summers and a closet one, Timothy Geithner. While Geithner has not out right said he opposes Warren, his statement that she was qualified was not a “bell ringer”.

As pointed out by Amy Siskind at the Post this is not Geithner’s “first clash with women in power”

One of his first acts in the role of Treasury Secretary was to attempt to push out FDIC Chairwoman Shelia Bair. As Rep. Barney Frank observed: “I think part of the problem now, to be honest, is Sheila Bair has annoyed the ‘old boys’ club…we have several regulators up in the tree house with a ‘no girls allowed’ sign…”

Geithner’s inability to respectfully interact with women in positions of power was further in evidence when he was questioned in April by the Congressional Oversight Panel. Warren rightfully asked Geithner about AIG’s funneling billions of taxpayers’ dollars to Goldman Sachs: Do you know where the money went? Geithner could barely conceal his disdain: watch his angry, condescending response here.

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

On this day in 1970, Aswan High Dam is completed. Construction for the dam began in 1960.

More than two miles long at its crest, the massive $1 billion dam ended the cycle of flood and drought in the Nile River region, and exploited a tremendous source of renewable energy, but had a controversial environmental impact.

A dam was completed at Aswan, 500 miles south of Cairo, in 1902. The first Aswan dam provided valuable irrigation during droughts but could not hold back the annual flood of the mighty Nile River.

snip

The giant reservoir created by the dam–300 miles long and 10 miles wide–was named Lake Nasser (in honor of Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser). The formation of Lake Nasser required the resettlement of 90,000 Egyptian peasants and Sudanese Nubian nomads, as well as the costly relocation of the ancient Egyptian temple complex of Abu Simbel, built in the 13th century B.C.

The Aswan High Dam brought the Nile’s devastating floods to an end, reclaimed more than 100,000 acres of desert land for cultivation, and made additional crops possible on some 800,000 other acres. The dam’s 12 giant Soviet-built turbines produce as much as 10 billion kilowatt-hours annually, providing a tremendous boost to the Egyptian economy and introducing 20th-century life into many villages. The water stored in Lake Nasser, several trillion cubic feet, is shared by Egypt and the Sudan and was crucial during the African drought years of 1984 to 1988.

Despite its successes, the Aswan High Dam has produced several negative side effects. Most costly is the gradual decrease in the fertility of agricultural lands in the Nile delta, which used to benefit from the millions of tons of silt deposited annually by the Nile floods. Another detriment to humans has been the spread of the disease schistosomiasis by snails that live in the irrigation system created by the dam. The reduction of waterborne nutrients flowing into the Mediterranean is suspected to be the cause of a decline in anchovy populations in the eastern Mediterranean. The end of flooding has sharply reduced the number of fish in the Nile, many of which were migratory. Lake Nasser, however, has been stocked with fish, and many species, including perch, thrive there.

What is the Obama administration doing? I can’t believe that Secretary of Agriculture, Thomas Vilsack, demanded a resignation from Shirley Sherrod, an Agriculture Department appointee in Georgia,  based on a video from a statement made 25 years ago that was edited by Andrew Breitbart’s cronies to look like Ms, Sherrod is a racist. Now, even though the whole affair has been exposed as phony, Vilsack is refusing to rehire her, at least, according to the White House, who is saying it is totally his call.

What digby says:

“Her decision ‘rightly or wrongly” will be called into question” because some right wing hitman put out an edited tape that makes her sound as if her point is the opposite of what it is, so she had to be fired.

They are telling wingnuts everywhere that all they have to do is gin up a phony controversy (especially about a black person, apparently) and the administration will fire them so as not to shake confidence that they are “fair service providers.”

This is sheer cowardice.

Even the NAACP has admitted they were “Snookered”:

With regard to the initial media coverage of the resignation of USDA Official Shirley Sherrod, we have come to the conclusion we were snookered by Fox News and Tea Party Activist Andrew Breitbart into believing she had harmed white farmers because of racial bias.

Having reviewed the full tape, spoken to Ms. Sherrod, and most importantly heard the testimony of the white farmers mentioned in this story, we now believe the organization that edited the documents did so with the intention of deceiving millions of Americans.

snip

Next time we are confronted by a racial controversy broken by Fox News or their allies in the Tea Party like Mr. Breitbart, we will consider the source and be more deliberate in responding. The tape of Ms. Sherrod’s speech at an NAACP banquet was deliberately edited to create a false impression of racial bias, and to create a controversy where none existed. This just shows the lengths to which extremist elements will go to discredit legitimate opposition.

According to the USDA, Sherrod’s statements prompted her dismissal. While we understand why Secretary Vilsack believes this false controversy will impede her ability to function in the role, we urge him to reconsider.

Pres. Obama, tell Secretary Vilsak to immediately rehire Ms. Sherrod.

Outrageous!

“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.

Peter Daou: Resolving the “Obama Paradox” (The Most Successful Failed Presidency in a Generation)

The intense dispute over President Obama’s personality, principles and policies is a proxy for the larger debate over the history, values, ideological composition and direction of America. The focus is on the person, but the battle is over the nation.

In that context, a number of progressive activists and observers (this writer included) have spent the past 18 months repeatedly making the case that the Obama administration’s unwillingness to stake out a strong, principled, progressive position on key issues is detrimental to Obama’s political fortunes, to the Democratic Party’s electoral prospects and most importantly, to the country. Looking at polls, trends, midterm projections, the economy, the environment, the war in Afghanistan, etc., the facts on the ground appear to have borne out that view.

snip

Further, the definitions of success and failure that undergird the “Obama Paradox” are exceedingly amorphous. Is it about legislative wins, no matter the underlying substance? Is it public opinion as reflected in polls? Is it pundit consensus and conventional wisdom?

And who defines success or judges which issue or question is the most important? Is it jobs? The Gulf disaster? Health care? Is Obama a progressive, a centrist, a corporatist, a socialist? Are we winning or losing Afghanistan? Is Obama the next FDR, Bush-lite, the anti-Bush, or the un-Reagan?

snip

So how do we resolve the present contradictions surrounding President Obama and how do we make a fair assessment of his tenure? To the extent that we can, we do so by clarifying our approach in advance of our judgment. A reporter looking at facts and data should first choose the metric(s). It might be the number of campaign promises kept, or legislation passed, or public opinion polls and trends, or economic stats, or a weighted combination of several factors.

For activists and opinion-makers, the process is somewhat different: it’s about fundamental ideals and values against which the president’s actions are measured.

For the general public, it’s a mix of personal circumstances (how the administration’s policies affect them and their families), their values, what the media tells them, what their friends and family think, and so on.

Whatever the parameters and methods, there are several ways to reach an informed, albeit incomplete, view of Obama’s presidency. Naturally, some of these views will be contradictory. From certain perspectives Obama is successful, from others he’s not – there’s nothing paradoxical about that.

What’s far more interesting is that there is one thing Obama can do that transcends the ebb and flow of events, the endless swirl of opinion, the daily wins and losses, the progress and setbacks that constitute governing. It is the one thing with lasting appeal and enduring value and a prerequisite for unqualified success in any endeavor: standing for something worthwhile, for a set of well-articulated principles, and fighting for those principles tooth and nail.

The real Obama paradox is why that hasn’t happened when it’s good policy and good politics.

They have “souls”?

“The Republicans are thinking, why don’t they just sell some of their stock? If they’re in really dire straits maybe they can take some of their art collection and send it to the auctioneer. And if they’re in deep deep trouble maybe the unemployed can sell one of their yachts. That’s what the Republicans are thinking right now. But that’s not the life of ordinary people…”

snip

“I will say to the Republicans who have blocked this bill for months, to those who have kept food out of the mouths of children, I will say to them now, may God have mercy on your souls”

h/t Blue Texan @ FDL and digby

While many of us remember the “giant leap” that mankind made as Neil Armstrong planted his boots in the thick dust of the lunar surface thus beginning one of the great CT’s of all time, there were other events that happened on this day that were just as significant, if not for the world but for some small spot on this great “Blue Marble”.

In 1888, just 5 years after the massacre at Little Big Horn, Sitting Bull surrenders to the US Army

Five years after General George A. Custer’s infamous defeat at the Battle of Little Bighorn, Hunkpapa Teton Sioux leader Sitting Bull surrenders to the U.S. Army, which promises amnesty for him and his followers. Sitting Bull had been a major leader in the 1876 Sioux uprising that resulted in the death of Custer and 264 of his men at Little Bighorn. Pursued by the U.S. Army after the Indian victory, he escaped to Canada with his followers.

snip

n 1873, in what would serve as a preview of the Battle of Little Bighorn three years later, an Indian military coalition featuring the leadership of Sitting Bull skirmished briefly with Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer. In 1876, Sitting Bull was not a strategic leader in the U.S. defeat at Little Bighorn, but his spiritual influence inspired Crazy Horse and the other victorious Indian military leaders. He subsequently fled to Canada, but in 1881, with his people starving, he returned to the United States and surrendered.

snip

He was held as a prisoner of war at Fort Randall in South Dakota territory for two years and then was permitted to live on Standing Rock Reservation straddling North and South Dakota territory. In 1885, he traveled for a season with Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West show and then returned to Standing Rock. In 1889, the spiritual proclamations of Sitting Bull influenced the rise of the “Ghost Dance,” an Indian religious movement that proclaimed that the whites would disappear and the dead Indians and buffalo would return.

On December 15, 1890, Sitting Bull was shot and killed during a raid on his house. There are varied accounts of the incident but it was generally believed that it was his support of he “Ghost Dancers” was what precipitated the raid. Until 1953, Sitting Bull’s remains were buried at Fort Yates when they were re-interred Mobridge, South Dakota, where a granite shaft marks his resting place.