Tag: Politics

Jun 20 2013

In Memoriam: Michael Hastings 1980 – 2013

Investigative reporter and author, Michael Hasting died in Los Angeles, CA. His death in single vehicle car crash has shocked his friends, colleagues and those of us who admired his work. His article in Rolling Stone, The Runaway General which  profiled US Army general Stanley McChrystal, then commander of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force in the war in Afghanistan. It was Michael’s report on the remarks by McChrystal’s staff that were overtly critical and contemptuous of White House staff and other civilian officials that ended with McChrystal being relieved of command by President Barack Obama.

Michael said in a Today Show interview with Matt Lauer, “I did not think Gen. McChrystal would be fired. In fact, I thought his position was basically untouchable, I thought it would give them a headache for maybe 72 hours.”

It put Michael on all our maps.

Amy Goodman has a look back Michael’s interviews on Democracy Now!

Here are two of the many tributes at Rolling Stone and BuzzFeed where Michael was a contributor, followed by Rachel Maddow’s tribute, who met Michael when she was working for Air America Radio.

Michael Hastings, ‘Rolling Stone’ Contributor, Dead at 33

by Tim Dickinson, Rolling Stone

For Hastings, there was no romance to America’s misbegotten wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He had felt the horror of war first-hand: While covering the Iraq war for Newsweek in early 2007, his then-fianceé, an aide worker, was killed in a Baghdad car bombing. Hastings memorialized that relationship in his first book, I Lost My Love in Baghdad: A Modern War Story.

A contributing editor to Rolling Stone, Hastings leaves behind a remarkable legacy of reporting, including an exposé of America’s drone war, an exclusive interview with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at his hideout in the English countryside, an investigation into the Army’s illicit use of “psychological operations” to influence sitting Senators and a profile of Taliban captive Bowe Bergdahl, “America’s Last Prisoner of War.”

Matt Farwell is a veteran of the Afghanistan war who worked as a co-reporter with Hastings on some of his recent pieces. He sent this eulogy to Rolling Stone:  “My friend Michael Hastings died last night in a car crash in Los Angeles. Writing this feels almost ghoulish: I still haven’t processed the fact that he’s gone. Today we all feel that loss: whether we’re friends of Michael’s, or family, or colleagues or readers, the world has gotten a bit smaller. As a journalist, he specialized in speaking truth to power and laying it all out there. He was irascible in his reporting and sometimes/often/always infuriating in his writing: he lit a bright lamp for those who wanted to follow his example.

Missing Michael Hastings

by Ben Smith, BuzzFeed

Michael Hastings was really only interested in writing stories someone didn’t want him to write – often his subjects; occasionally his editor. While there is no template for a great reporter, he was one for reasons that were intrinsic to who he was: ambitious, skeptical of power and conventional wisdom, and incredibly brave. And he was warm and honest in a way that left him many unlikely friends among people you’d expect to hate him. [..]

Some of that was Michael’s warmth, charm, and charisma. Some of it, I think, was the opposite: His anger and fearlessness made working with him, or against him, something more than the usual journalistic transaction. There’s a relief in dealing with someone and knowing where he stands.

In a way, Michael was born too late: He wrote with the sort of commitment of the generation of reporters shaped by the government’s lies about Vietnam, not by the triumphalism of the 1990s or the reflexive patriotism of the years after 9/11. He was surer than most of us that power is, presumptively, not to be trusted. Writers of his courage and talent are so rare, and he was taken way too soon. There are few like him. We will miss him terribly.

I wrote an article recently about Pres. Obama’s defense of his secretive drone war that featured Michael’s appearance on the Up with Steve Kornacki panel. I re-watched those videos last night admiring how forceful and accurate Michael was in his criticism.

Michael, you will be so missed.

Jun 19 2013

Punting the Pundits

“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.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Wednesday is Ladies’ Day

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Imara Jones: Why the Spying Scandal Is a Serious Racial Justice Issue

Given the massive investment in national security after 9-11, recent news that the federal government is spying on hundreds of millions of people in the United States and around the world may not have come as a surprise. Polls suggest that a majority of Americans are shrugging their shoulders at the revelations of a government espionage effort against them. But an uncomfortable reality of the once secret scheme is the degree to which people of color are disproportionately caught up in the government’s dragnet. That’s because the routine, legal activities of blacks, Latinos and immigrants-96 percent of whom are people of color-make them targets for monitoring in a way not true for whites.

For the over 40 million foreign born immigrants living in America-more than at any point in U.S. history-the basic act of keeping in contact with friends and family abroad is all that’s required to be sucked into the Obama administration’s electronic dragnet. Disturbingly, the fact that much of this historically broad snooping program is conducted by private companies with dubious oversight makes it that much harder for communities of color to figure out exactly what’s going on and how to curb any potential abuses.

Katrina vanden Heuvel: The NSA state of secrecy must end

Revelations of the sweeping collection of data on Americans by the National Security Agency (NSA) require that Congress launch a grand inquest into the post-9/11 national security state. Special committees in both the House and the Senate, armed with subpoena power, should investigate the scope of activities, the legal basis claimed, the operational structure and the abuses and excesses with a public weighing of costs and benefits.

The “war on terrorism” has gone on for 12 years, and while President Obama says it must end sometime, there is no end in sight. Secret bureaucracies armed with secret powers and emboldened by the claim of defending the nation have proliferated and expanded. The surprise of legislators at the scope of NSA surveillance shows that checks and balances have broken down.

Alexis Goldstein: The ‘Intimidate the CTFC Act’

When it comes to helping Wall Street lobbyists gut reforms passed in the wake of the financial crisis, there is often very little difference between the Republicans and the Democrats. Recent votes in the House Financial Services Committee demonstrated this bipartisanship all too well. Last month, the committee considered H.R. 1256, the Swaps Jurisdiction Certainty Act, which garnered a “Yea” from every single Republican and a majority (17) of Democrats. Eleven Democrats voted against the measure, including Ranking Member Maxine Waters (D-Calif.). Republicans are making a move to bring this deregulatory bill to the House floor as early as Wednesday.

Despite its formal name, H.R. 1256 should really be called the “Intimidate a Financial Regulator Act.” The bill seeks to change how derivatives are regulated. Derivatives allow bets to be made on the future value of some real asset like corn or gold or a stock. Warren Buffett has called derivatives “financial weapons of mass destruction,” and they played a major role in the financial crisis; it was derivatives trading, for example, that brought down the giant insurance company AIG and led to a government bailout.

Margaret Flowers: Trans-Pacific Partnership undermines health system

Medical corporations seek tools to protect their profits despite harmful effects on public health.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a deal that is being secretly negotiated by the White House, with the help of more than 600 corporate advisers and Pacific Rim nations, including Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. While the TPP is being called a trade agreement, the US already has trade agreements covering 90 percent of the GDP of the countries involved in the talks. Instead, the TPP is a major power grab by large corporations. [..]

From the information available, one thing is clear about the impacts of the TPP on health care: the intention of the TPP is to enhance and protect the profits of medical and pharmaceutical corporations without considering the harmful effects their policies will have on human health.

We know that the TPP will extend pharmaceutical and medical device patents and provide other tools to keep the prices of these necessities high. This will make medications and treatments unaffordable for millions of people and raise the costs of national health programmes. At its worst, the TPP will provide a pathway to infect the world’s health systems with the deadly parasite of for-profit health corporations that plague the US.

Jill Filipovic: America’s Private Prison System is a National Disgrace

An ACLU lawsuit against a prison in Mississippi is the latest to detail flagrant abuses at a private correctional facility

The privatization of traditional government functions – and big government payments to private contractors – isn’t limited to international intelligence operations like the National Security Agency. It’s happening with little oversight in dozens of areas once the province of government, from schools to airports to the military. The shifting of government responsibilities to private actors isn’t without consequence, as privatization often comes with a lack of oversight and a series of abuses. One particularly stunning example is the American prison system, the realities of which should be a national disgrace.

Some of those realities are highlighted in a recent lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on behalf of prisoners at the East Mississippi Correctional Facility (EMCF). EMCF houses severely mentally ill prisoners, with the supposed intent of providing both incarceration and treatment. Instead, the ACLU contends, the facility, which is operated by private contractors, is rife with horrific abuses.

Lucinda Marshall: Confronting Militarism And Patriarchy-The Take Away From The Congressional Hearings On Sexual Assault In The Ranks

The decision last week by both houses of Congress not to consider measures that would remove absolute control over the prosecution of sexual assault cases in the military from the chain of command sends a clear signal that preserving the system of power over that our military both depends upon and upholds is far more important than actually protecting the citizens of this country who serve in its ranks from attacks by those who supposedly have their backs.  While disappointing, it is hardly surprising.  After days of grueling hearings, in the end the congressional status quo effectively bitch slapped those who dared question how this country maintains its power structure.*

Jun 18 2013

Punting the Pundits

“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.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Tom Shorrock: Put the Spies Back Under One Roof

For decades, the N.S.A. relied on its own computer scientists, cryptographers and mathematicians to tap, decode and analyze communications as they traversed phone lines and satellite networks. By the 1990s, however, advances in personal computing, the growth of the Internet, the advent of cellphones and the shift in telecommunications to high-speed fiber-optic lines has made it difficult for the N.S.A. to keep up.

As the commercial world began to surpass the N.S.A., some in the agency began looking to the private sector for solutions. In 2000, thanks in part to an advisory committee led by James R. Clapper Jr., now the director of national intelligence, the N.S.A. decided to shift away from its in-house development strategy and outsource on a huge scale. The N.S.A.’s headquarters began filling with contractors working for Booz Allen and hundreds of other companies. [..]

Congress must act now to re-establish a government-run intelligence service operating with proper oversight. The first step is to appoint an independent review board – with no contractors on it – to decide where the line for government work should be drawn. The best response to the Snowden affair is to reduce the size of our private intelligence army and make contract spying a thing of the past. Our democracy depends on it.

Roger Cohen: Obama’s German Storm

Germany is normally a welcoming place for American leaders. But President Barack Obama will walk into a German storm Tuesday provoked by revelations about the Prism and Boundless Informant (who comes up with these names?) surveillance programs of the U.S. National Security Agency.

No nation, after the Nazis and the Stasi, has such intense feelings about personal privacy as Germany. The very word “Datenschutz,” or data protection, is a revered one. The notion that the United States has been able to access the e-mails or Facebook accounts or Skype conversations of German citizens has been described as “monstrous” by Peter Schaar, the official responsible for enforcing Germany’s strict privacy rules. When the German bureaucracy starts talking about monstrous American behavior, take note.

Dean Baker: Celebrate the Defeat of the Granny Bashers!

It isn’t often that progressives in the United States have much to celebrate. After all, the news has swung between bad and worse for most of the last three decades. That is why we should be celebrating the victory over the Campaign to Fix the Debt and its efforts to cut Social Security and Medicare. [..]

The result will be a somewhat smaller share of the pie for those on top and a larger share for everyone else. And it will almost certainly also mean a more rapidly growing economy. The latter would especially be true if we could reverse the sequester and other pointless austerity measures.

But the move to offense is not about to happen right now. And with all the money it has available, we can’t even assume the CFD effort will stay dead.

Jon Soltz and Sen. Tom Udall: President Obama Has Three Questions to Answer on Arms to Syria

In light of recent findings regarding Syria’s use of chemical weapons, the President has decided to send arms to the rebels fighting the government of Bashar al-Assad, but the full scope of this new intervention is unclear. There is a growing fervor for military intervention. As one of just three senators on the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations to vote against arming unorganized rebels, and as an Iraq War Veteran, we urge a different course.

A number of experts are warning that the options to intervene in Syria are misguided, and could prove damaging to America’s strategic interests. Despite these concerns, many who advocated for previously disastrous Middle East interventions are pushing loudly to arm groups we know little about, and declare war through air strikes on another Middle Eastern country.

This rush to judgment is dangerous. We should learn from history, not repeat it.

Richard (RJ) Eskow: We Need a New Deal For Millennials

What kind of society abandons its own young? What kind of society allows the generations in power to favor themselves over those who follow them, and then lets them claim they’re doing it out of selflessness?

Look around you.

This weekend we reviewed nine ways an extreme-right right social agenda has harmed the Millennial Generation.  But there’s a cure for that, a formula that’s rational, sane, wise, and fair. It involves time-tested techniques for jobs, growth, and education – a New Deal for Millennials.

And a New Deal starts with new values.

Mark Weisbrot: Domestic Dissent Can Change US Foreign Policy for the Better

From the Vietnam era to the Iraq war, it’s clear that the moral authority of protest has altered US government behaviour

The current revelations of a vast, secret NSA surveillance program are, of course, a continuation of what our government has been doing for the past century – the main difference being that the dragnet has gotten much larger due to change in communications technology. But there is an often-overlooked political reason for this mass intrusion on our personal communications: the government is gathering actionable intelligence in order to use it against those who oppose unpopular, unjust, and often criminal policies of that same government. And it has good reason to do so, because that opposition can be quite effective.

It is well-known that a mass protest movement, as well as its lobbying of Congres,s helped get us out of Vietnam. It is less widely known that the movement against the Central American wars in the 1980s, which involved hundreds of thousands of people, succeeded in cutting off congressional funding for the war against Nicaragua. And perhaps more historically significant, that result caused major problems for then-President Reagan, when his government turned to illegal funding and got caught, resulting in the infamous “Iran-Contra” scandal.

Jun 18 2013

Arming Syria Is Not a Good Idea

CNN host of GPS and editor of Newsweek International, Fareed Zacharia made this video before Pres. Barack Obama decided to send arms directly to the Al Qaeda backed rebels in Syria.

Oh Thank God–Finally, War With Syria

by Russ Baker,

Now, the Obama administration is preparing for war, in an astonishing echo of the George W. Bush administration’s misleading justifications for invading Iraq. [..]

No one is likely to demand good hard evidence for the use of chemical weapons. After all, the Bush administration and its lies for war was so…very long ago. [..]

None of these military adventures were ever about anything remotely honorable. So, whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, you just have to get over it. You may feel better believing the system of which you are part has noble intentions, or that the party you prefer is somehow more principled.

The truth is actually pretty simple: no matter which party is running things,  globally dominant governments do not make decisions based on humane do-goodism.  In the halls of power, decisions are based on a consensus of hard-headed “realists,” whose concerns do not extend to human rights, the safety of women and children and other civilians, or the “self-determination” of non-Americans. “Spreading democracy around world”? Um, no.

This entry into a new Middle East conflict isn’t going over very well with the American public. Only 20 percent support this action, while 70 percent oppose it. Opposing to arming the rebel is strong across party lines, as Jon Walker at FDL Action shows with this graph from Pew:

Americans Opposed to US Syrian Intervention photo 3_zpse6482096.png

Click on image to enlarge

At FDL News Desk, DSWRight makes some very salient points that this is not Rwanda and not how you get people to the table:

This is not Darfur or as Bill Clinton may infer Rwanda. This is a sectarian civil war where the Sunni majority is taking on a Shiite aligned government as part of a larger factional struggle in the region. [..]

In what world is that a way to launch peace talks? America is not neutral (and to be fair never has been) but starting off negotiations by claiming one of the parties at the talks must leave power is not going to advance the ball very far.

Getting in the middle of a regional conflict like Syria may even be dumber than Iraq, which is really saying something. And what if the rebels win? Then Al-Qaeda and friends come to power. After they are done massacring the losers and sectarian minorities they can help launch attacks against America. The Syrian intervention is all kinds of stupid.

This is not going to go well. Should anyone be surprised that Pres Obama’s approval rating is dropping?

Jun 17 2013

Punting the Pundits

“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.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Paul Krugman: Fight the Future

Last week the International Monetary Fund, whose normal role is that of stern disciplinarian to spendthrift governments, gave the United States some unusual advice. “Lighten up,” urged the fund. “Enjoy life! Seize the day!”

O.K., fund officials didn’t use quite those words, but they came close, with an article in IMF Survey magazine titled “Ease Off Spending Cuts to Boost U.S. Recovery.” In its more formal statement, the fund argued that the sequester and other forms of fiscal contraction will cut this year’s U.S. growth rate by almost half, undermining what might otherwise have been a fairly vigorous recovery. And these spending cuts are both unwise and unnecessary.

Dana Milbank: The left turns compliant on violating civil liberties

President Obama, who as a Democratic senator accused the Bush administration of violating civil liberties in the name of security, now vigorously defends his own administration’s collection of Americans’ phone records and Internet activities.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid said he thinks Congress has done sufficient intelligence oversight. His evidence? Opinion polls. [..]

There are a few Democrats who have upheld the party’s tradition of championing civil liberties – such as John Conyers (Mich.), who is introducing a bill with conservative Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) to curtail the program, and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), who with Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) introduced legislation backed by eight senators requiring more disclosure of secret court rulings.

But the Conyers bill is likely to go nowhere in the House, and Reid was cool to the Merkley proposal, saying only that “I’ll be happy to take a look.”

If he does look, he’ll find that they’re doing what progressives should do: Protecting the people from a too-secretive government.

Laura Beth Nielson: Facebook is not the government – here’s the difference

Just because the authorities have taken private data from Facebook doesn’t make it right.

The federal government is not a grocery store or a social networking site. The government has a special relationship with its citizenry. The terms of that relationship in the US are spelled out in the Constitution of the United States of America. The right to be “secure in our persons, homes, and papers” has a long history of protection in the United States. In response to the tyranny of British rule, this country was founded on principles that embody freedom from government intrusion in our lives.

Unless and until the government – in the form of police, federal agents, or a prosecuting attorney – can show that there is probable cause to believe that a person is engaged in criminal activity, we have rights against the government (what legal scholars call “negative rights”). This can be thought of as the list of things that the government may not do to you or take from you without proving to a judge that they may take it from you. And you are entitled to a fair determination on that question – this is your “due process” right.

What can’t the government take from you without due process? Your property, your life, and yes, your privacy. I have argued above that our clicking behaviour is valuable, so you might think of your internet footprint as your property.

Robert Kuttner: Thinking About the Government

I remember a time when liberals were the people who used government as a democratic counterweight to the abuses of capitalism, and conservatives were those close to big business who wanted to limit government. Liberals also recognized, with the Framers of the Constitution, that government had to be strong enough to protect the rights of the weak. Conservatives didn’t like the power of the state, but were fine with concentrated private power.[..]

But, lately the lines have blurred. The old, stylized picture of what liberals and conservatives want of government doesn’t mean much, especially to younger Americans, because they have seldom experienced it.

Richard (RJ) Eskow: 9 Ways the Right’s Cradle to Grave “Randian State” Is An Assault on Millennials

Conservatives keep claiming liberals want a “cradle to grave nanny state.” That rhetoric has distracted us from the real social re-engineering taking place all around us. The right, along with its “centrist” collaborators, is transforming our nation into a bloodless and soulless Randian State.

Their decades-long assault on our core social values is on the verge of consuming its first complete generation of Americans. Born at the dawn of the Reagan era, Millennials were the first to be fully subjected to this all-out attack on the idea that we take care of each other in this country, and they’ll pay for it from the cradle to the grave.

Some of us are the parents of Millennials. On this Father’s Day it’s hard not to wonder: Who’ll fight with them, and for them?

Glen Ford: Rep. Clyburn: Putting Obama First – Civil Liberties, Peace, Justice, and Reality Last

Congressman James Clyburn is supposed to represent the interests of more than half a million South Carolinians, the majority of them Black. One might expect a Black congressman to have more than a passing interest in the Bill of Rights and protection of civil liberties. The revelation that Uncle Sam is building up a dossier on everyone with a telephone and a computer connection should be at least mildly upsetting to anyone that calls himself a Black leader. But Congressman Clyburn has but one priority: to protect the image and legacy of Barack Obama.

Rather than thank whistleblower Edward Snowden for revealing the massive scope of government spying under Obama, Congressman Clyburn sees a conspiracy against the president. Otherwise, how could a 30-year-old white boy who dropped out of high school get in a position to blow the whistle on the Obama administration. “I haven’t gotten to where I am in politics without relying on my gut,” said Clyburn. “And my gut tells me this is an effort to embarrass the president.”

Jun 16 2013

Who Used Chemical Weapons in Syria?

There are a lot of unanswered questions about the use of chemical weapons in the two year old conflict between the Syrian government and the Syrian rebels. This week, the Obama administration has concluded that Syrian regime of president Bashar al-Assad has used chemical weapons against rebel fighters:

Congressional sources told CNN that investigators concluded that Syria has used chemical weapons multiple times.

In a statement released on Thursday, the White House says U.S. intelligence concluded that the Assad regime used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent Sarin, against rebel fighters in the last year. [..]

National Security Council deputy advisor Ben Rhodes said on Thursday that the President Obama reached a decision on what the new support for the Syrian opposition would look like. According to Buzzfeed, Rhodes said: “The president has made a decision “about what kind of additional support will be provided to the rebels. It will be “direct support to the SMC [Supreme Military Command] that includes military support.” Rhodes added that no decision has been made on the institution of a no-fly zone.

That’s correct the US is now going to arm Al Qaeda against the Hezbolah backed Assad government and no one, not even the press, is asking the hard questions. That is all but one member of the press. Al Jazeera White House correspondent goes there and asks, Where is the proof?

No one, not one person asked if the Obama administration would make public any of its “proof” that the Assad regime had used chemical weapons.

Think about that for a moment. An American administration is being allowed to say “trust us” on the issue of chemical weapons use and its consequences.

I’m not an expert, I don’t know what they have or if it would prove what they say. What I’m wondering is if they should have to share something.

I think it takes on an added importance when you hear the scepticism from other countries and what seem to be flaws in the US explanation. [..]

The allegations of chemical weapons being used and any kind of military response require a serious discussion, and questioning. I didn’t get a chance to ask – but if you look in the way back of the room – you’ll see my hand held high – I couldn’t get the White House’s attention that way, maybe this will work instead – couldn’t do that in grade school – we didn’t have the internet.

Patrick Coburn,  veteran foreign correspondent of The Independent, joined Amy Goodman and Juan González on Democarcy Now! to discuss this latest development in Syria’s civil war.

“There must be some doubts about this,” Cockburn says, adding that it “reminds me of what they were saying in 2002 and 2003 about Saddam [Hussein]’s weapons of mass destruction.” Cockburn warns U.S. involvement could escalate regional conflicts that could “go on for years,” and critiques the media’s lack of skepticism about White House claims.



Transcript can be read here

The enemy of my enemy is my friend. We all know where that got us the last time.

Jun 16 2013

Punting the Pundits: Sunday Preview Edition

“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.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

The Sunday Talking Heads:

Up with Steve Kornacki: Steve’s guests are Michelle Bernard, The Bernard Center for Women, Politics & Public Policy; Rick Perlstein, contributor, TheNation.com; Roberto Lovato, writer/commentator, New America Media; Tom Schaller, professor, University of Maryland Baltimore County; and Abby Rapoport, staff writer, The American Prospect.

This Week with George Stephanopolis: This Week‘s guests are Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL); and Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R).

The roundtable guests are George Will, The Washington Post; Democratic Strategist Donna Brazile; Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich; Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) and Martha Raddatz, ABC News.

Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer: Mr. Schieffer’s guests are White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough; and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI).

On his roundtable: David Corn, Mother Jones; Barton Gellman, TIME; Peggy Noonan, Wall Street Journal; and Rick Stengel, TIME.

The Chris Matthews Show: This Sunday’s panel are Chuck Todd, NBC News Chief White House Correspondent; Katty Kay, BBC Washington Correspondent; Kelly O’Donnell, NBC News Capitol Hill Correspondent; and David Ignatius, The Washington Post Columnist.

Meet the Press with David Gregory: The MTP guest are Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and Mark Udall (D-CO).

Guests on the roundtable are Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA); former Director of the NSA and CIA, now a principal of The Chertoff Group, Gen. Michael Hayden; Washington Post Columnist David Ignatius; New York Times national security reporter James Risen; and NBC’s foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell.

State of the Union with Candy Crowley: Ms. Crowley’s guests are House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-MI); and Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (D-NJ).

On her political panel are Peter Baker of The New York Times; Nia-Malika Henderson, The Washington Post; Ray Suarez, PBS’ The NewsHour; and A.B. Stoddard, The Hill.

Jun 16 2013

What We Now Know

On this week’s segment of “What We Know Now,” Up host Steve Kornacki talks about former Rep. Anthony Weiner who is running for mayor in New York City and his first campaign for the House. His guests, discussing with what they learned this week, are Ana Marie Cox, The Guardian; political strategist L. Joy Williams; Charmaine Yost, Americans United for Life; and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake.

Jun 15 2013

Punting the Pundits

“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.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Glenn Greenwald: On PRISM, Partisanship and Propaganda

Addressing many of the issues arising from last week’s NSA stories

How can anyone think that it’s remotely healthy in a democracy to have the NSA building a massive spying apparatus about which even members of Congress, including Senators on the Homeland Security Committee, are totally ignorant and find “astounding” when they learn of them? How can anyone claim with a straight face that there is robust oversight when even members of the Senate Intelligence Committee are so constrained in their ability to act that they are reduced to issuing vague, impotent warnings to the public about what they call radical “secret law” enabling domestic spying that would “stun” Americans to learn about it, but are barred to disclose what it is they’re so alarmed by? Put another way, how can anyone contest the value and justifiability of the stories that we were able to publish as a result of Edward Snowden’s whistleblowing: stories that informed the American public – including even the US Congress – about these incredibly consequential programs? What kind of person would think that it would be preferable to remain in the dark – totally ignorant – about them?

Gail Collins: The Other Side of the Story

The feds have said that surveillance programs have thwarted potential attacks. But is rummaging through little girls’ bedrooms really necessary?

The deck is always stacked when we debate keeping the nation safe.

Recently, we discovered that the National Security Agency is keeping an enormous file of our phone calls. In the N.S.A.’s defense, its chief, Gen. Keith Alexander, said “dozens” of potential terrorist attacks had been thwarted by that kind of effort. The director of the F.B.I., Robert Mueller, suggested it might prevent “the next Boston.”

How do you argue with that? True, the N.S.A. program had been up and running for years without being able to prevent the first Boston. And Alexander declined to identify the thwarted attacks, arguing that might aid potential terrorists.

But most Americans were sold. The words “terrorist attack” conjured up terrible, vivid pictures. On the other side was just a humongous computer bank full of numbers. If you didn’t do anything wrong, what was the problem?

Today, let’s try putting a face on it in the form of Brandon Mayfield.

New York Times Editorial Board: After Arming the Rebels, Then What?

Mr. Obama has also come under increasing attack from a small number of American politicians, including former President Bill Clinton, who this week said Mr. Obama risks looking “lame” for not doing more to help the rebels. It was a cheap shot leveled at an event hosted by Sen. John McCain, Republican of Arizona, a leading advocate of aggressive action in Syria. It is irresponsible for critics like Mr. McCain and Mr. Clinton to fault Mr. Obama without explaining how the United States can change the course of that brutal civil war without being dragged too far into it.

Like most Americans, we are deeply uneasy about getting pulled into yet another war in the Middle East. Those urging stronger action seemed to have learned nothing from the past decade of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, which has sapped the United States and has produced results that are ambiguous at best.

John Nichols: Peter King Goes All 1798 on the Bill of Rights

New York Congressman Peter King, with his call for the prosecution of journalist Glenn Greenwald, recalls a long and dishonorable American tradition. [..]

Growling that “legal action should be taken against (Greenwald),” the Republican chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security dismissed First Amendment concerns declares that: “No right is absolute!” — and that includes the First Amendment right of the people to be served by a free press.

So King is calling for the “very targeted, very selective” prosecution of journalists for informing the American people about what their government is doing — and why it might be wrong.

How very 1798 of him.

Joe Nocera: This Isn’t How to Stop Hacking

I don’t know whether Prism and the other programs truly stop terrorists. I have my doubts. What I do know is that if you are going to lecture the world about right and wrong – and if you’re trying to stop bad behavior – perhaps you shouldn’t be engaging in a version of that behavior yourself.

Instead, this has become one of the trademarks of the Obama administration: decry human rights abuses abroad, but hold men in prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, who have never been accused of a crime. Say all the right things about freedom of the press – even as you’re subpoenaing reporters’ phone records. And express outrage over Chinese hacking while carrying on a sophisticated spying operation of your own citizens. It may seem to us a false equivalence, but the existence of Prism will make it far more difficult to force the Chinese to get serious about stopping their own hacking.

Maybe America’s new motto should be: Do As We Say, Not As We Do.

Peter Dörrie: Ready for More Interventions in Africa? Obama is

While most of the coverage of the recent reshuffle of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy team has been focused on how it will (or won’t) change his administration’s approach to Syria, the continent most affected by it could turn out to be Africa. President Obama designated U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice as his new national security advisor – a post with influence on foreign policy potentially on par with the secretary of state – and nominated Samantha Power, a former journalist and longtime member of his administration, as Rice’s successor at the United Nations. [..]

There are currently a whole range of conflicts that could warrant military intervention: Most prominently, the civil wars in Darfur, Somalia, Eastern Congo and Mali – but also low-intensity or developing conflicts in South Sudan, Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire, Central African Republic, the Katanga province of Congo and Zimbabwe. It is likely that Power and Rice will try to use their new positions (as they have used their old ones) to push for greater U.S. engagement in resolving these conflicts, by military means if necessary.

Jun 14 2013

You Can’t Patent Mother Nature

In a rare unanimous decision, the US Supreme Court ruled that human genes cannot be patented:

The case, AMP v. Myriad Genetics, revolved around Utah corporation Myriad Genetics’ exclusive patents on the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes, which, when mutated, lead to a very high risk of breast and ovarian cancer. Because Myriad was the first to identify the BRCA genes, it patented them, charged exorbitant prices for BRCA testing, and then aggressively prevented any other labs from offering the same test. In 2009, a coalition of plaintiffs including the ACLU, Breast Cancer Action and a number of scientific organizations, researchers and patients sued Myriad, claiming that it had no legal right to hold patents on the BRCA genes.

In a majority decision written by Clarence Thomas, the court affirmed the plaintiffs’ claim that because DNA is naturally occurring, it “lie(s) beyond the domain of patent protection.” In so deciding, the court effectively reversed decades worth of policy by the US Patent and Trade Office, which has granted thousands of gene patents, many of which should now be rendered invalid.

The Court refuted Myriad’s claim that because it had put a lot of time and money into locating the gene, that it therefore deserved a patent: “extensive effort alone is insufficient” to make something patent-worthy. Basically, just because you tried really hard doesn’t mean that you deserve a multi-billion dollar legal monopoly.

This is great news for women, men, doctors, scientists and the world in the fight against breast and ovarian cancer. In a New York Times article about the impact of the ruling, other research companies said they would begin offering genetic testing which would bring down the cost and availability of the test, as well as, other tests held by patents:

Some experts say that other genetic tests that are exclusively controlled by a patent holder include the test for spinal muscular atrophy and the test for an inherited form of deafness.

Dr. (Sherri) Bale of GeneDx said the deafness gene also caused a skin disease. Her company is allowed to test for mutations that cause the skin disease, but if it discovers a mutation for hearing loss, it cannot tell the doctor. Instead, a new blood sample has to be drawn and sent to Athena Diagnostics, which controls the testing for the deafness gene. Dr. Bale said the court’s decision should eliminate the need for that arrangement.

It is often said that patents cover 4,000 human genes, or about 20 percent of all human genes, meaning the decision could have a large impact.

Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez of Democracy Now, in a discussion of the ruling, were joined by Judge Robert Sweet, the senior federal judge for the Southern District of New York who originally invalidated Myriad Genetics’ patents; Lisbeth Ceriani, one of the plaintiffs in the ACLU lawsuit. In May 2008, she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer; and Sandra Park, a senior attorney with the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project and a lead counsel on the case.

“With the ruling today, we fully expect much better access and much better options for patients, as well as for scientists who want to look at different parts of the genome,” Park says. “They no longer now need to deal with patents on the thousands of genes on our genome when they’re engaging in their scientific work.”



Transcript can be read here

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