Anybody else notice this?
This is from Robert Novak's February 9th column ...
At the same time, the Bush administration is going directly to the public with its war message. Raul Damas, associate director of political affairs at the White House, has been on the phone directly to Republican county chairmen to arrange local speeches by active duty military personnel to talk about their experiences in Iraq. To some Republican members, this unusual venture connotes a desire to go directly to the people to sell the president's position without having to deal with members of Congress.
One of Karl Rove's deputies is arranging for active duty military personnel to make speeches at Republican party events? The president is commander-in-chief. He's also head of the Republican party. But he's supposed to make at least some effort to show that the two jobs aren't melded into one.
The military, for good reasons, actually has quite detailed regulations about how active duty military personnel can and cannot participate in political events. One of the most referenced is the restriction on military personnel appearing at political events in uniform.
For instance, one directive states that active duty personnel may "Attend partisan and nonpartisan political meetings, rallies, or conventions as a spectator when not in uniform." They may not "Participate in partisan political management, campaigns, or conventions (unless attending a convention as a spectator when not in uniform)." (See a recent reissuance of the directive here.)
Now, we don't know if these military personnel are appearing in uniform or not. And much of this probably turns on what constitutes a 'political event'. But to my mind, an event organized by a Republican party official at the direction of the White House political office is by definition a political event. That's just obvious, isn't it?
Another question. We know how the White House political office knows who's a Republican County Chairman. How do they know which active duty military officers in a given area want to make speeches supporting the administration current policies in Iraq? Think about that.
In the United States, hearing from soldiers fighting in foreign wars has long been a way to maintain morale on the home front. But soldiers (& sailors, airmen and marines) aren't supposed to be dragooned by the president's political operatives into the GOP spin operation.
It seems that they are.
Late Update: Yes, someone else did notice: Robert Schlesinger at the Huffington Post.
--Josh Marshall
I am, I confess, a little surprised by this. But the Associated Press just doesn't seem able to come clean on this Reid-Abramoff-Marianas matter.
Let's jump down into the details.
As you remember, on Thursday John Solomon of the AP wrote a lengthy piece detailing alleged contacts between Jack Abramoff's team at Greenberg Traurig and Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV).
I followed up with a post explaining what seemed like a key problem with the article. The better part of the article is taken up with detailing Team Abramoff lobbying Reid on behalf of the sweatshop owners of the Marianas Islands, key and notorious. The whole thrust of the narrative suggests an illicit or suspect quid pro quo. But if you look closely what's never mentioned in the article is what Reid did on the Marianas sweatshop owners behalf -- which is of course a rather key detail.
I got on the phone with Reid's office and the lobbyist in question, Ron Platt, and they both said that Reid was and remained on the side of the debate -- he supported the minimum wage bill the Marianas folks opposed. That claim was confirmed by other supporters of the legislation.
In other words, whatever Abramoff and his crew might have tried to persuade Reid to do, he didn't do it.
That has to be a key part of the story, if you're discussing contacts between Marianas lobbyists on this issue. Only it's a part of the story the AP just neglected to mention.
Okay, so jump forward. After he spoke to me, Platt released a statement restating the gist of what he told me.
So what does the AP do with the information? They run a story with the lede that the Abramoff lobbyist confirms the meetings with Harry Reid. In other words, they portray a blackeye for their original story as a further confirmation of their story.
Now, yes, he did 'confirm' the meetings. But the fact that he had made contact with Reid's office was never seriously in dispute by anyone. They note that the lobbyist in question says the billing records overstate the nature of the work. Even this isn't quite accurate. It's more that he's saying the AP's characterization overstates the nature of the work. But let's set that aside, because whatever the nature of his lobbying was, it doesn't address the key issue.
Nowhere in the new article can the AP writers bring themselves to note that Reid never adopted Abramoff's clients' position on the issue. So whatever quids Abramoff's folks were offering up, Reid never gave them a quo. From start to finish he was the co-sponsor of the bill Abramoff's clients wanted to defeat.
That's key information -- arguably, the central piece of information in the whole case. But the AP keeps pressing their misleading narrative while omitting this key point.
This is a good example of what happens when getting (or in this case, not losing the story) becomes more important than getting the story right.
--Josh Marshall
Three more lawmakers come up in Abramoff case filings -- Reps. Capito (R-WV), LaTourette (R-OH) and Young (R-AK).
The specifics are more instances of writing letters on behalf of or favoring Abramoff clients. To the best of the my knowledge, this is the first time that Capito's name has come up.
Young's is the key. He keeps coming up in Abramoff related doings. Most recently, of course, is the story we published yesterday here on TPM regarding Young's Abramoff-arranged trip to the Marshall Islands.
--Josh Marshall
You did what for half a million dollars?
Earlier this morning, we brought you word of Jack Abramoff's 
work for the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) - which included arranging for a Congressional Delegation led by Rep. Don Young (R-AK) to visit the islands. But $500,000 in lobbying fees buys you so much more.
As we noted in our first post, Abramoff's work for the Marshall Islands eventually led to a lawsuit. And in the complaint, obtained by TPMmuckraker.com, Abramoff's then-firm Preston Gates sets forth the services he provided.
According to the complaint one of Abramoff's services was (from page 5 of the complaint) ...
Drafting, finding sponsorship for, and overseeing the mark-up of three bills on behalf of the RMI concerning payments by the United States and assumption of responsibility for nuclear tests conducted on or near the atolls of Rongelap, Bikini, and Enewetok. This work was interrupted by the non-payment of fees and charges by a new Administration for the RMI.
Now, that's a full service firm! Abramoff and Co. actually drafted and ushered through three bills on behalf of the RMI. Not advised on them - drafted them.
We're still trying to get in touch with Young, who was the committee chairman at the time, to find out his side of the story. So far his office isn't returning our calls.
--Paul Kiel
We've got a senate double-header this year in Ohio. First, it's Sherrod Brown and Paul Hackett fighting it out for the Democratic nomination. And then one of them is going to square off against Sen. Mike DeWine (R) in November.
You know Paul Hackett of course from late last year when he came really close to winning a seat in Congress in a very Republican congressional district.
Next week he joins us for the week guest-blogging at TPMCafe's Table for One.
See what Paul has to say. Ask him questions. Join the conversation.
--Josh Marshall
A senior Democratic hill staffer chimes in the AP Reid/Abramoff piece and our response ...
Longtime reader, first time writer. In rebuttal to the hit piece on Reid you're falling into the trap being set by the Republicans. People, and the media in particular, are getting way too caught up on "who lobbied who, and for what reason" and anyone who was lobbied, is a lobbyist, worked with a lobbyist, or received a donation from someone represented by a lobbyist has the stench of corruption. That's unfair and misses the crux of this particular scandal, and how GOP pay to play government works.Its not illegal to be lobbied, and hell, we couldn't do our jobs if we didn't interact with them. Legislation/regulation/oversight can't be done solely by Google research. What is illegal is to go out of your way, and use your position, as quid pro quo for gifts, jobs, and campaign contributions. The vast majority of Democratic staffers work on the Hill, despite the miserable pay and long hours, to try to achieve some measure of good. Many, many Republican staffers- convinced that government is an evil- work here in order to make money off that necessary evil. That breeds corruption. When you have a majority of members and staffers that could care less about policy ad governing and more about power/influence/money/profit Abramoff is inevitable. When the hard, tedious work of legislating and oversight is done by people motivated by careerism rather than professionalism not only do you have Abramoff, but you have Michael Brown, Halliburton, and illegal NSA wiretapping.
I could go on and on.
As I told the reader in my private response, I agree with a lot of what he says. But sloppy and misleading journalism really has to be pointed out. There's no alternative.
--Josh Marshall
Four Republican congressmen go to an island in the Pacific. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Josh Marshall
If you aren't watching the Michael Brown senate hearings, you just missed a real treat. Sen. Norm Coleman (R), doofus senator from Minnesota, just managed to get his butt kicked by disgraced former FEMA Director Michael Brown.
That's a singular accomplishment.
Coleman tried the standard hearings grandstanding against a disgraced or weakened witness -- a tactic pretty much written into the DNA of every senator and rep. But Brown managed to get in Coleman's face and turn the tables on him.
At the end, Coleman actually used the fact that he had run out of time to run away from the encounter with Brown. I'm not sure I've ever seen that happen before.
--Josh Marshall
Alaska Rep. Don Young (R-AK) says he's "never had any personal or professional relationship with [Jack] Abramoff." But that's a claim that gets harder to maintain by the day. Particularly today.
In February 1999, Rep. Young led a congressional delegation to the Republic of the Marshall Islands.
The trip was organized by Jack Abramoff.
Until now, Abramoff's representation of The Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) has gone almost completely unreported. On January 4th, 1999, the RMI hired Abramoff with a $50,000 retainer. Young led the trip the following month. The group arrived February 21st and left on the 22nd.
The trip was a so-called "CODEL", or Congressional Delegation, meaning that it was an official trip by Members of Congress to a foreign country. But, according to a former Marshall Islands government official familiar with the trip and court documents filed in 2001, the trip was organized and arranged by Jack Abramoff.
Fred Wertheimer, President 
of government watchdog group Democracy 21, called Abramoff's managing of the trip "very unusual." In fact, he couldn't think of another example of it. "CODELS are government trips paid for by the government," said Wertheimer. "And it would seem to me to be highly inappropriate for a Washington lobbyist to arrange and schedule a government trip."
The former Marshall Islands government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told TPMmuckraker.com that after Abramoff was hired, he told RMI officials: "You need Congress to come out to the Marshall Islands. Let me see what I can do about that."
And Abramoff delivered. At least three Members of Congress and three non-voting delegates accompanied Young on the February 1999 trip.
According to Congressional travel records filed by the House Committee on Resources, these included John Doolittle (R-CA) and Ken Calvert (R-CA), as well as Eni Faleomavaega (D-American Samoa), Bob Underwood (D-Guam), and Donna Christenson (D-Virgin Islands). Eight congressional staffers came along too. (The records do not show the cost of the taxpayer-funded trip.) Though not mentioned in congressional travel records, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) was also part of the delegation, according to the former RMI official. (Rohrabacher's attendence was later confirmed by his spokesperson Rebecca Rudman.)
While over in the beautiful islands, Young's delegation visited the Kwajalein Atoll missile test site and attended a meeting of the parliament, during which a resolution was introduced to rename the test site after Ronald Reagan. According to the former RMI official, Young addressed the assembly in Bermuda shorts.
Abramoff spokesman Andrew Blum declined to comment. When contacted on Tuesday, the Marshall Islands' Ambassador to the U.S. Banny de Brum declined to answer any questions about Abramoff. Rep. Young's office failed to return a call requesting comment.
At the time of the trip, Rep. Young was Chairman of the House Resources Committee, which handles issues pertaining to U.S. territories and freely-associated states like the RMI. The revelation of the trip, however, comes at a difficult time for Young.
Roll Call recently reported that he wrote letters to the General Services Administration, allegedly on behalf of Abramoff's tribal clients. That, together with the fact that a former aide of his went to work for Abramoff, and that he's been on the side of a number of Abramoff's clients, has kept the heat on. On Tuesday, in a guest editorial for The Anchorage Daily News, he insisted: "I have never had any personal or professional relationship with Abramoff."
As for others on the trip, Doolittle has frequently been in the news for his ties to Abramoff, and Rohrabacher and Abramoff are old friends.
The RMI retained Abramoff while he was at Preston Gates, from January of 1999 through February 2000. A dispute over the final fee of roughly $500,000 eventually led Preston Gates to file a law suit against the RMI in September 2001.
In the suit, Preston Gates detailed their extensive services for the Republic of the RMI, and the firm's role in organizing the trip. Among them (emphasis added):
"Organizing a visit by a congressional delegation led by Representative Don Young (R-AK) to the RMI. This included drafting all RMI statements and press releases, organizing the delegation's schedule, drafting all of the RMI's official speeches, and coordinating the delegation's activities with the RMI military."
Elizabeth Fleming, the attorney who filed the suit for Preston Gates, confirmed that Jack Abramoff was the Preston Gates lobbyist who worked on the account.
The suit for $433,369.19, the outstanding balance on the RMI's account, was ultimately settled out of court.
According to the Agreement that Preston Gates and the Marshalls signed, Abramoff was hired, among other reasons, to lobby the Congress and Administration on the islands' upcoming negotiations on the Compact of Free Association. The compact from 1986 - a massive financial settlement between the U.S. and the islands involving use of the missile site, grants, and a trust fund - was set to expire in 2001. After four years of negotiations, the two sides finally agreed on a settlement in 2003. The grants and trust fund in the new agreement add up to more than $800 million.
Coming Soon: What other services Jack Abramoff provided for the Republic of the Marshall Islands.
--Paul Kiel
White House said it didn't know about key levee break in New Orleans when Katrina hit; records now show they did. Michael Brown, former FEMA Director, personally notified the White House of the news that night. See the details in this piece in tomorrow's Times.
"There is no question in my mind, that at the highest levels of the White House they understood how grave the situation was," Brown tells the Times.
Brown testifies before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee tomorrow morning.
Could be interesting.
--Josh Marshall
Interesting.
After reading my earlier posts on the AP article on Jack Abramoff and Harry Reid, longtime TPM Reader DY wrote in and said, "After I read your post, I was wondering something. Did AP call Ron Platt? I mean, he clearly was willing to talk, and he clearly would have added to the story. Or actually, made a third of the story false, but be that as it may..."
(Platt, of course, is the former Greenberg-Traurig lobbyist who the AP article alleges was Abramoff's point of contact in trying to persuade Reid to support the position of the Marianas Island sweatshop owners. For the details on this and why talking to Platt might have been relevant, see this earlier post from this afternoon.)
Anyway, that sounded like a good question.
So I got hold of Platt and asked him. He told me he hadn't spoken to them for the piece and they'd made no attempt to get hold of him.
"So AP not only did not speak to you for this article, but made no attempt to speak to you?," I asked in a follow-up earlier this evening. "Exactly. No Voicemail[.] no record of any incoming," came his reply.
--Josh Marshall
$2.5 million? That's the amount of cash the Republican National Committee appears to have paid so far for lawyers to defend convicted New Hampshire phone-jamming conspirator James Tobin.
I guess they think it's money well-spent.
--Josh Marshall
Ahh, the quest for balance. As we noted below, today's AP story about Sen. Harry Reid and Jack Abramoff devotes most of its space to Abramoff's alleged attempts to lobby Reid on behalf of the Marianas Islands' sweatshops owners. Only, the piece fails to mention that Reid didn't support the position of Abramoff's clients.
Now MSNBC is running that same article with this headline "Top Democrat Reid met often with Abramoff."
Needless to say, the article, flawed as it may be in the ways I describe below, makes no claims that the two men have ever met.
Late Update: Apparently MSNBC fielded a little critical feedback on that bogus headline.
As of 11 PM this evening, the headline has been changed as you can see in the image above.
--Josh Marshall
A fairly illuminating look into the moonbat universe occupied by many young conservative Bush idolators.
From the Times ...
In the interview, Mr. Deutsch said that Dr. Hansen had partisan ties "all the way up to the top of the Democratic Party," and that he was "using those ties and using his media connections to push an agenda, a worst-case-scenario agenda of global warming." He said that anyone who disagrees with Dr. Hansen "is labeled a censor and is demonized and vilified in the media — and the media of course is a willing accomplice here."Mr. Deutsch contended that although Dr. Hansen was a scientist, he wanted to talk about policy as well as science. "He wants to demean the president, he wants to demean the administration and create a false perception that the administration is watering down science and lying to the public," Mr. Deutsch said. "And that is patently false."
Science is Democrats. Everybody's out to get us. They hate President Bush. Science isn't Bush.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, in the post below I linked to this new AP article tying Sen. Harry Reid to Jack Abramoff. The article references a number of contacts and contributions relating to the Marianas, Indian tribes, even Malaysia. Each should be looked at. The one about the Marianas Islands and their wage practices is just one. But it's the one that stood out to me. Here below are the passages about the Marianas ...
Reid, D-Nev., has led the Democratic Party's attacks portraying Abramoff's lobbying and fundraising as a Republican scandal.But Abramoff's records show his lobbying partners billed for nearly two dozen phone contacts or meetings with Reid's office in 2001 alone.
Most were to discuss Democratic legislation that would have applied the U.S. minimum wage to the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory and Abramoff client, but would have given the islands a temporary break on the wage rate, the billing records show.
...
Reid himself, along his Senate counsel Jim Ryan, met with Abramoff deputy Ronald Platt on June 5, 2001, "to discuss timing on minimum wage bill" that affected the Marianas, according to a bill that Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff's firm, sent the Marianas.
Three weeks before the meeting, Greenberg Traurig's political action committee donated $1,000 to Reid's Senate re-election committee. Three weeks after the meeting, Platt himself donated $1,000 to Reid.
Manley said Reid's official calendar doesn't list a meeting on June 5, 2001, with Platt, but he also said he couldn't say for sure the contact didn't occur. Manley confirmed Platt had regular contacts with Reid's office, calling them part of the "routine checking in" by lobbyists who work Capitol Hill.
As for the timing of donations, Manley said, "There is no connection. This is just a typical part of lawful fundraising."
The Marianas, U.S. territorial islands in the Pacific Ocean, were one of Abramoff's highest-paying clients and were trying to keep their textile industry exempt from most U.S. laws on immigration, labor and pay, including the minimum wage. Many Democrats have long accused the islands of running garment sweatshops.
The islands in 2001 had their own minimum wage of $3.05 an hour, and were exempt from the U.S. minimum of $5.15.
Republicans were intent on protecting the Marianas' exemption. Democrats, led by Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Rep. George Miller of California, wanted the Marianas to be covered by the U.S. minimum and crafted a compromise.
In February 2001, Kennedy introduced a bill that would have raised the U.S. hourly minimum to $6.65 and would have covered the Marianas. The legislation, which eventually failed, would have given the islands an initial break by setting its minimum at just $3.55 _ nearly $3 lower than any other territory or state _ and then gradually increasing it.
Within a month, Platt began billing for routine contacts and meetings with Reid's staff, starting with a March 26, 2001, contact with Reid chief of staff Susan McCue to "discuss timing and status of minimum wage legislation," the billing records say.
In all, Platt and a fellow lobbyist reported 21 contacts in 2001 with Reid's office, mostly with McCue and Ryan.
One of the Marianas contacts, listed for May 30, 2001, was with Edward Ayoob, Reid's legislative counsel. Within a year, Ayoob had left Reid's office to work for Abramoff's firm, registering specifically to lobby for the islands as well as several tribes. Manley confirmed Ayoob had subsequent lobbying contacts with Reid's office.
Now, do you notice what gets left unsaid in all this?
Right.
What did Reid do in response? That's really the key issue.
Did he intervene on behalf of Abramoff's Marianas clients? The gist of the whole narrative is that Reid was Team Abramoff's go-to guy to kill the bill that would have hurt the Marianas sweatshop owners.
But did he actually rise to the bait?
I rung up Reid spokesman Jim Manley. He said Reid was a "cosponsor of Sen. Kennedy's bill; he spoke in favor of the bill on the Senate; he was a strong supporter of the bill." When I pressed Manley on whether Sen. Reid took any action adverse to the bill or made changes in timing that lead to the bill's demise, he said, "No."
Then I got hold of Ron Platt, the lobbyist referenced in the passage above, on his cell phone while he was down at a conference in Florida. I asked him whether, to the best of his recollection, Reid had taken any action against the Kennedy bill. "I'm sure he didn't," Platt told me.
According to Platt, the purpose of his contacts was to see what information he could get about the timing and status of the legislation. Reid's position on the minimum wage issue was well known and there would have been no point trying to get his help blocking it. That's what Platt says. "I didn't ask Reid to intervene," said Platt. "I wouldn't have asked him to intervene. I don't think anyone else would have asked. And I'm sure he didn't."
Now, obviously, both Reid's office and Platt are interested parties on this question. If there were evidence to the contrary you wouldn't necessarily want to take their statements at face value. But as far as I can tell there is no evidence to the contrary. And that's after speaking with supporters of the legislation who would probably know. They don't seem to think Reid had anything to do with tanking the minimum wage bill. Nothing.
In this case, despite the AP story's narrative of lobbyist contacts, there doesn't seem to be any evidence whatsoever that Reid ever took any action on behalf of Abramoff's Marianas clients.
Wasn't that worth a mention?
--Josh Marshall
AP to try to pull Sen. Reid into Abramoff story? Here's the piece just out on the AP wire. Pretty weak stuff, but John Solomon, the reporter, gives it the old college try. Give it a look, judge for yourself.
--Josh Marshall
Fish rots from the head down ...
Gannett: "Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and House Speaker Dennis Hastert engineered a backroom legislative maneuver to protect pharmaceutical companies from lawsuits, say witnesses to the pre-Christmas power play. The language was tucked into a Defense Department appropriations bill at the last minute without the approval of members of a House-Senate conference committee, say several witnesses, including a top Republican staff member."
--Josh Marshall
Interesting. In National Journal, Murray Waas writes that Scooter Libby "testified to a federal grand jury that he had been 'authorized' by Cheney and other White House 'superiors' in the summer of 2003 to disclose classified information to journalists to defend the Bush administration's use of prewar intelligence in making the case to go to war with Iraq, according to attorneys familiar with the matter, and to court records."
What the article doesn't say is that he was specifically authorized to release information about Valerie Plame. But Libby apparently named Cheney specifically.
--Josh Marshall
Yet more trouble for Rep. Doolittle (R-for Rent). That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Josh Marshall
Michael "Brownie" Brown turns on the president?
It seems rather an abuse of executive privilege to insist that the Congress can't review communications between the president and his chief disaster relief coordinator. But that being as it may, Brown is now saying that he wants to turn over his correspondence with the president to congressional investigators unless the president specifically tells him not to and agrees to cover his legal fees.
"Unless there is specific direction otherwise from the president," writes Brown's lawyer, "including an assurance the president will provide a legal defense to Mr. Brown if he refuses to testify as to these matters, Mr. Brown will testify if asked about particular communications."
--Josh Marshall
This is going to upset a lot of TPM Readers. But pollster, message man uber-bamboozler Frank Luntz has been banned from the House Republican retreat in Cambridge, Maryland which starts tomorrow and runs through Saturday.
Majority Leader Boehner apparently told the members of his Caucus that Luntz was out.
“Boehner said he wasn’t going if Luntz was going,” a "leadership source" told Roll Call.
--Josh Marshall
Tom DeLay lost the House leadership. But as a consolation prize they gave him NASA. Republicans leaders put DeLay on the Appropriations subcommittee in charge of the NASA budget. (The Johnson Space Center is in the bugman's district.)
Houston, we have a problem.
There was a seat free on Appropriations because Duke Cunningham had to give up his seat.
No, you can't make this stuff up.
Oh, I forgot, his new committee controls the DOJ purse stings too.
--Josh Marshall
Is there any death of a political luminary that Republicans won't try to milk for political gain? Should they be allowed to attend funerals of non-Movement conservatives anymore?
--Josh Marshall
It's actually pretty amazing. President Bush took pretty much his entire Social Security phase-out plan from last year and put it into next year's budget without telling anyone.
Newsweek's Allan Sloan took a closer look and found it all there.
Now it just so happens we still have the Conscience Caucus list online -- remember, that's the list of the Republicans who wouldn't publicly commit to phase-out last year.
Are they coming out against Phase Out Round Two?
Let's find out. Give them a call. Ask them where they stand and let us know what you hear.
--Josh Marshall
It's not just cutting Social Security death benefits. President Bush has actually written Social Security phase-out into this years budget. Go look.
--Josh Marshall
Now TPM Reader JB responds to the Times piece: "Why didn't anyone mention last week's NBC-Wall Street Journal poll showing Dems leading Republicans 51-37 in Congressional preference? I believe it was the Dems best showing in more than 20 years on that question. So my questions are: (1) If that demonstrates a missed opportunity, what would a victory have looked like? (2) Why can't Nagourney be bothered to include this one piece of releavnt hard data along with all the silly navel-gazing? and (3) Why is Howard Dean talking about anything else? His response should be, 'The American people disagree with what you're saying. By an overwhelming margin they prefer our agenda to theirs.'"
--Josh Marshall
Sounds like the two senators from Maine -- Snowe (R) and Collins (R) -- aren't taking any position on the new Bush Social Security cuts. Neither is Rep. Bradley (R) of New Hampshire. Sen. Grassley's (R) office is telling constituents the same thing.
Heard from your representative or senator yet?
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader PM on the Times article: "Looks like the Times is reporting on the Dems the way Miller, et al. reported on Iraq: repeat the administrations theme and talking points. In this case: Dems are weak. I assume the quotes reported were selected to present that point of view. It follows a pattern. Dems speak out forcefully and fairly against some administration action, and the press report is couched in "Dems are weak" tones."
--Josh Marshall
Charlie Cook on the state of play: "A year ago, with Republican victories in the 2004 elections still fresh and with President Bush's job-approval ratings still above 50 percent, Democrats' chances of capturing the House looked fairly slim. Today, however, with Bush's approval ratings hovering around 42 percent, the possibility of a Democratic takeover -- although less than 50-50 -- is very real."
--Josh Marshall
Majority Leader Boehner rents his two-bedroom DC apartment from a lobbyist. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Josh Marshall
Here is a perfectly nauseating article in the Times about how Democrats are apparently not taking full advantage of GOP woes, are generally sad, haven't come up with a plan, aren't crazy about their leaders, are afraid the Republicans are going to do this or that to hurt them, and apparently a bunch of other stuff too.
If what the article reports is true, the Democrats haven't even won back the majority in either house of Congress yet.
The article itself reads like a pretty lazy piece of journalism.
But the people quoted, the mindset, the navel-gazing and sad-sac carping. Truly, just shut up.
My point isn't that dirty laundry shouldn't be aired. But the mindset of chatter and enervating insiderism is not the solution to the problem: it is the problem.
There is hardly a shortage of things wrong with the current direction of the country. Explain what they are, propose alternatives, advocate for them and hit the campaign trail. Everything else is a distraction and a waste.
Be an opposition party, oppose what deserves opposing, leave the verdict to the voters. And mainly just grow up.
--Josh Marshall
Last year President Bush made phasing out Social Security the centerpiece of his legislative agenda. But he got stopped in his tracks and suffered a severe blow to his popularity.
But the desire to do away with the program dies pretty hard.
This year he's asking Congress to eliminate the already-measly lump-sum death benefit that Social Security has paid for half a century. He also wants Congress to cut off survivor benefits for 16 and 17 year olds who are not currently enrolled in school.
If you can find out whether your member of Congress supports the new cuts to Social Security, let us know.
--Josh Marshall
George C. Deutsch, the young Bush campaign flack who was telling NASA personnel that they shouldn't discuss the Big Bang without considering the topic from its religious perspective, has been forced to resign. As reported first earlier today by the Scientific Activist blog, Deutsch claimed on his resume on file at NASA that he was a graduate of Texas A&M.
Only he never graduated.
So he lied on his resume, and presumably his job application too. Always a bad move if you're planning to become embroiled in a major media firestorm.
Just to keep the recollection fresh, Deutsch was an intern in the Bush-Cheney 2004 'war room'. That qualified him for his next assignment screening scientific information NASA personnel could communicate to the public.
When reviewing NASA documents Deutsch became concerned at references to the 'Big Bang'.
The Big Bang is "not proven fact; it is opinion," he instructed one person working at NASA. "It is not NASA's place, nor should it be to make a declaration such as this about the existence of the universe that discounts intelligent design by a creator ... This is more than a science issue, it is a religious issue. And I would hate to think that young people would only be getting one-half of this debate from NASA. That would mean we had failed to properly educate the very people who rely on us for factual information the most."
Deutsch's directive was that every reference to the 'big bang' be preceded by the words 'theory of'. And a number of you wrote in to say that whatever Deutsch's foolery, it is correct to refer to the Big Bang as a 'theory'. Indeed, the big bang is much closer to being a 'theory' in the colloquial sense of the word (as opposed to the scientific sense) than evolution is.
That is quite true. But Deutsch's comments above show that a narrow scientific reading, absent the political context, misses the point.
Deutsch told the NASA guy that the Big Bang was not a "proven fact", which is certainly true. But in no meaningful sense is it mere "opinion."
It's not just some idea someone thought up which stands on an equal footing with any other idea anyone else could cook up. Among cosmologists today, it's the dominant theory about how the universe began. It is based on various theoretical work (which I won't try to understand or explain) and supported by a lot of astrophysical data.
The theory could turn out to be wrong. And it will almost certainly end up being revised in one or more ways. But it is not 'opinion'.
It's worth taking note of the word choice because it captures the mix of obscurantism and relativism which has characterized all the Bush administration's attitude about science and, really, pretty much all empirically based knowledge -- something we discussed at length here.
The rub here is the failure to see that knowledge which has been subjected to and survived -- indeed been strengthened by -- empirical and theoretical scrutiny stands on a higher footing than information that hasn't. This isn't pedantry. Nor is this some obscure alcove in the science curriculum.
This mindset -- obscurantism and relativism duking it out to be of most use in the pursuit of power -- suffuses the Bush administration: a lack of respect for facts and the set of tools we use to discern factual information from chatter and bombast.
--Josh Marshall
I just noticed this at Atrios' site. And he's right. This is a significant development. This from Wednesday's Times ...
A House Republican whose subcommittee oversees the National Security Agency broke ranks with the White House on Tuesday and called for a full Congressional inquiry into the Bush administration's domestic eavesdropping program.The lawmaker, Representative Heather A. Wilson of New Mexico, chairwoman of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence, said in an interview that she had "serious concerns" about the surveillance program. By withholding information about its operations from many lawmakers, she said, the administration has deepened her apprehension about whom the agency is monitoring and why.
There are multiple layers of potential concern about the NSA wiretap program. One is simply that it breaks the law -- regardless of whether it serves a useful anti-terrorism purpose or whether the administration is using the tool in good faith (i.e., not using it to snoop on political enemies or something like that). That seems to me to be close to an open and shut case. And to me at least it's the most important issue since it goes to the heart of our republican system of government.
But if the Times characterization of Wilson's position is accurate, she's saying more than that. She seems to suspect that the administration may be using the program for nefarious or inappropriate purposes.
Why would she be doing this? You can't read these tea leaves without knowing about Wilson's political situation.
Heather Wilson is a Republican from a tenuous swing district centered around Albuquerque. (Today her opponent released a poll showing her tied in the low-40s in her race for reelection.) Every position Wilson takes is finely calibrated to keep her politically well-positioned since she'll probably never have a truly easy race in her district. You may remember that early last year we had some fun trying to get her to actually come clean on whether she would reveal her position on phasing out Social Security.
Is this just a decision on the merits in her role as subcommittee chair? Or does she have s read on the politics going into November?
--Josh Marshall
He gets around.
Newsweek: "Over the years, [John Boehner] has made the most of controversial rules allowing members to accept free trips to luxury retreats around the world. Since 2000, Boehner has taken more than $150,000 worth of junkets paid for by private interests—ranking him in the top 10 of all members of Congress."
--Josh Marshall
Will Lieberman slip Obama the shiv? Matt Stoller walks us through the possibilities.
--Josh Marshall
A bit more on the Obama-McCain back and forth. You have to dig into the actual correspondence between the two men to get a feel for how off the mark McCain is in his criticism of Obama (see links in today's Daily Muck).
But the key here to note is what's behind this dust-up. Obama is a rising star among the Democrats. Republicans want to lay a backstory for feature criticisms and character attacks against him. So, for instance, if Obama is the vice presidential candidate in 2008, they want to have a history of attacks on him banked, ones that allege he's a liar, or too partisan, or untrustworthy, whatever. It doesn't even really matter. What matters is that there already be an established history of them. Point being, that in early 2008, they want to be able to simply refer back to Obama's 'character issue', the questions about his honesty, etc. rather than have to make the case on its merits.
That's not surprising. One only needs to think back to the Gore story, etc.
What shouldn't be missed here, though, is that Sen. McCain is quite consciously and deliberately making himself a part of this. Why? Simple. Because he needs to get right with the GOP establishment in DC. (Indeed, he probably also wants to be the future beneficiary of the sliming.) Being loved by moderates and progressives doesn't cut it for getting the Republican presidential nomination in 2008.
Don't miss why he's doing this. It's the roll-out of the slime Obama campaign. And he's leading the charge.
We'll learn a lot from how Obama responds.
--Josh Marshall
Quote of the day: "This administration reacts to anyone who questions this illegal program by saying that those of us who demand the truth and stand up for our rights and freedoms somehow has a pre-9/11 world view. In fact, the President has a pre-1776 world view. Our government has three branches, not one. And no one, not even the President, is above the law."
That's from Sen. Feingold's post on the Gonzales' testimony that just went up on TPMCafe.
--Josh Marshall
Stay tuned. A little later this morning, Sen. Feingold is going to stop by TPMCafe and tell us what he thought of AG Alberto Gonzales's testimony yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the president's warrantless surveillance program.
--Josh Marshall
Here's the link to a story on John McCain bashing Barack Obama in a particularly vicious way. "I'm embarrassed to admit that after all these years in politics, I failed to interpret your previous assurances as typical rhetorical gloss routinely used in politics to make self-interested partisan posturing appear more noble," said McCain. "I understand how important the opportunity to lead your party's efforts to exploit this issue must seem to a freshman senator, and I hold no hard feelings over your earlier disingenuousness."
What about McCain making sure his Jack Abramoff hearings didn't touch any Republican politicians (he did give blanket assurances to them, remember) or key GOP powerbrokers?
Glass houses.
Wantin' to be president can go to a guy's head.
(ed.note: There's more on the Obama-McCain fracas in today's Daily Muck.)
--Josh Marshall
A reader adds a point about FISA ...
The constant invocation of the practices of pre-FISA presidents is an incredibly important legal and constitutional point. If the president has the inherent authority to conduct surveillance, FISA might be unconstitutional. The main issue is whether Congress was able to limit this supposedly inherent authority with its enactment of FISA. Thus, the pre-FISA presidential precedent becomes an important issue.
--Josh Marshall
Alberto Gonzales says that the president's warrantless wiretapping program is constitutional, necessary and legal.
I can see where it may be constitutional, though that seems debateable. It might conceiveably also be 'necessary', though that's a malleable term and it's a difficult one to judge as long as the president won't allow any oversight of what he's doing. But it does seem to be clearly illegal. There simply does not appear to be any real question about that. The FISA law appears to speak directly to the facts at hand.
The law might be a bad one. Perhaps it should be revised or repealed. But it's not voluntary.
And in this post Kevin Drum hits on a key point ...
I'm also more tired than you can imagine of his constant invocation of presidents from Washington to Roosevelt who authorized warrantless surveillance in wartime. All of that happened before FISA was passed in 1978 and is completely meaningless. And he knows it.
Kevin doesn't fully unpack what I suspect he's getting at here. The argument to history that Gonzales is attempting isn't just off point. It's typical of the administration's basic way of operating with the public -- conscious misdirection and flimflam. You can't make this argument unless your intent is to confuse the issue and avoid the issue of whether the president has to follow the law.
--Josh Marshall
McClellan reading TPM, but not that closely?
From today's press briefing (emphasis added) ...
Go ahead, Victoria.Q Scott, there have been various reports that photographs of the President with Jack Abramoff have disappeared from the archives of photographic studios, at least one. Could you tell us whether the White House or anyone working at the White House's behest has taken any steps to remove any photographs that the President --
MR. McCLELLAN: I don't know anything about that. I think that I saw some story where the very company that you're mentioning said otherwise. So I think you ought to see what they said.
Q They acknowledged that the photographs had disappeared from their work site.
MR. McCLELLAN: I think they said something other than that.
The reference, of course, is to our story about the Abramoff-Bush photos that were scrubbed from the website of Reflections Photography, the DC photo studio that specializes in campaign and political event photography for the Republican party.
Just for the record, please note that McClellan declined to answer the question of whether the White House instructed Reflections Photography to scrub its website of Abramoff-Bush photos.
If he coulda, he woulda, one would imagine.
--Josh Marshall
Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA) is a bold man.
When politicians all around him were losing their heads, refunding and donating Jack Abramoff’s money
as fast as they could, Doolittle stood strong and refused to bow to political expediency. And in a recent interview, he pretty much dared the Justice Department to come after him: “Investigate me.”
So here’s another bold play that shouldn't go unnoticed. I mentioned it this morning in the Daily Muck, but it really deserves more attention.
Brent Wilkes, owner of ACDS, Inc. and part-owner of Duke Cunningham, was not a mere one-Congressman man. He had quite a relationship with Doolittle too.
Being a crooked defense contractor, Wilkes’ business was earmarks. In 2002, he founded a new company called PerfectWave; the product was a sound technology that could supposedly be used to weed out background noises from electronic communications. As with Wilkes’ other businesses, a process detailed in Sunday’s San Diego Union-Tribune piece, Wilkes started with the technology and then worked to convince lawmakers that the Pentagon needed it.
Wilkes convinced Doolittle with $85,000 (from himself, his employees, his lobbyists) in contributions over three years. In return, PerfectWave won Doolittle’s support for $37M in earmarked appropriations. In a Washington Post story on this last week, Doolittle responded with a statement that "he frequently supports 'well deserving projects throughout the state.'" And "his support of PerfectWave Technology ‘was no exception and based completely on the project's merits and the written support of the military.'"
Now, forget for the moment about the "project’s [alleged] merits" (see the Daily Muck for more on that) – let's focus in for a moment on Doolittle's claim about "written support of the military."
The Post apparently just took Doolittle's word for it. In any case, they didn’t follow up on his claim about having written support from the military. But the San Diego Union-Tribune did. Here's what they came up with:
[T]he only evidence Doolittle's office could provide to show military support for the project was a letter of praise from Robert Lusardi, a program manager for light armored vehicles at the Marine Corps dated Feb. 25 – two and a half years after PerfectWave got its first earmark. By the time Lusardi wrote his letter, the company had received at least $37 million in earmarks.
So this "written support of the military" upon which Doolittle based his decision came almost three years too late. And it came from a "program manager for light armored vehicles" – relatively meaningless since the earmark for 2005 specified that the system was for "flight deck operations."
"The written support of the military" is a much better justification than "I was in Brent Wilkes’ pocket." Too bad it didn’t pan out.
--Paul Kiel
A number of news sources seem to be referring to the president's budget as a deficit-cutting plan. But the huge tax cuts included in it must massively off-set the spending cuts, right? So really it's a deficit increasing plan.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, just file this under the consumer reporting division of TPM Media. You've been sending us your horror stories (okay, pain in the ass stories) about IKEA. And it does seem like it's a fairly common occurrence that IKEA just forgets to process your order after you've made it. So it just never comes.
LM from outside Chicago says "Yep, same thing happened to us. Placed a $3000 kitchen cabinet order at the Schaumberg (Chicago) store. Called 3 weeks later to find out when the truck should be there to pick them up. Oops. Forgot to process the credit card payment! That’ll be another 3-4 weeks, then."
For TPM Reader JV it was even worse: "Long story short, they processed my order but forgot to charge me shipping. As I’m sure you realize, IKEA tends to ship large things, but back then (and maybe still) they didn’t really know HOW to ship large things. So after waiting a week after taking the order, my IKEA rep called back, left a message on our voicemail that said something to the effect of "Oh, we forgot shipping. That’ll be another $700 because it has to all go freight. [click]"
At least DC found out there was a problem after three days:
I had the exact same thing happen to me a few months back with a bookshelf for my office. I ordered it online; was alerted that my order would be confirmed by an email which never came; and then when I called 3-4 days later, was told that it never processed. They obviously have something seriously wrong with their e-commerce and logistics operations."At the end of the day though even we're in better shape than MT ... "I have my ongoing Ikea story going on now. Perhaps you're not interested in every detail, but it's a chance for me to vent. (There's a happy ending -- no thanks to Ikea -- so be sure to read the last part of the message.) I'm trying to get a long table for my kitchen.
First, at the store, the table was out of stock, but coming in. I found out online a couple of weeks later that they have it. (Of course, finding anything online is an adventure in itself, their website is such a mess.) It's a bit too long to take home in my car. So:
Started to order it online. They can't tell you shipping and tax before you hit "confirm" -- they say an Ikea associate will be in touch w/you w/in 1-2 days (I think) to firm it all up. So, I decided to call and get the information before I bought.
On hold, several times, for upwards of 20 minutes. Forget it. I emailed - their autoresponse said I'd hear back in 5-10 business days.
Finally went ahead and ordered it via the net - was told, only after hitting "confirm," that they wouldn't charge my credit card until my ok to shipping/tax charges. However, due to high volume, that would take a while -- 3-5 business days? Or maybe it was 5-10?
Meanwhile, they finally answered my original email about the shipping charges -- and told me they couldn't tell me. Told me to call their shipping department -- another 800 number. (Couldn't they have called the shipping department for me?)
Then, today, I hear about my online order -- due to a technical malfunction they couldn't complete it; would I please call. Of course, they give me the same number at which they put you on hold until you don't need the furniture anyway, because in the meantime your kids have grown up and your puppy has died of old age.
Unbelievable.
It just gets better and better. But keep your stories coming because they ease the agony and sorrow (that strange mix of discomfort and ennui) of sitting on the floor for us. Meanwhile, we'll get back to the political fare.
--Josh Marshall
This is nice. The OMB has a fact sheet up at the government website touting all the things "the administration" has done since 2001.
There's "Began a major reorganization of the Army ground forces, known as Modularity, to increase the number of combat brigades and improve their mobility, flexibility, and capability to operate autonomously." Okay, fair enough.
And there's "Raised servicemembers’ pay by about 25 percent and enhanced special pays and bonuses to improve recruiting and retention;" Okay, maybe debatable in context. But, sure, give them that too.
And then there's this one: "Liberated nearly 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan;"
Hmmm
"The administration" pulled that one off? Wasn't that like "the USA" or maybe "the US military". Heck, no love for "the coalition of the willing" even?
--Josh Marshall
I guess a lot of small businessmen want to crack down on onerous taxes and government regulation. Me? I'd be more than satisfied just to crack down on IKEA. Maybe vote them out of office entirely.
As many of you know, we've been expanding here at TPM. And we even have our own new offices where we're working from.
So here I am, sitting cross-legged on the floor with my laptop. And there across from me, against the other wall, is Paul Kiel (author of the renowned Daily Muck), sitting on the floor cross-legged with his laptop. And there's Josh Hudelson, our new intern, doing exactly the same over to my right. (Kate Cambor is at lunch.)
Now, you may say, something doesn't quite fit. Right! Where's the furniture? That's just what I was thinking!
We were guaranteed delivery of all our TPM desks and shelves by no later than tomorrow. But when I called this morning to find out what was going on, since they hadn't called us yet with the exact delivery time, I was informed that they'd, well ... pretty much forgotten to process the order. Oops.
(I'd heard that their ability to ship things was a bit less than top-notch. But I didn't know it would be quite this bad. You have an IKEA goof story? Let us know. And if you're waiting for your IKEA furniture to be delivered, by all means, call right now and make sure they didn't forget you ordered it.)
In any case, if the posts today have a particularly 'ground-level' feel to them, well, you'll know why.
--Josh Marshall
A few days ago, when we launched the Grand Ole Docket, many of you noticed that for several of the malefactors we had included a no picture available icon instead of the pictures of the guys themselves. In response a number of you pointed out that there were actually a number of pictures you can find of like John Colyandro or Jim Ellis (DeLay associates indicted in Texas).
The issue, though, wasn't that we couldn't find images. It was that we either couldn't or hadn't yet acquired rights to republish them. But no more.
One thing we decided to do was get mug shots of the folks who'd already been indicted.
John Colyandro
DeLay Associate
Indicted in Texas
Jim Ellis
DeLay Associate
Indicted in Texas
So here for instance, here are the photos of John Coyandro and Jim Ellis, both DeLay associates tied up in the Texas corporate money laudering scheme that toppled Tom DeLay from the pinnacle of the House leadership.
We'll be updating the Docket later today.
--Josh Marshall
How much of the outrage is orchestrated? See this diary at Kos. Also, see Juan Cole's important rebuttal to the charges of orchestration.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader RS: "It might be instructive to remember the reactions to "Piss Christ," Andres Serrano's photograph of a crucifix in a glass of urine. NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani, no friend of civil rights, tried to get it removed from a display at the tax-supported Brooklyn Museum. The arts and civil liberties community rose up in opposition and "Piss Christ" stayed. Giuliani didn't try to prevent the work from being displayed at all, he only said taxpayer's money shouldn't support its display, a distinction lost on many. And of course, there was no violence."
TPM Reader CZ: "My first reaction was to the violence and the sense that the Muslim world needs to understand what a free press means. But as I reflect on it more, I think one of the greatest weaknesses of our western societies (currently so wedded to capitalism and sensationalism) is the belief that nothing is sacred. So, of course, I repudiate Muslim violence. But I'm also put off by the cavilier attitude the Danish newspaper showed in publishing the cartoons."
--Josh Marshall
Would Americans be no less outraged at a mocking cartoon of Martin Luther King (say, in some stereotyped Watermelon-eating pose) or Jesus as many Muslims around the world are at the Danish cartoons?
I think it's probably fair to say that any mainstream publication that published such a caricature of King would be swamped in a wave of social opprobrium, probably sufficient to lead to the firing of editors or others who were directly responsible for the decision to publish. With a mocking or satirical Jesus, I think the reaction would be not quite so dramatic. But I think the informal bars to something like that are great enough that they just stop it from happening.
(Again, I think it's a given that one could probably find either in out of the way publications. But I'm talking about major newspapers, national magazines, etc.)
So does that make it the same? Is the level of offense equal?
I think we all have some sense of seeing some racist outfit publish a vile caricature of someone like King and then hiding behind 'free speech' orthodoxy when the you-know-what comes down on them. So if this were just the Muslims in Denmark equivalent, I wouldn't be inclined to much sympathy.
To me, that's part of the equation -- the level of offense and the social/cultural context. But the real issue here is the resort to violence (at the extremes) and the calls for state intervention to prevent such publication from happening (on the 'moderate' end) that makes this different.
But let me know your thoughts.
--Josh Marshall