Thursday’s Mini-Report

May 8, 2008

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* Relief efforts shouldn’t be this difficult: “Relief supplies from the United Nations arrived in Myanmar Thursday, but U.S. military planes loaded with aid were still denied access by the country’s isolationist regime five days after a devastating cyclone. The military junta also continued to stall on visas for U.N. teams seeking entry to ensure the aid is delivered to the victims amid fears that lack of safe food and drinking water could push the death toll above 100,000.”

* Gun battles break out in Beirut: “Gunfire broke out in downtown Beirut on Thursday after Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said recent government actions amount to ‘a declaration of open war.’ There are reports of open street battles in at least one neighborhood.”

* Good: “Today, the House passed a package of housing measures that will help families facing foreclosure keep their homes, help other families avoid foreclosures in the future, and help the recovery of communities harmed by empty homes caught in the foreclosure process. The package is the most comprehensive response yet to the American mortgage crisis.”

* Blue Dogs really do pick strange fights sometimes: “A small group of fiscally conservative Blue Dog Democrats is threatening to block the emergency war spending bill over a program for veterans’ benefits not offset with tax hikes or spending cuts. Because of that problem, and the efforts by House Republicans to stall floor action with procedural motions, the vote on the carefully crafted supplemental measure could be delayed until Friday or next week.”

* Terry McAuliffe thinks the Democratic race will be over in early June. We’ll see.

* Uh oh: “Is the Anbar Awakening coming unraveled? In the last four weeks nine U.S. soldiers have been killed in Anbar province. That’s up from two in the previous six months. Something to keep an eye on.”

* One of the military analysts involved in the Pentagon Pundit scandal “at one point proclaim[ed] that Rumsfeld need to get out there on the ‘offense,’ because ‘we’d love to be following our leader, as indeed you are. You are the leader. You are our guy.'” We don’t know who, but this same person went on national television where he/she was treated as an objective voice on military matters.

* Just how bad is inflation? (thanks to R.K. for the tip)

* Charlie Savage is going from the Boston Globe to the NYT. It’s a great pick up for the Times; Savage is one of the best reporters in the country.

* Did Mark Penn not realize that Dems award delegates proportionately? He denies it, and it seems hard to believe, but it’s been the subject of considerable speculation today.

* I’ll never understand rulings like these: “[T]he Michigan Supreme Court ruled ‘that a 2004 ban against gay marriage also blocks governments and state universities from offering health insurance to the partners of gay workers…. Up to 20 public universities, community colleges, school districts and local governments in Michigan have benefits policies covering at least 375 gay couples.'”

* More than 43,000 U.S. troops were sent to Iraq or Afghanistan despite the fact that they had been deemed medically “non-deployable” before they were shipped out.

* I can’t imagine why the White House press corps is so interested in the president’s daughter’s wedding.

* Russ Feingold: “The Bush administration recently announced it will allow select members of Congress to read Justice Department legal opinions about the CIA’s controversial detainee interrogation program that have been hidden from Congress until now. But as the administration allows a glimpse of this secret law — and it is law — we are left wondering what other laws it is still keeping under lock and key.”

* The telecom immunity fight is still percolating along.

* The Bushies won’t like this at all: “A military judge in the trial of Canadian captive Omar Khadr threatened Thursday to suspend the terror trial unless the prison camp releases a detailed log of Khadr’s treatment in more than five years of detention as an alleged al Qaeda terrorist.”

* Be sure to check out the addendum chapter to “Free Ride: John McCain and the Media.”

* How rough are things for Bush? His approval rating among Republicans has dropped to 60%. Ouch.

* And finally, remember the nuns who were rebuffed at the polls in Indiana on Tuesday because they didn’t have driver’s licenses? They’re really not happy.

Anything to add? Consider this an end-of-the-day open thread.

Clinton put the kybosh on the Michigan delegate plan discussed in the campaign round-up earlier.

Clinton supporters blaming Obama in 3…2…1…

  • I don’t see anything in the Penn memo quoted in the link to suggest that he wasn’t aware of the proportional distribution rule; he seems simply to be making the eminently reasonable argument that Clinton’s substantial leads in large states put her in a strong position as of April 2007.

  • The Michi ruling drives a big garlic-smeared stake through the lame ass agrument that if gay couples will just shut up and accept “marriage like” arrangements the TalEvan will leave them alone. I bet some jackass somewhere is trying to push legislation that would bar two non-related individuals of the same gender from co-signing on leases and mortgages.

  • * Relief efforts shouldn’t be this difficult — CB

    There was a similar problem with relief effort following the tsunami in Thailand (Sri Lanka); all authoritarian regimes tend to be paranoid about allowing anyone from the outside world into their tightly-controlled bubble. And they fear US more than anyone else. To be fair, they may have some reason to be suspicious of US’s “help”; we do have a history of meddling with other people’s governments, when it suits us. It is unfortunate that the, otherwise reasonable, “fear the gift-bearing Greeks” principle prevents real help from reaching people.

  • JRD – it’s not in the Penn memo, but is in the report link. Follow that one. It was reported by two people in the same strategy meeting that Penn claimed Hillary would have the race wrapped up early because she would get ALL of California’s 370 delegates.

  • EPA Might Not Act To Limit Rocket Fuel in Drinking WaterWASHINGTON –
    An EPA official said Tuesday there’s a “distinct possibility” the agency won’t take action to rid drinking water of a toxic rocket fuel ingredient that has contaminated public water supplies around the country.

    Democratic senators called that unacceptable. They argued that states and local communities shouldn’t have to bear the expense of cleansing their drinking water of perchlorate, which has been found in at least 395 sites in 35 states — or the risk of not doing so.

    The toxin interferes with thyroid function and poses developmental health risks, particularly to fetuses.

    Benjamin Grumbles, assistant administrator for water at the Environmental Protection Agency, told a Senate hearing that EPA is aware that perchlorate is widespread and poses health risks.

    But he said that after years of study, EPA has yet to determine whether regulating perchlorate in drinking water would do much good.

    http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/07/8782/

    Glad they’re there for us. I feel so much safer with the goopers in charge.

    h/t and the beat goes on at TP

    http://www.livefrankly.wordpress.com

  • More? Ok.

    Oil Giants to Settle Water Suit

    Some of the nation’s largest oil companies have agreed to pay about $423 million in cash to settle a lawsuit brought by more than a hundred public water providers, claiming water contamination from a popular gasoline additive.

    The companies also agreed to pay 70 percent of the future cleanup costs over the next 30 years. The defendants that agreed to the settlement include BP, Royal Dutch Shell, ConocoPhillips, Chevron, Marathon Oil, Valero Energy, Citgo and Sunoco. Six other companies named in the lawsuit, including Exxon Mobil, did not agree to the deal, said Scott Summy, a lawyer at Baron & Budd.

    In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs, which include 153 public water systems in New York, California and 15 other states, claimed that the additive, a chemical called methyl tertiary butyl ether, or M.T.B.E., was a defective product that led to widespread contamination of groundwater. The suit contended that the chemical was used by oil companies, even though they knew of the environmental and health risks that it posed.

    Low levels of M.T.B.E. can make drinking water supplies unpalatable because of its “offensive taste and odor,” according to the Environmental Protection Agency. The agency has also found that the compound caused cancer in laboratory rats that were exposed to high doses.

    Since the mid-1990s, hundreds of lawsuits have been brought against oil companies for their use of the chemical. This deal, if approved, would be the largest settlement to date.
    But after being widely adopted, it was found to corrupt groundwater. Even in small amounts, the additive makes water smell and taste like turpentine.

    The use of M.T.B.E. is now banned in 23 states, including New York and California.

    In 2003, the Republican-dominated Congress tried to pass a provision that would have shielded M.T.B.E. manufacturers from litigation, but failed because of strong opposition in the Senate. A second attempt to add a lawsuit shield also failed during discussion of the 2005 energy bill.

    http://biz.yahoo.com/ nytimes/ 080508/ 1194772938648.html?.v=3

    http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/mtbeban/ This link shows the other states who have banned MTBE.

    h/t Freedom Rebel at TP

    Just think of all the countries where there are NO watchdogs (as lame as ours are)

    Water, water, everywhere…and not a drop to drink

  • I can’t imagine why the White House press corps is so interested in the president’s daughter’s wedding.

    Because the equation:

    Global warming + Myanmar + Cyclone + Food shortages + Biofuels = Boring as hell

    And because….
    Rev. Jeremiah Wright hasn’t been on a podium somewhere lately.

  • And what about more US intervention?

    United States Maneuvers to Carve Up Bolivia with Autonomy Vote

    The illegal referendum held on Sunday to declare autonomy in Santa Cruz, Bolivia’s richest province, is backed by the Bush administration in an attempt to halt the leftward drift of South America. While the US embassy in La Paz blandly declares its support for “unity and democracy” in Bolivia, the government’s Interior Minister Alfredo Raba states what is widely known, that the United States “has an agenda more political than diplomatic in Bolivia, and this agenda is linked to opponents of the current government.” Evo Morales, the first indigenous president of the country, bluntly declares: “The imperialist project is to try to carve up Bolivia, and with that to carve up South America because it is the epicenter of great changes that are advancing on a world scale.”

    http://globalalternatives.org/node/86

    Maybe we can add all of South America to our Axis of Evil and go to war with the whole fucking world!

    h/t Mary at TP

    (sorry for my shameless blogwhoring, but, come on down and read Orders and Acts and Lies. Oh my! Long but hopefully you’ll think it’s worth your time.)

  • It’s obvious that Republicans are going to continue passing these voter ID laws, and given the current composition of the Supreme Court we have no realistic prospects for stopping them. As the article notes, such legislation could be passed in time for the GE this year. What we need to do — IMMEDIATELY — is establish programs to help those who need assistance to obtain the necessary IDs. Such programs could even be established on a charitable, rather than a partisan, basis. So long as the assistance is provided only to those who genuinely need help (including but not limited to voters who are poor, minorities, or both), it’s likely that Democrats will benefit the most from helping these voters exercise their right to vote, but no otherwise qualified voter should ever be disenfranchised based on inability to procure a photo ID and that is an issue of fundamental fairness, not a partisan issue.

    If people lack transportation to go get photo IDs, we need to be driving them there. If they need to order copies of their birth certificates, we need to be helping them fill out the paperwork.

    It’s time to respond to these measures with actions, not just words. I’m ex-US so I can’t drive anyone to the DMV myself, but that’s the sort of charitable activity I’d be glad to support.

  • The Answer is Orange(3): I bet some jackass somewhere is trying to push legislation that would bar two non-related individuals of the same gender from co-signing on leases and mortgages.

    This is West Virginia’s anti-cohabitation law:

    §61-8-4. Lewd and lascivious cohabitation and conduct; penalty; when persons presumed to be unmarried.
    If any persons, not married to each other, lewdly and lasciviously associate and cohabit together, or, whether married or not, be guilty of open or gross lewdness and lasciviousness, they shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and, upon conviction, shall be fined not less than fifty dollars, and may, in the discretion of the court, be imprisoned not exceeding six months, and, upon a repetition of the offense, they shall, upon conviction, be confined in jail not less than six nor more than twelve months. In prosecutions for adultery and fornication, and for lewdly and lasciviously cohabiting together, the persons named in the indictment shall be presumed to be unmarried persons in the absence of proof to the contrary.

    It’s an old law and I believe the only way it is used today is to deny the existence of common-law marriages. There was an attempt to dump the law a couple years ago, but Christian groups fought hard to keep it. Amazing.

  • And I don’t know about the rest of you, but I am fucking tired of my tax dollars going to:

    1. Companies who have their operations funneled through the Caymens and don’t pay Medicare or SSI taxes

    http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/08/cayman-islands-subsidiary-allows-pentagon-contractor-assisting-war-in-iraq-to-avoid-millions-in-taxes/

    – and –

    2. Companies who can’t get their employees to keep their dicks in their pants – AND who have no repercussions concerning them not keeping their dicks in their pants

    http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/08/latest-kbr-scandal-contractors-accused-of-sexual-harrassment-at-british-embassy-in-iraq/

    How do we stop the bleed of our tax dollars? This is total bullshit!!!

  • “How rough are things for Bush? His approval rating among Republicans has dropped to 60%. Ouch.”

    Yeah, but the 40% who don’t approve of him think he’s not conservative enough. Not much help for our side.

    Actually, if you think about it, Bush’s reckless fiscal policies are very conservative. He is bankrupting the federal government to the point where it not only will have to be shrunk so that it can be drowned in the bathtub, but that it’ll go down the drain. Isn’t that what they want, ultimately? A federal government that has but two departments: the department of defense, and the department of corporate welfare, aka the military/industrial complex.

    They just don’t appreciate what Bush has done for them.

  • Oops:

    AFT TPM!

    Permalink: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/194069.php

    Here is the killer Kurtz quote:

    Race has been the subtext of much of Hillary’s argument for her own electability. But now she’s thrown it right out there in the open: Obama can’t win because he’s black. Vote for me instead.

    You don’t have to believe that Hillary’s a racist (I don’t) to conclude that a combination of the rigors of the campaign trail and her own powerful ambitions have clouded her judgment and curdled her spirit. It has certainly soured what had been a historic relationship between the Clintons and the black community.

    Hers is not an appeal we’d tolerate from a Republican candidate, nor should we from a Democrat, no matter how sterling her progressive credentials might otherwise be.

    There’s been a lot of talk about the damage Hillary will do to the party by staying in the race this long. Perhaps she should consider the damage she’s doing to herself.

    That is exactly right.
    And explains I’ve been calling her a washed up clown… for months.
    Hillary and Bill and their dead-enders are sick… morally sick and spiritually ill.

  • And you’ll never guess what could be the Achilles heel of the GOP heading into Indecision 2008, with serious consequences galore.

    And tell me if this sounds like the conservatives’ preferred model for “reinventing welfare” in its “purest” form (with workfare being “only the beginning”)….

  • Do you think if Republicans were still the chairpersons of either Senate or House Committees, this information would ever have come out?

    “The general manager and possibly other senior staff at the Crandall Canyon Mine near Huntington, Utah, where 9 miners died in August 2007, hid information from federal mining officials that could have prevented the disaster and should face criminal charges, according to a Congressional investigation whose results were released Thursday.”

    The Congressional investigation, however, found that rather than informing officials at the Mine Safety and Health Administration of the March bump immediately after it occurred, Crandall Canyon officials instead contacted officials at the Bureau of Land Management.

    “This is curious,” said Mr. Miller, the committee chairman. “While the Mine Safety and Health Administration is responsible for safety, Bureau of Land Management is responsible for ensuring a profit. The mine operator called Bureau of Land Management.”

  • * Uh oh: “Is the Anbar Awakening coming unraveled? In the last four weeks nine U.S. soldiers have been killed in Anbar province. That’s up from two in the previous six months. Something to keep an eye on.”

    What a sad metric for measuring whether policies are working or not. “Let’s try it and see how many soldiers get killed. If it’s too many we might have to adjust the plan.” Canaries in coal mines.

  • re: myanmar.

    i don’t usually advocate stuff like this. but we ought to just tell the military to go f**k themselves and go in and deliver the relief supplies that are necessary. after all, aren’t the people living there what are really important?

  • shillary has been reduced to pleading that she is the “white Americans” candidate – this is truly disgusting. We would never accept this from a republican and now we have the wife of the last democratic president screaming that she is the one who represents “whites.”

    Shame on her, but more so, shame on those that proclaim to be “liberal” and/or “progressive” yet support an increasingly racist candidate that is now spouting crap the even john mclame knows better than to say (and he’s senile – what’s shillary’s excuse?)

    I know we should be grateful – shillary is desparate and now HER true “colors” are showing – a child of priviledge that believes she is entitled to the presidency even if she has to reopen racial chasms and divide the democratic party.

    We should all be thankful that we will not have to endure 28 years of bush-clinton-bush-clinton.

    But that doesn’t make her actions and those of her supporters any less offensive.

  • Re: #12 above – Michigan has a similar cohabitation law:

    THE MICHIGAN PENAL CODE (EXCERPT)
    Act 328 of 1931

    750.335 Lewd and lascivious cohabitation and gross lewdness.

    Sec. 335.

    Any man or woman, not being married to each other, who lewdly and lasciviously associates and cohabits together, and any man or woman, married or unmarried, who is guilty of open and gross lewdness and lascivious behavior, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment for not more than 1 year, or a fine of not more than $1,000.00. No prosecution shall be commenced under this section after 1 year from the time of committing the offense.

    As to why the law is being interpreted the way it is, our Republican Attorney General decided that it was important to use the law to harass universities that offered same-sex benefits, despite (or possibly because of) the damage this is going to do to the university system. We have a lot of right-wing religious extremists in this state – one of my representatives in the state legislature is a creationist.

  • How rough are things for Bush? His approval rating among Republicans has dropped to 60%. Ouch.

    I’d imagine that this number would be much lower if they polled all the people who switched parties to claim they’re independent now. This means it’s ‘only’ 60% amongst the diehards.

  • Ted @ #23.

    Guess your RAG is trying to make room for all the RUGs (Regents University Grads) who’ll soon be pouring out of D.C. My advice to you: Bonk them over the head, chuck them in the lake and let the zebra mussels cover the evidence.

    When state schools like UMich have become a national joke because the professors have gone some place that is not run by wetsuit wearing freaks he can wrap himself in Bush’s Mission Accomplished banner.

    I wish these shitheels could find a way to empty both chambers into their feet without bothering the rest of us.

  • RE:

    * Relief efforts shouldn’t be this difficult — CB

    There was a similar problem with relief effort following the tsunami in Thailand (Sri Lanka); all authoritarian regimes tend to be paranoid about allowing anyone from the outside world into their tightly-controlled bubble. And they fear US more than anyone else. To be fair, they may have some reason to be suspicious of US’s “help”; we do have a history of meddling with other people’s governments, when it suits us. It is unfortunate that the, otherwise reasonable, “fear the gift-bearing Greeks” principle prevents real help from reaching people.

    I guess that might have something to do w/ BushCo’s refusal of help from foreign countries after Katrina and Rita.

  • More than 43,000 U.S. troops were sent to Iraq or Afghanistan despite the fact that they had been deemed medically “non-deployable” before they were shipped out.

    As awful as this sounds, it is likely only the tip of the iceberg. I am working with some IVAW folks at Fort Hood. The young woman who works with them is married to a soldier now on his third tour in Iraq, who ended his second tour “dead on the table” for 20 minutes after his vehicle was blown up by an IED. After 5 months in the hospital, he was deemed OK to return, even though he has virtually no hearing in one ear. The Army said they wouldn’t send him on the streets without other soldiers who can hear. Another young soldier, who has severe PTSD and suffers from mile bipolarism (enough to have en effect) is afraid to go to the Army for treatment because as one doctor told him, “our job isn’t to help you, it’s to make you deployable.” He is also looking forward to being stop-lossed before the end of the year to be sent back to Iraq for his third tour in January (he’s 21, btw).

    Right now, the only way out of today’s action Army is a wheelchair or a casket.

    One percent of America is bearing 100% of the effort.

  • Cleaver…damn that sucks. So many people prevented from changing this situation because these war cheerleaders sit home acting like warriors while they sacrifice others pretending to support them. We support them by protecting them from those who are willing to sacrifice them needlessly. These neocons don’t even regard them as people, just numbers. It makes me sick. They have such little respect for their lives. They ignore the reality and live out some hero fantasy in their heads where death and injury do not exist and they are all commanders while the insanity of their actions are forced on these troops.
    When we they ever get it that supporting the troops means protecting them and getting them out of harm’s way not insisting they remain targets policing a civil war deserted by the ones who force them to stay there, fit or not, while they keep score on TV. Makes you wanna’ scream.

  • There was a similar problem with relief effort following the tsunami in Thailand (Sri Lanka)

    Thailand (Siam) and Sri Lanka are two quite separate countries, quite a long way apart: and both are democracies, not authoritarian regimes. You may be thinking of Indonesia, which is also a democracy, but still seems to have some bad habits left over from its’ earlier autocratic incarnations

  • Myanmar represents the perfect example of where the U.S. should be sending its troops and billions of dollars that Bushwhacker seems to think is his to spend on whatever he damn well wants. Instead of invading a country whose citizens largely want NO part of us or any other “peace-keeping force” telling them whom they can and cannot fight with, why not send troops to Myanmar for humanitarian aid, along with those billions of dollars we’re currently flushing down the Iraq toilet.

  • I live in Thailand and not very far from the border. A friend of mine just came back from Burma yesterday. She couldn’t leave because of the cyclone and spent a week after it hit. Based on her observations (the government did nothing); why don’t we just go in; throw out the junta; put Su Kyi in charge and leave 1,000 Blackwater killers to guard her and be done with it. The whole operation would take 4 hours and make us look like heroes. That Jackass Bush would look, oh, maybe 1% better in the polls and America might look 10% better in the world. hey, it’s just a thought.

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