QOTD, John Cole: they are mobilizing and going balls to the wall in defense of sadism. It is really quite amazing, and a testament to just how sick and detestable and rotten to the core the Republican party has become.
Incertus on the study finding repugs don't understand that Colbert is laughing at them:
Conservative comedy is one of those really elusive things, like Bigfoot, or a Republican solution to a problem that doesn't involve a capital gains tax cut. I've suggested in the past that it's because so many conservative comics (or radio talk show hosts, who have many of the same skill sets) feel that comedy comes from pointing and laughing at the weak, as opposed to puncturing the gas bags of power like most liberal (and far more successful comics) do.BarbinMD's summary of Cal Thomas' column: Cal " is concerned about the upcoming release of photos that show the "purported abuse of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan." Since we don't torture, it's unclear why the release of these photos should be a problem. "
...
So they just don't get satire? Is is just that they're so convinced that they're right that they can't understand that someone might be mocking their positions?
TPM Headline:
Conservative Activist: Flu Emergency Is 'Political Thing' To Push Sebelius Nomination Through
digby: Nothing To SayIn case you're wondering what the head of the Republican Party thinks about the flu outbreak, here is his statement:After the break, Rush attacked the UN for issuing a warning for a worldwide flu pandemic, claiming that it is "by design" to get people to respond to government orders. The media fall right in line with this stuff, Rush said, amplifying the nature of the crisis. Rush -- in his capacity as public health expert -- added that "the flu's a common thing."This makes perfect sense. If you are a conservative you can't believe that something like an epidemic or a pandemic could even exist or you would have to grant that the necessity for public health --- a government function. Indeed, you even have to grant that a pandemic requires that people are going to be forced to behave in ways that explicitly explicitly define their own personal survival with the common good.
Rush is right to be a little bit nervous about this, though. Public health crises tend to focus the public on the usefulness of things like science, international cooperation, government coordination. You know, the sort of thing that liberals think are necessary. Something like that simply doesn't fit into the conservative worldview. They see all problems and challenges in schoolyard terms of good guys and bad guys. This kind of challenge (like global warming) falls outside the paradigm by which they organize their world. Pandemics, like hurricanes, can't be dealt with by using tough talk and threats. So, they are lost.
Sudbay: GOP won't stop filibuster of Sebelius despite swine flu emergency
This just says everything we need to know about Senate Republicans. They are committed to their filibuster of the Sebelius nomination despite the growing fears of a flu pandemic. Republicans put politics first. Greg Sargent has the story:So Kathleen Sebelius will get her confirmation vote as Health and Human Services secretary tomorrow in the Senate — but even with the flu outbreak, her confirmation will still have to clear a big hurdle, requiring 60 votes.Want to know why? Sargent explains it succinctly:
So says the office of GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell, anyway.
As you know, Senate Republicans have been filibustering Sebelius over lingering questions about her views on late-term abortions and some campaign contributions she received from an abortion doctor. Late last week, the Senate Dem leadership announced that in the face of GOP opposition, they had agreed with Republicans to bring Sebelius’ confirmation to the floor for a vote tomorrow that would indeed require the 60 votes.
The outbreak of the flu epidemic had led some Dems to hope that the GOP would drop their filibuster, which would mean the 60 vote threshold would no longer apply. And even GOP Senator Susan Collins called for the Senate to expedite her confirmation today.Bottom line: The filibuster over an abortion controversy is still throwing a hurdle in the way of this nomination, despite the flu epidemic.McConnell is more worried about throwing a bone to the right-wing extremists than he is about having a Secretary of Health and Human Services during a health crisis.
Sudbay: What's the flu got to do with the economy? Ask Senator Susan Collins
During the stimulus negotiations earlier this year, Senator Susan Collins couldn't get herself on t.v. enough. And, like so many of her GOP colleagues, she found plenty to mock -- but, as John noted this morning, she seemed particularly obsessed with mocking preparations for a flu pandemic. Watch her in action via Media Matters:
Hmm. What's the flu pandemic got to do with the economy? For starters, Reuters reports it's already having an effect:Oil prices fell more than 4 percent to below $50 a barrel as investors feared a new blow to an already fragile global economy if trade flows are curbed and manufacturing is hit.What was that question Collins asked about the flu pandemic again? Oh yeah, "What does that have to do with an economic stimulus package?"
The MSCI world equity index fell 1 percent, and U.S. stocks were down in choppy trading.
Atrios: Supervillains The Villagers and the bedwetter crowd really bought into the alleged-terrorists-as-supervillains frame. It helped justify the extreme treatment they received. It's pretty damn hard to keep Magneto locked up, after all, the consequences of letting him get out would catastrophic.
Atrios: Our Moral Betters he people the Villagers have anointed as our moral leaders are, for the most part, monsters.
- digby: Relatively Appropriate
Bush's former speechwriter Michael Gerson is known as a Christian political operative with a very high moral standing. He wrote some of George W. Bush's most soaring, spiritual rhetoric. (They were usually the least believable words coming out of the man's mouth, although that's arguable.) Today, he says he was against torture until he read the most excellent Bybee and Bradbury memos which show how serious and thoughtful the decision was. He explains that the proper moral position on torture is that we really should try to avoid it but it's probably going to be necessary at times just because. And it's especially ok if we make sure that thoughtful, sober memos are written to secretly legalize it. And anyway using nuclear weapons and firebombing like we did in WWII was worse, so this is nothing.
And he also says this isn't moral relativism. I'm very relieved. Because moral relativism is very bad. Or, at least, that's what I've been told.
I just pray no fellatio was involved in the torture regime or there is going to be hell to pay.
One of the things that has kept me from saying much over the last week or so is my sheer amazement that there are people who seriously pose such questions and expect to be answered with something other than expressions of bafflement and moral horror. Something else that has kept me from writing much on this recently is the profoundly dispiriting realization (really, it is just a reminder) that it is torture and aggressive war that today’s mainstream right will go to the wall to defend, while any and every other view can be negotiated, debated, compromised or abandoned. I have started doubting whether people who are openly pro-torture or engaged in the sophistry of Manzi’s post are part of the same moral universe as I am, and I have wondered whether there is even a point in contesting such torture apologia as if they were reasonable arguments deserving of real consideration. Such fundamental assumptions at the core of our civilization should not have to be re-stated or justified anew, and the fact that they have to be is evidence of how deeply corrupted our political life has become, but if such basic norms are not reinforced it seems clear that they will be leeched away over time.I have to admit to being surprised that the right seems to not only have instinctively rushed to defend torture (when, of course, they are not busy insisting that it isn’t torture), but now they are attempting to shift the debate into one in which we discuss the relative merits of torture (look at all the good intel I got while drowning this guy!) while bringing in the lawyers (I guess Andy McCarthy has moved on from Obama’s birth certificate) to make sure that their legal behinds are covered.
Considering what they have done with virtually every other aspect of the Bush years, I honestly expected them to do what they did with the trillions of dollars of spending and debt that happened with a Republican congress and a Republican President Bush- first, pretend it didn’t happen, then after being forced to acknowledge it did happen, claim that everyone was doing it and blame the Democrats and scream about Murtha and Barney Frank, and when that didn’t work, just pretend that it was “other” Republicans who aren’t “real conservatives” (Move along, these aren’t the wasteful spenders you are looking for) while ranting about earmarks. That is what they did with spending, I figured they would do it again with torture.
But they didn’t and they aren’t. Instead, they are mobilizing and going balls to the wall in defense of sadism. It is really quite amazing, and a testament to just how sick and detestable and rotten to the core the Republican party has become.
- Republicans tortured by torture April 27: Rachel Maddow is joined by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-OR, and member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence to talk about why the Republicans can't seem to get their story straight on the torture issue.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
BarbinMD (D-Kos): The Evolution of John McCain
Andrew Sullivan neatly sums up John McCain:
"But we are not asked to judge the President's character flaws. We are asked to judge whether the President, who swore an oath to faithfully execute his office, deliberately subverted--for whatever purpose--the rule of law," - John McCain arguing for the impeachment of Bill Clinton for perjury in a civil suit, February 1999.
"Anyone who knows what waterboarding is could not be unsure. It is a horrible torture technique used by Pol Pot," - John McCain, October 2007.
"We've got to move on," - John McCain, April 26, 2009, reacting to incontrovertible proof that George W. Bush ordered the waterboarding of a prisoner 183 times, as well as broader treatment that the Red Cross has called "unequivocally torture."
My only quibble would be that I'd call it a devolution rather than an evolution.
But kudos to the NYT for revisiting.Suck on that America!
- In late 2007, there was the first crack of daylight into the government’s use of waterboarding during interrogations of Al Qaeda detainees. On Dec. 10, John Kiriakou, a former C.I.A. officer who had participated in the capture of the suspected terrorist Abu Zubaydah in Pakistan in 2002, appeared on ABC News to say that while he considered waterboarding a form of torture, the technique worked and yielded results very quickly.
Mr. Zubaydah started to cooperate after being waterboarded for “probably 30, 35 seconds,” Mr. Kiriakou told the ABC reporter Brian Ross. “From that day on he answered every question.”
His claims — unverified at the time, but repeated by dozens of broadcasts, blogs and newspapers — have been sharply contradicted by a newly declassified Justice Department memo that said waterboarding had been used on Mr. Zubaydah “at least 83 times.”
- Sully: Ali Soufan, American Hero
"We're the United States of America, and we don't do that kind of thing."
In the months ahead, as the full details of the Bush administration's decision to leave the rule of law behind and illegally torture human beings for intelligence, the experience of Ali Soufan will be vital for understanding how what happened happened. Like many other individuals along the way - Ian Fishback, Alberto Mora, Antonio Taguba come to mind - Soufan saw what was going on, understood immediately that it was illegal and immoral and did all he could to stop it. He failed but he may provide critical evidence of the war crimes of Cheney in the invesitigations that should and will come. He was the first to interrogate Abu Zubaydah and he gained a treasure trove of information without violating the law or core American values. From Mike Isikoff's must-read:
"We kept him alive," Soufan says. "It wasn't easy, he couldn't drink, he had a fever. I was holding ice to his lips." Gaudin, for his part, cleaned Abu Zubaydah's buttocks. During this time, Soufan and Gaudin also began the questioning; it became a "mental poker game." At first, Abu Zubaydah even denied his identity, insisting that his name was "Daoud."
But Soufan had poured through the bureau's intelligence files and stunned Abu Zubaydah when he called him "Hani"—the nickname that his mother used for him. Soufan also showed him photos of a number of terror suspects who were high on the bureau's priority list. Abu Zubaydah looked at one of them and said, "That's Mukhtar."
Now it was Soufan who was stunned.
The FBI had been trying to determine the identity of a mysterious "Mukhtar," whom bin Laden kept referring to on a tape he made after 9/11. Now Soufan knew: Mukhtar was the man in the photo, terror fugitive Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and, as Abu Zubaydah blurted out, " the one behind 9/11."
As the sessions continued, Soufan engaged Abu Zubaydah in long discussions about his world view, which included a tinge of socialism. After Abu Zubaydah railed one day about the influence of American imperialist corporations, he asked Soufan to get him a Coca-Cola—a request that prompted the two of them to laugh. Soon enough, Abu Zubaydah offered up more information—about the bizarre plans of a jihadist from Puerto Rico to set off a "dirty bomb" inside the country. This information led to Padilla's arrest in Chicago by the FBI in early May.
The reason Cheney and his acolytes are waging such a tough war in the public arena right now is because they know that men like Soufan know the truth. The more desperately the torture-defenders insist that their tactics gained results, the more they reveal how only those alleged results can justify the law-breaking and evil they trafficked in. But let it all come into the sunlight. Let's get a commission to look at everything in proper context. Then decide whom to prosecute. And by then, the junta party may be a little less flecked with spittle.
BarbinMD (D-Kos): Fox Won't Air Obama Press Conference
They don't even try to pretend anymore:
The AP reports that Fox has decided to stick with its regular line-up on Wednesday, meaning it won't air President Obama's prime-time news conference marking his 100th day in office. Instead, viewers will see an episode of "Lie to Me." ABC, CBS, and NBC will be airing the press conference.
It's unclear why Fox is going with "Lie to Me," given that a viewer can get that 24/7 on Fox News.
Think Progress: Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson OC Register: ‘There’s no evidence CO2 is harmful.’
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) recently downplayed the threat of global warming by arguing that the harmful pollutant carbon dioxide is simply a “natural byproduct of nature.” Following the same logic, Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson writes:
There’s no evidence man-made CO2, even if it increases temperatures, is harmful. Indeed, some argue that warmer climes would benefit mankind by increasing crop productivity and reducing deaths from severe cold. None of that matters when government is intent on forcing change.
Climate Progress's Joe Romm notes that the Washington Post op-ed pages also feature the rantings of global warming deniers George Will and Charles Krauthammer, in addition to Samuelson. The Wonk Room’s Brad Johnson writes, “One wonders when their paymasters, Washington Post opinion page editor Fred Hiatt and Writers Group editor Alan Shearer, are going to get embarrassed.”
UpdateFollowing an inquiry by the Wonk Room's Brad Johnson, the Orange County Register updated the column's attribution. The column was not written by Robert J. Samuelson, but was written by the Orange County Register editorial board. In his latest column for the Washington Post, Samuelson did not in fact deny global warming, but instead argued that the "selling of the green economy involves much economic make-believe."
This graphic is:
A.) Actually blaming the current global financial crisis and the unemployment created by said crisis on the Democratic control of Congress.
B.) Using the phrase “Democrat Majority” instead of “Democratic Majority.”
C.) Appearing on the Congressional Republican website, and not some idiot right-wing blogger’s own personal shrine to idiocy. The url includes the word “accountability.” I don’t think they know what that means.
When you read that only 21% of the country identifies with the GOP, that is because all that remains of the GOP is a pathetic bunch of wankers who do things like this and think it is clever.
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