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DonViejo
DonViejo's Journal
DonViejo's Journal
March 3, 2014
The punditocracy is in the grip of Rand Paul Fever. "Dismiss the Kentucky Senator as a fringe candidate at your peril," writes Chris Cillizza, who pronounces that "Rand Paul is winning" the GOP's 2016 invisible primary. "Rand Paul is the 2016 Republican frontrunner," writes Peter Beinart, arguing that "on issues from NSA surveillance to drug legalization to gay marriage, the GOP is moving in his direction."
Both Beinart and Cillizza warn "the media" not to under-rate Paul. Well, I'm never going to make that mistake -- back in August 2009, before any polls showed Paul within striking distance of winning his Senate primary, I was talking to the candidate and profiling his race. (Okay, at the time I was asking whether Paul would merely make life difficult for the GOP establishment's choice. Obviously he did.)
But I vividly remember a moment from that interview, and how it revealed something about Paul that pundits don't cover unless they're forced to. At the end of a short and friendly interview, I asked Paul whether the darker associations of Ron Paul, his father, could be used against him. If Republicans were looking to tar him, couldn't they bring up the racist newsletters published under Ron's name, or the donations from white supremacists that Paul never solicited but declined to give back.
It was like an Arctic blast came through my receiver. I don't see how anyone could think that, Rand Paul said. That has nothing to do with this campaign.
In the short term, absolutely, Paul was right. He ran a brilliant primary campaign and a steady general election campaign, in exactly the right year. He only stumbled in a post-victory appearance on Rachel Maddow's show, in which the host socratically wore Paul down on whether he'd have backed the Civil Rights Act. Paul never forgave Maddow for that interview, and for years since then he's attacked the "mischaracterizations" inspired by it.
more
http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2014/03/03/the_over_rating_of_rand_paul_2016.html?wpisrc=newsletter_jcr:content&mc_cid=b832839b6f&mc_eid=7a8b58c8c3
The Overrating of Rand Paul 2016
By David WeigelThe punditocracy is in the grip of Rand Paul Fever. "Dismiss the Kentucky Senator as a fringe candidate at your peril," writes Chris Cillizza, who pronounces that "Rand Paul is winning" the GOP's 2016 invisible primary. "Rand Paul is the 2016 Republican frontrunner," writes Peter Beinart, arguing that "on issues from NSA surveillance to drug legalization to gay marriage, the GOP is moving in his direction."
Both Beinart and Cillizza warn "the media" not to under-rate Paul. Well, I'm never going to make that mistake -- back in August 2009, before any polls showed Paul within striking distance of winning his Senate primary, I was talking to the candidate and profiling his race. (Okay, at the time I was asking whether Paul would merely make life difficult for the GOP establishment's choice. Obviously he did.)
But I vividly remember a moment from that interview, and how it revealed something about Paul that pundits don't cover unless they're forced to. At the end of a short and friendly interview, I asked Paul whether the darker associations of Ron Paul, his father, could be used against him. If Republicans were looking to tar him, couldn't they bring up the racist newsletters published under Ron's name, or the donations from white supremacists that Paul never solicited but declined to give back.
It was like an Arctic blast came through my receiver. I don't see how anyone could think that, Rand Paul said. That has nothing to do with this campaign.
In the short term, absolutely, Paul was right. He ran a brilliant primary campaign and a steady general election campaign, in exactly the right year. He only stumbled in a post-victory appearance on Rachel Maddow's show, in which the host socratically wore Paul down on whether he'd have backed the Civil Rights Act. Paul never forgave Maddow for that interview, and for years since then he's attacked the "mischaracterizations" inspired by it.
more
http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2014/03/03/the_over_rating_of_rand_paul_2016.html?wpisrc=newsletter_jcr:content&mc_cid=b832839b6f&mc_eid=7a8b58c8c3
March 3, 2014
JOAN WALSH
Among the racist jokes and emails found in recently released documents connected to the criminal probe of Gov. Scott Walker’s 2010 campaign, one stood out: A “joke” about a woman trying to sign up her dogs for welfare, because “my Dogs are mixed in color, unemployed, lazy, can’t speak English and have no frigging clue who the r Daddys are. They expect me to feed them, provide them with housing and medical care, and feel guilty.” The punchline: “My Dogs get their first checks Friday.”
Walker’s deputy chief of staff Kelly Rindfleisch replied: “That is hilarious. And so true.”
The joke is bad enough on its own, but it’s also worth noting: back when Walker was Milwaukee county executive, and Rindfleisch was a top aide, he managed the county’s welfare programs so abysmally that after lawsuits by local clients, the state was forced to take them over. “They didn’t just call people dogs, they treated them like dogs,” one Milwaukee elected official recalled angrily.
“Milwaukee County has demonstrated a sustained inability to successfully provide services to its (poor) customers,” state health services director director Karen Timberlake wrote in a February 2009 letter to Walker announcing the state takeover. Milwaukee became the only one of 72 Wisconsin counties to wind up with its programs for poor people under state control.
more
http://www.salon.com/2014/03/03/when_scott_walker_treated_welfare_recipients_like_dogs/
Scott Walker’s little-known scandal: When he treated welfare recipients like dogs
When Scott Walker was county executive, how he handled programs for Milwaukee’s poor will shock and amaze youJOAN WALSH
Among the racist jokes and emails found in recently released documents connected to the criminal probe of Gov. Scott Walker’s 2010 campaign, one stood out: A “joke” about a woman trying to sign up her dogs for welfare, because “my Dogs are mixed in color, unemployed, lazy, can’t speak English and have no frigging clue who the r Daddys are. They expect me to feed them, provide them with housing and medical care, and feel guilty.” The punchline: “My Dogs get their first checks Friday.”
Walker’s deputy chief of staff Kelly Rindfleisch replied: “That is hilarious. And so true.”
The joke is bad enough on its own, but it’s also worth noting: back when Walker was Milwaukee county executive, and Rindfleisch was a top aide, he managed the county’s welfare programs so abysmally that after lawsuits by local clients, the state was forced to take them over. “They didn’t just call people dogs, they treated them like dogs,” one Milwaukee elected official recalled angrily.
“Milwaukee County has demonstrated a sustained inability to successfully provide services to its (poor) customers,” state health services director director Karen Timberlake wrote in a February 2009 letter to Walker announcing the state takeover. Milwaukee became the only one of 72 Wisconsin counties to wind up with its programs for poor people under state control.
more
http://www.salon.com/2014/03/03/when_scott_walker_treated_welfare_recipients_like_dogs/
March 3, 2014
The Forces Behind The 'Religious Freedom' Movement That Exploded Last Week
DYLAN SCOTT – MARCH 3, 2014, 6:00 AM EST
Behind the "religious freedom" movement that burst onto the national scene last week, thanks to the controversial Arizona bill that finally died by Gov. Jan Brewer's veto pen, are -- perhaps unsurprisingly -- several conservative groups with deep pockets and a national reach.
They quickly deny that there's any vast right-wing conspiracy in play, and they're probably right. The societal forces in motion here go beyond the control of any specific interest groups, and there is evidence that the movement is, at least in part, spreading organically. But the bills that have now brought the issue into the national consciousness do have some common origins.
In the wake of the Arizona's bill's defeat and the simultaneous death of other legislation across the country, these groups appear to be distancing themselves from that defeat. They consult with lawmakers nationwide, they say, on a variety of issues. Nothing sinister in that.
"This whole implication that there's conspiracy going on behind the scenes is really laughable," Greg Scott, vice president at the Alliance Defending Freedom, which consulted on the Arizona bill and a similar Ohio bill introduced a month earlier, told TPM in a phone interview. Another group, the American Religious Freedom Project, told TPM that it had advised Kansas lawmakers on their bill.
more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/religious-freedom-origin-story
March 3, 2014
DANIEL STRAUSS – MARCH 3, 2014, 6:00 AM EST
For Texas tea partiers, Tuesday's primary might just be a grim day. Tea party candidates running in federal elections this cycle have struggled to get a foothold in the Lone Star state as the movement turns five.
The best example of the fizzle is one-time conservative favorite Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX), who's run such an incompetent campaign against Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) that even other tea party groups have turned against him.
"I network with over 300 liberty groups in Texas, [and] nobody that I know in the liberty movement went out and recruited Stockman. He just pops out and decided he's going to run," tea party activist JoAnn Fleming told TPM. "Well it doesn't take a whole lot of research before one figures out that Steve Stockman is not someone that you're going to want to hang your movement on."
Fleming said that her group instead would back Dwayne Stovall in protest, a candidate whose chances are even worse than Stockman's and who ran an ad that compared Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to a turtle.
more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/congressional-elections-texas-tea-party
Is The Tea Party Dying In Ted Cruz Country?
Tea Party Might Just Fizzle In Ted Cruz's TexasDANIEL STRAUSS – MARCH 3, 2014, 6:00 AM EST
For Texas tea partiers, Tuesday's primary might just be a grim day. Tea party candidates running in federal elections this cycle have struggled to get a foothold in the Lone Star state as the movement turns five.
The best example of the fizzle is one-time conservative favorite Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX), who's run such an incompetent campaign against Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) that even other tea party groups have turned against him.
"I network with over 300 liberty groups in Texas, [and] nobody that I know in the liberty movement went out and recruited Stockman. He just pops out and decided he's going to run," tea party activist JoAnn Fleming told TPM. "Well it doesn't take a whole lot of research before one figures out that Steve Stockman is not someone that you're going to want to hang your movement on."
Fleming said that her group instead would back Dwayne Stovall in protest, a candidate whose chances are even worse than Stockman's and who ran an ad that compared Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to a turtle.
more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/congressional-elections-texas-tea-party
March 3, 2014
The Republicans’ modernity gap and Hillary Clinton’s own ability to rally her troops were vividly displayed this past week. These twin forces stand to propel the former Secretary of State and First Lady back into the White House. The next presidential election may be more than two years away, but Clinton remains the one to beat.
First, the GOP’s modernity gap. Yes, I mean Arizona and gays. But the modernity gap also includes the gaping tech and analytics deficit that has plagued the Republicans since before the 2008 election.
As the result of a full court press by the American Airlines, Apple, Delta and others, Jan Brewer, Arizona’s Republican Governor, vetoed legislation that would have validated religion as a defense in the case of a defendant refusing to serve a same sex couple. Still, the fact that things got this out of control for the GOP signals the difficulty that the party will likely face in the high-end counties in 2016’s swing states. For Clinton and the Democrats, the cacophony out of Arizona is music to their ears.
To put things into perspective, just look at Ohio. In 2004, more than three-in-five Ohioans backed an amendment to the state’s constitution that barred same sex marriage. Fast forward, a recent Quinnipiac Poll shows that half the state supports same sex marriage, while 44 percent oppose it.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/republicans-better-mind-the-modernity-gap-to-catch-up-to-clinton.html
Republicans Better Mind the Modernity Gap To Catch Up to Clinton
Not only does Clinton have gay rights and a tech-savvy know-how on her side come 2016, but she’s even ahead among white voters—and the race is still two years away. Better catch up, Red or Blue’s got you beat!The Republicans’ modernity gap and Hillary Clinton’s own ability to rally her troops were vividly displayed this past week. These twin forces stand to propel the former Secretary of State and First Lady back into the White House. The next presidential election may be more than two years away, but Clinton remains the one to beat.
First, the GOP’s modernity gap. Yes, I mean Arizona and gays. But the modernity gap also includes the gaping tech and analytics deficit that has plagued the Republicans since before the 2008 election.
As the result of a full court press by the American Airlines, Apple, Delta and others, Jan Brewer, Arizona’s Republican Governor, vetoed legislation that would have validated religion as a defense in the case of a defendant refusing to serve a same sex couple. Still, the fact that things got this out of control for the GOP signals the difficulty that the party will likely face in the high-end counties in 2016’s swing states. For Clinton and the Democrats, the cacophony out of Arizona is music to their ears.
To put things into perspective, just look at Ohio. In 2004, more than three-in-five Ohioans backed an amendment to the state’s constitution that barred same sex marriage. Fast forward, a recent Quinnipiac Poll shows that half the state supports same sex marriage, while 44 percent oppose it.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/republicans-better-mind-the-modernity-gap-to-catch-up-to-clinton.html
March 3, 2014
Two out of John McCain’s three suggestions for how to aid the conflict in Ukraine and Russia are bad—and the US isn’t careful, we may end up more involved than it can afford to be.
I’m not sure what we should do about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. I am, however, dead sure about what we shouldn’t do. Please, Washington—don’t listen to John McCain!
The leader of the capital’s bombs-away caucus spoke exclusively over the weekend to the Beast’s Josh Rogin, who nailed the scoop. It was a relief to see McCain acknowledging that there is no plausible military option. So that’s progress. But the steps McCain advises are certain to heighten tensions and probably start a new Cold War, which is surely what the thuggish Putin wants. It’s most definitely not what the United States should want, at exactly the time when, as Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has proposed, we should be reducing the size of our military and the reach of our global commitments.
McCain floated three notions: tougher sanctions against Russia and its higher-ranking officials; NATO membership for Georgia; expanded and sped-up missile defense systems in Europe. The first is unobjectionable. The world has to do something here, and sanctions are that something. If we can’t prevent Putin from engaging in this kind of aggression—and face it, we can’t—we can at least do what we can to harm his economy and limit the foreign travel of his high government officials.
But Georgia in NATO and missile defense? McCain and other hawkish types (including, very distressingly, Joe Biden back in 2008) have been banging that gong for years now. Calls for Georgian entry into NATO go back to the mid-2000s, when “Rose Revolution” president Mikheil Saakashvili made it a top priority. It was a horrible idea then—expanding a military alliance right up to the doorstep of a certain country, all but surrounding it, is bound to be seen in that country, and not unreasonably, as a provocative act. It’s even worse when that country happens to have 8,500 nuclear weapons.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/take-john-mccain-s-russia-advice-and-you-might-get-another-cold-war.html
Take John McCain’s Russia Advice and You Might Get Another Cold War
Michael TomaskyTwo out of John McCain’s three suggestions for how to aid the conflict in Ukraine and Russia are bad—and the US isn’t careful, we may end up more involved than it can afford to be.
I’m not sure what we should do about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. I am, however, dead sure about what we shouldn’t do. Please, Washington—don’t listen to John McCain!
The leader of the capital’s bombs-away caucus spoke exclusively over the weekend to the Beast’s Josh Rogin, who nailed the scoop. It was a relief to see McCain acknowledging that there is no plausible military option. So that’s progress. But the steps McCain advises are certain to heighten tensions and probably start a new Cold War, which is surely what the thuggish Putin wants. It’s most definitely not what the United States should want, at exactly the time when, as Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has proposed, we should be reducing the size of our military and the reach of our global commitments.
McCain floated three notions: tougher sanctions against Russia and its higher-ranking officials; NATO membership for Georgia; expanded and sped-up missile defense systems in Europe. The first is unobjectionable. The world has to do something here, and sanctions are that something. If we can’t prevent Putin from engaging in this kind of aggression—and face it, we can’t—we can at least do what we can to harm his economy and limit the foreign travel of his high government officials.
But Georgia in NATO and missile defense? McCain and other hawkish types (including, very distressingly, Joe Biden back in 2008) have been banging that gong for years now. Calls for Georgian entry into NATO go back to the mid-2000s, when “Rose Revolution” president Mikheil Saakashvili made it a top priority. It was a horrible idea then—expanding a military alliance right up to the doorstep of a certain country, all but surrounding it, is bound to be seen in that country, and not unreasonably, as a provocative act. It’s even worse when that country happens to have 8,500 nuclear weapons.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/take-john-mccain-s-russia-advice-and-you-might-get-another-cold-war.html
March 3, 2014
To justify its invasion of Crimea, the Kremlin and state-run media went into full fabrication mode this weekend. Here are the lies that Russia is telling its viewers back home.
Russia invaded Ukraine over the weekend, justifying its incursion by claming it needed to protect Crimea’s ethnic Russian population from supposed neo-Nazi extremists. This was pure propaganda, of course—Vladmir Putin has been keen to annex land that used to be part of Russia, as he did in Georgia in 2008, and seems to think that the Ukrainian army will and should immediately surrender to the Russian one.
Still, Putin needed a story to spin, no matter how full of holes, and thus the neo-Nazi claims. But as it turns out, Crimea’s streets are not exactly paved with extremists—a fact that has proven troublesome for Russian state TV channels looking to find token far-right bogeymen. They’ve had to resort to tricks to get the right characters for Russian audiences—making much, for instance, of Sachko Bilyi, a buffoon who visited a local parliament with his AK-47 machine gun. No one in Ukraine thinks much of Bilyi, other than that he’s a clown, but Russian TV is now claiming that squads made up of thousands of Bilyis are terrorizing Ukraine’s civilians and intimidating MPs.
The Russian media also reported on “skirmishes” on the streets of Crimea and showed a video about “extremists in Crimea attacking Russian soldiers.” As it turns out, the video was actually made on February 20, when close to 100 protesters, aid workers and journalists were shot by snipers in Kiev. That day, several cameramen filmed the terror on location—one of them standing nearby for a very long time. When his video surfaced on Russian TV, purporting to be from Crimea, it made many suspect that the cameraman was from Russia and that Russian journalists may have had an arrangement with the snipers so that they wouldn’t draw fire.
For additional help manufacturing scenes of outrage, Russian provocateurs in Simferopol organized a nice mise-en-scene for Putin’s propaganda machine. A bus filled with people dressed like paramiliatry fighters, toting machine guns and grenade launchers, were filmed by Russian journliasts. It appeared instantly on the Internet and Russian TV channels, labeled as “The Right Sector from the Western Ukraine attacking peaceful Russian citizens and killing soldiers in Crimea.” But if one looks closely, it is possible to make out several important details: the bus from ‘the Western Ukraine’ in fact has a Crimean license plate number, and the fighters are armed with GM-94 grenade launchers and AK-100 machine guns, which are only used by Russian soldiers. Another question: how did Right Sector extremists manage to get to Simferopol on a big bus after all the roads to Crimea were blocked three days ago by armed police and Russian soldiers? Several jounralists tried to pass through the cordons, but in vain. Apparently only armed fighters and extremists can get permission to go to Crimea. Later, Russian consul general Vyacheslav Svetlichnyi dismissed reports of casulaties amongst Russian citizens and soldiers in Crimea as mere rumor.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/putin-s-crimea-propaganda-machine.html
Putin’s Crimea Propaganda Machine
Oleg ShynkarenkoTo justify its invasion of Crimea, the Kremlin and state-run media went into full fabrication mode this weekend. Here are the lies that Russia is telling its viewers back home.
Russia invaded Ukraine over the weekend, justifying its incursion by claming it needed to protect Crimea’s ethnic Russian population from supposed neo-Nazi extremists. This was pure propaganda, of course—Vladmir Putin has been keen to annex land that used to be part of Russia, as he did in Georgia in 2008, and seems to think that the Ukrainian army will and should immediately surrender to the Russian one.
Still, Putin needed a story to spin, no matter how full of holes, and thus the neo-Nazi claims. But as it turns out, Crimea’s streets are not exactly paved with extremists—a fact that has proven troublesome for Russian state TV channels looking to find token far-right bogeymen. They’ve had to resort to tricks to get the right characters for Russian audiences—making much, for instance, of Sachko Bilyi, a buffoon who visited a local parliament with his AK-47 machine gun. No one in Ukraine thinks much of Bilyi, other than that he’s a clown, but Russian TV is now claiming that squads made up of thousands of Bilyis are terrorizing Ukraine’s civilians and intimidating MPs.
The Russian media also reported on “skirmishes” on the streets of Crimea and showed a video about “extremists in Crimea attacking Russian soldiers.” As it turns out, the video was actually made on February 20, when close to 100 protesters, aid workers and journalists were shot by snipers in Kiev. That day, several cameramen filmed the terror on location—one of them standing nearby for a very long time. When his video surfaced on Russian TV, purporting to be from Crimea, it made many suspect that the cameraman was from Russia and that Russian journalists may have had an arrangement with the snipers so that they wouldn’t draw fire.
For additional help manufacturing scenes of outrage, Russian provocateurs in Simferopol organized a nice mise-en-scene for Putin’s propaganda machine. A bus filled with people dressed like paramiliatry fighters, toting machine guns and grenade launchers, were filmed by Russian journliasts. It appeared instantly on the Internet and Russian TV channels, labeled as “The Right Sector from the Western Ukraine attacking peaceful Russian citizens and killing soldiers in Crimea.” But if one looks closely, it is possible to make out several important details: the bus from ‘the Western Ukraine’ in fact has a Crimean license plate number, and the fighters are armed with GM-94 grenade launchers and AK-100 machine guns, which are only used by Russian soldiers. Another question: how did Right Sector extremists manage to get to Simferopol on a big bus after all the roads to Crimea were blocked three days ago by armed police and Russian soldiers? Several jounralists tried to pass through the cordons, but in vain. Apparently only armed fighters and extremists can get permission to go to Crimea. Later, Russian consul general Vyacheslav Svetlichnyi dismissed reports of casulaties amongst Russian citizens and soldiers in Crimea as mere rumor.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/putin-s-crimea-propaganda-machine.html
March 3, 2014
Following the veto of SB 1062, supporters are backpedaling to save face any way they can—from linguistics to redefining the original meaning of the bill. Kirsten Powers calls their bluff.
Conservative backers of Arizona bill SB 1062 had two choices following Gov. Jan Brewer’s veto of the right-to-discriminate bill. They could defend the bill on its merits. Or, they could distort the contents of the bill and attack anyone who disagreed with them as a legal Luddite and hysteric. Sadly, they chose the latter.
Conservatives fanned out to claim that the bill was a big nothingburger. Anyone who was upset about it was exaggerating its potential impact. It’s already legal to discriminate against gays in Arizona, so they don’t even need the law, they claimed.
Wait. If there is no need for the law, then why are they lobbying for it in the first place? Perhaps it’s because the Arizona legal system isn’t quite the anti-gay free-for-all they describe. A third of the state’s population (Flagstaff, Tucson, and Phoenix) is covered by local nondiscrimination ordinances, which also apply in the public accommodations context. So SB 1062 actually does significantly alter the legal landscape for Arizonans who want to discriminate.
Not so, said Jonah Goldberg in The National Review. Echoing the line that SB 1062 was just an innocuous amendment that doesn’t even merit a second glance, he wrote, "Arizona’s proposed SB 1062 would have amended the state’s 15-year-old Religious Freedom Restoration Act in a minor way so as to cover businesses.”
How is adding the entire marketplace “minor”?
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/are-arizona-anti-gay-law-opponents-eager-to-deceive.html
Are Opponents of Arizona's Anti-Gay Law Eager to Deceive?
Kirsten PowersFollowing the veto of SB 1062, supporters are backpedaling to save face any way they can—from linguistics to redefining the original meaning of the bill. Kirsten Powers calls their bluff.
Conservative backers of Arizona bill SB 1062 had two choices following Gov. Jan Brewer’s veto of the right-to-discriminate bill. They could defend the bill on its merits. Or, they could distort the contents of the bill and attack anyone who disagreed with them as a legal Luddite and hysteric. Sadly, they chose the latter.
Conservatives fanned out to claim that the bill was a big nothingburger. Anyone who was upset about it was exaggerating its potential impact. It’s already legal to discriminate against gays in Arizona, so they don’t even need the law, they claimed.
Wait. If there is no need for the law, then why are they lobbying for it in the first place? Perhaps it’s because the Arizona legal system isn’t quite the anti-gay free-for-all they describe. A third of the state’s population (Flagstaff, Tucson, and Phoenix) is covered by local nondiscrimination ordinances, which also apply in the public accommodations context. So SB 1062 actually does significantly alter the legal landscape for Arizonans who want to discriminate.
Not so, said Jonah Goldberg in The National Review. Echoing the line that SB 1062 was just an innocuous amendment that doesn’t even merit a second glance, he wrote, "Arizona’s proposed SB 1062 would have amended the state’s 15-year-old Religious Freedom Restoration Act in a minor way so as to cover businesses.”
How is adding the entire marketplace “minor”?
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/03/are-arizona-anti-gay-law-opponents-eager-to-deceive.html
March 3, 2014
Volodymyr Ishchenko
theguardian.com, Friday 28 February 2014 10.32 EST
Volodymyr Ishchenko is a sociologist studying social protests in Ukraine. He is the Deputy Director of the Center for Society Research (Kiev), an editor of Commons: Journal for Social Criticism, and a lecturer in the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy
Two popular labels are being ascribed to events in Ukraine: it was either a democratic – or even social – revolution, or it was a rightwing – or even neo-Nazi – coup. In fact, both characterisations are wrong. What we have have seen is a mass rebellion, overwhelmingly supported in western and central Ukraine without majority support in the eastern and southern regions, leading to a change of political elites. But there are no prospects for democratic, radical change, at least under the new government.
Why was it neither a social, nor democratic revolution? Some of the demands of the Maidan movement have been implemented. For example, the notorious Berkut regiment – the riot police who killed most of the dead protesters – was disbanded and the most odious of the former Yanukovych officials have been sacked.
However, this does not mean the start of systematic democratic change, or that the new government is in any way going to challenge the root of pervasive corruption in Ukraine: poverty and inequality. Moreover, it is likely only to aggravate these problems, putting the burden of the economic crisis on the shoulders of Ukraine's poor, not on the rich Ukrainian oligarchs.
The socioeconomic demands of the Maidan movement have been replaced with the neoliberal agenda of the new government. The cabinet, approved on Thursday, consists mainly of neoliberals and nationalists. Its official programme of action presented to parliament declares the need for "unpopular decisions" on prices and tariffs and its readiness to fulfill all the conditions of the loan from the International Monetary Fund.
more
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/28/ukraine-genuine-revolution-tackle-corruption
Ukraine has not experienced a genuine revolution, merely a change of elites
The new rulers in Kiev, with links to the right, will never tackle the root cause of corruption in Ukraine: poverty and inequalityVolodymyr Ishchenko
theguardian.com, Friday 28 February 2014 10.32 EST
Volodymyr Ishchenko is a sociologist studying social protests in Ukraine. He is the Deputy Director of the Center for Society Research (Kiev), an editor of Commons: Journal for Social Criticism, and a lecturer in the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy
Two popular labels are being ascribed to events in Ukraine: it was either a democratic – or even social – revolution, or it was a rightwing – or even neo-Nazi – coup. In fact, both characterisations are wrong. What we have have seen is a mass rebellion, overwhelmingly supported in western and central Ukraine without majority support in the eastern and southern regions, leading to a change of political elites. But there are no prospects for democratic, radical change, at least under the new government.
Why was it neither a social, nor democratic revolution? Some of the demands of the Maidan movement have been implemented. For example, the notorious Berkut regiment – the riot police who killed most of the dead protesters – was disbanded and the most odious of the former Yanukovych officials have been sacked.
However, this does not mean the start of systematic democratic change, or that the new government is in any way going to challenge the root of pervasive corruption in Ukraine: poverty and inequality. Moreover, it is likely only to aggravate these problems, putting the burden of the economic crisis on the shoulders of Ukraine's poor, not on the rich Ukrainian oligarchs.
The socioeconomic demands of the Maidan movement have been replaced with the neoliberal agenda of the new government. The cabinet, approved on Thursday, consists mainly of neoliberals and nationalists. Its official programme of action presented to parliament declares the need for "unpopular decisions" on prices and tariffs and its readiness to fulfill all the conditions of the loan from the International Monetary Fund.
more
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/28/ukraine-genuine-revolution-tackle-corruption
March 2, 2014
Fox News host calls out Darrell Issa for ‘highest level of falsehood’ on Benghazi
By David Edwards
Sunday, March 2, 2014 12:26 EST
Fox News host Chris Wallace on Sunday confronted Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) after he was rated as having the “highest level of falsehood” for his obsession with the terrorist attacks in Benghazi.
Last month, The Washington Post investigated Issa’s recent suggestion that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had told Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to “stand down” instead of letting the U.S. military fight the 2012 terrorist attack.
“Issa is crossing a line when he suggests there was no response — or a deliberate effort to hinder it,” fact checker Glenn Kessler concluded.
A fact check last year had found that Issa was wrong to assert that Clinton approved an embassy cable in Libya because her “signature” was on it. In fact, the secretary’s signature is stamped on all cables.
“For the second time, they gave you ‘Four Pinocchios,’ which is their highest level of falsehood,” Wallace told Issa on Sunday.
Issa defended himself by saying he was just “quoting something that was in somebody else’s report” when he accused Clinton of approving the embassy cable.
And in the case of the so-called “stand down” order, he said that the former secretary of state was responsible for the overall normalization policy in Libya.
“Witnesses have told us that they asked for help,” Issa opined. “The president himself implied that he told Leon Panetta, then-secretary of defense, to use what efforts they could. And what we know for a fact is, not one rescue of DOD was launched to get there in that 8.5 hours.”
“But to be honest, you do not have any evidence that secretary Clinton told Leon Panetta to stand down,” Wallace pressed.
Issa argued that he wasn’t using the term ‘stand down’ as it normally applied to military operations, “but rather, the failure to react.”
“The fact that only State Department assets, and only assets inside the country were ever used,” he declared. “That members of the armed forces, gun-carrying trained people were not allowed to get on the aircraft to go and attempt the rescue. Those kinds of things, through State Department resources, represent a stand down.”
“Not maybe on the technical terms of ‘stand down, soldier,’ but on what the American people believe is a failure to respond when they could have.”
Watch the video below from Fox News’ Fox News Sunday, broadcast March 2, 2013.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/03/02/fox-news-host-calls-out-darrell-issa-for-highest-level-of-falsehood-on-benghazi/
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