Wednesday, January 17, 2018

Literacy tests weren't so bad, after all.....


Whatever does Jeff Sessions mean?

“What good does it do to bring in somebody who is illiterate in their own country, has no skills and is going to struggle in our country and not be successful? That is not what a good nation should do, and we need to get away from it,” Sessions said, speaking on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”

Sessions criticized Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for reportedly reciting during a meeting Emma Lazarus’ poem that’s historically affiliated with American immigration and the Statue of Liberty.

“Not really a case you would expect a Republican to be making,” Carlson said, referencing Graham’s use of the poem. “Why aren’t there more articulate Republican members of Congress making the case that you just made?”

“Well, I wish there were, actually,” Sessions said, before claiming the U.S. should be more like Canada in its immigration policies. “We should evaluate them and make sure they are going to be lawful. They are not threats to us. They have the education and skills level to prosper in America. That’s good for them and good for America.” 

I can't imagine:

Hispanic Caucus members said Wednesday they felt it was not productive to bring up President Trump’s “shithole” remarks, and said Kelly did not say anything overtly vulgar in their meeting. But the lawmakers emphasized that several terms that the administration is using are offensive and revealing of their attitude towards immigration and immigrants.

“He wouldn’t use the word DREAMer,” Chu noted in a statement following the meeting. “Instead, he used ‘DACA people.'”

Speaking to reporters in the ornate hallway outside the meeting room, Chu added that she raised with Kelly that “the term ‘chain migration’ is offensive to us” when referring to the process of citizens and permanent residents sponsoring their relatives to come the United States. “In fact, when the law was passed in 1965, it was called family-based immigration,” she said.
Even seemingly neutral language, Gutierrez said, has taken on a different tone following the infamous “shithole” meeting.

“He said, ‘I am a firm believer in merit-based immigration.’ I was like, ‘Aw, no, that’s not good,'” he said.

When asked what he hears when Kelly uses the term “merit-based,” Gutierrez replied: “The president has been pretty clear that they want people from Norway and not ‘shithole countries’—and he mentioned Africa and Haiti. So that’s what I hear. Now the veneer has been ripped away about what they really mean. They don’t really mean it’s about security. They don’t really mean it’s about jobs for Americans. It’s about the color of people’s skin and what places they come from.”
Because literacy is the problem, right?

According to a study by the U.S. Department of Education, 32 million adults in the U.S. can’t read.

The current literacy rate isn’t any better than it was 10 years ago. According to the National Assessment of Adult Literacy (completed most recently in 2003, and before that, in 1992), 14 percent of adult Americans demonstrated a “below basic” literacy level in 2003, and 29 percent exhibited a “basic” reading level. 
Who knew that 32 million adults in the U.S. were immigrants?
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Monday, January 15, 2018

MLK Day Trump Style



Trump arrived at his Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach around 9 a.m. Monday, the White House press pool reported. His next public event was scheduled for 4:20 p.m., when he and first lady Melania Trump would depart Palm Beach International Airport for Washington.

Which gave him time to return to Twitter and remind us why we are all talking about what a racist he is (or may be) today, and now Sen. Dick Durbin is the Democratic party:

Yeah, about that:

But, in what appeared to be a direct jab at Sens. Tom Cotton and David Perdue, Graham said, "My memory hasn't evolved. I know what was said and I know what I said." Sen. Tim Scott, R-North Charleston, said Friday that Graham told him media reports of what Trump said were “basically accurate." 
And besides:

And one more time!

Lovely way to spend the day, Mr. President.


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Martin Luther King Day: 2018



Andrew Young takes us to church.
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Sunday, January 14, 2018

"They're rioting in Africa!"


Mudslides in California.  Panic in Hawaii.  Trump in Florida:

That doesn't include four retweets from the Washington Times, Lou Hobbs, and a private citizen responsible for the Pizzagate conspiracy, all in the past 24 hours.

On the Wall Street Journal interview:  there is a tape, the President is wrong.  Quelle surprise.

On immigration, presumably the President stands with Sen. Tom Cotton:

“The president reacted with pretty tough language because we want to move to a system that treats people for who they are,” the Arkansas Republican remarked. “Today, we have a system that rewards ties of blood, ties of kin, ties of clan. That’s one of the most un-American immigration systems that I can imagine.”

Because the American Dream is the immigration of economic units, not the reunification of families!  Not unless those kids and Grandma can be put to work!

As for Hawaii:  nothing to see here, folks!

"The President has been briefed on the state of Hawaii's emergency management exercise. This was purely a state exercise," White House deputy press secretary Lindsay Walters said in a statement.

Not that the White House took it that way:

A false warning of a missile threat in Hawaii sent White House aides scrambling Saturday, frantically phoning agencies to determine a response and triggering worries about their preparedness almost a year into the Trump administration.

President Donald Trump's Cabinet has yet to test formal plans for how to respond to a domestic missile attack, according to a senior administration official. John Kelly, while serving as secretary of Homeland Security through last July, planned to conduct the exercise. But he left his post to become White House chief of staff before it was conducted, and acting Secretary Elaine Duke never carried it out.
Pretty much "My Pet Goat" redux, except with the POTUS on the golf course, completely clueless and clearly more concerned with the state of himself than with the state of the nation.

Quelle surprise. 
Posted by at 2 comments:

Even if you weren't in the room...


A fairly anodyne statement, right?  I mean, he didn't mention Norway v. Haiti or Africa, so protecting American workers and our national interest is a good thing, right?  Certainly not a racist thing.


What is also an important takeaway out of this message from Trump is that it takes us back to an earlier period, 1924, when the National Origins Act passed. Part of what it did was — and it had been done before — but part of what that reinforced is that the US wanted people from certain countries and not from others.

It gave a percentage of allowances for people to come, giving preference to Northern Europe, discriminating against Southern and Eastern Europe, and completely barring immigration from Asia. There were a few exceptions, but Asian immigration was, for the most part, barred.

In 1965, we moved away from this National Origins Act, and part of what it means to say “we don’t want people from these countries” is moving back to that very racist law that existed.
Just to put 1924 in perspective, some 35 statues and monuments to the Confederacy were erected or dedicated between 1900 and 1931.   And there is the context of more recent history to consider:

In 1986, Congress passed, and Reagan signed, this law called the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which basically does four things. It more heavily fortifies the border, so that immigrants can’t come illegally, or makes it harder. It creates or expands a guest worker program, known as the H-2A, and H-2B programs. It imposes employer sanctions on employers who knowingly hire unauthorized immigrants, and it legalized immigrants who have been here for over 90 days if they worked on a farm [between May 1985 and May 1986], or who had been here since 1982 — so for five years.

Whenever the right talks amnesty, that’s what they’re referring to because of this legalization part.

It wasn’t really an amnesty, because an amnesty would have been basically giving something for free. Immigrants had to show that they were a big part of society, and that they knew English, and they had to pay very heavy fees. So it wasn’t quite like it’s depicted, and not everyone could legalize their status at the time.

Reagan hailed [the law] as the one that would protect our borders and would solve the immigration problem. Of course, part of the way it was supposed to do that was by heavily fortifying the border. But as we know, heavily fortifying the border is not something that stops unauthorized migration. Unauthorized migration actually exploded after 1986.

The right is like, “See, this exploded because you gave the amnesty to all these people, and people kept coming and we didn’t really fortify the border.” The left is saying, “Look, all this fortification of the border didn’t stop the immigrants from coming, but people did start dying in very high numbers.” So both the left and the right are unhappy with IRCA, as it is known.
"Imbalance" is just another word for "Not Our Kind."  Which is just another form of racism, something at least some in the GOP would gladly return us to as public policy.

And to put the comments of the Senators on what the President didn't say in perspective:

“Following comments by the president, I said my piece directly to him yesterday," [Sen. Lindsay] Graham said.

"The president and all those attending the meeting know what I said and how I feel," he added. "I’ve always believed that America is an idea, not defined by its people but by its ideals."
Especially it's racist ideals; well, among some people.  Not all of us, even those of us from South Carolina. 
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Saturday, January 13, 2018

The Ariel Poems: Journey of the Magi




'A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.'
And the camels galled, sorefooted, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
and running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you might say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.


--T.S. Eliot


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Friday, January 12, 2018

We Interrupt This Program...


I can't resist tracking this today.  Josh Marshall starts us off:

Here’s one thing that occurs to me. When I first heard about the “shithole” meeting at the White House I thought it was a bipartisan meeting. Technically it was. But my understanding now is that there was only one Democrat there: Dick Durbin (D-IL). He went there with Lindsey Graham. But there were a handful of other Republican senators already there. Would we have ever heard about this if a Democrat hadn’t been in the room?

The news very helpfully provides the answer:


Because law-zee, their precious shell-likes would drop off if somebody spoke that way in their presence.  I declare, Tom Cotton woulda fainted dead away to hear such talk!

Or it just wasn't remarkable enough to notice, much less remember.

As Chris Wallace said:  apply some common sense.  And go back to Mr. Marshall's question, because the answer is obviously "Not only 'no,' but 'HELL No!' "


“He was talking about the countries being not so great,” Campos-Duffy explained to her co-hosts without uttering the word. “First of all, I don’t agree with this term. I’m glad Rep. Mia Love (R-UT) put that [written condemnation] out and I would too. Sometimes the best immigrants come from those kind of countries.”

“That said, I still have a problem with people in a private meeting going out and saying what the president said, when they know, like right now, I just heard that the Panamanian ambassador just quit over this,” the wife of Congressman Sean Duffy (R-WI) continued.

“I mean, it makes our country look bad,” she elaborated. “I think the Democrats, in this case, should have used some discretion. And even if he did say something like that, not repeat it for the benefit of the country.”

Just because the President is a racist doesn't mean you have to tell everybody what they already know!   But I think we have bigger repercussions from this story than the U.S. Ambassador to Panama having had a belly-full:

The Botswana government summoned its U.S. ambassador “to clarify whether Botswana is regarded as a “shithole” country,” The Washington Post reported.

And Haitian ambassador Paul Altidor told MSNBC that Haiti believes Trump was “either misinformed or miseducated about Haiti and its people.”

Both Altidor and the government of Botswana released statements condemning the comments and asking U.S. officials for a formal explanation of the remarks.

See what you did, Sen. Durbin, you big meanie!

Mitch McConnell is still mum on this, so far as I know.  Paul Ryan wants us all to just excuse Grandpa, he gets a little out of hand, ya know:

“So, first thing that came to my mind, was, very unfortunate, unhelpful,” Ryan said when asked about Trump’s reported comments on Friday afternoon at an event in Milwaukee.

Yeah, I'm not sure how well that's gonna work in diplomatic circles.  And for pity's sake, don't talk about Hillary Clinton!
That's probably going to lead to another Justice Department investigation.

And, as part of my continuing effort to make a long post even longer, White House staff is upset that Trump overshadowed the WSJ interview:

In the wake of the administration’s tax reform coup, Fiat Chrysler had just announced it planned to spend more than $1 billion to move its assembly plant for the Ram truck from Mexico to Michigan. Walmart touted a round of bonuses and a higher pay for its U.S. workers.

And the White House communications team had pre-planned a sit-down interview for the president with reporters from the Wall Street Journal on Thursday – an outlet they expected would focus on economic news and help drive the message of the day.

Turns out they probably shouldn't complain, because not even the WSJ can make a silk purse out of a sow's ear:

WSJ: You think North Korea is trying to drive a wedge between the two countries, between you and President Moon?

Mr. Trump: I’ll let you know in—within the next 12 months, OK, Mike?

WSJ: Sure.

Mr. Trump: I will let you know. But if I were them I would try. But the difference is I’m president; other people aren’t. And I know more about wedges than any human being that’s ever lived, but I’ll let you know.
....
TRUMP: This is going to be state of the art wall; this will be state of the art. But, I can fully understand why you’d have to have vision. I’d like to be able to see three or four hundred yards instead of we’re at a wall we have no idea who’s on the other side. Does this make sense or am I just wasting my time.

HOPE HICKS: It’s what you’ve always talked; it’s consistent with what you’ve always said.

TRUMP: No, this is the same. I hope I don’t read tomorrow, Trump is going to make the wall, I always said, we need a wall.

WSJ: Yes.
....
WSJ: So when you say you have to have people, clearly there’s the 800,000 ‘Dreamers,’ but there’s also the larger group of people who are currently in the country…

TRUMP: That’s a different discussion.

WSJ: So, you said on Tuesday…

TRUMP: That’s comprehensive – well, if we could do that, that’s fine. I don’t know that that’s going to be possible.

There’s a lot of – there’s a lot of – there’s a big difference – first of all, there’s a big difference between DACA and Dreamers, OK?

Dreamers are different. And I want American kids to be Dreamers also, by the way. I want American kids to be Dreamers also.

But there’s a big difference between DACA and Dreamers. And a lot of times when I was with certain Democrats they kept using the word dreamer. I said, “Please, use the word DACA.” You know it’s a totally different word.

WSJ: Sure.

TRUMP: OK, people think they’re interchangeable, but they’re not.

This is my favorite, because we got to see him discuss this on television, and read his words in the official transcript:

TRUMP: The other thing … so the wall. The wall’s never meant to be 2100 miles long. We have mountains that are far better than a wall, we have violent rivers that nobody goes near, we have areas …. But, you don’t need a wall where you have a natural barrier that’s far greater than any wall you could build, OK? Because somebody said oh, he’s going to make the wall smaller. I’m not going to make it smaller the wall was always going to be a wall where we needed it. And there are some areas that are far greater than any wall we could build. So, maybe some day somebody could make that clear, Sarah, will you make that clear please?

I saw on television, Donald Trump is going to make the wall smaller; no, the wall’s identical. The other thing about the wall is we’ve spent a great deal of time with the Border Patrol and with the ICE agents and they know this stuff better than anybody, they’re unbelievable… I had meetings with them, they need see-through. So, we need a form of fence or window. I said why you need that – makes so much sense? They said because we have to see who’s on the other side.

If you have a wall this thick and it’s solid concrete from ground to 32 feet high which is a high wall, much higher than people planned. You go 32 feet up and you don’t know who’s over here. You’re here, you’ve got the wall and there’s some other people here.

WSJ: Yes.

TRUMP: If you don’t know who’s there, you’ve got a problem.

Still have no idea what river he's talking about.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming, already in progress.
Posted by at 2 comments:

Another Day In Paradise


Yeah, according to:  Breitbart, Fox News, The Daily Caller, and the Washington Times, that's what she said.  Odd I can't find anything at a non-right wing news source about this "story."  Oh, well.....

That would be the same President who said this on Tuesday:

Now, that doesn’t mean 2,000 miles of wall because you just don’t need that because of nature, because of mountains and rivers and lots of other things.  But we need a certain portion of that border to have the wall.  If we don’t have it, you can never have security.  You could never stop that portion of drugs that comes through that area.
.....
Yeah, we’re doing a study on that right now.  But there are large areas where you don’t need a wall because you have a mountain and you have a river — you have a violent river — and you don’t need it.  Okay?
.....
And we don’t need a 2,000-mile wall.  We don’t need a wall where you have rivers and mountains and everything else protecting it.  But we do need a wall for a fairly good portion.  We also — as you know, it was passed in 2006 — a essentially similar thing, which — a fence, a very substantial fence was passed.  But, unfortunately, I don’t know, they never got it done.  But they need it.
Still not quite sure what he means.

Yeah:  bullshit.
"Get smart" is his new tag line, apparently.  And the GOP is probably grateful this meeting didn't take place in front of TV cameras, so Trump could talk "tough".  Too tough, because this is what the White House said yesterday:
Not a word of denial there of the use of the term "shithole."  But this morning:
Because, sure, he's trustworthy.  And if that doesn't convince you:
Not sure where the "take them out" language came from, except Trump's imagination.  There's no reference to it in the NYT article.  Besides, Dick Durbin was there:


Oh, and was he not clear about the Democrats and military funding?
He's repeating himself on Twitter, not just verbally.  Not sure what this means, but it can't be good.  And yes, even if John Kelly can't bother to read the President's tweets, other people can:
I'm surprised Trump's tweets this morning haven't satisfied Haiti.  Right?  The rest of Africa is not too impressed, either.  Some Republicans publicly disapproved of Trump's reported comments; but Ryan and McConnell?  Crickets.  And while we're here, let's just add this in from yesterday:  two birds, one stone, and all that.

 Trump told the WSJ:

“A man is tweeting to his lover that if [Democrat Hillary Clinton] loses, we’ll essentially do the insurance policy,” Trump said. “We’ll go to phase two and we’ll get this guy out of office.”

“This is the FBI we’re talking about—that is treason,” he added. “That is a treasonous act. What he tweeted to his lover is a treasonous act.”
Treason is such a serious offense it is the only crime whose elements are set out in the Constitution, which means you'd need an amendment to change this language from Art. III:

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.
So by expressing opinions in text messages (opinions which were not political or even investigatory, but statements about an FBI investigation already underway, and while Trump was merely a candidate) that are deemed insulting by the sitting President is equivalent to "levying war against [the United States]" or "adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort"?

That's the primary problem with Trump's argument: the text is not a treasonous act, it isn't even an illegal act.  Then is the secondary problem: 

I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office — that there’s no way he gets elected — but I'm afraid we can’t take that risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you're 40.

That's the text Trump is referring to.  We already know the FBI was investigating Trump before Fusion GPS contacted them with the concerns raised by the Steele dossier.  All this tweet says is that the investigation shouldn't be dropped prematurely on the grounds that Trump won't win.  So not only is Trump stone ignorant as to the state of the law regarding treason, he doesn't even have the facts of the case right.

Fortunately Trump is not the state, and his legal opinions do not carry the force of law, or even sufficient force in the DOJ to prompt prosecutions of all the people he complains about, on the grounds (or any other grounds) that he complains about them on.

Just another day in paradise!

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Thursday, January 11, 2018

Scylla and Charibdys


I suppose this is one reason not to be anxious for the impeachment and removal of Donald Trump from office; or even the exercise of the 25th Amendment:

The White House released a photo of the event Thursday, which “prayer warrior” Frank Amedia also announced in an email, reported Right Wing Watch.

Amedia said he and other religious right activists enjoyed “a very small and intimate dinner meeting with Vice President Pence and his wife Karen,” where they discussed an evangelical event March 20-22 in Branson, Missouri, hosted by apocalyptic televangelist Jim Bakker.

“I perceive that this timing is critical and strategic as I have been advising that I have received that February is a time of chaos in our nation politically,” Amedia told his followers, “with flash points on the coasts and in the heartland, as well as the caution of the ‘ides of March’ looming which will try to swallow up the spiritual surge of progress and pierce the heart of our political and church reformation.”

Amedia, a volunteer policy liaison for President Donald Trump’s campaign, founded the POTUS Shield network of pastors who believe government should be controlled by conservative Christians.

He told followers that Pence and his wife, who conservative Christians, “are keenly aware” of the POTUS Shield’s work and asked Amedia to thank his followers on behalf of the vice president and Trump for their “relentless commitment to be a shield and weapon of spiritual force.”
Cheer up, things could be worse!
Posted by at 1 comment:

IT'S NOT ABOUT RACE!!!!!!

Yeah, this is not gonna get old anytime soon.

Josh Marshall was deeply moved by Jim Acosta's report that Trump called some African countries "shithole countries" whose people are not worthy to even travel to America.  But even JMM never writes the words "racist" or "racism."

This is America.  It's not about race, because it's never about race.  (I am indebted to RawStory for the tweets that follow):

We begin with CNN's version of "Some people say:"
Dear Mr. Acosta:  what was your first clue?

Trump is not racist but his views are racist.  See?  Big difference!
Don't say it!  Don't say it!! OBJECTIVITY!!!!!!
REPORT THE CONTROVERSY!!!!!!!
AND FOR PITY'S SAKE THINK OF THE WHITE VOTERS!
God Bless America!

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Get Smart!

Missed it by that much!

Somebody's watching too much cable news.
Yup:  a Fox&Friends story.  But not what the POTUS meant to say:
The final words alone resurrect irony to live another day.  And just to clarify:  the bill the House voted on today is not the bill dealing with "unmasking," which is what Trump was, and keeps, complaining about (without understanding what he's complaining about, obviously).

He really has no idea what he's doing.  What a mess!

ADDING:  as we're already talking about Trump's tweets, I can't resist throwing this in:


While Trump is right that these numbers are the highest positive rating for Quinnipiac polls on the economy since 2001, the poll also found that 49 percent of American voters believe former President Barack Obama to be responsible for the current state of the economy. Only 40 percent of voters said that Trump was responsible.

The Quinnipiac poll, which was published on Wednesday, also asked about Trump’s intelligence, his level-headedness, and his fitness to serve as Commander in Chief.

When asked to grade President Trump’s first year in office, 56 percent of those polled gave him a failing grade of an “F” or a “D.” Just sixteen percent of respondents gave him an “A.”

As for Trump’s performance so far in office, only 36 percent said they approved while 59 percent voiced their disapproval.

“No one’s been this low at this point,” the assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll, Tim Malloy, told Newsweek of Trump's 36 percent approval rating.


The number of American voters giving former president Obama credit for the state of the economy has increased since November.

Forty-three percent of respondents credited Obama in Quinnipiac’s November 22 poll. That percentage rose to 45 in December and to 49 in January.

Trump's numbers have been more stagnant.

Forty-one percent gave him economic credit in November. That percentage rose to 43 in December and fell to 40 in January.

At least somebody's paying attention!
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Everything is permitted and nothing is forgiven

Ms. Deneuve as Marianne

Am I wrong, or old, or French, or all three, that I find myself agreeing with Catherine Deneuve and her co-signatories?

"Rape is a crime, but trying to seduce someone, even persistently or cack-handedly, is not -- nor is being gentlemanly a macho attack," said the letter published in the daily Le Monde.

"Men have been punished summarily, forced out of their jobs when all they did was touch someone's knee or try to steal a kiss," said the letter, which was also signed by Catherine Millet, author of the hugely explicit 2002 memoir, "The Sexual Life of Catherine M.".

Men had been dragged through the mud, they argued, for "talking about intimate subjects during professional dinners or for sending sexually-charged messages to women who did not return their attentions".

The letter attacked feminist social media campaigns like #MeToo and its French equivalent #Balancetonporc (Call out your pig) for unleashing this "puritanical... wave of purification".

It claimed that "legitimate and necessary protest against the sexual violence that women are subject to, particularly in their professional lives", had turned into a witch-hunt.

"What began as freeing women up to speak has today turned into the opposite -- we intimidate people into speaking 'correctly', shout down those who don't fall into line, and those women who refused to bend (to the new realities) are regarded as complicit and traitors."

"The accidents of life that might touch a woman's body should not necessarily affect her dignity, and should not -- no matter how hard they are -- make her a perpetual victim," the letter argued.

Some women who were strong enough to demand equal pay, it claimed, would "not be traumatised forever by a fondler on the metro", even if it is a crime, preferring to see it as a "non-event".


"Instead of helping women, this frenzy to send (male chauvinist) 'pigs' to the abattoir actually helps the enemies of sexual liberty -- religious extremists and the worst sort of reactionaries," the collective of women who signed the letter said.

"As women we do not recognise ourselves in this feminism, which beyond denouncing the abuse of power, takes on a hatred of men and of sexuality."

They insisted that women were "sufficiently aware that the sexual urge is by its nature wild and aggressive. But we are also clear-eyed enough not to confuse an awkward attempt to pick someone up with a sexual attack."

The spectacle of men being forced into "public confessions... and having to rack their brains and apologise for 'inappropriate behaviour' that might have happened 10, 20 or 30 years before... recalled totalitarian societies," the letter went on.

This "puritan wave" was already bringing censorship in its wake, the women insisted, claiming that some of them had already been asked to make the male characters in their writing "less sexist", and told to tone down certain scenes to "better show the trauma suffered by female characters".

Some of this is, incidentally, consistent with Anglo-Saxon law.  I've remarked on the standard for civil assault before:  the contact must be offensive, not to the plaintiff (or, in modern parlance, "victim") but to a reasonably prudent person.  It is a standard meant to universalize the standard of the law, but also to keep us from seeing anyone with a complaint as a victim; or treating them that way, either.  Oddly, that road runs both ways.  "Do you see this woman?," Jesus asks Simon the Pharisee.  The question today could as easily be phrased "Do you see this victim?"  Except Jesus is asking us to see a person, a fellow human being; the modern question is asking us to see an object, a what, not a who. Who gets to declare that status, and what power does it give you in the world to claim it, or just to name it?  It can be an abuse of power in itself.

I haven't read the letter itself, as I haven't gone looking on-line for a translation.  What I know of it I know from this one article, which doesn't seem to inclined to be favorable toward it.  That said, there may be portions of the letter I disagree with strongly, on factual matters.  The article, for example, mentions that Ms. Deneuve is skeptical that Roman Polanski's accused rape of a 13 year old is indeed rape, despite the young girl's age.  She and I would strongly disagree on that; then again, that subject doesn't seem to come up in the letter.  And I'm not defending Harvey Weinstein; but I do know there have also been Al Franken and Garrison Keillor, and others similarly accused of the most minor of offenses, caught up in this frenzy.  James Franco is having his turn in the barrel as I write.  The parts of the letter quoted in the article don't, to my mind, speak of the offenses of Mr. Weinstein.  They seem to speak more to the problems of frenzy, and the avid desire to punish because you have the power to do so.

That's the letter; Ms. Deneuve's personal opinions are:

"I don't think it is the right method to change things, it is excessive," she said last year. "After 'Calling out your pig' what are we going to have, 'Call out your whore?'" she said.

The stereotype of the Puritans is that nothing was permitted, and nothing was forgiven.  And there is a real demand, not for justice but for vengeance, in the articles I've read about #MeToo and now "Time's Up."  Is there an excess in this response to what they decry as excess?  Perhaps; as I say, I haven't read the whole letter.  But they are certainly right about the excess they are decrying.

Besides, when everything is permitted and nothing is forgiven, it's at best one step forward, and two steps back.

And just to undercut my point a bit, but to make an old point in a new way:

We usually don’t think about infant mortality in the United States. We associate it with the developing world or with the distant past. Globally, in just the brief period between 1960 and 2001, infant mortality declined from 126 infant deaths per 1,000 live births to 57 per 1,000 live births.

The United States has the highest rate of infant mortality of any of these comparison countries while Japan, the competitor with the longest life expectancy, has the lowest. In the United States, the most common causes of infant mortality are congenital malformations and disorders associated with low birth-weight and short gestation.

Which is the problem we are going to be sure to address?  This trend, by the way, represents a reversal over the past 50 years.  In 1960 we were twelfth in infant mortality; 57 years later we're at the bottom.  Welcome to the future.
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Wednesday, January 10, 2018

Mail moves the country


Zip code moves the mail:

We’re also making America safe again.  Yesterday, we had a bipartisan meeting with House members and senators on immigration reform — something they’ve been talking about for many, many years.  But we brought them together in this room, and it was a tremendous meeting.  Actually, it was reported as incredibly good.  And my performance — you know, some of them called it a performance — I consider it work.

But it got great reviews by everybody other than two networks, who were phenomenal for about two hours.  Then, after that, they were called by their bosses for saying, “Oh, wait a minute.”  And, unfortunately, a lot of those anchors sent us letters saying that was one of the greatest meetings they’ve ever witnessed.  And they were great.  For about two hours, they were phenomenal.  And then they went a little bit south on us, but not that bad.  It was fine.

They probably wish they didn’t send us those letters of congratulations.  But it was good.  I’m sure their ratings were fantastic; they always are — which is why I think the media will ultimately support Trump in the end, because they’re going to say, if Trump doesn’t win in three years, they’re all out of business.  (Laughter.)  You guys will be out of business.  But the boom holders are still going to be there, so that’s good.  (Laughter.)  Those are the people I like.

So rapidly the White House gets instantaneous mail delivery.  One wonders if they arrive by carrier pigeon, owl post, or special courier; maybe all three, to get there that quickly.

Or is this the President trying to prove he reads?

Letters?  Really?  Is this the 18th century?  His lies and exaggerations are getting less and less connected to the world the rest of us inhabit.

And for lagniappe, Kellyanne Conway:

“The idea that we would have to look any further than Hillary Clinton to beat Hillary Clinton itself is a fantasy,” the former campaign manager said. “I didn’t need to talk to anybody in Moscow — I was talking to people in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina and Macomb County, Michigan.”

“There’s no reason to have gone anywhere outside of Hillary Clinton and how unattractive her policies were,” she said, adding that “so many people can’t get over the election results.”

“Says my friend who can’t keep Hillary Clinton‘s name out of her mouth,” Cuomo rebutted, causing Conway to melt down further.

“We don’t care about her, nobody here talks about her,” she exclaimed. “Hey, Chris, nobody talks about Hillary Clinton.”

Says her boss is "nobody":

“When you talk about interviews, Hillary Clinton had an interview where she wasn’t sworn in, she wasn’t given the oath, they didn’t take notes, they didn’t record, and it was done on the 4th of July weekend,” Trump said. “That’s perhaps ridiculous.”
....
“I will say this, I am for massive oil and gas and everything else, and a lot of energy. Putin can’t love that. I am for the strongest military that the United States ever had. Putin can’t love that,” he said. “But Hillary was not for a strong military, and Hillary, my opponent, was for windmills and she was for other types of energy that don’t have the same capacities at this moment, certainly.”
To both of them, Chris Cuomo's response applies:

“You just brought her up,” the host responded. “Hold on a second. No shouting contest here.” 

Master control of the narrative, indeed.
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POTUS as Internet Troll


Trump today, on the internet.  Trump yesterday, in a room with Sen. Feinstein:

Senator, would you like to say something?

SENATOR FEINSTEIN:  I would.  As you know, we tried for comprehensive immigration reform in the Senate.  It was on the floor, there were a number of amendments, it got a lot of attention in the judiciary committee, and then the House didn’t take it up.

I think there needs to be a willingness on both sides.  And I think — and I don’t know how you would feel about this, but I’d like to ask the question:  What about a clean DACA bill now, with a commitment that we go into a comprehensive immigration reform procedure?  Like we did back — oh, I remember when Kennedy was here and it was really a major, major effort, and it was a great disappointment that it went nowhere.

THE PRESIDENT:  I remember that.  I have no problem.  I think that’s basically what Dick is saying.  We’re going to come up with DACA.  We’re going to do DACA, and then we can start immediately on the phase two, which would be comprehensive.

SENATOR FEINSTEIN:  Would you be agreeable to that?

THE PRESIDENT:  Yeah, I would like — I would like to do that.  Go ahead. I think a lot of people would like to see that, but I think we have to do DACA first.

REPRESENTATIVE MCCARTHY:  Mr. President, you need to be clear though.  I think what Senator Feinstein is asking here: When we talk about just DACA, we don’t want to be back here two years later.  We have to have security, as the Secretary would tell you.

REPRESENTATIVE MCCARTHY:  But I think that’s what she’s saying.

SENATOR FEINSTEIN:  What do you think I’m saying?

REPRESENTATIVE MCCARTHY:  I’m thinking you’re saying DACA is not secure.  Are you talking about security as well?

SENATOR FEINSTEIN:  Well, I think if we have some meaningful comprehensive immigration reform, that’s really where the security goes.  And if we can get the DACA bill, because March is coming and people are losing their status every day —

REPRESENTATIVE MCCARTHY:  But, let’s be honest.  Security was voted on just a few years ago, and, no disrespect, there’s people in the room on the other side of the aisle who voted for it.  If I recall, Senator Clinton voted for it.  So I don’t think that’s comprehensive; I think that’s dealing with DACA at the same time.  I think that’s really what the President is making.

It’s kind of like three pillars: DACA, because we’re all in the room want to do it; border security, so we’re not back out here; and chain migration.  It’s just three items, and then everything else that’s comprehensive is kind of moved to the side.

So I believe when the (inaudible) —

THE PRESIDENT:  And the lottery.

REPRESENTATIVE MCCARTHY:  And the lottery.

THE PRESIDENT:  And I think you should add merit.  I mean, if you can, add merit-based.  (Laughter.)  I don’t think — I don’t know who is going to argue with merit-based?  Who can argue with merit-based?

Dianne, go ahead.

SENATOR FEINSTEIN:  Can I ask a question?  Do you really think that there can be agreement on all of that, quickly, to get DACA passed in time?  I wanted to ask Mr. McCarthy a question.  Do you really think there can be agreement on those three difficult subjects you raised in time to get DACA passed and effective?

REPRESENTATIVE MCCARTHY:  Yes, because you have heard from Leader McConnell and Speaker Ryan, who said they will put the bill onto the floor if the President agrees to it.  And us getting to the room, I haven’t seen us be this close and having this discussion in quite a few years — or the whole last four years.

So I think, yes, we can make this happen.  We all know it.  We’ve done it before.  You and I spent a long time — we did probably one of the most difficult things to do in California — water.  And I believe we can get there and we can just keep working each day on this.

THE PRESIDENT:  I think what we’re all saying is we’ll do DACA and we can certainly start comprehensive immigration reform the following afternoon.  Okay?  We’ll take an hour off and then we’ll start.

SENATOR FEINSTEIN: Okay.

THE PRESIDENT:  I do believe that.  Because once we get DACA done — if it’s done properly — with, you know, security, and everything else —

SENATOR FEINSTEIN:  That’s the point.

THE PRESIDENT:  If it’s done properly, we have taken a big chunk of comprehensive out of the negotiation, and I don’t think it’s going to be that complicated.

Funny, she's just "Senator" and "Dianne," there; not "Sneaky Dianne."  And, of course, he gives us his legal opinion that she "illegally" released transcripts of Congressional testimony, a legal opinion about as sound as this one:

“We are going to take a strong look at our country’s libel laws so that when somebody says something that is false and defamatory about someone, that person will have meaningful recourse in our courts,” he said.

....

“If somebody says something that’s totally false and knowingly false, that the person that has been abused, defamed, libeled, will have meaningful recourse,” he said. “Our current libel laws are a sham and a disgrace and do not represent American values or American fairness.”

“You can’t say things that are false, knowingly false, and be able to smile as money pours into your bank account,” Trump added.

Yes, he's threatening to examine the definition of "libel" in U.S. law in order to be sure the current definition of libel in U.S. law is the definition of "libel."   After all, he needs to be sure he's free to call Ms. Clinton "Crooked Hillary" and Steve Bannon "Sloppy Steve" and Sen. Feinstein "Sneaky Dianne." Not, of course, to their faces!

And I'm not even going to touch on his treating a Cabinet meeting like a reality TV show because he liked the ratings he thinks he got yesterday.

The President of the United States is an internet bully, braver on-line than he is in person; and he's a buffoon no more qualified for his job than a 5 year old would be.  We didn't need Michael Wolff to tell us that, but apparently we needed him to allow us to openly talk about that.

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Speaking Truth to Power

Who, exactly, did he make this clear to?



A reminder that most people who think "a wall" will solve problems on the Mexican border know absolutely nothing about either the border or the problems they think a wall will solve.

And Trump's go-to defense is the wall in Israel.  So we'll have a heavily militarized zone on the border, in the desert of Arizona, through Big Bend National Park, along the Rio Grande in El Paso?  In Del Rio?  Brownsville?

Yeah, that's a great idea.  The rest of his response is classic Trump:  no idea what he's talking about, but sure in his ignorance that he is right.  One example:  his claim that we give money to other countries, not to ourselves.    The United States is the largest donor of foreign aid in terms of amount donated.  However, in terms of percentage of GDP, the U.S. isn't even in the top ten. But still, we give too much....

Just to be clear, this is a meeting the White House described as:

President Donald J. Trump just concluded a successful bipartisan and bicameral meeting on immigration reform.  During the closed-door portion of the meeting, they reached an agreement to negotiate legislation that accomplishes critically needed reforms in four high-priority areas: border security, chain migration, the visa lottery, and the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders said a "deal" was negotiated after the cameras left.  But this statement only says the President and Congress agreed to do what we pay the President and Congress to do:  negotiate legislation.  And according to Shep Smith, the President negotiated with himself and gave up on a border wall:



Here is the official White House transcript of what Trump said about "the wall":

And we don’t need a 2,000-mile wall.  We don’t need a wall where you have rivers and mountains and everything else protecting it.  But we do need a wall for a fairly good portion.  We also — as you know, it was passed in 2006 — a essentially similar thing, which — a fence, a very substantial fence was passed.  But, unfortunately, I don’t know, they never got it done.  But they need it.

The Homeland Security Secretary, subsequently, noted:

So we need the wall system, which is some physical infrastructure as the President described — personnel and technology — but we have to close those legal loopholes, because the effect is that is this incredible pull up from Central America that just continues to exacerbate the problem.  So border security has to be part of this or we will be here again in three, four, five years again — maybe, unfortunately, sooner.

And then the President responding to Rep. Cuellar (in case you aren't watching all these videos carefully):

Now, that doesn’t mean 2,000 miles of wall because you just don’t need that because of nature, because of mountains and rivers and lots of other things.  But we need a certain portion of that border to have the wall.  If we don’t have it, you can never have security.  You could never stop that portion of drugs that comes through that area.

I'm still wondering if "rivers" means the Rio Grande, because that's about the only river affected by the border and a border wall (there is the Colorado River Delta in California).  Or more likely, Trump just has no idea what kind of geography he's talking about.

Yeah, we’re doing a study on that right now.  But there are large areas where you don’t need a wall because you have a mountain and you have a river — you have a violent river — and you don’t need it.  Okay?

He can't mean the Rio Grande; that was navigated by steamboat in the 19th century.  Yeah, that's what it is; he just doesn't know what he's talking about.

And then the overnight reviews came in:


So I ask again:  who did he make himself clear to?  Harvey the invisible six-foot rabbit?

Can you imagine what Trump will do when he finally sits down with Robert Mueller?
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Time's Up!


Not to take anything away from all the beautiful (and rich!) people at the Golden Globes, garbed in black and declaring their fealty to "Times UP!" (okay, to take something away from it), but this issue is a bit more important than what a pig Harvey Weinstein was, and can't be solved by Oprah giving her studio audience members cars or turning to Dr. Oz or Dr. Phil:

Living in the US increasingly looks like a health risk. Average life expectancy here dropped for the second year in a row, according to recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The grim trend stems from a toxic mixture of more drug- and alcohol-related deaths and more heart disease and obesity in many parts of the country. And it puts Americans at a higher risk of early death compared to their counterparts in other wealthy countries.

But what’s often lost in the conversation about the uptick in mortality here is that this trend isn’t affecting all Americans. In fact, there’s one group in the US that’s actually doing better than ever: the rich. While poor and middle-class Americans are dying earlier these days, the wealthiest among us are enjoying unprecedented longevity.

So when we talk about life expectancy slipping, what we should also talk about is the growing problem of health inequality in America. And it’s an increasingly urgent discussion, health researchers are warning, because of policy changes on the horizon that are poised to make the mortality gap even wider.

Maybe we could call this the "Not ME!" movement, because it doesn't affect anyone on that stage last weekend in the glare of the lights and the leer of the cameras; and because it probably doesn't affect any of the writers of the countless articles on just the websites I frequent about the Golden Globes and who wore black best and whether they should have worn black and whether what Oprah said makes her a shoo-in for President in 2020, or just amounts to her inauguration speech.

Okay, definitely to take something away from it.

I get itchy when rich and powerful people start talking about social justice for themselves and others similarly situated, because there are so many invisible Americans who don't get any attention at all.  "#MeToo" is not "TimesUP!", and more attention is paid to the complaints of Rose McGowan (who, I had to ask) than to all the people anonymously dying because they don't have the benefits of healthcare access that money buys.

This is America:  money talks, bullshit walks.  Money was screaming and applauding itself on that stage in front of the cameras, and tout le internet was properly outraged about who said what and made which jokes and won which award or wore whose gown.  And the poor and middle-class Americans dying earlier and earlier and skewing the numbers?  They're bullshit; they walk.  Nobody cares about bullshit.  Scrape it off your shoe if you happen to step in it, and walk on.  Money is chattering in your ear.

Here's the chart, if you want to see it.  It doesn't come festooned in a black designer gown, or stand on stage and accept an award with an inspiring speech that is about the other "invisible people" (i.e., not the ones dying off faster because they are poorer, which, ironically, is "us" actually.  Talk about "missing the point"!)   In matters of life, avoiding death pretty much is the point:

Here's another, courtesy of Vox, to save you clicking the link to find it.  This one, though, is only about men, so perhaps that's inappropriate for a discussion about sexual harassment:


Rich men live longer.  Sorry poor guys:  time's up!

This problem is complicated, and it isn't caused solely by access to healthcare; it is also tied to life choices, diet, exercise, the usual suspects.  Thinking in concrete ways about what needs to change I remember Mayor Bloomberg's doomed effort to limit the size of soft drinks sold in New York City.  That direct an approach won't work, but what indirect approaches are we attempting?  The Vox article ends with the concern that we won't see the solutions to this "early death" problem.  I'm more concerned that we even see the problem
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Is Process Due?


It's too early in the morning for this, but such is life today...

First, when we speak of "due process," we are usually speaking of crimes and criminal charges.  Oddly, none of the people mentioned in this article have faced criminal charges.  Maybe they should, and in some cases perhaps they will (there is an expression of impatience that Harvey Weinstein has not been charged, convicted, and buried under the jail yet, but this is reality, not a TV courtroom drama that has to wrap up in 50 minutes).  And "due process" is the protection the innocent have from being charged with a crime they did not commit, or from being convicted for a crime they aren't responsible for.  There isn't any "due process" for victims because they are not facing the full weight of the government and the threatened loss of their liberty.

Then again, we are all victims now, or aspire to be; it's become the new badge of identity.  We are victims and must carry that burden for the rest of our lives, else who are we?  I'll point to the case of Dylan Farrow, who is a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of Woody Allen because she's been told she was for most of her life.  She still professes her victimhood and uses it for publicity.  Do I mean she should be demure and "feminine" and stop bringing up such an unseemly event from her past, if indeed it happened?  No; but neither is her repeated statement that it happened to her evidence that would stand up in criminal court.  I'm old enough to remember the people convicted of child abuse on nothing more than the testimony of very young children, testimony everyone was shocked by at the time, and everyone now agrees was coerced and constructed by well-meaning people handing dolls to children and asking a blizzard of leading questions.  Is Dylan Farrow telling the truth?  She thinks she is.  Is it the truth?  We have no way of knowing.

Is Dylan Farrow being denied "her" due process?

Or what about Garrison Keillor?  We are reminded that an "investigation" revealed enough evidence to fire him from his job with MPR.  However, Mr. Keillor had already stopped working for the radio show he originated and hosted for years, reviving it once after taking it off the air himself.  MPR scrapped the name of that show, probably not because of its association with Mr. Keillor, but more likely because he kept a property interest in it, and they couldn't use it without either his permission, or after buying it from him.  Is Mr. Keillor truly harmed by this?  He doesn't seem to think so.  And what did Mr. Keillor do?  We still don't know.  MPR has refused to release the results of its investigation, even after Mr. Keillor's lawyers demanded they do so.  Whether Mr. Keillor presses that demand into a civil court is his business, but unless he does, we'll probably never find out why MPR cut ties with him.  And therein lies a crucial aspect of due process that works for victims as well as the accused:  a public trial.

The accused can always, of course, avoid a public trial by settling a civil case or entering into a plea agreement for a criminal case.  But if they don't, in criminal court they have to a right to face their accuser and to have the evidence presented against them in public.  If they are exonerated, the public knows why, and can decide for itself if justice was done (see., e.g., the OJ Simpson verdict).  If they are convicted, the public has access to the evidence against them, and again can decide if justice was done.

None of this is possible in an investigation by an employer who decides to fire you.  The victim's story is never told, the accused never faces his accusers, justice is not really done, due process is non-existent.

Does that matter?  Shouldn't the people accused be punished?  On what grounds?  Ally Sheedy posted three tweets about James Franco, hinting darkly that she was "#me too" about him, and then she deleted all three posts.  What was she referring to?  Now she won't say.  Is she being denied her due process?  Is Mr. Franco?

Why am I bothering with this?  Well, partly because of this analysis by Josh Marshall.  He lays out what we know about Trump and Russia, and tries out two "maximal theories" about what the evidence means:

Now, you might be saying, these are two extreme, strawman-ish scenarios you’re outlining. Well, I agree. That’s my point. I’m setting forth the maximal theories on either side to make the point that I don’t think we know quite where on this spectrum this all fits or how we reconcile what seems like a deep and close relationship with what seem like introductions. We know a fair amount about what happened before the campaign. We know a decent amount about what happened during the campaign. But it’s not as easy or clear as many assume how you fit them together.

The most important question is what happened during the campaign – in legal terms, in democratic terms, in national security terms. But in many ways the biggest question, the most fascinating and hardest to figure is this one I just laid out: how does Trump’s heavy dependence on Russian money and employees with deep ties to Russia and Ukraine and the criminal underworlds in those countries connect to the very pro-Russia line he took during the campaign and his campaign’s willingness to work with and conspire with the Russian disruption campaign in 2016? Sure they must be related. But how? I don’t think we really know that yet.

My best guess is that people around Putin knew Trump was crooked and dependent on Russian money and that he was likely to be friendly and up for … well, up for anything. So they went to work trying to make friends and found willing partners. He was up for anything. But that isn’t so much an explanation based on specific facts as it is the simplest explanation, the cleanest theory that accounts for all the facts we know.

This requires a lot more sleuthing and explanation.

And that last sentence, commenting on what is needed, is precisely what the special prosecutor is doing.  Undoubtedly the investigators know a great deal more about these matters than we do.  That is one reason their results should be presented in a court of law, in public, subject to cross-examination and verification under strict standards.    We never got that with Nixon; the closest we got were the House hearings, which many dismissed as partisan and biased, and held to the belief Nixon was railroaded out of office.  Even with a trial, of course, the public may not be satisfied; the OJ Simpson trial is, again, the prime example here.   No one can guarantee a judicial outcome.  But few think Simpson was not guilty; they are more likely to blame the prosecution, or even the defense, than to excuse Mr. Simpson.

But we can't conclude, like Trump wants to, that because we don't know the whole story, we already know the whole story.  We won't know the story without either a public release of the results of the investigation or, better yet, a trial where both sides can present their case to a judge and jury for determination under our legal system.  To convict Trump and his Administration on the grounds of "what we know", even a conviction in the court of public opinion, would be unfair and unfounded, at least in one sense (I'll admit that, as a matter of politics, it wouldn't bother me at all; then again, the only punishment would be at the ballot box).  It would also leave the matter grossly unresolved.

The proper resolution is what due process is for.  Are the victims of sexual harassment being denied their due process rights?  No; either they have criminal claims that a prosecutor can decide to prosecute; or they have civil claims they can take to court themselves.  It is entirely possible they have neither:  inappropriate touching may be a civil assault, but unless it is offensive to a reasonably prudent person, it isn't an actionable offense.  Most sexual harassment law requires an employer/employee relationship (most, not all), so there is another limit.  Criminal cases are even more severely limited; but this is the legal system we have.  If you want to take up the cry of "#metoo" and believe every woman who makes any allegation whatsoever, no one can stop you.  But a rallying cry that appeals to even millions is no replacement for due process; indeed, it is the reason for due process in the first place.
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