Obsidian Wings

Great Choice, Senator McCain!

by hilzoy

Via the super-liberal TPM, run by Bush-bashing über-liberal Limbaugh-analog Josh Marshall, this from Newsweek:

"After John McCain nailed down the Republican nomination in March, his campaign began wrestling with a sensitive personnel issue: who would manage this summer's GOP convention in St. Paul, Minn.? The campaign recently tapped Doug Goodyear for the job, a veteran operative and Arizonan who was chosen for his "management experience and expertise," according to McCain press secretary Jill Hazelbaker. But some allies worry that Goodyear's selection could fuel perceptions that McCain—who has portrayed himself as a crusader against special interests—is surrounded by lobbyists. Goodyear is CEO of DCI Group, a consulting firm that earned $3 million last year lobbying for ExxonMobil, General Motors and other clients.

Potentially more problematic: the firm was paid $348,000 in 2002 to represent Burma's military junta, which had been strongly condemned by the State Department for its human-rights record and remains in power today. Justice Department lobbying records show DCI pushed to "begin a dialogue of political reconciliation" with the regime. It also led a PR campaign to burnish the junta's image, drafting releases praising Burma's efforts to curb the drug trade and denouncing "falsehoods" by the Bush administration that the regime engaged in rape and other abuses."

You have to admire not just the McCain campaign's tin ear, but their impeccable sense of timing:

"Myanmar's military regime distributed international aid Saturday but plastered the boxes with the names of top generals in an apparent effort to turn the relief effort for last week's devastating cyclone into a propaganda exercise. (...) With voters going to the polls, state-run television continuously ran images of top generals including junta leader, Senior Gen. Than Shwe, handing out boxes of aid at elaborate ceremonies.

''We have already seen regional commanders putting their names on the side of aid shipments from Asia, saying this was a gift from them and then distributing it in their region,'' said Mark Farmaner, director of Burma Campaign UK, which campaigns for human rights and democracy in the country.

''It is not going to areas where it is most in need,'' he said in London."

No doubt all these stories are just falsehoods too.

What's particularly amusing is the McCain campaign's rationale for choosing Goodyear:

"Ironically, Goodyear was chosen for the post after the McCain campaign nixed another candidate, Paul Manafort, who runs a lobbying firm with McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis. The prospect of choosing Manafort created anxiety in the campaign because of his long history of representing controversial foreign clients, including Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos. More recently, he served as chief political consultant to Viktor Yanukovich, the former Ukrainian prime minister who has been widely criticized for alleged corruption and for his close ties to Russia's Vladimir Putin—a potential embarrassment for McCain, who in 2007 called Putin a "totalitarian dictator." "The Ukrainian stuff was viewed as too much," says one McCain strategist, who asked not to be identified discussing the matter."

So Ukraine is too much, but Burma is OK?

***

UPDATE: Well, that was quick: Goodyear has resigned. (H/t Robin Z and Nell in comments.)

Note to McCain: consider firing the people who do your vetting for you as well.

***

Further Update: Marc Ambinder reports that the person who actually managed the Burma account for DCI is one of the McCain campaign's regional managers:

"What becomes now of Doug Davenport, the DCI lobbying czar who is a campaign regional manager? A campaign spokesperson referred comment to Davenport, who did not immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment. As the head DCI lobbyist, Mr. Davenport was directly in charge of the Myanmar account.

Goodyear and Davenport were brought to the campaign by manager Rick Davis. This episode will increase criticism by some McCain allies that Davis has paid insufficient attention to McCain's brand by appointing so many lobbyists to key campaign positions."

Rick Davis is also on the rather lengthy list of lobbyists in senior positions in McCains campaign.

***

Yet Another Update:

From Marc Ambinder:

"Doug Davenport, the regional campaign manager for the mid-Atlantic states, founded the DCI Group's lobbying practice and oversaw the contract with Myanmar in 2002.

"Doug has tendered his resignation and we have accepted it," Jill Hazelbaker, McCain's communications director, wrote in a e-mail."

So Long, Ellen Malcolm

by hilzoy

Ellen Malcolm has an idiotic column in today's Washington Post:

"So here we are in the fourth quarter of the nominating process and the game is too close to call. Once again, the opponents and the media are calling for Hillary to quit. The first woman ever to win a presidential primary is supposed to stop competing, to curtsy and exit stage right."

Oh, please.

I honestly do not see how someone like Ellen Malcolm, who founded Emily's List, is still its President, and knows how politics works, could have written that "the game is too close to call" in good faith. It is not too close to call. Barring catastrophe, or a Rapture in which Obama is called to be with his maker while Hillary Clinton is left behind, Obama will win the race. That being the case, there is no need to explain why some people say that Hillary Clinton should drop out by appeal to sexism: to the idea that the person who should curtsy and step aside is the woman, or that women do not get to compete. The recognition that Clinton cannot win is all the motivation they need.

Moving right along:

"Why on earth should one candidate quit before the contest is finished? Democrats need not be so fainthearted. Both of the party's remaining candidates have raised tens of millions of dollars. Both have the respect of Democrats nationwide. Each has a progressive agenda that stands in stark contrast to Sen. John McCain and his adherence to Bush administration policies.

So why are some Democrats so afraid? We simply need to count every vote, let the remaining states have their say and see the process through to its conclusion."

Afraid? Who's afraid? I'm just tired of it all: of the endless shifting of standards, lists of which states count and which do not, endlessly changing values for "the magic number", and so on, all designed to show, somehow, that Clinton actually has a non-negligible chance to win the nomination. I am also tired of the idea that if Clinton dropped out of the race, that would disenfranchise people. It's incredibly common for candidates who have no realistic shot at winning to drop out before the primary season is over. In 2004, for instance, every single candidate for the Democratic nomination other than Kerry was out by March. When Edwards withdrew after failing to win any states on Super Tuesday, 21 states had not yet been heard from. When Bradley withdrew in March of 2000, 18 states had not yet voted. Horrors.

The fact that during the last two races, all the serious male candidates had withdrawn by March also makes it pretty unlikely that only sexism can explain the idea that Hillary Clinton should withdraw in May or June, now that it's clear that she has no realistic shot at winning.

Onwards:

"Hillary Clinton certainly has the right to compete till the end. But I believe Hillary also has a responsibility to play the game to its conclusion. For the women of my generation who learned to find and channel their competitiveness, for the working women who never falter in the face of pressure, for the younger women who still believe women can do anything, Hillary is a champion. She's shown us over and over that winners never quit and that quitters never win. We'll cheer her on until the game is over. And we hope that when the final whistle blows, we will have elected the first female president and the best president our country has ever had."

Speak for yourself, Ellen. For my part, I don't see that Clinton has any such responsibility. She might if there were a non-negligible chance that she would win. But there isn't. And I fail to see what worthwhile lesson it teaches women to pretend that there is, unless you think that what women really need, right now, is instruction in cynicism and mendacity.

I supported Emily's List for sixteen years. (Maybe seventeen: I can't recall whether I signed up in 1991 or 1992.) Over the years, I have sent their candidates thousands of dollars. That ended this campaign season, when it became clear to me that the leaders of Emily's List, and Ellen Malcolm in particular, had lost their intellectual integrity. This column is a perfect illustration of why I reached that conclusion. Luckily, Emily's List isn't so necessary anymore. It's a lot easier to find out about great progressive women candidates nationwide, and to give money to them. And there are a lot of other good political organizations whose presidents don't find it necessary either to lie to me or to invoke sexism, which I take very seriously, in a purely cynical fashion.

That makes it a lot easier to say that I will never support Emily's List again.

(Angry? Yeah. I expected much better.)

National Review: Still Clueless After All These Years

by hilzoy

This is funny. Via Ross Douthat, Michael Franc has a piece in the National Review on who donates to which party. Some of the results he finds are not surprising: Democrats are raising a lot more money than Republicans generally, so I'm not astonished to learn that they are raising more from people who list their occupation as 'CEO'. Franc takes this as evidence that the Democratic Party is becoming " a holding pen for all sorts of economic and educational elites." (Holding pen?) I take it as evidence of the Democrats' greater fundraising success overall, plus some bets on which party is more likely to win in November.

This, however, is more unexpected:

"Who favors the Republicans? The Democratic field, after all, enjoys an overall fundraising edge in excess of $200 million, so any pocket of Republican strength is noteworthy.

In this upside-down campaign season when populist GOP campaigners like John McCain and Mike Huckabee surprised the pundits with their primary victories or, in the case of Ron Paul, their fundraising prowess, it almost makes sense that the party of the country club set has been winning the fundraising race among the common man. That’s right. The white-shirt/red-tie brigade of Republican presidential aspirants holds a nearly three-to-one edge among janitors, custodians, cleaners, sanitation workers, factory workers, truckers, bus drivers, barbers, security guards, and secretaries. While Democrats command the financial loyalty of architects, Republicans successfully woo contributions from the skilled craftsmen who turn their blueprints into reality — specifically, contractors, hardhats, plumbers, stonemasons, electricians, carpenters mechanics, and roofers. This trend extends to the saloons, where the Democrats carry the bartenders and the Republicans the waitresses. The GOP field even secures more financial support from teamsters, steelworkers, bricklayers, and autoworkers."

Really? Republicans are raising more money than Democrats among waitresses, janitors, and secretaries? Not to mention all those Howard Roark-like "skilled craftsmen who turn their blueprints into reality"?

Actually, no. One of Ross Douthat's commenters pointed out the obvious:

"Franc's analysis of 2008 presidential donors is fatally flawed because the FEC only requires the disclosure of personal information for donors who give more than $200. You can see this quite easily by searching the site for any name or city, and you'll find that all are people who gave in excess of $200.

Barack Obama has received at least 80% of his donations (43% of his total funds raised) from small donors who gave less than $200 and who are not listed in the FEC database, or on the HuffPo site that uses the FEC data.

For instance, Franc said that Republicans had more contributions from waitresses. If you search for "waitress", you'll only see 30 donors - that's obviously far too few, and should have tipped Franc off to the incomplete nature of the data ... Not only that, but of the 14 waitresses who gave to Republicans, 13 gave to Ron Paul."

I checked the FEC database, just to be sure. I maxed out for Obama, but two of my contributions were under $50. Guess what? They don't appear. I also pulled up a random page from Hilary Clinton's disclosure forms; none of the contributions under $200 turn up either. Which means, of course, that the majority of donations from everyone -- including those "skilled craftsmen who turn their blueprints into reality -- specifically, contractors, hardhats, plumbers, stonemasons, electricians, carpenters mechanics, and roofers" -- don't appear at all.

There are lots of people out there who want to be journalists. The National Review could surely find someone, somewhere, who bothers to check whether the data he's using actually support his conclusions. It doesn't need to publish someone like Franc, even if he is a Vice President at the Heritage Foundation. It might also consider hiring fact-checkers.

***

Unrelated NRO oddness: here's one for Atrios' Simple Answers to Stupid Questions:

"Have you noticed that a lot of the people who are trying to purge all mention of jihad are the same folk who insist that restaurants must post calorie counts on the menu?"

No.

They Read The Onion And Thought It Was A How-To Manual

by hilzoy

I thought the Republicans in Congress moved beyond parody a while back, but this truly takes the cake. From a Washington Post article headlined "Republicans Vote Against Moms; No Word Yet on Puppies, Kittens":

"It was already shaping up to be a difficult year for congressional Republicans. Now, on the cusp of Mother's Day, comes this: A majority of the House GOP has voted against motherhood.

On Wednesday afternoon, the House had just voted, 412 to 0, to pass H. Res. 1113, "Celebrating the role of mothers in the United States and supporting the goals and ideals of Mother's Day," when Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.), rose in protest.

"Mr. Speaker, I move to reconsider the vote," he announced.

Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.), who has two young daughters, moved to table Tiahrt's request, setting up a revote. This time, 178 Republicans cast their votes against mothers.

It has long been the custom to compare a popular piece of legislation to motherhood and apple pie. Evidently, that is no longer the standard. Worse, Republicans are now confronted with a John Kerry-esque predicament: They actually voted for motherhood before they voted against it.

Republicans, unhappy with the Democratic majority, have been using such procedural tactics as this all week to bring the House to a standstill, but the assault on mothers may have gone too far. House Minority Leader John Boehner, asked yesterday to explain why he and 177 of his colleagues switched their votes, answered: "Oh, we just wanted to make sure that everyone was on record in support of Mother's Day."

By voting against it?"

When I first read this, I thought it was a spoof of some kind. It isn't. 178 Republicans actually voted against Mothers' Day.

Apparently, this was part of a general attempt to prevent the House from getting anything done:

"Boehner has enough trouble to preoccupy him here in Washington, where House Democrats have been passing their agenda with little thought for Republican preferences. "The majority has taken, once again, their go-it-alone policy," Boehner lamented yesterday. "It's time for Democrats and Republicans to work together."

To induce this working together, Boehner decided to stop the House from working at all. As House Democrats tried to pass legislation to ease the mortgage crisis on Wednesday, Republicans served up hours of procedural delays, demanding a score of roll call votes: 10 motions to adjourn, half a dozen motions to reconsider, various and sundry amendments, a motion to approve the daily journal, a motion to instruct and a "motion to rise.""

By voting against Mothers' Day?

Why Did Clinton Lose? In a Word, Iraq

by publius

I’m sure pundits and historians alike will be arguing for many years about why Clinton — who enjoyed such enormous advantages going in — lost the Democratic primary. (See, e.g., Karen Tumulty). Personally, I think the explanation is quite simple. Clinton lost the nomination because of Iraq. Period.

While that explanation seems overly simplistic, it’s more complex than you might think. Iraq hurt her not so much because she supported the war, but because the war interacted with her campaign — at this particular point in history — in a number of complex, harmful ways. Thus, what’s truly interesting is not so much that Iraq sunk her candidacy, but the particular manner in which it did so. Below the fold, I’ve listed several specific reasons why Iraq doomed her candidacy. While she deserves blame for some of these reasons, others must be chalked up to cruel Fortune.

Close My Eyes! It's All Pink!

by hilzoy

Yesterday, NPR had a fascinating story about two six year olds who are transgender. You can either read or listen to it here; if you have twenty three minutes, I recommend listening to it. One thing that becomes very clear when you listen to it is that these are not kids (biologically, boys) whose parents put the idea of being girls into their heads. They came up with it on their own. They played with dolls, not trucks; they identified with female characters, not male ones; one decided to go trick or treating as Dorothy when he was two and a half (and that's not the half of it; read or listen to the story.) As for the other:

"Around the age of 3, Jonah started taking his mother Pam's clothing. He would borrow a long T-shirt and belt, and fashion it into a dress. This went on for months — with Jonah constantly adjusting his costume to make it better — until one day, Pam discovered her son crying inconsolably. He explained to his mother that he simply could not get the T-shirt to look right, she says.

Pam remembers watching her child mournfully finger his outfit. She says she knew what he wanted. "At that point I just said, you know, 'You really want a dress to wear, don't you?' And [Jonah's] face lit up, and [she] was like, 'Yes!'"

That afternoon, Pam, her sister and Jonah piled into the family car.

"I thought [she]* was gonna hyperventilate and faint because [she] was so incredibly happy. ... Before then, or since then, I don't think I have seen [her] so out of [her] mind happy as that drive to Target that day to pick out [her] dress," Pam says.

Pam allowed Jonah to get two dresses, but felt incredibly conflicted about it. Even though Jonah asked, she wouldn't allow him to buy any more dresses for a year afterward, so Jonah wore those two dresses every day, nothing else, until Pam got sick of looking at them."

Eventually, both sets of parents sought counseling, and got two counselors with very different approaches. One believes in trying to get children like this to stop trying to be the opposite gender. The other does not.

I can see both sides of this question. I ask myself: suppose I had a transgender kid, and there was some completely benign thing I could do -- providing a diet with more of some vitamin, for instance -- that would make my child completely comfortable with his or her biological gender. (Note: to count as benign, it would have to be something like dietary modification, as opposed to telling my kid to act more like a boy or girl.) Would I do it? I think so. Being transgender is not just no fun at all; it involves pretty serious surgery and a lifetime on hormones, and if something like a dietary modification, undertaken early enough, could spare my kid this, I think I'd go for it.

[UPDATE: Hob, in comments, notes that being transgender doesn't necessarily mean surgery. True enough, and I was too quick to say that it did. Hob also says that I make it sound unduly grim: "many of my friends were having no fun at all for some part of their lives, but they are now." To be clear: I didn't mean that it's never fun (and should have been clearer on that; of course it can be.) I should probably have said: it can be tough, which is more like what I meant. Also, I meant to include the parts when people don't have fun: the part before you figure out what's going on and what to do about it, for instance. Though, on reflection, I should probably have hedged that too: maybe for some people it's never confusing at all, and people are never bigoted and vile, and there is no employment discrimination, and so forth. END UPDATE.]

But that hypothetical assumes something crucial, namely: that gender identification can be modified. Maybe in some cases it can: human nature being endlessly various, I'm sure there are boys out there who decide to be girls, or vice versa, but for whom this is malleable. (Thus the word 'decide', which would otherwise be completely question-begging.) I'm also sure that there are a lot of transmen and transwomen whose gender identification is not modifiable in any way we know of: people who try as hard as they can not to want to be a different gender, without success. And before I decided what to do in response to the fact that my hypothetical child did not identify with the body s/he was born with, I would want to have some idea which s/he seemed likely to be.

Here's what happened to the two kids.

Vito Fossella: Defending Marriage

by hilzoy

Vito Fossella was in trouble already:

"The clock is ticking on Rep. Vito Fossella (R-N.Y.) -- or "Vino" Fossella, as the New York tabloids have taken to calling him -- who is battling not just drunken driving charges but much more personally scandalous allegations that could damage his party's prospects in the November congressional elections.

GOP political insiders say Fossella, whose blood-alcohol content was more than twice the legal limit when he was busted at 12:15 a.m. last Thursday, stands little chance of running for reelection at this point, and their Democratic counterparts agree. Buzz on the Hill and around town Wednesday was that Fossella would be announcing sooner rather than later that he won't seek another term in what has quickly become a hotly contested seat for embattled Republicans. Fossella was not voting in the House Wednesday.

The Staten Island Republican was stopped for running a red light and charged with driving while intoxicated in Alexandria, Va., about three miles from the home of a woman who reportedly fetched him from the police station seven hours after his arrest."

Details about what preceded his arrest didn't help any:

"The Daily News reports the congressman and his buddy got kicked out of a Washington, D.C., bar hours before Fossella's arrest. Waiters at the Logan Tavern tell the paper that both men were incapable of driving and that at one point, Fossella's pal—known only as "Brian"—passed out in front of the men's room."

This, however, has to be the last straw:

"Representative Vito J. Fossella, a Staten Island Republican who was arrested on May 1 in Alexandria, Va., and charged with drunken driving, issued a statement on Thursday acknowledging that he had had an extramarital affair with Laura Fay, a former Air Force lieutenant colonel, and that the two of them had a 3-year-old daughter together. (...)

The Daily News has reported that Mr. Fossella called Ms. Fay for help after his arrest and told officers that he was on his way to Grimm Street, where Ms. Fay lives, to visit a sick daughter. As speculation swirled over Mr. Fossella’s relationship with Ms. Fay in recent days, his aides said only that they were good friends.

In Mr. Fossella’s four-sentence statement on Thursday, he declined to address his political future or specify whether he would seek re-election this fall to a sixth full term:

I have had a relationship with Laura Fay, with whom I have a three-year-old daughter. My personal failings and imperfections have caused enormous pain to the people I love and I am truly sorry. While I understand that there will be many questions, including those about my political future, making any political decisions right now are furthest from my mind. Over the coming weeks and months, I will to continue to do my job and I will work hard to heal the deep wounds I have caused."

***

Rep. Fossella voted for the Federal Marriage Amendment in both 2004 and 2006. It's always so important to protect marriage from the horrid threats posed by Teh Gay, which are much, much scarier than the threats posed by drunken husbands who have entire second families.

He also voted to ban gay adoptions in DC. And that makes sense: the damage caused to a child by being adopted by two loving people of the same gender vastly exceeds the damage caused to a three year old by having a father who can only drop by now and again, when his real family isn't paying attention, or to his three other children by growing up in a home where there are secrets no one can talk about.

Makes sense to me. After all, we have to stick up for Family Values™.

***

Oh: Fossella also voted for the Marriage Protection Act, which would have barred any court from hearing questions about the interpretation or constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act.

Because marriages need protecting, even by people who can't be bothered to protect their own.

McCain goes Racist?

"I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on," he said in an interview with USA TODAY. As evidence, McCain cited an Associated Press article "that found how Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

Wow.  I wouldn't think a Republican could still get away with such blatant racial pandering in 2008! 

They probably can't. 

The actual quote is:

"I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on," she said in an interview with USA TODAY. As evidence, Clinton cited an Associated Press article "that found how Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

Often, the game of "how would that come across if a Republican said it" isn't all that enlightening because the difference in reaction is subtle or the issue is complex.  But every now and then you see one that fits. 

I'm honestly surprised if any candidate for President, of either party, can get away with saying something quite that baldly and get away without appearing racist.  I suppose we'll know soon. But I'm certain that a Republican Presidential candidate would be crucified for it.

Obama has a vision for the US which changes the way race plays out in society.  Clinton's vision is one which wallows in race tension and attempts to exploit it for personal gain.         

Oops!

by hilzoy

This really is astonishing:

"Clinton picked people for her team primarily for their loyalty to her, instead of their mastery of the game. That became abundantly clear in a strategy session last year, according to two people who were there. As aides looked over the campaign calendar, chief strategist Mark Penn confidently predicted that an early win in California would put her over the top because she would pick up all the state's 370 delegates. It sounded smart, but as every high school civics student now knows, Penn was wrong: Democrats, unlike the Republicans, apportion their delegates according to vote totals, rather than allowing any state to award them winner-take-all. Sitting nearby, veteran Democratic insider Harold M. Ickes, who had helped write those rules, was horrified — and let Penn know it. "How can it possibly be," Ickes asked, "that the much vaunted chief strategist doesn't understand proportional allocation?" And yet the strategy remained the same, with the campaign making its bet on big-state victories. Even now, it can seem as if they don't get it. Both Bill and Hillary have noted plaintively that if Democrats had the same winner-take-all rules as Republicans, she'd be the nominee."

What's also astonishing is that after Penn made a mistake like that, he wasn't shifted to some other job, one that didn't involve having any say at all in general strategy, or require the slightest knowledge of the rules.

General management skills matter. One of those skills is knowing when someone is just out of his or her depth, and needs to be either fired or moved to another position, and then being willing to act accordingly. It's important to do this even when someone doesn't do you the favor that Penn did Clinton: making a mistake so egregious that the need to take action is obvious. But not responding to a mistake like this is just extraordinary.

Burma: It Just Gets Worse

by hilzoy

The news from Burma gets more and more horrific:

(Image from the Washington Post.)

From the NYT:

"The top United States diplomat in Myanmar warned that the toll could rise to 100,000 if aid was not prompt. The French foreign minister, meanwhile, suggested invoking United Nations powers to force delivery of international relief supplies on the reluctant Burmese government.

The Myanmar government has so far put its official tally of the deaths from the cyclone at 22,500, of which perhaps 40 percent were children. A further 41,000 people are missing, and up to 1 million people are estimated to have been left homeless. (...)

“The situation in the delta sounds more and more horrendous,” Reuters quoted her as saying. She said many people had died when the storm struck while they were sleeping, and they were either drowned or swept out to sea. Earlier in the day, the French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, said that the United Nations should invoke its “responsibility to protect” civilians as the basis for a resolution to allow the delivery of international aid even without the permission of the military junta.

Despite the emerging scale of the disaster, the Myanmar government has let in little aid and has restricted movement in the delta, aid agencies say. It has not granted visas to aid workers, even though supplies are being marshaled in nearby countries like Thailand. (...)

A United Nations official in Bangkok, Richard Horsey, said on Wednesday that “thousands of bodies” were floating in nearly 2,000 square miles of the flooded delta. And in the capital, Yangon, prices in the market were reported to be doubled for rice, cooking oil, charcoal and bottled water. Much of Yangon is reported to be without power, so residents could not use their pumps to obtain drinking water from wells."

AP:

"Local aid workers started distributing water purification tablets, mosquito nets, plastic sheeting and basic medical supplies.

But heavily flooded areas were accessible only by boat, with helicopters unable to deliver relief supplies there, said Richard Horsey, Bangkok-based spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Aid.

"Most urgent need is food and water," said Andrew Kirkwood, head of Save the Children in Yangon. "Many people are getting sick. The whole place is under salt water and there is nothing to drink. They can't use tablets to purify salt water," he said."

I listed some organizations who are getting aid to Burma in my last post on the subject. The NYT and Washington Post have more extensive lists.

How To Do It

by hilzoy

Round about now, Hillary Clinton might be wondering: is it possible to run a doomed campaign that just brightens people's day without leaving bitterness in its wake?

Yes.

Lookin' for a Suit and Tie Rap

The Pentagon just released all of the documents that the New York Times relied on for its story on the Pentagon's use of former military officials (and other so-called "experts") to surreptisiously parrot the party line in various media outlets and appearances.  There's a lot of documents to wade through, but there are bound to be some juicy tid bits wedged between the couch cushions.  In light of the volume, I thought I'd bring the doc dump to the attention to the ObWi commentariat. 

If you find anything scandalous, feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email.  Full attribution, and all the attendant fame and glory, are yours if you so desire.  Or just peruse for your pleasure.

Either way, happy hunting!

Kirchick's Sloppy Logic

by publius

Jamie Kirchick — whose struggles with honesty have been discussed here — penned an odd column for the Politico yesterday. The argument is essentially that “the left” is hypocritical because it criticizes conservative religious extremists while "cynically" developing “a newfound love” for extremists like Wright. He writes:

Yet the left, with its healthy skepticism toward religion, has shown itself to be cynically flexible over the past few weeks in response to the utter insanities emitted from [Wright]. Suddenly, some liberals have discovered a newfound love for extremists who hide behind the cloth to justify their radical views.

That’s an interesting argument because virtually every liberal blogger I read was extremely critical of Wright’s recent narcissistic rant. For that matter, I didn't see anyone endorsing his earlier statements either (some made the analytically distinct point that it was a silly controversy). For that reason, I anxiously awaited his evidence of the “left’s” “newfound love.” He gave three — all people I’d never heard of: (1) John Nichols of The Nation, (2) Princeton professor Melissa Harris-Lacewell, and (3) former Tribune public editor Don Wycliff. Quite an impressive list. Maybe these are all liberal luminaries who I've missed over the past four years of blogging, but it seems like he should have added more beef to make such a sweeping, nasty point about so many people.

But of course he doesn't. Kirchick's column is a textbook example of writing an argument first and finding support later. I'm sure he wrote it, added some bracketed place-fillers, and then scoured Lexis to plug in someone — anyone — to justify the argument. The idea that Kirchick observed a groundswell of Wright support among liberal bloggers and then wrote about it is, frankly, absurd.

The bigger problem here, though, is the type of argument he's using (and this form of logic is, sadly, used across the political spectrum). Specifically, he's citing a few outliers to make broad, sweeping attacks against a wider group with whom he disagrees ideologically. But again, honest dealing is not Kirchick’s strong point.

You Can Fake it for a While, Bite Your Tongue and Smile

by Eric Martin

Back in July 2006, I recall being struck by the sheer audacity of the gambit being attempted when Michael Ledeen and his supporters argued that, contra the assertions made in a Rolling Stone article, Ledeen had always "opposed military action against Iran."  But my freefalling jaw had not yet completed its descent.  A mere four months later, Ledeen made an even bolder go at real-time historical revisionism:   

I do not feel "remorseful" [about the situation in Iraq] since I had and have no involvement with our Iraq policy. I opposed the military invasion of Iraq before it took place and I advocated—as I still do—support for political revolution in Iran as the logical and necessary first step in the war against the terror masters. [emphasis added]

Suffice it to say, Ledeen's post hoc attempt to conceal his Iraq hawk's feathers in dove's plumage is easily exposed for the poultry paltry ruse that it is.  To his credit, Ledeen has mostly refrained from repeating this effort at creatively rehabilitating his Iraq war advocacy.  However, he has had a much harder time remaining reticent regarding his support for military action against Iran.  Every few months, seemingly overcome by impulses more powerful than his dedication to semi-plausible deniability, Ledeen slips out of character and tells us what he really thinks.  Keeping track of these flashes of honesty has become something of a hobby of mine (to each his own I suppose).

The latest from the man who has always "opposed military action against Iran" sure is a doozy:

Time to Attack Iranian Terror Camps?   [Michael Ledeen]

So says John Bolton, and he's right.  As you know, I have been proposing this for years.  I always thought it was only a matter of time before we were compelled to take this action, which is a legitimate form of self-defense.  And while we're at it, we should do the same thing to the Syrian camps as well.  It isn't "sending a message," it's acting to protect our guys by fighting back in the proxy war the mullahs have been waging since 1979.  Faster, please? [emphasis added, unintentional bout of honesty in the original]

You know, the Corner sure could use an editor. (Audience: What about Kathryn Jean Lopez?)  You know, the Corner sure could use an editor.

Final Thoughts Before Bed

by hilzoy

First thought: it's worth taking a step back and noticing that the gas tax pander didn't work. At least, it's hard for me to believe that Obama would have come as close as he did to winning Indiana in the face of the flap over Rev. Wright, the possible involvement of Limbaugh Republicans, and so on, if the idea of a gas tax holiday had really caught on.

Senator Clinton gambled on the stupidity of the voters, and she lost.* That is truly worth celebrating.

Second, the NYT:

"Clinton advisers acknowledged that the results of the primaries were far less than they had hoped, and said they were likely to face new pleas even from some of their own supporters for her to quit the race. They said they expected fund-raising to become even harder now; one adviser said the campaign was essentially broke, and several others refused to say whether Mrs. Clinton had loaned the campaign money from her personal account to keep it afloat.

The advisers said they were dispirited over the loss in North Carolina, after her campaign — now working off a shoestring budget as spending outpaces fund-raising — decided to allocate millions of dollars and full days of the candidate and her husband in the state. Even with her investment, Mr. Obama outspent Mrs. Clinton in both states."

This is where the rubber hits the road. If the campaign is "essentially broke", and if she doesn't somehow manage to raise money on tonight's results, then the Clintons no longer get to decide whether to stay in the race, period. They get to decide whether to stay in the race on their own nickels. I imagine this might be a sobering thought. (But why? They can spare the money more easily than most of their supporters.)

Third: as I've said in comments, I think the fact that she has cancelled her public appearances for tomorrow is serious. God willing, she will drop out, and spare us any continuation of this nightmare.

Fourth: it occurred to me this evening that if Obama is the nominee, it will be the first time in my life that someone I have supported in a contested primary has been the nominee. Starting with McGovern in 1968 and continuing for the next forty years, the people I have supported have an unbroken record of failure in primaries. It was almost enough to make me consider coming out for Kucinich or Gravel, just to jinx them. (Though both of them seem to have done a fine job jinxing themselves, without any help from me.)

If Obama gets the nomination, I will scarcely know what to make of it. It will be almost as strange as seeing the sun rise in the west, or cockatiels quoting Proust. These things just don't happen to me.

I hope I have the chance to get used to it. It sounds like fun. ;)

This is the End

by publius

Tonight, I think, marks the end of the Clinton campaign. I mean, it’s been over for some time, but tonight sucked the wind out of her rationale for staying in — particularly if Indiana flips when the Chicago vote comes in.

Math-wise, tonight’s elections don’t change much. The math is bad for Clinton, and it got worse tonight. But Clinton’s strategy in recent months hasn’t been about math (i.e., making up significant pledged delegate numbers). It’s been about perceptions.

As I explained a few days ago, Clinton’s current strategy is to hang around as long as possible and hope Obama trips up. She can only hang around, though, as long as she has plausible political cover for doing so. In other words, her strategy depends upon maintaining the perception that she should remain in the race (that Obama is wounded, that bottom will fall out, etc.). Winning Indiana and getting close in North Carolina would have allowed her to build on recent victories, thus strengthening the argument that she should stick around until the convention. The math wouldn’t change, but the perceptions would.

But that strategy ended rather abruptly tonight. She got beat badly in North Carolina, and is on the verge of a very narrow victory in Indiana (at best). That means those perceptions are going to shift tomorrow. Clinton didn’t beat him in all the final elections. Obama’s floor isn’t falling out — he regained momentum in a working class state like Indiana. And so on. In short, I think the political pressure on Clinton to get out will increase significantly tomorrow (which affects superdelegate preferences, and gives them cover to endorse).

On a final note, I think Clinton fell victim tonight to the type of expectations game that had been hurting Obama in recent months. Specifically, Obama has been hurt in several elections by the perception in the closing days that he was on the verge of catching up (e.g., Texas, Ohio). Clinton’s problem was not so much that she got beat in North Carolina — or even that she got beat badly. It’s that it appeared she was about to overtake him.

Again, this is all perceptions, but ending the perception that Clinton can win is Obama’s final obstacle to the nomination. The math has been settled for a long time. Tonight was the coup de grace.

NC/IN Open Thread

by hilzoy

The networks seem to have called North Carolina for Obama at the very moment the polls closed. As I write, Indiana has not been called, though Clinton is ahead 57-43 with a third of the votes counted. CNN has the results for NC and IN with nifty maps: just hold your mouse over an individual county, and its results so far will appear. Junkie food ;)

If you live in the Pacific northwest, don't let this open thread distract you from the dog you have been longing for. (You know you have. Really.)

Otherwise, discuss away.

Stop Voter Fraud By Nuns! Open Thread

by hilzoy

I wasn't going to post on this story, but since I've decided to post an open thread, what the heck:

"About 12 Indiana nuns were turned away Tuesday from a polling place by a fellow bride of Christ because they didn't have state or federal identification bearing a photograph.

Sister Julie McGuire said she was forced to turn away her fellow sisters at Saint Mary's Convent in South Bend, across the street from the University of Notre Dame, because they had been told earlier that they would need such an ID to vote.

The nuns, all in their 80s or 90s, didn't get one but came to the precinct anyway.

"One came down this morning, and she was 98, and she said, 'I don't want to go do that,'" Sister McGuire said. Some showed up with outdated passports. None of them drives.

They weren't given provisional ballots because it would be impossible to get them to a motor vehicle branch and back in the 10-day time frame allotted by the law, Sister McGuire said. "You have to remember that some of these ladies don't walk well. They're in wheelchairs or on walkers or electric carts."

Nonetheless, she said, the convent will make a "very concerted effort" to get proper identification for the nuns in time for the general election. "We're going to take from now until November to get them out and get this done. You can't do this like school kids on a bus," she said. "I wish we could.""

Really, though, this open thread is for wonkie, and whatever else anyone would like to discuss. Our national crusade against voter fraud by octogenarian nuns is just an extra.

Burma

by hilzoy

From the NYT:

"The death toll from a powerful cyclone that struck Myanmar three days ago rose to 22,500 Tuesday, with a further 41,000 people still missing, the government said, and foreign governments and aid organizations began mobilizing for a major relief operation.

Shaken by the scope of the disaster, the authorities said they would delay a vote in the worst affected areas on a new constitution that was meant to cement the military’s grip on power.

The death toll was the latest in a steadily escalating official count since Cyclone Nargis struck Myanmar early Saturday, devastating much of the fertile Irrawaddy Delta and Yangon, the nation’s main city.

At a news conference in Yangon, the minister for relief and resettlement, Maung Maung Swe, said 41,000 people were still missing in the aftermath of the cyclone, which triggered a surge of water inland from the sea.

“More deaths were caused by the tidal wave than the storm itself,” he said, in the first official description of the destruction. “The wave was up to 12 feet high and it swept away and inundated half the houses in low-lying villages. They did not have anywhere to flee.”

A spokesman for the United Nations World Food Program said that as many as one million people might have lost their homes and that some villages were almost totally destroyed."

You can help by donating to the Red Cross/Red Crescent, Doctors Without Borders, Save The Children, UNICEF, or the World Food Programme, all of which are providing assistance in Burma.

Our government, meanwhile, has decided this is a good time to play politics:

"The United States, which has led a drive for economic sanctions against Myanmar’s repressive regime, said it would also provide aid, but only if an American disaster team was invited into the country.

The policy was presented by the first lady, Laura Bush, along with a lecture to the junta about human rights and disaster relief.

“This is a cheap shot,” said Aung Nain Oo, a Burmese political analyst who is based in Thailand. “The people are dying. This is no time for a political message to be aired. This is a time for relief. No one is asking for anything like this except the United States.”"

The government in Burma is horrible. But that is no reason to attach these sorts of conditions to assistance in the face of disaster.

Hitchens Logic

by publius

Shorter Hitchens -- Obama attended Wright's church not because he was an aspiring Chicago politician, but because Michelle is a closet radical. The evidence? Her 1985 college thesis. The other evidence? None listed. All in all, a well-argued column.

And bonus points if anyone can identify the logical relevance of the first two paragraphs of gratuitous references to Farrakhan.

Beat That, John Thullen!

by hilzoy

Maureen Dowd seems to have written this in earnest (or what passes for earnestness with her):

"Proclaiming that the upcoming elections in Indiana and North Carolina would be “a game changer,” Hillary and her posse pressed hard on their noble twin themes of emasculation and elitism.

Cherry-bombing the word “pansy” into the discourse, Gov. Mike Easley of North Carolina said Hillary made “Rocky Balboa look like a pansy.”

Paul Gipson, president of a steelworkers local in Portage, Ind., hailed her “testicular fortitude,” before ripping into “Gucci-wearing, latte-drinking, self-centered, egotistical people that have damaged our lifestyle.”

James Carville helpfully told Eleanor Clift of Newsweek that if Hillary gave Obama one of her vehicles of testicular fortitude, “they’d both have two.”"

Words fail.

We Owe Them Better

by hilzoy

Sometimes the news makes me very, very angry:

"The number of suicides among veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may exceed the combat death toll because of inadequate mental health care, the U.S. government's top psychiatric researcher said.

Community mental health centers, hobbled by financial limits, haven't provided enough scientifically sound care, especially in rural areas, said Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland. He briefed reporters today at the American Psychiatric Association's annual meeting in Washington.

Insel echoed a Rand Corporation study published last month that found about 20 percent of returning U.S. soldiers have post- traumatic stress disorder or depression, and only half of them receive treatment. About 1.6 million U.S. troops have fought in the two wars since October 2001, the report said. About 4,560 soldiers had died in the conflicts as of today, the Defense Department reported on its Web site.

Based on those figures and established suicide rates for similar patients who commonly develop substance abuse and other complications of post-traumatic stress disorder, "it's quite possible that the suicides and psychiatric mortality of this war could trump the combat deaths,'' Insel said."

The Rand study (pdf) also found that of the roughly half of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who had PTSD, major depression, or a probable traumatic brain injury and who sought treatment, "just over half received a minimally adequate treatment." (p. xxii)

Some things in life are hard. But getting the number of vets who get minimally adequate treatment over 50% is not one of them. You train the doctors. If those treatments cost more, you provide the money. You do what you need to do to make sure that when someone walks in the door looking for help, s/he finds it.

It's also not that hard to think of ways of raising the number of vets who actually seek help above 50% of those who need it. I think there are good reasons why soldiers should not have the same expectations of confidentiality as civilians, especially during wartime. (We really, really do not want soldiers who are actively psychotic, for instance. Likewise, soldiers with persistent homicidal fantasies.) But as of now, if they are still in the military, they have to deal with the knowledge that their command will find out that they have sought counseling, unless they seek counseling outside normal military structures, which is (I believe) forbidden. Many of them believe that this will affect their careers, and while I'm sure some of them are wrong, I'm equally sure that others are right.

As I said, I think it's right that active duty soldiers should not enjoy the same level of confidentiality as civilians. But they ought to be able to seek counseling with the expectation that that fact will not be revealed to their command unless it's necessary. This would be better for the soldiers, and also better for the military: untreated major depression or PTSD is not exactly a prescription for fun on the battlefield.

So imagine a soldier, just back from his third or fourth tour in Iraq (or worse: in Bob Herbert's last column, he cites an obituary for a soldier who was killed in Afghanistan: "As I read his obituary, I noticed that he had been deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq seven times.") Imagine that he is suffering from PTSD or major depression. He knows she needs help. Heck, he needed help after the first tour, and the second. He hasn't gone in before because he's worried about his career. But this time, he knows he needs help too badly to worry about that. He's stressed all the time; he snaps at his kids, and worries that he might lose it altogether; he spends nights just crying and crying; he has begun to feel like killing himself. He finally gets up his nerve and goes in for treatment, and guess what? His counselor doesn't now what appropriate treatment is, so he doesn't get any.

Or maybe it's more like this:

"Soldier Tyler Jennings says that when he came home from Iraq last year, he felt so depressed and desperate that he decided to kill himself. Late one night in the middle of May, his wife was out of town, and he felt more scared than he'd felt in gunfights in Iraq. Jennings says he opened the window, tied a noose around his neck and started drinking vodka, "trying to get drunk enough to either slip or just make that decision."

Five months before, Jennings had gone to the medical center at Ft. Carson, where a staff member typed up his symptoms: "Crying spells... hopelessness... helplessness... worthlessness." Jennings says that when the sergeants who ran his platoon found out he was having a breakdown and taking drugs, they started to haze him. He decided to attempt suicide when they said that they would eject him from the Army."

You can imagine it. I can imagine it. It's not too much to ask that someone in the Pentagon imagine it before they send good people off to war, and that they then do something about it.

We owe our soldiers better.

Introduction - Out of Order

by Eric Martin

It is my great honor to announce to the distinguished readership of Obsidian Wings that I'll be joining the gifted authors on this site on rare occasion.  Their invitation led me to question their judgment, as you are no doubt harboring your own doubts at this time.  In order to make them look better, I'll try not to get in the way too often.

Sit by the Fire in Your Shangri-la

by Eric Martin

At this juncture, the Bush administration and its allies are primarily relying on three publicly stated rationales in order to justify maintaining the crippling occupation of Iraq: (1) protecting the Iraqi people from the violence of a civil war that would flare up should we leave; (2) fear of an al-Qaeda takeover in our absence; and (3) simultaneously with #2 for John McCain and others, curiously enough, fear of an increase in Iran's influence should we pull back our support for Iraqi political parties that were headquartered in Tehran prior to our invasion (and formed, funded, armed and indoctrinated in some instances). 

The second and third prongs are easily refutable if you follow the links - or just apply common sense.  al-Qaeda is a fringe movement amongst the already minority Sunni population.  A vastly unpopular fringe of a 20% minority with limited resources can't take over a country when opposing groups have access to ample supplies of wealth and arms. 

Iran's influence in Iraq was greatly increased due to the toppling of its nemesis, Saddam Hussein.  By propping up an unpopular and Iranian-tied regime in Baghdad today (some members of which still receive pensions from the Iran's Revolutionary Guard), we are not doing anything to lessen Iran's presence.  Our withdrawal would not add to what has already been achieved by Iran with our blood and treasure.

As to the first rationale, the facts, again, don't match the rhetoric.  Consider, we are currently laying siege to neighborhoods in Baghdad, as well as other cities such as Basra, that house nearly 3 million Iraqis (close to 10% of the population) simply because the majority of residents in these regions support a political movement, and militia, that oppose our presence.  All of these civilian casualties and countless hardships so that we can ensure our ability to maintain the occupation...for the well-being of the Iraqi people.  Call this the raze and save redux. 

Speaking of which, our intentions are further betrayed by our actions, as Spencer Ackerman relates:

In a city consumed by chaos, war, occupation, corruption, intermittent and unreliable electricity, sewage overflows that you sometimes have to wade through, food shortages, public-health crises, you know what you shouldn’t build?

…luxury hotels, a shopping center and even condos in the heart of Baghdad.

That’s all part of a five-year development “dream list” — or what some dub an improbable fantasy — to transform the U.S.-protected Green Zone from a walled fortress into a centerpiece for Baghdad’s future.

But the $5 billion plan has the backing of the Pentagon and apparently the interest of some deep pockets in the world of international hotels and development, the lead military liaison for the project told the Associated Press.

That sort of indifference to the suffering of Iraq is provocative. If I was Moqtada Sadr, I would use it as a rallying cry. Consider:

“When you have $1 billion hanging out there and 1,000 employees lying around, you kind of want to know who your neighbors are. You want to influence what happens in your neighborhood over time,” said Navy Capt. Thomas Karnowski, who led the team that created the development plan.

Your neighbors! Your actual neighbors, the ones whose country it is, experience shortages of water, electricity, fuel, cooking oil, medical care, security and more.

Charming.  But to realize our dreams, we may have to bomb another hospital or two.  And take out the one Shiite political movement, the Sadrist current, that has shown any acumen in terms of delivering vital services to impoverished Iraqi Shiites.  Makes perfect sense to me.

John McCain Works Tirelessly -- For You!

by hilzoy

The NYT has a story today about the increased costs of health care for people with insurance. It includes this:

"Shirley Giarde of Walla Walla, Wash., was not prepared when her husband, Raymond, suddenly developed congestive heart failure last year and needed a pacemaker and defibrillator. Because his job did not provide health benefits, she has covered them both through a policy for the self-employed, which she obtained as the proprietor of a bridal and formal-wear store, the Purple Parasol.

But when Raymond had his medical problems, Ms. Giarde discovered that her insurance would cover only $22,000, leaving them with about $100,000 in unpaid hospital bills.

Even though the hospital agreed to reduce that debt to about $50,000, Ms. Giarde is still struggling to pay it — in part because the poor economy has meant slumping sales at the Purple Parasol. Her husband, now disabled and unable to work, will not qualify for Medicare for another year, and she cannot afford the $758 a month it would cost to enroll him in a state-run insurance plan for individuals who cannot find private insurance."

Remember John McCain's health care speech the other day? Here's what he said about his plan to deal with people who have trouble buying insurance because of preexisting conditions:

"Even so, those without prior group coverage and those with pre-existing conditions do have the most difficulty on the individual market, and we need to make sure they get the high-quality coverage they need. I will work tirelessly to address the problem. But I won't create another entitlement program that Washington will let get out of control. Nor will I saddle states with another unfunded mandate. The states have been very active in experimenting with ways to cover the "uninsurables." The State of North Carolina, for example, has an agreement with Blue Cross to act as insurer of "last resort." Over thirty states have some form of "high-risk" pool, and over twenty states have plans that limit premiums charged to people suffering an illness and who have been denied insurance.

As President, I will meet with the governors to solicit their ideas about a best practice model that states can follow -- a Guaranteed Access Plan or GAP that would reflect the best experience of the states."

So John McCain will "work tirelessly" to make sure that people with preexisting conditions get "the high-quality coverage they need." His plan? To make sure that everyone has access to state-run insurance pools for people who can't get insurance elsewhere. That's exactly the sort of coverage that would cost Shirley Giarde's husband $758 a month.

In 2006, the median income for individuals in the US over 25 with earnings was $32,140. $758 a month is $9096 a year, or 28.3% of median income. For most Americans, this is just unaffordable.

But hey: as McCain also said, "Watch your diet, walk thirty or so minutes a day, and take a few other simple precautions, and you won't have to worry about these afflictions." So it's not really such a big deal. See how easy health policy can be when you don't bother your little head with all those pesky details and facts?