Top-Level Democrats Assault The Extremist Astroturfers

The White House took the lead on this, publicly calling the teabagger disruptions an example of astroturfing and citing conservative industry-backed groups taking credit for activating the rioters. Now other elements of the Democratic Party are taking up the baton. Dick Durbin and Chuck Schumer blasted the clown show today:

Speaking outside the White House after meeting with President Obama, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois and Chuck Schumer of New York both dismissed the significance of boisterous protesters who have been interrupting Democratic lawmakers' events.

"It is a small fringe group," Schumer told the Huffington Post, "and if we let a small group of people who want to monopolize the conversation and not listen to the facts win, you may as well hang it up."

"These town hall meetings have been orchestrated by the tea baggers and the birthers to just be a free-for-alls, make a lot of noise, go on YouTube and show discord," said Durbin. "I mean that is what they are determined to do. But that is not going to accomplish what we need to accomplish: real health care reform."

Likewise, the DNC called the protesters "right-wing extremists funded by K Street" and alluded to the Palin/McCain rallies with the ugly cries of racism and xenophobia. The House Speaker's blog has a pretty comprehensive list of the extremism of the rioters, the links to special interests, and the coordinated strategy to shut down debate. And I've seen every single Democrat on cable news today talking about the Brooks Brothers riot, astroturfing, lobbyist-funded front groups, and the like. It's pretty interesting.

Will this push either the extremism or the astroturf element of this into the conversation, given the obvious evidence of lobby groups strategizing on this? I'm not sure. The media has a depressing tendency to treat a mob like a poll sample of public attitudes. In fact, public support for health care is still very strong. But the various ambushes throughout the country will still get national and (perhaps more important) local ink.

I'm glad that Democrats are fighting back, but I'm compelled to note that their charges also have to get into the game themselves. The ads have largely been garbage, the organizing hasn't gotten the traction from the media, and they have been unable to drown out the shouters. There is a gap here.

The Burris Clown Show Returns

I prefer to ignore the sad spectacle of Roland Burris, but this pathetic tape recording of the Illinois Senator pleading with Rod Blagojevich's brother to have the Governor seat him, and offering to "personally do something" for Blagojevich cannot really be ignored any further. He not only offered to raise money in exchange for the Senate seat, but he intimated that he would use his lawyer's name on some of the checks, which is a total violation of law. And while Burris never followed through and actually offered anything of value, he has had several months to disclose this new information, where he appears to be wrestling with getting around those restrictions.

This tape will actually get released, apparently, and MSNBC reported that Dick Durbin won't support Burris for re-election after this revelation. Big surprise, he's polling around 8%. But this does vindicate Durbin and Reid to an extent for wanting to block Burris in the first place. Clearly there was a taint to his appointment, as there are to all Senate appointments, in my view.

Dick Durbin's Searing Indictment of Banksters On The Senate Floor

Dick Durbin is speaking about the destructive greed of the banksters right now, the ones who torpedoed his amendment to allow bankruptcy judges to modify loan terms on primary residences the way they can on second homes, yachts, cars, and other pieces of property. He was unsparing and did not shy away from the statement he made on local radio in Illinois recently, that the bankers "own the place". He set the needs of regular homeowners, who "don't have any paid lobbyists," against the desires of banks who took hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money and face seemingly no consequence for their bad decisions.

Durbin is a close ally of the President and I feel he wouldn't make a statement like this if he thought it too embarrassing to the Administration. He is trying to spark the American people to demand some change. Obama has done this too, albeit with more subtlety. We need to get their backs.

Here are a couple of excerpts (I'm transcribing):

One other argument that I think takes the cake: "Senator, you understand the moral hazard here. People have to be held responsible for their wrongdoing. If you make a mistake, darn it, you've gotta pay the price. That's what America is all about." Really, Mr. Banker on Wall Street? That's what America is all about? What price did Wall Street pay for their miserable decisions creating rotten portfolios, destroying the credit of America and its businesses? Oh, they paid a pretty heavy price. Hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer's money sent to them to bail them out, to put them back in business, even to fund executive bonuses for those guilty of mismanaging. Moral hazard, huh? How can they argue that with a straight face? [...]

At the end of the day, this is a real test of where we're going in this country. Next up, after mortgages, credit cards. Next week, the same bankers get to come in and see how much might and power they have in the Senate when it comes to credit card reform. And the question we're going to face, is whether or not this Senate is going to listen to the families facing foreclosure, the families facing job loss and bills they can't pay, or whether they're going to listen to the American Bankers Association, which has folded its arms and walked out of the room. Well, I hope that we have the courage to stand up to them. I hope this is the beginning of a new day in the Senate, a new dialogue in the Senate, that says to the bankers across America that your business as usual has put us in a terrible mess, and we're not going to allow that to continue. We want America to be strong, but if it's going to be strong, you should be respectful, Mr. Banker, of the people who live in the communities where your banks are located. You should be respectful of those families who are doing their best to make ends meet in the toughest recession that they've ever seen. You should be respectful of the people that you want to sign up for checking accounts and savings accounts, and make sure that they have decent neighborhoods to live in. Show a little loyalty to this great nation instead of just your bottom line when it comes to profitability. Take a little consideration of what it takes to make America strong...

I'll offer this Durbin amendment as I did last year. When I offered it last year, they said, "Not a big problem, only two million foreclosures coming up." They were wrong. It turned out to be eight million. And if the bankers prevail today, and we can't get something through conference committee to deal with this issue, I'll be back. I'm not going to quit on this [...] At some point, the Senators in this chamber will decide, the bankers shouldn't write the agenda in the United States Senate.

There's really not much to add to that. Especially when you see the Senate vote, which is happening right now, surely a defeat for the Durbin amendment. The Senators against this bill have lined up with the banksters, and for good reasons - they fund the campaigns, they throw the best parties, they share the interests and perspective of those disproportionately wealthy politicians. Last night, at Obama's press conference, he offered another hint of how the federal government is so immense that he cannot wield the power to "get the banks to do what I want them to do." Today he lashed out at the small group of hedge funds who forced Chrysler into bankruptcy, not just because they thought they could get a better deal from the bankruptcy judge, but because they'll get paid off on their credit default swaps due to the bankruptcy.

The Obama budget, mostly laudatory, stripped out those elements which would have taxed wealth, instead protecting it in many instances. The system of government in this country has become a system of fealty to oligarchs. Democrats like Durbin made one concession after another on the bankruptcy bill, and still couldn't get enough members of the Senate on board.

We have a major problem in this country, when the banksters hold this much control in the corridors of power. Dick Durbin is opening the window and showing the sick, decayed underbelly inside. Actions like the shareholder revolt ousting Ken Lewis from the chairmanship of Bank of America need to happen more and again. At some point, we can affect these people personally, and really damage them where they live. It's the only way, through a broad-based movement, to overturn this horrible dynamic of financial industry control of government.

UPDATE: 45 Yea, 51 Nay, motion fails. Abominable. Will update with a roll call. This Senate is useless.

UPDATE II: Roll call. Nays included all Republicans and Baucus, Bennet, Byrd, Carper, Dorgan (?), Johnson, Landrieu, Lincoln, Nelson (NE), Pryor, Specter, Tester. Also, some video of Durbin's speech here.



UPDATE III: Ryan Grim shouts out to Ted Kaufman, the first Senator from Delaware to vote against the banks maybe in history. Being a caretaker Senator not planning on running for re-election will do that.

Pressured By CA Lawmakers, Obama Expands Mortgage Refinance Program

When the Obama Administration's plan to mitigate foreclosures came out, it was clear that it would be insufficient to deal with the particular challenges faced in California. Initially, the plan would only modify loans where the amount owed was 105% of the home's true value. Given that home prices have collapsed here, this would have helped almost nobody in California. State lawmakers, in particular the Democratic point person on mortgages and foreclosures Asm. Ted Lieu, went to Washington to lobby for changes. And today, faced with a sluggish mortgage rescue program attracting few lenders or homeowners, the Administration expanded the plan.

The Obama administration said Tuesday it is expanding its foreclosure prevention program to cover second mortgages and to direct more troubled borrowers to the Hope for Homeowners program.

Under the administration's new program, the interest rate on second mortgages will be reduced to 1% on loans where payments cover interest and principal and to 2% for interest-only loans. The government will subsidize the rate reduction, with the money going to the mortgage investor [...]

Also Tuesday, the administration said it is now requiring servicers to offer troubled borrowers access to Hope for Homeowners as a modification option if they qualify.

Expanding Hope for Homeowners would address one of the major holes in the original Obama foreclosure prevention plan. It helps homeowners whose homes are now worth far less than their mortgages.

Servicers had balked at participating in the Hope program because it required they reduce the mortgage principal balance to 90% of a home's current value.

Hope for Homeowners, which began in October, is being revamped in Congress. Servicers would have to reduce the principal to 93% of the home's value. The change would also reduce the program's high fees, which turned off many troubled borrowers.

Loan servicers get a fair bit of cash incentives for participating in the program, which I don't totally support, but if we have to bribe lenders in order to keep people in their homes, that makes more sense than spending the same amount of money on the fallout from a foreclosure. And lenders do take a haircut in the Hope for Homeowners program, the first loss to my knowledge that lenders have been forced to take.

Asm. Lieu responded with this release:

“I am very pleased the Obama Administration today acted on the concerns raised by states such as California and took two steps to expand refinance and foreclosure assistance to distressed homeowners.

First, the Administration announced it would incorporate the Federal Housing Administration’s (FHA) Hope for Homeowners program into the existing Making Home Affordable Program. This is significant because currently, the Making Home Affordable Program has a 105% underwater refinancing cap, which shuts out many Californian homeowners. The Hope for Homeowners program does not have that limitation; instead, the Hope for Homeowners program states that lenders will take a loss on the difference between the existing loan amount and the new refinanced loan, which is set at 96.5% of the appraised loan value.

For example, under the existing Making Home Affordable program, a homeowner whose home is valued at $100,000 but owes $120,000 on the existing loan balance would not qualify for refinancing under the program because the loan is 120% underwater. However, under the Hope for Homeowners program, the homeowner could qualify and the new refinanced loan would be $96,500. The lender would take the loss of $23,500. The Obama Administration would increase the number of lenders participating in the Hope for Homeowners program by offering financial incentives to the lenders.

Second, the Administration announced steps to address the second lien problem. Many distressed mortgages have two liens and often the second lien holder does not want to modify the loan. The Obama Administration will provide financial incentives to allow the second lien to be reduced or extinguished.

These two critical actions will expand assistance to distressed homeowners in states such as California, where many loans are more than 105% underwater or have second liens.”

This is decent news. Unfortunately, the tool that homeowners really need to stave off foreclosure, the ability for bankruptcy judges to cram down the principal of a loan on a primary residence, appears poised for what amounts to defeat in the Senate, a testament to the continued power of the nation's biggest banks.

In order to garner the support of conservative Democrats and a few Republicans, the proposal has been watered down. The bankruptcy legislation will still allow homeowners to renegotiate mortgages in bankruptcy - the so-called cram down provision - but only under strict conditions. The banking industry has lobbied fiercely against cram down, but Durbin said on the Senate floor Monday night that the compromise was supported by Citigroup, which has been at the negotiating table.

"In the past, some of my colleagues understood the need for action but have been uncomfortable with the original language. Let me be clear: this amendment is different," said Durbin. "The amendment I'm going to offer will make a modest change in the bankruptcy code with a lot of conditions. It won't apply across the board. This amendment limits assistance in bankruptcy to situations where lenders are so intransigent that they are unwilling to cooperate with the foreclosure prevention efforts already underway - Obama's homeowner assistance and stability plan and the Congressionally-created HOPE For Homeowners, which this bill will greatly improve." [...]

Meanwhile, the banking lobbyists are furiously lobbying against it and Durbin acknowledges it will be difficult to "muster the votes, although I know it will be hard."

It is "hard to imagine that today the mortgage bankers would have clout in this chamber but they do," said Durbin. "They have a lot of friends still here. They're still big players on the American political scene and they have said to their friends, stay away from this legislation."

We will be in a better position with foreclosures by the end of the week than we were at the beginning, but not where we need to be.

Showdown At The IL Corral

The early report was that Roland Burris wouldn't resign but would agree not to run in 2010, but apparently that's not what he told Dick Durbin:

Sen. Dick Durbin said today that he told Sen. Roland Burris that he should resign.

But Burris, the junior and appointed senator from Illinois, told the senior senator from Illinois and No. 2 Democratic leader in the Senate that he would not resign, Durbin said.

Durbin said Burris refused to tell him whether or not he would run for election in 2010 Durbin said was "disappointed" in both responses, and said would not support Burris in any election bid. He said he would work with Burris as long as he remains in the Senate.

Durbin joins Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn and others in seeking the resignation of the senator appointed by the former and impeached Gov. Rod Blagojevich after Burris acknowledged that he had tried to raise campaign money for the governor.

No surprise that Burris is living in denial about it. He'll have to be pried out of that Senate chamber with a crowbar. And in 2010, he will get approximately less support than any incumbent politician ever.

And while I agree he should resign, I'm thinking David Vitter is REALLY not a good messenger to tell anyone they should resign for their "ethical shortcomings."

He's Baaack

If I were Roland Burris and I wanted to become a Senator this way, I would pitch a tent outside the Senate floor and hold vigil until the Dem leaders inside wearily decide that it's too embarrassing to hold him back any longer. Especially because their legal argument has been revealed to be pretty silly.

Roland Burris may return to Washington next week to demand that he be accepted as the legitimate Senate appointee to replace President-elect Barack Obama and be sworn into office, according to a Burris adviser.

If Burris' appointment is not accepted, he will file a lawsuit challenging Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democratic leadership's refusal to seat him, the adviser said [...]

Reid and Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) have refused to seat Burris, arguing that his appointment by Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was not certified by Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White.

But on Friday night, White submitted a document to the Senate certifying Burris' appointment. White's action followed an earlier decision by the Illinois Supreme Court, which ruled that Blagojevich's approval alone was all that was needed for Burris to take the seat.

This is going to end really ugly, and Blagojevich can't be removed from office fast enough to stop it. Burris has a legal claim to the seat, no matter how tainted the process is. Tying him up in court while seating a designate from Blago's post-impeachment successor Pat Quinn will probably make this situation WORSE. Just a disaster on all levels.

Out Of His Mind

Earlier today I speculated that the Senate might use the incidence of Rod Blagojevich's impeachment to stiffen their spines on the seating of Roland Burris. That's sure what it looks like:

No one can occupy the U.S. Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama until the governor of Illinois is removed and a new appointment can be certified, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois said Friday.

Durbin, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, was reacting to the Illinois Supreme Court's ruling denying a motion by Roland Burris that the state's secretary of state certify his appointment to the seat.

They're really sticking to the whole "the Secretary of State didn't sign the piece of paper and we can't go against tradition argument, even though the IL Supreme Court basically called it ridiculous today. But what's unsaid here is that Blago was impeached, and the Senate trial will probably be expedited, and I wouldn't be surprised if he was out on his ass in a couple of weeks. Not to mention the fact that he's being publicly insane and further tainting the appointment by making everyone aware of it.

Okay, fine, Blagojevich is clearly insane. I'm sitting here at my desk, listening to him chatter on in the background about the impeachment vote. And he's going on about how his policies let someone get a liver transplant, and should he really be impeached for that? It's like some bizarre performance art. Now he's quoting Tennyson.

No, really.



As Blagojevich swirls the bowl, Burris' hopes of getting seated do as well. Somehow, I have a sneaking suspicion that Lt. Gov. Quinn will appoint Burris, the Secretary of State will sign the order and everything will be fine.

Looking Up For Cram-Down

A breakthrough yesterday between Senate Democrats and, ahem, Citigroup has hopefully ended the deadlock over "cram-down" legislation.

Democratic lawmakers have reached a deal with Citigroup Inc. on a plan to let bankruptcy judges alter home loans in an effort to prevent foreclosures and urged other lenders to follow suit.

The lawmakers aim to attach the plan to President-elect Barack Obama's economic stimulus legislation, and said Thursday the change in bankruptcy law could ease the foreclosure crisis that has dragged the economy into the worst recession in decades.

The compromise between Citigroup and Sens. Richard Durbin of Illinois, Charles Schumer and Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, would be limited to loans made before the bill is signed. Obama has said he backs the concept.

Anything that will help keep people in their homes at this difficult time is a positive. But the fact that politicians have to negotiate with Citigroup, a company that received billions from the TARP program, is more than a little distasteful. Kevin Drum says that actually, the banks are a front.

Most of the reaction to this announcement has been dismay that Congress had to "negotiate" with Citigroup in order to pass this legislation, but it's important to get clear what's actually going on here. The negotiation wasn't really with Citigroup, it was with Senate Republicans, who have almost unanimously opposed this legislation in the past. With Citigroup on board, Durbin and Dodd and Schumer hope that other banks will hop on board too, and once the banks are on board then maybe a few of those legendary "moderate" Republicans will also see the light and do the right thing.

That's maybe worse, however, because it means that one of our two political parties has been wholly bought by banks. Of course, we knew that.

Who Will Be The Next Senator From Illinois?

Things are moving rapidly in the Rod Blagojevich case. Within hours of recognizing that Blago still has the ability to make an appointment to the US Senate, despite being arrested for trying to sell the seat, Dick Durbin called for a special election to fill the seat:



Then the Illinois legislature decided to move into a special session (called by Emil Jones, the state Senator thought to be a possible pick for the seat), with the goal of having legislation moved within a few days. Of course, that legislation would have to be SIGNED by the Governor, which seems unlikely since Blagojevich thinks it's a "fucking valuable seat" and wouldn't want to give up the power to appoint it. So who knows at this point. Harry Reid said that the process for selecting a new Senator shouldn't involve Blago, so there's at least a chance that whoever would be submitted by him would be rejected by the Senate, too.

The larger deal here is that both progressive organizations and the Obama transition are threatened by being tried in the media over their ties to Blagojevich. Change to Win says there was no position promised to the Governor on their staff in exchange for any appointment, and the President-elect briefly addressed the controversy today as well.

"Like the rest of the people of Illinois I am saddened and sobered by the news that came out of the U.S.. Attorneys office today. But as this is an ongoing investigation involving the governor, I donʼt think it would be appropriate for me to comment on the issue at this time [...] I had no contact with the governor or his office, and so I was not aware of what was happening," Mr. Obama said. "And as I said it is a sad day for Illinois. Beyond that I don't think it's appropriate to comment."

The buzzards are nonetheless circling. I don't think Obama has much to do with Blagojevich, who wasn't even invited to the Democratic convention, and whose machine-backed candidates he beat in a primary to get to the US Senate. Obama wouldn't play ball with Blago on the Senate appointment in question, either. But the unequivocal statement Obama made ("I had no contact with the governor or his office") is probably not true, and categoricals like that are a mistake.

His statement that he didn't have contact with Blagojevich about the Senate seat seems to conflict with that of top adviser David Axelrod, who told Fox News Chicago on Nov. 23: "I know he's talked to the governor, and there are a whole range of names, many of which have surfaced, and I think he has a fondness for a lot of them."

Obama transition officials say Axelrod misspoke.

That's certainly possible, but I imagine Obama would want to share his views on the seat, even as a courtesy. That's not to say he did anything untoward here, however.

What a mess.

Establishment Circles The Wagons Around Lieberman

Chris Bowers wrote yesterday that, with a vote next week on Joe Lieberman's chairmanship on the Senate Homeland Security Committee, it was time to set up a whip count. However, he based a portion of it on Howard Fineman's report that Dick Durbin and Chuck Schumer wanted Lieberman booted. ANd now Fineman has come out and said the opposite:

FINEMAN: Senator Dick Durbin is a key factor there and I think he's moving toward allowing Lieberman to stay. Dick Durbin was somebody who was extremely angry at Lieberman for campaigning for John McCain.

But I'm now told after having gone through a horrible week or so, where he was mourning the death of his 40-year-old daughter to congenital heart disease, he's come out of that and looked around and, also, heard what Barack Obama has had to say, and Durbin is now saying he's willing to give Lieberman a chance.

I think that's going to go to a vote next week but I bet that Lieberman gets to keep his committee chairmanship because Obama has signaled that he wants him to.

I think liberal bloggers are in denial about this. Many are saying that Obama didn't signal that Lieberman stays in the chairmanship, but the sequence of events pretty clearly suggests that he did. Lieberman balked at losing the chairmanship and threatened to bolt the party, and then Obama, through aides, said he wants Lieberman kept in the party. As President it's not his decision to make, but it's hard to see that as not exerting influence. And Durbin is Obama's chief ally in the Senate.

Obviously, the Senate, which is a clubby, insider organization, doesn't want to punish Lieberman because they don't see the upside in it. They think in terms of getting cloture votes, and Lieberman can help at the margins, so there's no need to irritate him. What they don't feel pressured by is any downside, and that's where the progressive community comes in. We have to keep making calls and let these Senators know that our memories will be long and our wallets suddenly tight if nothing is done to Lieberman.

But ultimately, this is up to the Senators themselves. If they want to project an attitude of lacking self-respect, of allowing a member of their caucus to endorse the opposing Presidential candidate, make all sorts of slanders and accusations against their standard-bearer, and welcome him back with open arms, it's really on them. And the mischief he ends up causing will be their doing. I will let my representatives know how I feel, but I'm kind of tired of protecting them from their own actions.

UPDATE: Politico has more. The establishment figures are whipping support for Lieberman. They'll only be stopped if we choose to make our voices heard.

WSJ Misleading About Democratic Plans On Energy

When I read this Wall Street Journal article about the Democrats possibly caving on oil exploration, my immediate thought was "I give up!" But there appears to be much ado about nothing here, and when you consider the source of Murdoch's new toy, you have to be skeptical.

Much of the headline is made out of this quote by Dick Durbin:

"Sen. Durbin said any compromise on drilling, however, would be contingent at a minimum on a requirement that oil and gas companies sitting on existing acreage either produce oil on those areas within a specified period or return the leases to the government."

This is pretty much what the Democrats have been saying on this issue all along. It's perfectly consistent with the "Use It Or Lose It" plan, and the Obama campaign's dismissal of this as another stunt by a party addicted to oil. Nancy Pelosi went even further in a news conference today.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday shut the door on expanding oil and gas drilling beyond areas that have already been approved for energy exploration, drawing a clear distinction from her counterparts in charge of the Senate.
“This call for drilling in areas that are protected is a hoax, it’s an absolute hoax on the part of the Republicans and this administration” Pelosi said at her weekly press conference. “It’s a decoy to punt your attention away from the fact that their policies have produced $4-a-gallon gasoline.”

There may be some Bush Dogs with loose lips talking to the WSJ, with the media all too happy to sow discord, but from the standpoint of the leadership, I don't think they're backing off of their pledge... for now.

Re-Branding Torture

A couple weeks ago, John Negroponte blurted out that America has used the practice of waterboarding, but only a few times. The admission of a torture technique dating back to the Spanish Inquisition, you would think, would have led to Negroponte's sacking, mass protests lasting weeks, and in a Parliamentary system, a no-confidence vote against the current government. Instead it led to a new PR strategy:

Negroponte's comments, which were seen as confirmation that waterboarding had in fact been used before that, were not cleared beforehand and caught White House officials off guard, according to the senior administration official. "It was an accidental disclosure," said the official. It also forced a reassessment of whether the administration should at least publicly confirm Negroponte's remarks, if only to reap whatever public-relations benefit could be derived from the slip.

That third word is "benefit."

For while they're still spooked about defining waterboarding as torture - leading to inanities like DNI Mike McConnell saying "I said waterboarding was torture, but I meant that I don't like water up my nose" - they have no problem confirming these details in public, and even suggesting that we'd use it again:

“It will depend upon circumstances,” spokesman Tony Fratto said, adding “the belief that an attack might be imminent, that could be a circumstance that you would definitely want to consider.”

In other words, the message is, "Yeah, we did it, and we'll do it again, and what are you gonna do about it with your laws and regulations?"

This has been a persistent pattern. Faced with deliberately flouting the law, they turn the law into a partisan issue. Anyone who doesn't think America should torture is a dirty liberal who wants to tax our families and endanger our kids. They're so used to politics as a bar fight that they know politicizing everything is a winner - I mean, please, Dick Durbin, an investigation? What are you investigating? They told you they torture, and they're defending it.

The White House on Wednesday defended the use of the interrogation technique known as waterboarding, saying it is legal — not torture as critics argue — and has saved American lives. President Bush could authorize waterboarding for future terrorism suspects if certain criteria are met, a spokesman said.

A day earlier, the Bush administration acknowledged publicly for the first time that the tactic was used by U.S. government questioners on three terror suspects. Testifying before Congress, CIA Director Michael Hayden said Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zubayda and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri were waterboarded in 2002 and 2003.

Waterboarding involves strapping a suspect down and pouring water over his cloth-covered face to create the sensation of drowning. It has been traced back hundreds of years, to the Spanish Inquisition, and is condemned by nations around the world.

The President is telling you that he authorized drowning terror suspects. He still claims it's legal, but his people won't investigate that because it's not true. He's demanding that the guy who wrote the legal opinion legitimizing torture be confirmed by the Senate, making them an accessory to torture. And somehow, there's this belief that this is the only secret that will be revealed. It's not.

For the first time, the top commander of detention operations at Guantanamo has confirmed the existence of the mysterious Camp 7. In an interview with The Associated Press, Rear Adm. Mark Buzby also provided a few details about the maximum-security lockup.

Guantanamo commanders said Camp 7 is for key alleged al-Qaida members, who must be kept apart from other prisoners to prevent them from retaliating against long-term detainees who have talked to interrogators. They also want the location kept secret for fear of terrorist attack.

And the official response from the White House will be "Yeah, we kept a secret detention camp at Guantanamo, and we'd do it again, because we believe in protecting your children, which our critics obviously don't!" And the media nods grimly, and somehow this bullying of the legal system and the Constitution continues, because nobody will punch back and use the handcuffs that are needed to take these criminals out of the White House.

This week a detainee died of natural causes at Guantanamo. It'll be a fate that will likely befall many other detainees. This particular one was accused of being a terrorist by people who held grudges against him and needed the bounty offered by the US government. He was never charged, never allowed to defend himself in court, and we'll never know just what he was guilty of doing. And if questioned, your leaders will tell you that his detention and death was necessary to protect your family. And you'll still believe that you live in a free society.

The Iraq Debate Returns

With all the race/gender nonsense in the Democratic Presidential primary, I'm happy to get back to an actual issue. And Iraq really ought to be front and center of the debate. When you're talking about becoming President, your foreign policy should simply be the primary factor, since the ability for a President to set their own course outside of Congress on foreign policy is (sadly) far more pronounced than on domestic policy. So yes, let's get back to the Iraq vote. And I really can't understand for the life of me what the Clintons are doing.

Bill Clinton really wants to blunt Obama's advantage on Iraq. His "fairy tale" comment was clearly about this; it had nothing to do with race. But what is he really saying here, and what is Hillary saying? Nobody disputes that Obama gave a forceful speech rejecting the Bush Administration's case for war back in 2002. The Clintons want to say that Obama hedged on his anti-war rhetoric in 2004 (based on truncating a quote), and that he hasn't followed that up with action in Congress. But has Hillary? It was part of Clinton's attack that "Hillary and Obama have the same voting record on the war." Why does that in any way reflect well on EITHER of them? If your argument is "Obama is just as bad as my candidate on the war," it's not exactly a ringing endorsement, nor does it help get us any closer to ending the war. Not to mention that there are other mischaracterizations involved in this as well.

Plus, Obama's speech in 2002 DID matter. That was the time to be forceful and outspoken against what George Bush was trying to do in Iraq. And Hillary Clinton did not lead when the country needed her. Dick Durbin says this pretty well:

“I’m really troubled by his questioning the sincerity of Barack Obama’s opposition to the war in Iraq,” Durbin said. “I really think it is unfortunate to question Barack’s sincerity on the war. He has been there from the start, opposing this war.” [...]

“It was not easy to be against that war back when we cast that vote in October of 2002,” Durbin said. “I was one of 23 who voted against the war. Barack was supportive — one of the few candidates speaking out strongly against it in Illinois.

“If President Clinton had opposed that war as strongly as Barack Obama at the time, it would have helped a lot of us who had voted against authorizing an invasion.”

Instead, Bill did not speak out, and Hillary voted for the war, and now she's trying to lie about it and sell to us that a vote on the "Authorization of Military Force in Iraq" wasn't a vote for military force. She's also claiming that Bush would have gone to war anyway so... it was responsible to give him a Congressional authorization to do so? She also continued on this horrendous line of argument that she "trusted" Bush to use every diplomatic recourse and then was "misled" by him, and frankly I don't want anybody in the White House gullible enough to be "misled" by George Bush (I suspect she wasn't misled at all, but simply thought that war was a good idea, which is also disqualifying).

What I really don't understand is why the Clinton campaign would want to highlight this issue. It puts her in the worst possible light, and reminds everyone that she voted for the war. As Matt Taibbi said on Bill Maher's show, "We have 70% of the country opposed to the war and may wind up with 2 pro-war candidates. If that doesn't tell you how fucked up the system is..." Obama's campaign isn't exactly making the war a centerpiece of his campaign. He mentions it in his stump speech, but that's about it. His recent commercials haven't brought it up at all. Why the Clintons would pre-emptively discuss her war vote is baffling. She's simply not on solid ground here.

Where'd This Come From

I'll believe it when I see it, but the Senate is certainly talking like they're going to reject Michael Mukasey until they get the right answer on torture.

Judge Michael Mukasey's nomination for attorney general ran into trouble Thursday when two top Senate Democrats said their votes hinge on whether he will say on the record that an interrogation technique that simulates drowning is torture.

"It's fair to say my vote would depend on him answering that question," Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., told reporters late Thursday.

"This to me is the seminal issue," said Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, another member of Leahy's panel. Asked if his vote depends on whether Mukasey equates waterboarding with torture, Durbin answered, "It does."

Leahy has refused to set a date for a vote on Mukasey's nomination until he clarifies his answer to that question.

Of course, a normal Administration would set Mukasey aside and put forth a compromise candidate, but whoever the White House dug up post-Mukasey would probably be worse.

But remember, the McCain torture amendment passed the Senate 90-9. There's a fair bit of consensus on the issue, outside of the Bush Administration and the nutjobs running for President. And Mukasey's answers about a President's right to virtually unchecked executive power ought not to inspire confidence in members of the legislative branch. Indeed, Republicans like Arlen Specter are making noises about voting no, although you can set your watch in Washington by the number of times he "expressed deep concern" and then votes the wrong way anyway.

If Democrats want to make torture a defining issue, I couldn't argue with it. Digby has a fabulous post on the subject the other day, saying that the failure of leadership at the top of the Republican Party has led to a dangerous backsliding on the question throughout the country, and some leadership in the other direction would be welcome.

If you believe that anything the US does is by definition "good" then you might agree that whether or not this act is torture "depends on who's doing it", I suppose. But the technique is exactly the same down through the ages, so there is no way that it depends on "how it's done."

The administration and the Republicans running for president refuse to admit that this practice is immoral and illegal. So does the president's nominee for Attorney General, a man who is currently a judge and someone that anyone could point to as being among the most elite, establishment legal thinkers. You can't really blame all those "Law and Order" fans for publicly going ballistic that their show would even tepidly imply as it did that such practices may be wrong. Their leaders certainly don't seem to think so. Whatever taboo there once was has been completely removed.

Unless the Democrats force Americans to come to terms with their own shame. I refuse to believe that we're too far gone to stuff this right back in the hellish box from whence it came. It just involves people standing up and saying, strongly and clearly, NO. This is not the country I believe in. This is not where I was born. This is not part of me.

Tell John Cornyn To Move On

Box Turtle John Cornyn is pushing a ridiculous Sense of the Senate resolution today (apparently all the Republicans in the Senate want to do in a time of looming recession, endless war and an expanding health care crisis is to give their SENSE) codemning the MoveOn "General Betray Us" ad. Dick Durbin and Barbara Boxer gave the proper context to this today.

Mr. DURBIN. Would the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. CORNYN. I yield for a question.

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, in the 2004 Presidential campaign, I might ask the Senator from Texas, there was a group from Texas that attacked Senator John Kerry and said he was undeserving of the commendations and decorations he received for his courage in fighting in Vietnam and raised questions about others who served in the military who were part of his swift boat operation. One would have to say, by any stretch, that the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth were attacking the honor and integrity of one of our colleagues who served with honor in the Vietnam war.

I would like to ask the Senator from Texas if he is prepared to remain consistent and if he is also prepared to amend his amendment to repudiate the activities, actions, and statements of the Texas-based Swift Boat Veterans for Truth organization with their unwarranted attacks on our colleague, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, during the 2004 campaign.

It's selective, OK if you're a Republican punishment, although I'm uncomfortable with juxtaposing the Swift Boat Liars with an ad that truthfully called out a General's dishonest PR campaign. Military men are not gods, and if they enter the political arena to defend a war that's killing our sons and daughters they shouldn't expect fealty.

But clearly, just as it's no business of the Senate to go around condemning political ads attacking John Kerry, the same with the MoveOn ad. Simply put, get back to work. Which is the message of Rick Noriega, a Fighting Dem who's been very aggressive so far in his upcoming Senate campaign against Cornyn. From an email:

Today John Cornyn is introducing a Senate resolution to condemn a recent advertisement from MoveOn.org in the New York Times. While the Senate is debating important legislation focused on bringing a responsible end to the war in Iraq, this is what John Cornyn is focused on?

Yesterday, he voted against restoring the Constitution's basic right of habeas corpus. Yesterday, he voted against the Webb-Hagel amendment, legislation that would have provided a safety net for our troops, requiring that they spend as much time at home with their families as they spend deployed in Iraq or Afghanistan. And today? He's wasting the Senate's and the people's time by introducing a resolution about MoveOn.org's ad!

Send an email right now to John Cornyn. Tell him to move on from MoveOn today!

This is to be expected of John Cornyn, a faithful practitioner of the politics of Karl Rove. Instead of public conversations about the large issues that are really important -- the war on terror, the future of Social Security, education and health care for working families -- we get distractions over non-issues and tirades over wedge issues to create divisions among people.

We should not be surprised that John Cornyn doesn't want to discuss his rubberstamping of this Administration's failed policies in Iraq. That he doesn't want to talk about his obstruction of comprehensive immigration reform. And that he doesn't want to talk about the fact he voted against CHIP, a program to ensure health insurance for millions of children across the country.

While Republicans make up things to sound like whiny-ass titty-babies about, challengers are simply going to address the public record. And voting against readiness, voting against SCHIP, and voting against habeas corpus is a hell of a record. And that's just this week. Good for Noriega, I'm liking this guy.

(Cornyn's crap resolution PASSED, by the way. Why did Reid allow a vote?)

Let's Play Hardball

Dick Durbin's Senate Committee refuses to fund Fourthbranch's office until he complies with the rules of the executive branch.

The Habeas Corpus Restoration Act is going to the floor of the Senate with 25 cosponsors.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) is calling for a special prosecutor to investigate the latest evidence of him lying to Congress.

The House will vote on an Iraq bill calling for redeployment within 120 days of passage.

I think they got the message. We'll see a stronger Democratic Party for the rest of this Presidency.

Daylight for the Progressive Movement

Good for Barack Obama for reconsidering his play to wealthy state interests in favor of the larger principle of cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

With pressure mounting on Democratic presidential candidates to adopt hard-line positions on curbing global warming, Sen. Barack Obama on Tuesday backtracked from his long-held support for a controversial plan to promote the use of coal as an alternative fuel to power motor vehicles.

The Illinois Democrat made his announcement with little fanfare — in a dryly worded and technical-sounding e-mail sent late in the day from his Senate office to environmental advocacy groups — and did not mention the issue during an appearance at a Brentwood gas station, described in a new Times blog, designed to shore up his green bona fides with a renewed call to nationalize California's ambitious goals for reducing carbon levels in fuel [...]

"Senator Obama supports research into all technologies to help solve our climate change and energy dependence problems, including shifting our energy use to renewable fuels and investing in technology that could make coal a clean-burning source of energy," the e-mail said. "However, unless and until this technology is perfected, Senator Obama will not support the development of any coal-to-liquid fuels unless they emit at least 20% less life-cycle carbon than conventional fuels."

Coal-to-liquid as it stands right now is a horrible idea, worse than nuclear power because it is a dangerous pollutant without improving the carbon footprint. It's good that Obama reconsidered. But it's better that the progressive movement could get out the truth on the issue and actually change the debate. That Sen. Kerry went to a state side to announce his opposition to coal-to-liquid shows exactly how powerful this progressive movement is becoming in creating conventional wisdom. The paradigm is really starting to shift, and for the first time in a while I feel that regular people are actually being listened to.

UPDATE: See also Dick Durbin's diary on the Big Orange Satan, where he actually understands the issue of funding progressive infrastructure. We have a long way to go, but I see that we're breaking through the ice somewhat.

Also, it's hilarious to see the coal industry whining like babies:

Popovich said the industry had been impressed by Obama's "willingness to take a stand that's unpopular with some of his party's constituents."

He called the senator's new statement the result of a "jihad" waged by some environmentalists against the coal industry.

"Clearly they are trying to intimidate Obama from doing something sensible," Popovich said.

Yeah, sensibly destroy the planet and make us all have to use oxygen masks to breathe.

Sorry we weren't here for a while, but the average citizen is back. And we're talking. And we're not going away. And you and your rich corporate buddies are going to have to deal with it.

Despicable

I was watching this when it happened and Dick Durbin got really hot about it. As well he should, that was beyond the pale.



"Watch what you say" is the watchword of the Bush Administration. For all the bluster they're a bunch of sissies. They claim to be hurt as the persecuted majority, and try to make any criticism of them as a criticism of people around them who have nothing to do with it. It's a disgusting tactic.

Sampson Wrap-Up

Other Senators beyond the Whitehouse got some excellent information out of Kyle Sampson in his testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee today. Here's a wrap-up:

• Sampson admitted to Sen. Durbin that he brought up firing Patrick Fitzgerald, and was met with cold stares by the principals.

"On one occasion in 2006, in discussing the removal of U.S. attorneys... that I was speaking with Harriet Miers and Bill Kelley and I raised Pat Fitzgerald, and immediately after I did it, I regretted it. I thought, I knew it was the wrong thing to do, I knew it was inappropriate. And I remember at the time that Harriet Miers and Bill Kelley just looked at me.... I said, "Patrick Fitzgerald could be added to this list."... They just looked at me."

Ya gotta admit, this guy's honest. This almost implicates Gonzales and Miers and Rove MORE, because it's clear that they knew there was a line they couldn't cross, that Fitzgerald was the gold standard and eliminating him in the middle of the Libby trial would set off a firestorm. You can credibly inference, then, the fact that they did essentially the same thing to those who had a lower profile than Fitz.

• Carol Lam was so bad at proseucting immigration cases that she received a special commendation from US Customs and Border Protection for her work on the issue. What's more, Sampson admitted that nobody at DoJ talked to Lam about her relative success or failure on border issues:



Are they so incompetent at DoJ that they'd just fire someone without giving them a chance to reverse what they considered a troubling trend? Or is this a complete red herring, initiated by a planted story from Rep. Darrell Issa that appears to have violated House ethics rules.

(Meanwhile, this didn't come out in the hearing, but the FBI station chief in San Diego, who publicly stated that Lam's firing would jeopardized ongoing investigations and received a rebuke from Kyle Sampson for those remarks, announced his retirement today.)

• Sampson also essentially called the entire mess a PR problem and really only admitted that the wrongdoing was not the firing itself, but how it was handled. This was expected, but Sen. Cardin's look of incredulity at this was priceless.

Overall, I think that today's testimony was more revelatory than I expected, as well as more harmful. Sampson came off as a true believer, and of course he evaded here and there, but I honestly saw him as fairly sincere when talking about discussions with other staff. He's drank the Kool-Aid on this thing and obviously put up the firewall (a self-immolating one) on whether or not these attorneys were fired for purely political reasons, but on other subjects I think he came off as somewhat credible. And that spells doom for Gonzales.

What Congress Is Doing Right

Some Gallup poll numbers came out showing a plunge in approval ratings for Congress after a significant uptick. The numbers are still above what they were for the dreaded 109th Republican Congress, and other polls suggest Gallup may be an outlier. But I think that Democrats in general aren't doing enough to highlight successes. So allow me to note some.

I've been critical of the Democratic leadership for how they're handling the Iraq debate, and I think that things are moving out of conference committee entirely too slow. We have two major pieces of the first 100 hours agenda passed by both houses of Congress, and they've fallen off the radar screen for weeks. Getting those to the President's desk would do a lot to blunt criticism. Nevertheless, here are some encouraging items:

• A trio of open government bills passed by the House would compel more records to be turned over during Freedom of Information Act requests, require public acknowledgement for donors to presidential libraries, and ensure that the public can scrutinize Presidential records. They sound like inside baseball, but they're crucial for history and the public record to ensure that government secrecy goes out with the Bush Administration. All of these bills had substantial bipartisan support.

• The Accountability in Contracting Act passed the House, which would minimize no-bid contracts (and require public justification for them), eliminate "cost-plus" contracts that make it financially beneficial for contractors to waste taxpayer dollars, mandate disclosure of any cost overruns, and close the "revolving door" whereby former federal government officials become contractors seeking business from government. This should also be called "The Most Sane Legislation in the World Act." The vote was 347-73.

• Byron Dorgan is leading the charge in questioning Halliburton's move to Dubai, which appears to be an attempt to slither out of having to pay taxes after fleecing taxpayers for years.

• The House is finally giving taxpayers in Washington, DC representation, moving toward passing a bill awarding two additional seats to Congress, one to DC and another to Utah, which would get one in the next Census anyway. The Bush Administration is threatening to veto this bill because everyone knows that people who live in Washington, DC shouldn't have a say in their government (?).

• A proposed bill by California Rep. Mike Honda would amend the No Child Left Behind Act to require parental opt-ins before military recruiters take their children's personal information. Right now every school must give the personal data of all their students to the military without notifying the parents. That's wrong, and this amendment would reverse it.

• I'm most pleased to announce that Sen. Dick Durbin, as he pledged in a blogger meeting I attended last month, introduced the Fair Elections Act, which allows for public financing of Congressional elections. He even got bipartisan support, as Arlen Specter (R-PA) cosponsored.

The Fair Elections Now Act would restore public confidence in the election process by allowing qualified candidates to receive campaign funds from the Senate Fair Elections Fund instead of asking for money from private interests. In return, participating candidates would voluntarily agree to limit their campaign spending to the amount allocated to them. This voluntary alternative to traditional privately financed campaigns would free candidates from the incessant, time-consuming money chase that has tainted public perceptions of elected officials and fostered abuses that undermine our democracy. Candidates could instead devote their time and energy to talking with their constituents about the issues that are important to them.

We're never going to totally get rid of the corrosive power of money in politics. But this bill would go a long way to restoring some basic fairness and allow legislators to legislate again.

• Finally, Nancy Pelosi has promised to bring a measure requiring Congressional authorization for any attack on Iran to a vote, and I plan to hold her to it.

This is all outside of the search for justice in the US Attorney Purge scandal. But it shows that the Congress is trying to do the people's business in many respects, and they ought to be recognized for that.