More Wingnut Wrangling Over The Miranda “Bogeyman”

This is almost too stupid for words, but I believe it needs to be addressed.

Via Irrational Spew Online, Byron York over at The Washington Examiner sayeth the following (here, in the matter of whether or not reading the Miranda rights to the Christmas pants bomber supposedly caused him to go quiet, which John Podesta recently commented on here)…

…(Obama) and his administration are still trying to justify their actions in the Detroit case. “They’re changing their story constantly to try to defend their tactics,” says a knowledgeable source on Capitol Hill.

For example, we know that the FBI interrogated Abdulmutallab for just 50 minutes before Attorney General Eric Holder decided to advise the suspect of his Miranda rights to remain silent and to have a court-appointed attorney. After that, Abdulmutallab shut up.

Republicans hit the administration hard on that point, especially when the White House made the unbelievable claim that agents had gotten every last bit of valuable information from Abdulmutallab in that brief talk. In response to GOP criticism, administration officials leaked the story that Abdulmutallab actually stopped talking before being read his Miranda rights, meaning Holder’s decision was not to blame for cutting off the brief flow of intelligence.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, say knowledgeable sources on Capitol Hill. “It is totally false that he had stopped cooperating and then they made the decision to Mirandize him,” says one GOP source. “They made the decision, and then they weren’t trying to question him any more.”

(By the way, one would assume this is a news report from the way it’s structured, but it’s actually editorial commentary, and it should be labeled as such.)

In response, John Brennan, Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, said the following here…

The Republicans have been trying to score political points on “terrorism” by, among other things, suggesting that the FBI, which has obtained information from the Christmas bomber without torture, should not have been allowed to question him.

Brennan calls them out:

Politics should never get in the way of national security. But too many in Washington are now misrepresenting the facts to score political points, instead of coming together to keep us safe.

Immediately after the failed Christmas Day attack, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was thoroughly interrogated and provided important information. Senior counterterrorism officials from the White House, the intelligence community and the military were all actively discussing this case before he was Mirandized and supported the decision to charge him in criminal court.

And York actually mentions Brennan in his column, but check out how York spins what Brennan has to say…

Brennan said he called four top GOP lawmakers — Sens. Mitch McConnell and Christopher Bond and Reps. John Boehner and Peter Hoekstra — on Christmas night, just hours after Abdulmutallab tried to blow up Northwest Airlines Flight 253. Brennan said he told the Republicans that the FBI had a suspect in custody; from that, Brennan claimed, the lawmakers should have inferred that Abdulmutallab would be read his Miranda rights.

“None of those individuals raised any concerns with me at that point,” Brennan said. “They didn’t say, ‘Is he going into military custody? Is he going to be Mirandized?’”

Within hours of Brennan’s TV appearance, all four GOP lawmakers denied the story. “Brennan never told me of any plans to Mirandize the Christmas Day bomber,” said Bond. “It never came up,” said Hoekstra. Spokesman for McConnell and Boehner denied it, too.

GOP lawmakers don’t expect to hear that charge again.

Well, of course they’re not going to “hear the charge” if they don’t even bother to ask the question about it, are they?

I would tend to agree with the analysis of Matt Yglesias on this, who said the following from here…

The underlying issue here, as I’ve been saying, is that conservatives think that any constraint on the state security apparatus is too much. They believe, contrary to all of the evidence, that the rule-bound criminal justice system can’t or doesn’t function and that things would be better if we scrapped all the rules. And, indeed, in the civilian context they’ve worked steadily and systematically over a period of decades to weaken the constitutional protections as much as possible, and bring us as close as possible to their dream scenario of limitless state-sponsored violence. The desire to push certain categories of people (non-citizens) or certain categories of suspects (terrorists) out of the constitutionally protected realm is just part-and-parcel of that broad-based assault on the idea of a rule-bound justice system.

And leave it to Holy Joe Lieberman and three of his Repug pals in the Senate who, as noted here…

…are pushing legislation that would require civilian authorities to consult with intelligence leaders when taking an accused terrorist into custody.

“[This] legislation would not deprive the President of any investigative tool,” Sen. Lieberman’s Web site claims. “It would not preclude a decision to charge a foreign terrorist in our military tribunal system or in our civilian criminal justice system.”

In a response, Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, fired back: “It is extremely disturbing that members of the U.S. Congress are essentially calling for Obama administration officials to discard the Constitution when a terrorist suspect is apprehended – as if the Constitution should be applied on a case by case basis.”

And as noted here, as long as York and his ideological pals are so upset by our intelligence officials adhering to the rule of law, they should be reminded that Obama’s predecessor also “Mirandized” terrorism suspects also.

But of course, we know this doesn’t comport with the wingnut worldview, if for no other reason than because it never worked for Jack Bauer on “24,” as we know.

“Self Ciervo” And His PA Pension Polemic

The following appeared on the Op-Ed page of the Bucks County Courier Times today from Rob Ciervo, running against Steve Santarsiero for the PA-31 State House seat (from here)…

The Courier Times editorial staff is right to hold all incumbents and candidates for state representative and state Senate to a pledge to put forth serious ideas about the current public pension crisis. As a candidate for the state House in the Makefields, Yardley and Newtown areas, this issue will be one of great importance to my goal of reforming Harrisburg to save taxpayers’ money.

The problem? Public employees receive a defined benefit pension plan, guaranteed by taxpayers for life. If the money is not in the retirement fund then taxes have to be raised to pay out the benefits each year. In 2012, what now costs $1 billion will cost more than $3 billion and that is not a one time payment, these payments will continue for decades.

I have a question; is Ciervo talking about underfunded plans? If so, the following should be noted from here (a pensions subcommittee report issued last April)…

The subcommittee recommends that Pennsylvania follow Missouri’s example by enacting legislation that prohibits municipalities from authorizing pension benefit increases unless their pension plan would be at least 80 percent funded after taking the increased liability into account. Such a provision would prevent municipalities still catching up on prior underfunding of plans from approving further benefits that they could not easily afford.

Also (from the report)…

With regard to defined contribution versus defined benefit plans, subcommittee members did not reach consensus but recognized the need to balance labor’s concerns for pension security with municipalities’ concerns for controlling costs.

In addition to basic fairness in honoring the state’s defined benefit pension obligation here (with those pensioners being almost entirely individuals nearing retirement), there’s another reason why the obligations should be honored, and that is because, as noted here, it is illegal not to do so…

“The state employees and the teachers have been putting their fair share in every year and we have not. Shame on us that it hasn’t occurred, we should have been doing this all along,” said Rep Mario Scavello (R-Monroe).

“During the good years, instead of paying our normal costs, we ended up putting it on a credit card, and now that credit card has come due, so if I change it to another system and another credit card, it will probably add even more to what it will cost in the long run. If we do not get enough money to meet our normal costs, we can’t invest it, and then we have even less and the amount the taxpayers owe will be even greater,” said Melva Volger, chairman of the (Public School Employees Retirement System) PSERS board.

Also, get a load of this from Ciervo…

The private sector realized decades ago that defined benefit plans are completely unsustainable in an age where with the best medical system in the world, residents are living much longer than any actuary would have expected.

As Wikipedia tells us here, the U.S. ranks 38th in worldwide life expectancy (in your face, Uruguay, Macedonia and Latvia!).

And here’s more “fun” from Ciervo…

The first pension reform needed is to simply eliminate the option for a taxpayer-funded pension for any new state employee, including public school educators. All new hires should be provided the option to participate in a defined contribution plan, whereby employees contribute at least 5 percent of their salary, pre-tax, toward their retirement fund and the state matches that contribution at the minimum of 5 percent as well.

Good luck trying to attract good teachers with a crappy pension benefit (of course, this ties in nicely to what Ciervo and his teabagger friend Simon Campbell want to do, and that is to force a Pennsbury teachers strike to try and make Steve look bad, among other goals). And if the taxpayers aren’t going to contribute the “match” here, where will it come from?

And finally…

You can be certain that the Philadelphia and Harrisburg union bosses will vehemently oppose this plan. They will continue to fund the campaigns of candidates who would block these needed reforms and offer little assistance to the taxpayer in return.

Actually, as noted here, Steve Santarsiero voted in favor of a bill to amend payment of unfunded actuarial liability to PA pension plans (not that Ciervo would actually acknowledge that, of course).

I will grudgingly admit that Ciervo is right to point out that the day must come when public employees move to the 403(b) defined contribution plans he advocates. But as noted here, our pension issue in PA emerged due to market conditions first and foremost (referencing the words of Rep. Scavello above), and the PSERS, at which Ciervo is taking aim, “is well-managed and as sound as any public pension plan in the country.” Let’s all take a deep breath and keep that in mind before we try to take a sledgehammer to it, OK?

And to contact Steve, click here.

All Hail The Champs Of Super Bowl XLIV

Congrats to the New Orleans Saints – what a great story (and I’ll turn it over to “Satchmo”…he had an interesting history with The Crescent City, but that’s a topic for another day).

Obama’s Nominees Lost In The “Shelby Shuffle”

I didn’t know that the turncoat Repug Senator from Alabama was a “birther” also, but K.O. explains it here.

I thought it appropriate to revisit the clip given this little maneuver from the ranking Senate Repug on the Finance Committee (yep, Shelby is pretty rank, all right…and here are more of his antics).

Update 2/6/10: CREDO Action came up with a petition against Shelby here to sign and send to Harry Reid (worth a shot).

A Lesson In “Rewrite Therapy”

The latest from Pap on the wingnut worldview…

A Repug Political Pigskin Preview

This item at the AEI blog, timed for the Super Bowl, tells us of three former NFLers who are seeking political office next year: former Pittsburgh Steeler Jay Riemersma, former Washington Redskin Clint Didier, and former Philadelphia Eagle Jon Runyan.

Riemersma is running for the U.S. House seat to be vacated by Repug Rep Pete Hoekstra, who will run for governor of Michigan. And as noted here, Riemersma is no slouch when it comes to fundraising, having hired a company to help him in his efforts (and he cited a rotator cuff injury here as “divine intervention” that led him from a position change as a quarterback to a tight end; yep, that should go over big with those “values voters” all right).

Didier has got Riemersma beat when it comes to wingnuttery, though. As noted here…

EVERETT – Ex-NFL tight end Clint Didier announced his candidacy for U.S. Senate on Monday with an inspirational quote from Glenn Beck, a blast at environmentalists and warnings about Obama Administration “czars.”

…

In an interview, Didier came out at a global warming skeptic, citing hacked e-mails from gossipy scientists at a British university, and saying science has been “altered” so as “to make it look like it is truly happening.”

“They say the glaciers are shrinking but with information I’m receiving, it seems clear that the (Arctic) ice is reforming and expanding,” he said.

“Reforming and expanding,” huh? Sounds like somebody has been out in the woods a bit too long.

A Washington native and Portland State University graduate, Didier played with three Washington Redskins’ Super Bowl teams, and made a name for himself as a team player. He relates a dream on the night before the 1987 Super Bowl.

“I dreamed that we would win the game, that I would score a touchdown and that we would come from behind,” Didier said.

The dream literally came true the next day. The ‘Skins spotted Denver a 10-0 lead, and roared back to win 42-10.

So one of these guys has a vision of divine intervention, and the other can supposedly read the future in his dreams. Uh huh.

And Didier is aiming higher than Riemersma, since he’s trying to take over the seat of Dem Patty Murray in the U.S. Senate. Wonder what his dream will tell him the night before the election?

So that leaves us with Jon Runyan, and as we learn here…

Congressional candidate John (sic) Runyan, the NFL lineman, is another person taking advantage of a law meant to protect farmers from high taxes. On his 20-acre spread he pays $57,000 on the five acres around his house. On the other 15, he pays $468 because he gets a farmland break. Specifically, he uses five acres for donkeys and 15 for timber. Did the controversy surrounding former state Sen. Ellen “Christmas Tree” Karcher send politicians a message? That law needs to be changed so that it applies only to people who are farmers for a living. Enough time has passed since the last blowup to get that done. Why isn’t it been changed? Too many connected folks taking advantage of it, maybe?

Maybe Runyan can ask Riemersma for a bit of heavenly guidance on this matter also. And I would suggest that Runyan ask Didier to dream up an election win, but sadly, Runyan is running against DINO John Adler, so no mystical invention may be necessary to flip the NJ-03 seat to the “R” column.

Still More Comedy From “The Most Trusted Name In News”

1) And this from the party that did every human thing it could possibly do to avoid seating eventual Dem Minnesota Senator Al Franken, ladies and gentlemen.

Didn’t take Scotty long to “learn the ropes,” did it?

Update 2/4/10: Yep, Scotty is a pro at the hypocrisy game all right, in particular on health care as noted here.

Update 2/5/10: Why do I have a feeling that it’s going to be a really long three years with this guy (here)?

2) And also I got a laugh out of this item (from here)…

(CNN) – President Obama declared on Wednesday that Democrats can be trusted on the budget because, “the last time the budget was balanced was under a Democratic president.”

…

– Republicans say they should get at least some of the credit for the balanced budgets during the Clinton administration, because Republican majorities controlled both the House and Senate.

In response, I give you the following here (dated February 1998)…

WASHINGTON — In a White House ceremony heavy with political symbolism, President Clinton ushered in a new era yesterday in the way the federal government handles the taxpayers’ money.

Unveiling a $1.73 trillion spending blueprint, Clinton sent, as he had promised, the first balanced budget to Capitol Hill in 30 years. The president proposed spending more on a host of issues, including child care, environmental cleanup, AIDS and cancer research and education, paid for largely by a sizable increase in tobacco taxes.

Republicans questioned whether the federal government would ever reap such a revenue windfall, and some accused the president of backsliding on his previous declaration that the “era of big government is over.”

I swear, some things never change.

3) And finally (from here)…

An abstinence-only education program is more effective than other initiatives at keeping sixth- and seventh-graders from having sex within a two-year period, according to a study described by some as a landmark.

The study, published in the current issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, indicated that about one-third of the preteens and their young teen classmates who received an eight-hour abstinence lesson had sexual intercourse within two years of the class.

…

“It is unreasonable to expect any single intervention, curriculum or program to solve the teen pregnancy problem,” (The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy) said. “True and lasting progress requires not only good programs in schools and communities, but also supportive norms and values, informed and active parents, good health services, a positive media culture and more.”

So yeah, it turns out that abstinence-only ed may be beneficial after all.

For two years.

And after that, you’re on your own.

And remember, you heard about all of these stories from CNN.

…

We’ll have to “leave it there.”

Beck Goes All “Humuna, Humuna” Over His “Slaughter” Dreck

Media Matters provides the context on the remarks of this fool here.

This Just In – “The Rat” Saw His Shadow

Meaning six more weeks of winter, or getting drunk I suppose (and I thought this was a good movie…easy to forgot how long ago it was made; sigh).

Setting A Democrat Up For A Fall

I should tell you that I personally don’t like partisanship in our political dialogue, but I prefer Democratic capitulation even less. And that is the issue I have with this column by E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post, in which he makes the partly reasonable suggestion that President Obama should more or less expand the Q&A session he held with Republican members of Congress last Friday (in which Obama basically cleaned their proverbial clocks, swatting away their idiotic talking points as if they were mosquitoes, as noted in this clip).

I say “partly reasonable” because dialogue is a good thing. However, if Obama were to conduct another one of these forums with the “loyal opposition,” I can tell you right now what would happen. The Repugs would find some way to rig it to allow every possible way to try and frustrate Obama by trying to talk over him and interrupt him at every opportunity, just so they could get a few moments of him getting impatient with these imbeciles. That way, they would have their precious “attack” footage they would rerun endlessly so they could say “See? We told you he was arrogant.”

This, though, is the bigger issue I have with Dionne’s column today…

The Q&A was a smash success, and we need many more. Let’s have Obama do the same kind of session with the Senate Republicans. Then, let’s have him debate potential 2012 Republican presidential candidates, starting with Sarah Palin, and then, perhaps, Mitt Romney. I’m quite serious. Tens of millions of Americans would turn on to politics again.

I’m not sure if Dionne is aware of this or not, but according to this CBS poll, most of those polled (including 56 percent of Republicans) don’t want Sarah Palin to run for president. For that reason, a decision by Obama to elevate her to the same level as the President of the United States on a debate stage would be an act of supreme idiocy. And such a move with Willard Mitt Romney would have a similar effect.

And it should be emphasized, as this article tells us, that debates are fraught with danger for incumbent presidents, even though we pretty much take them for granted now. In 1964, Lyndon Johnson decided not to debate Barry Goldwater and won decisively. Richard Nixon didn’t debate Hubert Humphrey in 1968 and eked out a win, and he made the same decision in 1972 against George McGovern and thumped the challenger. Jimmy Carter ended up debating challenger Ronald Reagan a week before the 1980 election, and though Carter was considered the debate winner, Reagan handled himself well enough and ended up projecting himself better than the 39th president, and he won the election.

Besides, if it takes Obama having to share the stage with the former mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, who would likely end up winking a time or two and deciding not to answer questions she didn’t like or giving totally non-responsive answers to the questions she preferred, to get “tens of millions of Americans” to “turn onto politics again,” then this country is in worse shape than I could have imagined.