Thursday, July 29, 2010
Republicans Go After Long-Term Care Insurance, Introduce Legislation To Repeal CLASS Act
First, some background. CLASS is a voluntary, government long-term care insurance program that will provide medical and non-medical services like dressing, bathing, and using the bathroom to adults who become severely functionally impaired. Working adults who enroll in the program will be able to receive the benefit — approximately $50 a day — after paying into the program for five years.
Long-term care proponents contend that the current system of financing long-term care is unsustainable. Americans spend more than $200 billion a year on long term care services in nursing homes, at home, or in assisted living facilities. “Medicaid is now the largest single provider of long-term care costs — it spent more than $100 billion last year, over one-third of its budget” and “paid more than 40 percent of the nation’s total long-term care bill.” Families and senior citizens (and Medicare to a lesser extent) pick up the rest of the tab, often spending down to “$2,000 in financial assets” to qualify for Medicaid coverage. By mid-century, the Congressional Budget Office predicts that the nation will have to spend 16% of anticipated federal revenues on Medicaid to fund care for the baby-boom generation.
So the question becomes, how do we fix this system? How do we create a system that can both relieve the burden on families and relieve this burden on government? Republicans argue that the program will be overrun by sick people who desperately need long-term-care benefits, increase costs, and push out healthier enrollees. “Health economists call this an ‘adverse-selection death spiral,’ and it would likely end in program bankruptcy,” the Heritage Foundation’s Brian Riedl noted in yesterday’s Washington Times, predicting that the government would have to consistently bail out the program with taxpayer dollars “to keep premiums low and pay out all benefits.”
But rather than repealing the program, as Boustany suggests, Congress should address some of its shortfalls. Back in November, I spoke with Howard Gleckman, a resident fellow at the Urban Institute and author of “Caring For Our Parents.” He admitted that the current CLASS Program has its pitfalls and suggested several solutions to keeping it sustainable over the long term:
- Make the program mandatory: If you have a mandatory program, you accomplish two things. The first is you of course eliminate the adverse selection problem, because everyone is in the program, and the other thing is, you are able to push down rates to level where they are pretty easily affordable for most of the population.
- Include CLASS in employer cafeteria plans: The tax deduction is not so important, but including long-term insurance insurance with other benefits raises its profile.
- Provide HHS with more money to market CLASS: The law only allows 3 percent of premiums for all admin costs. That is not enough and, in the run-up to initial sales, there are no premiums.
- Redesign premiums: In CLASS, they are fixed at the age at which you first enroll. Unless all premiums are raised (because the program is deemed insolvent) you always pay the same premium. Instead, they could adjust premiums for inflation. This would allow premiums to start very low (especially for young workers) and rise with their incomes.
As Gleckman noted just yesterday, “Fiscal conservatives such as Capretta and Riedl ought to be looking for ways to improve CLASS, rather than demanding its repeal. The millions of Americans who will need personal assistance, their families, and taxpayers would all be better off for it.” Those principles should outweigh whatever pressure Republicans are receiving from the long-term-care insurance lobby — which sees CLASS as a competitor to their private insurance product. (When in reality it may compliment the existing market place in which private insurers will be able to market supplemental “Medigap”-like coverage to CLASS beneficiaries.)
Recently Elected Dem Senators Want More ‘Passion,’ ‘Political Clarity,’ And ‘Fight’ For Green Economy
The Democrats described by Sen. Cardin as the “new class” overwhelmingly support strong green economy legislation, unlike the older generation peppered with climate peacocks. In fact, according to Politico, every one of the 12 Democrats elected in 2008would vote for cloture on comprehensive climate and energy reform. Of the ten Democrats elected in 2006, only Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) make polluter-friendly arguments against clean energy reform.“This is going to be a generational battle,” Merkley explained. “We’re going to have keep working and pushing because even our most optimistic bill has fairly weak goals for 2020. We’re going to have to be a lot more aggressive between 2020 and 2050 if we’re going to address carbon dioxide.”“We can’t give up,” Cardin said during his interview, “because the stakes are too high for our country.”UPDATEIn contrast to the above senators' frustration with Republican obstruction, other Democrats want to ensure its continuation. Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI, elected in 1990), Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA, 1992), Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE, 2000), Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR, 2002), and one member of the newer classes, Sen. Jon Tester (D-MO, 2006), want to preserve the 60-vote threshold for all action in the Senate.
Cap-and-Trade is Dead; Long Live Cap-and-Trade
7.27.2010
@ 10:44 PM
I'm fairly pessimistic about the world's ability to address the global warming issue in a serious way without having first risked catastrophe; the Copenhagen summit, for instance, was a disaster. But I'm less pessimistic about the United States' ability to pass cap-and-trade legislation at some point in the next 2-6 years -- even though Senate Democrats have given up on their legislation this year and even though Democrats will probably not again enjoy the majorities they had this session for the for the foreseeable future.
Part of this is for the reason that Jonathan Bernstein points out: cap-and-trade, although it has been discussed in policy circles for years, is a relatively new part of the Democratic agenda, and major programs don't usually pass on the first try. Part of it is because it is probably now the major unfinished piece of the Democratic/Obama agenda, with financial reform and health care reform having passed. Part of it is because the issue isn't actually all that partisan: 8 Republicans voted for cap-and-trade in the House, which is obviously not a lot, but is certainly better than the goose-egg the Democrats got on health care or the stimulus and suggests that there might be less friction in an environment when obstructionism is deemed to be less politically advantageous. (This works both ways, of course: a relatively high number of Democrats in carbon-intensive states are sure to oppose the program.)
But the main reason is simply this: at some point, the country is going to have to raise revenues to fix the deficit. And cap-and-trade, if done the right way -- if permits are sold, rather than given away to the industry -- can produce quite a lot of revenues: $145 billion per year initially, the CBO estimated in 2008, with the number rising much faster than inflation as emissions targets become continually more stringent.
Most of those costs will be passed onto consumers in the form of higher energy prices -- although interestingly, the CBO analysis suggests that the public will bear less of the cost if the permits are indeed sold to produce revenue rather than given away.
But my premise is that tax increases are inevitable: it's a question of who bears those taxes and how they bear them. And at some point Congress -- which is surely headed for some massive showdowns over the budget at some point in the next several years -- might conclude that cap-and-trade is a more acceptable way to raise revenues than an omnibus tax increase. In fact, cap-and-trade actually polls rather well. That might change as the public learns more about policy and comes to grips with the fact that they're going to have to bear some of the costs personally. But other than increased taxes on the very wealthy, and some gimmicky stuff like sin taxes and windfall profits taxes that don't have all that much revenue-generating potential, it polls a lot better than other types of tax increases, and may be a more politically palatable compromise.
In the meantime, it's time for the environmental community to heed Clive Crook's adviceand think about its messaging and its science. Yes, most of the attacks on climate science are intellectually dishonest, and the Climategate scandal was much exaggerated. But I've come around to the position that it also exposed at least some real misconduct, and it certainly exposed some contempt for the public that is not as evident in most other scientific disciplines. There are real risks to the environmental community in engaging in a rhetorical arms race with the climate change denial crowd, which contains some individuals who are playing a healthy and even benevolent role in the long tradition of scientific skepticism, but is dominated by impetuous contrarians and, more dangerously, partisans who are seeking to exploit society's cognitive biases. It's time for them to reclaim the moral highground because the next crack and the cap-and-trade apple might come sooner than you would think.
Part of this is for the reason that Jonathan Bernstein points out: cap-and-trade, although it has been discussed in policy circles for years, is a relatively new part of the Democratic agenda, and major programs don't usually pass on the first try. Part of it is because it is probably now the major unfinished piece of the Democratic/Obama agenda, with financial reform and health care reform having passed. Part of it is because the issue isn't actually all that partisan: 8 Republicans voted for cap-and-trade in the House, which is obviously not a lot, but is certainly better than the goose-egg the Democrats got on health care or the stimulus and suggests that there might be less friction in an environment when obstructionism is deemed to be less politically advantageous. (This works both ways, of course: a relatively high number of Democrats in carbon-intensive states are sure to oppose the program.)
But the main reason is simply this: at some point, the country is going to have to raise revenues to fix the deficit. And cap-and-trade, if done the right way -- if permits are sold, rather than given away to the industry -- can produce quite a lot of revenues: $145 billion per year initially, the CBO estimated in 2008, with the number rising much faster than inflation as emissions targets become continually more stringent.
Most of those costs will be passed onto consumers in the form of higher energy prices -- although interestingly, the CBO analysis suggests that the public will bear less of the cost if the permits are indeed sold to produce revenue rather than given away.
But my premise is that tax increases are inevitable: it's a question of who bears those taxes and how they bear them. And at some point Congress -- which is surely headed for some massive showdowns over the budget at some point in the next several years -- might conclude that cap-and-trade is a more acceptable way to raise revenues than an omnibus tax increase. In fact, cap-and-trade actually polls rather well. That might change as the public learns more about policy and comes to grips with the fact that they're going to have to bear some of the costs personally. But other than increased taxes on the very wealthy, and some gimmicky stuff like sin taxes and windfall profits taxes that don't have all that much revenue-generating potential, it polls a lot better than other types of tax increases, and may be a more politically palatable compromise.
In the meantime, it's time for the environmental community to heed Clive Crook's adviceand think about its messaging and its science. Yes, most of the attacks on climate science are intellectually dishonest, and the Climategate scandal was much exaggerated. But I've come around to the position that it also exposed at least some real misconduct, and it certainly exposed some contempt for the public that is not as evident in most other scientific disciplines. There are real risks to the environmental community in engaging in a rhetorical arms race with the climate change denial crowd, which contains some individuals who are playing a healthy and even benevolent role in the long tradition of scientific skepticism, but is dominated by impetuous contrarians and, more dangerously, partisans who are seeking to exploit society's cognitive biases. It's time for them to reclaim the moral highground because the next crack and the cap-and-trade apple might come sooner than you would think.
It's Like Mathematically Unpossible for Republicans to Win the House, or Something
We're introducing a new scale tonight to "reward" polling and strategy memos which are vapid, disingenuous, jargony, or just plain fucking wrong. The scale is dubbed the Pennometer after former Clinton strategist Mark Penn, who was a master of the genre; it runs from 0 Penns for memos that are honest and persuasive to 5 Penns for something that could have been penned by Penn himself.Our contestant in this pilot episode is this memo, which was circulated to the Washington Post's Greg Sargent by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC). It argues that it's like totally impossible for the Republicans to win the House, okay dudes?
Republicans will need to win 39 seats to take back the House. Democrats will win at least four Republican seats (the best opportunities include: LA-02, HI-01, IL-10, DE-AL, FL-25). As a result, the real number of seats Republicans will have to pick up to win a majority is at least 43. To win 43 seats, the NRCC would need to put 70 to 80 seats in play. The NRCC have simply not put that many Republicans seats in play and do not have the resources or caliber of candidates to do so.There's not really any there there. What does it mean for a seat to be "in play", for instance? Suppose it means a seat which the Republican has some tangible chance of winning. If that's the case, there are more than 70 or 80 seats "in play". In fact, there are 101 Democrat-held seats that as something other than safe by at least one of the "Big 4" forecasters (Cook, CQ, Rothenberg, Sabato). And if you include Real Clear Politics' forecasts in the mix, the total rises to 108.
That's a fairly liberal definition of "in play", but at least it's one with some concrete standard attached. By a slightly more conservative definition -- a seat is "in play" if at least three of the five forcasters noted above think it is -- the figure is 89 seats, still higher than the range that the DCCC memo suggests.
But I don't know that we should be erring on the side of conservativism in defining the number of seats that are "in play". Occasionally, in a wave election, a few seats that nobody was polling and nobody was paying attention to wind up switching sides: one instance I recall is the IA-2 district in 2006, which was won by a then-obscure political science professor Dave Loebsack, who edged out 15-term Republican incumbent Jim Leach (I was following the race intently because Leach, although a moderate Republican overall, was a leading proponent of the legislation to prohibit online poker, from which I was making a portion of my living at the time.)
The DCCC memo also argues that there's like no freaking way that the Republicans can win more than about 60 percent of the seats that happen to be "in play", however that's defined:
To win 43 seats, the NRCC would need to put 70 to 80 seats in play.I don't really know what the basis for this claim is. Would it be impossible for the Republicans to win 43 seats, for instance, if there were 69 rather than 70 in play? If you tossed a fair coin 69 times, there is only about a 3 percent chance that it would come up tails on at least 43 of those occasions. But elections to Congress aren't like that; the outcomes aren't independent of one another. If the pollsters aren't quite capturing the full magnitude of anti-Democratic sentiment, for instance, that's going to affect a lot of races, and a large fraction of the "toss-ups" could go to the Republicans.
Of course, we should be careful not to conflate the terms "in play" and "toss-up", which are not at all synonymous. Of the 108 seats "in play" seats that we described above, there are only 8 that the consensus of five forecasters thinks are more likely than not to go to the Republicans, and 27 which the consensus deems to be a toss-up. Conversely, 73 of the 108 "in play" seats are still thought to be more likely than not to hold for the Democrats.
Obviously, this is a question that begs for more systematic analysis, and we'll be rolling out our House forecasting model at some point next month. If our Senate model is any guide -- it tends to imply a more pessimistic forecast for Democrats than the qualitative forecasters like Cook do -- it might not contain good news for Team Blue. But the logic of the House forecasting model will be quite different than the Senate one, so there's really no telling.
The memo also asserts, quite confidently, that Democrats will win at least 4 seats currently held by Republicans.
Democrats will win at least four Republican seats (the best opportunities include: LA-02, HI-01, IL-10, DE-AL, FL-25).Again, this claim is dubious. There are only two Republican-held seats -- DE-AL and LA-2 -- that the consensus of forecasters think are more likely than not to go to the Democrats, but both are still highly uncertain. There are also two seats, HI-1 and IL-10, that the forecasters regard as toss-ups. Democrats certainly could win all four of the seats -- and they could win 5 GOP-held seats, or 6, or 8, if the sentiment turns out to be more anti-incumbent than anti-Democrat. But none of these seats are in the bag, and being completely shut out -- as happened to the Republicans in 2006 and the Democrats in 1994 -- is unlikely but not completely out of the question.
The second paragraph of the memo contains more further arbitrary math of the sort you see above, which I would address out of concern for flogging a dead horse. The third paragraph talks about the Tea Party potentially costing the Republicans a few opportunities where inexperienced and/or wacky candidates are nominated: I happen to agree with this point based on what we're seeing in some Senate races like Nevada and Kentucky, although bear in mind that in the macro view, the Tea Party has been a huge asset to the Republicans in the way that it facilitated a "rebranding" of conservative ideas.
***
It is, of course, an impossible task to argue that the Republicans have no chance of winning the House, something which betting markets -- and yours truly -- in fact consider to be somewhat more likely than not. Unavoidably, therefore, the memo was indeed vapid, jargony, and just plain fucking wrong in many places. However, because it largely avoided being disingenuous, we'll give it only 3.5 Penns rather than a full allotment of 5.Republican Governors Make a Movie Trailer Thing Too Read more at Wonkette: http://wonkette.com/417008/republican-governors-make-a-movie-trailer-thing-too#ixzz0v4Rx8E8V
14 Weeks from Republican Governors Association on Vimeo.
OH MY GOD WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE IF REPUBLICANS DO NOT KILL ALL OF THESE DEMOCRAT SPACE MONSTERS BEFORE THEIR MOTHERSHIP COMES! Yes, like the Democratic Governors Association, the RGA has come up with a movie trailer for this election to rile up their base. And it actually has much higher production value than the Democrats’ movie-thing? And it’s hosted on Vimeo? Oh no, they must have captured a librul and whipped him until he made them this video!
THIS IS THE BATTLE FOR FUCKING HUMANITY ITSELF, YOU GUYS.
Republican governors have never blown up an asteroid this big, but they did blow up New Jersey and Virginia, so they will give it a try. Help us, Republican governors! You’re our only hope!
And as this is a blockbuster movie, it will have a happy ending. Our nation will no longer be “governed by politicians in Washington, D.C.” after this election, you see! It will be governed by 600 Will Smiths wearing sunglasses, and they will live on the Moon. [Vimeo]
Healthcare.gov Is Your New YouPorn
The White House Blog has a lot to say about this new website, the Healthcare.gov (which has actually been online for like a couple months or something, whatever, perhaps it already had its “soft-launch” and this is its “hard-launch,” right here, on the Wonkette). Mrs. Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden even put up a neato snuff film for you to watch, in which they softly and seductively whisper the virtues of Healthcare.gov to innocent American children. I am a huge Michelle Obama fangirl (I have all the trade paperbacks AND the single issues!) but I must remind all of you that Grampa Joe Biden’s wife is also smoking hot. She is kind of like your Cindy McCain, with more Medical Training and less Glassy-Eyed Stare. Also, ha-ha, she is soon to be an Emmy-nominated actress, on the porn show for women whose husbands are deployed to Iraqistan!
Anyway, so after I watched Michelle and Jill roll out their saleswomanly charms, I tore myself away from the White House Blog for a moment (farewell for now, Arun Chaudhary!) and ventured over to this so-called “Healthcare.gov.” And boy, what a magical wonderland awaited me upon my arrival! Here is the first thing one sees when one goes to Healthcare.gov:
Ha-ha, this is not a real screenshot from that website. Alas, the real Healthcare.gov is just a bunch of boring and maybe-helpful information about Insurance Options, Prevention (of Fattie Disease, mostly) and other stuff. Go to it if you must, for a second, and then return to your Wonkette. Laughter is the best medicine! Or did you not know this, because of Nobama’s many terrible lies? [Healthcare.gov]
Judge blocks most controversial parts of Arizona immigration law
- 07/28/10 08:42 PM ET
A federal judge on Wednesday struck down key provisions of a controversial Arizona immigration law, stoking a divisive debate that hangs over this November’s congressional elections.
Democrats hailed the preliminary injunction by U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton as protecting a federal responsibility, while Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and other Republicans seized on it as an intrusion into states’ rights.
Nevertheless, Democrats hope the suit will benefit them by attracting Hispanic voters who think the law would lead to racial profiling by police.
One of the provisions struck down on Wednesday would have required police who stop individuals for other reasons to verify their citizenship if there’s a “reasonable suspicion” that the person stopped is an illegal immigrant.
The ruling also granted an injunction against a provision of the law that would force immigrants to carry proof of immigration status and make it a crime for illegal immigrants to seek employment in the state.
In explaining her preliminary injunction, Bolton wrote that the law probably pre-empted federal law, the basis for the Justice Department’s argument.
“Preserving the status quo through a preliminary injunction is less harmful than allowing state laws that are likely pre-empted by federal law to be enforced,” Bolton wrote.
“There is a substantial likelihood that officers will wrongfully arrest legal resident aliens under the new [law]. By enforcing this statute, Arizona would impose a ‘distinct, unusual and extraordinary’ burden on legal resident aliens that only the federal government has the authority to impose,” her decision read.
Republicans argue the administration’s decision to challenge the popular law will only intensify voters’ anger at the party in power.
A key part of the GOP argument is that the Obama administration and congressional Democrats have expanded the reach of the federal government with legislation on healthcare and financial reform that intrudes on state governments and private businesses. The suit against Arizona’s law plays into that argument.
“Instead of wasting taxpayer resources filing a lawsuit against Arizona and complaining that the law would be burdensome, the Obama administration should have focused its efforts on working with Congress to provide the necessary resources to support the state in its efforts to act where the federal government has failed to take responsibility,” McCain and fellow Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl said in a statement.
Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican, predicted that her state would prevail in the fight with the government and vowed to appeal the ruling, which could land the matter in the Supreme Court.
Latino groups, many of which had urged boycotts against Arizona, rejoiced at news of the injunction.
“Not only did the judge side with the Latino community, she sided with the Constitution,” said Janet Murguia, president and CEO of the National Council of La Raza. “This is an unequivocal victory. The ruling enjoins the crux of the law that would have legitimized racial profiling.”
Hispanics were a key segment of Obama’s winning coalition in 2008, but the president’s support among that group of voters has fallen significantly since he has taken office, according to polls. If Hispanics do not turn out to the polls this fall, it could hurt candidates in states such as California, Colorado and Nevada, where Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) faces a tough reelection fight.
Advocates for Hispanic-Americans and key members of Congress such as Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) have voiced frustration with Obama for not doing more to push comprehensive immigration reform that would include a pathway to citizenship for the country’s illegal immigrants.
“I’m glad to see the judge did enjoin what clearly is a federal responsibility, and I think it was important to do,” Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) said on MSNBC shortly after the ruling. “I wish that the governor of Arizona and others would talk to their United States senators and say that we need that kind of comprehensive reform.”
Immigration is an issue that divides the Democratic Party, however, and some members were in no mood to celebrate the ruling.
“There are no winners here — no matter what the courts ultimately decide, we will still have wasted millions of dollars and our borders will still not be secure,” said Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Ariz.), who opposed the law.
She said the administration should focus on immigration reform instead of the Arizona law.
“The administration needs to stop pursuing this distraction and start working with us to get the border region under control and develop a national immigration strategy,” she said.
This story was originally posted at 6:13 p.m. and updated at 8:42 p.m.
Democrats hailed the preliminary injunction by U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton as protecting a federal responsibility, while Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and other Republicans seized on it as an intrusion into states’ rights.
One of the provisions struck down on Wednesday would have required police who stop individuals for other reasons to verify their citizenship if there’s a “reasonable suspicion” that the person stopped is an illegal immigrant.
The ruling also granted an injunction against a provision of the law that would force immigrants to carry proof of immigration status and make it a crime for illegal immigrants to seek employment in the state.
In explaining her preliminary injunction, Bolton wrote that the law probably pre-empted federal law, the basis for the Justice Department’s argument.
“Preserving the status quo through a preliminary injunction is less harmful than allowing state laws that are likely pre-empted by federal law to be enforced,” Bolton wrote.
“There is a substantial likelihood that officers will wrongfully arrest legal resident aliens under the new [law]. By enforcing this statute, Arizona would impose a ‘distinct, unusual and extraordinary’ burden on legal resident aliens that only the federal government has the authority to impose,” her decision read.
Republicans argue the administration’s decision to challenge the popular law will only intensify voters’ anger at the party in power.
A key part of the GOP argument is that the Obama administration and congressional Democrats have expanded the reach of the federal government with legislation on healthcare and financial reform that intrudes on state governments and private businesses. The suit against Arizona’s law plays into that argument.
“Instead of wasting taxpayer resources filing a lawsuit against Arizona and complaining that the law would be burdensome, the Obama administration should have focused its efforts on working with Congress to provide the necessary resources to support the state in its efforts to act where the federal government has failed to take responsibility,” McCain and fellow Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl said in a statement.
Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican, predicted that her state would prevail in the fight with the government and vowed to appeal the ruling, which could land the matter in the Supreme Court.
Latino groups, many of which had urged boycotts against Arizona, rejoiced at news of the injunction.
“Not only did the judge side with the Latino community, she sided with the Constitution,” said Janet Murguia, president and CEO of the National Council of La Raza. “This is an unequivocal victory. The ruling enjoins the crux of the law that would have legitimized racial profiling.”
Hispanics were a key segment of Obama’s winning coalition in 2008, but the president’s support among that group of voters has fallen significantly since he has taken office, according to polls. If Hispanics do not turn out to the polls this fall, it could hurt candidates in states such as California, Colorado and Nevada, where Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) faces a tough reelection fight.
Advocates for Hispanic-Americans and key members of Congress such as Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) have voiced frustration with Obama for not doing more to push comprehensive immigration reform that would include a pathway to citizenship for the country’s illegal immigrants.
“I’m glad to see the judge did enjoin what clearly is a federal responsibility, and I think it was important to do,” Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) said on MSNBC shortly after the ruling. “I wish that the governor of Arizona and others would talk to their United States senators and say that we need that kind of comprehensive reform.”
Immigration is an issue that divides the Democratic Party, however, and some members were in no mood to celebrate the ruling.
“There are no winners here — no matter what the courts ultimately decide, we will still have wasted millions of dollars and our borders will still not be secure,” said Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Ariz.), who opposed the law.
She said the administration should focus on immigration reform instead of the Arizona law.
“The administration needs to stop pursuing this distraction and start working with us to get the border region under control and develop a national immigration strategy,” she said.
This story was originally posted at 6:13 p.m. and updated at 8:42 p.m.
Dem senators want congressional approval for Afghan engagement
- 07/28/10 11:22 AM ET
Two Democratic senators wrote President Obama on Wednesday requesting that future agreements between the U.S. and Afghan governments be subject to Senate approval.
Sens. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), a staunch critic of the Afghan war, and Jim Webb (D-Va.), a former Republican Secretary of the Navy, requested that any bilateral agreement between the U.S. and Afghanistan with regard to “our long-term relationship and military operations in that country” be approved by the Senate in the form of a treaty.
”We do not believe that a long-term, open-ended presence of U.S. military forces in Afghanistan serves our national interest,” they wrote. “Most importantly, we believe that any consideration of such a prospect must be taken with the full advice and consent of the Senate.”
If such an agreement were put into the form of a treaty, two-thirds of the Senate would have approve it to have it go into effect.
The senators’ letter came one day after the House signed off on a $59 billion supplemental spending bill that included $33 billion in additional funding for troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, sending it to Obama for his signature.
Skepticism of the Afghanistan war has heightened among some lawmakers since the release of 92,000 secret government documents by the organization WikiLeaks.
The documents say that Pakistani intelligence agents have assisted Islamic extremists operating in Afghanistan despite the fact their government receives anti-terror aid from the United States.
The doubts have created a divide most noticeably among Democrats. On Tuesday, 102 House Democrats voted against war funding, as opposed to 32 who voted against it last year.
Webb and Feingold noted that, as a senator, Obama supported legislation during the Bush administration that would have applied similar congressional approval to agreements between the U.S. and Iraq.
They wrote that the “failure to submit the [majority security agreement with Iraq] as a treaty ... entailed significant risks implicating our nation as a whole including operational constraints on one hand and a failure to specify an end-point for our security commitments on the other.”
Feingold voted against the supplemental funding for the troops, arguing that a hard deadline of troop withdrawal is needed.
Read the full letter here.
Reid moves closer to ending secret holds in Senate
- 07/28/10 09:58 AM ET
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) added a bill to eliminate the practice of secret holds on nominees to the Senate calendar on Wednesday.
Reid added Sen. Ron Wyden's (D-Ore.) legislation to do away with the longstanding Senate tradition of being able to anonymously halt a president's nominees in the Senate.
Adding the legislation to the calendar has the effect of moving the legislation closer to the point where Reid could bring it up for a vote.
If Reid does bring it up, it appears that he may have the votes to do away with the practice after Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) lobbied Senate colleagues to end it. Sixty-seven votes are needed to change Senate rules, and McCaskill, as of late June, had said she'd gathered 68.
The Wyden bill wouldn't do away with the practice of holds entirely; rather, it would require that senators publicly disclose when they have put a hold on a nominee.
Republicans have used the practice to some effect while doing their work as an opposition party. Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) notoriously placed a blanket hold on 70 of President Obama's nominees, until relenting under public pressure. Democrats also used the policy aggressively against many of President George W. Bush's nominees during the past decade, as well.
Reid added Sen. Ron Wyden's (D-Ore.) legislation to do away with the longstanding Senate tradition of being able to anonymously halt a president's nominees in the Senate.
Adding the legislation to the calendar has the effect of moving the legislation closer to the point where Reid could bring it up for a vote.
If Reid does bring it up, it appears that he may have the votes to do away with the practice after Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) lobbied Senate colleagues to end it. Sixty-seven votes are needed to change Senate rules, and McCaskill, as of late June, had said she'd gathered 68.
The Wyden bill wouldn't do away with the practice of holds entirely; rather, it would require that senators publicly disclose when they have put a hold on a nominee.
Republicans have used the practice to some effect while doing their work as an opposition party. Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) notoriously placed a blanket hold on 70 of President Obama's nominees, until relenting under public pressure. Democrats also used the policy aggressively against many of President George W. Bush's nominees during the past decade, as well.
America's Top Mediator Heads to the Gulf
Kenneth Feinberg tackled executive pay and 9/11. Now for BP spill compensation.
| Wed Jul. 28, 2010 3:00 AM PDT
Somewhere along the line, Kenneth Feinberg became the go-to mediator for the country. Most recently, he took a turn as executive pay czar [1], tapped by the Obama administration to oversee the compensation of executives at companies which received federal bailout money. He's officially done with that job at the end of this month. Then, he'll move into the job of Gulf oil fund czar full time, a role in which he'll be charged with making sure those hurt by the spill are properly compensated.
Add these two roles to an already lengthy list of high-profile mediations. After serving as special master of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, dispensing $7 billion to the more than 5,000 survivors and relatives of those lost in those attacks, Feinberg administrated the fund established in the wake of the April 2007 Virginia Tech shootings. In June, he was called in to help mediate disputes with Maricopa County, Ariz.'s infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio [2]. All of this leads to an obvious question: Why him?
Add these two roles to an already lengthy list of high-profile mediations. After serving as special master of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, dispensing $7 billion to the more than 5,000 survivors and relatives of those lost in those attacks, Feinberg administrated the fund established in the wake of the April 2007 Virginia Tech shootings. In June, he was called in to help mediate disputes with Maricopa County, Ariz.'s infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio [2]. All of this leads to an obvious question: Why him?
"I think there are millions of Americans that, if asked, could do just what I'm doing," Feinberg told an audience at Public Citizen on Tuesday, in one of his first public appearances since he was tapped as spill czar. He acknowledged that tackling touchy issues is a tough job. "I have experience. I think that's what people look to: Experience dealing with mass claims involving not only substance, but the emotion of people you're dealing with," he said.
He'll be handling claims with plenty of both when he moves his focus to the Gulf spill on August 1. BP has yet to make the first payment into what will be a $20 billion escrow fund that Feinberg is tasked with doling out. The company is supposed to set aside $5 billion a year for the next four years for the fund. Getting that up and running can't happen fast enough, as BP is already facing allegations [3] of cutting spill victims off from much-needed funds.
Feinberg has already been busy making stops around the Gulf region [4] in hopes of winning over residents who worry that the fund might yield less compensation than lawsuits against BP. He acknowledges that the job ahead of him is difficult, and possibly more complicated than other cases he's mediated where the liability has been more clear. In the Gulf, he'll have to deal with a litany of unknown environmental and health harms, most of which aren't going to be immediately apparent.
"One of the challenges I will have, as I did with 9/11, is calculating with a murky crystal ball what is a future claim worth," said Feinberg, citing health concerns that might manifest years later, or difficult-to-determine damages to the Gulf ecosystem. He offered a fishing example: If they determine fisherman will be out of work for a year and offer a $180,000 compensation, what happens when the fisherman argues that he might in fact be out of work for two years? "That individual will be offered $180,000, and if he or she doesn't want it, don't take it," he says.
Other challenges lie ahead. First, there's the question of what constitutes an eligible claim. "It's easy if there's a motel on the beach and no customers or no clients or guests because there's oil there. Or you're a fisherman who can't fish because of the oil," said Feinberg. "But what if you're a motel 40 miles from beach and say business is down a third because of perception of the spill, even though the oil never got to the beach? Is that a valid claim?"
The other major problem will be documentation, especially in a region where many work in an underground economy with little or no documentation of their wages. To deal with that, he said he expects to have to take "much less documentation than would otherwise be required," like letters certifying employment from ship captains rather than official tax forms or pay stubs.
He was also optimistic about holding BP accountable for reimbursing all injured parties with the $20 billion escrow fund. And, "if it's insufficient," he says, "BP has promised to honor any additional final obligations."
Even with BP footing the bill, Feinberg will have his work cut out for him in assessing short- and long-term damages.
"I'm trying to get the money out to these people," said Feinberg. "I'm the fiduciary for the people in the Gulf."
He'll be handling claims with plenty of both when he moves his focus to the Gulf spill on August 1. BP has yet to make the first payment into what will be a $20 billion escrow fund that Feinberg is tasked with doling out. The company is supposed to set aside $5 billion a year for the next four years for the fund. Getting that up and running can't happen fast enough, as BP is already facing allegations [3] of cutting spill victims off from much-needed funds.
Feinberg has already been busy making stops around the Gulf region [4] in hopes of winning over residents who worry that the fund might yield less compensation than lawsuits against BP. He acknowledges that the job ahead of him is difficult, and possibly more complicated than other cases he's mediated where the liability has been more clear. In the Gulf, he'll have to deal with a litany of unknown environmental and health harms, most of which aren't going to be immediately apparent.
"One of the challenges I will have, as I did with 9/11, is calculating with a murky crystal ball what is a future claim worth," said Feinberg, citing health concerns that might manifest years later, or difficult-to-determine damages to the Gulf ecosystem. He offered a fishing example: If they determine fisherman will be out of work for a year and offer a $180,000 compensation, what happens when the fisherman argues that he might in fact be out of work for two years? "That individual will be offered $180,000, and if he or she doesn't want it, don't take it," he says.
Other challenges lie ahead. First, there's the question of what constitutes an eligible claim. "It's easy if there's a motel on the beach and no customers or no clients or guests because there's oil there. Or you're a fisherman who can't fish because of the oil," said Feinberg. "But what if you're a motel 40 miles from beach and say business is down a third because of perception of the spill, even though the oil never got to the beach? Is that a valid claim?"
The other major problem will be documentation, especially in a region where many work in an underground economy with little or no documentation of their wages. To deal with that, he said he expects to have to take "much less documentation than would otherwise be required," like letters certifying employment from ship captains rather than official tax forms or pay stubs.
He was also optimistic about holding BP accountable for reimbursing all injured parties with the $20 billion escrow fund. And, "if it's insufficient," he says, "BP has promised to honor any additional final obligations."
Even with BP footing the bill, Feinberg will have his work cut out for him in assessing short- and long-term damages.
"I'm trying to get the money out to these people," said Feinberg. "I'm the fiduciary for the people in the Gulf."
Fear Factor: What's Keeping the President From Picking the Best Person to Protect Consumers?
Arianna Huffington
Posted: July 27, 2010 05:27 PM
On Monday, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs lauded Elizabeth Warren as "a terrific candidate" to lead the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: "I don't think any criticism in any way by anybody would disqualify her."
So why isn't the White House rushing to nominate her for the position? In a word: fear.
The same fear-based approach that caused the administration to throw Shirley Sherrod under the bus before her name had even been uttered on Fox News is once again rearing its head in the decision-making process over Warren.
This time, it's not the ire of Glenn Beck that has Team Obama's backbone turning to mush -- it's the fear of angering the bankers by appointing a consumer advocate who might actually advocate for consumers (the same consumers who, in their role as taxpayers, have spent hundreds of billions bailing the bankers out).
According to the National Journal, the banking industry "privately grumbles that Warren would be their least favorite candidate to head the agency." Or, as Floyd Norris put it in the New York Times, "whether or not she is named to run the bureau may depend on how willing the president is to anger the banks."
Warren is far and away the best person for the position. Picking her is a no-brainer. For many high-level positions, such as a Supreme Court justice, a president will often say he's looking for the "best candidate" when, in fact, there isn't one "best candidate." But this is that rare occasion when there truly is a single best candidate. When it comes to heading the Consumer Bureau, there is Elizabeth Warren -- and there is everybody else.
Not only is she one of the country's foremost experts on bankruptcy law and the multiple ways in which banks trick and trap consumers, she's been the leading advocate for the creation of the agency, which the banking industry worked night and day to kill. In fact, it was Warren who came up with the idea for the agency in the first place, in a paper she wrote in 2007. Her entire career has been devoted to the issues the agency is being created to address.
So obvious is the choice of Warren as the inaugural head of the Consumer Bureau that nearly a dozen senators and over 60 members of the House have already publicly come out in her favor. And over 200,000 people -- i.e. consumers -- have signed a petition urging her nomination.
Here are a few examples of the support she's getting:
- Sen. Al Franken: "In my consideration, I think Elizabeth would be the best."
- Rep. Barney Frank (chair of the House committee that drafted the financial reform bill): "She's far and away the best candidate."
- Sen. Bernie Sanders: "No one in our nation could do a better job."
- Rep. Rosa DeLauro: "In my living room with many members of congress, she predicted what was going to happen several years ago. As she put it in 2007, consumers cannot buy a toaster that has a one in five chance of bursting into flames but they can enter into a mortgage that has the same one in five chance of putting them out onto the street...Professor Warren we cannot, Ma'am, do it without you."
- Sen. Jeff Merkley: "I support Elizabeth Warren...She has both the clarity of the need for an agency that has as its top mission protecting citizens against tricks, traps and scams, and she has the ability to articulate that vision. She has the leadership skills and the knowledge of the financial world. She has the full set of requirements to be an effective leader."
- Sen. Tom Udall: "Should [the president] decide to nominate her to lead the Bureau, it will be a clear sign that the Bureau will be a champion for the American consumer, will stand up to unscrupulous actors and will not shrink from...fulfilling its mission under pressure."
Then there was this argument in her favor:
She is an enormously effective advocate for reform. Probably the most effective advocate for consumer protection in the country. She has huge credibility and she played a decisive role in helping make the public case for reform and she was early on this, way ahead of everybody else.That, as it happens, was Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, speaking Sunday on ABC's This Week. So why has Geithner stopped short of endorsing Warren (and, indeed, privately argued against her)? And why, as HuffPost's Jason Linkins put it, is the White House still "hesitating, looking for all the world like it is going to veer away from tapping Warren for the sort of job she was born to do?"
Fear. You know what they say: give a man some fear, and you make him fearful for a day -- teach a man to scare himself, and you make him fearful for life. The administration has taken the lesson to heart.
And the courage-killing virus isn't confined just to one end of Pennsylvania Avenue. Sen. Chris Dodd told NPR's Diane Rehm, "The question is, 'is she confirmable?' And there's a serious question about it." And today he challenged Robert Gibbs' assertion that Warren is "very confirmable": "How does he know that?" Dodd said to TPM.
Nothing fortifies your opponents like signaling your willingness to surrender. A different approach would be to do the right thing, welcome the fight, and make your case to the American people. "Are the Republicans, when we bring her name up, going to argue that she shouldn't be confirmed because she's too tough on the big banks and too tough on the financial industry?" asked Sen. Tom Harkin. "Boy, that'll get them a lot of votes in November!"
And if Senate Democrats don't have the stomach for the fight, there is a provision in the financial reform bill the president signed into law last week that allows the Treasury Secretary to name someone to head the Consumer Bureau until the Senate confirms a presidential nominee. And there is no clear deadline on how long the Secretary's appointee may serve. "The statute gives the Treasury Secretary the obligation to get it done, but doesn't tell him how to get it done," says Gail Hillebrand of the Consumers Union. "Consumers have been waiting a long time. The sooner we can get it off the ground the better."
So the administration has no excuses left for not nominating Warren -- including the threat of a Republican filibuster.
And given that her opponents, shameless though they are, can't just come out and say, "We're against her just because we're doing the banks' biding," what argument can they make? One currently being test-marketed is that because Warren is such a zealous advocate for consumers she would somehow be bad for "innovation." You know, the kind of innovation that brought us credit default swaps, teaser rates, 600 percent payday loan rates, and that led to widespread foreclosures and bankruptcies. This line of reasoning is akin to saying that we don't want our police force to be very vigilant, lest it diminish criminal innovation. Warren herself addressed this ludicrous claim in a paper in 2008:
Thanks to effective regulation, innovation in the market for physical products has led to greater safety and more consumer-friendly features. By comparison, innovation in financial products has produced incomprehensible terms and sharp practices that have left families at the mercy of those who write the contracts.Which, of course, is exactly why the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created in the first place. If someone with Warren's skill set and perspective isn't named to head it, why even bother creating it? Just so another banking industry shill has a place to cool his heels before adding a few zeros to his salary when he quits and joins the companies he was ostensibly regulating? Given that this is the usual M.O. of how regulatory agencies in Washington work, it's all the more important to name Warren so she can start the Consumer Bureau off on the right foot -- as a true voice for the people.
So which way will Obama go? If he makes his decision on the merits, Elizabeth Warren will be the first head of the Consumer Bureau. If he makes his decision out of fear, she won't be. For guidance, he should listen carefully to these words:
All too often -- our government made decisions based upon fear rather than foresight, and all too often trimmed facts and evidence to fit ideological predispositions. Instead of strategically applying our power and our principles, we too often set those principles aside as luxuries that we could no longer afford. And in this season of fear, too many of us -- Democrats and Republicans; politicians, journalists and citizens -- fell silent... if we continue to make decisions from within a climate of fear, we will make more mistakes.That was Barack Obama in May of last year, talking about the Bush administration's approach to national security in the wake of 9/11. As he finds himself in a different kind of "season of fear," will he use his insights as a guide to his decision?
Appointing Elizabeth Warren will demonstrate that the detour his administration took to Feartown with Shirley Sherrod was a lesson learned.
P.S. Check out this post by HuffPost's Social News editor Adam Clark Estes, to learn all about our new pairing with Meetup that, as Adam puts it, aims "to turn the conversations about the news on our site into face-to-face encounters."
Deal or no deal with Rep. Charlie Rangel
Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) is caught between a rock and a hard place. He’s scrambling to strike a deal with the House Ethics Committee over allegations that he violated some pretty basic rules. Meanwhile, whether he settles or not, the case against him will be made public tomorrow at a 1:00 p.m. hearing that will be the precursor to a September trial. Sure, Rangel would get to defend his tattered honor. But that could come at a higher price. The faint calls for him to resign his seat altogether, which haven’t gained any traction, would almost assuredly take off once a trial began.
Rangel’s fellow Democrats are already returning campaign cash he’s given them. And with the clock ticking to disclosure, some are being more blunt about what he should do. Laurie Kellman of the Associated Press does a great job deciphering House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s (D-Md.) comments on the Rangel matter. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), a close ally of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), told the New York Post, "I think it's best that he settle." With a trial set to run concurrently with the fall campaign and the Democrats poised to lose a ton of seats (and perhaps control of the House), I bet he does.
Like I’ve said before, Rangel has the uncanny ability to make a walk over hot coals seem like a stroll on the Mall. His bluster and defiance over the last week is a cover for the intense negotiations going on behind the scenes. Reports say Rangel is worried about his legacy. Well, it’s already tainted. Foregoing a deal the Democrats desperately want him to take runs the risk of a bad situation potentially getting worse for him.
Rangel’s fellow Democrats are already returning campaign cash he’s given them. And with the clock ticking to disclosure, some are being more blunt about what he should do. Laurie Kellman of the Associated Press does a great job deciphering House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s (D-Md.) comments on the Rangel matter. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), a close ally of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), told the New York Post, "I think it's best that he settle." With a trial set to run concurrently with the fall campaign and the Democrats poised to lose a ton of seats (and perhaps control of the House), I bet he does.
Like I’ve said before, Rangel has the uncanny ability to make a walk over hot coals seem like a stroll on the Mall. His bluster and defiance over the last week is a cover for the intense negotiations going on behind the scenes. Reports say Rangel is worried about his legacy. Well, it’s already tainted. Foregoing a deal the Democrats desperately want him to take runs the risk of a bad situation potentially getting worse for him.
By Jonathan Capehart | July 28, 2010; 11:08 AM ET
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Pakistan’s Double Game
But the most alarming of the reports were the ones that described the cynical collusion between Pakistan’s military intelligence service and the Taliban. Despite the billions of dollars the United States has sent in aid to Pakistan since Sept. 11, they offer powerful new evidence that crucial elements of Islamabad’s power structure have been actively helping to direct and support the forces attacking the American-led military coalition.
The time line of the documents from WikiLeaks, an organization devoted to exposing secrets, stops before President Obama put his own military and political strategy into effect last December. Administration officials say they have made progress with Pakistan since, but it is hard to see much evidence of that so far.
Most of the WikiLeaks documents, which were the subject of in-depth coverage in The Times on Monday, cannot be verified. However, they confirm a picture of Pakistani double-dealing that has been building for years.
On a trip to Pakistan last October, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton suggested that officials in the Pakistani government knew where Al Qaeda leaders were hiding. Gen. David Petraeus, the new top military commander in Afghanistan, recently acknowledged longstanding ties between Pakistan’s Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, known as the ISI, and the “bad guys.”
The Times’s report of the new documents suggests the collusion goes even deeper, that representatives of the ISI have worked with the Taliban to organize networks of militants to fight American soldiers in Afghanistan and hatch plots to assassinate Afghan leaders.
The article painted a chilling picture of the activities of Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul of Pakistan, who ran the ISI from 1987 to 1989, when the agency and the C.I.A. were together arming the Afghan militias fighting Soviet troops. General Gul kept working with those forces, which eventually formed the Taliban.
Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States said the reports were unsubstantiated and “do not reflect the current on-ground realities.” But at this point, denials about links with the militants are simply not credible.
Why would Pakistan play this dangerous game? The ISI has long seen the Afghan Taliban as a proxy force, a way to ensure its influence on the other side of the border and keep India’s influence at bay.
Pakistani officials also privately insist that they have little choice but to hedge their bets given their suspicions that Washington will once again lose interest as it did after the Soviets were ousted from Afghanistan in 1989. And until last year, when the Pakistani Taliban came within 60 miles of Islamabad, the country’s military and intelligence establishment continued to believe it could control the extremists when it needed to.
In recent months, the Obama administration has said and done many of the right things toward building a long-term relationship with Pakistan. It has committed to long-term economic aid. It is encouraging better relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is constantly reminding Pakistani leaders that the extremists, on both sides of the border, pose a mortal threat to Pakistan’s fragile democracy — and their own survival. We don’t know if they’re getting through. We know they have to.
It has been only seven months since Mr. Obama announced his new strategy for Afghanistan, and a few weeks since General Petraeus took command. But Americans are increasingly weary of this costly war. If Mr. Obama cannot persuade Islamabad to cut its ties to, and then aggressively fight, the extremists in Pakistan, there is no hope of defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Getting Lost in the Fog of War
By ANDREW EXUM
ANYONE who has spent the past two days reading through the 92,000 military field reports and other documents made public by the whistle-blower site WikiLeaks may be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about. I’m a researcher who studies Afghanistan and have no regular access to classified information, yet I have seen nothing in the documents that has either surprised me or told me anything of significance. I suspect that’s the case even for someone who reads only a third of the articles on Afghanistan in his local newspaper.
Let us review, though, what have been viewed as the major revelations in the documents (which were published in part by The Times, The Guardian of London and the German magazine Der Spiegel):
First, there are allegations made by American intelligence officers that elements within Pakistan’s spy agency, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, have been conspiring with Taliban factions and other insurgents. Those charges are nothing new. This newspaper and others have been reporting on those accusations — often supported by anonymous sources within the American military and intelligence services — for years.
Second, the site provides documentation of Afghan civilian casualties caused by United States and allied military operations. It is true that civilians inevitably suffer in war. But researchers in Kabul with the Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict have been compiling evidence of these casualties, and their effect in Afghanistan, for some time now. Their reports, to which they add background on the context of the events, contributed to the decision by the former top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, to put in place controversially stringent new measures intended to reduce such casualties last year.
Third, the site asserts that the Pentagon employs a secret task force of highly trained commandos charged with capturing or killing insurgent leaders. I suspect that in the eyes of most Americans, using special operations teams to kill terrorists is one of the least controversial ways in which the government spends their tax dollars.
The documents do reveal some specific information about United States and NATO tactics, techniques, procedures and equipment that is sensitive, and will cause much consternation within the military. It may even result in some people dying. Thus the White House is right to voice its displeasure with WikiLeaks.
Yet most of the major revelations that have been trumpeted by WikiLeaks’s founder, Julian Assange, are not revelations at all — they are merely additional examples of what we already knew.
Mr. Assange has said that the publication of these documents is analogous to the publication of the Pentagon Papers, only more significant. This is ridiculous. The Pentagon Papers offered the public a coherent internal narrative of the conflict in Vietnam that was at odds with the one that had been given by the elected and uniformed leadership.
The publication of these documents, by contrast, dumps 92,000 new primary source documents into the laps of the world’s public with no context, no explanation as to why some accounts may contradict others, no sense of what is important or unusual as opposed to the normal march of war.
Many experts on the war, both in the military and the press, have long been struggling to come to grips with the conflict’s complexity and nuances. What is the public going to make of this haphazard cache of documents, many written during combat by officers with little sense of how their observations fit into the fuller scope of the war?
I myself first went to Afghanistan as a young Army officer in 2002 and returned two years later after having led a small special operations unit — what Mr. Assange calls an “assassination squad.” (I also worked briefly as a civilian adviser to General McChrystal last year.) I can confirm that the situation in Afghanistan is complex, and defies any attempt to graft it onto easy-to-discern lessons or policy conclusions. Yet the release of the documents has led to a stampede of commentators and politicians doing exactly that. It’s all too easy for them to find field reports to reaffirm their preconceived opinions about the war.
The Guardian editorialized on Sunday that the documents released reveal “a very different landscape ... from the one with which we have become familiar.” But whoever wrote that has not been reading the reports of his own newspaper’s reporters in Afghanistan.
The news media have done a good job of showing the public that the Afghan war is a highly complex environment stretching beyond the borders of the fractured country. Often what appears to be a two-way conflict between the government and an insurgency is better described as intertribal rivalry. And often that intertribal rivalry is worsened or overshadowed by the violent trade in drugs.
The Times, The Guardian and Der Spiegel did nothing wrong in looking over the WikiLeaks documents and excerpting them. Despite the occasional protest from the right wing, most of the press in the United States and in allied nations takes care not to publish information that might result in soldiers’ deaths.
But WikiLeaks itself is another matter. Mr. Assange says he is a journalist, but he is not. He is an activist, and to what end it is not clear. This week — as when he released a video in April showing American helicopter gunships killing Iraqi civilians in 2007 — he has been throwing around the term “war crimes,” but offers no context for the events he is judging. It seems that the death of any civilian in war, an unavoidable occurrence, is a “crime.”
If his desire is to promote peace, Mr. Assange and his brand of activism are not as helpful as he imagines. By muddying the waters between journalism and activism, and by throwing his organization into the debate on Afghanistan with little apparent regard for the hard moral choices and dearth of good policy options facing decision-makers, he is being as reckless and destructive as the contemptible soldier or soldiers who leaked the documents in the first place.
We're Still at War:
Photo of the Day for July 26, 2010
Mon Jul. 26, 2010 2:00 AM PDT
US Army Soldiers from Charlie Company, 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, provide security during a mission in the Zirat Mountain Area, Waza Kwah District, Paktika province, Afghanistan, on July 7. The purpose of the mission is to disrupt anti-Afghan forces and find enemy caches. Photo via the US Army.
A Renewable Energy Hail Mary?
| Mon Jul. 26, 2010 11:14 AM PDT
Climate legislation is now officially dead in the Senate, but does that mean that we can't accomplish anything on clean energy this year? With Majority Leader Harry Reid set to bring what's left of the energy package to the floor this week, environmental and labor groups, along with a number of clean technology companies, are making a last-ditch effort to get a renewable electricity standard attached to the bill.
Reid said Saturday that he doesn't think he can pass even a bare-minimum renewable electricity standard, or RES, which would mandate that every state draw a specific portion of their power from renewable resources. "Right now, I don't think I have 60 votes to get that done," Reid told a crowd at the Netroots Nation conference Saturday.
But advocates of the RES say he's mistaken. "I certainly know that finding 60 votes in the Senate on the verge of an important election is no easy task," said Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle. "But the votes are there for an RES."
A Senate Democratic aide told me that leadership is concerned about including the RES now that the other climate provisions have been axed, because the RES "would replace the cap in terms of scare tactics from the right."
But some Senate Democrats are pushing back on the idea that the votes aren't there, including some moderate Midwestern Dems who were considered "no" votes on a carbon cap like Byron Dorgan (N.D.). Dorgan, Mark Udall (Colo.) and Tom Udall (N.M.) took the lead on a letter to Reid on the issue, which at least 17 other Democrats have reportedly signed as well so far.
The sad thing is, an RES really shouldn't be a tough measure to pass. Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia already have one in place. Most importantly, both the House and the Senate have passed an RES multiple times in the past decade, though it still has not made it into law.
The Senate actually passed a renewable energy standard calling for 10 percent of power to come from renewables by 2020 for the first time back in 2002, and passed it again in both the 108th and 109th Congresses. Then the House got its act together and, during the prolonged debate over the 2007 energy bill, the twice passed versions of the bill that included an RES. But then the Senate couldn't muster enough votes and it didn't make it into the conference bill, either, after the Bush White House pledged to veto the measure.
The House managed to pass an even more ambitious RES last June as part of the American Clean Energy and Security Act, one that requires 20 percent of electricity to come from renewables by 2020 (though it gave states an out if they couldn't meet the target). But now the Senate can't seem to muster support for even a minimal RES right now, like the 15 percent by 2021 RES that the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee passed last June with bipartisan support.
Solar and wind advocates say that even the House-passed standard is actually less ambitious than the path that the industry is already on, and have advocated for a 25 perecent standard by 2025. But at this point, they'll take anything to put the US government on record in support of a renewables mandate. "Getting a signal in place that we're open for business is going to be critical to build the base in the US and attract manufacturing," said Denise Bode, CEO of the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) in a call with reporters Monday. "In this political climate we have to do what we can do."
AWEA, United Steelworkers, Sierra Club, Xcel Energy, and 11 other groups representing labor, environmental, and green business interests sent a letter to Reid asking him to include an RES in the package. "Without immediate passage, hundreds of thousands of future jobs in the clean energy sector could be lost and surrendered to other countries forever," the groups wrote to the leader.
Governors are also joining the drumbeat for an RES, including Iowa's Chet Culver (D), who extolled the value the state portfolio rule has had for Iowa, bringing the state to 20 percent renewables from just 5 percent four years ago. "Our energy future in this country depends on it," said Culver.
For environmental groups, the RES has become the last best hope for anything resembling a clean energy requirement in a bill this year. "While we are deeply disappointed that the Senate is not moving a comprehensive clean energy and climate bill at this time, we think it would be a huge missed opportunity if this package did not include a strong renewable electricity standard, which creates jobs and has bipartisan support," said Sara Chieffo, deputy legislative director at the League of Conservation Voters.
It's still anybody's guess whether the RES stands a chance of making it into the package this year. The RES could be the last hope for calling the Senate energy bill meaningful movement forward, or it could go down in flames along with the idea of mandatory carbon reductions this year.
On the death of the climate bill
"With all dead there’s usually only one thing you can do." ’What’s that?’ "Go through its clothes and look for loose change."
As Jon noted, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has officially announced that there will be no climate bill this year. But Jon's post doesn't fully convey the extent of the capitulation. What's happened is total and complete surrender. There's no silver lining in this cloud.
Not only will the bill not contain any restrictions on greenhouse gases -- not even a watered-down utility-only cap -- it won't even contain the two other key policies that would have moved clean energy forward: the Renewable Electricity Standard (RES) and the energy efficiency standards.
Basically, Reid canvassed his caucus and figured out what they could pay for (without a carbon price for funding) and what already had 60 votes. This is it:
- Some response to the Gulf oil spill, in the form of tighter restrictions on offshore drilling.
- Some pork for natural gas vehicles. (T-Boone gets his money.)
- Home Star.
- Some money for land and water conservation. (Baucus demanded $5 billion for this, leaving other, much more worthy clean energy programs begging.)
I'm running around at Netroots Nation right now, so I don't have a lot of time, but just a few quick notes.
Blame where it is due: I'm frustrated with Obama's passivity on this issue. I'm frustrated with Reid. I'm frustrated with the environmental movement. But we should be clear about where the bulk of the responsibility for this farce ultimately lies: the Republican Party and a handful of "centrist" Democrats in the Senate. They are the ones who refused to vote for a bill, no matter how many compromises were made, no matter how clear the urgency of the problem. They are moral cowards, condemning their own children and grandchildren to suffering to serve their own narrow electoral interests. There isn't enough contempt in the world for them. So when the anger and recrimination get going -- as they already are -- let's at least try to keep the focus on the real malefactors.
The cap is dead this year, but the RES & efficiency don't have to be: I've heard that some environmental groups are loath to push for an RES this year, because they think it's a kind of sweetener that will help the cap go down next year. That is dangerously short-sighted and wrong-headed. We know that the RES and efficiency have bipartisan support, and with a little bit of pressure, they could be strengthened. Green groups (and progressive senators) should rally around these two policies, and only these two policies, for the next few weeks.
Big Coal will be back begging for cap-and-trade: No, really. Right now there are EPA rules in the pipeline that are going to shut down a third or more of the existing coal fleet. No new coal plants are going to get built -- they're not cost-competitive with natural gas or wind, and every one runs into a buzzsaw of grassroots opposition. In other words, carbon caps or no carbon caps, Big Coal is in trouble. Sooner or later, the industry will realize that the funding it can get from cap-and-trade, to support carbon capture and sequestration, is its only path to survival. Robert Byrd tried to tell the industry the truth before he died. Byron Dorgan tried to tell it the truth just the other day. By 2012, certainly by 2015 when many of the rules kick in, the industry will be forced to acknowledge this basic truth. And they'll come begging Congress for cap-and-trade.
Protecting the EPA is now job one for progressives: Murkowski already tried to block EPA on carbon. Rockefeller's going to try again shortly, and his bid is going to be even trickier to block than hers. The EPA's ability to act must be protected. It won't be as comprehensive, as economically efficient, or as socially cooperative as smart climate legislation would have been, but it will reduce carbon. And you know what? Senators from coal-heavy states have poorly served their constituents, so as far as I'm concerned, they deserve a big ol' EPA boot to the ass. They made this bed, they can sleep in it.
"We don't have 60 votes" is bull: Every cowardly senator repeats it like a talisman to ward off the terrible threat of having to act: "We don't have the votes." Two things to say about that. First, of course you don't have votes for something this controversial before you go to the floor and force the issue. Pelosi didn't have the votes before she took the House bill to the floor. She got the votes by twisting arms and making deals. She forced the issue. That was the only way the Senate vote could ever work -- if the bill was put on the floor, the issue was forced, and Dems united in daring the GOP to vote against addressing the oil spill. There's no guarantee that would have worked, but at least it would have been a political rallying point. It would have put senators on record. And it's not like the wimpy avoidance strategy is producing better results.
Second, senators need to stop talking about "60 votes" as though it's in the Constitution that the U.S. Senate -- unlike every other legislative body on the planet -- has a supermajority requirement. It's not in the Constitution. It's an accident, an informal rule that Republicans have taken to relentlessly abusing, not to extend debate but simply to degrade the Senate's ability to act. The filibuster is anti-democratic and it is thwarting the country's will. The American people need to be told this and senators who still want their institution to be minimally functional need to start getting angry about it.
It's a sad, corrupt state of affairs this country finds itself in. I wish I had some hopeful words to offer. But at this point, American government appears to be broken. And our children and grandchildren will suffer for it.
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