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Tuesday, September 18, 2012


Coalition Sharply Reduces Joint Operations With Afghan Troops


By
September 18, 2012

Bryan Denton for The New York Times
An Afghan soldier spoke to children in Kandahar Province in March, while an American soldier kept watch. 

KABUL, Afghanistan — After years of tightly intertwining its forces with Afghan troops, the American-led military coalition has sharply curtailed ground-level operations with the Afghan Army and police forces, potentially undercutting the training mission that is the heart of the Western exit strategy.
The new limits, which were issued Sunday and require a general’s approval for any joint work at the small-unit level, were prompted by a spike in attacks on international troops by Afghan soldiers and police over the past six weeks. There was also fear that anger over an anti-Islam video could prompt more of what the coalition calls insider attacks, American officials said.
Coalition officials stressed that their officers would still be paired with higher-level Afghan units, and that the basic concept of training, advising and fighting alongside Afghan units in the field to ready them to fight on their own remained at the core of war strategy.
The advisory mission is “the way ahead. It is still valid,” said Lt. Col. Richard W. Spiegel of the Army, a coalition spokesman.
“We are not stepping away from this,” Colonel Spiegel added. “Things might look a little different, but we’re not walking away.”
Underscoring the potential for backlash over the amateurish video parodying the Prophet Muhammad, 14 people, 10 of them foreigners, were killed by a suicide bomber here in Kabul on Tuesday, bringing to at least 28 the number of deaths attributed to unrest sweeping the Muslim world as a result of the film. A spokesman for an Afghan insurgent group, Hezb-i-Islami, claimed responsibility for the bombing and said it was carried out by an 18-year-old woman.
“We claim credit for the attack by a martyrdom-seeking mujahid, an 18-year-old girl named Fatima, from Kabul, and the attack has been conducted in response to the film insulting the Prophet Muhammad and Islam,” said Zubir Siddiqi, a spokesman for the group, who was reached by telephone.
Coalition officers said the order to curtail direct cooperation covers all work done with Afghan forces below the level of a battalion. An American battalion has about 700 to 800 troops, though some are larger or smaller, and is designed to be the smallest unit that can fight independent of a higher command.
But in Afghanistan, where the Taliban blend easily and often strike in small groups, most of the combat goes on far below the battalion level, with small squads of about 10 men or platoons of about 15 to 40 soldiers or Marines.
Many of the day-to-day interactions between coalition and Afghan forces, like joint patrols and meetings with village elders, also take place in small groups. Sometimes, even recreation is shared, with Afghans and foreign troops playing volleyball or working out together at one of the scores of small, shared combat outposts spread across the country.
“Clearly, we’re going to be seeing less of that,” Colonel Spiegel said.
But, he stressed, work at those levels with the Afghans would not cease completely. Rather, any operations below the battalion level now must be approved by one of the five coalition regional commands in Afghanistan.
Most officials insisted the change would not have a huge impact or alter the basic American strategy. “No one should interpret this as anything more than a prudent response to recent events. We remain committed to our goals and strategy in Afghanistan,” said George Little, the Pentagon spokesman, speaking to reporters during a trip to China.
At a news conference on that trip, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said: “We are concerned with regards to these insider attacks and the impact they are having on our forces.” Gen. John R. Allen, the top NATO commander in Afghanistan, “has reflected that in the steps that he has taken,” Mr. Panetta said.
Some officials, though, acknowledged the new order would sharply limit organic cooperation between junior American and Afghan officers and their troops in the field, and thus could undercut the effectiveness of the advisory mission.
Until now, they had been empowered to organize patrols or small operations. An American captain could send men from his company to reinforce Afghans in a firefight without seeking higher approval.
But now, if a young lieutenant who commands a platoon wants to take a few dozen soldiers on a routine patrol with Afghan forces, he needs approval from a two-star general who commands a division, which usually has about 10,000 service members.
How adding layers of bureaucracy will play out remains to be seen, coalition officials said, noting that the new order was only issued two days ago. The order was first reported on Tuesday by NBC News, although its report said that all partnering of forces had been cut off, not just the work done by smaller units.
But officials insisted the strategy of partnering with the Afghans to get them ready to fight on their own remained in place. “The advisory piece has not stopped,” Colonel Spiegel said. “All that’s really happening is that we’ve changed the level at which risk assessments are approved.”
It was also unclear how the logistics of the new plan would work. The higher-level commands — the battalions and brigades — that will remain fully partnered with their Afghan counterparts are housed on sprawling bases where there is often physical distance and high walls between them and the Afghan commands.
But the smaller units those commands are composed of — companies and platoons — are in many places based at small outposts shared with Afghan forces. Sometimes, the two are separated by mere yards, and they often share guard duty at the outpost’s gate and in its guard towers, among other duties.
How work at those outposts is supposed to continue is unclear. Colonel Spiegel said there was no “cookie-cutter solution” and each case would be considered on an individual basis.
Other support the Americans and their NATO allies provide the Afghans would remain in place, like air cover, artillery support and the airlifting of wounded Afghans on American medical evacuation helicopters.
Afghan soldiers were not reassured by such talk. Three interviewed as word spread Tuesday said their many of their units were not yet ready to fight alone — an assessment shared by the Pentagon — and could be in deep trouble without close coalition assistance.
The curtailment of partnered operations is “a big problem for the Afghan Army,” said Maj. Salam, an officer based in western Afghanistan who asked that he only be identified by his rank and last name.
“We rely on the Americans for everything,” he continued. “The army is not in a level to carry out military operations independently, we still need their support. I do not buy the lies that the MOD officials are trying to sell us and the public — we are in the field and we know how difficult it would be for the army without Americans.”
He cited an episode on Monday in which an Afghan Army vehicle struck a hidden bomb. Two soldiers were killed, and the Americans did not respond to a request to evacuate four wounded soldiers.
Instead, they had to wait for help from their own forces, which do not have medical evacuation helicopters. “It took them six hours to bring the soldiers to the hospital. One of them has lost a lot of blood, and he might die,” Major Salam said.
If the Americans “abandon us,” he said, “they should know that it would be the end of everything for all of us.”

Habib Zahori, Sangar Rahimi and Rod Nordland contributed reporting in Kabul, and Thom Shanker in Beijing contributed reporting.


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We're Still at War: Photo of the Day for September 17, 2012

Mon Sep. 17, 2012 7:37 AM PDT
A U.S. Soldier looks out over Khas Uruzgan district, Afghanistan, from the door of a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter Aug. 29, 2012. DoD photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class James Ginther.
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SECRET VIDEO: Romney Tells Millionaire Donors What He REALLY Thinks of Obama Voters

When he doesn't know a camera's rolling, the GOP candidate shows his disdain for half of America.

—By 
| Mon Sep. 17, 2012 1:00 PM PDT
During a private fundraiser earlier this year, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney told a small group of wealthy contributors what he truly thinks of all the voters who support President Barack Obama. He dismissed these Americans as freeloaders who pay no taxes, who don't assume responsibility for their lives, and who think government should take care of them. Fielding a question from a donor about how he could triumph in November, Romney replied:
There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…These are people who pay no income tax.
Romney went on: "[M]y job is is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."
Mother Jones has obtained video of Romney at this intimate fundraiser—where he candidly discussed his campaign strategy and foreign policy ideas in stark terms he does not use in public—and has confirmed its authenticity. To protect the confidential source who provided the video, we have blurred some of the image, and we will not identify the date or location of the event, which occurred after Romney had clinched the Republican presidential nomination. [UPDATE: We can now report that this fundraiser was held at the Boca Raton home of controversial private equity manager Marc Leder on May 17 and we've removed the blurring from the video. See the original blurred videos here.]
Here is Romney expressing his disdain for Americans who back the president:
At the dinner, Romney often stuck to familiar talking points. But there were moments when he went beyond the familiar campaign lines. Describing his family background, he quipped about his father, "Had he been born of Mexican parents, I'd have a better shot of winning this." Contending that he is a self-made millionaire who earned his own fortune, Romney insisted, "I have inherited nothing." He remarked, "There is a perception, 'Oh, we were born with a silver spoon, he never had to earn anything and so forth.' Frankly, I was born with a silver spoon, which is the greatest gift you can have: which is to get born in America."
Romney told the contributors that "women are open to supporting me," but that "we are having a much harder time with Hispanic voters, and if the Hispanic voting bloc becomes as committed to the Democrats as the African American voting block has in the past, why, we're in trouble as a party and, I think, as a nation." When one attendee asked how this group could help Romney sell himself to others, he answered, "Frankly, what I need you to do is to raise millions of dollars." He added, "The fact that I'm either tied or close to the president…that's very interesting."
Asked why he wouldn't go full-throttle and assail Obama as corrupt, Romney explained the internal thinking of his campaign and revealed that he and his aides, in response to focus-group studies conducted by his consultants, were hesitant to hammer the president too hard out of fear of alienating independents who voted for Obama in 2008:
We speak with voters across the country about their perceptions. Those people I told you—the 5 to 6 or 7 percent that we have to bring onto our side—they all voted for Barack Obama four years ago. So, and by the way, when you say to them, "Do you think Barack Obama is a failure?" they overwhelmingly say no. They like him. But when you say, "Are you disappointed that his policies haven't worked?" they say yes. And because they voted for him, they don't want to be told that they were wrong, that he's a bad guy, that he did bad things, that he's corrupt. Those people that we have to get, they want to believe they did the right thing, but he just wasn't up to the task. They love the phrase that he's "over his head." But if we're—but we, but you see, you and I, we spend our day with Republicans. We spend our days with people who agree with us. And these people are people who voted for him and don't agree with us. And so the things that animate us are not the things that animate them. And the best success I have at speaking with those people is saying, you know, the president has been a disappointment. He told you he'd keep unemployment below 8 percent. Hasn't been below eight percent since. Fifty percent of kids coming out of school can't get a job. Fifty percent. Fifty percent of the kids in high school in our 50 largest cities won't graduate from high school. What're they gonna do? These are the kinds of things that I can say to that audience that they nod their head and say, "Yeah, I think you're right." What he's going to do, by the way, is try and vilify me as someone who's been successful, or who's, you know, closed businesses or laid people off, and is an evil bad guy. And that may work.
(Note: Obama did not promise his policies would keep unemployment under 8 percent, and 50 percent of college graduates are not unemployed.)
To assure the donors that he and his campaign knew what they were doing, Romney boasted about the consultants he had retained, emphasizing that several had worked for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu:
I have a very good team of extraordinarily experienced, highly successful consultants, a couple of people in particular who have done races around the world. I didn't realize it. These guys in the US—the Karl Rove equivalents—they do races all over the world: in Armenia, in Africa, in Israel. I mean, they work for Bibi Netanyahu in his race. So they do these races and they see which ads work, and which processes work best, and we have ideas about what we do over the course of the campaign. I'd tell them to you, but I'd have to shoot you.
When one donor said he was disappointed that Romney wasn't attacking Obama with sufficient intellectual firepower, Romney groused that the campaign trail was no place for high-minded and detail-oriented arguments:
Well, I wrote a book that lays out my view for what has to happen in the country, and people who are fascinated by policy will read the book. We have a website that lays out white papers on a whole series of issues that I care about. I have to tell you, I don't think this will have a significant impact on my electability. I wish it did. I think our ads will have a much bigger impact. I think the debates will have a big impact…My dad used to say, "Being right early is not good in politics." And in a setting like this, a highly intellectual subject—discussion on a whole series of important topics typically doesn't win elections. And there are, there are, there are—for instance, this president won because of "hope and change."
Romney, who spoke confidently throughout the event and seemed quite at ease with the well-heeled group, insisted that his election in and of itself would lead to economic growth and that the markets would react favorably if his chances seemed good in the fall:
They'll probably be looking at what the polls are saying. If it looks like I'm going to win, the markets will be happy. If it looks like the president's going to win, the markets should not be terribly happy. It depends of course which markets you're talking about, which types of commodities and so forth, but my own view is that if we win on November 6th, there will be a great deal of optimism about the future of this country. We'll see capital come back and we'll see—without actually doing anything—we'll actually get a boost in the economy. If the president gets reelected, I don't know what will happen. I can—I can never predict what the markets will do. Sometimes it does the exact opposite of what I would have expected. But my own view is that if we get a "Taxageddon," as they call it, January 1st, with this president, and with a Congress that can't work together, it's—it really is frightening.
Video production: James West, Adam Serwer, Dana Liebelson, and Erika EichelbergerAt the dinner, Romney also said that the campaign purposefully was using Ann Romney "sparingly…so that people don't get tired of her." And he noted that he had turned down an invitation from Saturday Night Live because such an appearance "has the potential of looking slapstick and not presidential."
Here was Romney raw and unplugged—sort of unscripted. With this crowd of fellow millionaires, he apparently felt free to utter what he really believes and would never dare say out in the open. He displayed a high degree of disgust for nearly half of his fellow citizens, lumping all Obama voters into a mass of shiftless moochers who don't contribute much, if anything, to society, and he indicated that he viewed the election as a battle between strivers (such as himself and the donors before him) and parasitic free-riders who lack character, fortitude, and initiative. Yet Romney explained to his patrons that he could not speak such harsh words about Obama in public, lest he insult those independent voters who sided with Obama in 2008 and whom he desperately needs in this election. These were sentiments not to be shared with the voters; it was inside information, available only to the select few who had paid for the privilege of experiencing the real Romney.
COMING SOON: More from the secret Romney video. (Romney tells his donors he doesn't believe in a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, that resolving this conflict is "almost unthinkable," and that he would merely "kick the ball down the field.")
Research assistance: James Carter  (Jimmy Carter's grand son)
This story originally contained versions of the videos that were blurred out. You can find those videos, in the order they appear in this post, here, here, here, here, and here.


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Why the Poor Pay No Federal Income Tax: A Wee Tutorial

—By 
| Mon Sep. 17, 2012 3:45 PM PDT
Is it true, as Mitt Romney says, that 47% of Americans don't pay federal income tax? Yes! That's mostly because they're either poor, elderly, or take advantage of tax credits for low-income workers. Details here. But why do these people pay no income tax? Ezra Klein breaks it down into Twitter-sized chunks:
  • Rs have spent years cutting income taxes and increasing things like the Child Tax Credit. This means fewer people pay income taxes.
  • So whenever you hear a stat like "47% don't pay income taxes," remember: Reagan and Bush helped build that.
  • These tax cuts for the poor were partly in order to make further tax cuts for the rich political palatable.
  • But now that fewer people pay income taxes as a result of GOP policies, they’re being called lazy and dependent.
  • And thus the GOP's tax cuts are being used to make a case that the rich are overtaxed and that the less-rich are becoming dependent.
  • Which thus leads to a policy agenda of tax cuts for the rich and cuts to social services for the non-rich.
Yep, that's about it. Also worth noting: the poor often pay higher state tax rates than the rich. Add in payroll taxes and excise taxes, instead of cherry picking only a single tax, and it turns out that the poor and the working class end up paying a fair chunk of their income in taxes. Not as big a chunk as the rich, it's true, but then, it strikes most of us as perfectly fair that the poor should pay lower tax rates than the rich. I wonder if this strikes Romney as fair too?
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 Eleven Years Later, We Are Still at War

Tuesday, 11 September 2012 13:09 By Johnny Barber, War Is a Crime | News Analysis
A memorial honoring sustainment soldiers who fell during operations Iraqi Freedom and New Dawn at the Army Logistics University, Fort Lee, Virgina. (Photo: Jamie Carson, CASCOM Public Affairs Office)A memorial honoring sustainment soldiers who fell during operations Iraqi Freedom and New Dawn at the Army Logistics University, Fort Lee, Virginia. (Photo: Jamie Carson, CASCOM Public Affairs Office)
"We are at war. Somebody is going to pay."
-George W. Bush, Sept 11th, 2001.

Eleven years later, we are still at war. Bullets, mortars and drones are still extracting payment. Thousands, tens of thousands, millions have paid in full. Children and even those yet to be born will continue to pay for decades to come.
On a single day in Iraq last week there were 29 bombing attacks in 19 cities, killing 111 civilians and wounding another 235. On Sept 9th, reports indicate 88 people were killed and another 270 injured in 30 attacks all across the country. Iraq continues in a seemingly endless death spiral into chaos. In his acceptance speech for the Democratic nomination for President, Obama claimed he ended the war in Iraq, well... not quite.
The city of Fallujah remains under siege. Not from U.S. troops, but from a deluge of birth defects that have plagued families since the use of depleted uranium and white phosphorus by U.S. forces in 2004. No government studies have provided a direct link to the use of these weapons because no government studies have been undertaken, and none are contemplated.
Dr. Samira Alani, a pediatric specialist at Fallujah General Hospital, told Al Jazeera,
"We have all kinds of defects now, ranging from congenital heart disease to severe physical abnormalities, both in numbers you cannot imagine. There are not even medical terms to describe some of these conditions because we've never seen them until now." The photographs are available on line if you can bear to look at what we have wrought. George W. Bush will loudly proclaim his "Pro-life" bona fides, and he'll tell you he believes "that every child, born and unborn, ought to be protected in law and welcomed into life." Apparently, "every child" doesn't apply to the children of Fallujah, and the "law" doesn't apply to George W. Bush.
Our soldiers, some physically damaged by IED's, some mentally destroyed by PTSD, will pay for these wars for the rest of their days. Drug and alcohol abuse is out of control. Suicide among the troops is an epidemic. 2,916 Americans were lost in the towers on that fateful day, many, many more have perished in the intervening years.
Today we will be asked to honor the men and woman of our armed forces, but what does honoring the veterans entail? In its most recent report, The Veterans Administration estimates about 107,000 veterans are homeless on any given night. Mental illness plagues 45% of homeless vets and 70% suffer from some kind of substance abuse. So how do you honor our veterans? Are "Support Our Troops" ribbons still in vogue? How does our government honor our veterans other than use them as political pawns in stump speeches and cannon fodder for their wars?
84,000 American troops remain in Afghanistan. While the occupation is rarely mentioned in the U.S. mainstream media, that doesn't mean the killing has stopped. On average, one U.S. soldier dies everyday. Not an enormous sum, unless it is your mother, father, son or daughter that has perished. Few Americans notice. Afghan loses are not reported. They have loved ones who grieve as well.
The American public has turned their attention to feeding their families, keeping their homes, and finding employment. But what of the $2 billion dollars per week we are spending on war in Afghanistan? What would $2 billion per week look like in our devastated communities, in our schools, in creating jobs or in caring for our elders? Politicians in both parties claim our first priority is to reduce the debt. If they were really serious, if they were honest, they would end this occupation and stop calling for cuts to Medicaid, Food Stamps, and Social Security.
And what is the price extracted from the Afghan people? Security is still a dream, even in Kabul. As I write this, 6 people have perished in a suicide bombing outside NATO headquarters, in the heart of Kabul. Several of them were impoverished street kids, peddling packs of gum to the westerners who frequent the area.
Hilary Clinton, Madeline Albright, Jan Schakowsky, and other prominent American women claim American forces are necessary in Afghanistan to protect the gains made in woman's rights. On Sept 6th, Emma Graham-Harrison reported in the Guardian that 3 women in Kabul were attacked by a group of men because of their work as television actresses. One of the women was murdered. After seeking treatment at the hospital, the two survivors were taken to prison, where they face intrusive virginity tests and possible charges of prostitution or collusion in the attack. They face long prison sentences. This is not the Taliban; this is woman's rights in Afghanistan today, rights that Hilary Clinton fears will be rolled back!
On the streets of Kabul it is not unusual to see burka clad women clutching starving children begging for spare change. Poverty and hunger is even worse in Kandahar and Helmand, areas that have seen some of the most intense fighting of the war. In southern Afghanistan 29.5% of the children are suffering from severe malnutrition. This compares to famine stricken areas of Africa, yet, officially, there is no famine in Afghanistan and hundreds of millions of dollars of humanitarian aid has flowed into the country.
In America, 35 million people are hungry or do not know where their next meal is coming from and 13 million of them are children. Who benefits from the "War on Terror"?
On Sept 2nd, Hamid Karzai announced his choice for the new intelligence chief, Asadullah Khalid. Khalid is currently the country's minister of tribal and border affairs who oversees its southern security forces. In 2009 Richard Colvin, Canada's former deputy ambassador to Afghanistan, testified before Canada's parliament that his team had uncovered "very credible" evidence of torture, which allegedly included Khalid's direct involvement. "He was known to have had a dungeon in Ghazni, his previous province, where he used to detain people for money, and some of them disappeared," Colvin said in his testimony. "He was known to be running a narcotics operation. He had a criminal gang. He had people killed who got in his way." Khalid and Karzai dismiss the allegations as unfounded.
In Kabul, children freeze to death in the winter, and they starve to death all year round. Meanwhile on the edge of Kabul a "New City" is being built. Hamid Karzai's brother, Qayum Karzai, the owner of a construction company, benefits as his company "wins" government contracts without the hassles of competitive bidding. Karzai's relatives are also benefiting from lucrative contracts in the oil and mineral sectors. In late 2011, Watan Oil and Gas, a company controlled by President Karzai's cousins Rateb and Rashid Popal gained a contract with China's National Petroleum Corporation. In 1989 Rateb was convicted for smuggling drugs in the U.S. and spent more than eight years in prison. The Popal family's company, Watan Risk Management, also worked as a contractor for the US forces. In 2010, they were accused of paying off Taliban insurgents with a cut from NATO contracts. According to the NY Times, another brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai was involved in the heroin trade and was also on the CIA's payroll for several years before his assassination in 2011. The Karzai family now brings in billions of dollars a year. 42% of Afghans live on less than a dollar a day. So we are bent on ridding Afghanistan of the Taliban while the government is full of warlords, gangsters, and drug dealers.
Since America's intervention in Afghanistan, the heroin trade has exploded, doubling opium production. Afghanistan is now the source of 90% of the world's heroin. This dovetail's nicely with America's "War on Drugs."
The growth in the heroin trade coupled with the despair of daily living has contributed to an eruption of drug addiction. Addicts can be found huddled under bridges throughout Kabul. As these men succumb to addiction, their families are left to fend for themselves. Heroin floods the streets of Europe and Russia. Which banks benefit from the enormous cash flows generated by the heroin trade? Who in the Afghan government benefits?
The corruption is mind-boggling. We support terrorist elements, most recently in Syria and Libya, but before that in Iraq, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan, and then find ourselves fighting them down the road. In a reversal of our usual modus operandi, it has come to light that during the Bush years the CIA tortured numerous members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), an armed Islamist Group that had worked to overthrow Gaddafi for 20 years, before transferring them to Gaddafi's regime for further torture. Some of these same fighters rendered and tortured by America and Libya now hold key leadership posts in the "liberated" Libya.
Private interests in Saudi Arabia continue to fund Sunni extremists around the world. Wikileaks released a Dec. 2009 cable from the State Department that complained that Saudi donors remain the primary financiers of militant groups like Al-Qaeda. In May 2010, the Sunday Times of London revealed that the Afghan Financial Intelligence Unit, FinTRACA, reported that since 2006 at least 1.5 billion dollars from Saudi Arabia was funneled to the Taliban in Afghanistan, with Al-Qaeda withholding a cut for their delivery services. Why is there no outcry from the U.S.?
In 2011 overseas weapons sales by the United States totaled $66.3 billion, or more than three-quarters of the global arms market. Russia was second, with $4.8 billion in deals. Who benefits from the War on Terror and who benefits when America threatens war?
Over half of the sales, or $33.4 billion, consisted of arms sales to Saudi Arabia. These sales included F-15 fighter jets, dozens of Apache and Black Hawk helicopters, as well as an array of missiles, bombs and delivery systems, as well as accessories such as night-vision goggles and radar warning systems. These sales offset the flow of US dollars to pay for Saudi oil, and this explains why there is no outrage directed toward the Saudi regime.
The War on Terror exploits the tragedy of September 11 for the benefit of a very few. Poor people continue to pay an enormous price, while the elites, including our own government and the corporations it answers to, ignore everything but the influx of cash into their coffers. The war business is profitable if you refuse to count the cost of human lives.
In his acceptance speech for the Democratic nomination for President, Obama said, "Our destinies are bound together. A freedom which only asks what's in it for me, a freedom without a commitment to others, a freedom without love or charity, is unworthy of our founding ideals." In closing, he said, "We travel together. We leave no one behind. We pull each other up." Why is it our Presidents fail to include those they bomb in their lofty sentiments? The simple truth is our destinies are bound together with those who lie beyond the borders of our country as well.
A young, educated Afghan man, an advisor to Parliament, sees the corruption of his government and despairs. He asks me, "What is my share in this world?" He continues, "Absolutely nothing. And for my child, the same." His voice trails off. We sit drinking tea as night comes on.
Johnny Barber is writing from Kabul where he is a guest of the Afghan Peace Volunteers in Kabul. To learn more, visit www.oneBrightpearl-jb.blogspot.com and www.oneBrightpearl.com.
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Romney Reacts to 47 Percent Video, Stands By Remarks

—By 
| Mon Sep. 17, 2012 2:52 PM PDT

On Monday, my colleague David Corn published exclusive video of remarks Mitt Romney made at a closed-door fundraiser for big-money donors, in which the GOP presidential nominee declared that 47 percent of Americans—that is, those who support President Obama—are "dependent upon government" and "believe that they are victims." (And, according to Romney, Obama backers don't pay income taxes either.) Now, the Obama campaign is looking to turn those statements into a major campaign issue. Here's the statement from campaign manager Jim Messina that was emailed to reporters on Monday afternoon:
"It's shocking that a candidate for President of the United States would go behind closed doors and declare to a group of wealthy donors that half the American people view themselves as 'victims,' entitled to handouts, and are unwilling to take 'personal responsibility' for their lives. It's hard to serve as president for all Americans when you've disdainfully written off half the nation."
It was also blasted out to Obama's 19 million Twitter followers. For Romney, this may be only the beginning of his problems: more clips from this private fundraiser are coming soon.
Update: And here's the Romney campaign's statement, from spokeswoman Gail Gitcho:
Mitt Romney wants to help all Americans struggling in the Obama economy. As the governor has made clear all year, he is concerned about the growing number of people who are dependent on the federal government, including the record number of people who are on food stamps, nearly one in six Americans in poverty, and the 23 million Americans who are struggling to find work. Mitt Romney’s plan creates 12 million new jobs in four years, grows the economy and moves Americans off of government dependency and into jobs.
Update II, 9/17, 10:23 p.m.: In a rare and hastily scheduled press conference in Orange County on Monday night, Romney stood by his remarks. "This is the same message I give to people," Romney said of his dig at the 47 percent. His only failing, he said, was in the delivery. "It's not elegantly stated, let me put it that way," Romney said. "I'm speaking off the cuff in response to a question and, I'm sure I can say it more clearly"
Romney added, "I hope the person who has the video would put out the full video."
Watch:
The Segerstrom Center for the Arts
Costa Mesa, CA
ROMNEY OPENING STATEMENT

21:57:30: Good evening. I understand there's been a video that's been on the internet for a few weeks that has attracted some attention and I thought I would make some comments about it. Apparently it's got a snippet of a question and answer session at a fundraising event. It doesn't capture the question so I don't know precisely what was asked but I think it was about my campaign and how I would be able to get a majority of voters to support me. By the way, whoever has released the snippets would, I would certainly appreciate if they would release the whole tape so we could see all of it. I believe the point I was made is that the president starts off with a large number of the voters, 47, 48, 49 percent, something like that. These are people who are in his camp and uh they will vote for him almost no matter what, and I also have a large number of people who will vote for me almost no matter what, at least I hope so, and my campaign effort is to focus on the people in the middle. The people I will try and draw into my campaign are largely people who voted for Barack Obama last time around and who I want to have as part of my campaign (a little jumbled on my audio here, but think he says "if it is to be successful").

21:58:30 So it's a question and answer as I recall about the process of the campaign and how I'm going to get the 51 or 52 percent I need and I point out it's by focusing on those folks that are neither in his camp nor in my camp.  Of course there's a very different approach of the two different campaigns, as I point out I recognize that among those that pay no tax, approximately 47 percent of Americans, I'm not likely to be highly successful with the message of lowering taxes.  That's not as attractive to those who don't pay income taxes as it is to those who do.  And likewise those who are reliant on government are not as attracted to my message of slimming down the size of government.  And so I then focus on those individuals who I believe are most likely to be able to be pulled into my camp and help me win the 51 or 50.1% that I need to become the next President.


21:59:15 This is, of course, something I talk about a good deal in rallies and speeches and so forth, which is the president and I have very different approaches to the future of America and what it takes to ignite our economy and put people back to work.  The president believes in what I've described as a government centered society where gov't plays a larger and larger roll, provides for more and more of the needs of individuals and I happen to believe instead in a free enterprise, free individual society where people pursuing their dreams are able to employ one another, build enterprises, build the strongest economy in the world.  I happen to believe that my approach is the approach that will put 23 million people back to work again.  We've watched the results of the Presidents approach over the last 3 ½ , 4 years, and his government-centric, larger and larger government approach has meant that we have 15 million more people on food stamps, 23 million people out of work or stopped looking for work or underemployed.  We have had 43 straight months with unemployment above 8 percent and my view is that the right approach for our nation is not to adopt a government centered approach, but instead a free, free people, free enterprise, free market, consumer driven approach and that will build the strongest economy for ourselves and for the coming generation.


22:00:40 Q1 (Murray/WSJ): On "victims" language, and "personal responsibility". What did you mean by that?

A: Well, you said a number of things there and I'm talking about the political process of drawing people into my own campaign. Of course, individuals are going to take responsibility for their lives. My campaign is about helping people take more responsibility and becoming employed again, particularly those who don't have work. This whole campaign is based on getting people jobs again, putting people back to work. This is ultimately a question about direction for the country. Do you believe in a government centered society that provides more and more benefits or do you believe instead in a free enterprise society where people are able to pursue their dreams....

22:01:57 Q2 (Holland/Reuters): Are you not stepping away from anything and do you worry you've offended this 47 percent you mentioned?
 
A: Well, um, It's not elegantly stated let me put it that way I'm speaking off the cuff in response to a question and I'm sure I can state it more clearly in a more effective way than I did in a setting like that and so I'm sure ill point that out as time goes on but we don't even have the question given the snippet there nor the full response and I hope the person who has the video would put out the full material. But it's a message which I'm going to carry and continue to carry which is look the president approach is attractive to people who aren't not paying taxes because frankly my discussion about lowering taxes isn't as attractive to them and therefore I'm not likely to draw them in to my campaign as effectively as those who are in the middle. This is really a discussion about the political process of winning the election and of course I want to help all americans, all americans, have a bright and prosperous future and I'm convinced the presidents approach has not done that and will not do that.
 
22:03:13 Q3 (Haake/NBC): What insurance can you give to voters that you're not saying different things to people that fund your campaign than you do to people on the stump?

A: "You're coming to my fundraiser and this is the same message that i give to people which is that we have a very different approach the president and i between a government dominated society and a society driven by free people pursuing their dreams I'm talking about the process of campaigns, typically i don't talk about process in speeches because I think candidates are wiser to talk about policy and their vision than to talk about how they're going to win a election, at a fundraiser you have people say governor how are you going to win this? And so I respond well, the president has his group I have my group I want to keep my team strong and motivated and I want to get those people in the middle, that's something which fundraising people who are parting with their monies are very interested in knowing can you win or not and that's what this was addressing.
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Gov. Rick Scott visits Miami-Dade high school

Teachers and the Miami-Dade schools chief told Scott their concerns about accountability rules for English-language learners and students with disabilities. Scott said those would be reviewed.

Unfortunetly, he is a republican, and right now those governors of states are looking to do away with public school and do charter or magnet schools, where state does not enter the picture and parents have to foot the bill. And that would leave  a lot of kids without school, because their parents could not afford it. Don't get me wrong, I am for reliable strong, school systems, that educate children to their full potential.  But right now, all I see are republican governors who cut, hack, and squeeze money out of education.  I see lots of schools closing down, because teachers have been laid off, class size doubled, and teachers buying their own supplies, because budgets have not been improved they have been slaughtered. We want our children prepared for college, if they want, prepared to hit the street running in order to get a job in their chosen field, that offers a steady wage, incentives, good working conditions and additional education if need be. This is the first public school that Mr Scott has visited, that tells me a lot about what this governor  feels about public teaching.  I used to live in Volusia County and I saw several schools closed, and several schools forced to take those students in their already over crowded schools. I now live in Akron Pennsylvania, and the school system here is the Ephrata School System, and this system works, and is top notch.  They care about their students, both of my grand daughters have trouble with speech, need extra help. Here they get it, Mom is always kept informed, so she and the teacher can make changes in the school year plan. Again our state is run by a republican governor and congress, and they are cutting, slashing education.  I worry, what would happen in this state if teachers went on strike, like Ohio teachers. I know why there are unions, I know that they look after their members.I know that it seems that they are only interested in keeping the status quo for their members. There has to be a way to eliminate the friction between the state and the unions.

By Laura Isensee

lisensee@MiamiHerald.com

Gov. Rick Scott continued his weeklong education listening tour Tuesday in South Florida.

 While high-stakes testing dominated his first stop in Jacksonville, the superintendent and teachers in Miami-Dade told Scott about major concerns with accountability rules for English-language learners and students with intellectual disabilities, on top of the amount of testing and tight budgets in schools.

 Scott, who plans to run for reelection in 2014, visited Southwest Miami Senior High as part of his tour to gather input from parents, students, teachers, principals and superintendents on how to improve education in Florida.

The governor watched the school’s Sept. 11 memorial and toured several classrooms. His wife, Florida first lady Ann Scott, visited with students while the governor and interim Education Commissioner Pamela Stewart sat down with about a dozen teachers.

 It was the governor’s first visit to a traditional public school in Miami-Dade.

 The teachers were not shy. They gave Scott a copy of their testing schedule and shared their concerns.

 “I have a huge concern, a very big concern for kids who are expected to be at par with kids who were [raised] here, were born here, in a year’s time,” said Maria Amor, who heads the department of English as a second language.

 “Put me in China with the only accommodation that you’re going to give me extra time to take the test in Chinese and a dictionary in Chinese, I still will not pass it, and it has nothing to do with my intellectual ability,” she said.

 Southwest Miami, with about 3,100 students, has earned an ‘A’ from the state for the past two years. It has nearly 500 students who are learning English as a second language and about 500 students in special education classes. 

 Those two groups of students will now be included in the formula for calculating school letter grades under new state rules. Former Education Commissioner Gerard Robinson said the changes were needed to apply for a waiver for the federal No Child Left Behind law, which requires schools to make annual progress or face increasingly tough consequences.

 Similarly, Agustin Grana, a former Miami-Dade teacher of the year, said he was concerned about accountability rules for his students, who have intellectual disabilities.
“Our school is a community school and comparing it to charter schools or even magnet schools that don’t have the sort of demographics ... troubles me. I’m wondering if he has a plan,” Grana said. “I also have some questions with how my students -- intellectually disabled students -- are assessed. I’m not too comfortable with the test that they’re given.”
Grana’s students take the Florida Alternative Assessment, which is conducted one on one. Teachers often help their students fill in answers. Grana said if student scores on those tests are tied to teacher pay, it could cause temptation for teachers to boost students’ progress, and in turn their own paycheck.

 After the hourlong roundtable, Scott told reporters he learned interesting facts -- like how one science teacher spent thousands out of pocket for her classes -- that he would take back to Tallahassee.

 He said he and the Department of Education would review the accountability rules for English-language learners and students with disabilities.

 “We’ve asked for some additional information, but we’ve got to look at that,” Scott said, noting his daughter has taught students with learning disabilities. “We’re clearly going to look at it. The whole idea with this is to get information and say what should we be focusing on, what can we do to improve.”

Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said he appreciated the willingness from Scott and the education commissioner to look at those rules.
“It is unfair. It is disparaging to both students and teachers alike, and it does not adequately or accurately depict student achievement gains posted by these students,” Carvalho said.
Last week, the Miami-Dade School Board voted to support changing how schools are graded on the performance of English-language learners.

 The other big topic of Carvalho’s discussion with Scott: more education funding in the state budget.

 Teachers and students said they were thankful for face time with the governor and hopeful he’d act on their input.

 “He listened more than he talked, so we got to be heard,” Amor said.

 Later Tuesday, Scott was scheduled to meet with teachers and parents in Boca Raton.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/09/11/2997295/gov-rick-scott-visits-miami-dade.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy
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Thurston Howell Romney


By 
September 17, 2012
In 1980, about 30 percent of Americans received some form of government benefits. Today, as Nicholas Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute has pointed out, about 49 percent do.
In 1960, government transfers to individuals totaled $24 billion. By 2010, that total was 100 times as large. Even after adjusting for inflation, entitlement transfers to individuals have grown by more than 700 percent over the last 50 years. This spending surge, Eberstadt notes, has increased faster under Republican administrations than Democratic ones.
There are sensible conclusions to be drawn from these facts. You could say that the entitlement state is growing at an unsustainable rate and will bankrupt the country. You could also say that America is spending way too much on health care for the elderly and way too little on young families and investments in the future.
But these are not the sensible arguments that Mitt Romney made at a fund-raiser earlier this year. Romney, who criticizes President Obama for dividing the nation, divided the nation into two groups: the makers and the moochers. Forty-seven percent of the country, he said, are people “who are dependent upon government, who believe they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to take care of them, who believe they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it.”
This comment suggests a few things. First, it suggests that he really doesn’t know much about the country he inhabits. Who are these freeloaders? Is it the Iraq war veteran who goes to the V.A.? Is it the student getting a loan to go to college? Is it the retiree on Social Security or Medicare?
It suggests that Romney doesn’t know much about the culture of America. Yes, the entitlement state has expanded, but America remains one of the hardest-working nations on earth. Americans work longer hours than just about anyone else. Americans believe in work more than almost any other people. Ninety-two percent say that hard work is the key to success, according to a 2009 Pew Research Survey.
It says that Romney doesn’t know much about the political culture. Americans haven’t become childlike worshipers of big government. On the contrary, trust in government has declined. The number of people who think government spending promotes social mobility has fallen.
The people who receive the disproportionate share of government spending are not big-government lovers. They are Republicans. They are senior citizens. They are white men with high school degrees. As Bill Galston of the Brookings Institution has noted, the people who have benefited from the entitlements explosion are middle-class workers, more so than the dependent poor.
Romney’s comments also reveal that he has lost any sense of the social compact. In 1987, during Ronald Reagan’s second term, 62 percent of Republicans believed that the government has a responsibility to help those who can’t help themselves. Now, according to the Pew Research Center, only 40 percent of Republicans believe that.
The Republican Party, and apparently Mitt Romney, too, has shifted over toward a much more hyperindividualistic and atomistic social view — from the Reaganesque language of common citizenship to the libertarian language of makers and takers. There’s no way the country will trust the Republican Party to reform the welfare state if that party doesn’t have a basic commitment to provide a safety net for those who suffer for no fault of their own.
The final thing the comment suggests is that Romney knows nothing about ambition and motivation. The formula he sketches is this: People who are forced to make it on their own have drive. People who receive benefits have dependency.
But, of course, no middle-class parent acts as if this is true. Middle-class parents don’t deprive their children of benefits so they can learn to struggle on their own. They shower benefits on their children to give them more opportunities — so they can play travel sports, go on foreign trips and develop more skills.
People are motivated when they feel competent. They are motivated when they have more opportunities. Ambition is fired by possibility, not by deprivation, as a tour through the world’s poorest regions makes clear.
Sure, there are some government programs that cultivate patterns of dependency in some people. I’d put federal disability payments and unemployment insurance in this category. But, as a description of America today, Romney’s comment is a country-club fantasy. It’s what self-satisfied millionaires say to each other. It reinforces every negative view people have about Romney.
Personally, I think he’s a kind, decent man who says stupid things because he is pretending to be something he is not — some sort of cartoonish government-hater. But it scarcely matters. He’s running a depressingly inept presidential campaign. Mr. Romney, your entitlement reform ideas are essential, but when will the incompetence stop?
Frank Bruni is off today.
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John Lewis: GOP 'Still Trying to Stop People From Voting'

Ari Berman on September 6, 2012 - 6:44 PM ET

Representative John Lewis of Georgia was brutally beaten while marching for the right to vote during “Bloody Sunday” in Selma, Alabama, in 1965. The brave activism of Lewis and so many others in the segregated South led to the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965. At the Democratic convention tonight, Lewis told his own story and strongly rebuked efforts by Republican legislators to restrict the right to vote since the 2010 election. Here are his remarks. They are worth quoting in full:
I first came to this city in 1961, the year Barack Obama was born. I was one of the thirteen original “Freedom Riders.” We were on a bus ride from Washington to New Orleans trying to test a recent Supreme Court ruling that banned racial discrimination on buses crossing state lines and in the stations that served them. Here in Charlotte, a young African-American rider got off the bus and tried to get a shoeshine in a so-called white waiting room. He was arrested and taken to jail.
On that same day, we continued on to Rock Hill, South Carolina, about 25 miles. From here, when my seatmate, Albert Bigelow, and I tried to enter a white waiting room, we were met by an angry mob that beat us and left us lying in a pool of blood. Some police officers came up and asked us whether we wanted to press charges. We said, “No, we come in peace, love and nonviolence.” We said our struggle was not against individuals, but against unjust laws and customs. Our goal was true freedom for every American.
Since then, America has made a lot of progress. We are a different society than we were in 1961. And in 2008, we showed the world the true promise of America when we elected President Barack Obama. A few years ago, a man from Rock Hill, inspired by President Obama’s election, decided to come forward. He came to my office in Washington and said, “I am one of the people who beat you. I want to apologize. Will you forgive me?” I said, “I accept your apology.” He started crying. He gave me a hug. I hugged him back, and we both started crying. This man and I don’t want to go back; we don’t want to go back.
Brothers and sisters, do you want to go back? Or do you want to keep America moving forward? My dear friends, your vote is precious, almost sacred. It is the most powerful, nonviolent tool we have to create a more perfect union. Not too long ago, people stood in unmovable lines. They had to pass a so-called literacy test, pay a poll tax. On one occasion, a man was asked to count the number of bubbles in a bar of soap. On another occasion, one was asked to count the jelly beans in a jar—all to keep them from casting their ballots.
Today it is unbelievable that there are Republican officials still trying to stop some people from voting. They are changing the rules, cutting polling hours and imposing requirements intended to suppress the vote. The Republican leader in the Pennsylvania House even bragged that his state’s new voter ID law is “gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state.” That’s not right. That’s not fair. And that is not just.
And similar efforts have been made in Texas, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, Arizona, Georgia and South Carolina. I’ve seen this before. I’ve lived this before. Too many people struggled, suffered and died to make it possible for every American to exercise their right to vote.
And we have come too far together to ever turn back. So Democrats, we must not be silent. We must stand up, speak up and speak out. We must march to the polls like never, ever before. We must come together and exercise our sacred right. And together, on November 6, we will re-elect the man who will lead America forward: President Barack Obama.
Earlier today I attended an event organized by the DNC’s Voting Rights Institute, where Lewis spoke. The overwhelming theme of the panel was how the voter suppression laws passed by Republicans in the past two years take us back to a frighteningly dark period in our country’s history. MSNBC host/Nation columnist Melissa Harris-Perry likened the fights of today to the post-Reconstruction era of 1880-1910, when white segregationists passed a slew of laws undermining the right to vote for newly emancipated black voters following the Civil War. “[Republicans] went back to the older playbook—you use the law to suppress the vote,” said NAACP President Ben Jealous, who called strict voter ID laws “the new poll tax.”
According to Susan Falck, a research associate at California State University–Northridge, twenty-nine laws restricting the right to vote were passed in the United States from 1865–1967. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, twenty-five laws restricting the right to vote have been passed from 2011–12. Eight of eleven states in the former confederacy have passed laws aimed at suppressing minority voters since the 2010 election. These are unbelievable statistics—and make one wonder why the likes of Lewis aren’t speaking in prime time.
Bill Clinton touched on this alarming trend at the end of his speech last night, saying “it is wrong to change voting procedures just to reduce the turnout of younger, poorer, minority and disabled voters.” Clinton forcefully attacked GOP voter suppression at greater length on Tuesday night during an event with the Arkansas Democratic Party.
Democratic Party leaders are belatedly recognizing the moral and political consequences of the war on voting—a subject Lewis knows all too well. Said Lewis this morning: “There are folks on the other side who want to steal the election before it even takes place.”
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