Republicans make big gains on voter suppression and ‘caging’ for 2008 election.
A House resolution condemning MoveOn’s Petraeus ad passed overwhelmingly, 341-79.
Late Update: Greg Sargent, on the unwillingness of so many opinion-makers to refute the underlying premise that the NYT was in collusion with MoveOn.
In yesterday’s episode of TPMtv we brought you news of the Kyl-Lieberman amendment, the backdoor use of force resolution against Iran. They just voted on the amendment in the Senate, and in today’s episode we bring you up to speed on what went down …
Late Update: More details on Kyl-Lieberman here at ‘National Security Advisors’, a national security blog.
Later Update: TPM Reader TC dissents …
I just watched your “Veracifier” piece on the Kyl-Lieberman amendment. I’m mystified by your analysis.
Paragraphs 3 and 4 were largely irrelevant, as evidenced by Lieberman’s ready willingness to drop them. The essential part of the amendment was the designation of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization. That’s all bush needs to attack Iran. The Iraq AUMF conceded Bush’s inherent constitutional authority to deter terrorist attacks, and Bush will now certainly characterize any hostile action by the IRG, however immaterial, as a terrorist attack. Now that the IRG is a terrorist organization, Bush can attack with further congressional authorization.
The IRG is obviously a part of, and under the control of, the Iranian government. Accordingly, authority to attack the IRG is authority to attack the Iranian government. Would any democrat dare suggest that Bush’s authority extended only to the IRG proper, but not to the “command and control” functions residing in the Iranian government? Not likely.
I really hate to say this, but the terrorist designation was really the whole point for Lieberman all along. Paragraphs 3 and 4 were just decoys.
My response is that I think this is largely a matter of emphasis. Designating the IRG a terrorist organization does open a backdoor way for the president to say he has authorization to use force against Iran. But the president himself already made this designation, via the State Department. Congressional confirmation does add to that. But I think paragraphs 3 & 4 were even more dangerous. So the upshot is not that the bill is innocuous. It’s just not as bad as it was. At least that’s my read. For those Dems who voted for it, it was still a really bad vote.
Leave it to Sen. Norm Coleman to step on his own dingbat story. Turns out Coleman also got a cut-rate price on his anti-Moveon newspaper ad.
At the TPMCafe Book Club, Mark Schmitt and Ed Kilgore chime in on Matt Bai’s new book, The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics. It’s so engrossing that Mark read it right past his subway stop. Ed’s post is here.
Rep. Charlie Rangel (D): Cheney’s policy legacy more damaging to America than anything since slavery. See the video.
I’ll give ABC some real credit for this headline of their new story on the firestorm in response to Bill O’Reilly’s latest racist outburst: “O’Reilly: Blacks Suprisingly Civilized.”
I usually don’t go in much for working the O’Reilly front. But in this case the comedic value of this racist dork is just too much to pass up.
O’Reilly says that only people looking to be offended could have been offended by his comments.
“If you listened to the full hour, it was a criticism of racism on the part of white Americans who are ignorant of the fact that there is no difference between white and black anymore,” O’Reilly told the AP. In other words, I guess, it was criticism of people like Bill O’Reilly, which is sort of broad-minded of him.
It’s also good of him to note that blacks aren’t any different from whites like he apparently thinks they were before the 1990s or something.
Federal judge rules key parts of Patriot Act unconstitutional.
Just flipped on the Democratic debate at a little before 9:30. The first exchange I saw was with Russert asking Barack Obama if he would support Israel attacking Iran if Israel thought it was endangered by the Iranian nuclear program. The question was framed a bit better and more sharply. But that was the gist of it. Weak answer. Obama didn’t come down one way or another; he just rambled.
Not impressive.
9:31 PM.
Actually, Richardson just got the same question. He didn’t do much better. Didn’t ramble quite as long. But he also wanted to avoid the question.
I can see this is a question neither thought they had much to gain by giving an answer to. But I would think a candidate could say something like this: “The US is Israel’s stongest ally. When Israel is threatened we will always stand with her, with the American military if need be. But an attack on the Iranian nuclear sites would be a grave step. And as president I’m not going to give any ally a blank check based on their own perceptions of the threat and without knowing the specifics of the situation in advance.”
Not particularly smooth or articulate. But I would think the general point is clear. And a candidate, even one who doesn’t want to offend anyone, could say that and also be able to do what’s critical which is to refuse to sign off in advance, in the absence of any situational knowledge, on any attack the Israeli government might decide is necessary.
9:54 PM
Gravel is one weird dude. But sort of inspiringly weird in a way. He triumphantly said yes, I went bankrupt. But who’d I stick the $90,000 dollars of unpaid debts with? The credit card companies. And they deserved it!
9:56 PM
Russert hit Kucinich with the bankruptcy of Cleveland while he was mayor. His response was actually incredibly good, actually better than the facts of the case as I remember them.
9:59 PM
Russert now comes at Richardson with a list of all his gaffes, weird statements, etc. Good answer. I’ve noticed that Richardson’s numbers, while still well behind the top three, are still pretty decent. I guess we just all assume that Richardson isn’t pretty enough to win the nomination. But I could actually see him being a pretty good president.
10:10 PM
Russert starts in on Social Security. I thought he misstated the actuarial numbers in the initial questions — saying that the program would be bankrupt in 20 years. But I may have misheard that. Biden says he’d lift the cap on payroll tax liability. HRC basically dodges the question. But then when Russert tries to get in her face, she slaps him down for some of his silly ignorance of the topic. Obama signs on for the cap-lift — maybe.
One thing that’s very interesting about this discussion is how little privatization is even getting mentioned. Until a moment ago no one had even mentioned it. Obama touched on it as an aside at the end of his answer.
Dodd mentioned it as an aside too.
I think what this means is that privatization is so dead people barely feel the need to mention it any more.
Of course, a constant backdrop to this discussion is Russert’s amazingly militant ignorance of the topic, wrapped in a package of illusion that he has some idea what he’s talking about. Unfortunately Richardson wasn’t quite quick enough on his feet to knock down Russert’s ridiculousness.
Okay, I’m about to lose my mind. Tim Russert is so colossally ignorant and talks so routinely out of his ass on the topic of Social Security that I’m not sure I can bear it anymore. Help. Please stop him.
10:45 PM
Obama, really good answer on torture.
10:56 PM
Russert’s final question: what’s your favorite Bible verse. Believe it or not, there were some decent answers.