Worst president of the 20th century, I dunno, but the idea that Vietnam should be laid primarily at LBJ’s feet is ridiculous. I think Oliver Stone’s fervent belief that JFK’s assassination was inevitable because of his left-wing radicalism on foreign policy and civil rights makes JFK one of the funniest movies ever made…
Apparently, the phone hacking scandal doesn’t just implicate people within the Murdoch crime family.
Meanwhile, Consigliere Brooks has been arrested. Hopefully this time the questioning officers won’t accept Fox News sinecures…
Consiglieres Brooks and Hinton may have resigned, but it seems pretty clear that having been killed by the Murdoch family the good Wall Street Journal is never coming back.
There has been an interesting discussion in the comments about the value of Mariano Rivera to the Yankees. On one level, I don’t disagree with the arguments of the skeptics. While has value is almost certainly understated by WAR — which, if I understand correctly, doesn’t take leverage into account, hence understating the value of a close, I certainly agree that in the regular season Rivera has obviously not been nearly as valuable as Jeter, Posada, Williams, A-Rod, et al. Another way of looking at the question is Tom Tango‘s study in this year’s Hardball Times book, which assesses Rivera’s value as only about 2 wins a year more than the rest of the Yankee bullpen, which can’t be considered to be significantly more valuable than an ordinary closer and is probably less. Having said that, I think this underestimates Rivera’s value to the Yankees for two reasons:
I have an article up at the Prospect about the worst Supreme Court decision you probably didn’t hear about this term. Well, actually, I should clarify that according to what we’ll charitably call the “logic” of the Supreme Court’s Republicans, I didn’t make any of the statements that appear under my name at all.
Since LGM prides itself on being fair and balanced, I should note that according to Ramseh Ponnuru the Court is not nearly pro-business enough. Ponnuru being smarter and better-informed than your typical conservative pundit, there are actually some truths expressed in the course of his column. But to borrow Scalia’s paraphrase of Churchill, what’s relevant isn’t true and what’s true isn’t relevant. Yes, Roberts and Alito are even more reflexively pro-business than Scalia and Thomas, and yes the Court lacks anything remotely resembling a Brennan/Marshall-style liberal, both points widely acknowledged by the Court’s critics and, if anything, more supportive of the critic’s position than Ponnuru’s. As to the more general claim that, despite its very pro-business record, a Court that is willing to hold that financial executives didn’t “make” statements they made in order to insulate them from accountability when they rip off their customers isn’t pro-business enough…let’s just say I continue to demur.
I too am a Harry Potter virgin – no books, no movies. I can’t really imagine the books ever being a priority given the always-large stack of books that must be read on my shelf, but in principle I’m not opposed to the films (although I have no particular interest in them either.) But unlike Frank Bruni, I have a good reason! The unavoidable barrier, alas, can be summed up in four words: “Directed by Chris Columbus.“ Starting with the third doesn’t seem workable, but watching the first two is obviously not an option as there’s no chance whatsoever that they’ll be watchable, and there we go.
As the Obama administration’s ability to attack Libya without congressional authorization reminds us, Congress has largely abdicated its constitutional role to legislate on military affairs. The good news is that this year’s National Defense Authorization Act is an exception. The bad news is that the legislation would restrict the president’s ability to transfer prisoners being arbitrarily held at Gitmo. Even worse, these restrictions involve Kafkaesque requirements to prove the impossible while also holding detainees effectively responsible for the actions of unrelated individuals. Jamie Mayerfeld lays out the problems in detail:
Imagine yourself under arrest and locked up. Having committed no crime, would you be confident that your innocence would set you free? What if the government imprisons you not for something you did but for something you might do? Could you prove that you pose no future threat?
Such a scenario seems outlandish, yet it is precisely the logic behind legislation that Congress is getting ready to enact regarding Guantánamo detainees. The bill passed the House of Representatives and will soon come to a vote in the Senate. Individuals never shown to be dangerous, much less convicted of a crime, must remain in U.S. detention unless our government certifies that they cannot cause harm in the future.
[...]
Former detainees include Murat Kurnaz of Germany, whose imprisonment was justified on the grounds that his friend had carried out a suicide bombing in Istanbul. Leaving aside the oddity of detaining Kurnaz for something his friend did, it turned out that his friend never took part in the bombing, but was alive and well in Germany. Although internal Pentagon documents dating from 2002 cleared Kurnaz of any link to al-Qaida or terrorist activity, he was kept in detention and tortured for the next four years.
Such stories remind us why we must honor the presumption of innocence. Congress would reverse this principle, forbidding the release of any prisoner unless his harmlessness, not just now but in the future, is publicly certified.
But that is not all. The legislation also bars a prisoner from being transferred to his home country or a third country if another detainee previously sent to the same country went on to commit a terrorist act — another instance of guilt by association.
For reasons Ben Wittes explains, the Obama administration’s feckless, passive-aggressive response hasn’t helped matters either. But it’s telling that when Congress finally decides to take the initiative, it is to restrict human rights rather than to protect them.
Among other things, many of them worse, your local bar might run out of beer. And this is telling:
Meanwhile, budget negotiations on Tuesday remained at a standstill. No meetings transpired, and no offers were traded. Dayton left St. Paul to press his case for more revenue in St. Cloud, while Republican lawmakers dodged questions about whether they were going to present their first budget offer since the shutdown began.
Of course, in even pointing this out, I’m violating the etiquette rules laid down by James Taranto, who sees actually pointing out the consequences of government shutdowns as uncivil, almost as uncivil as accurately describing Republican Medicare plans.
Really good trade for both teams, at least assuming that the Brewers let Axford continue to close and don’t let K-Rod’s option vest.
…will not be fully taking over BSkyB, at least for the time being. And, yes, it seems implausible that the criminal activity was limited to one country.
It’s good that the GOP can’t take “yes” for an answer. Still, given what Obama is willing to give up it’s pretty clearly evidence in favor of those who were opposed to the 2010 tax deal; if we’re going to get austerity anyway we should have done it with the Bush tax cuts repealed.
