Commentary (not)

Is there any greater irony than the blog of a magazine named “Commentary” shutting off comments?

Of course there were a lot of trolls in their comments, and with rising concerns about liability, they may have decided the effort of policing the comments section wasn’t worth it. If we ever had an influx of trolls here, I can’t promise I wouldn’t consider the same solution.

Update: Heh, I suppose Podhoretz is just belatedly coming to the same conclusion Moulitsas did years ago, only he’s banning everyone, not just dissenters:

Having learned from the failures of the others, I immediately announced that dKos was a progressive community, and that conservatives would be on a short leash. There was a lot of crying about “free speech” and whatnot, but I made clear that cons had plenty of places to go online – Free Republic, Lucianne, etc – and liberals didn’t, and that Daily Kos would be a safe haven for progressives. I aggressively cleaned out the conservative troublemakers, and what do you know, liberals liked their little safe haven.

Balance

I don’t know how President Obama and his administration handle the harsh treatment they get by the press corps:

Much of the White House press corps spent the Fourth schmoozing with White House staffers, catching performances by the Foo Fighters and Jimmy Fallon, and watching the fireworks from the most exclusive vantage point in the D.C. metro area, all off the record—not to mention off-the-Facebook and off-the-Twitter. These are the same people who just a week ago were whining in the press briefing about Obama’s malicious and dastardly attempts to “control the press.” . . .

There is a cosmic irony at work here: The party was “closed press.” (Ha!) It was covered, under onerous restrictions, by a pool reporter—the Baltimore Sun’s Paul West. West was ushered in by White House staffers for a mere 40 minutes, so he could record the president’s remarks. He was kept in a pen so that he wouldn’t run amok and interview someone. He shouted questions at Obama as he worked the rope line, which the president ignored. Then he was taken away. West wrote up his blindered account of the party and then e-mailed it to the White House press corps, many of whom were actually at the party, outside of the pen, hanging out with all the other guests. And then, because they had temporarily signed away the right to do their jobs in exchange for facetime with staffers, a few cold Stoudt’s American Pale Ales, and some corn on the cob, their news organizations picked up that pool report and used it to tell their readers what happened at the party. This is how the press covers the White House.

Really, as Slublog said over at Ace’s place, this isn’t bias — It’s malpractice. Of course, for balance, I suppose I should offer a different perspective: DougJ at Balloon Juice says: “…I can’t escape the feeling that many in the media are fixated on puncturing the Obama image in a way they never were with Bush.”

Ah well, you gets what you pays for, and blogs are free.

Gee, you think?

The Examiner joins many of us in commenting on Krugman, et. al.’s call for a second stimulus:

“Be sure to thank the President and Congress. This week, with news of some 467,000 jobs lost in June, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the U.S. has now lost about two million jobs since the economic stimulus package passed. Even more notable is that the average workweek has been slashed to 33 hours – the lowest number on record. When the President signed his $787 billion stimulus package into law, he confidently asserted that unemployment would not exceed eight percent. If Congress hadn’t passed it, he warned, it would rise to nine percent by 2010. Well, unemployment reached 9.5 percent last month, meaning, by the President’s own logic, that his stimulus package has failed.”

So yeah, no thanks on that second stimulus, Barry. The first one hasn’t been a hit, if you know what I mean.

And hey, Colin Powell would like a word with you as well. Seems he thinks you’ve written a bit bigger check than your ass can cash with this mega-expensive agenda of yours. Somehow I doubt the Democrats and the media (but I repeat myself) will find these concerns as newsworthy as they found his endorsement of you last year…

Palin Resigns

Sarah Palin announced today that she will resign as Governor of Alaska as of July 26. It doesn’t seem entirely clear why, from the reports of the statement she gave from her home in Wasilla today, although she did say that she thought she would be able to do more outside of government than in it. That may suggest that she has something else lined up to do, which we presumably will find out.
I don’t have much time to blog right at the moment but wanted to get this up and solicit your thoughts, readers.
What do you suspect is her motivation for this? Make money? Raise money? Make speeches around the country? Spend more time with family?
And what do you see as the significance of it. Think it makes it more or less likely that she’ll run for President in 2012?

My own quick guess is that it is probably some combination of the three motives I suggested. I think this suggests that she is thinking seriously about running and freeing herself up to do so, including by spending a fair amount of time over the next year outside of Alaska. I think it may help her position herself for the primary race, but I think it probably hurts her chances for the general.

Hucking fypocrite

BarbinMD at Daily Kos, in reference to this Americablog piece on white supremacists planning to recruit at Tea Parties:

Those patriotic teabaggers must be so proud.

Gosh, Barb, did you climb up on your patriotic, moral high horse when David Corn wrote about Communists using your beloved anti-war rallies in 2002 to recruit and proselytize?

At the rally, speaker after speaker declared, ”We are the real Americans.“ But most ”real Americans“ do not see a direct connection between Mumia, the Cuban Five and the war against Iraq. Jackson, for one, exclaimed, ”This time the silent majority is on our side.“ If the goal is to bring the silent majority into the anti-war movement, it’s not going to be achieved by people carrying pictures of Kim Jong-Il — even if they keep them hidden in their wallets.

Or do you only climb on that horse when it gives you an opportunity to stare down your nose at folks who oppose your wunderkind president?

That’s a rhetorical question, by the way. We all know the ANSWER already.

Is the United States now negotiating with terrorists?

I put that in the form of a question not because I don’t trust National Review or Andy McCarthy, but because it’s a serious allegation, and one of our resident Obamanauts may have an explanation for it. That said, it doesn’t look good:

On Jan. 20, 2007, five American soldiers were killed and three seriously wounded in Iraq. As Bill Roggio relates at the Long War Journal, it was a daring operation: a twelve-man terrorist team disguised as U.S. servicemen attacked our troops as they held a previously arranged meeting with local officials in Karbala. Four of the soldiers were alive when they were abducted from the scene. They were handcuffed and murdered in a remote location when the coalition forces attempting to rescue them closed in.

…

About two weeks ago, the Obama administration released Laith Qazali after extensive negotiations with the Asaib al-Haq terror network. That network has long been in negotiations with the fledgling Iraqi government, dangling the possibility of laying down its arms, renouncing violence, and integrating into Iraqi society, provided that its top members — particularly Qais and Laith Qazali, as well as Ali Mussa Daqduq — be released. Realizing, however, that these terrorists were responsible for kidnapping and killing American soldiers in gross violation of the laws of war, the Bush administration had declined to release them.

The Obama administration has not only released Laith Qazali, it has been in negotiations to release his brother, Qais Qazali, as well. The negotiations and release were carried out in flagrant disregard of the longstanding policy against exchanging prisoners for the release of hostages. Undermining that policy endangers all American troops and civilian personnel — as well as the troops and civilian personnel of our allies — by encouraging terrorists to kidnap them to use as bargaining chips.

If Obama is indeed negotiating with terrorists, that’s one hell of a bad precedent to set. Of course, given his emphasis on “engagement” and negotiating with enemies, I won’t be surprised if he is in fact doing so already.

Standing Ovation for the Openness and Transparency of Obama’s Administration

On Tuesday, the Obama Administration’s Chief Information Officer was given a standing ovation for unveiling a new digital tool that taxpayers can use to track information, including spending, on information technology programs across the federal government.

Vivek Kundra is a rock star.

At least at the annual Personal Democracy Forum conference. On Tuesday morning, Kundra, the chief information officer of the Obama administration, opened the second day of this gathering of digital techies by unveiling a new dashboard that taxpayers can use to track the federal government’s spending on information technology. The crowd went wild. They greeted his announcement with a standing ovation.

You can go to Data.gov to see this new tool, which will allow you to obtain and mash data about IT programs across the federal government. For example, as Kundra said, you could check out “how much the US Department of Agriculture spends on information technology projects and what is the health of those projects.” You can see who’s getting the IT contracts, assess the performance of those contracts, and provide feedback to the CIOs of these agencies.

This is a real step forward for accountability and transparency in the operations of the federal government.

Cap and Trade “Placeholder”

OK, I’ve heard of making up the rules as you go along, but this is ridiculous.

…you people who called for openness and transparency…

Well, you can stew over Jake Tapper, Obamanauts, but Helen Thomas is one of your own. Here’s what she had to say to Gibbs today:

“We have never had that in the White House,” Thomas said, referring to the degree that press events are pre-scripted in the Obama administration. “I’m amazed, I’m amazed at you people who called for openness and transparency…”

That’s when things got testy, and Gibbs looked very uncomfortable as Reid and Thomas took turns attacking his evasive answers.

“Calling reporters the night before, telling them they’re going to be called on — that’s shocking,” Thomas said, referring to an incident last week when Huffington Post blogger Nico Pitney was given advance warning that he would be called on to ask a question on behalf of the Iranian public.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume this is unimportant to you, although under the exact same circumstances, you’d have had absolute fits were George W. Bush and Ari Fleischer, Scott McClellan, Tony Snow, or Dana Perino involved.

Openness and transparency. And bullshit.

The Marines Move In

The big American push into Afghanistan’s southern Helmand province got under way today as 4,000 U.S. Marines from the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade moved into the Helmand River valley on helicopters and armored vehicles in the biggest Marine operation since the invasion of Fallujah, Iraq in 2004. They’ll be joined by an Army brigade later this summer.