McCain's Political Posturing On The Militia Mess

post from The Liberal Doomsayer on 21 April 2009 06:17:00 PM. © The Liberal Doomsayer

(And I also posted here.)

I would say that this story has a lot to do with this one; I mean, how late is it anyway in the news cycle for the senator from Arizona and Repug presidential candidate last year to be alleging that the report on militia activity from Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano was ?insulting? to veterans? Particularly when Napolitano has already apologized (unnecessarily, I think) as noted here (from the WaPo)?

And what of Chris Simcox, McCain?s just-declared primary challenger? Well, in addition to a history that includes a failed marriage, unemployment, 9/11 trauma and a three-month stint in the desert (reported by Max Blumenthal here), we also learn the following from Blumenthal?s Salon.com article?

There are those in Tombstone who say that the 41-year-old former teacher is an eccentric, an egomaniac and a threat to the local tourism industry. While Simcox says his militia has 600 members, others here say the number is far smaller. "Chris can only get a three-man patrol going," says Jeff, a bartender at the Crystal Bar on Main Street. "Basically, the kind of people who want to join his group can't even pass a background check."

However quixotic his character, Simcox is a leading figure in a loose but committed alliance of anti-immigrant forces that have turned Cochise County into a national flash point for escalating tensions over illegal immigration. The alliance includes not only local ranchers, landowners and law enforcement officials, but also former high-ranking Border Patrol agents and U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, a Colorado Republican. Quietly backing their efforts is the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a controversial anti-immigration group that in the 1980s and 1990s received more than $1 million from a shadowy group accused of white-supremacist leanings.

Despite my own ideological disagreements with McCain, I?m not sure what else it says about the current state of the Repug Party that someone like Simcox could come along and wage a legitimate primary threat to a party elder (not quite what we have in PA, though, where wingnut Pat Toomey ? a bit more established based on his prior campaign in 2004 ? poses a real threat to Snarlin? Arlen?s party nod).

But returning to the matter of militia groups, I think this post from Dave Neiwert at Crooks and Liars has a lot of good information, including, among other things, the following quote from Thomas Jefferson?

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Of course, this was the quote on the T-shirt worn by Timothy McVeigh when he was arrested for the Oklahoma City bombing in 1994 (McCain mentions McVeigh in the story today ? Neiwert?s point is that it?s part of the M.O. of hate groups to blend in with the rest of us as effectively as possible)

Which, to me, leads us to the $64,000 question, which is this (echoed by Neiwert) ? how can we deal with these crazies in a manner that is most effective from a law enforcement perspective (I should note that the outcry began over a report issued by the Missouri State Patrol about trying to identify trends among those who could commit violent acts as part of an extremist movement).

Also, why should anyone feel defensive if veterans are targeted by these people? That is one demographic in particular that I believe, on the whole, would know how to respond appropriately if they thought they were being recruited (with McVeigh a tragic exception ? I have no evidence at this point that indicates otherwise).

Or, as McCain himself says?

?The last people on earth we need to worry about are our veterans"?

So why doesn?t McCain just let ?sleeping dogs lie,? as it were, unless he were trying to serve his own opportunistic self interest against a primary challenger who makes common cause with those who would do harm to this country? And read Simcox?s dare to be arrested for representing those ?who are protecting their own country? ? and he said that in 2003 while Dubya was in the White House; would he be any less belligerent now with Obama in charge?

Do you even need to ask?

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http://liberaldoomsayer.blogspot.com/2009/04/mccains-political-posturing-on-milit
ia.html

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Feingold Latest To Call For Bybee Impeachment

post from TPMMuckraker on 21 April 2009 06:17:00 PM. © TPMMuckraker

Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) is the latest to call for the impeachment of Judge Jay Bybee, in response to the release of those torture memos last week.

Bybee wrote one of the memos in 2002, when he served in the Justice Department's Office of Special Counsel.

Here's Feingold's statement:

The just released OLC memos, including the 2002 memo authored by Jay Bybee, are a disgrace. The idea that one of the architects of this perversion of the law is now sitting on the federal bench is very troubling. The memos offer some of the most explicit evidence yet that Mr. Bybee and others authorized torture and they suggest that grounds for impeachment can be made. Clearly, the Justice Department has the responsibility to investigate this matter further. As a Senator, I would be a juror in any impeachment trial so I don't want to reach a conclusion until all the evidence is before me.

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TPMmuckraker/~3/gbPUCx6lsnU/feingold_latest_to_cal
l_for_bybee_impeachment.php

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Wash. Times editorial misleadingly crops
Summers' remarks on increasing cost-effectiveness to finance health coverage

post from Media Matters for America on 21 April 2009 06:16:27 PM. © Media Matters for America

An April 21 Washington Times editorial misleadingly cropped comments made by White House National Economic Council director Lawrence Summers while discussing how to fund a universal health care program to falsely suggest that Summers is advocating for cutting health care expenditures "by almost 30 percent" using "cost-effectiveness" regulations. The Times described the use of such regulations as "a major amputation to the system" and "rationing." In fact, immediately after the portion of his[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mediamatters/latest/~3/fFvKRKb4nQ4/200904210035

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Throw Chuck Todd A Lifeline

post from Taylor Marsh on 21 April 2009 06:14:04 PM. © Taylor Marsh

The minute Mr. Cheney appeared on “Hannity,” you knew something was up. But what? Then, just like clockwork, the Cheney v. the Obama administration talking point started regarding possible torture investigations. The partisan trap was set[...]

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http://www.taylormarsh.com/2009/04/21/throw-chuck-todd-a-lifeline/

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The Spitzer File Chronicles, Part 1: What Judge
Rakoff Unsealed, Then and Now

post from Firedoglake on 21 April 2009 06:00:03 PM. © Firedoglake

Way back in the mists of time, er 2001, Judge Rakoff of the the federal district court SDNY issued a decision unsealing some court documents so that a news outlet, TheStreet.com, could have access to them for news gathering and disseminating[...]

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http://firedoglake.com/2009/04/21/the-spitzer-file-chronicles-part-1-what-judge-r
akoff-unsealed-then-and-now/

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Harman on NPR: Train Wreck

post from Daily Kos on 21 April 2009 06:00:00 PM. © Daily Kos

Congresswoman Jane Harman was just interviewed on the National Public Radio news show, All Things Considered, about the charge that she lobbied the New York Times to spike the NSA wiretap story. There's no link or transcripts yet of the NPR interview, but here's the thrust of her defense:

Essentially Harman would not acknowledge that the conversations reported in the CQ and NYT articles even took place. When asked by host Robert Segal about the reported calls, she first responded by referring to "phone calls that may or may not have taken place," and then again said, "I don't know if there was a phone call like this." Segal asked her about the conversation she's reported to have had with Haim Saban, supposedly an agreement of a quid pro quo where she would lobby the DoJ on behalf of accused Israeli spies working for AIPAC in return for his lobbying of Nancy Pelosi to make Harman chair of the Intelligence committee. Harman asked Segal in response, "How do we know?" This response on her part showed her falling back again to the position that it's unclear whether the conversations ever took place.

She repeatedly called for a release of all transcripts of conversations in which she was purportedly picked up on a wiretap, and then, she said, "We'll see what I may or may not have said."

But then she screwed up. She raised the question of whether the wiretaps were legal--which implied that she accepts their existence, contradicting her previous claims of skepticism that the conversations in fact took place. She wondered whether other members of Congress were or are being wiretapped. And then she stepped in it further by claiming, "The person I talked to was an American citizen."

Segal immediately caught the inconsistency, asking, "but if you know it was an American citizen...." He then immediately followed up with, "you're saying it was an American citizen..." Harman deflected both questions, instead declaring it an "abuse of power that Members of Congress are wiretapped and maybe some part of some investigation" and "I was never told by the Justice Dept that I was being investigated." This latter bizarre statement implies she thinks she's entitled to something other citizens are not: notification that their possible illegal actions are being monitored, so they would then know to no longer conduct their potential illegal activities in a manner enabling wthe DoJ to build a case.

If Harman thought going on NPR was going to help her, she's most certainly proven herself politically tone deaf. As bad as things were for Jane Harman at 3:59 PM EDT, they were much, much worse by 4:15 PM EDT.

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http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/-OCJSBogOBQ/-Harman-on-NPR:-Train-
Wreck

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Amanda Carpenter obviously doesn't understand the
meaning of the word "News"

post from Crooks and Liars on 21 April 2009 06:00:00 PM. © Crooks and Liars

I pity Amanda Carpenter because it seems like the appearances on Bill O'Reilly's show are really affecting her, and that's too bad. She's a conservative and I'm a liberal, but I think we can both agree that the news is the news and her response to a segment on Reliable Sources was really a justification for the behavior of Fox during the teabagging parties.

SESNO: Because that's not our job. Our job is not to use our podium and our platform and our television camera to tell people what they should be thinking and doing. Our job should be to tell them what's happening out there and then they decide what to do.
KURTZ: You disagree with that?
CARPENTER: You know, this is -- I disagree with using words like "fascism" on the Fox Business Network, but we are entering a period, I think Ana Marie would agree -- I mean, we both cover things, we both have perspectives. I think this is becoming more acceptable in journalism as long as you're up front about it first.

No, it's never acceptable to do this. Never, ever. Journalists can have a point of view, but not when they are reporting on events. You can't say that Iraq is going to bomb us just because you want that war to take place, no matter what the evidence suggests. And then masquerading as a news entity is the worst form of deceit there is, especially when they turn into a propaganda enterprise. It is acceptable if you don't have the word "News" in your network.

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http://crooksandliars.com/john-amato/amanda-carpenter-obviously-doesnt-under

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Middle-Class Task Force Heads Off to College

No wonder we're all drowning in debt. Over the past 30 years, a college degree has become[...]

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-force-heads-off-to-college

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Fox Nation advances dubious report that "Obama
actually delayed pirate rescue"

Following the U.S. Navy's successful rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips from Somali pirates, The Fox Nation -- Fox News' purportedly bias-free website -- advanced the dubious claim by the right-wing website WorldNetDaily that President Obama "actually delayed [the] pirate rescue." Nearly all of WND's article echoes elements of an anti-Obama chain email posted on blogs and online bulletin boards, and the article was, according to WorldNetDaily, "adapted from an exclusive report in [WND founder and[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mediamatters/latest/~3/S9bWaHHRTNE/200904210032

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Joe Lieberman Up To His Old Tricks

Joe Lieberman has been staying out of the spotlight lately but don't be fooled, he's still the same ole Joe. Here's an exchange he had with Greta Van Susteren on Fox News (via Glenn Thrush): VAN SUSTEREN: Again, the whole business about the torture[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mydd/~3/xDzrQzCSJoQ/095

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