Later On

Two good but brief articles by Mary Kane in the Washington Independent:

A Consumer Financial Protection Agency Sounds Like a Great Idea — But How Strong Will It Be?

Questions to Ask as Obama Unveils Financial Regulatory Overhaul Plan

Interesting column:

For two years now, John McCain has been entirely consistent on Iran: every last statement he’s made–at least, those that I’ve seen–has been (a) fabulously uninformed and (b) dangerously bellicose. He’s still at it, apparently. There is no question that President Obama’s more prudent path is the correct one right now. There is also no question that the neoconservatives are trying to gin up this situation into an excuse for not engaging with the Iranian government in the near future–and also as a rationale for their dearest, looniest dream, war with Iran. I’ve come home more pessimistic that much can be accomplished in negotiations with the Khamenei-Ahmadinejad government, but we certainly should continue to make the effort to lure the Iranians into the civilized world. It may even be the case that Khamenei decided that Ahmadinejad’s reelection was a pre-requisite for negotiations.

Meanwhile, Pete Wehner has a post at the Commentary blog comparing Iran in 2009 to the Soviet Union of the 1980′s which, of course, is completely ridiculous. I visited Russia back in the day and I’ve now visited Iran twice. There is no comparison. The Soviet Union was the most repressive place I’ve ever been; its residents lived in constant terror. I’ll never forget my first translator in Moscow telling me that his parents had trained him never to smile in public–it could easily be misinterpreted and then he’d be off to the Gulag. There was no internet in those days, no cellphones, no facebook or twitter.

Iran, by contrast, is breezy with freedom. It is certainly freer now, despite Ahmadinejad, than it was when I first visited in 2001. There are satellites dishes all over the place, which bring accurate news via BBC Persia and the Voice of America. The place is awash in western music, movies and books. The Supreme Leader has a website; ayatollahs are blogging. You can get the New York Times and CNN online. (I was interested to find, however, that most blogs except those, like this one, that are associated with a mainstream media outlet, are filtered by the government.) There is, in fact, marginally more freedom of expression in Iran than in some notable U.S. allies, like Egypt and Saudi Arabia–although the danger of imprisonment always exists if a journalist or politician takes it a step too far for the Supreme Leader’s watchdogs. It is not even clear that Ahmadinejad–who has significant backing from the sort of people who support Republicans here (the elderly, the religious extremists) plus a real following among working-class Iranians–would have lost this election, if the votes had been counted fairly. (I tend to believe that they weren’t counted at all, but that’s just my opinion.)

The point is, neoconservatives like McCain and Wehner just can’t seem to quit their dangerous habit of making broad, extreme statements based on ideology rather than detailed knowledge of the situation in Iran and elsewhere. This was always the main problem with McCain’s candidacy–he would have been a trigger-happy President, just as Wehner’s old boss, George W. Bush, was. We are well out of that.

It seems strange that everyone is so convinced that the US is incapable of running a government healthcare option when other countries do quite well managing their national healthcare system through a single-payer method (i.e., the government). And they have, on the whole, better outcomes than the US. David Leonhardt in the NY Times:

Rationing.

More to the point: Rationing!

As in: Wait, are you talking about rationing medical care? Access to medical care is a fundamental right. And rationing sounds like something out of the Soviet Union. Or at least Canada.

The r-word has become a rejoinder to anyone who says that this country must reduce its runaway health spending, especially anyone who favors cutting back on treatments that don’t have scientific evidence behind them. You can expect to hear a lot more about rationing as health care becomes the dominant issue in Washington this summer.

Today, I want to try to explain why the case against rationing isn’t really a substantive argument. It’s a clever set of buzzwords that tries to hide the fact that societies must make choices.

In truth, rationing is an inescapable part of economic life. It is the process of allocating scarce resources. Even in the United States, the richest society in human history, we are constantly rationing. We ration spots in good public high schools. We ration lakefront homes. We ration the best cuts of steak and wild-caught salmon.

Health care, I realize, seems as if it should be different. But it isn’t. Already, we cannot afford every form of medical care that we might like. So we ration.

We spend billions of dollars on operations, tests and drugs that haven’t been proved to make people healthier. Yet we have not spent the money to install computerized medical records — and we suffer more medical errors than many other countries.

We underpay primary care doctors, relative to specialists, and they keep us stewing in waiting rooms while they try to see as many patients as possible. We don’t reimburse different specialists for time spent collaborating with one another, and many hard-to-diagnose conditions go untreated. We don’t pay nurses to counsel people on how to improve their diets or remember to take their pills, and manageable cases of diabetes and heart disease become fatal.

“Just because there isn’t some government agency specifically telling you which treatments you can have based on cost-effectiveness,” as Dr. Mark McClellan, head of Medicare in the Bush administration, says, “that doesn’t mean you aren’t getting some treatments.”

Milton Friedman’s beloved line is a good way to frame the issue: There is no such thing as a free lunch. The choice isn’t between rationing and not rationing. It’s between rationing well and rationing badly. Given that the United States devotes far more of its economy to health care than other rich countries, and gets worse results by many measures, it’s hard to argue that we are now rationing very rationally.

Continue reading.

After all, if they didn’t drop people with serious illnesses, their profits would be impacted. We MUST have a government option. The story by Lisa Girion in the LA Times:

Executives of three of the nation’s largest health insurers told federal lawmakers in Washington on Tuesday that they would continue canceling medical coverage for some sick policyholders, despite withering criticism from Republican and Democratic members of Congress who decried the practice as unfair and abusive.

The hearing on the controversial action known as rescission, which has left thousands of Americans burdened with costly medical bills despite paying insurance premiums, began a day after President Obama outlined his proposals for revamping the nation’s healthcare system.

An investigation by the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations showed that health insurers WellPoint Inc., UnitedHealth Group and Assurant Inc. canceled the coverage of more than 20,000 people, allowing the companies to avoid paying more than $300 million in medical claims over a five-year period.

It also found that policyholders with breast cancer, lymphoma and more than 1,000 other conditions were targeted for rescission and that employees were praised in performance reviews for terminating the policies of customers with expensive illnesses.

No one can defend, and I certainly cannot defend, the practice of canceling coverage after the fact,” said Rep. Michael C. Burgess (R-Tex.), a member of the committee. “There is no acceptable minimum to denying coverage after the fact.”

The executives — Richard A. Collins, chief executive of UnitedHealth’s Golden Rule Insurance Co.; Don Hamm, chief executive of Assurant Health and Brian Sassi, president of consumer business for WellPoint Inc., parent of Blue Cross of California — were courteous and matter-of-fact in their testimony.

But they would not commit to limiting rescissions to only policyholders who intentionally lie or commit fraud to obtain coverage, a refusal that met with dismay from legislators on both sides of the political aisle.

Experts said it could undermine the industry’s efforts to influence healthcare-overhaul plans working their way toward the White House.

“Talk about tone deaf,” said Robert Laszewski, a former health insurance executive who now counsels companies as a consultant.

Democratic strategist Paul Begala said the hearing could hurt the industry’s efforts to position itself in the debate.

“The industry has tried very hard in this current effort not to be the bad guy, not to wear the black hat,” Begala said. “The trouble is all that hard work and goodwill is at risk if in fact they are pursuing” such practices.

Rescission was largely hidden until three years ago, when The Times launched a series of stories disclosing that insurers routinely canceled the medical coverage of individual policyholders who required expensive medical care…

Continue reading. Read the whole things—there’s much more. From later in the article:

The committee’s investigation found that WellPoint’s Blue Cross targeted individuals with more than 1,400 conditions, including breast cancer, lymphoma, pregnancy and high blood pressure. And the committee obtained documents that showed Blue Cross supervisors praised employees in performance reviews for rescinding policies.

One employee, for instance, received a perfect 5 for “exceptional performance” on an evaluation that noted the employee’s role in dropping thousands of policyholders and avoiding nearly $10 million worth of medical care.

Health insurance works only when the insurance company decides to allow it. Karen Tumulty of TIME magazine:

In May, 2008, Robin Beaton, a retired registered nurse from Waxahachie, Texas, went to her dermatologist to be treated for acne. He mistakenly wrote down something on her chart that made it appear that she might have a pre-cancerous skin condition.

Not a big deal, right? It shouldn’t have been, except that soon after that, she was diagnosed with something far more serious—invasive and aggressive breast cancer. Three days before she was scheduled for a double mastectomy, her insurance company, Blue Cross, called her and told her they were launching an investigation into the last five years of her health records. It turned out that dermatologist’s note had been a red flag, and the company was looking for a way to cancel her policy on the grounds that she had been hiding a serious medical condition.

What Robin went through after that was a nightmare, one she tearfully described Tuesday morning in front of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s oversight and investigations subcommittee. “The sad thing is, Blue Cross gladly took my high premiums, and the first time I filed a claim and was suspected of having cancer, they searched high and low for a reason to cancel me,” said Robin, whose hair is just beginning to grow back in from chemotherapy.

The subcommittee took a look today at an immoral—and illegal—practice in which some health insurance companies engage. It’s called post-claims underwriting, and you should know about it. Because you or someone you love could be a victim if they buy insurance on the individual insurance market. Robin got her mastectomy, but only after her congressman, Joe Barton, leaned on the head of the company. (This is constituent service, in the very best sense of why we elect these guys. But the best thing they could do is to make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone’s constituent.)

There were other witnesses, too. Like Peggy Raddatz, whose brother Otto Raddatz lost his insurance coverage right before he was scheduled to receive an expensive stem-cell transplant to treat his lymphoma. Why? Because Fortis Insurance Company discovered that his doctor had found gall stones and an aneurysm on a CT scan—conditions that had nothing to do with his cancer, and that never bothered him, and that he wasn’t even aware of. And Jennifer Wittney Horton of Los Angeles, whose coverage was canceled because she had been taking a drug for irregular menstruation. Now, she can’t get coverage anywhere else. “Since my rescission, I have had to take jobs that I do not want, and put my career goals on hold to ensure that I can find health insurance,” she told the subcommittee. “Fortunately, after my husband and I got married, I was able to gain coverage through his company’s group health care plan. However, if he ever loses his job, or I don’t have employment with a company that offers group health insurance, I might have to go without insurance.”

The insurance companies will argue that cases like these are rare, and that they have to be vigilant against fraud so that they can hold down costs for everyone else. But an investigation by the subcommittee found widespread instances where the insurance companies rescind coverage even over discrepancies that are unintentional, unknown to the policyholder or immaterial to the more serious health conditions for which the policyholders are filing for benefits…

Continue reading. No wonder the insurance companies are fighting a government healthcare option.

From the Center for American Progress:

Today, the Obama administration is rolling out its plan for reforming the financial regulation system. In an effort "likely to result in the most sweeping overhaul since the 1930s," the administration intends to address some of the regulatory gaps and oversights that contributed to the current economic crisis. "The goal is to integrate the system, make sure that there are not any gaps, and to make sure that we have a[n] updating of the regulatory system that worked back in the 1930s, but doesn’t work with the kinds of financial instruments and the kinds of global capital markets that exist today," President Obama told Bloomberg News. The plan will, among other things, set up a structure to monitor systemic risk, develop a new resolution authority for winding down complex non-bank financial institutions, and establish a new consumer protection agency to police financial products. It will also mandate the regulation of derivatives and require financial institutions to retain part of any asset that they securitize and sell. Of course, the banking lobby is gearing up to oppose some of the reforms. "Wall Street seems to maybe have a shorter memory about how close we were to the abyss than I would have expected," Obama said yesterday. "All we’re doing is cleaning up after the mess that was made." And even with all of these reforms, the administration will need to ensure that regulators follow through on their responsibilities, which is something that did not occur under the Bush administration.

Read the rest of this entry »

From the Center for American Progress:

Citing the expected high cost of comprehensive health care reform as planned by Democrats in the Senate, fiscally conservative Democrats in the House, known as the Blue Dogs, have been meeting in secret with centrist Republicans to work out a "middle-of-the-road" health care reform package. When asked last Friday about conversations between the two centrist groups, Blue Dog Rep. Lincoln Davis (D-TN) confirmed that his colleagues are "actively working on compromises" on a number of issues. Rep. Mike Castle (R-DE) confirmed that he has had talks with a number of conservative Democrats, including Rep. Ron Kind (D-WI). The centrists are reportedly discussing "including the option of forming insurance cooperatives," but will not offer a public insurance option. According to Dean Barker, the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, the relationship between the insurance industry and many Blue Dog members is proving to be a significant road block to reform. Baker explained, "The biggest obstacle to reform is obviously the corruption of Congress. The insurance and pharmaceutical companies, the hospitals and medical supply industry and other beneficiaries of the enormous waste in the system all have powerful congressional lobbies. This gives them enormous influence in Congress, especially among Blue Dog Democrats, who are heavily dependent on special-interest contributions." Rep. Patrick Tiberi (R-OH) appraised the Blue Dog influence, commenting that the Blue Dogs have "a lot of leverage" at the moment.

Great: the medical industry has bought off a pack of Senators. What makes this system of government so good? I don’t like having the country controlled by Big Business, to whom we are just a source of revenue.

James Rosen in McClatchy:

Senators from both parties praised Inez Tenenbaum on Tuesday as a strong nominee to strengthen federal regulation of toys, Chinese drywall and a host of other consumer products with health and safety defects.

Tenenbaum told the Senate Commerce Committee that her experience running South Carolina’s public schools system, from 1998 to 2006, had trained her to focus on practical solutions and would help her protect children’s wellbeing as head of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

"If confirmed as the new chairman, I will reassure America’s families that their government can and will protect them from unknown or unforeseen dangers in the products they use," Tenenbaum said at her confirmation hearing.

Tenenbaum, a Democrat, co-chaired President Barack Obama’s White House campaign in South Carolina. She was the first state leader to endorse him in his primary campaign against Sen. Hillary Clinton, now secretary of state.

Obama nominated Tenenbaum, 58, last month to reinvigorate the demoralized federal agency.

President George W. Bush slashed the budget and cut the staff of the consumer safety agency, which ended his tenure with only two of its five commissioners in place.

The scheduling of Tenenbaum’s confirmation hearing so soon after her nomination indicates widespread support, but final Senate approval could be delayed.

Senate tradition allows any member to block a nomination anonymously. White House aides said Tuesday that Republican Senate leaders for the last week had held up all Obama nominations to protest his bid to achieve a quick confirmation of federal appellate Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter…

Continue reading.

I still don’t understand the pervasive fear and cowardice regarding non-terrorists coming to the US. Sabin Willett in the Boston Globe:

One afternoon last week, four men from central Asia walked into a shop in Bermuda to buy pants.

Refugees from Chinese communism, these Uighur men were swept up by US forces in 2001. They were sent to Guantanamo. But they were not terrorists and not our enemies. The military soon realized its mistake and quietly tried to resettle them abroad. The efforts failed: No one wanted to brook the Chinese for the sake of a few dissidents whom the United States would not accept itself.

Years later, after the Uighurs’ plight emerged in court, the Bush administration formally admitted they were not enemies. A judge ordered their release.

Then, a new president, who had campaigned on a vow to close Guantanamo, was on the point of admitting them to this country. But suddenly Congress was stampeded by the right, and President Obama ducked for cover. Congressional Democrats and many Republicans had applauded the call to close Guantanamo, but when it came to action, they ran for the exits. There were a few exceptions, like Senators Dick Durbin and Pat Leahy, and Congressman Bill Delahunt of Massachusetts. But they seemed like schoolteachers after the bell had rung, trying to bring order to a ruck of noisy children, looking in vain for help to the principal’s office.

And so the Uighurs, cleared in every imaginable way, were stranded at the prison.

Bermudian Premier Ewart Brown saw the humanitarian crisis that lay beneath the politics. He offered to accept four of them into the island’s guest worker program. At 3 a.m. on June 11, I watched on the Guantanamo airstrip as four innocent men were unshackled for the last time. They climbed aboard a charter aircraft. And when the sun rose, they stepped down to free soil in Bermuda, smiling broadly.

One said, "This is a small island, but it has a big heart."

Others will have to judge the American heart. Within hours, the lunatic fringe was feeding lies to Bermudian media. CNN joined in the mugging with a false report from a Bush-era mouthpiece that the men had "trained in Al Qaeda camps." (Before meeting interrogators, the men had never heard of Al Qaeda, and in court the Bush administration itself conceded that there was no Al Qaeda link. But in the feeding frenzy, truth did not matter.)

A political crisis exploded in Bermuda’s parliament. The minority called for a vote of no-confidence in the government. The British loudly protested not being asked permission.

At home, Congress has already said it prefers that men cleared by courts remain in prison forever, rather than having America participate in the shutdown. Congress’s idea of a solution is that we are the broom, and our allies the dustpan.

There is talk that the tiny Pacific island of Palau may provide asylum to other Uighurs. The small places are not so timid as we are. They don’t stampede as easily. But whether they can fully solve the problems seems doubtful. There are many innocents left to free, and the political row in Bermuda will discourage others from participating in an enterprise that America lacks the character to join.

How Obama will make good on his pledge to close the prison remains unclear. The Democrats may yet create America’s gulag – a forever prison from which innocents never leave…

Continue reading.

This is what happens when you shoot off your mouth unnecessarily. Nate Carlile in ThinkProgress:

The Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza reports that Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), a member of GOP leadership and a potential candidate for president in 2012, will hold a press conference later today in which he will acknowledge having an extramarital affair “with a campaign staffer who was married to an employee in Ensign’s Senate office.” Ensign flew back to Las Vegas to make the public announcement.

Since his election to the Senate in 2000, Ensign has been a leading conservative voice who demanded the resignation of former Idaho Sen. Larry Craig in September 2007. Ensign called Craig a “disgrace” after he was arrested in June 2007 in an airport men’s restroom on disorderly conduct charges. But when Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) acknowledged having an affair, Ensign didn’t call on him to resign.

Ensign has also been an ardent opponent of gay marriage. In Feb. 2004, Ensign announced his support for an amendment to the Constitution that would have defined marriage as a union between a man and a woman. Ensign said the amendment, which ultimately failed, was necessary to protect “the institution of marriage“:

“Sadly, the effort to redefine marriage against the wishes of a majority of the people is, with help from activist judges, succeeding,” Ensign said. “In order to defend the institution of marriage, uphold the rights of individual states, and maintain the will of the people, I believe we are compelled to amend our country’s constitution.”

“The effort to pass a constitutional amendment reaffirming marriage as being between a man and a woman only is being undertaken strictly as a defense of marriage against the attempt to redefine it and, in the process, weaken it,” Ensign said. “Marriage is an extremely important institution in this country and protecting it is, in my mind, worth the extraordinary step of amending our constitution.”

In 1998, while running for Nevada’s Senate seat against Harry Reid, Ensign called on President Clinton to resign in light of his admitted affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky:

“I came to that conclusion recently, and frankly it’s because of what he put his whole Cabinet through and what he has put the country through,” Ensign said Thursday, becoming the first member of the Nevada delegation to call for Clinton to quit. “He has no credibility left.”

How much “credibility” does Ensign have left?

Update: More quotes from Ensign:

“I believe that marriage should be defined as that between one man and one woman. You want to do what is ideal for children and all of the studies show that the ideal for children is to be in a household with a father and a mother.” [4/19/09]

“Mr. President, I rise today to speak on a topic that is very important. That is the preservation of the most important structure in our society.” [7/13/04]

“There’s too many people that paint with a broad brush that we’re all corrupt, we’re all amoral. … And having these kinds of things happen, whether it’s a Republican or Democratic senator — we certainly have had plenty of Democratic scandals in the past — we need people who are in office who will hold themselves to a little higher standard.” [10/18/07]

FINALLY Congress is starting to take our domestic spying operation seriously. James Risen and Eric Lichtblau in the NY Times:

The National Security Agency is facing renewed scrutiny over the extent of its domestic surveillance program, with critics in Congress saying its recent intercepts of the private telephone calls and e-mail messages of Americans are broader than previously acknowledged, current and former officials said.

The agency’s monitoring of domestic e-mail messages, in particular, has posed longstanding legal and logistical difficulties, the officials said.

Since April, when it was disclosed that the intercepts of some private communications of Americans went beyond legal limits in late 2008 and early 2009, several Congressional committees have been investigating. Those inquiries have led to concerns in Congress about the agency’s ability to collect and read domestic e-mail messages of Americans on a widespread basis, officials said. Supporting that conclusion is the account of a former N.S.A. analyst who, in a series of interviews, described being trained in 2005 for a program in which the agency routinely examined large volumes of Americans’ e-mail messages without court warrants. Two intelligence officials confirmed that the program was still in operation.

Both the former analyst’s account and the rising concern among some members of Congress about the N.S.A.’s recent operation are raising fresh questions about the spy agency.

Representative Rush Holt, Democrat of New Jersey and chairman of the House Select Intelligence Oversight Panel, has been investigating the incidents and said he had become increasingly troubled by the agency’s handling of domestic communications.

In an interview, Mr. Holt disputed assertions by Justice Department and national security officials that the overcollection was inadvertent.

“Some actions are so flagrant that they can’t be accidental,” Mr. Holt said.

Other Congressional officials raised similar concerns but would not agree to be quoted for the record.

Mr. Holt added that few lawmakers could challenge the agency’s statements because so few understood the technical complexities of its surveillance operations. “The people making the policy,” he said, “don’t understand the technicalities.”  …

Continue reading.

Greenwald:

"My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government" — Barack Obama, January 28, 2009

Promising "a new era of openness in our country," President Obama [said]: "Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency" — CNN, January 21, 2009

"A democracy requires accountability, and accountability requires transparency.  As Justice Louis Brandeis wrote, ‘sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants.’  In our democracy, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which encourages accountability through transparency, is the most prominent expression of a profound national commitment to ensuring an open Government.  At the heart of that commitment is the idea that accountability is in the interest of the Government and the citizenry alike. . . .

All agencies should adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure, in order to renew their commitment to the principles embodied in FOIA, and to usher in a new era of open Government" — Barack Obama, January 21, 2009

* * * * *

Has Obama fulfilled those pledges and lived up to those commitments — even remotely?  Just examine the facts and judge for yourself:

February 9, New York Times:

In a closely watched case involving rendition and torture [Mohamed v. Jeppesen Data], a lawyer for the Obama administration seemed to surprise a panel of federal appeals judges on Monday by pressing ahead with an argument for preserving state secrets originally developed by the Bush administration.

February 21, Huffington Post: 

The Obama administration, siding with former President George W. Bush, is trying to kill a lawsuit that seeks to recover what could be millions of missing White House e-mails.

February 27, Associated Press:

The Obama administration has lost its argument that a potential threat to national security should stop a lawsuit challenging the government’s warrantless wiretapping program. . . . The Obama administration, like the Bush administration before it, claimed national security would be compromised if a lawsuit brought by the Oregon chapter of the charity, Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, was allowed to proceed.

April 7, The Atlantic:

The Obama Administration still wants to keep its secrets. Yesterday, the Justice Department [in a case brought against Bush officials for illegal spying] embraced the argument that the state secrets privilege . . . should shut down any litigation against the National Security Agency for its arguably illegal warrantless surveillance program.

April 28, New York Times:  …

Keep reading—it gets worse.

The MP3 player is greater—very good idea.

Missing functionality: the Kindle DX should have a clock that shows current date and time and can be used as an alarm clock. Moreover, it should include a couple of timers: a countdown timer, for times when you want to read for 30 minutes but then have to get going, and a count-up timer that lets you see how long you’ve been reading.

I don’t know the impact the clock, alarm, and timer would have on battery life, but I think it would be minimal. It would be nice if the WhisperNet connection could automatically reset the clock to the NIST time. (This would require being able to enter your time zone and DST information.)

A truly baby-bottom-smooth shave this morning. The Woods of Windsor shaving soap produced an excellent lather with the help of the Rooney Style 2, and the Merkur Heavy Duty (aka “HD”) performed flawlessly. A really fine shave, topped off with Woods of Windsor aftershave. (A leaky bottle in the shipment removed the lettering from the label.) Terrific start to the day. This is one of those shaves which require one to caress one’s face (unobtrusively, one hopes) from time to time.

Spencer Ackerman:

Via Dana Goldstein, Ali Gharib makes the stellar point that what’s going on in Iran is reaffirmation of the Islamic Revolution, not a repudiation of it. Kate Klonick finds that problematic. But why, really? If Gharib is right, then what’s unfolding is a measure of reconciling the revolution with greater openness. There isn’t sufficient evidence to support the proposition that the people out in the streets in Iran are liberals. But that doesn’t diminish from the fact that what they’re fighting is deeply illiberal, and what they’re fighting for as baseline propositions — the principles of sound, trustworthy elections; the right to be free from violence and harassment — are eminently supportable. If they can harmonize the Islamic Revolution with those concepts, they’ll have done themselves and the world a great service. It’s not the case that, as Mark Krikorian writes, “We’ll know it’s a revolution when Iranian women start throwing off their headscarves en masse.” The fact that they’re demonstrating in their headscarves is proof enough. Let Iranian opposition sort out the balance between their religiosity and their politics for themselves.

I am watching season one of Six Feet Under, which I’ve never seen, and enjoying it a lot. I started thinking about the episodes so far and I became aware of how I was imposing a structure on them—categories, sub-categories, etc.—and I realized that I do that quite a bit. I just sat and thought through some examples of that sort of thinking—as in, for example, the table of contents of the Guide to Gourmet Shaving, or the way Cooking Compendium is organized.

I could even somehow visualize the process in motion, like moving translucent blocks around: stacking, sliding, putting together in various ways.

As I thought more about it, I realized that this is the way my mind works when I am trying to understand something. And I think of understanding something as being able to teach it, properly organized for optimal learning. So when I’m working on understanding, I have going on in the background the composition of a beginner’s book on whatever I’m trying to understand.

Apologies for the navel-gazing, but I only just figured this out. Maybe this is the way everyone works at understanding.

What’s up with this guy? Victor Zapanda at ThinkProgress:

MSNBC reports that the Obama administration has denied its request for the names of individuals who have visited the White House since the Inauguration. Additionally, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington announced today that it is suing the Department of Homeland Security after the non-partisan organization was denied a request for records of visits of “leading coal company executives.” The Obama administration’s explanation:

The administration ought to be able to hold secret meetings in the White House, “such as an elected official interviewing for an administration position or an ambassador coming for a discussion on issues that would affect international negotiations,” said Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt.

The Bush administration made the same arguments, which were ruled against twice in federal court. In fact, before his election, Obama promised that he would end the Bush administration’s practice of holding secret meetings in the White House, which is supposed to be “the people’s house”:

– In 2006, Obama criticized Cheney’s secret energy meetings: “When big oil companies are invited into the White House for secret energy meetings, it’s no wonder they end up with billions in tax breaks.” [1/26/06]

– In 2007, Obama promised on his first day to: “launch the most sweeping ethics reform in history to make the White House the people’s house and send the Washington lobbyists back to K Street.” [6/22/07]

– In 2008, Obama told Wisconsin voters: “This change will not be easy. It will require reforming our politics by taking power away from the lobbyists who kill good ideas and good plans with secret meetings and campaign checks.” [9/22/08]

The day after the Inauguration, Obama issued a memo saying, “my Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government.” Obama had a long record of increasing accountability and transparency in government before he entered the White House. By opening up access to the White House visitor logs, Obama has an opportunity to fulfill his promise of making the White House the people’s house.

McCain, for example: "Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran" (to the tune of the Beach Boys’ "Barbara Ann"). But now the same conservatives love the Iranian people. Greenwald:

I’m going to leave the debate about whether Iran’s election was "stolen" and the domestic implications within Iran to people who actually know what they’re talking about (which is a very small subset of the class purporting to possess such knowledge).  But there is one point I want to make about the vocal and dramatic expressions of solidarity with Iranians issuing from some quarters in the U.S.

Much of the same faction now claiming such concern for the welfare of The Iranian People are the same people who have long been advocating a military attack on Iran and the dropping of large numbers of bombs on their country — actions which would result in the slaughter of many of those very same Iranian People.  During the presidential campaign, John McCain infamously sang about Bomb, Bomb, Bomb-ing Iran.  The Wall St. Journal published a war screed from Commentary‘s Norman Podhoretz entitled "The Case for Bombing Iran," and following that, Podhoretz said in an interview that he "hopes and prays" that the U.S. "bombs the Iranians."  John Bolton and Joe Lieberman advocated the same bombing campaign, while Bill Kristol — with typical prescience — hopefully suggested that Bush might bomb Iran if Obama were elected.  Rudy Giuliani actually said he would be open to a first-strike nuclear attack on Iran in order to stop their nuclear program.

Imagine how many of the people protesting this week would be dead if any of these bombing advocates had their way — just as those who paraded around (and still parade around) under the banner of Liberating the Iraqi People caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of them, at least.  Hopefully, one of the principal benefits of the turmoil in Iran is that it humanizes whoever the latest Enemy is.  Advocating a so-called "attack on Iran" or "bombing Iran" in fact means slaughtering huge numbers of the very same people who are on the streets of Tehran inspiring so many — obliterating their homes and workplaces, destroying their communities, shattering the infrastructure of their society and their lives.  The same is true every time we start mulling the prospect of attacking and bombing another country as though it’s some abstract decision in a video game.

After The Wall St. Journal published the Podhoretz war dance demanding that Iran be bombed, and after Podhoretz casually called for England to "bomb the Iranians into smithereens" if their sailors weren’t immediately returned, I wrote: …

Continue reading.

Good column by Greenwald:

On May 13, when Obama announced he would attempt to suppress prisoner abuse photos on the ground that their release would inflame anti-American sentiment, I wrote:

Think about what Obama’s rationale would justify. Obama’s claim . . .  means we should conceal or even outright lie about all the bad things we do that might reflect poorly on us. For instance, if an Obama bombing raid slaughters civilians in Afghanistan (as has happened several times already), then, by this reasoning, we ought to lie about what happened and conceal the evidence depicting what was done — as the Bush administration did — because release of such evidence would “would be to further inflame anti-American opinion and to put our troops in greater danger.” Indeed, evidence of our killing civilians in Afghanistan inflames anti-American sentiment far more than these photographs would. Isn’t it better to hide the evidence showing the bad things we do?

Last Friday, when yet another dispute arose between local Afghan officials and the U.S. military over whether a U.S. airstrike caused a large number of civilian deaths, I wrote a post entitled “Should the U.S. also suppress evidence of civilian deaths in Afghanistan?” and asked:

Using the standard that is now so accepted across the political spectrum in Washington — information that will inflame anti-American sentiment should be suppressed rather than disclosed so at to not endanger our troops — isn’t it better if we just cover-up, rather than learn the truth about, the civilian deaths we caused in Afghanistan? After all, news reports of dead Afghan women and children at the hands of American bombs obviously inflame anti-American sentiment and Endanger Our Troops at least as much as the disclosure of some additional torture photos would. By the prevailing reasoning of Washington, shouldn’t we want our government to hide the truth about what we did — lest anti-American anger and the risk of attack on Our Troops increase? Isn’t that the noble anti-transparency principle we’re now endorsing?

Here’s what McClatchy is reporting today (h/t Paul Tenny/GregMitchell): …

Continue reading. And note his UPDATE II:

Here is still more on Our New Era of Transparency:

Obama blocks list of visitors to White House

Taking Bush’s position, administration denies msnbc.com request for logs

The Obama administration is fighting to block access to names of visitors to the White House, taking up the Bush administration argument that a president doesn’t have to reveal who comes calling to influence policy decisions.

Despite President Barack Obama’s pledge to introduce a new era of transparency to Washington, and despite two rulings by a federal judge that the records are public, the Secret Service has denied msnbc.com’s request for the names of all White House visitors from Jan. 20 to the present. . . .

The Obama administration is arguing that the White House visitor logs are presidential records — not Secret Service agency records, which would be subject to the Freedom of Information Act. The administration ought to be able to hold secret meetings in the White House, “such as an elected official interviewing for an administration position or an ambassador coming for a discussion on issues that would affect international negotiations,” said Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt.

The new light being shined on our government is so bright as to almost be blinding.

Actually, he’s quoting the conclusions of the government study, but it’s well worth noting:

A group of 13 federal agencies, coordinated by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, has produced a report on the science behind Global Warming. The conclusions:

1. Global warming is unequivocal and primarily human-induced.
2. Climate changes are underway in the United States and are projected to grow.
3. Widespread climate-related impacts are occurring now and are expected to increase.
4. Climate change will stress water resources.
5. Crop and livestock production will be increasingly challenged.
6. Coastal areas are at increasing risk from sea-level rise and storm surge.
7. Threats to human health will increase.
8. Climate change will interact with many social and environmental stresses.
9. Thresholds will be crossed, leading to large changes in climate and ecosystems.
10. Future climate change and its impacts depend on choices made today.

Read the report here.

Dana Perino disagrees, of course. But her expertise in this field is… ?