USA v. Abdulmutallab, AQ, et al

For a cool-headed strategic evaluation of the ongoing jihadist threat, one could do worse than to read STRATFOR's latest take on the issue, at: http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100106_jihadism_2010_threat_continues

Tempest in a Tea Party

Not to defend Harry Reid who was -- at best -- mind-bendingly impolitic in his remarks about Obama, but Glenn Greenwald, writing in Salon, describes the source book, Game Change, thusly:

"...the book is filled with the type of petty, catty, gossipy, trashy sniping that is the staple of sleazy tabloids and reality TV shows, and it has been assembled through anonymous gossip, accountability-free attributions, and contrived melodramatic dialogue masquerading as 'reporting'."

Now, Glenn Greenwald is no poster-boy for political centrism, so we must await the consensus view of Game Change, but it is not an insignificant fact that its co-author, Mark Halperin, is as far to the right as Greenwald is to the left. The Reid remark is unsourced, in line with the authors' note that all interviews were conducted on "deep background", and the fact that Reid has not disowned his unfortunate remark is telling; but it does not rule out the possibility that he was blind-sided. That the GOP is having a revanchist field-day over the issue was predictable, but their attempt to compare this with the party-engineered political demise of Trent Lott is merely embarrassing.

Read Greenwald's column at: http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/index.html

Metaphoric Medley

We have free-lance writer William Ecenberger and Smithsonian magazine to thank for a delightful parody of the cliches showered upon us by politicians and reverberated by the press.
Read it at:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/The-Last-Page-There-Oughta-Be-a-Law.html

The Stone Chronicles

Revisionist historian Oliver Stone is reported to have made known to the Television Crtics Association that he is going to give actual historians something to chew on by producing a 10-part series for Showtime entitled Secret History of America. His stated premise is that "Stalin, Hitler, Mao, McCarthy -- these people have been vilified pretty thoroughly by history", and, "Stalin has a complete other story", and, "Hitler is an easy scapegoat." He modestly refrained from adding his own name to the list of rogues thus unfairly demonized.

In fairness to Mr. Stone, he is a compelling storyteller despite a tendency to conflate fact with fiction.

Kirk to the Mast

To readers unfamiliar with the one-party domination of Massachusetts politics, Paul Kirk is not exactly a household name. An old friend of the Kennedy family, he was appointed by our governor as an interim replacement for the late Senator Ted Kennedy after a highly partisan political squabble that was resolved by his agreeing not to run in the subsequent special election.


He also had to agree not to endorse any candidate in that election, lest the power inherent in his incumbency unduly influence some voters. Now -- in direct contravention of the resolution that got him the job -- the senator has publicly endorsed the Democratic candidate, Martha Coakley. Not content with seizing the moral low ground, he dismissed entirely-justified Republican criticisms by averring that his views were no surprise to anyone; hardly the point and hardly a defense of such blatant dissing of the legislature. He may well argue that the operative resolution was -- in fact -- non-binding, but this is a mealy-mouthed evasion, not likely to satisfy the ever-vocal critics of the Kennedys in particular and of us Massachusetts Democrats in general.

Show Biz Notes

One reads to one's dismay the below-linked AP item advising us that Morgan Freeman's voice has now replaced Walter Cronkite's as introducer of the CBS Evening News With Katie Couric. Lest there might have been any any doubt previously, it seems clear that CBS News has now -- psychically at least -- migrated to the network's Entertainment division.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100104/ap_en_tv/us_cbs_cronkite

Health Care Legislation Unconstitutional?

In today's Cape Cod Times, local Republican politician Jeffrey Perry attacked the proposed -- or, for that matter, any -- health care legislation as being an unconstitutional exercise of power by Congress. He dragged out as evidence the old "enumerated powers" argument that has been the refuge of progress-averse conservatives since the era of the Anti-federalists.

For Perry to cavalierly dismiss the Congress’ authority to legislate for "the general Welfare of the United States” as being "simply a preamble to the Article I section 8 enumerated powers", is to read that article in a manner so jaundiced as to nullify his subsequent conclusions.

Far from being simply a preamble, the opening paragraph of Article I also gives Congress the power "to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, and to provide for the common defense"; powers which Mr. Perry would presumably not venture to deny. It is hardly the superfluous expository preamble that Mr. Perry would have it.

Constitutional promotion of "the general welfare" (a term self-evidently descriptive of universal health care) is, furthermore, a phrase echoed in the document's actual Preamble, a statement of intent so existential to the American ethos that generations have been willing to put their lives at risk to defend it. While there may be valid political reasons for opposing healthcare reform, distorting the Constitution to validate them is not the way to go.