Sunday Mishmash

Bravo to Nate 'The Great" Silver,baseball's leading statistician, for taking a break from politics to do an analysis of Derek Jeter's salary compared to performance and the compartive prices of other shortstops. I tend to believe this column printed in the New York Times led to the Yankees' upping the offer and snagging Derek for the next 3 years. Jeter now stands to become the first Yankee to pass the 3,000 hit level,to surpass Mickey Mantle's record for most games played as a Yankee, and to top Ricky Henderson's stolen base record for the franchise.

Dick Cheney in a moment of lucidity told Tim Russert that the tax cuts for the wealthy did not create any jobs and that they only account for 25% of the national debt. I have an ingenious solution to Cheney's Interpol problem. Since Cheney literally doesn't have a pulse anymore, his lawyers should claim he's dead, thereby sparring the Obama Administration from having to finesse the arrest warrant. The bonus to this is that he can take advantage of the Estate Tax, which is due to re-appear in 2011.

Since it looks like the tax cuts for the wealthy will be extended, Glenn Beck will get $2,500,000 in tax breaks and Mitch McConnell, whose net worth is $34 million, will get enough of a tax break that he will earn more than the President of the United States. Not bad for saying "no"

James Fallows writes in the Atlantic about how John McCain became a shell of his former self. Fallows likens McCain's fate to that of Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh, who became right-wing crackpots in their old age. Regenary, the right-wing publisher, has printed a new book extolling Lindbergh's politics when he was challenging FDR. It must have been underwritten by the Koch Brothers, who are trying to rehabilitate their families' reputation during that period.

For his part, McCain is trying to run out the congressional clock on DADT as GOP spokespeople claimed in the Sunday news shows,saying DADT is dead for this Congress. Don't bet on this.

Remember to revisit Prop 8 trial tracker tomorrow as the oral arguments begin at the 9th Circuit Court on same-sex marriage in California. So far, no names have been announced about the defenders. Boies and Olson are back up for the same-sex marriage advocates.

Meanwhile in Illinois, the Governor signed the bill allowing same-sex marriage and partnerships. What's interesting about this bill is that it allows for "marriage-lite" for both gays and straights. Straight couples can opt for domestic partnerships instead of marriage. A little shot across the bow was said by government authorities when they told the press, "No church can define marriage." Ouch!

Nate Silver in today's New York Times does a post-mortem about the House races. In short, he concludes that the Republican 60 seat pickup was a result of the polarization in those districts and that over 48 of them were districts where McCain had won in 2008. he also notes that the Democrats picked up all seats in Massachusetts, suggesting that the Coakley candidacy was incredibly weak when she lost to Scott Brown.

Newton Leroy Gingrich sort of thinks he may run for President so far. Stay tuned. He came up with an ingenious suggestion that the "rich" should determine when their tax cuts end. After all aren't they the ones who built America?

Robert Kaplan is an author I have enjoyed over the years but he leaves me today with a sophomoric article in the Washington Post, which will pass in this town as wise, saying that the problems in the world today are the result of the weakening of empires, including our own. He extols the fact that both the United States and the Soviets were "missionizing empires" and deplores China's reluctance to play the same role, exporting their values. He tut-tuts that China is not stepping up to the plate to accept their leadership role in this age. A strange argument but one that was heard on the Senate floor this week uttered by the "Liberator of South Ossetia" himself, John McCain.

Kaplan tells readers--wrongly--that we do not face the same fate as the Soviet union because of our wealth and personal freedom. This stuff just fries me. We have a war against the Middle Class--the Poor lost out two decades ago--,the world's largest debt, and the greatest shrinking of personal freedom in a generation but, no, Robert thinks we can go on with building up our military power. I guess the royalties for his books have been so good that he doesn't have to live in everyday world. I suggest Kaplan may be hanging out too much with Niall Ferguson, who has been on a global speaking campaign saying the American empire is threatened by the country's social benefits.

Dick Lugar risks being renditioned by teabaggers to Arizona to placed in Governor Brewer's death panels. Lugar praised the President for his outreach to Republicans, claimed the Republican leadership appreciated it and said that Repubicans have to come up with some constructive programs and can't be the party of no. The Teabaggers are issuing a Fatwa against Senator Lugar for faintly praising the Muslim President.

Actually the founder of the Tea Party Express said this week we should return to the days when only those who owned property could vote. Does a car count?

The new Teabagger Governor of Maine,LePage, discovered something interesting. He is urging his Attorney-General to sign on to the case against the Healthcare Bill because when Maine becomes the 35th state,the law becomes null and void. Isn't that Great? It's also wrong. A great state now run by a total moron.

But in Virginia, we have the great Cooch, our fanatic Attorney-General, who now wants to streamline his appeal on the healthcare bill straight to the Roberts Court,Inc. You see the first federal court suit here in Virginia upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate. Now Cooch doesn't just want an appeal he wants the final decision while Gumba Tony Scalia is still on the court.

I recommend reading Andy Rowell and Eveline Lubbers' "Ken Saro-Wiwa was framed, secret evidence shows" in today's The Independent (U.K.). This article details the multi-year investigation by Nigerian authorities into the military's killing of four Ogoni elders whose murders led to the execution of the playwright and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa in 1995. The article should be read not only for this infamous case but also for the tawdry atmosphere around all abuses. Remember Saro-Wiwa was charged with murdering the elders for their moderate stance on issues in Ogoniland. The article details the activities of the military leading to killing the Ogoni elders and later to the whole frame-up and execution of Saro-Wiwa. And one of the details--those gratuitous details that show up in human rights cases--is the delivery of Ghana Must Go Bags filled with money to Lt.Col Okuntimo and how they spill open with guards present. The bags were the Shell Oil Company's payoff to the Colonel. Will anything be done?

The whole Wikileaks controversy has certainly opened the door to politicians' inner fascism around the globe. Both Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin call Julien Assange a traitor--even though he's Australia. Mike wants all leakers executed. I object--I don'tthink Scooty Libby should be executed. Mitch McConnell calls Julian Assange a "high-tech terrorist". Australian journalists are calling for Donald Assange, Julien's 20year old son to be kidnapped and used as ransom for his father's return. I guess this is Colombia-style democracy. Senator Lieberman,I-Knesset, said he got Amazon's cloud network to drop Wikileaks. And the woman who has accused Assange of sex with a broken condom turns out to have worked with the CIA and on other issues with anti-Castro groups organized by Carlos Alberto Montaner. (Full discloser--Carlos is a friend of mine.) Meanwhile,the United States, Australia and the United Kingdom are doing an all-global press to shut down any Wikileaks websites and their new tweeter accounts.

Now,let's focus on what our Government thinks of us. The Middle Eastern governments have basically enforced media censorship on the Wikileaks stories and shut down all internet sites commenting on it. We expect that. And we expect Russia and China to do the same as human rights activists have protested for years about authoritarian governments waging cyberwarfare against dissidents. Aside from the amateur hacker in the first days of the story, it has been the United States' government ,which has unleashed the electronic war to swamp every and all Wikileaks websites. It makes me sick to see our country is the best in the world at this. I had always felt it was Iran and China, working with a software called "Rain" that were the champs in suppressing information.

Now graduates students in Ivy League Schools have been warned not to read Wikileaks if they want a job in the State Department. Government employees have been warned not to read any of the Wikileaks' cables--even in the press? We have heard that lives at danger. American diplomats have been fanning out across the globe to offer their sources the opportunity to relocate for protection. How much of this concern is based on realistic threats I don't know. But the attitude of American politicians to the American public certainly is eye-opening.

Is there anything you have read that suurprises you? Are you shocked to find that Hamid Karzai is not a Jeffersonian Democrat? Are you surprised to find that an American defense contractor procured young boys and drugs for the Afghanis they are training as policemen? Were you stunned to find that the Saudis want to fight Iran to "the last American"? I'm not sure that the American public is shocked by anything in these cables.

But what I cam certain is that the over-reaction to Wikileaks will stir up more anti-Americanism than before. It seems very peculiar that we are hunting down Julian Assange with an insensity we lack against Bin Laden. Our plea to interpol was immediately after Assange said he was going to dump thousands of documents about an American bank. The Iraq and Afghanistan dumps--which were massive--elicited a very nonchalant response from Bob Gates at the Pentagon. Or maybe it has been Assange's call for both Hilary Clinton and Obama to resign for ordering spying on the United Nations that triggered the harsh reactions. I thought both statements showed how Assange was actually very naive about politics in general. We've been spying along with everyone else on the United Nations for decades.

But one question I do have is why the manic urge to shut down Wikileaks but no such effort has been made to close down the Jihadi websitesthat recruit new Al Qaeda members. We have Al Qaeda in Yemen recruiting American college kids from Virginia and relaying praise to the FT. Hood shooter. These websites actually kill people and yet we haven't made a move on them. I know it's so we can obtain intelligence on these groups so we allow them to operate. Meanwhile, troubled youths destroy their own lives and maybe others.

The simple lesson on Wikileaks is to keep your condom on, others the feds will come get you.

If you want to own a part of American history, the Unibomber's parcel of land in Montana is on sale. Unfortunately, it doesn't include the cabin. The last time I looked the cabin was at the Newseum here in Washington.