Tag Archives: afghanistan

The Press Needs to Stop Encouraging Republican Lunacy Toward Muslims

by KerstinBowling Posted on November 19, 2015

Mother Jones

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Donald Trump is still Donald Trump, trying to gain attention by saying obviously outrageous things. But his latest outrage looks a little contrived. Here’s the full context of his recent interview with Yahoo’s Hunter Walker:

Yahoo News asked Trump whether his push for increased surveillance of American Muslims could include warrantless searches. He suggested he would consider a series of drastic measures.

“We’re going to have to do things that we never did before. And some people are going to be upset about it, but I think that now everybody is feeling that security is going to rule,” Trump said. “And certain things will be done that we never thought would happen in this country in terms of information and learning about the enemy. And so we’re going to have to do certain things that were frankly unthinkable a year ago.”

Yahoo News asked Trump whether this level of tracking might require registering Muslims in a database or giving them a form of special identification that noted their religion. He wouldn’t rule it out.

“We’re going to have to — we’re going to have to look at a lot of things very closely,” Trump said when presented with the idea. “We’re going to have to look at the mosques. We’re going to have to look very, very carefully.”

It would be one thing if Trump floated the idea himself of warrantless searches and special IDs. It’s quite another if a reporter brings them up and Trump tap dances a little bit. Needless to say, in a better world Trump would have explicitly denounced all these ideas. Obviously we don’t live in that world. Still, the only thing Trump actually said here is that we’re going to have to look at a lot of things very closely. The rest was just a reporter fishing for a headline.

To state the obvious: no, we don’t need to do anything that was “unthinkable” a year ago. As my colleague Miles Johnson notes, “of the 745,000 refugees resettled in the US since the September 11 terrorist attacks, only two have been arrested on terrorism-related charges.” The American Muslim community has been instrumental in preventing jihadist violence in the US since 9/11, and to deliberately alienate them, as Trump and many other Republicans are proposing, is just about the most dangerous thing we could do.

We know how to fight dangerous people. We know how to fight terrorism. And we don’t have to shred the Constitution to do it. Instead of fishing for headlines and stoking the latest round of fatuous fearmongering from Republicans, maybe we’d be better served if reporters started asking them hard questions instead.

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The Press Needs to Stop Encouraging Republican Lunacy Toward Muslims

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Medicaid Provides Pretty Good Health Coverage for Children

by TanjaPflaum0174 Posted on November 18, 2015

Mother Jones

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Via Harold Pollack, here’s an interesting study of children’s health care. The researchers investigated how good Medicaid coverage was, and the results were surprisingly positive. I have painstakingly modified the chart so that higher numbers are always better, and as you can see, reported satisfaction with Medicaid was equal to or better than private insurance on most measures, and very close on the others.

Now, this is only for children, and the results might be different for adults. Still, a lot of people—including me—generally think of Medicaid as fairly lousy coverage. If this study is correct, we need to rethink this.

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Medicaid Provides Pretty Good Health Coverage for Children

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Let’s Take a Look at How Tough Republicans Would Be Against ISIS

by ConnorTrudeau Posted on November 15, 2015

Mother Jones

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Following the terrorist attacks in Paris, conservatives are eagerly taking the opportunity to accuse Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton of fecklessness and appeasement for not taking a harder line against ISIS. We need someone with the guts to lead, and who isn’t afraid to use the term radical Islam. Apparently that’s important.

Maybe so. But ground troops are the only way to destroy ISIS in the short term, and the Republican presidential candidates have all been oddly reluctant to get behind a serious American invasion force. So before we allow them to get too far up on their high horses about how tough they’d be, here’s a reminder of what they were saying about ISIS before two days ago.

Donald Trump wants to take away oil fields controlled by ISIS, but has explicitly dodged the question of whether he would use a substantial ground force to do it. His preference is for an air campaign: “I would just bomb those suckers. That’s right. I’d blow up the pipes. I’d blow up every single inch. There would be nothing left.”

From Tuesday’s debate: “If Putin wants to go and knock the hell out of ISIS, I am all for it, 100%.“

Jeb Bush has previously ruled out a “major commitment” of ground troops. He would support a modest increase in “supportive” troops, and wants to unite the moderate anti-Assad forces in Syria. But he also thinks Trump is crazy.

From the debate: “Let ISIS take out Assad, and then Putin will take out ISIS?….That’s not how the real world works. We have to lead, we have to be involved. We should have a no fly zone in Syria.“

Carly Fiorina has specifically said ground troops are unnecessary. Our allies should provide any troops necessary.

From the debate: “We must have a no fly zone in Syria….We also have a set of allies in the Arab Middle East that know that ISIS is their fight….King Abdullah of Jordan….The Egyptians, the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Bahrainis, the Emirati, the Kurds….They must see leadership support and resolve from the United States of America.”

Marco Rubio said last year the he would like to see a permanent US presence in the Middle East. “I’m not saying 100,000 troops, but certainly some level that allows us to project power quickly and confront challenges and threats.” More recently, he’s backed off that position: “ISIS is a radical Sunni Islamic group. They need to be defeated on the ground by a Sunni military force with air support from the United States.” And this: “Intervening doesn’t mean ground troops. Intervening can be a lot of things.” His official position on his website specifically recommends air strikes, special ops, training, arms for Sunni and Kurdish forces, diplomacy, financial targeting, and better PR. It does not mention ground troops.

From the debate: “ISIS is now in Libya….Soon they will be in Turkey. They will try Jordan. They will try Saudi Arabia….They hate us because of our values. They hate us because our girls go to school. They hate us because women drive in the United States. Either they win or we win, and we had better take this risk seriously, it is not going away on its own.”

Ben Carson has suggested that ground troops “might” be necessary, but has declined to go any further.

From the debate: “We’re talking about global jihadists….We have to destroy their caliphate. And you look for the easiest place to do that? It would be in Iraq. Outside of Anbar in Iraq, there’s a big energy field. Take that from them. Take all of that land from them. We could do that, I believe, fairly easily, I’ve learned from talking to several generals, and then you move on from there.”

Ted Cruz has suggested that Kurdish pesh merga are all we need: “We need boots on the ground, but they don’t necessarily need to be American boots. The Kurds are our boots on the ground.” Cruz has generally dodged specific questions about sending in American troops, instead supporting an “overwhelming” American air campaign.

From the debate: Cruz declined to address ISIS during the debate.

And just for comparison, here is Hillary Clinton on her website:

ISIS and the foreign terrorist fighters it recruits pose a serious threat to America and our allies. We will confront and defeat them in a way that builds greater stability across the region, without miring our troops in another misguided ground war. Hillary will empower our partners to defeat terrorism and the ideologies that drive it, including through our ongoing partnership to build Iraqi military and governing capacity, our commitment to Afghanistan’s democracy and security, and by supporting efforts to restore stability to Libya and Yemen.

So Hillary is a little bit more categorical about not using American ground troops, but basically she’d fit in just fine on the Republican stage. She supports an air campaign; she supports a no-fly zone in Syria; she supports arming the anti-Assad rebels; and she supports partnerships with our allies. If the Republican candidates are any tougher on ISIS than Hillary, they’ve been oddly timid about saying so.

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Let’s Take a Look at How Tough Republicans Would Be Against ISIS

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Live Coverage of the Democratic Presidential Debate in Iowa

by o99hjkd Posted on November 14, 2015

Mother Jones

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The Democratic debate is on CBS tonight at 9 pm Eastern. I had a great football-program-related excuse not to liveblog it, but it turned out that USC played on Friday this week. So now I have no excuse, and I’ll be here with bells on my toes.

Because of the terrorist attacks in Paris, CBS has promised lots of questions about foreign policy. At the risk of being crass, this is probably good for Hillary and not so great for Bernie Sanders. Even among Democrats, there’s likely to be more taste than usual for a hawkish, Hillary-esque foreign policy tonight. We’ll see.

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Live Coverage of the Democratic Presidential Debate in Iowa

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Friday Cat Blogging – 13 November 2015

by tadeusz444 Posted on November 13, 2015

Mother Jones

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According to Marian, the second Friday the 13th of the year isn’t unlucky. Is this really a thing? Or is she just yanking my chain?

Beats me. But why take chances? This week our (mostly) black cat gets a rest, and our lovely gray-and-white cat takes center stage. She does not look like she expects any kind of bad luck at all. And she was right! By rolling over and looking adorable she got an immediate tummy rub. Life is good.

Continued:

Friday Cat Blogging – 13 November 2015

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Ted Cruz Really Hates Climate Change

by Laura Brown Posted on November 13, 2015

Mother Jones

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Yesterday I dinged Ted Cruz for blathering about how he’d eliminate five cabinet departments. Big deal. The programs would just go elsewhere. Instead, tell me what programs you’d eliminate.

As it turns out, Cruz does have a list of programs he wants to get rid of. It’s really hard to find because his website is a horrific mess, but here it is:

  1. Climate Ready Water Utilities Initiative
  2. Climate Research Funding for the Office of Research and Development
  3. Climate Resilience Evaluation Awareness Tool
  4. Global Methane Initiative
  5. Green Infrastructure Program
  6. Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program
  7. New Starts Transit Program
  8. Pacific Coastal Salmon Recovery Fund
  9. Regulation of CO2 Emissions from Power Plants and all Sources
  10. Regulation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Vehicles
  11. Renewable Fuel Standard Federal Mandates
  12. UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
  13. UN Population Fund (abortion)
  14. USDA Catfish Inspection Program (genuinely wasteful)
  15. Appalachian Regional Commission (helps poor people)
  16. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (Obama program)
  17. Corporation for Public Broadcasting (culture war)
  18. Corporation for Travel Promotion (???)
  19. Legal Services Corporation (helps poor people)
  20. National Endowment for the Arts (culture war)
  21. National Endowment for the Humanities (culture war)
  22. Presidential Election Campaign Fund (no one uses it anymore)
  23. Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation (???)
  24. Sugar Subsidies (anti-Rubio)
  25. Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (part of hated Obama stimulus program)

I’ve re-ordered this list to make clear just how much Cruz hates climate change. Nearly half of his cuts are to programs related to the environment or climate change. Cruz also wants to ditch some culture warrior stuff (arts, humanities, public broadcasting), some anti-liberal stuff (legal services, CFPB, TIGER), some anti-Rubio stuff (sugar subsidies), and some genuinely stupid stuff (USDA catfish inspection, a clever protectionist measure beloved of catfish-producing states).

So how much would this save? Cruz says $50 billion per year, but that seems pretty optimistic. The catfish thing, for example, costs $14 million, and lots of items on the list don’t cost the government anything. I suppose I could google all 25 of them and see what they add up to, but not today. My horseback guess, though, is maybe $10-20 billion.

I’ve tried to identify the reasons Cruz hates each of these programs, but I came up blank on two of them: travel promotion and the Saint Lawrence Seaway. Maybe they’re genuinely wasteful. I’m not sure.

In any case, this is it. Cruz deserves credit for at least making a list, which is more than most candidates are willing to do. But will this actually save more than a tiny fraction of his stupendous tax cuts? Not a chance.

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Ted Cruz Really Hates Climate Change

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Conservatives Need to Admit That Racism Still Exists

by Kerstin50Z Posted on November 12, 2015

Mother Jones

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I hopped over to The Corner to see what was going on, and the answer is….political correctness. Here are first few headlines I saw:

The Hidden Cost to Crazy Leftist Domination of Universities

Yale & Missouri: Power Play

The Left Is Starting to Tear Itself Apart: College Coeds Are Like Yazidi Slaves?

Campus Cattle Actually, I believe the correct term is “veal.” -ed.

The Mugging Continues

Conservatives are really flooding the zone over this. And since there’s obviously been some bad behavior on the part of the Yale and Missouri protesters, they have an easy time mining a few days of outrage over it. As for myself, I haven’t said much of anything, for a couple of reasons. First, I’m not just a middle-aged white guy, I’m a middle-aged white guy who grew up in Orange County and now lives in Irvine. Off the top of my head, I can remember only one black schoolmate while I was growing up, and pretty much none in the neighborhood I live in now. So I’m not exactly well placed to have any deep insights on interracial relationships.

Second, when things like this erupt, it’s often the case that the proximate cause is merely the last in a long series of things that already have everyone simmering. So the provocation itself (say, a fairly anodyne email about Halloween from a residential master) is often easy to mock because it really is sort of trivial on its own. And the reaction (“friends who are not going to class, who are not doing their homework, who are losing sleep, who are skipping meals”) can seem absurdly delicate. But fixating on a single incident like this is as silly as trying to figure out why all those European countries really cared so much about Archduke Ferdinand. In both cases, you’re missing the forest for the trees.

And this is why the conservative reaction to this stuff always seems so shallow. Sure, students shouldn’t scream at people. Sure, professors shouldn’t call in “muscle” to kick people out of public spaces. Sure, yet another demand for more diversity training can seem tiresome. Go ahead and criticize all this stuff. Plenty of people on the left have done so too.

But at the same time, if you are going to comment on these affairs, take the time to understand not just the (possibly trivial) proximate cause, but the underlying problems that have been building up for months or years. At least acknowledge what the real grievances are. I haven’t spent a lot of time reading about the Yale and Missouri protests, but even I know that there are a whole raft of complaints about racist behavior that have been accumulating for some time. Is it asking too much for conservatives to at least mention this, and perhaps condemn it? Even a “to be sure” paragraph would be better than nothing.

For what it’s worth, I think the hair trigger that campus lefties seem to have for all manner of isms often goes too far. It’s not just tiresome, it’s counterproductive, since it convinces too many people that they shouldn’t engage with these issues at all. One wrong word at the wrong time bears too much risk of career or education-threatening blowback—especially in an era when social media can randomly pluck people out of obscurity to become sacrificial lambs. Better to just hunker down and say nothing. Unfortunately, the result is that you lose the engagement of some of the very people it would be most helpful to have on board. Just a thought.

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Conservatives Need to Admit That Racism Still Exists

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The Chinese Are Coming….To Syria

by ShelbyNorthcott Posted on November 12, 2015

Mother Jones

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In a typical election, candidates move from the extreme to the middle as the campaign progresses. If you’re a Republican, for example, you start out as a fire-breathing conservative in order to win the early primaries, and then slowly move to the center to win the later primaries and the general election.

Donald Trump has flipped the script, though. Now, you start out outrageous in order to get some attention, and then slowly become more sober-minded in order to appear more plausibly presidential. Will it work? Wait and find out! But it sure looks like Ben Carson has been taking lessons from the master. In Tuesday’s debate he seemed to suggest that China had troops in Syria. Today, his business manager and all-around campaign major-domo, Armstrong Williams, took away any possible doubt:

When MSNBC’s Tamron Hall told Williams on Wednesday that the Chinese are not in Syria, Williams remained steadfast.

“From your perspective and what most people know, maybe that is inaccurate,” Williams told MSNBC….”Just because the mainstream media and other experts don’t want to see any credibility to it, does not mean some way down the line in the next few days that that story will come out and will be reinforced and given credibility by others,” Williams said. “But as far as our intelligence and the briefings that Dr. Carson’s been in and I’ve certainly been in with him, we’ve certainly been told the Chinese are there.”

Carson—or Williams—really ought to tell us who these experts are that keep briefing the campaign on foreign policy issues. Are these the same guys who told him that seizing the Anbar oil fields in Iraq could be done “fairly easily” and that ISIS could then be destroyed in short order? I mean, I like the can-do attitude here, but I’m still a little curious about what the exact battle plan would be. Maybe Carson will share that with us in the next debate.

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The Chinese Are Coming….To Syria

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Jeffrey Lacker Says Real Wages are Going Up. Is He Right?

by Daniela75Q Posted on November 12, 2015

Mother Jones

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Binyamin Applebaum asks inflation hawk Jeffrey Lacker why inflation hasn’t risen if labor markets are tight, as he believes:

….There’s this confusion about real and nominal that I think infects the discussion, particularly of wages and slack. Real wages have accelerated over the last year because inflation has fallen and the rate of gain in nominal wages hasn’t changed much. The wage pressures we’ve been hearing about, they show up in the macro data as real wage pressures.

And the historical evidence suggests that there’s some lag before things accelerate as you reduce slack significantly. In 1966-67, we had unemployment at 5 percent, we pushed it to 4, and it was 1967 and 1968 when inflation took off. So there was a significant lag in the way that relationship seems to have worked in the past.

That got me curious: have real wages risen over the past couple of years? My preferred measure is production and nonsupervisory wages, and it looks like Lacker is right. Compared to CPI, the general trend is upward. It doesn’t look to me like it’s accelerating, but it does seem to be going up.

Continued – 

Jeffrey Lacker Says Real Wages are Going Up. Is He Right?

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Here’s Why Other Candidates Are Giving Ben Carson a Pass

by LupitaPrior Posted on November 11, 2015

Mother Jones

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Why didn’t any of the other candidates go after Ben Carson last night? He’s a frontrunner, isn’t he?

Yeah, he is. Here’s my guess: when you see a guy digging himself into a hole, why get in the way? More and more, as the stress of the campaign gets to him, Carson is freely exposing himself as an honest-to-God crackpot. Not just a hardcore conservative like Ted Cruz or an ego-driven windbag like Donald Trump, but a true Glenn Beck/Michele Bachmann/Alex Jones type who really and truly believes in fever swamp conspiracy theories. Criticize his past and he goes full frontal on every bit of listserv crankery about Barack Obama—and he does it pretty fluently, too. He obviously knows this stuff cold. Push him on his odd world view and he starts spouting off about how “secular progressives” are destroying America and probably trying to kill him. Ask him about his theory that the pyramids were built by Joseph to store grain, and he doesn’t blink. Sure he still believes that. Put him in a friendly setting and he’ll give you the full nine yards about how political correctness is responsible for everything from drug addiction to persecution of Christians to Marxist tyranny and gun confiscation.

This is a guy who’s set to implode all by himself, so why waste energy attacking him? Eventually he’ll suggest that the pope is actually Satan or something, and then he’ll be forced to slink back to the rubber-chicken circuit—with a higher speaking fee to soothe his pain. In the meantime, better to worry about the folks who might actually pose a real threat.

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Here’s Why Other Candidates Are Giving Ben Carson a Pass

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