December 05, 2009

Sarah Palin meets the Washington media

    Look at it this way, Sarah Palin told a Washington journalists’ dinner Saturday night: If Joe Biden had lost, he’d be peddling a book today titled, “Going Rogaine.”

            Biden, of course, is now vice president (and with a head of thinning hair), while Palin, the former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee,stopped in Washington Saturday to promote her book, “Going Rogue,” and entertain the Gridiron Club, a group of veteran Washington reporters and bureau chiefs at their annual winter dinner.

            She joked about the snow outside—“I’m lovin’ the weather—feelin’ right at home.”

            She talked about going out for a jog, “or as Newsweek calls it, a cover shoot.” And with husband Todd on the dais with her, she talked about how he thought “the Audacity of the North Slope” could have been an alternative book title.

            Palin spoke for 11 ½ minutes, poking gentle fun at the media.

            “Sometimes you just gotta trust your instincts,” she said, “and when you don’t, you end up in places like this.”

            But it had some value: “At least now I can put a face to the newspapers I do read.”

Kidding aside, sort of, “It's good to be here though, really, in front of this audience of leading journalists and intellectuals,” Palin said, “or as I like to call it, a death panel."

            She had started her day at a book signing in suburban

Washington

, and recalled how “the view is so much better from inside the bus than under it,” a reference to whispers about her from the John McCain campaign.

Before the dinner, she mingled and chatted amiably. At the banquet, she sat at he head table, and in her remarks, chided the

Washington

elite as badly wanting her book to have an index. If it did, she said, it would start with A for

Alaska

, and how the media didn’t understand, pages 1-432. B would be for biased media, pages 1-432.

Palin was the featured Republican speaker and was politely received. Democrats were represented by House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., known for his sharp tongue and liberal ways.

“And I’m the controversial one?” Palin laughed.

December 04, 2009

Why did Library of Congress fire Guantanamo prosecutor?

The ACLU today accused the Congressional Research Service of firing Col. Morris Davis from his job as the assistant director of its Foreign Affairs, Defense and Trade Division because his boss didn't like his opinions about recent developments at Guantanamo.

In a press release you can read here, the ACLU accuses the CRS of violating Davis's free speech rights. According to the ACLU, Davis was fired after he wrote an op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal and had a letter to the editor published in the Washington Post. Both were published on Nov. 11.

In the first, Davis took Attorney General Eric Holder to task for citing different ways of treating evidence as one reason the 9/11 plotters would be given civilian trials while some other Guantanamo detainees would undergo military commissions. In the other, he slammed former Attorney General Michael Mukasey for saying in the Washington Post that civilian federal courts weren't capable of handling terrorist prosecutions.

The reaction, says the ACLU, was immediate. Davis's boss sent him an e-mail and then, after several meetings, fired him, citing the publications.

Davis is no neophyte when it comes to Guantanamo controversy. He resigned as the Pentagon's chief prosecutor in 2007, saying the military commission process had little to do with the search for justice, then famously testified as a witness for the DEFENSE in the trial of bin Laden's alleged driver, Salim Hamdan, saying politics, not justice, seemed to be behind a rush to prosecutions. The goal: Get the trials started so whoever succeeded George Bush couldn't ever stop them.

"There was that constant theme that if we don't get this thing rolling before the election, it's going to implode," he said. "Once you get the victim families energized and the cases rolling, whoever took the White House would have difficulty stopping the process."

No word from the CRS, part of the sprawling Library of Congress. You'll remember last month, Sen. John Kerry and Rep. Howard Berman asked the library's law branch to withdraw an opinion about the law behind the political crisis in Honduras. The library refused, though the Library's opinion in that case does have an odd leap of logic.

Davis is only the latest government official who's been critical of Guantanamo and is now out on his ear. This Time account of White House counsel Greg Craig's departure paints a picture of an Obama administration all too willing to fade on Guantanamo issues. And shortly after Craig left, Phil Carter, the Pentagon official responsible for seeing that Guantanamo gets closed, also was gone. Carter, an Iraq war veteran, had been an outspoken critic of Bush detention policy, which is what earned him his job. He still hasn't said publicly what pushed him to leave last week.

Pelosi opposes war surtax

Democratic Rep. David Obey is getting lots of attention in Washington for proposing a 1 percent surtax to pay for the war in Afghanistan.

Obey, of Wisconsin, argues that the United States must start paying for its military efforts instead of pushing them into the future.

But his idea lacks support from a key person: his boss, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco.

“With the highest regard for Mr. Obey, that is his idea,” Pelosi told reporters on Thursday. “He is speaking for himself and the considerable reputation he enjoys in the Congress.”

So how would Pelosi pay for the war?

“When the president makes a request, we will make a judgment about what support it has, and some of that will relate to how it affects the deficit,” she said.

In other words, stay tuned.

 

Obama in diner - diary of a photo op

Just a regular guy, having a burger at the diner with a bunch of folks. Well, not really.

Here’s the pool report from Sheryl Stolberg of the New York Times on President Obama’s stop at an Allentown diner for lunch Friday:

“After the speech, POTUS motorcaded to the edge of Allentown for a stop at the Hamilton Family Restaurant, an all-night diner where patrons were dressed in very un-diner-like suits and ties for the visit. The chrome topped diner has a neon sign above the front door, reading "Ham Fam" in script.

“ … We found him at one end of the restaurant, in a center table for six, surrounded by about two dozen people in booths. He was eating his usual for-public-consumption average guy fare: a cheddar cheeseburger with fries.

“Here are his table mates:
Dr. Debby Cougar, Simmons Veterinary Hospital; Thedorus Bus, ATAS International Inc; Rolf Schlake, Applied Separations Inc.; Ester Erdossy, Egypt Star Bakery; Mayor Ed Pawloswki. Mr. Obama sat between the mayor and Ms. Erdossy on one side of the table; Mr. Schlake sat at the head of the table and the other two sat opposite Mr. Obama.

“That way, one end of the table was clear for photogs.”
 

Obama rules out drugs and hookers as economic stimulus

It was one of those moments that make life on the road a little more interesting.

During a town hall meeting on jobs at the Lehigh Carbon Community College in Schnecksville, Pennsylvania, President Barack Obama called first on a very eager young man who said he was a second year student.

He wanted to know if the president had thought about legalizing prostitution and drugs as a way of stimulating the economy. (His parents must be so proud.)

"I appreciate the boldness of your question," Obama responded as the audience laughed.

"That will NOT be my job strategy."

But just so the audience didn't turn on the young man, Obama gave his question the approval of a former professor.

"Part of what you're supposed to do in college is question conventional wisdom," he said.

"You're doing exactly what you’re supposed to be doing."

  

December 03, 2009

War tax appears dead

Forget the idea of a special tax to pay for the Afghanistan war troop buildup.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Thursday all but killed the idea, which has been pushed by House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, D-Wisc.

"I am not in support of the proposal of Mr. Obey," she told her weekly news conference.

The plan has been seen as unlikely anyway, since senators were cool to the idea. But still to be determined is how the Obama administration plans to pay for the anticipated $40 billion cost of the escalation.

"When the President makes a request, we will make a judgment about what support it has, and some of that will relate to how it affects the deficit," Pelosi said.

"The Bush Administration has run up trillions of dollars in war costs.  Not many people ever ask how it is going to be paid for on the Republican side.  We want to be responsible about reducing the deficit, and so we will see all of the priorities that we have in perspective and with bringing our budget deficit under control." 

  

Lou Dobbs gets de-friended

Seems the onetime champion of anti-immigration activists -- now mulling a run for public office -- has ticked off his one-time allies by suggesting he'd back a pathway to legalization for illegal immigrants.

Americans for Legal Immigration PAC says it's so mad it's withdrawing support for the former CNN anchor, including suspending websites that championed Dobbs for president.

William Gheen of the group says Dobb's recent comments on Telemundo and his national radio show "supporting some kind of path to citizenship for illegal immigrants is inconsistent with positions of ALIPAC and the views of most American citizens."

ALIPAC says it was the first national organization to call on Dobbs to run for president. Now it's shuttering its two Dobbs fan websites: The Facebook "Draft Lou Dobbs for President or US Senate" and the fan site www.LouDobbsForPresident.org.

December 02, 2009

Surges, then and now

Amid all the hubbub about whether it's a good idea to set a date for when U.S. troops will begin leaving Afghanistan, it's probably useful to point out that the Bush surge in Iraq (also 30,000 troops) had an end point to it that everyone knew when it started -- and it was just 15 months.

The first "surge" troops of the Iraq era began arriving in February 2007, and continued arriving at the rate of one brigade a month for six months. The first "surge" troops to depart Iraq began leaving in April 2008 and were bascially out at an even faster pace. As Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno pointed out in this August 2007 briefing, "The surge, we all know, will end sometime in 2008, in the beginning of 2008. We know that the surge brigades will leave at 15 months, so that will be somewhere between April and August of '08 when those units will leave based on the 15-month rotation."

The same "they'll-just-wait-for-you-to-go" rhetoric was around then. But Iraq just marked its most peaceful month since the U.S. invasion -- with U.S. troops basically confined to their bases.

There's still a lot of debate about whether Iraq will hold together when American forces are finally gone in 2011. That's when we'll know if the surge really worked. And Afghanistan isn't Iraq. But right now experience doesn't suggest a deadline has made matters worse.

House begins 2010 session Jan. 12

The House of Representatives plans to begin its 2010 session on Jan. 12, take five major breaks and adjourn Oct. 8, leaving about a month to campaign before the elections.

The schedule announced Wednesday has week long recesses for President's Day (week of Feb. 14), Memorial Day (week of May 31), Fourth of July (week of July 5) and a two week break the weeks of March 29 and April 5 for Easter and Passover.

Its August break will begin somewhat later this year, the week of August 9, and last later, until Sept. 14, because the Jewish New Year begins Sept. 8 for two days.

The schedule:

http://majorityleader.gov/docUploads/2010Calendar.pdf