Israeli commandos stormed a six-vessel flotilla of activists seeking to run the blockade of Gaza in early morning hours, prompting a firestorm of international condemnation. At least 10 activists were killed and many more wounded during the operation, which took place in the international waters of the Mediterranean. President Barack Obama’s Tuesday meeting at the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu is off.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … MEMORIAL DAY MAUNDERINGS, AND THE MEANING OF THEY WERE EXPENDABLE.
** OBAMA TODAY – MONDAY. President Barack Obama is in Illinois and Washington, DC today.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings this morning in his Chicago home. This weekend marks the first time he has slept in his own bed since becoming president. This is in rather marked contrast with former President George W. Bush, who spent so much time at his Texas ranch that it’s hard to count that high in a timely manner.
Much of Obama’s time was taken up with the sudden international crisis occasioned overnight by the backfiring attempt of the Israeli military to turn back a six-vessle flotilla of activists seeking to breech its blockade of Gaza. More about that in a moment.
Obama attended Memorial Day ceremonies at Illinois’s Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery.
There he presented a large wreath.
Obama was to have delivered remarks to a crowd of thousands there, but a violent thunderstorm caused the postponement and ultimate cancellation of the bulk of the ceremonies.
At 1:40 PM Pacific, the Obama family departs Chicago on Air Force One en route to Andrews Air Force Base.
At 3:15 PM Pacific, the Obamas arrive at Andrews Air Force Base, where they board Marine One.
At 3:30 PM Pacific, the Obamas land on the South Lawn of the White House.
For his part, Vice President Jo Biden and Dr. Jill Biden hosted breakfast for Gold Star Families at the White House.
Biden then participated in a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknowns before delivering remarks at the Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington National Cemetery.
Sadly, Memorial Day festivities have largely been overshadowed by the backfiring interdiction by Israeli commandos and naval vessels of a six-vessel flotilla of international activists carrying supplies to break the blockade of Gaza.
The interdiction took place under cover of darkness some 40 to 65 miles away from the Gaza coast, still well within international waters out in the Mediterranean.
Israeli forces jammed communications as they engaged the flotilla of Turkish, Greek, and Irish-flagged vessels, carrying some 750 activists and thousands of tons of supplies. The activist ranks included a Nobel Peace Prize winner and a number of elected officials from various countries.
Helicopter-borne Israeli commandos rappelled onto the decks of the vessels. What happened after that is in dispute. (What happened before it is in some dispute as well, as one Al Jazeera reporter on the lead vessel said the Israeli forces fired on the ship, wounding its captain.)
What we do know is that at least 10 activists were killed, and many more wounded. Several Israeli solders were also wounded.
The Israeli version of events is that they were ready to deal with peace activists, but encountered violent resistance. The Israelis say that two commandos suffered gunshot wounds. But the guns were reportedly taken from the raiding commandos. A few other Israelis were reportedly wounded after being hit with clubs and so forth.
All the activists were detained by Israeli authorities and have not been available to be interviewed.
It’s hardly a surprise that the Israeli commandos would encounter some resistance when they showed up on these vessels in the middle of the night. That’s obvious, so any protestations to the contrary are quite foolish.
The operation was carried out under cover of darkness, far out in the international waters of the Med so as to avoid media coverage. Well, so much for that.
The UN Security Council is in emergency session today on this.
The European Union has denounced the operation. Britain’s new Conservative/Liberal Democrat government has criticized the Israeli move and called for an end to the Gaza blockade. Turkey, Israel’s longtime ally which nonetheless unofficially sponsored this flotilla, has recalled its ambassador and canceled joint Israeli/Turkish military exercises. Condemnations have poured in from around the globe.
Washington and Moscow have offered a very measured response so far, calling for more information.
One immediate political casualty of the early morning raid on the flotilla is tomorrow’s White House meeting between Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. The Israeli PM was in Canada when the operation went down; he’s returning to Israel, where there are also demands for an inquiry into what looks like a huge fiasco.
Now let’s not be naive. Quite a few peace activists also hate Israel and wish to see it go away. Israelis have genuine existential fears. The Hamas government which currently governs in Gaza is an extremist variant of the Palestinian independence movement and a history of backing terrorism.
Yet the policy of continued settlement by far right religionists in disputed areas only further fans the flames of extremism.
And, in one of those ironies of history, it was actually the Israeli government and the Bush/Cheney Administration which further empowered Hamas. They pushed for separate elections in Gaza a few years back, not thinking that Hamas could win.
Which proved to be yet another miscalculation by then Secretary of State Condi Rice, the conservative Stanford academic who recently resurfaced in TV advertising in California endorsing billionaire Meg Whitman as the right choice for governor.
Rice had no clue what was happening in Gaza, just as she had had no clue what was happening in Iraq when, as Bush’s national security advisor, she was a chief architect of the Iraq War.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE – MONDAY. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today.
He has no scheduled public events.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WHOPPERS.As someone with no experience in public affairs prior to being talked into running for governor by her business mentor, Mitt Romney, Meg Whitman is totally dependent on a coterie of lobbyists and consultants. …
BP’s ballyhooed “top kill,” the latest effort to stop the disastrous Gulf oil spill, has failed despite repeated assurances to the contrary.
** OBAMA TODAY – SUNDAY. President Barack Obama is in Chicago.
He has no scheduled public events.
Despite earlier reports of success, BP admitted on Saturday that the “top kill” effort to stop the Gulf oil spill is a failure, the latest in a string of failures by the company to stop the spill that began on April 20th with the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil drilling platform. 11 men died in the catastrophe.
BP is trying something else, another undersea techno-fix, but Obama Administration officials say that the spill may not be stopped until August, by the drilling of relief wells.
In the meantime, however, hurricane season is about to begin. And forecasters say that this year’s hurricanes will in intensity those of 2005, when Hurricane Katrina nearly drowned New Orleans.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Korea, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE – SUNDAY. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles.
He has no scheduled public events.
In his weekend video/radio address, President Barack Obama asks all Americans to join him in remembering and honoring those who have died in service to the country.
** OBAMA TODAY – SATURDAY. President Barack Obama is in Chicago today.
He has received his daily intelligence and economic briefings in his private residence there.
Obama has no scheduled public events today.
This is Obama’s first extended visit to Chicago since becoming president.
Obama visited the Gulf Coast yesterday to pledge more federal action on the BP oil disaster, now by far the worst oil spill in American history.
Unfortunately, BP’s much ballyhooed “top kill” procedure to stop the underwater oil flow from the ruptured well by injecting a heavy mud-like substance is not working as advertised.
BP officials, who have given conflicting and evasive reports on the procedure over the past few days, now say they won’t know until Sunday if it is working.
In other action, Vice President Joe Biden is in Washington.
He delivered the commencement address at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland on Friday.
Biden will preside over a number of Memorial Day activities in the Washington area, and will be at Arlington National Cemetery on Monday.
Obama will speak at the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Illinois on Memorial Day.
Obama is being slammed by many on the far right for not being at Arlington on Monday, as presidents usually are. But as it happens, a number of Republican presidents have also celebrated Memorial Day away from Washington.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
The governance situation in Iraq remains unresolved since the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger discusses the meaning of Memorial Day to him as an immigrant and the recent groundbreaking of new Veterans Homes in California. While Schwarzenegger did not serve in the U.S. Armed Forces, he did serve in the Austrian Army prior to emigrating to America.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE – SATURDAY. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today.
He has no scheduled public events.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** TIME SLIPS AWAY FOR 24 AND LOST IN VERY DIFFERENT FINALES.I don’t like when somebody comes up to me the next day and says, “Hey, man, I saw your play. It touched me; I cried.” I like it when a guy comes up to me a week later and says, “Hey, man, I saw your play … what happened?”
– off-off-off-off Broadway playwright Jeff Slater (played by Bill Murray) in Tootsie
Two of the most important and popular television series of the past decade had their series finales this week. One, Lost, opted for a relentless, rather gooey positive ending, stepping literally in the last into the light. The other, 24, ended in a far darker, essentially shattering place. Spoilers await. …
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. …From my May 22nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Having crashed over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, 2008, crude oil closed on Friday at $73.97 per barrel. Energy markets are closed on the weekend,
This is up about $40 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
President Barack Obama toured the Port Fourchon beach in Louisiana Friday, where tar balls from the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico have littered the sand. Obama, who will be in Chicago over Memorial Day weekend, is not out of the woods on this issue. BP again halted its “top kill” attempt to stop the underwater spill last night. It supposedly restarted the effort this afternoon.
** CALIFORNIA 2010: SAY WHAT?! Billionaire Meg Whitman has expanded that double-digit lead I first reported a week ago that she had over Steve Poizner in their hard-fought battle for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. But my forecast about her spending in trying to hold on to a primary she and her people said they’d had in the bag for months is looking off.
I said she would spend $85 million. But it turns out that she had already spent well over $80 million as of May 19th. Now, with a heavy burst of TV advertising and mailers being sent all over the state, it looks like she will spend around $90 million in the Republican primary.
Since she had vowed to spend $150 million total for the primary and the general election — assuming she made it to the general election — it is very safe to say that she is way off her plan with $90 million in spending to try to secure a primary victory.
Does all this spending and advertising backfire at a certain point? Absolutely.
Not that she is out of the woods in the primary, mind you. Poizner is going to spend more of his money. And to the extent that he unmuddies the waters on illegal immigration (Whitman has distorted both her position and Poizner’s), making it clear that he supports the Arizona law and she does not, counters the effective advertising casting him as a “closet liberal,” and throws in a surprise here and there, the primary is still in play.
And there is always, let’s say, the Whitman mistake factor. We saw it again today, when she falsely claimed in an interview with Politico that she doesn’t have a border fence in her advertising. She does. In fact, it’s in a TV ad that I am told she demanded and helped write herself. That’s the curious 60-second spot in which she speaks defensively to camera about how tough politics is.
It’s also in her voluminous mailers featuring Prop 187 champion Pete Wilson, the former governor who chairs her campaign.
Whitman made the claim twice in the interview, and had to be corrected by the designated flak catcher of the campaign, press secretary Sarah Pompei.
Whitman also falsely claimed that Poizner hadn’t been to the border till four weeks ago.
But this lack of veracity should be no surprise with regard to this former Goldman Sachs board member who had to resign in the wake of her inside trading. Whitman, who has flip-flopped on the issues repeatedly in this campaign, and couldn’t say how often she’d even bothered to vote, lied in her very first TV ad about how long she’s lived in California.
Exactly how long has Whitman lived in the state whose governorship she is trying to purchase? She won’t say.
** TIME SLIPS AWAY FOR 24 AND LOST IN VERY DIFFERENT FINALES.I don’t like when somebody comes up to me the next day and says, “Hey, man, I saw your play. It touched me; I cried.” I like it when a guy comes up to me a week later and says, “Hey, man, I saw your play … what happened?”
– off-off-off-off Broadway playwright Jeff Slater (played by Bill Murray) in Tootsie
Two of the most important and popular television series of the past decade had their series finales this week. One, Lost, opted for a relentless, rather gooey positive ending, stepping literally in the last into the light. The other, 24, ended in a far darker, essentially shattering place. Spoilers await. …
As Speaker Nancy Pelosi predicted, on Thursday night the House of Representatives passed legislation to repeal the “Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell” policy on gays and lesbians in the U.S. Armed Forces. The vote was 234 to 194.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Illinois and Louisiana today.
Obama departed Chicago, Illinois on Air Force One en route to New Orleans, Louisiana.
Obama will receive his daily intelligence and economic briefings on Air Force One.
At 8:10 AM Pacific, Obama arrives in Louis Armstrong International Airport in New Orleans.
At 10:10 AM Pacific, Obama attends a briefing by Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen on the Gulf oil crisis at U.S. Coast Guard Station Grand Isle in Grand Isle, Louisiana.
At 10:30 AM Pacific, Obama delivers a statement on the Gulf oil crisis to the press at U.S. Coast Guard Station Grand Isle in Grand Isle, Louisiana.
At 11:25 AM Pacific, Obama departs New Orleans on Air Force One en route to Chicago.
At 1:35 PM Pacific, Obama arrives in Chicago.
He then proceeds to his private home in Chicago, where he will join First Lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia for the Memorial Day weekend.
This is Obama’s first extended return to Chicago since his inauguration as president.
In other action, Vice President Joe Biden delivers the commencement address at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland at 7 AM Pacific.
Biden will be in the Washington area for the Memorial Day weekend.
Obama’s press conference yesterday on the Gulf oil disaster went all right for the president, but did not dispel the potential political crisis for him. Obama fired the head of the Minerals Management Service and suspended oil drilling in the Arctic, as well as new oil drilling.
But these moves are overlaid by the realization that BP was very wrong in its earlier estimates and that this disaster has already surpassed that of the infamous Exxon Valdez as the biggest oil spill in American history.
Serious damage has been done and will continue to be done, even if the oil spill itself is finally stopped.
And there, too, BP has again given bad information. The “Top Kill” technique of injecting a muddy substance into the ruptured well to stanch the flow of oil was actually suspended many hours before BP announced its suspension on Thursday. This knowledge came after BP announced that it was working. But in reality, it wasn’t working very well.
BP and Coast Guard officials, who are too reliant on BP for this incredibly complex operation, said this morning that the procedure is again underway and again said that it is working.
We’ll see. If it were a surefire procedure, it would not have been so far down on the list of things to try.
Of course, it should be no surprise that this spill is proving to be so hard to stop. In our zeal for oil, we are drilling a mile beneath the surface of the ocean, and drilling a mile deeper than that for the oil itself. It is an incredibly complex and risky procedure.
The heaviest hurricane season since 2005, which saw Hurricana Katrina devastate New Orleans, is forecast for this year.
Adding to the many woes of the Gulf Coast region is a new report by weather forecasters that this year’s hurricane season is likely to be one of the biggest and most intense in history.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
The governance situation in Iraq remains unresolved since the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today.
He has no scheduled public events.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. …From my May 22nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $40 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Speaking at today’s White House press conference on the Gulf oil disaster, President Barack Obama declared that “BP is responsible for this horrific disaster” and that his administration is in charge of the response.
** QUICK HITS. The U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee voted 16-12 to repeal the Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell policy on gays in the military. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is confident of House passage, perhaps tonight. … A new survey by Public Policy Polling has Jerry Brown with a big lead over Republicans Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner in the California governor’s race, 48-36 over Whitman and 48-32 over Poizner. Both Whitman and Poizner have massive deficits in favorable vs. unfavorable ratings. … President Barack Obama is getting mixed reviews for his press conference today on the Gulf oil disaster. Tomorrow’s appearance in the Gulf Coast region will tell more of the tale for Obama, who also needs BP’s “Top Kill” injection of muddy material into the blown-out well a mile beneath the ocean’s surface to work. After positive signs early today, the procedure has been suspended for assessment, with likely restart late tonight.
** JERRY-RIGGING. Attorney General Jerry Brown, the Democratic candidate for governor of California who effectively won the June primary by clearing the Democratic field last fall, has nearly $21 million in his campaign warchest.
Brown raised close to $7 million in the last two months.
He spent about a quarter of a million during that period while the two Republicans vying for the opportunity, as it were, to run against him spent tens of millions of dollars attacking each other and establishing their right-wing bona fides.
** NEW NATIONAL POLL: GULF OIL DISASTER DRIVES SHARP CHANGE IN ATTITUDES ON ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION VS. ENERGY PRODUCTION AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT. As you might suppose, the Gulf oil disaster — now the biggest oil spill in American history, eclipsing even the infamous Exxon Valdez — has more than reversed a previously growing trend of acceptance of energy production and economic development at all costs.
The new Gallup Poll shows a big reversal in national attitudes since the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil drilling platform on April 20th.
Between March and today, with the Gulf of Mexico oil spill intervening, Americans’ preferences for prioritizing between environmental protection and energy production have shifted from a somewhat pro-energy stance to an even stronger pro-environment stance.
The new results are based on a May 24-25 USA Today/Gallup poll. In March, by 50% to 43%, Americans said it was more important to develop U.S. energy supplies than to protect the environment, continuing a trend in the direction of energy production seen since 2007. Now, the majority favor environmental protection, by 55% to 39% — the second-largest percentage (behind the 58% in 2007) favoring the environment in the 10-year history of the question.
Democrats had already put more emphasis on environmental protection than on energy production in March, but that position has gained strength among Democrats today. Independents’ views have flipped from a majority pro-energy stance in March to a majority pro-environment one today. In contrast, Republicans’ opinions have not changed since the oil spill occurred; they continue to prioritize energy production over environmental protection by a 2-to-1 margin.
Note that the shift is entirely amongst independents and Democrats. The Republican Party continues to hug the far right rail on the “Drill, baby, drill” issue.
What does this mean, incidentally, in the California governor’s race?
Well, Democrat Jerry Brown has been a consistent, decades-long opponent of new offshore oil drilling. He fought to create the California Coastal Commission, a unique governmental body that balances legitimate economic development needs with the imperative to protect the globally unique resource that is California’s coast.
In contrast, both Republicans vying for the party nomination to attempt to succeed Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger — billionaire Meg Whitman and super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner — have backed new offshore oil drilling moves.
Whitman was a staunch backer of new offshore oil drilling as national co-chair of the McCain/Palin campaign in 2008, her only major role in public affairs prior to starting her run for the governorship. She fully supported Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s famed chant: “Drill, baby, drill!”
Whitman also backed offshore oil drilling in her gubernatorial campaign, citing the wonders of new drilling technology. More recently, though, she says she is against it.
Whitman and Poizner both want to do away with California’s landmark climate change program, a signature achievement of the Schwarzenegger years. (Whitman had said that she wanted a one-year suspension; more recently, she’s said she wants to do away with it altogether.) In contrast, Brown has aggressively defended the program in court as attorney general.
Americans’ shift toward a more pro-environment point of view is also evident in a separate trade-off question, which pits environmental protection against economic growth. After the oil spill, the balance of opinion tips toward the environment by seven points, 50% to 43%. Just over two months ago, Americans favored economic growth by a 15-point margin, 53% to 38%.
The recent oil spill has spurred a significant shift in Americans’ environmental attitudes. For the last few years, Americans’ environmental concerns declined as the public placed a higher priority on pocketbook concerns like the economy and energy, likely due to the poor U.S. economy. However, in just two months’ time, that trend has reversed, and the pro-environment position has regained the strength it showed for most of the last decade.
President Barack Obama spoke yesterday about how clean energy investments can diminish the environmental risks of continued use of fossil fuels and provide new jobs and opportunities after touring the Solyndra solar panel plant in Fremont, California.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and Chicago today.
Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
Obama then welcomed the NCAA Men’s Basketball Champion Duke Blue Devils to the White House to honor their 2009-2010 season with a ceremony in the Rose Garden.
Following that, Obama and Biden tok a photo with former President Bill Clinton and the U.S. World Cup Soccer Team on the North Portico. The World Cup takes place next month in South Africa.
At 8:25 AM Pacific, Obama has lunch with President Clinton in the Private Dining Room.
At 9:30 AM Pacific, Biden meets with Clinton in the Roosevelt Room.
At 9:45 AM Pacific, Obama and Biden deliver remarks, principally on the Gulf oil disaster, and Obama takes questions from the press in the East Room.
After flying to with his family tonight to Chicago, where he will spend the bulk of Memorial Day weekend, Obama will travel to the Gulf Coast tomorrow to deal with the Gulf oil disaster.
Today’s reports are that BP was wrong in its earlier estimates and that this disaster has already surpassed that of the infamous Exxon Valdez as the biggest oil spill in American history.
Obama today fired Minerals Management Service director Ellen Birnbaum, whose agency was responsible for regulating the exploded Deepwater Horizon and other offshore oil drilling platforms.
The latest attempt by BP to stanch the undersea flow of oil, which consists of injecting heavy mud into the ruptured well and which began yesterday, appears to have temporarily stopped most if not all of the oil flow. But that’s only a very preliminary assessment.
At 11:05 AM Pacific, Obama receives a briefing in the White House Situation Room on the 2010 hurricane season forecast and an overview of the Federal government’s national hurricane preparedness.
Experts are saying that, after a spell of relatively mild hurricanes, upcoming hurricane seasons will be much more violent.
At 12:10 PM Pacific, Obama holds a bilateral meeting with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia in the Oval Office.
At 1:10 PM Pacific, Obama, Biden, and First Lady Michelle Obama host a reception in honor of Jewish American Heritage Month in the East Room.
At 3:15 PM Pacific, the Obama family departs the White House on Marine One en route to Andrews Air Force Base.
At 4 PM Pacific, the Obamas depart Andrews Air Force Base on Air Force One en route to Chicago.
At 5:15 PM Pacific, the Obamas arrive in Chicago.
This will be the first extended trip that Obama has made to Chicago since becoming president. And it will be interrupted tomorrow when he goes to the Gulf Coast to oversee efforts to stop the ongoing offshore oil disaster there.
BP is still trying the “top kill” method it began yesterday to try to stop the Gulf oil spill by plugging it with heavy mud. Meanwhile, the head of the federal agency overseeing offshore oil drilling was fired today. This is now the worst oil spill in American history.
On behalf of the Obama Administration, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will today, in an address at the Brookings Institution, unveil a new national security strategy that focuses on homegrown extremists and steps away from the Bush/Cheney Administration’s era’s “war on terror” formulation.
National Security Advisor James Jones, the retired Marine general who commanded NATO, will also weigh in on the strategy which he and his office played the lead role in devising.
As Obama himself did in his West Point commencement speech last weekend, the new strategic document will emphasize the pairing of military superiority with very active diplomacy, development assistance, and sophisticated intelligence.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
The governance situation in Iraq remains unresolved since the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today.
At 11 AM, Schwarzenegger will join director Steven Spielberg and Universal Studios chief Ron Meyer in Universal City to deliver remarks at the opening of New York Street, 13 city blocks of newly created filming locations on four acres of historic studio lot, a part of the largest construction project in Universal’s history.
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. …From my May 22nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $40 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Speaking today at Solyndra, a solar manufacturer in Fremont, California which is a major success story of the economic recovery act, President Barack Obama discussed the need for renewable energy and the effort to bring the Gulf oil disaster under control. Obama will be in the Gulf Coast region again on Friday.
** QUICK HITS. With BP’s latest effort to stop the Gulf oil spill underway, President Barack Obama will address the Gulf oil crisis tomorrow and take press questions at the White House, following a private lunch meeting with former President Bill Clinton. Obama helds to the Gulf Coast on Friday. … John McCain is now going up against erstwhile best buddy Joe Lieberman on gays in the military. Foreign military officials who’ve formally integrated their forces, incidentally, say it turned out not to be a big deal.
** CALIFORNIA 2010: A STRANGELY IRONIC THING TO SAY, AND THE RETURN OF MCCLINTOCK TO POIZNER ADVERTISING. Political hired guns can say the darnedest things, can’t they?
Evidently counting on the amnesia, or perhaps just lack of knowledge, of California reporters. billionaire Meg Whitman’s chief strategist Mike Murphy, during the course yesterday of his latest attempt to spin his client’s inevitability in the hard-fought Republican gubernatorial primary, came up with a real howler.
“Everyone’s kind of tired of the Sacramento political system that Jerry Brown is kind of the alpha male dog of,” he opined.
That would be, naturally, why Whitman is herself surrounded by a large retinue of consultants and lobbyists, one supposes, and even features a Sacramento lobbyist in her TV and radio advertising.
Or why the Whitman campaign used Sacramento insiders to try and clear the Republican primary field for her.
Or why the Whitman campaign pushed — unsuccessfully, as it happens — to use the Sacramento-based Chamber of Commerce as its vehicle for anti-Brown attack TV advertising, violating the law for non-profit organizations.
Or why Attorney General Brown himself, far from being a Sacramento insider, runs the state Department of Justice out of his Oakland office and spends very little time in the capital.
Or why Brown is a famous maverick of many years’ standing, having been a registered independent himself as the mayor of gritty Oakland.
But, ironic as all that is, the real irony concerns Murphy himself.
No one in recent memory in California politics fused the political consultant and lobbyist roles as much as Murphy himself did after Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected.
In other words, to quote himself, Murphy set out to make himself “the alpha male dog” of the “Sacramento political system.”
On the day of Schwarzenegger’s inauguration in November 2003, Murphy swiftly moved to make himself the principal influence peddler in Sacramento. He swiftly set up an office of his D.C. Navigators lobbying and consulting firm in Sacramento, and created a web site which screamed access to Schwarzenegger.
Murphy was so aggressive in marketing his access to Schwarzenegger that it created a major embarrassment for the governor within months, with the web site having to be dramatically altered.
But the behavior continued, and I had to reveal that Murphy was using Schwarzenegger’s image as a logo on all his proposals to prospective corporate clients.
As someone with no experience in public affairs prior to being talked into running for governor by her business mentor, Republican presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney, Whitman is totally dependent on a coterie of lobbyists and consultants which Murphy personifies.
There’s a great deal here, and I’ll get to it if Whitman does survive the Republican primary.
Speaking of which, her fierce rival, super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, has some new advertising in the form of first a radio ad and now a TV ad again featuring California conservative icon Congressman Tom McClintock.
In the TV ad, which is being added to McClintock’s statewide rotation and which you can watch here, McClintock talks up the “key difference” between Poizner and Whitman on illegal immigration, notably the Arizona law, and says its time for “a governor from the Republican wing of the Republican Party.”
** NEW NATIONAL POLL: VOTER ENTHUSIASM DECREASING, ESPECIALLY AMONG REPUBLICANS.A new Gallup Poll shows that voter enthusiasm is continuing to decline, after peaking in late March with the passage of the much-pilloried national health care reform bill.
Voter enthusiasm, driven by Republican opposition to the Democratic agenda, is now at its lowest ebb in this election cycle.
As a result, Democrats have a slight edge on the generic Congressional ballot. But Republicans still hold a clear edge in voter enthusiasm.
Registered voters’ enthusiasm about voting in this fall’s midterm elections has steadily declined since peaking in late March after the passage of healthcare reform. The 30% of registered voters who now say they are very enthusiastic about voting is down 10 points from late March and is tied for the lowest Gallup has measured so far during the campaign.
Enthusiasm is lower among both Republicans and Democrats — down 15 and 10 points, respectively, from its peak. Still, Republicans continue to hold a double-digit advantage in voting enthusiasm, a key measure in forecasting past election outcomes.
According to the same Gallup Daily tracking data for the week of May 17-23, registered voters’ candidate preferences are closely divided, with 47% saying they would vote for the Democrat in their district and 46% for the Republican if the election were held today.
Gallup’s weekly tracking of congressional voting preferences has shown no more than a one-point spread in any of the last five weeks. Though the Democrats’ current one-point edge is not a statistically meaningful lead, it does represent the first time the party has had a numerical advantage in registered voter preferences since mid-March. …
Other polls, however, have previously shown a Democratic edge.
Speaking today in Seoul, South Korea, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the world must respond to North Korea’s sinking of a South Korean Navy ship on March 26th. The Cheonan blew up, killing 46 sailors, victim of what an international investigation revealed to be a North Korean torpedo attack.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in California and Washington, DC today.
At 9:35 AM Pacific, Obama tours Solyndra, Inc. in the San Francisco Bay Area city of Fremont. Solyndra is a major solar manufacturer and a success story of the economic recovery act. Obama will be joined by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
At 10:20 AM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks on the economy at Solyndra.
At 11:15 AM Pacific, Obama departs San Francisco on Air Force One en route to Andrews Air Force Base.
At 3:55 PM Pacific, Obama arrives at Andrews Air Force Base, where he boards Marine One.
At 4:10 PM Pacific, Obama lands on the South Lawn of the White House.
Vice President Joe Biden is in Washington today.
In the morning, he and White House Domestic Policy Council Director Melody Barnes hold a Middle Class Task Force roundtable with small businesses.
At noon time, Biden meets with United Steelworkers president Leo Gerard.
In the early evening, Biden hosts a reception at the Naval Observatory honoring firefighters and law enforcement officials.
White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel is in Israel today. Emanuel traveled to Israel for the bar mitzvah of his son, Zach and a nephew. He’s with his father, the Israeli-born Benjamin Emanuel, and his brothers, Hollywood agent Ari and Ezekiel, a White House health policy advisor.
While in Israel, Emanuel is meeting with Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, joined by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner for the China portion of the tour, is wrapping her Asian trip in South Korea. While her tour has been overshadowed by the revelation that it was in fact a North Korean torpedo that sank the South Korean Navy ship Cheonan on March 26th, she and Geithner were able to focus in on economic concerns in high-level talks with Chinese leaders.
Today, following a meeting with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, Clinton called on North Korea to “halt its provocative acts” and called on the international community to take “a strong but measured response” to the torpedoing of the South Korean ship, which killed 46 sailors.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
The governance situation in Iraq remains unresolved since the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
Space shuttle Atlantis landed for the last time this morning, its flying career over. The 25-year old Atlantis, which helped to nearly compete the International Space Station on its final mission, touched down with its six-person crew at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area today.
At 10:15 AM, Schwarzenegger will join President Obama at Solyndra, Inc., a solar panel manufacturer, where Obama will deliver remarks regarding jobs and the economy.
In September 2009, Schwarzenegger joined Vice President Joe Biden and Energy Secretary Steven Chu at Solyndra to announce that the U.S. Department of Energy had finalized a $535 million loan guarantee in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds
In March, Schwarzenegger signed legislation he sponsored to create a sales tax exemption for the purchase of green tech manufacturing equipment in California, providing an incentive for companies like Solyndra, Inc.
In other action, as the slow-moving Capitol dance of the budget unfolded earlier this month, Schwarzenegger unveiled a draconian “May Revise” of his proposed budget, focusing on big cuts to welfare and health programs and fiscal maneuvers.
State Senate Democrats under Senate leader Darrell Steinberg offered their counter-move Monday in the form of a $5 billion tax hike program.
That includes rollback of $2 billion in new corporate tax breaks, which Schwarzenegger noted in January may have to be done, as well a billion dollar extension of income tax surcharges and $1.2 billion in increased vehicle license fees. The latest PPIC poll noted that only 28% favor an increase in the car tax.
And yesterday, Assembly Speaker John Perez rolled out his rather gimmicky response to the state’s chronic budget crisis: An avoidance of further budget cuts, an oil severance tax, rollback of new corporate tax breaks, and a complex scheme to further balance the budget and fund a multi-billion dollar jobs program by borrowing against consumer recycling deposits, and a majority vote tax scheme.
Negotiating positions are becoming clearer.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. …From my May 22nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $37 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
The Gulf oil disaster: From bad to worse? The oil still spewing into the Gulf of Mexico from the April 20th offshore oil drilling disaster is getting darker in color. Engineering experts say that it is a heavier, more polluting oil. President Obama will visit the Gulf again on Friday.
** NEW ESSAY COMING UP … LOST AND 24: TIME SLIPS AWAY FOR TWO MILESTONE SHOWS.
** QUICK HITS. President Barack Obama is sending 1200 National Guard troops to the border with Mexico, as well as requesting another $500 million for border security. His defeated 2008 opponent, John McCain, who was far more liberal on the issue before acquiring a far right primary challenger, says it’s not enough. … A day after state Senate Democrats, California Assembly Speaker John Perez rolled out his response to the state’s chronic budget crisis: An avoidance of further budget cut, an oil severance tax, rollback of new corporate tax breaks, and a complex scheme to further balance the budget and fund a multi-billion dollar jobs program by borrowing against consumer recycling deposits, and a majority vote tax scheme. … Former MoveOn.org executive director Peter Schurman, challenging Jerry Brown from the left in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, dropped out today with fulsome praise for the attorney general. … For his part, Brown today rejected San Francisco’s bid to drop out of a federal law enforcement program concerning illegal immigrants. Brown’s Department of Justice automatically sends the fingerprints of suspects arrested by local law enforcement agencies to federal immigration authorities. There is a lot more to this story, which I’ll get into another time. Suffice to say that I’ve been following the illegal immigration issue closely for some time now. Since around 1994.
** CALIFORNIA 2010: NEWT TO THE RESCUE! Trying to consolidate a regained lead in her Republican primary battle with Steve Poizner, billionaire Meg Whitman has rolled out another big-name national conservative endorser for her gubernatorial. Today it is ex-House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a possible though not likely presidential contender best known for trying to shut down the federal government in a stand-off with then President Bill Clinton.
Gingrich wrote in today’s San Jose Mercury-News that Whitman is a true conservative, declaring: “Whitman has the conservative values, courage and vision to clean up the spending mess in Sacramento and rebuild the state’s economy.”
Gingrich likens Whitman’s campaign platform to his conservative Contract With America, which helped lead to a brief Republican takeover of the House of Representatives but ultimately led to disaster for the Republican Party.
“Sixteen years ago, I stood on the steps of the U.S. Capitol with hundreds of Republican candidates for Congress and signed the Contract with America.
“It took courage for our candidates to outline our agenda in black and white so voters could size up what we would actually do if they gave us their trust.
“It is always easier in politics to let the television ads do the talking, but Whitman has put forward the most detailed set of policies of any of the candidates running for governor in California. Her ideas are bold. They are conservative, and they will succeed in bringing California back.”
Gingrich has now joined ex-Vice President Dick Cheney and the intellectual author of Whitman’s candidacy, her business mentor Mitt Romney in the national right-wing rescue squad for Whitman’s primary campaign.
Was this really part of the plan? In California? True, Whitman chief strategist Mike Murphy once called the strategy shots for Oliver North and Jeb Bush, but he worked for Arnold Schwarzenegger, too. Of course, he masterminded the 2005 special election debacle.
Or was Whitman, who will end up spending an astounding $85 million, at least, trying to hold on to a primary that she thought she had in the bag months ago, really planning to spend only $50 million and avoid the taint of these ideological associations?
A rhetorical question, certainly, and one that answers itself.
** NEW POLL: ACCEPTANCE FOR GAY AND LESBIAN RELATIONSHIPS CROSSES THE 50% THRESHOLD NATIONALLY. While opposition to same sex marriage remains above 50% in the latest Gallup survey, another new Gallup Poll shows that national acceptance for gay and lesbian relationships has crossed the milestone majority level.
This has occurred as the Obama Administration moves forward with legislation to change the military’s “Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell” policy on gays and lesbians in the military.
It also happens as the California governor’s race accelerates.
Democrat Jerry Brown, who readers know I have rated as the favorite for the past few years, supports same sex marriage. The two Republican battling to succeed Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who also now supports same sex marriage — billionaire Meg Whitman and state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner — oppose same sex marriage.
The California Supreme Court established the right to same sex marriage in 2008. But that right was removed with the passage of Proposition 8 in 2008. The ballot language established by Attorney General Brown properly framed the choice. However, a series of mistakes by gay marriage proponents, a few of them quite mind-boggling, opened the door for an electoral victory by gay marriage opponents.
I believe that the stage will be set for the restoration of same sex marriage rights in California in 2012.
Here’s what Gallup found on the national level.
Americans’ support for the moral acceptability of gay and lesbian relations crossed the symbolic 50% threshold in 2010. At the same time, the percentage calling these relations “morally wrong” dropped to 43%, the lowest in Gallup’s decade-long trend.
Gallup’s annual Values and Beliefs survey, conducted each May, documents a gradual increase in public acceptance of gay relations since about 2006. However, the change is seen almost exclusively among men, and particularly men younger than 50.
Additionally, Gallup finds greater movement toward acceptance among independents and Democrats than among Republicans, and a big jump in acceptance among moderates. Liberals were already widely accepting of gay relations in 2006, and have remained that way, while conservatives’ acceptance continues to run low.
Notably, there has been a 16-point jump in acceptance among Catholics, nearly three times the increase seen among Protestants. Acceptance among Americans with no religious identity has expanded as well. …
Americans remain closely divided over the factors contributing to being gay. Currently, 37% say being gay is due to upbringing and environment while 36% say it is a trait one is born with.
The division on this question has been the norm for most of the past decade, although the plurality response has fluctuated. Longer term, however, there has been a major change in Americans’ views on this question, with far fewer today than in the 1970s and 1980s believing that being gay or lesbian is the result of upbringing and other life experiences.
There is a gradual cultural shift under way in Americans’ views toward gay individuals and gay rights. While public attitudes haven’t moved consistently in gays’ and lesbians’ favor every year, the general trend is clearly in that direction. This year, the shift is apparent in a record-high level of the public seeing gay and lesbian relations as morally acceptable. Meanwhile, support for legalizing gay marriage, and for the legality of gay and lesbian relations more generally, is near record highs.
South Korea has launched psychological warfare over the sinking of its Navy ship, while North Korea has said its troops are braced for war. The rising tension on the peninsula is worrying many.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and San Francisco today.
Obama has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings and met with senior advisors in the Oval Office.
At 8:15 AM Pacific, Obama hosts award-winning small business owners from around the country and delivers remarks on small business jobs proposals in the Rose Garden.
At 9:05 AM Pacific, Obama addresses the Senate Republican Caucus at the U.S. Capitol.
At 11 AM Pacific, Obama meets with President Giorgio Napolitano of Italy in the Oval Office.
At 11:55 AM Pacific, Obama departs the White House on Marine One en route to Andrews Air Force Base.
At 12:15 PM Pacific, Obama departs Andrews Air Force Base on Air Force One en route to San Francisco.
At 5:35 PM Pacific, Obama arrives in San Francisco.
At 6 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at a fundraiser for Senator Barbara Boxer and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee at the Fairmont Hotel.
At 6:30 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at a high-dollar fundraiser for Senator Barbara Boxer and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee at the Fairmont Hotel.
At 7:50 PM Pacific, Obama attends a reception for Senator Barbara Boxer and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee at the home of Gordon and Ann Getty.
Meanwhile, the three Republicans vying for the nomination to take on Boxer this fall — ex-Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, ex-Congressman Tom Campbell, and far right Orange County Assemblyman Chuck DeVore — debate this afternoon on LA’s far right “The Jon & Ken Show.”
In other action, Vice President Joe Biden is in Washington all day.
He meets with Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski, holds a conference call with mayors from around the country to discuss implementation of the economic recovery act, meets with the U.S. commander in Iraq, General Ray Odierno, then hosts Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor.
Later Biden meets with Arizona Senator Jon Kyl and Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman on several matters, including the proposed repeal of the Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell policy on gays in the military, which the Obama Administration is pushing forward.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, joined by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner for the last part, is wrapping her Asian trip in China. While her tour has been overshadowed by the revelation that it was in fact a North Korean torpedo that sank the South Korean Navy ship Cheonan on March 26th, she and Geithner have been able to focus in on economic concerns in high-level talks with Chinese leaders.
China will not adjust its currency to aid the U.S. in the big trade imbalance between the two nations. Which is hardly a surprise, as the Chinese economy has its own level of precariousness and the U.S. and China have a symbiotic relationship: They export to our market, we borrow their money.
Clinton and Geithner apparently made some progress on opening up the Chinese market to advanced technology products. And Geithner outlined the Obama Administration’s basic economic strategy to reassure that China will not have to fund massive deficits in perpetuity. The Obama plan is to keep stimulating the economy out of the deflationary spiral through recovery, then pursue more fiscally conservative policies.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles and Sacramento today.
He holds private talks in and around the Capitol.
As the slow-moving Capitol dance of the budget unfolded earlier this month, Schwarzenegger unveiled a draconian “May Revise” of his proposed budget, focusing on big cuts to welfare and health programs and fiscal maneuvers.
State Senate Democrats under Senate leader Darrell Steinberg offered their counter-move yesterday in the form of a $5 billion tax hike program.
That includes rollback of $2 billion in new corporate tax breaks, which Schwarzenegger noted in January may have to be done, as well a billion dollar extension of income tax surcharges and $1.2 billion in increased vehicle license fees. The latest PPIC poll noted that only 28% favor an increase in the car tax.
Negotiating positions are becoming clearer.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. …From my May 22nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WILD WEEK THAT WAS.Is billionaire Meg Whitman having fun yet? She’s certainly had a careening week in her once seeming juggernaut of a bid to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California.
In any car race, the worst moment is not when the trailing car pulls up in the rear view mirror, it’s when you can no longer see it in the rear view mirror. That’s because it’s alongside.
I’ve been reporting for weeks on her steep slide in private polling on her Republican primary race against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, who was once dismissed by nearly all as a hapless speed bump in the race. That culminated here on the Huffington Post in “Meg Whitman’s Titanic Campaign for Governor of California.”
After a lot of denial of the truth by her chief strategist Mike Murphy and others in the well-paid Whitman camp, this week they had to face facts. This week began with a stark bit of reality. … From my May 15th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
The Film Society of Lincoln Center honored Michael Douglas with the Chaplin Award on Monday night in New York. Douglas, a co-founder of the LA Weekly, stars in the forthcoming Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $34 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
However, it is down one-fifth from just three weeks ago.
World stock markets dropped Tuesday as the euro continues to slide.
European economic activity is slowing again, there are still major worries about the Greek bail-out, and American inventory is increasing.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Despite mounting frustrations with its many failures, the top federal official overseeing the response to the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster says there’s no reason to push BP out of the way.
** QUICK HITS.Beatles legend Sir Paul McCartney will play the White House on June 2nd when President Barack Obama awards the 3rd Gershwin Prize for Popular Song from the Library of Congress. Last year’s honoree was Steve Wonder, whose “Signed, Sealed, Delivered” was an Obama campaign song. … In the GOP Senate race in California, a new KABC/SurveyUSA poll has ex-Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina opening a very big lead over ex-Congressman Tom Campbell, 46% to 23%. Far right state Assemblyman Chuck DeVore is far back with 11%. … Caliifornia state Senate Democrats reacted to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s call for additional budget cuts today with a $5 billion tax hike package. That includes $2 billion in postponing new corporate tax breaks, a billion in extending an across-the-board income tax surcharge, and $1.2 billion in increasing the very unpopular car tax. …
** CALIFORNIA 2010: NEW WEEK, NEW AD ROTATIONS. In the vicios GOP primary for governor, billionaire Meg Whitman, trying to hold off state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, has a new TV ad in her rotation, perhaps taking the place of that defensive 60-second spot she’s had on to a certain extent. I believe the effective ad attacking Poizner as a closet liberal is staying in the rotation.
And Poizner has a new ad, too, going all in — for now — on illegal immigration with both his principal ads on that topic in the wake of last week’s denuciation of the new Arizona law by President Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon last week in Washington.
Whitman, the first candidate I can recall whose candidacy is so tethered to consultants and lobbyists that she has a lobbyist in her ads, has a new spot in which her mentor, GOP presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney (who conceived her candidacy) appears with ex-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. What do they say? That she’s a real “fiscal conservative.”
For his part, Poizner’s new TV ad opens with a narrator asking: “Do you want a governor that has the same position on illegal immigration as the president of Mexico?” as the faces of Whitman, Calderon, and Obama are overlaid on a border fence.
In California, which repealed the right to same sex marriage granted by the state Supreme Court by passing a 2008 initiative, polls show that voters are essentially split, with a slight edge to the yes side.
Opponents of legalizing same-sex marriage continue to outnumber supporters in the United States, by 53% to 44%. However, opposition is now tied for the lowest Gallup has measured. Support was slightly higher, at 46%, in 2007.
These results are based on Gallup’s Values and Beliefs Poll, which has tracked attitudes toward legal same-sex marriage annually since 2004. When Gallup first asked about the legality of gay marriage in a 1996 poll, 68% of Americans were opposed and 27% in favor.
Since that time, support has increased among the major political and ideological subgroups, though more among those on the left of the political spectrum than among those on the right. Currently, a majority of Democrats favor legal gay marriage, as do a majority of moderates and liberals, with liberals the most supportive of these groups, at 70%. …
These political differences in support for gay marriage may stem from even larger differences by religion. Americans who say religion is “very important” in their lives oppose legal same-sex marriage by 70% to 27%. In contrast, Americans who say religion is not important to them support gay marriage by just as wide a margin.
Differences on the issue are also apparent by religious affiliation. Notably, 81% of Americans who claim no religious affiliation favor legal same-sex marriage. That compares to 48% support among Catholics and 33% among Protestants (including those who identify as Christian but do not specify a particular Christian denomination). …
Over time, Americans have become more accepting of legal same-sex marriage, and a growing number of subgroups now show majority support for it. However, religious and conservative segments of the U.S. population remain largely opposed — even though their support for gay marriage has also increased in recent years. Because religious and conservative groups are larger than nonreligious and left-leaning groups in the United States, overall, more Americans remain opposed to, rather than in favor of, same-sex marriage.
President Barack Obama delivered the commencement address at West Point on Saturday. He laid out a new doctrine blending civilian engagement and multilateral action with military intervention.
MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK.
A big week for President Barack Obama, with travel to California and elsewhere and a focus on economic recovery, the Gulf oil disaster, finding a new national intelligence director, and geopolitics, including the Korean crisis caused by the North Korean torpedoing of a South Korean warship, the Iranian nuclear crisis, and the still unsettled Iraqi governance situation.
And in California politics, the rock ‘em, sock ‘em Republican primary to attempt to succeed Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger heads toward the stretch run, with billionaire Meg Whitman trying to hold on to a lead over Steve Poizner. See my Saturday piece explaining the race, “The Empire Strikes Back,” linked below.
Meanwhile, Jerry Brown awaits the survivor. He’s raised $1 million in the past 10 days and just received a $2.25 million contribution from the California Democratic Party.
And rising ex-Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina contines her GOP primary duel with ex-Congressman Tom Campbell for the right to take on Senator Barbara Boxer.
Obama spends Monday in Washington, overseeing the Gulf oil crisis and meeting with the prime minister of pivotal Lebanon.
On Tuesday, Obama flies to San Francisco to appear at three fundraisers for embattled Senator Barbara Boxer. He did fundraisers for her last month in Los Angeles.
On Wednesday, Obama visits Solyndra, Inc., a solar manufacturer, in the San Francisco Bay Area city of Fremont. Solyndra is a big success story for the economic recovery act. He then flies back to Washington.
On Thursday, Obama welcomes the national collegiate basketball champions from Duke University and hosts the first White House reception for Jewish American Heritage Month.
Obama’s special Mideast envoy, former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, is trying now to play shuttle diplomat between Israel and the Palestinians.
Obama’s schedule, as it frequently is, is rather vague toward the end of the week, allowing flexibility to deal with breaking or impending events. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him do something high profile around the Gulf oil disaster.
BP’s estimates of the spill continue to be proven wrong and its efforts to end the spill continue to fall far short. Meanwhile, oil is washing ashore and even conservative Gulf Coast politicians are hopping mad.
South Korea has struck back at the North over the sinking of its Cheonan warship in March. President Lee Myung-bak and his government announced measures aimed at crippling Pyongyang.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington today.
Obama has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He then attended a reception for the Federal Judge Association before returning to the Oval Office to meet with senior advisors.
At 9 AM Pacific, Obama participates in the daily briefing call with Gulf Coast Governors on the BP oil spill.
BP is proving to be far less than capable in handling its Gulf oil disaster, and demands are rising for the federal government to take over the effort. Not that the federal government is any better at this sort of thing.
Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen will join White House press secretary Robert Gibbs in deliverthe daily briefing for the press.
At 11:30 AM Pacific, Obama welcomes Prime Minister Saad Hariri of Lebanon to the White House.
At 1 PM Pacific, Obama hosts a reception to celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month.
At 1:30 PM Pacific, Obama meets with Secretary of Defense Bob Gates in the Oval Office.
For his part, Vice President Joe Biden attends an event for his ailing son, Attorney General Beau Biden, in Philadelphia. The younger Biden has been released from the hospital after suffering a minor stroke.
FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles and Sacramento today.
At 2:45 PM, Schwarzenegger views a Mitsubishi electric vehicle in Capitol Park and holds a press availability.
He holds private talks in and around the Capitol.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. …From my May 22nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WILD WEEK THAT WAS.Is billionaire Meg Whitman having fun yet? She’s certainly had a careening week in her once seeming juggernaut of a bid to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California.
In any car race, the worst moment is not when the trailing car pulls up in the rear view mirror, it’s when you can no longer see it in the rear view mirror. That’s because it’s alongside.
I’ve been reporting for weeks on her steep slide in private polling on her Republican primary race against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, who was once dismissed by nearly all as a hapless speed bump in the race. That culminated here on the Huffington Post in “Meg Whitman’s Titanic Campaign for Governor of California.”
After a lot of denial of the truth by her chief strategist Mike Murphy and others in the well-paid Whitman camp, this week they had to face facts. This week began with a stark bit of reality. … From my May 15th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $36 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
However, it is down one-fifth from just three weeks ago. European economic activity is slowing again, there are still major worries about the Greek bail-out, and American inventory is increasing.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
After a week of flying together, space shuttle Atlantis detached from the nearly completed International Space Station today and headed for home on its final voyage.
** OBAMA TODAY – SUNDAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington today.
He has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He has no scheduled public events.
Obama is monitoring the BP oil spill crisis as well as geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
He got bad news today in the form of American-born Yemeni cleric Anwar al-Awlaki releasing a video urging the killing of U.S. civilians. Al-Awlaki has been linked to the suspects in the November 2009 Fort Hood shooting and the Dec. 25, 2009, attempting bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight
And he got good news with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama saying that a U.S. military base will remain in Okinawa. Hatoyama had promised during his campaign to move U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma to another island, but said it will instead be relocated to another area of Okinawa.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE – SUNDAY. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today.
He has no scheduled public events.
** THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK IN THE CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S RACE.After finally losing nearly all her lead last week in the Republican primary to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California, billionaire Meg Whitman is battling back against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, whom she led a few months ago by a whopping 50 points. She has a lead again, but it’s only about a fifth what it was, and less than her campaign claims. With little more than two weeks to go till the primary, with over a third of the voters still undecided, she’s in a precarious position.
Before delving again into the particulars of this race, let’s pause a moment in wonderment at this spectacle before us. (And yes, this weekend is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.)
Whitman is really showing us the possible future of oligarchic politics if she survives this far more difficult than expected primary and then manages to pull out a victory against Jerry Brown, who’s barely spent a dime so far, in the fall. It’s a possible future of unlimited spending and unlimited spin. Which is also, paradoxically, the problem with her candidacy. … From my new column.
In his weekend video/radio address, President Barack Obama announces that the independent commission he created for the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling will be chaired by former Florida Governor and Senator Bob Graham and former EPA Administrator Bill Reilly. He promises accountability not just for BP, but for those in government who bore responsibility.
** OBAMA TODAY – SATURDAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and West Point, New York today.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He then traveled to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in upstate New York.
There he delivered the commencement address to the graduating class and Corps of Cadets.
Here are Obama’s remarks:
Good morning. It is wonderful to be back at the United States Military Academy—the oldest continuously occupied military post in America—as we commission the newest officers in the United States Army.
Thank you, General Hagenbeck for your introduction, on a day that holds special meaning for you and the Dean, General Finnegan. Both of you first came to West Point in the Class of 1971 and went on to inspire soldiers under your command. You have led this Academy to a well-deserved recognition: best college in America. And today, you’re both looking forward to a well-deserved retirement. General Hagenbeck and Judy, General Finnegan and Joan, we thank you for 39 years of remarkable service to the Army and to America.
To the Commandant, General Rapp; and Academy staff and faculty, most of whom are veterans, thank you for your service and for inspiring these cadets to become the “leaders of character” they are today. Let me also acknowledge the presence of Secretary Shinseki, Secretary McHugh, and the members of Congress who are with us today, including two former soldiers that this Academy knows well, Senator Jack Reed and Congressman Pat Murphy.
To all the families here —especially all the moms and dads—this day is a tribute to you as well. The decision to come to West Point was made by your son or your daughter. But it was you who instilled in them a spirit of service that led them to this hallowed place in a time of war. On behalf of the American people, thank you for your example and your patriotism.
To the United States Corps of Cadets, and most of all, the Class of 2010 – it is an honor to serve as your Commander-in-Chief. Under our constitutional system, my power as President is wisely limited. But there are some areas where my power is absolute. And so, as your Commander-in-Chief, I hereby absolve all cadets who are on restriction for minor conduct offenses. That’s a lot of cheering. So I’ll leave the definition of “minor” to those who know better.
Class of 2010, today is your day—a day to celebrate all that you have achieved, in the finest tradition of the soldier-scholar, and to look forward to the important service that lies ahead.
You have pushed yourself through the agony of Beast Barracks; the weeks of training in rain and mud; and, I am told, more inspections and drills than perhaps any class before you. Along the way, I’m sure you faced moments when you asked yourself: “What am I doing here?”
You have trained for the complexities of today’s missions, knowing that success will be measured not merely by performance on the battlefield, but also by your understanding of the cultures, traditions and languages in the places where you serve.
You have reached out across borders, with more international experience than any class in Academy history. And you have not only attended foreign academies to forge new friendships, you’ve welcomed into your ranks cadets from nearly a dozen countries.
You have challenged yourself intellectually – in the sciences and the humanities, in history and technology. You have achieved a standard of academic excellence that is without question, tying the record for the most post-graduate scholarships of any class in West Point history.
This includes your number one overall cadet and your valedictorian—Liz Betterbed and Alex Rosenberg. This is the first time in Academy history when your two top awards have been earned by female cadets. This underscores a fact I have seen in the faces of our troops from Baghdad to Bagram – in the 21st century, our women in uniform play an indispensable role in our national defense. Time and again, they have proven themselves to be role models for our daughters and sons – as students, soldiers, and as leaders in the United States Army.
The faces in this stadium show a simple truth: America’s Army represents the full breadth of the American experience. You come from every corner of our country – from privilege and poverty; cities and small towns. You worship all of the great religions that enrich the life of our people. You include the vast diversity of race and ethnicity that is fundamental to our nation’s strength.
There is, however, one thing that sets you apart. Here in the quiet of these hills, you have come together to prepare for the most difficult tests of our time. You signed up knowing your service would send you into harm’s way, and did so long after the first drums of war were sounded. In you we see the commitment of our country, and timeless virtues that have served our nation well.
We see your sense of Duty – including those who have earned their right shoulder combat patches – like the soldier who suffered a grenade wound in Iraq, yet still helped his fellow soldiers to evacuate —your First Captain of the Corps of Cadets, Tyler Gordy.
We see your sense of Honor—in your respect for tradition, knowing that you join a Long Grey Line that stretches through the centuries; and in your reverence for each other, as when the Corps stands in silence every time a former cadet makes the ultimate sacrifice for our nation. Indeed, today we honor the 78 graduates of this academy who have given their lives for our freedom and our security in Iraq and Afghanistan.
And we see your love of Country—a devotion to America captured in the motto you chose as a class; a motto which will guide your lives of service: “Loyal ‘Til the End.”
Duty. Honor. Country. Everything you have learned here, all that you have achieved here, has prepared you for today: when you raise your right hand; when you take that oath; when your loved one or mentor pins those gold bars on your shoulders; when you become, at long last, commissioned officers in the United States Army.
This is the ninth consecutive commencement that has taken place at West Point with our nation at war. This time of war began in Afghanistan – a place that may seem as far from this peaceful bend in the Hudson River as anywhere on Earth. The war began only because our own cities and civilians were attacked by violent extremists who plotted from that distant place, and it continues only because that plotting persists to this day.
For many years, our focus was on Iraq. Year after year, our troops faced a set of challenges there that were as daunting as they were complex. A lesser Army might have seen its spirit broken. But the American military is more resilient than that. Our troops adapted, they persisted, they partnered with coalition and Iraqi counterparts, and through their competence, creativity and courage, we are poised to end our combat mission in Iraq this summer.
Even as we transition to an Iraqi lead and bring our troops home, our commitment to the Iraqi people endures. We will continue to advise and assist Iraqi Security Forces, who are already responsible for security in most of the country. And a strong American civilian presence will help Iraqis forge political and economic progress. This is no simple task. But this is what success looks like: an Iraq that provides no safe-haven to terrorists; a democratic Iraq that is sovereign, stable, and self-reliant.
As we end the war in Iraq, we are pressing forward in Afghanistan. Six months ago, I came to West Point to announce a new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan. I stand here humbled by the knowledge that many of you will soon be serving in harm’s way. And I assure you that you will go with the full support of a proud and grateful nation.
We face a tough fight in Afghanistan. Any insurgency that is confronted with a direct challenge will turn to new tactics. From Marjah to Kandahar, that is what the Taliban has done through assassination, indiscriminate killing, and intimidation. And any country that has known decades of war will be tested in finding political solutions to its problems, and providing governance that can sustain progress, and serve the needs of its people.
This war has changed over the last nine years, though it is no less important than it was in those days after 9/11. We toppled the Taliban regime; now we must break the momentum of a Taliban insurgency and train Afghan Security Forces. We have supported the election of a sovereign government; now we must strengthen its capacity. We have brought hope to the Afghan people; now we must see that their country does not fall prey to our common enemies. There will be difficult days ahead. But we will adapt, we will persist, and I have no doubt that together with our Afghan and international partners, we will succeed in Afghanistan.
Even as we fight the wars in front of us, we must also see the horizon beyond them – because unlike a terrorist whose goal is to destroy, our future will be defined by what we build. To get there, we must pursue a strategy of national renewal and global leadership – to build the sources of American strength and influence, and to shape a world that is more peaceful and prosperous.
Time and again, Americans have risen to meet – and to shape – moments of change. This is one of those moments – an era of economic transformation and individual empowerment; of ancient hatreds and new dangers; of emerging powers and global challenges. We will need you to meet these challenges, and you have answered the call. You, and all who wear America’s uniform, remain the cornerstone of our national defense, and the anchor of global security. And through a period when too many of our institutions have acted irresponsibly, the American military has set a standard of service and sacrifice that is as great as any in this nation’s history.
But now the rest of us must do our part. To do so, we must first recognize that our strength and influence abroad begins with the steps we take at home. We must educate our children to compete in an age where knowledge is capital, and the marketplace is global. We must develop clean energy that can power new industry, unbound us from foreign oil, and preserve our planet. We must pursue science and research that unlocks wonders as unforeseen to us today as the microchip and the surface of the moon were a century ago. Simply put, American innovation must be a foundation of American power. Because at no time in human history has a nation of diminished economic vitality maintained its military and political primacy.
As we build these sources of our strength, the second thing we must do is build and integrate the capabilities that can advance our interests, and the common interests of human beings. America’s armed forces are adapting to changing times, but your efforts must be complemented. We will need the renewed the engagement of our diplomats, from grand capitals to dangerous outposts; and development experts who can support Afghan agriculture and help Africans build the capacity to feed themselves. We need intelligence agencies that work seamlessly with their counterparts to unravel plots that run from the mountains of Pakistan to the streets of our cities; law enforcement that can strengthen judicial systems abroad, and protect us at home; and first responders who can act swiftly in the event of earthquakes, storms and disease.
Moreover, the burdens of this century cannot fall on American shoulders alone – indeed, our adversaries would like to see America sap its strength by overextending our power. In the past, we have had the foresight to avoid acting alone. We were part of the most powerful wartime coalition in human history through World War II, and stitched together a community of free nations and institutions to endure a Cold War. Yes, we are clear-eyed about the shortfalls of our international system. But America has not succeeded by stepping outside the currents of cooperation; we have succeeded by steering those currents in the direction of liberty and justice – so nations thrive by meeting their responsibilities, and face consequences when they don’t.
So the third thing we must do is shape an international order that can meet the challenges of our generation. We will be steadfast in strengthening those old alliances that have served us so well, including those who will serve by your side in Afghanistan and around the globe. As influence extends to more countries and capitals, we must also build new partnerships, and shape stronger international standards and institutions. This engagement is not an end in itself. The international order we seek is one that can resolve the challenges of our times – countering violent extremism and insurgency; stopping the spread of nuclear weapons and securing nuclear materials; combating a changing climate and sustaining global growth; helping countries feed themselves and care for their sick; preventing conflict and healing its wounds.
More than anything else, our success will be claimed by who we are as a country. This is even more important given the nature of the challenges that we face. Our campaign to disrupt, dismantle, and to defeat al Qaeda is part of an international effort that is necessary and just. But this is a different kind of war. There will be no simple moment of surrender to mark the journey’s end – no armistice or banner headline. Though we have had more success in eliminating al Qaeda leaders in recent months than in recent years, they will continue to recruit, plot, and exploit our open society. We see that in bombs that go off in Kabul and Karachi. We see it in attempts to blow up an airliner over Detroit or a SUV in Times Square, even as these failed attacks show that pressure on networks like al Qaeda is forcing them to rely on terrorists with less time and space to train. We see it in al Qaeda’s gross distortion of Islam, their disrespect for human life, and their attempts to prey upon fear, and hatred, and prejudice.
So the threat will not go away soon, but let’s be clear: al Qaeda and its affiliates are small men on the wrong side of history. They lead no nation. They lead no religion. We need not give in to fear every time a terrorist tries to scare us. We should not discard our freedoms because extremists try to exploit them. We cannot succumb to division because others try to drive us apart. We are the United States of America. We’ve repaired our union, faced down fascism, and outlasted communism. We have gone through turmoil and come out stronger, and we will do so once more.
I know this to be true because I see the strength and resilience of the American people. Terrorists want to scare us, but New Yorkers go about their lives unafraid. Extremists want a war between America and Islam, but Muslims are a part of our national life, including those who serve in our Army. Adversaries want to divide us, but we are united by our support for you – soldiers who send a clear message that this country is both the land of the free and the home of the brave.
In an age of instant access to information, it is easy to lose perspective in a flood of pictures and the swirl of debate. Power and influence can seem to ebb and flow. Wars and grand plans can appear won or lost day to day, even hour to hour. As we experience the immediacy of the image of a suffering child or the boasts of a prideful dictator, it is easy to give in to the belief that human progress has stalled – that events are beyond our control and change is not possible.
But this nation was founded upon a different notion. We believe, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” That truth has bound us together, a nation populated by people from around the globe, enduring hardship and achieving greatness as one people. It is a belief as true today as it was two hundred years ago. It is a belief that has been claimed by people of every race and religion in every region of the world. Can anyone doubt that this belief will be any less true – and any less powerful – two years, two decades, or even two centuries from now?
And so a fourth and fundamental part of our strategy is America’s support for those universal rights that formed the creed of our founding. We will promote these values above all by living them –through our fidelity to the rule of law and our Constitution, even when it’s hard; and through our commitment to forever pursue a more perfect union. And together with our friends and allies, America will always seek a world that extends these rights. Where an individual is silenced, we aim to be her voice. Where ideas are suppressed, we provide space for open debate. Where democratic institutions take hold, we add a wind at their back. When humanitarian disaster strikes, we extend a hand. Where human dignity is denied, America opposes poverty and is a source of opportunity. That is who we are. That is what we do.
We do so with no illusions. Change does not comes quick. Neither America – nor any nation – can dictate every outcome beyond its borders. A world of mortal men and women will never be rid of oppression or evil. What we can do – what we must do – is work, reach, and fight for the world that we seek.
In preparing for today, I turned to the words of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Reflecting on his Civil War experience, he said, and I quote, “To fight out a war you must believe something and want something with all your might. So must you do to carry anything else to an end worth reaching.” Holmes went on, “More than that, you must be willing to commit yourself to a course, perhaps a long and hard one, without being able to foresee exactly where you will come out.”
We know that America does not fight for the sake of fighting. We abhor war. As one who has never experienced the field of battle, I say that with humility, knowing – as General MacArthur said – that “the soldier above all others prays for peace.” We fight because we must. We fight to keep our families and communities safe. We fight for the security of our allies and partners, because America believes that we will be safer when our friends are safer; that we will be stronger when the world is more just.
Cadets, a long and hard road awaits you. You go abroad because your service is fundamental to our security back home. You go abroad as representatives of the values that this country was founded upon. And when you inevitably face setbacks – when the fighting is fierce or a village elder is fearful; when the end that you are seeking seems uncertain – think back to West Point.
Here, in this peaceful part of the world, you have drilled, and studied, and come of age in the footsteps of great men and women – Americans who faced times of trial, and who even in victory could not have foreseen the America they helped to build; the world they helped to shape.
George Washington was able to free a band of patriots from the rule of an empire, but he could not have foreseen his country growing to include fifty states connecting two oceans.
Grant was able to save a union and see the slaves freed, but he could not have foreseen just how much his country would extend full rights and opportunities to citizens of every color.
Eisenhower was able to see Germany surrender and a former enemy grow into an ally, but he could not have foreseen the Berlin Wall coming down without a shot being fired.
Today it is your generation that has borne a heavy burden – soldiers, graduates of this Academy like John Meyer and Greg Ambrosia who have braved enemy fire, protected their units, carried out their mission, and earned the commendation of this Army, and of a grateful nation.
From the birth of our existence, America has had a faith in the future – a belief that where we’re going is better than where we’ve been, even when the path ahead is uncertain. To fulfill that promise, generations of Americans have built upon the foundation of our forefathers – finding opportunity, fighting injustice, and forging a more perfect union. And our achievement would not be possible without the long grey line that has sacrificed for duty, honor, and country.
Years from now, when you return here, when for you the shadows have grown longer, I have no doubt that you will have added your name to the book of history. That we will have prevailed in the struggles of our times – that your legacy will be an America that has emerged stronger, a world that is more just. Because we are Americans –our destiny is never written for us, it is written by us, and we are ready to lead once more.
Thank you. May God Bless you. And may God bless the United States of America.
Tea Party leader Rand Paul, who won the Republican primary for U.S. Senate in Kentucky in a landslide and then caused a firestorm of controversy with his view that restaurants should be able to refuse service to black people, declared that Obama’s criticism of BP is “un-American.”
Obama is still savoring a major victory on Thursday night. The U.S. Senate passed the Wall Street reform bill, 59 to 39, with four Republicans voting yes. Now the bill moves to the House.
Obama is also looking for a new director of national intelligence. The DNI oversees the myriad of U.S. intelligence agencies, including the CIA, which is now headed by Californian Leon Panetta, a former longtime congressman who was White House chief of staff under Bill Clinton, as well as a frequently rumored gubernatorial candidate.
The outgoing director of national intelligence, retired Admiral Dennis Blair, repeatedly tangled with the affable Panetta, first insisting that he should have his own station chiefs in U.S. embassies around the world — the CIA station chief has always been the top spook in-country — and opposing the expansion of Predator drone strikes against jihadist cadre favored by Panetta and the White House.
The barely foiled Christmas bombing in the skies over Detroit proved to be the clincher against Blair. First, it was the National Counterterrorism Center, which he oversees, which failed to connect the dots on the bomber. Then Blair announced that his office’s new High-Value Interrogation Group should have taken over questioning of the suspect from the FBI. That group was not yet operational.
In other action …
And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in the midst of a three-nation tour of Asian countries, meeting with leaders of Japan, China, and South Korea. Today she is In China.
But her trip, which was to have largely focused on global economic matters, notably the adjustment of China’s currency to help the trade imbalance with the U.S., is now inevitably dominated instead by the March 26th sinking of a South Korean Navy ship.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq. (See my column, linked below, on Afghanistan and Pakistan.)
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE – SATURDAY. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles today.
He has no scheduled public events.
Today is Harvey Milk Day in California, honoring the birth of the late San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man elected to public office in California, assassinated in 1978 by a disgruntled conservative former colleague.
Schwarzenegger named Milk to the California Hall of Fame and signed legislation authorizing the official day after previously vetoing it.
Harvey Milk was the subject of the acclaimed 2008 film Milk, which garnered eight Academy Awards and won two Oscars, for best screenplay and best actor. Sean Penn played Milk and the Oscar-nominated Josh Brolin, a former colleague, played Milk’s assassin, former San Francisco Supervisor Dan White, who also assassinated San Francisco Mayor George Moscone, for whom the city’s convention center is named.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.… From my May 19th column.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WILD WEEK THAT WAS.Is billionaire Meg Whitman having fun yet? She’s certainly had a careening week in her once seeming juggernaut of a bid to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California.
In any car race, the worst moment is not when the trailing car pulls up in the rear view mirror, it’s when you can no longer see it in the rear view mirror. That’s because it’s alongside.
I’ve been reporting for weeks on her steep slide in private polling on her Republican primary race against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, who was once dismissed by nearly all as a hapless speed bump in the race. That culminated here on the Huffington Post in “Meg Whitman’s Titanic Campaign for Governor of California.”
After a lot of denial of the truth by her chief strategist Mike Murphy and others in the well-paid Whitman camp, this week they had to face facts. This week began with a stark bit of reality. … From my May 15th column.
Harrison Ford, Ewan McGregor, Billy Dee Williams, and Peter Mayhew celebrated the 30th anniversary of The Empire Strikes Back in Los Angeles.
** IRON MAN‘S POST-MODERN HOWARD HUGHES IS BACK AND CONFUSED.The biggest movie of the summer may already be in theaters. It’s Iron Man 2, of course, sequel to 2008’s surprise smash hit starring Robert Downey, Jr. as that billionaire technologist/arms dealer-turned-peaceloving action hero Tony Stark. (Be aware that there are a few spoilers.)
Iron Man has cultural and political roots that elevate it beyond a simple action flick, and in Downey, a seemingly quirky choice, it has the post-modern Howard Hughes it needs. Downey’s old friend Warren Beatty has always said that casting is the key, and nowhere is that more obvious than with Downey. In the hands of a conventional action star or leading man, Tony Stark would not be nearly so interesting a character. … From my May 13th essay.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Having crashed over $147 for yet another record on July 11th, 2008, crude oil closed on Friday at $70.04 per barrel. Energy markets are closed on the weekend.
This is up about $36 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
However, it is down one-fifth from just over two weeks ago. European economic activity is slowing again, there are still major worries about the Greek bail-out, and American inventory is increasing.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Here’s raw footage of the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil platform collapsing into the Gulf Mexico as it burns. The rig exploded on April 20th, killing 11 men. BP has admitted in the last day that more oil is spewing into the Gulf and less oil is being siphoned away than it had previously claimed.
** QUICK HITS.Tea Party leader Rand Paul, who won his Kentucky GOP Senate primary in a landslide then promptly opined in favor of racial discrimination, is in meltdown mode, having just canceled his appearance on Meet The Press. … White House press secretary Robert Gibbs announced during his daily briefing that President Obama, already slated to appear at big fundraisers next Tuesday night in San Francisco for Senator Barbara Boxer, will tour solar panel manufacturer Solyndra, a major success story for the economic recovery act, in Fremont. … Obama is searching for a new national intelligence director. Some say that Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence James Clapper is the leading candidate. As director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency during the Bush/Cheney Administration, Clapper supported the notion that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Another candidate for DNI is Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations Mike Vickers, a former Green Beret-turned-CIA officer who was featured in the hit film Charlie Wilson’s War. He was the young expert who came up with appropriate weapons to be used in the covert war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. Hmm, let’s see: Very off-target advice in a great historical event. Very on-target advice in a great historical event. What to do?
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: BILLIONAIRE MEG WHITMAN BATTLES BACK AGAINST THE STEVE POIZNER SURGE. Yes, it is the 30th anniversary of the launch of a little movie called The Empire Strikes Back.
** CALIFORNIA 2010: POLLS, SPIN PATROLS, THOSE VALIDATING PPIC NUMBERS, AND MORE INTERESTING THINGS THAN THAT. Since first revealing on April 16th that the Republican primary race for governor of California was closing dramatically, I’ve kept on top of the numbers. As should now be apparent, I have very good contacts in state, national, and international politics.
On Monday, I reported that billionaire Meg Whitman was fighting back against the surge of super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner. And that her lead, which had diminished so sharply as to be nearly non-existent (and in one sounding was briefly a narrow deficit), was in the high single digits, and possibly a bit higher, thanks to a boost over the weekend. In the upcoming column, I’ll explain why that happened.
Whitman leads Poizner 38% to 29% In the PPIC poll, with the balance undecided. In March, Whitman led Poizner by 50 points, 61% to 11%.
Democrat Jerry Brown leads them both.
Whitman’s support has dropped at least 17 points across all demographic groups, with the sharpest declines among those who are not college graduates (29 points) and those whose annual household incomes are at least $80,000 (28 points). Support for Poizner has increased sharply across demographic groups, but a plurality in each group would still vote for Whitman.
Now, as you may have heard and may recall from previous reporting, Whitman chief strategist Mike Murphy, who presided over the historic debacle known as Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “Year of Reform” special election package of four statewide initiatives back when he was still Schwarzenegger’s chief strategist in 2005, has been doing an enormous amount of spinning on the polling situation. So much so that he has been pretzelized.
When Poizner had closed to within 20 points or so, Murphy claimed that he was really 31 points behind, trotting out a memo from pollster John McLaughlin. Who had a bad experience with Murphy in 2005, with Murphy citing McLaughlin’s polling as he continued to insist that the doomed initiatives were really in good shape.
When Poizner had closed to within single digits, Murphy claimed that Whitman had a lead in the high double digits. Then, with the PPIC poll about to come out, Murphy touted a poll commissioned by Whitman ally Joel Fox, a pro-business/anti-tax lobbyist, which purported to show that Whitman was 18 points ahead. The difference being that the Fox poll was more recent and hence more accurate than the PPIC effort.
Now that the PPIC poll is out, Murphy, who not surprisingly is into Twitter, has been twittering and skittering furiously. He claims that Whitman is really 25 points ahead now, and told Democratic operative Steve Maviglio, who had twittered that the race was within the polling margin of error, that he was behind the curve. That that’s what it had been a week earlier. Which, of course, was when Murphy was claiming that Whitman had a double digit lead. Oops. Pretzelized.
Well, PPIC, like the Field Poll, has a few problems. One big problem is that the poll is conducted over a week-long period. As a result, these polls — which also come out far too infrequently for the fast-paced post-modern political era, being linked to the old newspaper era — don’t pick up sudden shifts.
But the PPIC poll does pick up a Whitman move over last weekend, which is why Poizner is seen as nine points behind rather than closer.
A more recent poll, as in completed the night before last, that I’ve seen has Whitman 10 points ahead of Poizner. She might be a little bit higher than that.
As I said, I’ll explain what happened to move her back ahead in the race, albeit by a dangerous margin that is vastly less than it used to be.
In the meantime, let’s look at a few other PPIC numbers. In the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, ex-Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina is out front with 25% to ex-Congressman Tom Campbell’s 23%. Far right Orange County Assemblyman Chuck DeVore has 16%. Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer leads all of them.
Now to issues.
For starters, Prop 14, the open primary, is on cruise control headed to victory, leading 60% to 27%. I’ve looked at the competitive situation, and there isn’t much to change the course of this Arnold Schwarzenegger-backed measure. Its political support is far broader than that, incidentally, but this campaign may err, if at all, on the side of caution in terms of spelling it all out.
Unfortunately, despite having plenty of time to conduct the poll, PPIC did not measure any other initiative on the June ballot.
It did look at the marijuana legalization measure targeted for the November ballot, and the findings are decidedly mixed. 49% yes, 48% no. That’s really not where you want to start out with such a controversial measure.
Here are a few highlights:
Majorities of Democrats (56%) and independents (55%) favor legalization. Thirty-four percent of Republicans are in favor. Most San Francisco Bay Area residents (56%) are in favor. Residents in other regions are either divided or opposed. Most Latinos (62%) oppose legalization. A majority of whites (56%) are in favor. Men (54%) are more likely to be in favor. Less than half (42%) of women favor legalization. Support for legalization decreases with age. 56 percent of adults aged 18–34 are in favor compared to 42 percent aged 55 and older.
And what do California voters think of the state’s chronic budget mess? Somewhat surprisingly, given Schwarzenegger’s low job approval rating, his budget plan gets pretty good marks.
Californians are also divided over Schwarzenegger’s May budget revision for the next fiscal year, which proposes big cuts in health and human services, as well as cutting spending for prisons and state employee compensation. The governor says his plan will maintain spending levels for K–12 education and increase funding for higher education. The plan includes no new taxes. After reading a brief description of the plan to 829 survey respondents, PPIC finds that 46 percent of Californians are satisfied with the plan and 43 percent are dissatisfied. Most Californians are concerned (40% very concerned, 40% somewhat concerned) about the impact of spending cuts in the governor’s plan. Yet they are divided (46% yes, 49% no) about whether tax increases should be included.
Of the four main spending categories of the state budget, Californians are the most willing to consider a tax increase to spare K–12 education from budget cuts (69%), while just over half would pay higher taxes to maintain current funding levels for higher education (54%) or for health and human services (54%). A large majority (79%) opposes paying higher taxes to spare prisons and corrections from budget cuts.
Californians would consider some other ways to raise revenues: 67 percent favor raising the top rate of the state income tax paid by the wealthiest Californians and 58 percent would favor raising state taxes paid by California corporations. Residents are much less likely to support extending the state sales tax to services that are not currently taxed (35%) or increasing the vehicle license fee (28%).
So the usual split personality with regard to spending and taxes.
If you want to know why I paid so little attention to the recent state tax reform commission, which came up with a complex plan that includes lower rates for the highest income Californians, look no further than the 67% support for higher taxes for such folks. I’d kind of guessed that. The proposal wasn’t going anywhere.
And if you want to know why I give short shrift to the idea of raising the vehicle license fee (aka car tax), please note the 28% support for that frequently proposed idea.
When I suggested to then Governor Gray Davis that a car tax hike was a logical move, at least from an arithmetic if not political standpoint, to help balance a wildly out of control state budget in 2003, he was not, let’s say, enthusiastic. He knew it was wildly unpopular. As indeed it was, proving to be a significant factor driving his recall. And Schwarzenegger knew that cutting the subsequently raised car tax was a wildly popular idea.
** NEW SURVEY ON OBAMA AND WHITES: BIG GENDER GAP AND EVEN BIGGER EDUCATION GAP. Here’s a pretty good way to find a supporter of President Barack Obama. Find a white woman with at least some post-graduate education. There’s little more than one chance in three that she doesn’t back Barack.
Approval of President Barack Obama among white U.S. adults has held fairly steady around the 41% mark in 2010, after a gradual decline from 62% in January 2009. At the same time, a gender gap among whites, averaging six percentage points, has persisted throughout Obama’s presidency. Thus far in May, his approval rating is 44% among white women vs. 39% among white men.
The white gender gap in views of Obama is not evident among all demographic subgroups. Rather, there is a distinct socioeconomic cast to it. Gallup Daily data collected thus far in May find white men and white women with no college background holding similar views on Obama. The slight gender gap that exists among whites with some college experience (41% approval among women vs. 37% among men) expands moving up the educational ladder to 10 points among those with at least some postgraduate education.
The widening gender gap that occurs among whites as education increases is mainly the result of increasing approval among women at each educational threshold — surging to 62% among postgraduates. By contrast, approval among white men is fairly steady up to the college graduate level, and then it increases significantly among postgraduates.
In the end, however, white views of Obama are remarkably similar to white views of then President Bill Clinton at a similar period in his presidency.
With the difference that college grad and post-grad white men are slightly more supportive of Obama now than they were of Clinton then.
One might ask how much these differences have to do with Obama himself — as opposed to his Democratic Party affiliation. The ratings of President Bill Clinton provide some insight into this. In the fall of 1993, when Clinton’s approval rating among whites (then 44%) was similar to Obama’s today, approval for Clinton among whites ranged from 36% among men with a college degree to 62% among postgraduate women — almost identical to the pattern now seen for Obama.
In contrast, white approval of George W. Bush was similar without regard to educational level. Until you get to the post-grad level, where it drops significantly.
White women also liked Bush less than white men.
By contrast, on average over the course of George W. Bush’s entire presidency, approval of Bush among white men and women varied relatively little by education, although approval among men was consistently higher at each level.
President Barack Obama commended the Senate late yesterday for moving closer to bringing Wall Street reform legislation to a final vote during remarks in the Rose Garden. After Obama’s remarks on the breaking of the filibuster, the Senate passed the bill itself.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington today.
Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have received the daily intelligence and economic briefings and met with senior advisors in the Oval Office.
At 7:45 AM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks and signs a presidential memorandum on green vehicles in the Rose Garden.
Obama will order the development of new fuel efficiency standards for vehicles beyond the 2016 model period he established in his new fuel efficiency standards of last year. And trucks, which use 20% of of on-road transportation fuels, will be included.
At 9:30 AM Pacific, Obama and Biden have lunch in the Private Dining Room.
Obama is savoring a major victory last night. The U.S. Senate passed the Wall Street reform bill, 59 to 39.
Four Republicans voted for the bill: Scott Brown of Massachusetts (who incited much consternation when he won the late Ted Kennedy’s seat in January), Maine’s Susan Collins and Olympia Snow, and Iowa’s Charles Grassley. Two Democrats voted against: Wisconsin’s Russ Feingold and Washington’s Maria Cantwell.
The Senate version of the bill doesn’t address the too big to fail issue. Now it goes back to the House, where an earlier version already passed, for reconciliation.
Obama is also looking for a new director of national intelligence. The DNI oversees the myriad of U.S. intelligence agencies, including the CIA, which is now headed by Californian Leon Panetta, a former longtime congressman who was White House chief of staff under Bill Clinton, as well as a frequently rumored gubernatorial candidate.
Obama is looking for a new national intelligence director. Admiral Dennis Blair is leaving after a series of intelligence failures, as well as turf battles with CIA Director Leon Panetta, the veteran California politician.
The outgoing director of national intelligence, retired Admiral Dennis Blair, repeatedly tangled with the affable Panetta, first insisting that he should have his own station chiefs in U.S. embassies around the world — the CIA station chief has always been the top spook in-country — and opposing the expansion of Predator drone strikes against jihadist cadre favored by Panetta and the White House.
The barely foiled Christmas bombing in the skies over Detroit proved to be the clincher against Blair.
First, it was the National Counterterrorism Center, which he oversees, which failed to connect the dots on the bomber.
Second, Blair announced that his office’s new High-Value Interrogation Group should have taken over questioning of the suspect from the FBI. There was one slight problem. That group was not yet operational. Oops.
In other action … Biden meets with Djibouti President Ismail Omar Guelleh.
And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in the midst of a three-nation tour of Asian countries, meeting with leaders of Japan, China, and South Korea.
But her trip, which was to have largely focused on global economic matters, notably the adjustment of China’s currency to help the trade imbalance with the U.S., is now inevitably dominated instead by the March 26th sinking of a South Korean Navy ship.
An international investigation, which the Obama Administration endorses, concluded on Wednesday that the ship was sunk by a North Korean torpedo attack.
Speaking today in Tokyo after meeting with Japan’s foreign minister, Clinton harshly condemned North Korea for the attack. The international community, she said, will formulate a strong response over the next week.
Speaking today in Tokyo, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared that the South Korean Navy corvette Cheonan was sunk on March 26th by a torpedo fired by a North Korean submarine. Clinton said there can be no “business as usual” as the international community formulates its response.
North Korea, in its inimitable fashion, has threatened war if there are any retaliations for the submarine attack on the Cheonan, a 1200-ton corvette. This is a ship that is a little less than 300-feet long, smaller than a frigate or destroyer but far larger and more capable than a patrol boat. It’s about the size of a World War II destroyer escort.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq. (See my new column, linked below, on Afghanistan and Pakistan.)
In Iran, officials are gauging reaction to their agreement with Turkey and Brazil to swap lightly enriched uranium for further enrichment to use in their medical reactor, and to a reported draft agreement on UN sanctions against Iran.
The sanctions won’t be brought to a vote in the UN Security Council till June.
In Iraq, maneuvering continues around the future government, the shape of which is still undetermined more than two months after the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who lost the election, vowed today that the election’s winner, former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi’s more secular Sunni party, will never get the opportunity to form a government.
Unfortunately for Maliki, the Iraqi constitution gives Allawi’s party the right to take the lead role in attempting to form a government. Maliki and his allies have tried numerous maneuvers to eliminate the Allawi victory. Now he’s into stonewalling.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger secured the agreement with electric car pioneer Tesla Motors to manufacture its Model S sedan at a factory in California in 2008. Last night, that turned out to be at Toyota’s just closed NUMMI plant in the Bay Area city of Fremont.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles and Redding today.
At 10:30 AM, he participates in the groundbreaking for the Veterans Home of California in Redding.
Late yesterday, as I mentioned then, Schwarzenegger helped preside over a major announcement in the San Francisco Bay Area city of Fremont.
There he and Lieutenant Govenor Abel Maldonado joined Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda and Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk at the site of the just closed NUMMI (New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc.) auto plant. That plant, the last auto plant in California, closed at the beginning of April as part of Toyota’s retrenchment around the world in the wake of the global economic meltdown and the nearly collapsed General Motors withdrawal from the joint venture.
Its closure was cited as supposed evidence of a hostile business climate in California.
Yesterday’s announcement was real evidence of something else, the state’s emerging greentech future.
Electric car pioneer Tesla and Toyota are forming a joint venture, and reopening the plant.
Toyota is anteing up $50 million to help Tesla buy the plant. There the two companies will make a new electric car, the model as yet undisclosed. They will also make the Tesla Model S, a luxury mid-sized sedan which is the follow-on to Tesla’s acclaimed electric sports car, the Tesla Roadster.
Schwarzenegger worked hard and closely with Toyota’s leadership to keep the Fremont plant from closing, putting together a package of incentives. But Toyota’s volume collapsed around the world in the wake of the 2008 financial meltdown and the company had to close factories in many places.
Schwarzenegger has also worked closely with Tesla, the Silicon Valley start-up, helping promote the company with his purchase of one of the original sports cars, constantly mentioning the Tesla, and assisting the company with its plans. (In addition to his fondness for the car and its greentech potential, Schwarzenegger is friendly with Tesla co-founder Musk and Tesla board member Steve Westly, the former state controller.) Tesla looked at a number of potential manufacturing sites, and seemed close to settling on the LA County city of Downey.
But Tesla CEO Musk and Toyota CEO Toyoda had met secretly last month in Los Angeles, where they rode around LA in Musk’s Tesla sports car and talked. They kept talking. The deal came together suddenly yesterday.
Musk is a notable innovator and entrepreneur in online finance (PayPal), new vehicles (Tesla), renewable energy (SolarCity), and rocketry and commercial space exploration (SpaceX, which will play a major role in resupplying the International Space Station after the retirement of the space shuttle). He’s engaged to rising 24-year old English actress Talulah Riley, who, among other credits, featured in a memorable two-parter on Doctor Who and appears in Dark Knight director Christopher Nolan’s forthcoming Inception.
After the groundbreaking for the new veterans home in Redding, Schwarzenegger will also hold private talks on the state’s chronic budget crisis.
On Friday, Schwarzenegger unveiled his revised state budget proposal for the 2010-11 fiscal year.
With the budget $19 billion in deficit, Schwarzenegger proposed eliminating the welfare system and big cuts to health care programs.
He hopes to at last negotiate his way to long sought budget and pension reforms.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WILD WEEK THAT WAS.Is billionaire Meg Whitman having fun yet? She’s certainly had a careening week in her once seeming juggernaut of a bid to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California.
In any car race, the worst moment is not when the trailing car pulls up in the rear view mirror, it’s when you can no longer see it in the rear view mirror. That’s because it’s alongside.
I’ve been reporting for weeks on her steep slide in private polling on her Republican primary race against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, who was once dismissed by nearly all as a hapless speed bump in the race. That culminated here on the Huffington Post in “Meg Whitman’s Titanic Campaign for Governor of California.”
After a lot of denial of the truth by her chief strategist Mike Murphy and others in the well-paid Whitman camp, this week they had to face facts. This week began with a stark bit of reality. … From my May 15th column.
** IRON MAN‘S POST-MODERN HOWARD HUGHES IS BACK AND CONFUSED.The biggest movie of the summer may already be in theaters. It’s Iron Man 2, of course, sequel to 2008’s surprise smash hit starring Robert Downey, Jr. as that billionaire technologist/arms dealer-turned-peaceloving action hero Tony Stark. (Be aware that there are a few spoilers.)
Iron Man has cultural and political roots that elevate it beyond a simple action flick, and in Downey, a seemingly quirky choice, it has the post-modern Howard Hughes it needs. Downey’s old friend Warren Beatty has always said that casting is the key, and nowhere is that more obvious than with Downey. In the hands of a conventional action star or leading man, Tony Stark would not be nearly so interesting a character. … From my May 13th essay.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $36 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
However, it is down one-fifth from just over two weeks ago. European economic activity is slowing again, there are still major worries about the Greek bail-out, and American inventory is increasing.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
A live video feed that shows the oil gushing from the blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico is now available online.
** QUICK HITS. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Fremont this evening for the announcement that electric car pioneer Tesla and Toyota will make electric cars at Toyota’s late NUMMI car plant there. … Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair is departing after repeated intelligence failures and turf battles with CIA Director Leon Panetta, the former California congressman. … The Senate defeated a filibuster atttempt today against the Wall Street reform bill with the help of new GOP Senator Scott Brown and the Maine moderates. … BP finally acknowledged that its estimates of the Gulf oil spill are way off.
** CONSUMER SPENDING UP IN MAY. Here’s another good sign for the Democrats. Even better than Tea Party leader Rand Paul, who won a smashing victory Kentucky’s Republican primary for the U.S. Senate, telling MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that he opposes the Civil Rights Act of 1964 because he thinks that private restaurant owners should be able to discriminate on race.
Say, what is is about Barack Obama that is so different from the usual?
A new Gallup survey shows that U.S. consumer spending was up significantly in the first two weeks of May.
Americans’ self-reported spending averaged $72 per day in the week ending May 16 — up 18% year over year. Gallup found a similar 16% increase during the prior week when spending averaged $73 per day. May’s spending increases follow similar if smaller year-over-year improvements during March and April.
During the week ending May 16, upper-income spending averaged $158 per day, compared with $122 and $143 during the previous two weeks. These are far higher spending levels than the $109 per day average of April and the $99 per day of March. …
The weekly spending increases among upper-income Americans are particularly encouraging. Prior to recent weeks, upper-income consumers did not seem to be taking part in the year-over-year spending increase that took place during March and April. Additionally, early May spending by this group seems largely unaffected, at least to this point, by the financial crisis in Greece and the European Union, not to mention the recent declines in the equity markets.
Nascent new job creation also seems to be contributing to increased spending among middle- and lower-income Americans in recent months and weeks. Add to this the recent increases in spending among upper-income consumers and — barring some unfortunate fallout from the global financial situation that alters current company hiring and consumer spending behaviors — a sustainable economic recovery could begin taking hold.
** AFTER THE AFGHAN SUMMIT: FIVE KEY THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA’S PROBLEMATIC PLANS.Now that the pomp and circumstance of last week’s Washington summit between the Obama Administration and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has faded, what is the state of things?
Not very good. Really, not very good at all.
With the much telegraphed U.S., NATO, and Afghan offensive in Kandahar Province — heartland of the Taliban since the movement’s mid-1990s inception in the midst of Afghanistan’s lengthy post-Soviet chaos — on tap for June, the Taliban aren’t exactly cowering in their caves waiting to lose. In fact, they say they’re launching their own offensive.
A sad milestone was reached on Tuesday. With a morning suicide attack against a U.S. military convoy in Kabul, the 1000th American has been killed in action in Afghanistan.
On Wednesday, a small unit of Taliban fighters launched an attack on massive Bagram Air Base. The four suicide bombers in the unit were killed before they could light off their explosives, thus preventing the unit from penetrating deeper into the base. The attack didn’t amount to much in the end.
But the firefight did last for hours, and coming a day after the devastating suicide bombing of the U.S. military convoy in Kabul, counts as a propaganda coup for the Taliban.
Embarrassing and hurtful as these attacks in supposedly secure zones are, the problems for the U.S. in Afghanistan are much deeper.
Here are five key things to know. It’s not meant to be an exhaustive list. …
U.S. President Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon spoke last night following the state dinner and before the evening performances at the White House.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington today.
Obama has received his daily intelligence and economic briefings and met with senior advisors in the Oval Office.
At 12 noon Pacific, Obama and Vice President Joe Biden meet with Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner in the Oval Office.
In other action, Biden attends Mexican President Felipe Calderón’s address to a Joint Session of Congress at the Capitol. He also meets with Senator John Kerry on the climate change/renewable energy bill and various geopolitical matters.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is off today for a three-nation tour of Asian countries, meeting with leaders of Japan, China, and South Korea.
But her trip, which was to have largely focused on global economic matters, notably the adjustment of China’s currency to help the trade imbalance with the U.S., will inevitably be dominated instead by the March 26th sinking of a South Korean Navy ship.
An international investigation, which the Obama Administration endorses, concluded yesterday that the ship was sunk by a North Korean torpedo attack.
Obama hosted the second state dinner of his presidency, in honor of Mexico, last night at the White House. His first state dinner, last November, was in honor of India.
In the course of all the festivities, Obama gave fresh impetus to the issue of illegal immigration, denouncing the new Arizona law in his joint press conference with President Calderon.
That will stir up partisans on both sides of the issue, and probably push the issue, which was fading a bit, back into the center of the Republican gubernatorial primary fight in California. Billionaire Meg Whitman opposes the law; her risen rival Steve Poizner supports it.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq. (See my new column, linked above, on Afghanistan and Pakistan.)
In Iran, officials are gauging reaction to their agreement with Turkey and Brazil to swap lightly enriched uranium for further enrichment to use in their medical reactor, and to a reported draft agreement on UN sanctions against Iran.
In Iraq, maneuvering continues around the future government, the shape of which is still undetermined more than two months after the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who lost the election, vowed today that the election’s winner, former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi’s more secular Sunni party, will never get the opportunity to form a government.
South Korea has accused the North of launching a deadly torpedo attack that sunk its warship March 26th. The Obama Administration, which participated in the international investigation, backs the charge. Pyongyang has warned of war if retaliation is taken against it over the sinking.
Unfortunately for Maliki, the Iraqi constitution gives Allawi’s party the right to take the lead role in attempting to form a government.
Maliki and his backers have tried every trick in the book to try to wriggle out of this fact, as I’ve discussed here over the past few months, from trying to disqualify candidates to a long and pointless recount to various other forms of stonewalling.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles and Silicon Valley today.
At 10:30 AM, Schwarzenegger will deliver remarks at Google headquarters in Mountain View at the announcement of the first-in-the-nation Green Products Innovation Institute in California. He will then hold a media availability.
Schwarzenegger will also hold private talks on the state’s chronic budget crisis.
On Friday, Schwarzenegger unveiled his revised state budget proposal for the 2010-11 fiscal year.
With the budget $19 billion in deficit, Schwarzenegger proposed eliminating the welfare system and big cuts to health care programs.
He hopes to at last negotiate his way to long sought budget and pension reforms.
Incidentally, a new Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) poll finally reports what I have been reporting since April 16th; namely, the dramatic tightening of the Republican gubernatorial primary race between billionaire Meg Whitman and state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner.
It also has Jerry Brown ahead of Whitman again — although by a lower margin than shown in private polling — and ahead of Poizner.
And it has Carly Fiorina narrowly ahead of Tom Campbell in the GOP Senate primary.
I’ll have more about the spin around this poll, since the PPIC findings are old hat for NWN readers, later today.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WILD WEEK THAT WAS.Is billionaire Meg Whitman having fun yet? She’s certainly had a careening week in her once seeming juggernaut of a bid to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California.
In any car race, the worst moment is not when the trailing car pulls up in the rear view mirror, it’s when you can no longer see it in the rear view mirror. That’s because it’s alongside.
I’ve been reporting for weeks on her steep slide in private polling on her Republican primary race against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, who was once dismissed by nearly all as a hapless speed bump in the race. That culminated here on the Huffington Post in “Meg Whitman’s Titanic Campaign for Governor of California.”
After a lot of denial of the truth by her chief strategist Mike Murphy and others in the well-paid Whitman camp, this week they had to face facts. This week began with a stark bit of reality. … From my May 15th column.
** IRON MAN‘S POST-MODERN HOWARD HUGHES IS BACK AND CONFUSED.The biggest movie of the summer may already be in theaters. It’s Iron Man 2, of course, sequel to 2008’s surprise smash hit starring Robert Downey, Jr. as that billionaire technologist/arms dealer-turned-peaceloving action hero Tony Stark. (Be aware that there are a few spoilers.)
Iron Man has cultural and political roots that elevate it beyond a simple action flick, and in Downey, a seemingly quirky choice, it has the post-modern Howard Hughes it needs. Downey’s old friend Warren Beatty has always said that casting is the key, and nowhere is that more obvious than with Downey. In the hands of a conventional action star or leading man, Tony Stark would not be nearly so interesting a character. … From my May 13th essay.
** MEG WHITMAN’S TITANIC CAMPAIGN FOR GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA.What has a record $70 million in primary spending gotten billionaire Meg Whitman? A plummeting Republican primary lead over state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, not long ago dismissed as a hapless figure by the state’s diminished press corps. And a lot more trouble besides.
Today the Democratic Party and Jerry Brown, the de facto nominee, are intervening with a tough new TV ad against Whitman, hitting her on ethics and Goldman Sachs.
It’s been a wild slide of a ride for the “inevitable” Meg Whitman these past few weeks.
Three weeks ago, I revealed on my blog, New West Notes, that private polling showed her once 50-point primary lead over Poizner had been cut in half. A week ago, I revealed that Poizner was going up on the air with a rugged TV ad attacking Whitman, a controversial former Goldman Sachs board member, for her deep linkages to the investment banking house. On Tuesday, I revealed that private polling showed Whitman’s lead cut further, to 10 points or less. All these things came as shocks to most.
Kudos, incidentally, to Poizner, who made his fortune as a Silicon Valley inventor and entrepreneur, and his gritty team. …From my May 7th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $35 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
However, it is down one-fifth from two weeks ago. European economic activity is slowing again, there are still major worries about the Greek bail-out, and American inventory is increasing.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
As the issue appeared to be dying down a bit, President Barack Obama reaffirmed his commitment to comprehensive immigration reform and denounced a harsh immigration law in Arizona at a joint news conference with Mexican President Felipe Calderon.
** QUICK HITS. The Taliban small unit attack today on massive Bagram Air Base, a day after a devastating suicide bombing of a U.S. military convoy in the Afghan capital of Kabul, didn’t amount to much in the end. But the firefight did last for hours, thus counting as a propaganda coup for the Taliban, which insists it’s launching its own offensive to counter NATO’s offensives. … Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger saw lots of spots that weren’t there while working out this morning, but got a clean bill of health from his doctor before proceeding with his schedule. … The mothers of three jailed recent UC Berkeley grads arrived today in Iran to see their children, who are charged with espionage after wandering over the border while hiking last July.
** CALIFORNIANS AT THE STATE DINNER. The Honorable Xavier Becerra, House of Representatives and Dr. Carolina Reyes; The Honorable Steven Chu, Secretary of the Department of Energy, Washington, DC and Mrs. Jean Chu; Ms. María Elena Durazo, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, Los Angeles, CA; Mr. John B Emerson, Beverly Hills, CA and Ms. Kimberly K Marteau; Ms. Giselle Fernandez, Los Angeles, CA; Ms. Dolores C Huerta, Delores Huerta Foundation, Bakersfield, CA; Mr. David C Lizárraga, Los Angeles, CA and Mrs. Yvonne Lizárraga; Ms. Eva Longoria-Parker, Los Angeles, CA; Mr. David Figueroa, Pasadena, CA; Mr. George Lopez, Los Angeles, CA and Mrs. Ann M Lopez, Toluca Lake, CA; Ms. Monica Lozano, Publisher, La Opinion, Los Angeles, CA and Mr. David Ayon; Mr. Eliseo Medina, Oxnard, CA and Ms. Liza Medina; Dr. Mario Molina, Department of Chemistry, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA and Ms. Guadalupe Limón; The Honorable Nancy Pelosi, United States Representative and Speaker of the House and Mr. Paul Pelosi; The Honorable John Pérez, Speaker of the House, State of California, Sacramento, CA and Jason Seifer; Maria Elena Salinas, Noticiero Univision; Mr. Mark Sanchez, New York Jets, Florham Park, NJ; The Honorable Hilda L. Solis, Secretary of Labor, Department of Labor, Washington, DC; Mr. Sam Sayyad, El Monte, CA; Mr. Andy Spahn, Los Angeles, CA and Jennifer L Perry;Mr. Arturo Vargas, Executive Director, National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, Los Angeles, CA and Mrs. María Vargas; and The Honorable Antonio Villaraigosa, Mayor, City of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA and Ms. Prisila Rodriguez.
United Farm Workers co-founder Dolores Huerta, L.A. County Labor Federation chief Maria Elena Durazo, Assembly Speaker John Pérez and Jason Seifer, Univision newscaster Maria Elena Salinas, and TELACU founder David and Priscilla Lizarraga are among the 20 people at the head table with the two presidents.
Other Californians will be on hand for the Reception and Performance (with Beyonce and Rodrigo y Gabriela) following the State Dinner: Mrs. Denise Bauer, Belvedere, CA and Mr. Steve Bauer; The Honorable Alan D. Bersin, Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security for International Affairs; The Honorable Barbara Boxer, United States Senate; The Honorable Gil Cedillo, California State Senate, Los Angeles, CA; Ms. Christy Haubegger, Creative Artists Agency, Los Angeles, CA and Mr. Steven Wolfe Pereira; The Honorable Lucille Roybal-Allard, United States Representative and Mr. Edward Allard; The Honorable Linda Sánchez, United States Representative and Mr. James Sullivan; and The Honorable Loretta Sanchez, United States Representative.
** NEW POLL: AMERICANS ARE SPENDING MORE. In a new sign of nascent economic recovery, more Americans are spending more, and fewer are spending less.
This, along with last night’s latest Democratic victory in a special election for Congress — in a Pennsylvania district the Republicans expected to win — is heartening some today in the Obama White House. If there is a big Republican wave coming to sweep away Democratic control of the Congress, it is not manifesting itself in actual election results.
A new Gallup Poll reveals that Americans are substantially loosening their tight recession-born grips on their wallets.
47% of Americans say they have been spending less money in recent months than they used to — still a fairly high number, but down significantly from 57% in February. Twenty-two percent say they have been spending more money — up from 17%.
Gallup has asked Americans this question about their spending intentions four times since April 2009. The current 47% who say they are “spending less” is lowest of the four readings by a few points. …
Women and men are about equally likely to say they are cutting back on their spending, but both groups are doing so to a lesser degree than was true just three months ago. Younger Americans aged 18 to 29 are less likely to say they are cutting back than are their older counterparts. Liberals are less likely than conservatives to say they are cutting back. Fewer upper-income than lower-income Americans are cutting back, as are fewer of those who are not married.
Throughout 2009 and into February 2010, a Gallup measure of saving vs. spending preferences suggested that the recession and financial crisis resulted in a significant change in the way many Americans feel about spending and saving. However, based on May’s results, spending and saving preferences may once again be shifting. Forty-four percent of Americans now say they more enjoy spending than saving — up from as low as 35% in February. Similarly, 50% now say they more enjoy saving, down from 62%. May’s spending and saving preferences are now back to where they were in December 2008 and in prior years of this decade. …
Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter lost the Democratic primary to Congressman and former Navy Admiral Joe Sestak, Tea Party favorite Rand Paul won the Republican Senate primary in Kentucky, and a Washington Democratic insider held a Pennsylvania Congressional seat Republicans had expected to win.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington today. He hosts the second state dinner of his presidency, in honor of Mexico, tonight at the White House. His first state dinner, last November, was in honor of India.
Obama has received his daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, First Lady Michelle Obama, and Dr. Jill Biden welcomed Mexican President Felipe Calderón and Mrs. Margarita Zavala to the White House in a ceremony on the South Lawn.
Obama then held a bilateral meeting with President Calderón in the Oval Office.
At 8 AM Pacific, Obama holds an expanded bilateral meeting with President Calderón and the official U.S. and Mexican delegations in the Roosevelt Room.
At 8:50 AM Pacific, Obama and President Calderón hold a joint press conference in the Rose Garden.
At 10 AM Pacific, the Bidens and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton host a lunch in honor of President Calderón and Mrs. Zavala at the State Department. Biden delivers the principal toast remarks.
At 12:30 PM Pacific, Obama meets with Ambassador to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland Lou Susman in the Oval Office.
At 1:15 PM Pacific, Obama and Biden meet with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the Oval Office.
At 3:30 PM Pacific, the Obamas welcome President Calderón and Mrs. Zavala on the North Portico of the White House.
At 3:30 PM Pacific, the Obamas take the official photo with President Calderón and Mrs. Zavala on the Grand Staircase.
At 4:10 PM Pacific, the Obamas attend the State Dinner with President Calderón and Mrs. Zavala in the East Room. Presidents Obama and Calderón deliver toasts.
At 5:30 PM Pacific, the Obamas attend the State Dinner Reception with President Calderón and Mrs. Zavala in the tent on the South Lawn.
There were big elections last night in Pennsylvania and Arkansas, where two Democratic senators, ex-Republican Arlen Specter and Blanche Lincoln, faced tough challenges in Democratic primaries.
Specter, a party switcher last year who held a big lead over his challenger, Congressman and retired Navy Admiral Joe Sestak last month before the polls started yo-yoing, in the end lost by a 54% to 46% margin. Sestak will be a strong general election candidate.
In Arkansas, Lincoln barely led Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter, 44% to 42%, and is forced into a run-off. Halter is heavily backed by unions which dislike Lincoln’s centrism. She’s backed by former President Bill Clinton.
Obama had endorsed both incumbents, as you might expect, especially since he helped persuade Specter to switch parties and give the Democrats a 60-seat filbuster-proof majority. But he will be fine with Sestak — who commanded an aircraft carrier battle group, has a doctorate from Harvard, and was a deputy chief of naval operations — as the Senate candidate. Prior to becoming a senator, Specter was best known as the young staffer for the Warren Commission who devised the “magic bullet theory” in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
In a congressional special election that Republicans expected to win, Washington Democratic insider Mark Critz held on to his old boss John Murtha’s Pennsylvania congressional seat. The district seemed a prime candidate for flipping, as it’s the only one in the country that went for John Kerry in 2004 and John McCain in 2008. But organized labor came through, big time.
In Kentucky, Tea Party co-founder Rand Paul, son of Texas Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul, crushed the establishment Republican candidate in the Senate primary. Paul replaces Senator Jim Bunning, the famed baseball pitcher, as the GOP candidate. He will face the state’s Democratic attorney general in November, in a race which is now much more competitive.
In other action, National Security Advisor General James Jones and CIA Director Leon Panetta are in Pakistan today meeting with President Asif Ali Zardari.
They are there to assess progress in the war against internal jihadists and the Pakistani Taliban connections to the failed Times Square car bombing. They are expected to urge more of a crackdown against training camps in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, where suspect Faisal Shahzad, son of a retired Pakistani general, says he received training before his failed attack in New York.
In South Korea. officials are saying that an international investigation suggests that the Navy frigate Chon An, which mysteriously sunk on March 26th, was destroyed by a North Korean torpedo attack. This is going to be a fascinating situation.
Obama is also monitoring geopolitical crises in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq.
Yesterday in Afghanistan, a Taliban suicide bomber roaming the streets of the capital city Kabul struck during the morning rush hour, targeting an American military convoy. At least 10 people were killed, including five American soldiers.
Today in Afghanistan, a Taliban unit attacked the perimeter of the Bagram Air Base, built by the Soviets and now the main U.S. base in the country. A lengthy firefight ensued.
In Iran, officials are gauging reaction to their agreement with Turkey and Brazil to swap lightly enriched uranium for further enrichment to use in their medical reactor, and to a reported draft agreement on UN sanctions against Iran.
In Iraq, maneuvering continues around the future government, the shape of which is still undetermined more than two months after the March 7th national parliamentary elections.
New video released by BP shows oil and gas erupting from its crippled blowout preventer safety device on the ocean floor. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar acknowledged his department had been lax in overseeing offshore drilling activities.
Obama is also closely monitoring the Gulf oil disaster, where things haven’t improved much. The device that BP finally succeeded in inserting to siphon off oil from the massive undersea leak is only getting, at most, 20% of the flow.
Obama is going to appoint an independent commission of inquiry on the disaster. The chief federal regulator of offshore oil drilling, a holdover from the Bush/Cheney Administration, resigned yesterday.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Los Angeles and Fresno today.
At 10:20 AM, Schwarzenegger will participate in the Golden Guardian 2010 exercise in Long Beach. This year’s exercise focuses on multiple terrorist attack scenarios at California’s ports.
At 12:15 PM, Schwarzenegger will deliver remarks at the groundbreaking ceremony for the Veterans Home of California in Fresno.
On Friday, Schwarzenegger unveiled his revised state budget proposal for the 2010-11 fiscal year.
With the budget $19 billion in deficit, Schwarzenegger proposed eliminating the welfare system and big cuts to health care programs.
He hopes to at last negotiate his way to long sought budget and pension reforms.
Meanwhile, billionaire Meg Whitman late yesterday put another $4 million from her personal fortune into her campaign for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, trying to hold off one-time speed bump Steve Poizner.
Whitman has now officially contributed $68 million to her primary campaign. But it’s really more like $70 million, as she has not reported heavy early spending on consultants and research.
… THE CALIFORNIA AS FIRST “FAILED STATE” DEBATE: SCHWARZENEGGER, DAVIS, WHITMAN, AND JERRY BROWN. … From my March 2nd column.
** MEG WHITMAN’S WILD WEEK THAT WAS.Is billionaire Meg Whitman having fun yet? She’s certainly had a careening week in her once seeming juggernaut of a bid to succeed Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California.
In any car race, the worst moment is not when the trailing car pulls up in the rear view mirror, it’s when you can no longer see it in the rear view mirror. That’s because it’s alongside.
I’ve been reporting for weeks on her steep slide in private polling on her Republican primary race against super-rich state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, who was once dismissed by nearly all as a hapless speed bump in the race. That culminated here on the Huffington Post in “Meg Whitman’s Titanic Campaign for Governor of California.”
After a lot of denial of the truth by her chief strategist Mike Murphy and others in the well-paid Whitman camp, this week they had to face facts. This week began with a stark bit of reality. … From my May 15th column.
** IRON MAN‘S POST-MODERN HOWARD HUGHES IS BACK AND CONFUSED.The biggest movie of the summer may already be in theaters. It’s Iron Man 2, of course, sequel to 2008’s surprise smash hit starring Robert Downey, Jr. as that billionaire technologist/arms dealer-turned-peaceloving action hero Tony Stark. (Be aware that there are a few spoilers.)
Iron Man has cultural and political roots that elevate it beyond a simple action flick, and in Downey, a seemingly quirky choice, it has the post-modern Howard Hughes it needs. Downey’s old friend Warren Beatty has always said that casting is the key, and nowhere is that more obvious than with Downey. In the hands of a conventional action star or leading man, Tony Stark would not be nearly so interesting a character. … From my May 13th essay.
** MEG WHITMAN’S TITANIC CAMPAIGN FOR GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA.What has a record $70 million in primary spending gotten billionaire Meg Whitman? A plummeting Republican primary lead over state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, not long ago dismissed as a hapless figure by the state’s diminished press corps. And a lot more trouble besides.
Today the Democratic Party and Jerry Brown, the de facto nominee, are intervening with a tough new TV ad against Whitman, hitting her on ethics and Goldman Sachs.
It’s been a wild slide of a ride for the “inevitable” Meg Whitman these past few weeks.
Three weeks ago, I revealed on my blog, New West Notes, that private polling showed her once 50-point primary lead over Poizner had been cut in half. A week ago, I revealed that Poizner was going up on the air with a rugged TV ad attacking Whitman, a controversial former Goldman Sachs board member, for her deep linkages to the investment banking house. On Tuesday, I revealed that private polling showed Whitman’s lead cut further, to 10 points or less. All these things came as shocks to most.
Kudos, incidentally, to Poizner, who made his fortune as a Silicon Valley inventor and entrepreneur, and his gritty team. …From my May 7th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th, 2009 Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
This is up about $35 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity.
However, it is down one-fifth from two weeks ago. European economic activity is slowing again, there are still major worries about the Greek bail-out, and American inventory is increasing.
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