Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made an unannounced trip to Kabul tonight to urge a reluctant Afghan government to continue pursuing talks with the Taliban. Talks crashed last month when the former Afghan president running the peace council was assassinated in his high-security home.
** QUICK HITS.Greece was hit today by massive demonstrations amidst a burgeoning general strike as the Greek parliament prepares to act on deep austerity measures to stave off a financial collapse. … Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Afghanistan on an even more highly-secured trip than her visit to Libya, trying to prod the Afghan government back into peace talks with the Taliban. … Turkish forces are continuing military operations in northern Iraq following deadly cross-border attacks by Kurdish separatist guerrillas. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has canceled a trip to Kazakhstan. The Iraqi government has failed to rein in the Kurdish separatist movement after repeated complaints from Turkey. …
** JERRY-RIGGING: JOBS FROM TEXAS AND A RENEWED REPUBLICAN ANTI-REDISTRICTING DRIVE. Governor Jerry Brown joined Dell Computer founder and CEO Michael Dell today in Silicon Valley for the opening of a new Dell research and development center.
“California is the world capital of innovation and technology, so it’s only natural that Dell has chosen Santa Clara as the home for its newest Research and Development facility,” Brown declared. “Dell has made a sound investment by expanding in California, and I look forward to further expansions of Dell’s presence here in the Golden State.”
When completed, the Dell Silicon Valley Research and Development Center will take up some 240,000 square feet in two buildings containing 700 staffers.
Intriguingly, Brown didn’t ding Texas for losing this facility to California.
While this was happening, reports emerged of a fresh infusion of funds for the lagging conservative drive to derail the Citizens Redistricting Commission’s lines for state Senate districts.
The semi-moribund California Republican Party has somehow come up with $400,000 to revive the drive to get more than a half-million valid signatures in the next three-and-a-half weeks to qualify a referendum against the plan of the commission, which itself was created by a popular initiative promoted by Brown’s predecessor, former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and others.
Will they qualify? They have a renewed chance now, but it won’t be easy.
** NEW POLL: MORE BLAME GOVERNMENT THAN WALL STREET FOR ECONOMIC WOES. A new Gallup Poll indicates that twice as many blame the federal government for America’s financial meltdown and ongoing economic woes as blame Wall Street.
Of course, the focus has only shifted to Wall Street in the last few weeks, while there has been a steady drumbeat on the government for years.
The two to one response comes as a result of a forced choice question. In the first round of questioning, Wall Street is given “a great deal” of blame by nearly half, with government given that level by over half.
Not surprisingly, Republicans blame the federal government more than Wall Street by a five to one ratio. Democrats are evenly split, while independents blame the government more by a greater than two to one ratio.
What the poll does not tell us, because it doesn’t ask, is the extent to which people believe that the federal government has been bought off. Since the government is supposed to be in charge and is thus held responsible, that’s a key question.
Of course, that’s a tricky point for, say, an incumbent president running for re-election, breaking fundraising records in the process, to raise.
Americans are more than twice as likely to blame the federal government in Washington (64%) for the economic problems facing the United States as they are the financial institutions on Wall Street (30%). …
Both of these large entities have been the target of protest groups this year. The Occupy Wall Street movement has focused on large financial institutions on Wall Street, while the Tea Party movement continues to focus mainly on the federal government.
There appears to be no shortage of blame for either of these entities. The Oct. 15-16 USA Today/Gallup poll asked Americans how much they blame the federal government for the economy and, separately, how much they blame financial institutions on Wall Street. More than three-quarters of Americans, in both cases, say these entities deserve a great deal or a fair amount of blame for the economic problems facing the U.S. Still, reflecting the results of the forced-choice question, the percentage saying the federal government deserves a great deal of blame is 11 points higher than the percentage for financial institutions on Wall Street. …
Republican presidential candidates held a spirited debate last night on the Las Vegas Strip, with everyone attacking new frontrunner Herman Cain for his 9-9-9 plan and Mitt Romney taking heavy fire for the first time on flip-flops, health care, and immigration.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Virginia and Washington.
Obama is wrapping up a three-day bus tour of North Carolina and Virginia.
Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama delivered remarks this morning at Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Hampton, Virginia.
At 11:40 AM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at Fire Station 9 in North Chesterfield, Virginia.
At 12:45 PM Pacific, Obama departs Richmond, Virginia on Air Force One en route Joint Base Andrews.
At 1:25 PM Pacific, Obama arrives at Joint Base Andrews, where he boards Marine One.
At 1:40 PM Pacific, Obama lands on the South Lawn of the White House.
He has quite a few stops on these bus tours that are not on his schedule in advance. This is in large part due to security, in order to cut down on the number of frequently ramshackle sites that the Secret Service must investigate and secure prior to his arrival.
Last night’s Republican presidential debate in Nevada was entertaining.
New frontrunner Herman Cain took heavy fire for his economic plan, which evidently would raise taxes for most people but cut them dramatically for those making more than a million dollars a year.
So what’s the controversy? The raising taxes for most people part.
Mitt Romney finally took some serious fire, for the first time in any of these debates. And Rick Perry showed signs of life.
Romney didn’t look so cool, calm, and collected through much of the debate, denying that he ever said that his Massachusetts health care plan, the forerunner of “Obamacare,” should be taken to the rest of the nation only to have Rick Santorum hit him for saying that very thing in his book only to remove it in a re-issued version.
Romney also came under fire from Perry for having had illegal immigrants doing yard work at his estate while now claiming to be tough on illegal immigration.
Cain, once again, looked like someone who can’t really talk about any geopolitical issue with any degree of specificity.
Turkish troops today entered Iraq after attacks from Kurdish separatists based there killed at least 26 Turkish soldiers, the worst loss of life by Turkish forces in decades.
Watching live early this morning, I saw an Iraqi official deny that the incursion had occurred.
Obviously this is a blow to Iraqi sovereignty.
Once US forces withdraw, we can expect even greater Iranian involvement throughout the country — the parliament is already tilted toward Iran, and has denied US troops any future ability to avoid trial in Iraqi courts — and Turkish involvement in northern Iraq to quell Kurdish separatist activity.
Turkish forces entered Iraq today after Kurdish separatist guerrillas operating from inside the country killed 26 soldiers in strikes inside Turkey.
Today Russia surprised many observers by forming a free trade zone with most of the former Soviet republics. I believe that only the Baltic states are not going to join.
This is a major project of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who will switch jobs next year with his former chief of staff, President Dmitry Medvedev.
Libyan rebels are celebrating the fall of Bani Walid. This leaves only a remnant of Gaddafi loyalists in a small slice of the deposed dictator’s home town of Sirte fighting on.
The new leadership was happy to welcome Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on a surprise visit yesterday to Tripoli. Clinton, one of the main advocates of the ultimate intervention policy in the administration’s internal deliberations on Libya, came bearing promises of ongoing aid to the new government.
Deposed dictator Moammar Gaddafi remains a fugitive, his whereabouts officially unknown.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
At 10:30 AM, Brown will join Dell Chairman and CEO Michael Dell in Santa Clara to open the company’s newest research and development center. Following the ceremony, Dell will hold a career fair on-site to recruit hundreds of employees for the new center.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
** PAN AMERICAN GAMES LIVE. The Pan American Games, bringing together athletes from 41 nations across North, Central, and South America and the Caribbean contesting in 36 sports, have their opening ceremony tonight in Guadalajara, Mexico. The Pan Ams run until October 30th.
You can watch the action on ESPN Deportes.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $88 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $54 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $26 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said yesterday in Las Vegas that struggling homeowners should be allowed to go under so that private investors can buy the houses.
** WHAT HAPPENS IN VEGAS DOESN’T ALWAYS STAY THERE: WHY IT’S BEEN GOOD FOR ROMNEY THAT OTHERS KEEP GETTING THE SPOTLIGHT. On Monday, sometime Republican presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney formally opened his Nevada campaign headquarters with an event in Las Vegas, timed to coincide with tonight’s CNN debate at the Venetian on the Vegas Strip.
In the normal course of things, he met with the editorial board of the Las Vegas Review-Journal for a routine discussion and interview.
The Review-Journal is a conservative paper, so Romney felt no qualms about talking his laissez-faire economic policy. But maybe he shouldn’t have been so comfortable.
In the course of the meeting, Romney allowed as how the best thing to do is to just let struggling home owners sink. In fact, he blamed President Barack Obama for prolonging the economic crisis through his rather muted efforts to help.
Two-thirds of Nevada home owners have underwater mortgages.
The Review-Journal didn’t think to highlight any of this this morning — here’s the original story — but video of the meeting was available on its site and a not surprising controversy erupted after it was viewed by others, as the paper now reports.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was one, and he’s demanding that Romney apologize.
Several hours before Tuesday’s CNN debate, U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., demanded Mitt Romney apologize for saying in an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal that the home foreclosure crisis should “run its course” so private investors can buy houses that homeowners can no longer afford.
Nevada has the highest home foreclosure rate in the nation with about two-thirds of homeowners “underwater,” owing more than a house is worth.
“Mitt Romney owes the thousands of Nevada families struggling to keep a roof over their heads an apology,” Reid said in a statement. “Once again, Mitt Romney is demonstrating he’s more concerned with big Wall Street banks than middle-class families. With the highest foreclosure rate in the nation, Nevadans can’t afford someone in the White House whose response to this crisis is ‘tough luck’.”
In the Monday interview with the Review-Journal’s editorial board, Romney said that the home foreclosure crisis has lingered because President Barack Obama has been trying to prop up homeowners with programs that don’t work and so the best solution is to let some homes go into foreclosure.
“Don’t try to stop the foreclosure process. Let it run its course and hit the bottom,” Romney said. “Allow investors to buy the homes, put renters in them, fix the homes up and let it turn around and come back. The Obama administration has slow walked the forclosure process … that has long existed and as a result we still have a foreclosure overhang.”
>>>>>>LIVE VIDEO NETCAST
At 2 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at Greensville County High School in Emporia, Virginia. The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
** NEW POLL: WIDESPREAD UNCERTAINTY ABOUT OCCUPY WALL STREET. It’s striking a nerve around the world, but Occupy Wall Street is mostly regarded with uncertainty by a big majority of Americans.
According to a new Gallup Poll, over 60% of the country doesn’t know what to make of the still amorphous anti-Wall Street movement, whose symbolic center is an encampment near the New York Stock Exchange.
Which is not exactly a large surprise.
The protest just began a month ago, and was largely a fizzle until a few weeks ago when New York police fatefully pepper sprayed a number of protesters while arresting them.
And the movement’s goals still remain amorphous.
That said, and most intriguingly, support for Occupy Wall Street is around the same level as that for the far more massively hyped and well-established Tea Party movement.
Less than half of Americans express an opinion about either the Occupy Wall Street movement’s goals or the way it has conducted its protests. Those with an opinion are more likely to approve than disapprove. …
But the American public does not seem to be very familiar with the movement or its goals. Part of that may stem from the below-average level of attention Americans are paying to the news story. Fifty-six percent say they are following the story closely, including 18% who say very closely. The averages for more than 200 news events Gallup has tracked since the 1990s are 61% closely and 22% very closely.
Additionally, the lack of knowledge about the movement’s goals may be because the movement has not had clearly defined leaders or goals. Rather, it appears to be united by grievances against the wealthiest Americans — in particular, those who run major Wall Street financial institutions.
Republicans (57%), Democrats (57%), and independents (55%) are about equally likely to say they are following news about Occupy Wall Street closely.
Those who are closely following the news about Occupy Wall Street are more likely to approve than disapprove of the movement’s goals, but even among this more attentive group there is a substantial degree of uncertainty, 44%. That drops to 27% among the most highly attentive group, those who are following the story “very closely.” Among this group, 45% approve and 29% disapprove of the Occupy Wall Street movement’s goals.
Americans paying attention to the news about Occupy Wall Street movement are more inclined to have an opinion about the way the protests are being conducted, and are somewhat more likely to approve than disapprove of those methods. …
Democrats are much more likely to say they are supporters (42%) than opponents (8%) of the Occupy Wall Street movement, with the remainder neutral (47%) or not having an opinion. Most Republicans, 55%, are neither supporters nor opponents, though Republicans are much more likely to oppose the movement (34%) than support it (9%).
The poll sought to contrast support for Occupy Wall Street with another prominent American movement, the Tea Party. In the poll, 22% describe themselves as Tea Party movement supporters, 27% as opponents, and 47% as neither. Gallup has typically found that about equal percentages of Americans are Tea Party supporters or opponents, with the greatest percentage neutral. Thus, the current level of public support for Occupy Wall Street is similar to that for the Tea Party movement. …
Imprisoned Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, whose kidnapping in 2006 prompted a brief war between Israel and Hamas, was today exchanged for nearly 500 Palestinian prisoners, with over 500 more slated for release later this fall.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in North Carolina and Virginia.
Obama is in the midst of a three-day bus tour of North Carolina and Virginia.
He has quite a few stops on these bus tours that are not on his schedule in advance. This is in large part due to security, in order to cut down on the number of frequently ramshackle sites that the Secret Service must investigate and secure prior to his arrival.
This morning, Obama held a roundtable meeting with educators at Guilford Technical Community College in Jamestown, North Carolina.
He then delivered remarks at Guilford Technical Community College in Jamestown
At 2 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at Greensville County High School in Emporia, Virginia.
The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes.
You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
Israel and Hamas today executed an historic prisoner exchange.
477 Palestinian prisoners were released in exchange for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, snatched in a daring 2006 kidnapping which led to a brief and unsuccessful Israeli war with Hamas.
Another 550 Palestinian prisoners are to be released in two months.
Egypt played a major role as intermediary in the agreement and the exchange, which I watched live on international television. Before being handed over to Israeli authorities, Shalit went on Egyptian state television and called for peace between the contesting parties.
Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu then held a welcoming ceremony on an Israeli Air Force base, speaking much of his own role in gaining the freedom of Shalit, a corporal when he was taken and now a sergeant.
The deal helps Netanyahu and Israel in that it satisfies a widespread huge demand in the country for Shalit’s release and makes Israel appear more reasonable. It also boosts Hamas in its rivalry with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who’s received all the acclaim of late for his move to gain United Nations recognition.
But it raises the question of how dangerous all those Palestinian prisoners really were. Thousands more remain in captivity. And it certainly undermines the Israeli stance of not negotiating with terrorists, a stance which it has trumpeted for itself and for its allies.
Libyan rebels are celebrating the fall of Bani Walid. This leaves only a remnant of Gaddafi loyalists in a small slice of the deposed dictator’s home town of Sirte fighting on.
So the new leadership was happy to welcome Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on a surprise visit today to Tripoli.
Clinton, of course, was one of the main advocates of the ultimate intervention policy in the administration’s internal deliberations on Libya.
Saudi Arabia is asking that the alleged Iranian plot to assassinate its ambassador in Washington be brought to the UN Security Council. The story is getting mostly short shrift in international media coverage. But the Saudis haven’t said what they want the Security Council to do.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Tripoli today on an unscheduled visit to the new leadership of Libya.
In domestic politics, Obama’s re-election campaign is touting the accomplishment of having one million contributors as of Monday.
He has far out-distanced all Republicans in fundraising.
Republicans are embroiled in a huge internal process dispute sparked by Florida moving its primary into the midst of the anointed first four contests of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina.
Nevada reacted by moving up also, to January 14th, rather than be left in the dust. New Hampshire threatens to move into December, because its cranky secretary of state insists on having a week between his state’s primary and the Silver State’s caucuses.
Today Iowa set its historically first-in-the-nation contest as a date in stone: January 3rd.
The Republican field debates again tonight in Las Vegas, with the event airing on CNN at 5 PM Pacific.
It will be interesting to see if they discuss anything new beyond laissez-faire and austerity to help Nevada’s slumping economy.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN FOLLOWING A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him on Wednesday.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
Senator Dianne Feinstein officiated at Brown’s wedding to Anne Gust in 2005. She’s up for re-election next year, but has no opponent as yet, despite slumping ratings in the polls.
But she does have one big problem.
Feinstein’s campaign says now that it lost $4.7 million to the embezzlement of its longtime campaign treasurer, veteran California accountant/political consultant Kinde Durkee, who is said to have looted the accounts of dozens of political clients. I had never heard of Durkee before the scandal emerged last month, campaign treasurers being something I’ve paid virtually no attention to. Clearly I’m not the only one with such a blind spot.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
** PAN AMERICAN GAMES LIVE. The Pan American Games, bringing together athletes from 41 nations across North, Central, and South America and the Caribbean contesting in 36 sports, have their opening ceremony tonight in Guadalajara, Mexico. The Pan Ams run until October 30th.
You can watch the action on ESPN Deportes.
Virgin Galactic has opened the world’s first commercial spaceport in New Mexico, a central project of former Governor Bill Richardson.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $86 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $52 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $28 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Kicking off his three-day bus tour this morning in Asheville, North Carolina, President Barack Obama said that pieces of his American Jobs Act proposal will be pushed forward in Congress.
** QUICK HITS.Saudi Arabia is asking that the alleged Iranian plot to assassinate its ambassador in Washington be brought to the UN Security Council. The story is getting mostly short shrift in international media coverage. But the Saudis haven’t said what they want the Security Council to do. … Israel’s Supreme Court today gave final approval to the exchange of more than 1000 Palestinian prisoners for long captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was kidnaped by Hamas in 2006. Some families of terror victims protested the exchange. But 1027 Palestinians are now slated for release, with 477 prisoners to be let go tomorrow in exchange for Shalit, with the remaining 550 to be released in two months. … President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign is touting the accomplishment of having one million contributors as of today. … Senator Dianne Feinstein’s campaign says now that it lost $4.7 million to the embezzlement of its longtime campaign treasurer, veteran California accountant/political consultant Kinde Durkee, who is said to have looted the accounts of dozens of political clients. I had never heard of Durkee before the scandal emerged last month, campaign treasurers being something I’ve paid virtually no attention to. Clearly I’m not the only one with such a blind spot.
** NEW SURVEY: UNEMPLOYMENT APPEARS TO DECLINE. A welcome sign of some good economic news.
A new Gallup Poll survey indicates that unemployment has dropped in mid-October, and is now well below its level from a year ago.
Underemployment is down in this survey, as well. To its lowest level of the year, in fact.
This is good news for the Obama Administration, whose economic forecasts have been far too rosy from the start and whose latter-day efforts have been blocked by conservative Republicans.
Unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, is 8.3% in mid-October — down sharply from 8.7% at the end of September and 9.2% at the end of August. A year ago, Gallup’s U.S. unemployment rate stood at 10.0%. While seasonal hiring patterns may explain some of this improvement, the drop suggests the government could report an October unemployment rate of less than 9.0%. …
In addition to the drop in unemployment, Gallup also found a decline in the percentage of part-time workers who want full-time work, to 9.2% in mid-October from 9.6% at the end of September. …
Underemployment, a measure that combines the percentage of workers who are unemployed with the percentage working part time but wanting full-time work, is thus at 17.5% in mid-October, down sharply from 18.3% at the end of September — and its lowest measurement of the year. …
>>>>>>LIVE VIDEO NETCAST
At 2 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at West Wilkes High School in Millers Creek, North Carolina. The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
Protests spurred by Occupy Wall Street are continuing in various parts of the world in the wake of Saturday’s demonstrations in nearly a thousand cities in over 80 countries. Protesters have been welcomed to camp next to the iconic St. Paul’s Cathedral in London near the stock exchange.
MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK.
A very big week in presidential politics is on tap, with President Barack Obama on a three-day bus tour of North Carolina and Virginia, two states he turned blue in 2008 that he aims to keep, and a Republican presidential debate in hard-hit Nevada. And a relatively quiet week again in California politics, as conservatives struggle to mount referendum campaigns against new laws.
The Republican presidential debate Tuesday night in Las Vegas comes as the party struggles for focus in its race. Former Godfather’s Pizza mogul Herman Cain now leads in most national polls.
The event also comes with the Nevada presidential caucuses not garnering much campaigning so far. It’s in part due to forces of habit; i.e., a traditional emphasis on Iowa and New Hampshire. And it’s in part due to the fact that, with its reeling economy, Nevada is a state in need of stimulus and Republican prescriptions for austerity and laissez-faire economics are not very relevant.
Meanwhile, Obama has embarked on a three-day bus tour of North Carolina and Virginia, two red states turned blue in 2008 that he means to hold in 2012. He’ll continue his more populist tack, as he and many Democrats express sympathy for the Occupy Wall Street protests and Wall Streeters, offended by Obama’s limited reforms, shift support to Republican Mitt Romney, a former leveraged buyout artist, as I reported a while back.
While this goes on, protests against corporate power and the global financial system, inspired by the Occupy Wall Street protests which began so inauspiciously in New York four weeks ago this weekend, took place Saturday in nearly a thousand cities in some 80 nations across the planet.
The biggest demonstration, drawing some 200,000 people, took place in Rome, already a hotbed of discontent against billionaire media mogul-turned-Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, constantly enmeshed in one scandal or another even as he promotes austerity budgets. In that protest, a small group of disciplined black-clad anarchists broke bank windows, trashed store fronts, and got into clashes with the practiced Roman police. Rome is quiet now.
But the demonstrations elsewhere were largely peaceful, though there were spates of arrests in New York — where demonstrators crowded into Times Square — and elsewhere.
In a notable surprise, protesters have been able to pitch camp near the City of London, London’s equivalent of Wall Street, outside the iconic St. Paul’s Cathedral, seat of the Church of England’s bishop of London.
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, standing on the steps of the cathedral on Saturday, said of the global protests that their purpose is to establish a separation of corporation and state in line with the separation between church and state.
That may be as articulate as anything that’s come out of the protests so far, which tend to the amorphous. Yet, while it’s easy to sharpshoot the utterances, it’s hard to escape a larger realization: The surprise about these protests is that they haven’t happened till now.
In geopolitics this week, Israel is readying the release of over 1000 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for hostage soldier Gilad Shalit, whose taking by Hamas spurred a brief war in 2006 which nonetheless failed to get him back. The prisoner release is controversial for several reasons, with some Israelis fearing more kidnappings for this purpose and others wondering how much of a security threat the prisoners were.
Obama Administration representatives continue to strive to gain international support for their report of a bizarre Iranian conspiracy to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to US masterminded by an alcoholic used car salesman in Texas. It’s tough going.
Delegations have been dispatched to Moscow and a few other capitals to press the case against Iran. But it doesn’t seem to be going very well. How could it not? I mean, who wouldn’t buy a conspiracy centering on a Texas used car salesman-as-mastermind whose plan was to reach out to a DEA informant masquerading as Mexican drug cartel player as the contractor on the hit? (Whose reported nickname, incidentally, was “Jack,” as in Jack Daniels whiskey.)
Kidding aside, while the plot is taken largely at face value in the US media, it’s not really flying at all in most of the international news media I see. This could turn into an embarrassment.
In Iraq, where Iran has gained great sway in the wake of the ouster of Saddam Hussein through very clever moves, the parliament continues to refuse to grant US troops immunity from prosecution so virtually all American forces are slated for withdrawal by the end of the year.
The status of forces agreement, required for US troops to legally remain in Iraq, is nearly up, and the Pentagon is loathe to expose Americans to trials in Iraqi courts.
Senator John McCain complained, on one of the Sunday chat shows, that his victorious rival Obama should leave 13,000 troops in Iraq, or else allow Iran to gain influence there.
But that ship, in a phrase that McCain have heard, has sailed.
Here’s what Obama’s week looks like.
On Monday, Obama travels to Asheville, North Carolina to begin his three-day American Jobs Act bus tour. On the first day, Obama will deliver remarks at the Asheville Regional Airport and at West Wilkes High School in Millers Creek, North Carolina. He will overnight in the Greensboro area.
On Tuesday, will be in North Carolina and Virginia for the second day of his American Jobs Act bus tour, making stops in Jamestown, North Carolina, Emporia, Virginia, with his overnight in Hampton, Virginia.
On Wednesday, Obama will be in Virginia for the third day of his American Jobs Act bus tour. On the third day of the tour, Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama will hold an event at Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, Virginia where they will discuss the importance of hiring American veterans. Obama will visit other Virginia stops before returning to the White House.
On Thursday, Obama will welcome to the White House the 13 recipients of the 2011 Presidential Citizens Medal, the nation’s second-highest civilian honor. Later, he will host Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg of Norway for a meeting in the Oval Office. The will focus on Norway’s contribution to the NATO mission in Libya and on Afghanistan, Middle East peace, the Arctic, global health, climate change, the famine in Somalia and support for the new democracies in North Africa.
On Friday, Obama will attend meetings at the White House. As usual, the Obama team builds in flexibility at the back of the week to deal with emerging events.
In California politics, various pols are discussing the economy in conferences and hearings. Do we need to open trade offices?
I don’t know. Didn’t we close the ones we had because they didn’t work very well? Does anyone else remember this?
The state legislature failed to enact any meaningful economic legislation this year, after managing, somehow, to largely ignore the issue most of the year. I doubt that Governor Jerry Brown is looking there for guidance.
He’s undoubtedly monitoring the status of conservative efforts to block recently enacted legislation through qualifying referenda. A bid to stop California’s landmark law on including gay and lesbian contributions in school curricula failed last week, with proponent falling far short in signature gathering.
Similar efforts to block the new Citizens Redistricting Commission’s new state Senate districts and to block the move of initiatives to the November general election ballot appear to be in trouble.
While Brown watches these developments, and works on his own economic and initiative plans for next year, predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger starts filming this week in New Mexico on The Last Stand, his second movie since his governorship and the first major personal vehicle for him since Terminator 3. (He shot several days last week in Bulgaria on The Expendables 2.)
The Last Stand, which will be in principal photography for the next two months, will also film in Nevada. Schwarzenegger plays a down-at-the-heels small town border sheriff suddenly confronted by a challenge that few think he’s up to. I’ll have more on this.
President Barack Obama delivered remarks Sunday at the dedication ceremony for the new Martin Luther King Memorial on the National Mall in Washington.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and North Carolina.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings early this morning in the Oval Office.
He then departed the White House, flying on Air Force One to Asheville, North Carolina.
Obama delivered remarks at Asheville Regional Airport, then got on the bus for the start of a three-day bus tour of North Carolina and Virginia.
Obama has quite a few stops on these bus tours that are not on his schedule in advance. This is in large part due to security, in order to cut down on the number of frequently ramshackle sites that the Secret Service must investigate and secure prior to his arrival.
At 2 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at West Wilkes High School in Millers Creek, North Carolina.
The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes.
You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him on Wednesday.
There was a private memorial service for Steve Jobs at Stanford on Sunday, which Governor Jerry Brown proclaimed Steve Jobs Day in California. Attendees included former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President and current Apple board member Al Gore, and former California First Lady Maria Shriver. There will be another memorial service on Wednesday at Apple headquarters in Cupertino.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
** PAN AMERICAN GAMES LIVE. The Pan American Games, bringing together athletes from 41 nations across North, Central, and South America and the Caribbean contesting in 36 sports, have their opening ceremony tonight in Guadalajara, Mexico. The Pan Ams run until October 30th.
You can watch the action on ESPN Deportes.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $86 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $52 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $28 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
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 rather amorphous Occupy Wall Street movement, driven by Internet organizing and social media, went global on Saturday with demonstrations against corporate power and the global financial system in nearly a thousand cities around the world.
** OBAMA TODAY – SUNDAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He then took part in the dedication of the new Martin Luther King Memorial on the National Mall.
At 12 noon Pacific, Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama host a reception in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the King Family in the Blue Room of the White House.
On Monday, Obama embarks on a three-day bus tour during the week of North Carolina and Virginia, two red states turned blue in 2008 that he means to hold in 2012. He’ll continue his more populist tack, as he and many Democrats express sympathy for the Occupy Wall Street protests and Wall Streeters, offended by Obama’s limited reforms, shift support to Republican Mitt Romney, a former leveraged buyout artist.
Meanwhile, protests against corporate power and the global financial system, inspired by the Occupy Wall Street protests which began so inauspiciously in New York four weeks ago this weekend, took place Saturday in nearly a thousand cities in some 80 nations across the planet.
The biggest demonstration, drawing some 200,000 people, took place in Rome, already a hotbed of discontent against billionaire media mogul-turned-Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, constantly enmeshed in one scandal or another even as he promotes austerity budgets. In that protest, a small group of disciplined black-clad anarchists broke bank windows, trashed store fronts, and got into clashes with the practiced Roman police.
Rome is quiet today.
But the demonstrations elsewhere were largely peaceful, though there were spates of arrests in New York — where demonstrators crowded into Times Square — and elsewhere.
In a notable surprise, protesters have been able to pitch camp near the City of London, London’s equivalent of Wall Street, outside the iconic St. Paul’s Cathedral, seat of the Church of England’s bishop of London.
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, standing on the steps of the cathedral yesterday, said of the global protests that their purpose is to establish a separation of corporation and state in line with the separation between church and state.
Meanwhile, Obama Administration representatives continued to strive to gain international support for their report of a bizarre Iranian conspiracy to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to US masterminded by an alcoholic used car salesman in Texas. It’s tough going.
In Iraq, where Iran has gained great sway in the wake of the ouster of Saddam Hussein through very clever moves, the parliament continues to refuse to grant US troops immunity from prosecution so virtually all American forces are slated for withdrawal by the end of the year.
The status of forces agreement, required for US troops to legally remain in Iraq, is nearly up, and the Pentagon is loathe to expose Americans to trials in Iraqi courts.
Senator John McCain complained, on one of the Sunday chat shows, that his victorious rival Obama should leave 13,000 troops in Iraq, or else allow Iran to gain influence there.
But that ship, in a phrase that McCain have heard, has sailed.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES – SUNDAY. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
Brown and First Lady/Special Counsel Anne Gust Brown will attend a special memorial service in honor of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs this evening at Stanford University.
Brown declared Sunday, October 16th to be Steve Jobs Day in California.
On October 19th, there will be a larger, though still private, memorial service for Jobs at Apple headquarters in Cupertino.
He wrote this tribute to his old friend in the form of his proclamation:
In his life and work, Steve Jobs embodied the California dream. To call him influential would be an understatement. His innovations transformed an industry, and the products he conceived and shepherded to market have changed the way the entire world communicates. Most importantly, his vision helped put powerful technologies, once the exclusive domain of big business and government, in the hands of ordinary consumers. We have only just begun to see the outpouring of creativity and invention that this democratization of technology has made possible.
It is fitting that we mark this day to honor his life and achievements as a uniquely Californian visionary. He epitomized the spirit of a state that an eager world watches to see what will come next.
NOW THEREFORE I, EDMUND G. BROWN JR., Governor of the State of California, do hereby proclaim October 16, 2011, as “Steve Jobs Day.”
At 8:05 AM Pacific Sunday morning, President Barack Obama delivers remarks at the dedication of the Martin Luther King Memorial on the National Mall in Washington. The event is netcast live here on New West Notes.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
In his weekend video/radio address, recorded Friday at a General Motors plant in Detroit, President Barack Obama highlights the trade agreements passed a few days ago, touts his administration’s saving of the U.S. auto industry, and pushes his American Jobs Act proposal. Obama embarks on a three-day jobs bus tour on Monday.
** OBAMA TODAY – SATURDAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He has no scheduled public events today.
Obama takes part in the dedication of the new Martin Luther King Memorial Sunday on the National Mall.
Obama’s Sunday MLK remarks are scheduled for 8:05 AM Pacific. The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes.
Folllowing Sunday’s celebration of the new Martin Luther King Memorial, Obama embarks on a three-day bus tour during the week of North Carolina and Virginia, two red states turned blue in 2008 that he means to hold in 2012.
The rather amorphous Occupy Wall Street movement, having forced New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to back down early Friday from his intention to clear the lower Manhattan park where the core protest group is encamped, is pushing a “global day of action today against Wall Street greed.”
Reports are that there are demonstrations in over 900 cities in 80 nations around the world.
The largest so far has been in Rome, where 200,000 people turned out to protest against the global financial culture and against Italy’s new austerity budget.
Rickety Italy, which seeks to stave off a financial meltdown that could help crash the Eurozone, seemed to shore up its stability up a bit yesterday when Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi narrowly staved off a vote of no confidence. But Berlusconi, beset by all kinds of sexual and financial scandals, is an incredible lightning rod, as we see again today.
Berlusconi, a billionaire media magnate, is the face of the global financial culture in Italy, as well as the country’s very unpopular prime minister.
The protest degenerated into flashes of rioting as small groups of disciplined black-clad anarchists trashed store fronts and sought conflict with Rome’s experienced police, who seemed eager for the action.
The Occupy Wall Street protest has spread worldwide. The biggest demonstration so far was Saturday in Rome, where a small group of anarchist protesters broke away from the crowd of 200,000 to break windows and fight police.
Meanwhile, the Obama Administration continues to press its case for more sanctions against Iran for an assassination plot against the Saudi ambassador to the US. Delegations have been dispatched to Moscow and a few other capitals to press the case against Iran.
But it doesn’t seem to be going very well. How could it not? I mean, who wouldn’t buy a conspiracy centering on a Texas used car salesman-as-mastermind whose plan was to reach out to a DEA informant masquerading as Mexican drug cartel player as the contractor on the hit? (Whose reported nickname, incidentally, was “Jack,” as in Jack Daniels whiskey.)
Kidding aside, while the plot is taken largely at face value in the US media, it’s not really flying at all in most of the international news media I see.
This could turn into an embarrassment.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him next week.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES – SATURDAY. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
Brown is declaring Sunday, October 16th to be Steve Jobs Day in California.
He made the announcement about his old friend via a tweet.
There will be a private memorial service for Jobs on Sunday at Stanford University.
On October 19th, there will be a larger, though still private, memorial service for Jobs at Apple headquarters in Cupertino.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
The Pan American Games opened Friday night in Guadalajara, Mexico.
** PAN AMERICAN GAMES LIVE. The Pan American Games, bringing together athletes from 41 nations across North, Central, and South America and the Caribbean contesting in 36 sports, have their opening ceremony tonight in Guadalajara, Mexico. The Pan Ams run until October 30th.
You can watch the action on ESPN Deportes.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 $86.80 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Energy markets are closed on the weekend.
This is up about $53 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $27 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
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 and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak ventured to Michigan today to talk up the new free trade agreement at a General Motors facility.
** QUICK HITS. New Republican presidential frontrunner Herman Cain today joined dark horse moderate candidate Jon Huntsman in boycotting the Nevada presidential caucuses unless the Silver State accedes to New Hampshire demands to move its contest back from January 14th. The rather (what’s a synonym for cranky?) New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner demands that the Granite State’s venerable primary have at least a week until a similar contest takes place after it. The fact that Nevada is a caucus state seems lost on Gardner, who also threatens to take the primary into December. … Nevada’s move was precipitated by Florida’s party rule-breaking in jumping its primary ahead. But Mitt Rommey and Rick Perry, the two strongest candidates in Nevada, haven’t joined any boycott and Romney opens his state headquarters in Las Vegas on Monday. … Rickety Italy, which seeks to stave off a financial meltdown that could help crash the Eurozone, shored its stability up a bit today when Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi narrowly staved off a vote of no confidence. … But Britain found a new measure of disarray, with Defense Minister Liam Fox resigning after a week of controversy over the shadowy role of friend and former roommate Adam Werrity, a lobbyist for business interests, in the running of the ministry.
** OCCUPY WALL STREET EXPANDS REACH, PREPS INTERNATIONAL DEMONSTRATIONS THIS WEEKEND. The rather amorphous Occupy Wall Street movement, having forced New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to back down early today from his intention to clear the lower Manhattan park where the core protest group is encamped, is pushing a “global day of action Saturday against Wall Street greed.”
I’ve been getting announcements throughout the day from labor and progressive groups in California and around the country urging participation in one or more events taking place tomorrow in 950 cities across 82 countries.
But the relatively small park near Wall Street is key to the protesters’ aims.
Bloomberg, whose companion Diana Taylor is on the board of the company that owns Zuccotti Park, Brookfield Properties, had planned to oust the protesters from the park this morning, utilizing a massive police presence to clear the park so it can be cleaned.
But once the park was cleaned, no further camping would be allowed. Demonstrations would be allowed, but not the 24/7 presence a la Tahrir Square in Cairo.
Bloomberg and Taylor, naturally, are not exactly fans of the protest, nor is his administration. The only billionaire to hold major elected office in the US traces his fortune to Wall Street, as his Bloomberg News Service was founded on providing business and financial news to the banking and investments industries through the legendary “Bloomberg boxes.”
Taylor, who is one of three directors of Brookfield Properties, as well as a managing director of the Wolfensohn & Co. investment firm, came up through Wall Street and served as state superintendent of banking under Republican Governor George Pataki.
New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly was once head of security for a big Wall Street investment bank, and many in the NYPD moonlight for the industry, which lavishly funds various police charities.
Ironically, it was overly aggressive policing and pepper spraying of the protesters just a few weeks ago that galvanized interest in the protests, which not long ago were seen as a joke.
Nevertheless, Bloomberg had prepped a big police operation to clear the park at dawn this morning. Which in turn led to thousands of protesters gathering overnight for a confrontation.
Bloomberg backed down after coming under heavy pressure from other New York politicians as well as some of his own supporters.
Now the thing is going viral.
** NEW POLL: GENERIC REPUBLICAN LEADS OBAMA. President Barack Obama leads all Republican contenders in the most credible polls I see, albeit by small margins in some cases. But he trails the figurative generic Republican candidate in the latest Gallup Poll.
His standing is this sounding has not recovered from the debt ceiling debacle of August, which resulted in a smash-up for all the players involved.
Of course, elections are not contests between hypothetical candidates. And each of the potential Republican opponents is deeply flawed, even before their contest turns into a festival of negativity.
U.S. registered voters, by 46% to 38%, continue to say they are more likely to vote for the Republican presidential candidate than for Barack Obama in the 2012 presidential election. The generic Republican led by the same eight-percentage-point margin in September, and also held a lead in July. The August update, conducted just after an agreement to raise the federal debt limit, had Obama with a slight edge. …
On the generic ballot, Republicans overwhelmingly say they will vote for the Republican candidate in 2012. Democrats favor Obama by a wide margin, but they support their party’s candidate to a lesser degree than Republicans support theirs. Independents currently favor the Republican candidate by 43% to 30%. …
Independents have generally shown greater support for the generic Republican than for Obama. One hopeful sign for Obama is that a significant proportion of independents are undecided.
>>>>>>LIVE VIDEO NETCAST
At 10:50 AM Pacific, President Barack Obama and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak appear together at a General Motors facility in Michigan. The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
President Barack Obama toasted President Lee Myung-bank at last night’s White House state dinner in honor of the Republic of Korea.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and Michigan.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
Obama and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak are on Air Force One en route Detroit, Michigan.
At 9:05 AM Pacific, Obama and President Lee arrive in Detroit.
At 10:30 AM Pacific, Obama and President Lee tour General Motors Orion Assembly at Lake Orion, Michigan.
At 10:50 AM Pacific, Obama and President Lee deliver remarks on the trade agreement with South Korea at GM Orion Assembly at Lake Orion.
The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes.
At 12:40 PM Pacific, Obama and President Lee depart Detroit on Air Force One en route Joint Base Andrews.
At 2:05 PM Pacific, Obama and President Lee arrive at Joint Base Andrews, where they board Marine One.
At 2:20 PM Pacific, Obama and President Lee land on the South Lawn of the White House.
Obama is doing something very unusual today, following last night’s state dinner, taking the president of another country in tow on what is essentially a campaign tour of the American heartland.
Obama is once again selling the notion that he saved the US auto industry, for which there is ample evidence. And this time he is doing it with the head of state of a country which is a major competitor of the US auto industry, arguing that the brand new free trade deal will be a win-win for both nations.
Obama got more good news as would-be Republican rival Mitt Rommey reported that he raised $14 million in the quarter just passed. That’s less than Rick Perry’s $17 million raised in only half the time, and less than the $18 million Romney raised in the previous quarter.
Since Romney has spent far more money, Perry actually has a little more cash on hand.
But both are swamped by Obama, who raised $70 million in the quarter just passed for his official account and for the aligned DNC account.
Of course, neither Romney nor Perry leads in most brand new polls of the Republican presidential race. Herman Cain does. I don’t know how much he’s raised.
The Texas governor, incidentally, unveils his economic plan today in Pennsylvania, in the first major policy speech of his campaign. It’s all about, you guessed it, energy. A certain type of energy.
Drill, baby, drill.
New York City officials backed down early this morning from Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan to clear Zuccotti Park, base camp for Occupy Wall Street, of protesters. The ostensible purpose was to clean the park, but in reality, the protest encampment would have been removed.
The news isn’t so good elsewhere for Obama.
The Obama Administration continues to press its case for more sanctions against Iran for an assassination plot against the Saudi ambassador to the US. But it’s unclear how well officials are doing in prompting international retaliation for a conspiracy centering on a Texas used car salesman-as-mastermind whose plan was to reach out to a DEA agent masquerading as Mexican drug cartel player as the contractor on the hit.
Manssor Arbabsiar, a naturalized US citizen, may well have one of the great espionage covers of all time but, failing that, he frankly seems like a dolt.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him next week.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
** PAN AMERICAN GAMES LIVE. The Pan American Games, bringing together athletes from 41 nations across North, Central, and South America contesting in 36 sports, have their opening ceremony tonight in Guadalajara, Mexico. The Pan Ams run until October 30th.
You can watch the action on ESPN Deportes.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $86 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $52 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $28 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
In his joint press conference with South Korea’s president, President Barack Obama declared that “individuals in the Iranian government were aware” of a plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the US.
** QUICK HITS.The end is reportedly very near for Gaddafi regime loyalists fighting in the last square mile of territory they hold in the deposed Libya dictator’s home town of Sirte. As few as 100 fighters are said to be carrying on. But Gaddafi himself remains at large. … The Obama Administration continues to press its case for more sanctions against Iran for an assassination plot against the Saudi ambassador to the US. But it’s unclear how well officials are doing in prompting international retaliation for a conspiracy centering on a Texas used car salesman-as-mastermind whose plan was to reach out to a DEA agent masquerading as Mexican drug cartel player as the contractor on the hit. Manssor Arbabsiar, a naturalized US citizen, may well have one of the great espionage covers of all time but, failing that, he frankly seems like a dolt.
** JERRY-RIGGING: CONVERSATIONAL MODE. Governor Jerry Brown was in conversational mode this afternoon with Michael Milken, the once all powerful junk bond financier-turned-convict-turned philanthropist whose Milken Institute has become a major player in the think tank world. A visionary if very flawed fellow who I profiled at great length in 1996, Milken was a huge figure in the boom of the 1980s who was brought low on insider trading yet remained a billionaire. Now his institute’s annual State of the State conference is a fixture in California public affairs.
He and Brown reportedly bantered amiably this afternoon as they shared the stage at the Beverly Hilton — once the site of the Milken-dominated Drexel Lambert’s so-called “Predators’ Balls” — with Milken likening Brown to a Thomas Edison figure in terms of creative political thinking and Brown, discussing the national crisis in obesity, revealing that he has lost 30 pounds since 2004.
Brown, as I may have mentioned once or twice before, has become an inveterate runner, and got down to the weight of 174 pounds that he was at when he first ran for governor in 1974.
On other aspects of public policy, Brown vowed to review regulations with an eye to streamlining. He also discussed reform of unsustainable public pension obligations, saying that he will unveil a proposal likely requiring a public vote.
** NEW SURVEY: CHINESE BETTER ABLE TO AFFORD BASICS THAN AMERICANS. A very sobering new Gallup Poll survey indicates that a higher proportion of Americans now struggle to pay for the basic necessities of life than is the case in China.
The standard of living in America had been thought to be higher than that in China, and may well be for the more fortunate.
Gallup surveys in China and the U.S. reveal Chinese are struggling less than Americans to put food on their tables. Six percent of Chinese in 2011 say there have been times in the past 12 months when they did not have enough money to buy food that they or their family needed, down significantly from 16% in 2008. Over the same period, the percentage of Americans saying they did not have money for food in the previous 12 months more than doubled from 9% in 2008 to 19% in 2011. …
Chinese are also struggling less to afford adequate shelter. Sixteen percent of Chinese say in 2011 there have been times in the past 12 months when they did not have enough money to provide adequate shelter or housing for themselves and their families. This marks considerable progress since 2008, when 21% of Chinese had trouble providing shelter.
Fewer Americans are struggling with housing costs than Chinese, but the number of Americans who are struggling is increasing. Eleven percent of Americans say there have been times in the past 12 months when they could not afford adequate housing, up from 5% in 2008. …
Since the financial crisis began in 2008, more Americans have struggled to buy the food and shelter they and their families need. In China, on the other hand, fewer are struggling despite a slight slowdown in the country’s economic growth.
Key behavioral metrics such as having enough food and adequate shelter are important for leaders to track, Gallup Chairman Jim Clifton writes in his new book, The Coming Jobs War, “not only because they occur before job and GDP growth … but also because without these basic requirements, the populace doesn’t have the energy to solve its everyday problems.”
>>>>>>LIVE VIDEO NETCAST
At 9:20 AM Pacific, President Barack Obama and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak hold a joint press conference at the White House. At 5:35 PM Pacific, Obama attends the state dinner for the Republic of Korea. The events will be netcast live here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
Congress has approved new free trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and First Lady Michelle Obama then welcomed South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and First Lady Kim to the White House on the South Lawn.
Obama and Biden then held a bilateral meeting with President Lee in the Oval Office.
Following that, Obama held an expanded bilateral meeting with President Lee and the official U.S. and Korean delegations in the Cabinet Room.
At 9:20 AM Pacific, Obama and President Lee hold a joint press conference in the Rose Garden.
At 4 PM Pacific, the Obamas welcome President Lee and First Lady Kim to the North Portico.
At 4:30 PM Pacific, the Obamas take official the photo with President Lee and First Lady Kim on the Grand Staircase.
At 5:34 PM Pacific, the Obamas attend the State Dinner with President Lee and First Lady Kim in the East Room. Both presidents will deliver a toast.
At 7 PM Pacific, the Obamas attend the State Dinner Reception with President Lee and First Lady Kim in the State Dining Room.
The Republic of Korea state visit is about expanded business and trade (a big new free trade deal just passed Congress yesterday), the ongoing irritant and threat of North Korea, and the rise and looming threat of China.
As if on cue, Congress yesterday overwhelmingly passed new free trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama. Advocates say the deals will create hundreds of thousands of jobs in America through expanded trade, but critics say many jobs will be lost to cheaper labor abroad.
Obama has more good news. His campaign has revealed that it raised $70 million in the last quarter, some $43 million directly for his campaign account and another $27 million for the affiliated Democratic Party account. He did this despite losing a month of canceled fundraisers due to the debt ceiling impasse.
That’s far more than the Republican fundraising leader, Texas Governor Rick Perry, who raised $17 million in half the quarter since announcing.
The US is out to “unite the world” against Iran, as Vice President Joe Biden puts it, in the wake of the Saudi ambassador assassination plot. But international reaction is notably more cautious so far.
It’s not that Iran is not a demonstrably hostile nation, it’s that many are not yet buying into the scenario.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
A 42-year old ex-Marine is accused of shooting eight people to death in a hair salon in sleepy Seal Beach on the Southern California coast. The suspect was reportedly in a custody dispute with his former wife, who worked at the salon.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him next week.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Los Angeles.
At 1 PM, Brown will join Michael Milken for a one-on-one discussion at the Milken Institute’s 13th Annual State of the State conference. Their conversation will focus on California’s challenges and the need to create jobs, get the state budget in order, and keep California’s innovative and competitive edge.
The event takes place at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills and will NOT be webcast.
Speaking of keeping California’s high tech edge …
At 4 PM, Brown will swear in retired Major General Peter Gravett as the Secretary of the California Department of Veterans Affairs at the West Los Angeles Veterans Home.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
NASA’s Mars Rover Opportunity has transmitted fascinating images from the surface of the Red Planet.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $84 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $50 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $30 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Dozens have been killed today in a series of suicide bombings of police stations in Baghdad, Iraq’s supposedly secured capital. US troops are slated to be withdrawn by the end of the year.
** QUICK HITS.Former pizza mogul Herman Cain leads the Republican presidential field in the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. It’s Cain 27%, Mitt Romney 23%, Rick Perry 16%. “Strange days have found us …” The US is out to “unite the world” against Iran, as Vice President Joe Biden puts it, in the wake of the Saudi ambassador assassination plot. International reaction is more cautious so far. It’s not that Iran is not a demonstrably hostile nation, it’s that many are not yet buying into the scenario. … Governor Jerry Brown gives his take on things California tomorrow in a one-on-one conversation with Michael Milken at the Milken Institute’s annual State of the State conference in Beverly Hills.
** CALIFORNIA 2012: THE RIGHT MOVES RIGHT. Conservative California Republicans today admitted that they have fallen far short in their bid to suspend the state’s first-in-the-nation law requiring that the contributions of gay, lesbian, and transgendered people be recognized in school curricula.
They sought to suspend the law immediately by gathering enough signatures to qualify a referendum next year, then to end the law by passing the referendum.
But they fell far short in gathering the needed signatures.
Word is that the leader of California’s state Senate minority caucus will be an even more conservative member next year.
Current Senate Minority Leader Bob Dutton, who has constantly been at crossed swords with Governor Jerry Brown this year, is termed next year.
It looks now that he will be replaced by another right-winger from Southern California’s sprawling Inland Empire, state Senator Bob Huff. Huff is currently the caucus chairman.
I was on a radio show with Huff during the the state budget fight early this year. Huff was staunchly opposed to Brown’s balanced approach of big budget cuts and tax extensions.
I made the obvious logical point that since he favored an all-cuts budget, he needed to identify what he would cut.
Huff, though, had a clever rejoinder.
“I’m not for $25 billion in cuts; I’m for $25 billion in reforms.”
Naturally, I asked him what that meant. He couldn’t say.
** NEW POLL: ALL-TIME LOW IN CONGRESSIONAL APPROVAL IS MATCHED, AGAIN. Politics in the US, as you may have gathered, is stalling out.
In a new Gallup Poll, the all-time low in job approval for Congress of 13%, first set in October 2010, then matched in August of this year, has again been tied in October.
Congressional approval has been low all year, despite the new Republican House majority being sworn in in January. And it’s been below 20% since June.
In fact, Congress is on track for its lowest annual job approval since Gallup began measuring back in 1974, the height of the Watergate scandal.
If anything, this is developing into even more of an anti-politics era.
Behind the recent rock-bottom ratings is subpar approval from all three party groups. Republicans’ and independents’ approval of Congress in 2011 has consistently been below 25%, and more often below 20%. After averaging 24% from January through July, Democrats’ approval fell sharply in August, to 15%, and has remained lower than that since.
Currently, Republicans’ and Democrats’ approval of Congress is identical, at 14%, similar to the 13% among independents. …
Older Americans are even less favorable toward Congress than the public at large. Eight percent of those 55 and older approved of Congress in October, similar to their single-digit ratings of Congress since July. Approval is not much higher among middle-aged adults, but rises to 21% among those 18 to 34. Young adults have been more supportive of Congress this year than older age groups, similar to their relatively high approval of President Barack Obama. This is consistent with previous Gallup research showing a long-term inverse relationship between congressional approval and age.
These age patterns may be even more pronounced today than historically, and could be relevant to congressional race outcomes if they hold through next year’s elections, because older Americans are typically more likely to vote.
>>>>>>LIVE VIDEO NETCAST
At 10:30 AM Pacific, White House press secretary Jay Carney delivers a briefing. The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
As protests spread, President Barack Obama’s new economic package fell short last night in the Senate, with a 51-49 vote in favor on a motion needing 60 votes to overcome the latest threatened Republican filibuster. Two Democrats voted no: Nebraska’s Ben Nelson and Montana’s Jon Tester. But anti-Wall Street protesters are unimpressed in any event.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington.
Obama has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings and met with senior advisors in the Oval Office.
At 8:35 AM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at White House Forum on American Latino Heritage at the Department of the Interior.
At 10:30 AM Pacific, White House press secretary Jay Carney delivers a briefing in the James S. Brady Briefing Room.
The event will be netcast live. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
At 11:40 AM Pacific, Obama meets with the National Association of Evangelicals Executive Committee in the Roosevelt Room.
At 1:30 PM Pacific, Obama meets with Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in the Oval Office.
As expected, the Senate did not vote to overcome the threatened Republican filibuster on his jobs bill, so it will be taken up in component parts.
His would-be Republican presidential opponents all debated last night in New Hampshire. Principal topic? The economy.Between this debate and next week’s debate in Las Vegas, we’ll learn a lot about the dynamics of a fluid, even bizarre, Republican contest.
As usual in these strange events, Mitt Romney got the best of it with no one going after him. Rick Perry played rope-a-dope, Herman Cain bore the brunt of attacks, Newt Gingrich was gaseous.
But the big story is elsewhere.
And here is the big question.
Are the Iranians that desperate? Or that daring?
Or are key elements of Iran’s power structure that out of control?
They would have to be for the bizarre assassination plot charged yesterday by the administration to be real.
Of course, if words have meaning then there is ample reason to believe that Iran’s leaders are capable of such things.
Here, incidentally, is a Guardian profile from earlier this year on the leader of the elite Quds Force, General Qassem Suleimani, who is widely believed to be the most powerful man in Iraq.
Yes, Iraq.
What would be the real purpose of such a plot? I’m still thinking this over.
US officials are promising to further isolate Iran on a global scale in the wake of yesterday’s charges that Iranian operatives plotted to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the US in a daring Washington bomb attack. But not everyone is convinced.
Meanwhile, the lower house of the parliament of Australia, one of the world’s leading emitters of greenhouse gases, has adopted a carbon tax in advance of a cap and trade market.
Israel has agreed to trade over 1000 Palestinian prisoners for Gilad Shalit, the soldier captured by Hamas in 2006 whose continued imprisonment led to a brief war.
Libya rebel forces have all but taken the last Gaddafi regime stronghold of Sirte, the deposed dictator’s home town.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him next week.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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 AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $86 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $52 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $28 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and FBI Director Robert Mueller today announced that an Iranian-American and an Iranian Republican Guard operative have been charged with organizing a complex assassination plot against the Saudi ambassador to the United States involving a Mexican drug cartel.
** QUICK HITS. What a difference an apology makes. Israel apologized for the deaths of several Egyptian security officers last month and now it has a deal with Hamas, mediated by Egypt, to at last re-gain its captured soldier Gilad Shalit, taken by Hamas in 2006. In exchange for more than 1000 Palestinian prisoners, that is. Such a deal. … A very quiet day in California politics, save for a raft of stories about the “unpredictable” Governor Jerry Brown. Jerry is a mystery for people who aren’t into mysteries.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
NOTE: I have a column coming with remembrance of and perspective on Steve Jobs, tied to the Apple memorial for him next week.
** NEW POLL: ROMNEY AND CAIN IN STATISTICAL DEAD HEAT, SLUMPING PERRY A CLOSE THIRD. A brand new Gallup Poll shows Mitt Romney and former pizza mogul Herman Cain in a dead heat at the top of the Republican presidential field, with formerly frontrunning Texas Governor Rick Perry a close third after losing half his support.
The finding comes along with word that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is venturing to New Hampshire to endorse Romney before tonight’s debate.
Christie’s move means that Romney, who was already out-raising President Barack Obama on Wall Street, is moving to consolidate Wall Street Republicans behind his candidacy. It also adds a dollop of “straight talk” to buttress Romney, a notorious flip-flopper.
Here are the numbers.
Romney 20%, Cain 18%, Perry 15%, Ron Paul 8%, Newt Gingrich 7%, Michele Bachmann 5%, Rick Santorum 3%, and Jon Huntsman 2%.
Republicans’ support for Herman Cain has surged to 18%, their support for Rick Perry has sagged to 15%, and their support for Mitt Romney remains relatively stable at 20%. However, Romney’s support is matched by the 20% of Republicans who are unsure which candidate they will back for the Republican nomination in 2012. …
Republicans’ current lack of consensus about who should face President Barack Obama next fall is in stark contrast to Republican primary contests over the past half century in which, in all but one case, the eventual nominee was the runaway leader by this point in the campaign.
For instance, in early October 1999, George W. Bush led the Republican field, with 60% of Republicans preferring him for the 2000 nomination. Bob Dole led at a comparable point in 1995 with 46%, George H.W. Bush in 1987 with 41%, Ronald Reagan in 1979 with 41% (in a trial heat that did not include former President Gerald Ford), and so on back to Richard Nixon in 1959, when he led with 67%.
The exception occurred in 2007, when the eventual Republican nominee, John McCain, was drawing just 16% support in early October, putting him in third place behind Rudy Giuliani (32%) and Fred Thompson (20%) for the 2008 nomination. …
Romney and Cain currently lead in Republicans’ preferences nationally for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination. However, their 20% and 18% support levels, respectively, are well below where most previous Republican nominees stood in October of the year prior to the election.
Today’s Republican lineup is more akin to the history of Democratic primary campaigns than Republican campaigns. And it may be instructive to note that the Democrats’ eventual nominees often ranked second or lower at this stage leading up to the election year. Of course, the media, political climate, and political system are quite different today from decades past, so the opportunity for candidates with lower support to surge into the lead as a result of early primary (or state party convention or caucus) wins may not be as great as it once was.
In the meantime, Gallup is seeing plenty of surging and plunging of candidates as a result of the media exposure they are receiving from the Republican straw polls and debates. Given that, and the still-sizable percentage of Republicans who are undecided, history suggests the race may remain fluid for some time.
>>>>>>LIVE VIDEO NETCAST
At 10:50 AM Pacific, President Barack Obama speaks on the American Jobs Act in Pittsburgh. Before that, he meets with his economic competitiveness and jobs council. The events will be netcast live here on New West Notes.
** LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.
With massive geopolitical events swirling and the 2012 presidential race unfolding, the White House is increasingly a pivot point for the day’s events. Live streaming of key presidential events is now available as a matter of course here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
NWN will continue to present other live netcasts in full streaming mode, as it did with the Ronald Reagan Centennial events from the Reagan Library, as they emerge and are technically available and as significance dictates.
The Occupy Wall Street protesters have settled in for the long haul in lower Manhattan and Washington. Bongo alert!
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington, Pennsylvania, and Florida.
Obama received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He then flew to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he toured an electrical workers union training facility and conferred with his economic competitiveness commission.
At 10:50 AM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at IBEW Local 5 Training Center in Pittsburgh.
The event will be netcast live here on New West Notes. You can mute the audio by clicking on the pause button.
At 11:40 AM Pacific, Obama departs Pittsburgh on Air Force One en route Orlando, Florida.
At 1:40 PM Pacific, Obama arrives in Orlando, Florida.
At 2:50 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at a fundraiser at the Sheraton Orlando Downtown Hotel.
At 5:30 PM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks at a fundraiser at a private residence.
At 6:45 PM Pacific, Obama departs Orlando on Air Force One en route Joint Base Andrews.
At 8:35 PM Pacific, Obama arrives at Joint Base Andrews, where he boards Marine One.
At 8:50 PM Pacific, Obama lands on the South Lawn of the White House.
His would-be Republican presidential opponents all debate tonight in New Hampshire. Principal topic? The economy.
Between this debate and the Sunday debate in Las Vegas, we’ll learn a lot about the dynamics of a fluid, even bizarre, Republican contest.
Obama is monitoring a variety of geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
On Monday, Brown visited the new headquarters of SunEdison in Belmont, site of the company’s new world headquarters. The company, currently headquartered in Maryland, made the move after actions by Brown and legislators to improve its business climate.
“SunEdison’s decision to relocate to California is proof that, working together, state government and business can find ways to cut red tape, tackle our environmental problems and create jobs,” declared Brown.
Meanwhile, triggered cuts encased in the on-time state budget loom ever closer with word yesterday from state Controller John Chiang that revenues continue to run behind that budget’s optimistic projection.
In September, revenues came in $301.6 million below projections from the recently passed state budget.
After accounting for September revenues, total year-to-date general fund revenues are now behind the budget’s estimates by $705.5 million.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
The first full trailer for The Avengers is out today. The film itself will be released on May 4, 2012. Not the ’60s British spy series, as that’s not Emma Peel in the still image, but the assemblage of Iron Man/Tony Stark, Captain America, the Hulk, Thor, Black Widow, and Nick Fury.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $85 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $51 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $29 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
At least two dozen people were killed Sunday night in Cairo, the worst violence there since the unfinished Egyptian revolution in February.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … SIGNS: JERRY BROWN WRAPS UP A DISAPPOINTING LEGISLATIVE YEAR.
MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK.
Happy Columbus Day!
A relatively short but intriguing week in presidential politics is on tap, while in California politics, Governor Jerry Brown has just finished going through hundreds of bills from this year’s disappointing legislative session, signing and vetoing a number of notable bills.
The Republican presidential candidates are preparing for debates on Tuesday in New Hampshire and on Sunday in Las Vegas. It’s an opportunity for formerly high-flying Texas Governor Rick Perry to get back on track with better preparation and rest. (Former Air Force pilot Perry had back surgery a few months ago, not long before entering the race for president.)
It’s an opportunity to see what the surging Herman Cain and a resurgent Newt Gingrich have under sharper scrutiny, and to see if others showing some signs of life, such as Rick Santorum on the far right and Jon Huntsman in New Hampshire, can lever their way into the media mix.
And it’s an opportunity to see if anyone — candidate or journo — is going to go after Mitt Romney. Or is the idea to have him float through the primaries, leaving it to Obama to unload the suitcases of flip-floppery and Wall Street ways on the former governor of Massachusetts?
Over the weekend, the Republican presidential campaign had yet another straw poll, this time at the Values Voters Conference in Washington. You know what I think of straw polls, and their worse than dubious history. But the media loves them, because it’s more to chatter about.
Ron Paul won this one, again, with the suddenly ascendant Herman Cain second. Okay then.
On the Sunday chat shows, Republicans attacked Obama and declared the anti-Wall Street protests to be bad things for America, indeed “anti-American,” as they encourage envy of the rich. One of the most intriguing questions about Occupy Wall Street is why it hasn’t happened until now.
Cain and Michele Bachmann refused to answer when asked if Mitt Romney is the member of a religious cult. Many Christians believe that the Mormon Church isn’t really a church, finding its doctrine — which includes the discovery of golden plates in upstate New York — to be vastly more fantastic than theirs.
Libyan rebel forces said on Saturday they would complete the take-over of deposed dictator Moammar Gaddafi’s home town of Sirte by Sunday.
Well, no. But they are very close. Of course, they have been very close for a few weeks now.
Meanwhile, there was escalating violence late Sunday in Cairo, where Egypt’s Coptic Christians protesting against the country’s provisional military government after repeated attacks on churches are under attack by organized gangs.
At least two dozen people were killed and the government seems both angered and perplexed about it, blaming sectarian politics.
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who surprised the US by returning to his country after months of medical treatment in Saudi Arabia, announced that he will step down within days. Opposition leaders expressed skepticism on Al Jazeera.
As Wired first reported, the computer network controlling US drones has been infected by a so-far benign virus. It reportedly does no more than record all keystrokes. That would certainly be useful information to have.
The drones, which operate over Afghanistan and other critical areas, are flown by controllers at Creech Air Force Base, which is about 35 miles outside Las Vegas, Nevada.
It is increasingly a post-geographic world.
Here’s what Obama’s week looks like.
On Monday, Obama visits wounded veterans of the Afghan and Iraq Wars at Walter Reed National Military Center in Bethesda, Maryland. On Tuesday, he will travel to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he will visit the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local No. 5 Training Center, convene a meeting of the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, and deliver remarks. Later in the day, Obama will travel to Orlando, Florida for fundraisers.
On Wednesday, Obama will deliver remarks at an American Latino Heritage Forum being hosted by the White House and the U.S. Department of the Interior. On Thursday, the Obamas will host President Lee Myung-bak and First Lady Kim Yoon-ok of the Republic of Korea for a state visit.
Details about Friday’s schedule will be released later; as usual the White House is maintaining flexibility late in the week.
This probably has a lot to do with a possible Senate vote on Obama’s American Jobs Act proposal.
This far right pastor’s introduction of Texas Governor Rick Perry, in which he lauded the Republican presidential candidate’s fealty to “Biblical values” and criticized the Mormon religion, kicked off a debate about both its propriety and the impact of the religion on Perry rival Mitt Romney.
Jerry Brown must be suffering from some eyestrain today. He’s just finished working through 600 bills that piled up on his desk at the end of this year’s state legislative session.
I’ll have a full report this week on Brown. But in the meantime …
In big ticket action, Brown signed state Assemblyman Gil Cedillo’s California Dream Act, which allows for financial assistance for top illegal immigrant students attending California universities.
And he vetoed legislation to restore affirmative action based on race and gender in admissions to the University of California and California State University systems. Brown said in his veto message that, while he agrees with affirmative action personally, it is up to the courts to decide whether the long established Proposition 209 initiative restrictions on affirmative action should be allowed to stand.
He also, in vetoing a bill by state Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg that would have added yet more metrics to school performance, called in his veto message instead for the establishment of local panels to visit schools and observe teachers in action.
In his statement about his signing of the California Dream Act, Brown noted: “Going to college is a dream that promises intellectual excitement and creative thinking. The Dream Act benefits us all by giving top students a chance to improve their lives and the lives of all of us.”
Under already existing law, illegal immigrant students pay state resident tuition rates to attend state universities if they affirm that they are applying to legalize their immigration status. The new AB 131 will make this group of students eligible to apply for Cal Grants and other forms of state aid.
The California Department of Finance estimates that 2,500 students will qualify for Cal Grants as a result of AB 131, at a cost of $14.5 million. That is only 1% of the program.
Among a a great many things, Brown also signed legislation moving statewide initiatives and referenda to the November ballot, a big win for labor, vetoed legislation unionizing baby sitters and vetoed new restrictions on megastores like Walmart (two big losses for labor), extended tax credits for Hollywood productions, allowed minors to get vaccinations for HPV and other sexually transmitted diseases without parental consent, stopped the practice of local government impounding of unlicensed drivers’ cars, and made it illegal to openly carry a handgun in public.
Brown will lay out more of his overall view of things on Thursday when he does a one-on-one conversation with Michael Milken at the Milken Institute’s annual State of the State conference at the Beverly Hilton.
Brown’s predecessor, former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, is in Europe.
Schwarzenegger, having inaugurated the Schwarzenegger Museum on Friday in his Austrian hometown of Thal, moved on to Madrid for a press conference kicking off this weekend’s first ever Arnold Classic Europe sports festival in Madrid, where he is presiding this weekend. Schwarzenegger, of course, has long hosted an annual Arnold Classic in Ohio.
Today, Schwarzennegger has joined his co-stars in The Expendables 2 in Sofia, Bulgaria.
Star and longtime Schwarzenegger rival-turned-pal Sylvester Stallone was already there filming with Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, and Jet Li.
Bruce Willis, who spent four hours filming a memorable cameo with Schwarzenegger and Stallone in last year’s action hit, is also on tap. This time Schwarzenegger’s spending not four hours but four days filming.
Schwarzenegger is reprising his role as Trent Mauser, a name which is an in-joke I’ll explain as we go forward.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and Maryland.
Obama has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
At 9:15 AM Pacific, Obama departs the South Lawn on Marine One en route Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland.
At 9:45 AM Pacific, Obama visits the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda.
Obama is visiting wounded veterans of the Afghan and Iraq War, many with such severe wounds that they would have died in earlier conflicts in which heroic medical procedures were unavailable.
At 11:20 AM Pacific, Obama returns to the White House, landing on the South Lawn.
At 12:30 PM Pacific, Obama, returning from Camp David on Marine One, lands on the South Lawn of the White House.
Obama is monitoring a variety of geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
At 11:30 AM, he joins SunEdison president Carlos Domenech to announce the move of the solar firm’s headquarters from Beltsville, Maryland to Belmont, California.
The event takes place at SunEdison’s new headquarters in the San Francisco Bay Area city of Belmont.
Brown has finished working his way through hundreds of bills which he must decide upon by the end of October 9th, also known as Sunday midnight.
Brown signed and vetoed many bills yesterday. I’ll have a full report explaining it all in an upcoming feature.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
Yes. And no. Mostly no.
Bin Laden, of course, is, on the one hand, a very definitive loser. For one thing, he is quite dead, killed in a daring Navy SEAL raid that ranks as one of the most outstanding operations in the history of American arms, and with his organizational cadre nearly shattered. For another, despite massive exertions, his dream of a caliphate embracing the Muslim world lies in tatters. Not one of the Arab governments he hated has fallen to fundamentalist Islam. The awakening sweeping the Arab world springs largely from far different roots. (With the obvious caveat that history plays out not in the space of a Tweet but over time in complex ways and the final outcome of this year’s upheaval remains unclear.) …
And yet, Osama bin Laden may be the man who crashed the world. With a great deal of help from not unpredictable actions on the part of his enemies. … From my October 7th essay.
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. … From my October 4th 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.
Scientists have unveiled a prototype self-driving car developed by Nissan Motors, British defense firm BAE, and Oxford University.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 is trading around $86 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
This is up about $52 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $28 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
Paul McCartney got married today in London. Third time’s the charm.
NOTE: NEW WEST NOTES WILL PUBLISH A COLUMBUS DAY EDITION OF THE WEEKLY MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK.
** OBAMA TODAY – SUNDAY. President Barack Obama is in Maryland and Washington.
Obama has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings at Camp David.
He has no scheduled public events.
At 12:30 PM Pacific, Obama, returning from Camp David on Marine One, lands on the South Lawn of the White House.
The Republican presidential campaign had yet another straw poll, this time at the Values Voters Conference in Washington. You know what I think of straw polls, and their worse than dubious history. But the media loves them, because it’s more to chatter about.
Ron Paul won this one, again, with the suddenly ascendant Herman Cain second.
Okay then.
Today on the Sunday chat shows, Republicans attacked Obama and declared the anti-Wall Street protests to be bad things for America as they encourage envy of the rich.
Cain and Michele Bachmann refused to answer when asked if Mitt Romney is the member of a religious cult. Many Christians believe that the Mormon Church isn’t really a church, finding its doctrine — which includes the discovery of golden plates in upstate New York — to be vastly more fantastic than theirs.
Libyan rebel forces said on Saturday they would complete the take-over of deposed dictator Moammar Gaddafi’s home town of Sirte by Sunday.
Well, no.
But they are very close.
Meanwhile, there is escalating violence late Sunday in Cairo, where Egypt’s Coptic Christians protesting against the country’s provisional military government after repeated attacks on churches are under attack by organized gangs.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES – SUNDAY. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
Brown is finishing working his way through hundreds of bills which he must decide upon by the end of October 9th, also known as Sunday midnight.
Brown signed and vetoed many bills yesterday, with most of the vetoes coming on Democratic bills on education.
He signed a host of bills on energy and the environment.
In big ticket action, Brown signed state Assemblyman Gil Cedillo’s California Dream Act, which allows for financial assistance for top illegal immigrant students attending California universities.
And he vetoed legislation to restore affirmative action based on race and gender in admissions to the University of California and California State University systems. Brown said in his veto message that, while he agrees with affirmative action personally, it is up to the courts to decide whether the long established Proposition 209 initiative restrictions on affirmative action should be allowed to stand.
He also, in vetoing a bill by state Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg that would have added yet more metrics to school performance, called in his veto message instead for the establishment of local panels to visit schools and observe teachers in action.
In his signing statement about his signing of the California Dream Act, Brown noted: “Going to college is a dream that promises intellectual excitement and creative thinking. The Dream Act benefits us all by giving top students a chance to improve their lives and the lives of all of us.”
Under already existing law, illegal immigrant students pay state resident tuition rates to attend state universities if they affirm that they are applying to legalize their immigration status. The new AB 131 will make this group of students eligible to apply for Cal Grants and other forms of state aid.
The California Department of Finance estimates that 2,500 students will qualify for Cal Grants as a result of AB 131, at a cost of $14.5 million. That is only 1% of the program.
In his weekend video/radio address, President Barack Obama discussed next week’s Senate vote on his American Jobs Act.
** OBAMA TODAY – SATURDAY. President Barack Obama is in Washington and Maryland.
Obama has received the daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He has no scheduled public events.
At 1:15 PM Pacific, Obama departs on Marine One for the president retreat at Camp David.
The Republican presidential campaigns are taking part in yet another straw poll, this time at the Values Voters Conference in Washington. You know what I think of straw polls, and their worse than dubious history.
But the media loves them, because it’s more to chatter about.
Meanwhile, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who surprised the US by returning to his country after months of medical treatment in Saudi Arabia, announced today that he will step down within days. Opposition leaders expressed skepticism on Al Jazeera.
Libyan rebel forces say they will have completed the take-over of deposed dictator Moammar Gaddafi’s home town of Sirte by Sunday. We’ll see.
And, as Wired first reported, the computer network controlling US drones has been infected by a so-far benign virus. It reportedly does no more than record all keystrokes. That would certainly be useful information to have.
The drones, which operate over Afghanistan and other critical areas, are flown by controllers at Creech Air Force Base, which is about 35 miles outside Las Vegas, Nevada.
It is increasingly a post-geographic world.
Obama is monitoring a variety of other geopolitical crises, mostly related to the Arab awakening, AfPak, and Iraq.
War Zone Times: Libya is nine hours ahead of Pacific time, Iraq is ten hours ahead of Pacific time, and Afghanistan is eleven and a half hours ahead of Pacific time.
** FROM THE JERRY FILES – SATURDAY. Governor Jerry Brown is in Northern California.
He has no scheduled public events as of this morning.
Brown is working his way through hundreds of bills which he must decide upon by the end of October 9th, also known as Sunday midnight.
Late yesterday he signed a bill authorizing online voter registration.
He also vetoed three more Democratic bills on elections.
These bills would have disallowed paying campaign workers to register voters on a per registration basis, required the top five contributors for and against an initiative to be listed in the voter pamphlet, and required disclaimers about program funding sources in initiatives.
Former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger formally opened the Schwarzenegger Museum yesterday in his home town of Thal, Austria.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILES. Former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Spain.
Schwarzenegger, having inaugurated the Schwarzenegger Museum yesterday in his Austrian hometown of Thal, moved on to Madrid for a press conference kicking off this weekend’s first ever Arnold Classic Europe sports festival in Madrid, where he is presiding this weekend. Schwarzenegger, of course, has long hosted an annual Arnold Classic in Ohio.
Meanwhile, Schwarzenegger’s co-stars in The Expendables 2 are gathering in Sofia, Bulgaria awaiting his arrival.
Okay, they’re not just waiting, they’re filming. At least some of them are, including star and longtime Schwarzenegger rival-turned-pal Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, and Jet Li.
Bruce Willis will be arriving around the same time as Schwarzenegger, who spent four hours filming a memorable cameo with him and Stallone in last year’s action hit. This time he’s spending four days filming.
Schwarzenegger is reprising his role as Trent Mauser, a name which is an in-joke I’ll explain another time.
** AFGHAN WAR AT 10, 9/11 AT 10+: DID OSAMA BIN WIN AFTER ALL?It’s 10 years since our Afghan War began, and ten-plus years since 9/11.
Most Americans, according to two new polls, don’t think we should be doing what we’re doing in Afghanistan, or that the war effort has been worth it. Every week, there are major fiascoes in Afghanistan. But Osama bin Laden has found his eternal rest far beneath the surface of the Arabian Sea, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALs. So bin Laden still lost, right?
Yes. And no. Mostly no.
Bin Laden, of course, is, on the one hand, a very definitive loser. For one thing, he is quite dead, killed in a daring Navy SEAL raid that ranks as one of the most outstanding operations in the history of American arms, and with his organizational cadre nearly shattered. For another, despite massive exertions, his dream of a caliphate embracing the Muslim world lies in tatters. Not one of the Arab governments he hated has fallen to fundamentalist Islam. The awakening sweeping the Arab world springs largely from far different roots. (With the obvious caveat that history plays out not in the space of a Tweet but over time in complex ways and the final outcome of this year’s upheaval remains unclear.)
The cadre and leadership of al Qaeda have been decimated by America’s intelligence war against it. Copycat organizations have sprung up, but seem to lack the global reach of the original.
And yet, Osama bin Laden may be the man who crashed the world. With a great deal of help from not unpredictable actions on the part of his enemies. … From my October 7th essay.
** CALIFORNIA’S WILD RIDE: OF ARNOLD, JERRY, AND VANITIES FAIR (AND OTHERWISE).It’s nine months since Jerry Brown’s inauguration as governor. After a big early flurry of activity around big state budget cuts, Brown has proceeded more slowly, his new/renewed tenure as California’s second three-term governor beset by the same forces of dysfunctionality that marked the governorship of predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. …
Aside from the hard slogging in the lengthy opening sequence about a financial analyst (who makes a point of denigrating municipal bonds as boring even as her work shows them to be very important), it’s a terrific if ramshackle read nonetheless in the November Vanity Fair from best-selling author Michael Lewis (Liar’s Poker, Moneyball) on the crisis in public finance, California’s seeming ungovernability, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and the selfish, er, lizard brains shared by all Americans. … From my October 4th 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 AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in three wars in the region, and the Arab awakening underway, 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.
** 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.
** 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 $82.98 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Energy markets are closed on the weekend.
This is up about $49 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program, reflecting a low point in global economic activity, and down $31 from the price at the time of the Osama bin Laden raid.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum. You can send me a private tip by clicking on the “Contact” button in the upper right.
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