Edwards Wimps Out

So sayeth the N-G. See the post below as to why.

Someone Said the "I" Phrase!

Former presidential advisor Karl Rove refused to respond to a subpoena from the House Judiciary Committee and this time they're not pussyfooting around.

"A refusal to appear in violation of the subpoena could subject Mr. Rove to contempt proceedings, including statutory contempt under federal law and proceedings under the inherent contempt authority of the House of Representatives," Conyers and Sanchez wrote.

Normally, contempt proceedings against the executive branch fail, since congress chooses to let the Justice dept handle prosecutions in Federal courts under statutory contempt rules and most administrations will call off their lawyers rather than prosecute themselves. However, statutory contempt is merely congress fobbing its contempt powers off on the other two branches of government. Each house also has inherent contempt powers, which means that the body of congress so defied can try the case themselves and hold that person until the end of the session. This can be repeated at the beginning of each session, and the Supreme Court has upheld this power as valid and integral to the functioning of the Legislative Branch.

Unsurprisingly, his lawyer is playing dumb with the media (who, for the most part, is likely dumb themselves on the issue):

Luskin noted in May that his client had already received a separate subpoena from the Senate Judiciary Committee. "While the [House] committee has the authority to issue a subpoena, it is hard to see what this will accomplish, apart from a 'Groundhog Day' replay of the same issues that are already the subject of litigation," the lawyer wrote, referring to a movie in which a person lives the same day over and over again.

As Mr. Luskin knows full well (or should, if he's taking Rove's money), the reason for the House to issue its own subpoena is that it allows the inherent contempt proceedings to occur in that house. Inherent contempt trials are conducted by the presiding officer of the house so offended. Cases in the senate are presided over by the President of the Senate, a.k.a. VP Dick Cheney, who has political reasons to oppose letting anything Rove's done come to light. Inherent contempt trials in the House of Representatives are presided over by the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, who is much more likely to play ball on the issue. Knowing those to things, which venue would Democrats prefer such a trial to occur in? I'll give you two guesses, but if the first isn't the House of Representatives you have a moral obligation to strike yourself in the head with a brick.

Right now, though, while I listen to the sound of a thousand bricks thumping, all I can hope for is to see this threat of Inherent Contempt be acted upon.

The "E" Word

The truth is out: the "surge" really was an exercise in Escalation after all.

President Bush ordered nearly 30,000 additional troops to Iraq in January 2007 to pacify Baghdad and its surrounding provinces. When the last of the five Army combat brigades and two Marine battalions ordered in as part of that campaign leave Iraq by July, 140,000 troops will remain -- about 8,000 more than the 132,000 U.S. troops stationed there before the surge, Ham told reporters at the Pentagon.

"This will be very much conditions-based, but that's our projection as of today," he said.

I'm sure you can Google up loads of fodder for the round of "told-you-so", so I'll let my few readers do that if they want to. Needless to say, the liberal blog consensus was that the surge was an all-around bad idea strategically. Of course, the story neglects to mention how underprepared the surge has left our military, which was predicted, but that wouldn't be proper steno journalism.

Air America Needs to Get Stronger

WCPT-AM needs to up its transmitter strength so that it reaches central IL. As much as I like listening to WPGU-FM, I do occasionally have a hankerin' for talk radio that doesn't make me want to pull the stereo out of my dash.

Lies, Truth, and What's Really Going on North of the Border

Sara Robinson, usually of Orcinus, has a post up at the blog of the Campaign for America's Future going over some common misconceptions that get booted around the US media about Canadian healthcare. It's not easily excerptable, so go and take a gander yourself. It's part I of II, and I'll post a link to the second part as soon as I notice that it's up.

UPDATE: Part II is up.

Is the Media Really That Stupid?

I spent a good chunk of my evening tonight hanging out in a place with lots of TV screens, some tuned to the election coverage. I saw them call a number of states for Obama or Clinton - which makes absolutely no sense, since winning states doesn't matter for the Democrats. The primaries are not the general election, so there is no statewide winner-take-all system for the Democratic Party's presidential primary system. Delegates are awarded proportionally by congressional district, which makes the big deal that's being made over winning states really pointless. Just show the bloody delegate total, which is what matters, rather than insulting our intelligence and loudly declaring who has won which states.

Disclaimer: There was no sound where I was watching the TV, so maybe they were actually talking about how important the delegates are. By the amount of time the graphics dwelt on who won which state, though, I highly doubt this was the case.

The Second America

CNN.com is apparently kicking off a series of articles titled "Behind the Scenes" which, according to the site, is intended to let "CNN Correspondents share their experiences in covering news and analyze the stories behind the events." (I say apparently becuase a Google search of cnn "Behind the Scenes" reveals no other stories in this series.)

Anyhow, this inaugural story is about the side of Palestine that President Bush did not see when he visited the area. While I applaud any depiction of how the average Palestinian is getting the shaft by the current situation, I think that there is a better direction to go with this series: do a Behind the Scenes on the America that Bush never sees. Better yet, do a whole series. They can start with New Orleans, since the city still isn't rebuilt yet. Next would be a focus on the thousands of men and women going back to Iraq for a third tour, followed by a report on how the VA is still trying to skimp on giving soldiers disability benefits. Next they could focus on the stories of some young U.S. Citizens whose illegal immigrant parents were taken from them to provide Lou Dobbs and the GOP with some PR and talking points. Wrapping up the series might be a look at the Urban Poor in Washington D.C., and go places in the White House's back yard that the presidential motorcade never will.

But alas, pointing out still more proof that poor management and trickle-down economics are synergistic in their suckiness would be considered partisan as opposed to real journalism, and the media can't stand being called liberal.

What We Need for Dubya

Is something along the lines of "Hey, Hey, LBJ, How many kids did you kill today?" It needs to be short, catchy, and an earworm, so that not only would the entire crop of candidates be scared of keeping us in Iraq for fear of the backlash, but also the media would be forced to pay attention to people chanting it every time Bush went anywhere.

I've tried, but Bush, Dubya, and George are all hard to find rhymes for, let alone ones that make sense.

The Almighty Narrative

While we're waiting for the New Hampshire results to come in, here's something to chew on: Glenn Greenwald points out the Edwards surge that nobody is talking about. (Kudos to Avedon at Eschaton.)

Edwards -- who, just one week ago, was 10 points behind Obama nationally among Democrats -- is now only two points behind him. Less than a month ago, he trailed Clinton by 29 points. Now it's 13 points. He is, by far, at his high point of support nationwide. Apparently, the more exposure Democratic voters get to Edwards and his campaign positions -- and that exposure has been at its high point during his surge -- the more they like him. By contrast, Obama is more or less at the same level of support nationally, even having decreased some since his Iowa win (for most of mid-Decemeber, he was at 27-28 points).

Yet to listen to media reports, Edwards doesn't even exist. His campaign is dead. He has no chance. They hate Edwards, hate his message, and thus rendered him invisible long ago, only now to declare him dead -- after he came in second place in the first caucus of the campaign.

There are certainly horse-race counterarguments to all of this. This is only one poll. Obama is ahead in New Hampshire, where his support has increased, etc. etc.

But I'm not focusing on the accuracy of horse-race predictions here, but instead, on the fact that the traveling press corps endlessly imposes its own narrative on the election, thereby completely excluding from all coverage plainly credible candidates they dislike (such as Edwards) while breathlessly touting the prospects of the candidates of whom they are enamored. Their predictions (i.e., preferences and love affairs) so plainly drive their press coverage -- the candidates they love are lauded as likely winners while the ones they hate are ignored or depicted as collapsing -- which in turn influences the election in the direction they want, making their predictions become self-fulfilling prophecies.

It's just all a completely inappropriate role for political reporters to play, yet it composes virtually the entirety of their election coverage.

That's just an excerpt; go read the whole thing.

While I'm posting this largely because I support Edwards, everyone should be incensed that the media is so caught up in the narrative of who they want to see win that they neglect to report on what's actually going on. I'd suggest contacting various media outlets about this, but as they're so wrapped up in saying what they want to say, the facts be damned, I'm not sure they'd listen.