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This AP report on what it’s like to be reporting from Tripoli right now is a fascinating read. None of it is surprising to anyone who’s been following what’s going on there, but it does provide a good illustration of how Gaddafi has been able to portray what’s happening there as a civil war against an armed insurrection. In a bizarre sense, one could refer to what’s happening there as a civil war, but it’s more accurately a war of optical illusion. What Gaddafi is trying to do is to convince these journalists (and by extension, the rest of the world) that he’s still vastly popular. He’s been shelling cities, killing thousands of civilians in their homes, then busing journalists on these “magical mystery tours” to witness bizarrely staged “celebrations”. The fact that Libyans are desperately trying to figure out ways to defend themselves from this madness doesn’t really make it a civil war.

None of this is to say whether or not our intervention there is wise. That’s an issue I’ve weighed in on and I still agree with the decision to intervene. But there are good arguments against, and unlike Iraq – where it was overwhelmingly obvious intervention was a disaster – we’ll be debating the wisdom of this move for years to come.

But the Gaddafi regime, and their reaction to the uprising, has been a terrifying display of homicidal pathology that I’m not sure I know a real precedent for. Gaddafi is like a cross between Idi Amin and Willy Wonka, living in a fictional world that he desperately wants the rest of the world to see; and he can still pay enough willing subjects (many of whom don’t appear to be Libyan) to carry out his plan.

So, I kept up the Sunday “Bible Study” posts after moving to Slog, partially out of habit, and partially just to keep my fingers in the muck that is HA, but if you couldn’t tell by my late postings these past couple weeks, I’m getting a little tired of the schtick.

The original idea was this: Goldy quotes offensive/bizarre/awful Bible verse entirely out of context—you know, just like the Bible thumpers often do—and then righties get all angry at Goldy for posting Bible verse out of context… even though I did so without comment. Predictable, yeah. But surprisingly amusing, and occasionally fascinating.

But now it just feels repetitive. (That said, I’m seriously considering recycling some of the “best of” Bible verses over at Slog, mostly out of laziness.)

Anyway, if folks really want this feature to continue, I might oblige, or perhaps the current HA crew might consider taking it over. Or if you think it’s time to nail this particular joke to the cross, I don’t think I’d disagree. Either way, let me know in the comment thread.

Last week’s contest was won by wes.in.wa. It was St. Louis, where a Deputy U.S. Marshall was killed in a shootout with a man he was trying to take into custody.

Here’s this week’s contest, just a random location somewhere in the world. Good luck!

– Mexico’s organized crime groups are now starting to take over some other agricultural industries by force.

– Naked Capitalism connects the dots on how our banking crisis provided a very strong disincentive to do anything about Wachovia’s dealings with Mexico’s drug trafficking organizations.

– At the Cannabis Defense Coalition’s public meeting tomorrow night, the discussion will be about the pending medical marijuana bill.

– Also regarding medical marijuana, Dr. Oz actually did a pretty good job with the topic, despite allowing heavily-funded charlatan Andrea Barthwell on the panel (Barthwell is paid by a company that makes a medical marijuana substitute called Sativex, which would like to charge lots of money for their drug without having to worry about people just using the plant instead).

– A good start for the M’s. They’re 2-0 and yesterday Ichiro became the all-time franchise hits leader.

Young Turks: Florida Republican Governor Rick Scott to drug test all public employees and welfare recipients.

Ann Telnaes: G.O.P. outlook for the 2012 presidential race.

Lawrence O’Donnell: Eric Cantor tries to rewrite the Constitution.

Newsy: Ohio Dems vow to fight anti-worker bill.

Young Turks on The Donald.

Mark Fiore: April message.

Thom with The Good, The Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

Tina Dupey with Andy Kroll: Recall effort in Wisconsin.

Maddow: Vermont’s “Medicare for All” single payer plan.

Young Turks: AK judicial panel nominee thinks premarital sex should be outlawed.

Congressional Correspondent’s Dinner:

• Anthony Weiner on his name (and other funny topics):
• Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) does stand-up.
• Daily Show’s Larry Wilmore does the Congressional Correspondence Dinner:

Newsy: Arizona law bans abortions based on sex and race.

Tina Dupey: Sarah Palin, obviously channeling Shakespeare, makes up another word.

Maddow: Why are Republicans afraid of Rachael Maddow?

Cenk: Wacky Republicans on Obama private army & jobs flip-flop.

Rep. Gohmer’s (R-TX) odd conspiracy theory: Libya action will deplete military to allow Obama to call up that private army authorized in health care bill (via Crooks and Liars).

Newsy: Battle budget.

Bill Maher’s dumbed down citizenship test:

Cenk: Leaked tape shows FAUX News executive lied about Obama & socialism.

Ann Telnaes: South Dakota passes 72 hour waiting period law.

Ed and Pap: The alternative reality of the Koch Brothers.

Maddow: Republicans attempt to change child labor laws in Maine.

Jon: I give up (via OneGoodMove).

ONN: Damaged women stage drunken 2 am march on Washington.

Thom: Is Fukushima already worse than Chemobyl?

Libya:

• Obama’s address on Libya.
• Sarah Palin exaggerates cost of Libya intervention by 700% (via ThinkProgress).
• Sarah Palin wonders if Libya action is a war, an intervention or a “squirmish” (via Crooks and Liars).

Ed and Pap: GOP passing laws to keep liberals from voting.

Gov. Gregoire (D-WA) on radiation from Japan.

Red State Update: The end of times:

ONN: American dream declared dead as final believer gives up.

Young Turks: Gov. Walker (R-WI) wants federal money.

Pap: Koch Brothers—The more we know you, the less we like you.

FAUX News executive confesses to lying on the air about Obama (via Media Matters).

Cenk: Glenn Beck claims Obama is helping terrorists in Libya.

Thom: The Good, The Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

Young Turks: Sarah Palin is a national embarassment on FAUX News.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

WordPress ate my last post so here’s an abbreviated version before I head out: Even though House Republicans hate Obama, and might well not pass an authorization of force against Libya, he shouldn’t have taken military action there without one. The War Powers Act is more wide ranging than I’d like, but it still probably doesn’t allow this. Also, even if he could get authorization, I’m not sure he should have anyway. I do think the humanitarian mission has value, but I don’t know what the US and its allies have done to prevent a bloodbath by the rebels if they take Tripoli, and I can’t imagine a partition (especially one enforced by Western air power) working out well in the long term. That said, this conservative anti war case is embarrassingly stupid, even by Federal Way Conservative’s low, low standards.

Bush’s Unilateral Action Had More Partner’s Than Obama’s Multinational Effort

The Libya mission has the UN, and NATO, and sort of the Arab League? Well Iraq had the UK, Spain for a while, and Poland.

It’s all here, in black and white: When President Bush went to war against Iraq, he had 4 times as many nations supporting him than Obama doing his “Kinetic Military Action” in Libya.

This isn’t an apples to apples comparison. The link includes military action by every country that just supplied a few troops in Iraq at any time in the last decade. So most of them came on (and in small numbers) after the invasion. You can’t compare that to just an air offensive. Hell, the fact that Eritrea said they supported the invasion to try to gain favor with the Bush administration made them part of the Coalition of the Willing. We had to put those together because the Iraq war didn’t have the backing of NATO, the UN or other international organizations that might give it international legitimacy.

Of course, now that Obama’s little crusade against Libya is turning out far worse than Bush’s romp in Iraq, maybe even democrats will admit Bush was the greatest president ever.

Did a we lose several thousand troops and billions of dollars in Libya? Because if not, it’s not as bad.

Salon’s “Ask the Pilot” columnist Patrick Smith writes:

Which brings us to [Hong Kong Airport’s] most impressive and appealing feature: its rail connection to the city. The sleek, high-speed Airport Express train is literally only steps from the arrival and departure halls. Within a half-hour of landing you can be alighting at Kowloon or Hong Kong Island — without ever having stepped outside. Returning to the airport, you can check your bags and get your seat assignment right there at the downtown station.

Kuala Lumpur, Tokyo-Narita and Shanghai are among other spots in Asia with similar railway links. And this is where it gets depressing. Why can’t American airports have public transport like this?

Amen.

I left on Alaska Air flight 2 for Reagan National on Wednesday, escaping a rainy, 40 degree Seattle to arrive at a rainy 40 degree evening in Washington, D.C.

(Aside: Our Boeing 737 did a go-around on final approach. My initial thought was that the controller fell asleep before issuing our landing clearance. Alas another plane was taking too long to exit the runway, so the controller, very much awake, thank you, instructed the pilot to go around).

I fly to D.C. once or twice a year, and I always fly into Reagan. I suppose you could say that I love Reagan. I love being able to hop on the Metro and quickly be within a short walk of any destination I need to be at.

A metro-like rail connection should be a feature of every large American airport. In Seattle, the light rail between the Airport and downtown is a fair start. But wouldn’t it be great to have rail infrastructure as well developed in Seattle as in D.C.?

If only we could be as Socialist as D.C….

From first talk of recalling eight Republican Senators in Wisconsin, I figured a couple of signature gathering efforts might succeed. And today, one has:

La Crosse area Democrats say they will file petitions today with enough signatures to trigger a recall election of Sen. Dan Kapanke, one of eight Senate Republicans targeted over votes to curtail collective bargaining rights for public workers.

Just shows what you can do with an outraged public, plenty of time and boatloads of money:

The filing comes just before the halfway point in the 60-day window the recall committee had to gather signatures in the district.

The state Democratic Party provided infrastructure support but “not a single paid canvasser was needed to trigger the recall versus Dan Kapanke,” said party spokesman Graeme Zielinski, who credited volunteers for collecting more than 20,000 signatures in less than 30 days.

“It took on a life of its own,” said Scheller, who filed the original paperwork to launch the recall effort.

Okay…so scratch the plenty of time and boatloads of money.

This is about a public outraged over extremists going too far in stripping rights away from public employees.

Given how quickly the drive has succeeded on a low budget, it seems all eight Republican Senators better get busy on their stump speeches….

(I recommend the Santorumesque campaign theme: “How collective bargaining leads to a culture of fetal cannibalism.”)

It appears that – contrary to popular belief – Dave Reichert does things in Washington:

AARP lobbied for the new health care law and now it stands to profit, Republican lawmakers charged Wednesday as they called for the IRS to investigate whether the powerful interest group representing older Americans should be stripped of its federal tax exemption.

Three veteran GOP representatives released a report that estimates the seniors lobby could make an additional $1 billion over 10 years on health insurance plans whose sales are expected to pick up under the new law. They also questioned seven-figure compensation for some AARP executives.

“Based on the available evidence, substantial questions remain about whether AARP should maintain its tax-exempt status,” said the report, released by Reps. Wally Herger of California, Charles Boustany of Louisiana and Dave Reichert of Washington.

As Sarge in Seattle points out:

By definition, AARP makes no profit, and has no shareholders to distribute profits to. What it does have is a lot of money to promote the interests of its members, lobby Congress, and fund various charitable organizations.

AARP is big, and the CEO makes a lot of money. But it is neither an insurance company nor a for profit organization. Congressman Sander Levin of Michigan called this for what it is; a “witch hunt”.

That’s all true, but it avoids the most unseemly thing about Reichert’s attempt to “go Full ACORN” on the AARP. Insurance companies – whose practices should be far more of a concern to the American public – make profits and pay out salaries that completely dwarf what anyone at the AARP makes, yet are ignored by Reichert and his cronies. These companies also got what they wanted with the Affordable Care Act.

If Dave Reichert actually cared about how much money non-profits like the AARP are able to finagle for themselves in a system where the government will soon force citizens to buy private coverage without a public alternative, he’d be advocating for the one big structural change that could undercut all the profiteering – a public option. But he’s not concerned about those structural issues, only the non-profits who gain from them. His constituency isn’t the middle class family in Auburn who struggles to find adequate health care coverage – he could give a fuck about them. His constituency is the insurance company who doesn’t like the fact that the AARP has been able to use their trusted name to rake in lots of money in the health care market.

It’s entirely possible that the AARP will get roasted for their actions here, but with Dave Reichert and the House Republicans driving the bus until 2013, the situation for America’s families is only going to get worse.

UPDATE: Curtis Cartier at the Weekly writes:

AARP functions in two distinct ways–one, as a lobbying group, dedicated to advancing causes for seniors; two, as a kind of “branding organization” that offers to lend its name to certain products (namely insurance plans) for a cost.

It’s these dual roles that Republicans believe should disqualify the group from tax exemptions.

Sort of like how they are also calling for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to lose its tax-exempt status for supporting the Supreme Court’s decision in the Citizens United case, which stands to bring in hundreds of millions of dollars to its corporations through their ability to anonymously contribute to political campaigns, right?

Wait, I’m being told that Republicans have made no such demands.

Republicans are having a hard time getting the nerve up to challenge President Obama:

“Right now, just three Republicans (Cain, Pawlenty, and Roemer) have formed exploratory committees, and no one has yet to formally announce a presidential bid. By comparison, at this point in the 2008 cycle, at least 17 Democratic and Republican presidential candidates had already formed their exploratory committees or had officially declared they were running for president…

Bloody wafflers!

Okay, so maybe the problem isn’t spineless waffling. Perhaps they are suffering an epidemic of reality, with advisors pointing out the hurdles: huge fundraising requirements, tough odds against Obama, and a very red G.O.P. primary (as in, a bloodbath). The entire picture might be overwhelming.

Whatever the cause, the lack of action is starting to mess things up. The first Republican primary debate for the 2012 presidential election cycle was supposed to be held on May 2. It isn’t going to happen and is being moved to mid-September.

My sense is that the compressed schedule will not work in the Republican’s favor. First, it will provide an expanded platform for the political nutjobs to launch quixotic campaigns. We have a growing list of crazies hinting at a run—including Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Rand Paul…. And most recently, The Donald, has been working diligently to establish credentials as a bona fide birfer loon. The lack of a serious mainstream candidate can only embolden these people.

This cycle we will see the nutjobs soaking up a lot of press attention, later into the season, leaving a deficit of press attention for more mainstream candidates.

Another possible negative consequence is that whoever is eventually selected may not be fully vetted. Vetting takes time, and must encompass multiple dimensions—fundraising prowess, mistresses on the side, past indiscretions, pregnant unwed teenage daughters, gaffe proneness, lack of charisma, bouts of irrational decision making, lack of any coherent vision, etc.

In other words, the late start of the election season maximizes the opportunity for Republicans to end up with a flawed candidate. They did pretty well in that regard in 2008, even with a long, bruising election season. The first sign of McCain’s “gambling problem” became evident when he gave the G.O.P. establishment, including his former rivals, a great big “fuck you” and took a desperate gamble on an entirely un-vetted running-mate. The results weren’t pretty.

Man, what great material us bloggers got from it.

But more than I want good blogging material, I really do want a large field of serious, solid candidates from both sides, and plenty of time to evaluate them. I want this because, in principle, that is what is best for America.

In practice…I am not convinced that there is any Republican politician who is actually good for America.

Is it on large corporations? Is it on private jets? On cosmetic surgery? No, silly. The Republican Senate Whip and House floor leader have put out a press release demanding that the tribes pay more taxes. Now ignore tribal sovereignty and the other logical reasons why this is not the right place to start.

We’re in a terrible budget hole and fixing it can take on a logic of its own. So according to the press release, if you force tribes to pay more state taxes on cigarettes, gas and tribal property on non-trust land, the state could make $110 Million extra. And in this budget hole, that’s real money. But compare that to the $142 Million we’d get back if we closed just the loophole for software developers. Seriously, as long as private jets and out of town banks have loopholes, we shouldn’t try to balance the budget on the backs of the tribes.

Recently, my favorite sports writer, Joe Posnanski wrote a piece about the meanings of advanced baseball statistics. He started quoting this piece from Louis CK:

“And then I was looking at the little Chinese lady. There was a beauty to her — she was just a tiny little Chinese lady, I was staring at her because I was fascinated by her. I don’t know anybody like her, and I am SO not a little old Chinese lady.

“Then I look and I think, ‘What are her thoughts?’ That’s what I was burning inside with. ‘What is she thinking right now?’ I can never know. And my dumb brain is telling me she’s just thinking: ‘Ching chung cheeng, chung cheeng chaing.’ That’s how dumb I am, that I think Chinese jibberish* that I made up is in her actually Chinese mind.”

Posnanski then went on to explain that a lot of people who oppose the use of advanced statistics are arguing with the Chinese jibberish in their head.

Baseball people really don’t get at all what people like Bill James and Tom Tango and Pete Palmer and the like are doing at all. They might THINK they know. But in the end, they are just assuming that the Chinese jibberish that they make up is what is actually happening in the minds of the most brilliant sabermetric minds.

This is a long way of saying that whenever I mention car culture or Washington State imposing car culture on its city folk, that I feel like the arguments I get into are with people assuming the Chinese jibberish in their head is my argument. If this was confined to the Internet, I’d just chalk it up to trollery and use this post to write about something else (more metacommentary, probably), but I hear it in conversation elsewhere, so I thought I should clarify what I mean, and hopefully we can get away from that and onto an actual conversation.

To address the jibberish: Opposing car culture doesn’t mean that nobody will ever be allowed to drive anywhere. It doesn’t mean that we’ll turn all the roads into bike paths. It doesn’t mean that you won’t be able to drive. While I can’t speak to anyone else who uses the term, for me it certainly doesn’t mean I think you’re a bad person if you drive or if you enjoy driving. It doesn’t mean that you are a bad person for feeling unsafe on a bike, or thinking it’s important to have a car if you have children.

Car culture is the myriad ways we privilege driving over other ways to get around as a society. It’s the fact that you need a car for so many jobs, even jobs unrelated to driving. It’s the fact that our bicycle infrastructure even in Seattle is pretty inadequate, and worse further out. It’s the fact that so many parents have such a need for cars. It’s all the roads without a shoulder let alone a decent bike lane. It’s the sidewalks that neighborhoods have been promised for decades but that never quite seem to materialize. It’s the underfunded public transit. It’s the fact that when we discuss the viaduct replacement that many people are more concerned about how to move cars than how to move people. It’s our refusal to deal with the externalities of driving from pollution, to global warming gases, to the big holes in cities where we have to park, to the fact that streets aren’t safe for pedestrians in the way they were before cars.

And car culture is treating all these things as inevitable instead of the result of choices we make. When I say the legislature imposes car culture (especially, but not exclusively) on Seattle, I’m saying that consciously or not, the policies that the state pushes make those things in the above paragraph, and more, worse. So when, for example, a state legislator from Yakima tries to impose a maximum parking tax on Seattle that’s a choice for that legislator, and possibly the entire state. They’re saying we should have cheaper parking. Not we should figure out what’s reasonable given the budget deficit and the things that extra parking does to a city, but that they know best. When the legislature wants to build a replacement for the Viaduct, instead of looking at how to move people around, they’re looking at how to move cars. Until they recognize that cars are one way people and goods move around, but aren’t the only way, they’ll still push cars on us when there are better alternatives. Not just with the Viaduct replacement but with all sorts of policies.

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I’m in Hearing Room A of the John L. O’Brien Building in Olympia. I’m here for the House Ways and Means Committee hearing, where they’ll be discussing E2SSB 5073, the medical marijuana bill. As the meeting progresses, I may post updates here, or to my Twitter feed. This is an open thread.

UPDATE: Layla Bush, who was shot in the Jewish Federation shooting, just testified for the bill. She became a medical marijuana patient in order to deal with the nerve pain resulting from her injuries.

UPDATE 2: A number of testifiers – from physicians to lawyers to other health care professionals – are reiterating their objection to Section 301.2a, which could potentially endanger pain specialists who see patients diagnosed by other physicians.

Goldy has been (mostly) gone for almost two months now. And during this evening’s Drinking Liberally event, the topic of a slight HA re-branding arose. The winning slogan idea was:

The New HorsesAss…Same great flavor, 50% less “fuck.”

What do you think?

(H/T to occasional poster Goldy for contributing the “50% less ‘fuck'” bit.)

Please join us tonight for an evening of polititical discussion, debate and “squirmishes” under the influence at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. We meet at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00 pm, but feel free to join some of us earlier for dinner.

Not in Seattle? There is a good chance you live near one of the 220 other chapters of Drinking Liberally.