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JULY 5,  2015

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 6:05 P.M. ET: 

IRAN TALKS DOWN TO THE WIRE – From Fox: Secretary of State John Kerry said Sunday that the U.S. and Iran are closer to reaching a final nuclear deal but expressed uncertainty about hitting their 48-hour deadline, saying negotiations “could go either way.”  Kerry made his comments during a break in one-on-one talks in Vienna with Iran Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.  The fate of millions might well depend on the soundness of this agreement, and they're negotiating it like a labor contract for a fast-food chain.  I can't imagine an outcome that can satisfy serious, mature people.

YIKES – From The Wall Street Journal:  ATHENS—Greek voters were set to resoundingly reject the terms of an international bailout on Sunday, an outcome that would set the country on a collision course with the rest of the eurozone.  With more than 87% of votes counted, preliminary results showed more than 61% of voters had cast ballots against creditors’ demands in the historic referendum—a heavier-than-expected victory for the “no” campaign against the austerity policies demanded by Greece’s lenders: the rest of the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund.  We'll have much more about this.  A major economic development that could seriously impact Europe and might even affect Obama's vacation schedule and ice-cream time-outs.

MAJOR FINE-DINING BULLETIN – From the Chicago Sun-Times: Nine-year-old Shreya Patel of Schaumburg will be among the young winners of Michelle Obama’s “healthy lunchtime challenge” who’ll get to dine with the first lady at the White House later this week.  Her garam masala quinoa burger with raita was chosen as the winning recipe entered from Illinois, winning her a spot at the awards luncheon Friday. Entries had to be healthy, affordable and tasty.  Shreya wrote in an essay accompanying her entry that she’s been cooking since she was 3 and said she loves to “mix, measure, chop and even clean up afterwards.”  I'll take it only if it comes with fries and a chocolate shake.

July 5, 2015       Permalink

DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA – AT 11:18 A.M. ET:  This weekend we celebrate the birth of America, and its democracy.  But the practice of democracy in our country is sometimes a bit odd.  Don't you think?  From Fox: 

Campaign aides for Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton on Saturday roped off reporters from the candidate as she walked and talked with potential voters during a July Fourth parade in New Hampshire, sparking frustration from the press corps and outrage from the state Republican Party.

“Hillary Clinton continues to demonstrate her obvious contempt and disdain for the Granite State’s style of grassroots campaigning,” New Hampshire Republican State Committee Chairman Jennifer Horn said in a statement. “The use of a rope line at a New Hampshire parade is a sad joke and insults the traditions of our first-in-the-nation primary.”

Reporters were reportedly allowed to get close to Clinton but were later herded away by campaign aides concerned about crowd control.

“Spectacle of Clinton as candidate -- press being pulled along with a rope,” tweeted New York Times presidential campaign correspondent Maggie Haberman.

The campaign responded to the outrage, telling CNN: “While the GOP might want to spin a good yarn on this, let’s not get tied up in knots. We wanted to accommodate the press, allow (Clinton) greet voters (sic.) And allow the press to be right there in the parade with her, as opposed to preset locations.”

However, the optics of reporters being corralled along at the event, in Gotham, N.H., did not look good and added to the criticism that Clinton, unlike other 2016 presidential candidates, is shielded from reporters and their questions and as a public figure is cloaked in secrecy.

COMMENT:  I should point out that this is not an exclusively Hillary issue.  Barack Obama has been one of the least accessible presidents in modern history.  In fact, democratic practices themselves are not particularly popular on the left, which is becoming increasingly contemptuous of the open American style.  If you actually look at the record, the Democratic Party, especially in foreign policy, but more and more in domestic affairs, is becoming a party run by elites who regard democracy at best as a nuisance, and at worst as a threat to their power. 

July 5, 2015       Permalink

DEMS GAINING ON GOP – AT 11:05 A.M. ET:  We've watched this trend recently, with some alarm.  From respected political reporter Dan Balz at WaPo: 

The Gallup organization reported its latest findings on party identification late last week, and the report contained good news for the Democrats and a flashing yellow for Republicans.

The Democrats “have regained an advantage” over the GOP in party affiliation, Gallup’s Jeffrey M. Jones wrote in an accompanying analysis. Republicans, he added, “have seemingly lost the momentum they had going into last fall’s elections.”

The current numbers don’t mean Republicans can’t win the White House in 2016. The Democrats’ advantage is not as large as at other points in the past, for example. But the findings add to a series of data points that underscore the challenges ahead for a party trying to keep pace with a rapidly changing country.

The latest numbers essentially mark a reset that returns party affiliation to its modern historical norm. Democrats long have enjoyed the advantage over Republicans in Gallup’s measures.

In those few periods when the GOP drew even or slightly ahead (after Republicans took control of Congress in 1994 or after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001), the party has been unable to hold that ground for long.

COMMENT:  I don't see this as a major crisis, but I do view it with concern.  As Balz points out, the Dems usually have an advantage in party affiliation, but that hasn't prevented the elections of Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, or the two Bushes.  Presidential elections often defy party labels, depending on the quality of the candidates.

The Republican National Committee is now in good hands.  It must focus on increasing the approval of its brand, and that starts with good policies that are sensitive to the needs of people, and good candidates to represent the party at the polls.  The job won't be easy, but the country's future may depend on it.

A Democratic presidential victory next year would impact the Supreme Court for a generation.  A Democratic president would need to replace only one of the four safe conservative votes on the Court to have a working liberal majority.  Since liberals regard the Court as a political instrument, the outcome for the United States could be grim indeed.

July 5, 2015       Permalink

SCALIA COMPARES SUPREMES TO THE BRITS OF 1776 – AT 10:48 A.M. ET:  It's July 4th weekend, and Justice Scalia's comments, prompted by recent decisions of his colleagues, are particularly appropriate.  From Breitbart: 

In his scintillating and sometimes raucous dissent from last month’s horrendous same-sex marriage decision in Obergefell vs. Hodges, Justice Antonin Scalia warned a pre-Fourth of July nation that what the Court’s majority had done to them was worse than anything the British perpetrated prior to the Revolutionary War.

In his brief history lesson, Scalia underscored the gravity of the Court’s action by comparing it to England’s treatment of the American colonies that ignited the movement for American independence. The justice said that in its hubris, the majority decision had carried out a more serious offense than the one that sparked the Boston Tea Party and later the American Revolution itself.

Indeed, wrote Scalia, “to allow the policy question of same-sex marriage to be considered and resolved by a select, patrician, highly unrepresentative panel of nine is to violate a principle even more fundamental than no taxation without representation: no social transformation without representation.”

The citizens living in the 13 original American colonies, in fact, had no direct representatives in the British parliament, and therefore could not vote on how they would be taxed or who would represent them. When the British began abusing this already precarious situation, the colonists rebelled. In 1773, the Sons of Liberty boarded ships of the East India Tea Company and proceeded to dump the entire shipment of tea into Boston Harbor, an event that escalated into the war of independence.

When the Supreme Court ceases acting like a judicial body and instead usurps the power to enact legislation, as it did in its infamous June 26 ruling, it radically oversteps its mandate and is worthy of nothing but scorn.

“The strikingly unrepresentative character of the body voting on today’s social upheaval would be irrelevant if they were functioning as judges,” Scalia continued. “But of course the Justices in today’s majority are not voting on that basis.”

“Today’s decree says that my Ruler, and the Ruler of 320 million Americans coast-to-coast, is a majority of the nine lawyers on the Supreme Court,” he said.

The problem with independence and self-rule is that they are always fragile, and if not defended, can just as easily be lost. Something to ponder on the Fourth of July.

COMMENT:  Well said.  Nothing to add. 

July 5,  2015     Permalink

JULY 4,  2015

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:58 P.M. ET: 

WHAT AMERICA IS ALL ABOUT – From CNN:   The American Ballet Theatre (ABT) announced through its website on Wednesday (July 1) the promotion of Filipina-American ballerina Stella Abrera to principal dancer of the company.  Abrera's promotion makes her the first Filipino-American principal in the company's 75-year history.  Born in Manila, Abrera first started studying dance at the age of five and in 1995, she received the Gold Medal at the Royal Academy of Dancing's Adeline Genée Awards in London.  Abrera first joined ABT as a member of its corps de ballet in 1996 and was named a soloist in 2001.  Asian Americans often get short shrift in news media, despite their record of accomplishment.  This outstanding woman deserves special mention, as American Ballet Theatre is one of the world's most prestigious ballet companies.

SHOCKING CULTURAL NEWS – From the New York Post:  Lindsay Lohan isn’t being deluged with starring roles in Hollywood blockbusters — but she still has enough pride to turn down a humiliating Burger King commercial.  The flame-haired actress was asked to wear a Spicy Chicken Fries box, smoke a chicken fry like a cigarette, and vamp a “spicy” monologue.  “We were gob-smacked. It was making fun of her issues,” an insider told me.  Lohan and her managers at Untitled Talent suggested some alternate concepts to no avail.  If the signers of the Declaration of Independence only knew...

DON'T LAUGH, THE MAN CREATED AN INDUSTRY – From The New York Times:   Lawrence R. Herkimer, who elevated cheerleading into an aspirational goal for generations of youths and a highly successful business for himself, organizing camps for would-be cheerleaders and selling the clothing and gear they would need, died on Wednesday in Dallas. He was 89.  The cause was heart failure, his grandson Michael Dewberry said.  Mr. Herkimer was often called the grandfather of modern cheerleading and Mr. Cheerleader. Not only did his enterprises achieve sales of $50 million a year, he also patented the pompoms that have become a staple of cheerleading and invented a leap known as the “Herkie jump” that is widely used by squads across the country.  Sis-boom-bah.  I've always had a soft spot in my heart for pompoms.

July 4, 2015       Permalink

PROGRESS? – AT 11:58 A.M. ET:  There are some tentative reports of progress at the Iran nuclear talks.  But there enough caveats to fill a page.  We can't really confirm this, but many news organizations are reporting it.  From CNN:   

(CNN) Experts from the countries involved in the Iran nuclear negotiations have reached a tentative agreement on language dealing with sanctions relief, a source familiar with the talks told CNN on Saturday.

This is the first noticeable sign of progress in these discussions, which have been slow-going. However, the source said there is a lot of work to do and this language still has to be presented to the foreign ministers of the countries involved in the talks, meaning this is far from complete.

Earlier, a senior administration official told the pool traveling with Secretary of State John Kerry that "Even if and when issues get resolved at an experts level, there will remain some open issues that can only be decided by ministers."

A source directly involved in the talks said the sides would declare at a deal signing that sanctions are lifted, allowing Iran to claim at home that they got immediate relief. But the sanctions would only be lifted over time as Iran meets its various obligations, allowing the West to stick to its commitment to conditional relief.

COMMENT:  Let's see what happens when this "agreement" reaches the next level.  There is a long way to go in these talks, and they won't be finished on Tuesday, which is the new deadline.  If they go to Thursday, the 9th, that triggers a provision in American law that would give Congress a full 60 days to examine any agreement that might be adopted. 

July 4, 2015       Permalink

BERNIE ROMPS – AT 11:31 A.M. ET:  Bernie Sanders had another triumph yesterday, this time in Iowa.  If I were Hillary, I'd be worried.  It's not that Bernie will get the nomination, although it's a long-distance possibility, it's that Hillary arouses so little enthusiasm.  From WaPo: 

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa — Another day on the presidential campaign trail, another crowd of eye-popping size for Bernie Sanders.

The independent senator from Vermont attracted more than 2,500 people to a convention center here on Friday night as part of his continued quest to lead a "political revolution" and win the Democratic nomination in a field that also includes Hillary Rodham Clinton.

It was by far the largest draw in Iowa, the nation’s first caucus state, by any White House hopeful this cycle — though there were plenty of Sanders fans in the crowd who came across the river from Nebraska.

Still, by any measure, it was impressive gathering and the latest to underscore the strength of the Sanders phenomenon. Earlier this week, 10,000 people showed up in Madison, Wis., to hear Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, decry the "grotesque level" of income inequality in the country and the influence of the "billionaire class" on its politics.

His message was much the same Friday, as Sanders laid out priorities that include guaranteeing family leave and sick time for workers and making health care a national right, as well as fighting climate change and providing public financing for elections.

Among the enthusiastic supporters who turned out was William Pugh, a retired journalist and teacher who lives across the river in Omaha.

"He's the only truth-speaker out there," Pugh, 62, said of Sanders. "He calls the system for what it is. It's broken, it's corrupt, and it's an oligarchy. ... If he's not electable, there's no hope for this country."

COMMENT:  I disagree, of course, with most of what Bernie is saying, but I have to agree that he's a breath of fresh air in the hopelessly deteriorating Democratic Party.  At least the man speaks his mind and has opinions.  He comes off as a kind old uncle who really does care about his country...although his prescriptions hardly have a great track record.

Hillary has yet to fight back against Bernie, but she'd better start.  He is landing body blows that may do serious damage to the queen, even if she wins the nomination.

July 4, 2015       Permalink

THE MEANING OF THE DAY – AT 10:46 A.M. ET:  In an era when the nation's founders are often called "dead white men," we are reminded of how extraordinary those men were.  The authors of the Declaration of Independence, the document we celebrate this day, pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, and they meant it.  Many suffered terribly during the war that followed the proclamation of the Declaration.   Many lost everything.  Some lost their lives. 

Scott Johnson, at Powerline, reminds us of their vast accomplishment, as described in an eloquent speech by Calvin Coolidge, our quote of the day:

About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

COMMENT:  And that is why this day is important.

July 4,  2015     Permalink