Permanent link to MTA daily media news

The First 100 Days of… (by Stateofdisbelief at The Confluence)
Click through for more of TOTUS’s accomplishments, including instructive videos.

[W]hat has TOTUS done in his/her’s/its first 100 days?

Started a blog
Barack Obama’s Telepromter Blog

Twittered (or is that tweating?)
TOTUStelepromt on Twitter

Obama’s 100 Days: The Mad Men Did Well (by John Pilger)
It is more than 100 days since Barack Obama was elected president of the United States. The “Obama brand” has been named “Advertising Age’s marketer of the year for 2008”, easily beating Apple computers… No one knew what the new brand actually stood for. So accomplished was the advertising (a record $75m was spent on television commercials alone) that many Americans actually believed Obama shared their opposition to Bush’s wars. In fact, he had repeatedly backed Bush’s warmongering and its congressional funding… In his first 100 days, Obama has excused torture, opposed habeas corpus and demanded more secret government. He has kept Bush’s gulag intact and at least 17,000 prisoners beyond the reach of justice…

Perhaps the biggest lie – the equivalent of smoking is good for you – is Obama’s announcement that the US is leaving Iraq, the country it has reduced to a river of blood. According to unabashed US army planners, as many as 70,000 troops will remain “for the next 15 to 20 years”. On 25 April, his secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, alluded to this. It is not surprising that the polls are showing that a growing number of Americans believe they have been suckered – especially as the nation’s economy has been entrusted to the same fraudsters who destroyed it. Lawrence Summers, Obama’s principal economic adviser, is throwing $3trn at the same banks that paid him more than $8m last year, including $135,000 for one speech. Change you can believe in.

Obama, with his toothpaste advertisement smile and righteous clichés, is a godsend. At a stroke, he has seen off serious domestic dissent to war, and he brings tears to the eyes, from Washington to Whitehall. He is the BBC’s man, and CNN’s man, and Murdoch’s man, and Wall Street’s man, and the CIA’s man. The Madmen did well.

Hillary is ’suprise winner’ of first 100 days, Rothkopf says (Foreign Policy, thanks to mablue2 at The Confluence)
FP blogger David Rothkopf has picked his surprise winners and losers of Obama’s first 100 days, and one of the winners is Secretary Clinton. After stating that National Security Advisor James L. Jones is the surprise loser in the “foreign policy division,” Rothkopf writes: “[A] good place to look if [Jones] wants an example [of] how to do it all right thus far is over in Foggy Bottom where the surprise winner of the first 100 days in this division is Hillary Clinton. She was supposed to be the uncontrollable ego, but instead she has turned out to be the team player who is using her star-power to very effectively advance the Obama agenda.”

Obama To Fox News And Tea Baggers: ‘Let’s Not Play Games’ (Think Progress)
President Obama spent part of the 100th day of his presidency today in Arnold, Missouri where he hosted a town hall meeting with local residents. During the town hall, Obama recognized criticism he’s been receiving from the far right. “I know you have been hearing all these arguments about, ‘Oh, Obama’s just spending crazy, look at these huge trillion dollar deficits, blah, blah, blah.’” Obama then noted that the real fiscal problem facing the United States is the skyrocketing costs of Medicare and Medicaid, not the Recovery Act or bank bailouts, which he said are “one-time charges.” “If we aren’t careful, health care will consume so much of our budget that ultimately we won’t be able to do anything else,” he warned…

“That’s why I have said we’ve got to have health reform this year to drive down costs and make health care affordable for American families, businesses, and for our government,” Obama said. Referring to the tea baggers’ grievances, he later added, “We tried that formula for eight years. It did not work, and I don’t intend to go back to it.”
My comment: Please stop using the term tea bagger when referring to these people. It’s not only a silly slur against them, it’s a silly slur against gay men, as well.

Obama To GOP: You Have To Start Meeting Me Halfway (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
From the budget, passed by the Senate on Wednesday night, to a stimulus package, the current administration has put in place an economic framework that will shape domestic policy for decades to come. Those achievement, however, have come at a cost to another tenet of the Obama agenda: the dawning of a bipartisan age… Confronted by the fact that, in his words, “there is still a certain quotient of political posturing and bickering that takes place even when we’re in the middle of really big crises,” Obama offered a stricter definition of what he views as a Washington bipartisan. The GOP, in short, has to start meeting him half way.
No, they don’t, President Obama.  You continue to misunderstand the situation in Washington. The Republicans are the OPPOSITION party. They believe in OPPOSING the majority. It’s what we netizens wanted from the Democrats when YOU were in the minority. An opposition party doesn’t meet you halfway, it tries to make you stumble. And fall. And hurt yourself. That’s the JOB of an opposition party. I understand that your political experience was almost solely confined to the state of Illinois, where both parties work together to fleece the taxpayers.  It’s not quite that cozy in Washington, and the sooner you figure that out, the better.

Toobin: “On this whole issue of bipartisanship, can I just ask, who cares?” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

I want to personally thank our famously free press… (by lambert at Corrente)
… for asking not one single question about the financial crisis during Obama’s presser [Wednesday night]. Every American must do their part in these troubled times, and not asking questions, especially about the extremely large sums of money being collected by banksters, is very important!

Priorities (by Jamison Foser at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
CBS News gets a shot at asking the President of the United States a question — one question — with the nation watching, and Chip Reid uses it to ask what Arlen Specter’s party change says about the state of the Republican Party. It’s in a shambles.  Who cares?  That’s really the most important thing you could think of to ask the President?

We waited a month for that? (by Jamison Foser at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
On March 24, President Obama held a press conference without calling on the New York Times, causing some chatter among Establishment media. [Wednesday night], the Times got its chance to ask the President a question — and Jeff Zeleny used it to ask “What has surprised you the most about this office, enchanted you the most about serving in this office, humbled you the most, and troubled you the most?”

Obama Hits Back Against Bybee’s Defense: ‘Legal Rationales’ For Torture Memos Were ‘A Mistake’ (Think Progress)
In tonight’s press conference, ABC’s Jake Tapper asked President Obama if he believes “that the previous administration sanctioned torture,” in light of Obama’s recent release of Bush-era torture memos. Obama refrained from saying the Bush administration committed criminal acts, but he said, “I do believe that it [waterboarding] is torture.” The President added that the legal guidance that Bush lawyers provided were a “mistake”.
Click through to watch the video.

In presser, Obama lowers the baseline on health care “reform” yet again (by lambert at Corrente)
Is Obama interested in health care? Is he even paying attention? “[OBAMA] You can expect us to work on health-care reform that will bring down costs while maintaining quality” You know, I was under the impression that maintaining quality wouldn’t really be enough.

Press Conference Transcript (by Susie at Suburban Guerrilla)
Here. I had it on in the background but I wasn’t really paying attention. I did catch the part where he made it clear that women’s reproductive rights aren’t a current priority but placating the anti-choice movement is (believe it or not, Mr. President, an unwanted pregnancy is a pretty big economic crisis for most women): “…Now, the Freedom of Choice Act is not my highest legislative priority. I believe that women should have the right to choose, but I think that the most important thing we can do to tamp down some of the — the anger surrounding this issue is to focus on those areas that we can agree on. And that’s — that’s where I’m going to focus.”

Why should he be seeking “consensus” on women’s rights? Do we now allow people’s opinions to determine whether we have rights? Hmm.

Bennett’s response to CNN internet respondents giving Obama an “A” on the economy: “What are they drinking out there in America?” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Cunningham on Obama: “What we have here is this little boy who grew up in Jakarta, Indonesia, at the age of 6 to 10, rejected by his own father, rejected by his own mother, rejected by his stepfather, raised by his grandparents” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Discussing Obama’s tea party comments, Miller says, “I think he looks out at that Norman Rockwell hoi polloi demo, and those are the only people he might want to waterboard” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

World health officials urge governments to prepare for pandemic (McClatchy)
The global threat from the swine flu outbreak reached its highest level yet on Wednesday as the World Health Organization urged government, business and health officials to start planning in earnest for a pandemic, which now appears unavoidable.

Terrorist Plot Uncovered! (by Tengrain at Mock Paper Scissors)

Flu panic sweeps Texas; Fort Worth orders schools closed (McClatchy)
The Fort Worth school district shut down all 144 of its campuses until at least May 8 shortly before the first Tarrant County case of swine flu was confirmed at one of its campuses late Wednesday.

School flu closings put working parents in a bind (McClatchy)
President Barack Obama, at the behest of public-health officials, is recommending that schools with confirmed or suspected cases of swine flu “strongly consider temporarily closing so we can be as safe as possible.”

Teasing a “swine flu update,” Kudlow asks “Does that mean I’m going to have to call this the Mexican flu?” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Combating Epidemic Ignorance (by Joe Conason, New York Observer, posted at Truthdig)
At the first news of the flu outbreak, all of the usual loudmouths on Fox News Channel and the Internet immediately started to spread panic and blame—including rumors that this illness could represent a bioterror attack launched from across the border… As these commentators ought to know, the vector of swine flu into the United States had nothing to do with immigrants from any country, who so far have shown no sign of illness, and everything to do with ordinary travel and commerce. A group of high school students from New York City went to Cancún on spring vacation and on their return carried home the virus—which has traveled as far as Spain, Scotland, Israel and New Zealand via similar pathways.

As the worldwide coordinator for public health officials in every country when a pandemic looms, [WHO] plays an essential role—analogous to the Centers for Disease Control in the United States—that simply would not be performed otherwise. Without the WHO, this planet would be far sicker, poorer and more dangerous. The same cannot be said of the demagogues who inhabit so much of the airwaves and cyberspace. On a planet where human survival will demand cooperation, tolerance, honesty and generosity, their persistent idiocy is not just embarrassing but potentially lethal.

Swine flu fashion hits the streets of Mexico (Metro, U.K.)
Despite the continued spread of swine flu, Mexicans are showing no let-up in their attempt to have the most pimped-up masks around. The first signs of a concerted effort to make face mask fashion appeared [Tuesday], when young Mexicans began drawing smiley faces on their cover-ups. And now there seems to be a new move into a range of altogether more creepy masks – complete with sharp teeth and a Terminator-inspired look.
Click through for more photographs.

CBS’s Knoller watching too much 24? ”[I]f part of the United States were under imminent threat, could you envision yourself ever authorizing the use of those enhanced interrogation techniques?” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Disclosure of ‘Secrets’ in the ’70s Didn’t Destroy the Nation (by Amy Goodman at Truthdig)
Back in the Watergate era, the Senate’s Church Committee exposed government abuses. Of course some people tried to block its work. You may have heard of a couple of them—Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.

Look to the Law—Not to Whether Torture ‘Works’ (by William Pfaff at Truthdig)
The calls for an independent commission to investigate torture usually argue that a congressional investigation, or a Justice Department criminal investigation, would become so politicized as to be hopelessly compromised. I am not sure this is true.

Sadly, we have to depend on the investigations of strangers to bring our elite criminals to justice:
Spanish judge opens Guantanamo investigation (AP)
A Spanish judge opened a probe into the Bush administration over alleged torture of terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, pressing ahead Wednesday with a drive that Spain’s own attorney general has said should be waged in the United States, if at all. Judge Baltasar Garzon, Spain’s most prominent investigative magistrate, said he is acting under this country’s observance of the principle of universal justice, which allows crimes allegedly committed in other countries to be prosecuted in Spain. He said documents declassified by the new U.S. government suggest the practice was systematic and ordered at high levels of the US government.

Sands: Bybee should resign to maintain international credibility of U.S. federal courts. (Think Progress)
The Washington Post reported over the weekend that anonymous friends of Judge Jay Bybee said that he had been apologetic for authoring Bush-era memos that legally justified torture. However, The New York Times [reported Wednesday] that Bybee contradicted the Post’s report. “I believed at the time, and continue to believe today, that the conclusions were legally correct,” Bybee said. NPR’s Fresh Air interviewed international lawyer Philippe Sands and asked him to respond to Bybee’s most recent defense. Sands said that the American federal courts, where Bybee currently sits, “are immensely respected institutions” internationally and that Bybee should resign to preserve their credibility.

Rice Channels Nixon: Since The President Authorized Torture, That Makes It Legal (Think Progress)
Recently, former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke with some students at Stanford University, where she is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute. When a student asked whether Rice had authorized torture, she refused to take responsibility, saying only that she “conveyed the authorization of the administration.” She added that, “by definition,” once the president authorized “enhanced interrogations,” they were automatically legal… In fact, the United States — and its president — are bound by U.S. statute and international treaties that ban the use of cruel, humiliating, degrading treatment, the infliction of suffering, and the attempt to extract coerced confessions.

Bush Flashback: “War Crimes Will Be Prosecuted…It Will Be No Defense To Say, ‘I Was Just Following Orders’” (Think Progress)
Just before launching his invasion of Iraq, President Bush went on national television to issue an ultimatum to Saddam Hussein, urging him to leave his country within 48 hours. Bush also had this message for “all Iraqi military and civilian personnel”: “War crimes will be prosecuted, war criminals will be punished and it will be no defense to say, ‘I was just following orders.’”
Click through to watch the video.

The Bad News Continues… (by Mark Thoma at Economist’s View)
First quarter GDP down 6.1%. Green shoots are not, policymakers must plan for a prolonged downturn. If things turn out better than expected, great, but given that this downturn has been deeper and longer than anyone expected, even updated forecasts have consistently been too optimistic, we cannot let down our guard.

Fed Study Puts Ideal U.S. Interest Rate at -5%.(Financial Times)
The ideal interest rate for the US economy in current conditions would be minus 5 per cent, according to internal analysis prepared for the Federal Reserve’s last policy meeting. The analysis was based on a so-called Taylor-rule approach that estimates an appropriate interest rate based on unemployment and inflation.

A central bank cannot cut interest rates below zero. However, the staff research suggests the Fed should maintain unconventional policies that provide stimulus roughly equivalent to an interest rate of minus 5 per cent. Fed staff separately estimated what size and type of unconventional operations, including asset purchases, might provide this level of stimulus. They suggested that the Fed should expand its asset purchases by even more than the $1,150bn (€885bn, £788bn) increase policymakers authorised at the last meeting, which included $300bn of Treasury purchases.

Next economic crisis looms: Commercial real estate defaults (McClatchy)
Two years after fissures in the residential housing market gave way to a national collapse of home prices and sales, experts warn the next shoe to drop is the commercial real-estate market, bringing more woes to the battered economy.

Anti-green economics (by Paul Krugman)
Clearly, opposition to doing something about climate change has fallen back to a new position: claims that attempting to limit greenhouse gas emissions would be incredibly costly. Yet the most careful studies, like the big MIT study of Congressional proposals, find only modest costs… Opponents of a policy change generally believe that market economies are wonderful things, able to adapt to just about anything — anything, that is, except a government policy that puts a price on greenhouse gas emissions. Limits on the world supply of oil, land, water — no problem. Limits on the amount of CO2 we can emit — total disaster. Funny how that is.

China’s Stimulus Spurs U.S. Business (Wall Street Journal)
As the Government’s $585 Billion Program Pours Money Into Projects, U.S. Suppliers Find Opportunities
Every country in the world should be doing this. We’ll all benefit.

Chrysler files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy (AP)
Chrysler filed for bankruptcy protection Thursday and announced it will temporarily halt most of its vehicle production while it completes a deal with Italian carmaker Fiat designed to revive its tattered fortunes. The Obama administration said it had long hoped to stave off bankruptcy for the nation’s third-largest automaker, but it became clear that a holdout group of creditors wouldn’t budge on proposals to reduce Chrysler’s $6.9 billion in secured debt. Clearing those debts was a needed step for Chrysler to restructure by a government-imposed Thursday deadline.

Lewis ousted as BofA chairman, remains as CEO (McClatchy)
Bank of America Corp, today said that Walter Massey was named chairman after a proposal to split the chairman and chief executive positions was narrowly approved with 50.3 percent of the vote at the company’s annual shareholder meeting.

Massey becomes Bank of America chairman
Bank of America’s new chairman is a distinguished physicist, respected academic administrator and longtime bank director, who has dined with the Queen of England and danced at the White House.

Why Congress Won’t Investigate Wall Street (by Thomas Frank)
The famous Pecora Commission of 1933 and 1934 was one of the most successful congressional investigations of all time, an instance when oversight worked exactly as it should. The subject was the massively corrupt investment practices of the 1920s. In the course of its investigation, the Senate Banking Committee, which brought on as its counsel a former New York assistant district attorney named Ferdinand Pecora, heard testimony from the lords of finance that cemented public suspicion of Wall Street. Along the way, the investigations formed the rationale for the Glass-Steagall Act, the Securities Exchange Act, and other financial regulations of the Roosevelt era.

A new round of regulation is clearly in order these days, and a Pecora-style investigation seems like a good way to jolt the Obama administration into action. After all, the financial revelations of today bear a striking resemblance to those of 1933… It’s probably not going to happen, though, in the comprehensive way that it should. The reason is that understanding our problems, this time around, would require our political leaders to examine themselves… [I]t’s not only Republicans who would feel the sting of embarrassment.

The Clinton Bubble (by Robert Scheer at Truthdig)
Now I know that the conventional wisdom among Democrats is that the Clintonistas were wildly successful in running the economy when they had their turn, and that [Robert] Rubin and his protégés Lawrence Summers and [Timothy] Geithner deserve a lot of the credit. But that view is dead wrong. The seeds of the current economic chaos were planted in those years, in which Wall Street lobbyists were given everything they wanted in the way of radical deregulation, and hence was born the madcap world of credit swaps and other unregulated derivatives. The result was a Clinton bubble, which saw the rise of a new superrich class that vastly skewed income distribution…

What is involved here is an extreme case of government-condoned “moral hazard” offering outrageous compensation to the superrich for screwing up royally. Where is the socially conscious Obama we voted for? E-mail him and ask.
That “socially conscious” Obama never existed, Mr. Scheer. You were sold some cotton candy—spun sugar—plumped up by nothing but air. Those of us who tried to warn the rest of you were called stupid, white trash racists and kicked off message boards.  We are like those who tried to warn the nation about the Iraq War and those who tried to warn about the housing bubble and the subsequent crash we’re now dealing with.  We were not allowed to speak then, and we are still not allowed to speak in many places.

Boxer Will Run for Re-Election (Political Wire)
Though all signs suggested Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) would run for re-election in 2010, some analysts thought she could make a bid for governor instead. But the California lawmaker made it official this past weekend at the state Democratic convention, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Said Boxer: “I’m formally announcing, in front of this convention, that I am running again for the United States Senate.” CQ Politics rates the race as Safe Democrat.

Specter’s first vote as a Democrat: No on Obama’s budget. (Think Progress)
In a 53-to-43 vote [Wednesday night], the Senate followed the House in passing President Obama’s budget. Not a single Republican voted in favor of the budget resolution, but a number of key Democrats including Sens. Evan Bayh (IN), Robert Byrd (WV), Ben Nelson (NE), and most notably Arlen Specter (PA) voted against it. Just yesterday, Specter reportedly said to Obama, “I’m a loyal Democrat. I support your agenda.” The budget resolution that passed … allowed for health care reform to be implemented using the budget reconciliation process, which Specter expressed his opposition to yesterday.

The Bolter: Specter Spectacle Hides Deadly New Folly in Terror War (by Chris Floyd at Empire Burlesque)
So the Democrats have yet another supporter of aggressive war, oligarchy, authoritarianism and torture in their Senate ranks. Wow, that will certainly shake up the political landscape in Washington! It looks like the promised New Jerusalem of hope and change has well and truly arrived at last…

The reaction to Specter’s turning of his blood-spattered coat (or rather, his re-turning, as he began his political life as a Democrat) has been marked by the total amnesia that is the chronic affliction of our dozy, cozy media mandarins. The idea that Specter will vote in lockstep with the Democratic leadership’s wishes, thus providing a “filibuster-proof” majority, is, of course, ludicrous, and flies in the face not only of Specter’s own extensive (and deeply conservative) legislative record, but also the record of the current Democratic Party in the Senate. They can’t even get “real” Democrats to vote their way on every issue.

Heh (by Susie at Suburban Guerrilla)
Congressman Joe Sestak threatens to run in the primary against Arlen if he doesn’t vote like a Democrat.

Gingrich: After Specter’s Departure, A New ‘Contract With America’ Sounds Like A ‘Very Good Idea’ (Think Progress)
One of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s lasting legacies was his 1994 conservative revolution where he and other Republicans made a so-called “Contract with America.” Over time, the public learned that the real “contract” conservatives were making was with K Street lobbyists who lined the pockets of the right-wing with hefty contributions, helped them maintain power, and were in turn rewarded with undue (and corrupting) influence over policy-making. Leaders of the Republican revolution — such as Tom DeLay and Dennis Hastert – left office surrounded by ethics scandals.

[Tuesday] night, Gingrich — who often tries to find “new, bold” ideas in decades-old proposals – went on Fox News and agreed with Sean Hannity that what America now needs is a new “Contract with America“.

Republicans To Launch “Rebranding” Effort (Political Wire)
CNN reports on a new effort to revive the image of the Republican Party and to counter President Obama’s characterization of Republicans as “the party of no.” “It will involve an outreach by an interesting mix of GOP officials, ranging from 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain to Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor and the younger brother of the man many Republicans blame for the party’s battered brand: former President George W. Bush.” Also involved: Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Mitt Romney.

Jim Morin

Quote of the Day (Political Wire)
“I’m not as partisan as I once was. I don’t like what politics has become.” — GOP pollster Frank Luntz, quoted by The Wrap, on trying to change careers.
That is from the man who invented the lie by proximity—he encouraged Republican leaders to put 9/11 and Saddam Hussein together in the same sentence or phrase, thereby making the gullible think Saddam had something to do with 9/11. An implied lie, with implied deniability.

Local GOP cancel speech by Utah’s Republican governor because he’s too moderate. (Think Progress)
Joanne Voorhees, the chairwoman of the Kent County Republican party in Michigan, has “abruptly canceled” an upcoming fundraiser with Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, Jr. (R). Voorhees “said that hosting the moderate Utah governor would mean abandoning the party’s conservative principles.” The cancellation comes as Republicans are pushing for a more narrow party focused on hard-right principles. In a new interview with ABC News, Huntsman sharply criticizes the national GOP leadership, giving them an “incomplete” grade on their first 100 days as an opposition party to President Obama. “Instead of just kind of grousing and complaining, it would do us all a whole lot of good if we actually started engaging directly in finding compromises and common ground and shared solutions,” said Hunstman.

Steele Losing Control of RNC Purse Strings (Political Wire)
“A battle over control of the party’s purse strings has erupted at the troubled Republican National Committee, with defenders of Chairman Michael S. Steele accusing dissident RNC members of trying to ‘embarrass and neuter’ the party’s new leader,” the Washington Times reports. Top party officials have called “for a new set of checks and balances on the chairman’s power to dole out money. The powers include new controls on awarding contracts and spending money on outside legal and other services.”

GOP Hysterical Over Hate Crimes Bill Because It Would Protect Gay People (Think Progress)
The House is scheduled to vote today on the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act. The bill, also called the Matthew Shepard Act, would “permit greater federal involvement in investigating hate crimes and expand the federal definition of such crimes to include those motivated by gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability.”… The right wing, unsurprisingly, is up in arms over extending protection to victims of anti-gay crimes. Led by Rep. Steve King (R-IA), House Republicans took to the floor last night to warn that the bill would impose “tyranny,” create a “Big Brother” government, and end religious freedom.

After weeks of grandstanding, Palin will accept stimulus funds. (Think Progress)
Following the lead of the other 2012 GOP presidential contenders, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) announced last month that she would reject nearly half of the $930 million Alaska was to receive from the stimulus package on education, health care, and labor. But after calling the stimulus “an unsustainable, debt-ridden package of funds,” Palin has now decided to accept the vast majority of the package… South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R) also recently backed down from his standoff with the White House over his desire to reject stimulus funding.

Democrats Preemptively Attack Crist (Political Wire)
While Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R) hasn’t even announced whether he’ll run for U.S. Senate next year, the DSCC isn’t taking any chances and released its first advertisement of the 2010 cycle blasting Crist’s tenure as governor.
Actually, Crist hasn’t been too bad, considering that he’s a Republican.

In New Book, James Carville Dishes And Disses On Hillary Campaign (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
In a forthcoming book, top Hillary supporter James Carville reveals that Bill Clinton was privately shocked and infuriated by the Hillary campaign’s awful financial mismanagement, and he serves up scorching criticism of the campaign, singling out polling guru Mark Penn for “suffering fatal confusion” about delegate strategy… [H]ere are a few choice tidbits:
* Just before the Iowa caucuses, Bill Clinton was privately informed by Hillary campaign chair Terry McAuliffe that the campaign only had enough money to buy TV ads for two more states…
* As early as mid-April, well before Hillary dropped out, it was already clear that many super-delegates they were pursuing were likely to go for Obama…
* Mark Penn, Carville says, was a key factor in Hillary’s defeat, because he “suffered fatal confusion on the subject of delegates.”
So Greg, did Carville mention in his book the more than 2,000 instances of irregularities in the caucuses that have never been investigated? Did he mention that the person who spent all the money was Patty Solis Doyle, sister of Chicago Alderman Solis and longtime friend of David Axelrod? Did he talk about the Rules & Bylaws Committee of the DNC breaking its own rules to hand pledged delegates to a candidate who didn’t even run in the state for which he was awarded delegates? Obama cheated his way into the nomination. He didn’t win, and Hillary didn’t lose.

Edwards Says Husband Should Not Have Run (Political Wire)
The New York Daily News got an advance copy of Resilience by Elizabeth Edwards who writes that when she learned of her husband’s affair, “I cried and screamed, I went to the bathroom and threw up.” “Despite feeling deeply deceived,” she “nonetheless publicly stood by her husband’s side, lending his candidacy the aura of a warm, loving family life. But she had actually wanted him to quit the race to protect the family.” Later events proved her right. “He should not have run,” she says.

New Hampshire Senate passes gay-marriage bill (Reuters)
New Hampshire’s Senate passed a bill on Wednesday that would legalize same-sex marriage after an amendment was added that allows clergy to decline to marry gay couples… Because the Senate and House passed separate versions, they must resolve their differences before the bill can go to the governor, who in 2007 signed a law recognizing same-sex civil unions, making New Hampshire the fourth state to do so. [Governor John] Lynch has said the word marriage should be reserved for a traditional heterosexual relationship.

Coming Soon: Social Networking With The Feds (Paid Content)
If all goes well, soon you’ll be able to meet up with the folks from the Agricultural Research Service or the Office of Personnel Management on Facebook and MySpace! Thanks to agreements that the U.S. General Services Administration reached with the two companies this week, there should soon be lots of new profiles of government agencies on the social-networking sites. The GSA says that the agreements resolve legal concerns on issues like advertising, endorsements, and liability that until now have deterred some government entities from using the sites. A Facebook spokesman says the agreement will enable federal agencies to “establish a presence on Facebook so that they may communicate more interactively with the constituencies they serve.”

Misdemeanor Courts a Waste of Time and Money, Says Defense Lawyers Group (Law.com)
Misdemeanor courts are a waste of time and money. So claims the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, which on Tuesday issued a first-of-its-kind national report on the status of misdemeanor courts across the country. The report, which involved 18 months’ worth of research at courts in seven states, concluded that state and local governments are wasting millions of tax dollars to prosecute petty offenses, such as curfew and open container violations, loitering and feeding the homeless. The report found that taxpayers are footing the bill for more than 10 million misdemeanor prosecutions per year, paying an average of $60 a day, per inmate, to incarcerate misdemeanor defendants.

Courts are also violating the constitutional rights of citizens who are being hauled into court, the report claims, and often coerced into cutting deals without legal representation… The report … recommends that states divert nonviolent misdemeanor cases that do not affect public safety to programs that are less costly to taxpayers and repay society through community service or civil fines.

Media Matters for America headlines

• Time has Beck praising Limbaugh’s “honesty” inTime 100 profile

• NBC/WSJ poll question advanced false claim about proposed labor law

• Does Dobbs think Dr. Gupta and others at CNN are “out of their cotton pickin’ minds”?

• Rove pushes “extreme” distortion of Obama health care remark

• Media still bored by Obama press conferences

• Stamp of approval: Media tout Obama polling falsehood

• Fox’s Henneberg repeats right-wing myth that hate crimes bill could gag ministers

• FNC’s Napolitano peddles paranoia about “swine flu,” Obama’s health care plan

French group urges Iran to free US journalist
More than a dozen people in Paris have launched a hunger strike in support of an American journalist who is in jail in Tehran.

French lawmakers reconsider Internet piracy bill
French legislators reconsidered a bill Wednesday that would punish people who illegally download music and films by cutting off their Internet connections.

Panel Advises Clarifying U.S. Plans on Cyberwar
A three-year study concluded that the U.S. has no clear policy about how it might respond to a cyberattack.

Obama picks Clyburn for FCC.
South Carolina Public Service commissioner and former newspaper publisher Mignon Clyburn has been picked by the President to fill one of the open Democratic seats on the FCC. She is the daughter of House Majority Whip Rep. James Clyburn — who is also the highest-ranking African-American member of Congress.
Thus does Jim Clyburn get his reward for portraying the Clintons as racists during last year’s primary.

Tony Blair’s son begins legal action against Sunday Express
Euan Blair issues writ claiming £50,000 damages after Sunday Express diary item about his personal life

Minnesota asks ISPs to block gambing sites
Minnesota officials are trying a novel tactic to block online gambling sites using a federal law that enables restrictions on phone calls used for wagering.

Microsoft Fights Antitrust Charge Over Its Browser
Microsoft is responding to Opera’s accusation that bundling Internet Explorer with Windows harms the market for browsers.

Gagging on Google (by Willem Buiter at Maverecon, Financial Times)
[T]he Microsoft Leviathan has now been joined or even replaced by Google’s Godzilla as the main threat to the freedom of the internet, and now also a growing threat to key intellectual property rights, especially copyright, and privacy… When confronted with criticism of Google’s repeated assaults on copyright and privacy, Google CEO Eric Schmidt comes up with the most astonishing infantile defence.  It amounts to: if something can be done, it will be done and indeed ought to be done… It is time for people to take a stand, as individual consumers and internet users, and collectively through laws and regulations, to tame this new Leviathan.
Click through for specifics.

So It’s Official, Then: Ashton Kutcher Got Punk’d (Sorry, Twit!) (by Simon Dumenco, Advertising Age)
I’m happy to report that overwhelmingly, readers were able to look past Kutcher’s media stunt — and the mass media’s celebration of his “triumph” — and parse what having 1 million Twitter followers really means and doesn’t mean. In fact, all the reader response helped me crystallize my understanding of everything the media — and Kutcher himself — got wrong about his “win.”… I think it’s pretty clear that Kutcher allowed himself to get punk’d. He drank his own Kool-Aid… Most Twitterers “breaking” news of consequence are, duh, just grabbing it from mainstream media websites like CNN’s.
I’m not a Twit, but I do belong to Facebook. I use it to notify people that my daily website post is done. But a lot of what I see there, which is much like Twitter posts, is a lot of people talking PAST each other.

How to Use the Web to Prevent Remaining Print Readers From Fleeing (by Steve Outing, Editor & Publisher)
As much as media companies tend to focus on how to serve younger people (generally with digital strategies), let’s not forget the older crowd. They have a transition to make, and newspaper publishers, especially, need to help them out — or kiss them goodbye. Here’s why.

Time Warner Is Moving Closer to AOL Spinoff
Such a move would untangle what many consider one of the worst mergers in American corporate history.

WSJ Editor Slams ‘Brain Dead’ Times Readers (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
[Click through to read a memo [the Wall Street Journal's managing editor Robert Thomson] sent to staff… Along with the chart [below], it’s supposed to prove the Journal caters to the sort of active, engaged readers who pick up the paper on the newstand. USA Today and the Times, meanwhile, are for the non-sentient.

New ‘USA Today’ Editor: Seek to ‘Innovate Like Hell’ 
“I think USA Today is in better shape than a lot of papers,” John Hillkirk told E&P Wednesday. “I don’t see radical new changes.” 

Will The Boston Globe Survive? (by Adam Reilly, Boston Phoenix)
There are all sorts of reasons people want the Globe to live, apparently; some are good, but some aren’t. And even the paper’s staunchest partisans already seem to be bracing for defeat. Let’s hope they’re wrong.

Globe Guild Leader Takes Heat as Talks Divide Staff
In negotiating concessions to save The Boston Globe, Daniel Totten, president of the newspaper’s biggest union, sometimes faces a tougher crowd than The New York Times Co. executives across the table: his own members.

Baltimore Sun Cuts 1/3 of Newsroom
The Baltimore Sun has cut its newsroom staff by nearly a third in a reorganization the company said would help it not just survive but succeed in one of the worst economic downturns in decades. The news company laid off 61 newsroom staffers, a spokeswoman said Wednesday.

Big Job Cuts at NAA — And No Longer Will Print ‘Presstime’ 
While its members struggle under a punishing economic downturn and a secular transition to digital, the Newspaper Association of America is cutting its staff by 50% and will cease publication of the print edition of the magazine Presstime, says John Sturm

Uploading Personal Files to Your Kindle? That’ll Be 15 Cents Per Megabyte (Mashable)
Amazon has announced a couple of Kindle-related changes… First, they’re adding support for two new document types: RTF and DOCX. Support for PDF as well as DOCX files is experimental, and Amazon is warning that “some complex PDF and DOCX files might not format correctly on your Kindle.” The other change has to do with pricing; from now on, Amazon will charge 15 cents per megabyte for wireless uploading of personal documents to your Kindle – rounded up to the nearest whole megabyte. This is effectively quite a large price increase, since up until now the fee was 10 cents per document, regardless of the size.

Taunton Reorganizes, Eliminates Publisher Positions
Taunton Press has eliminated the publisher position across its five magazines as part of a reorganization. Now, staff will be organized into three groups: content creation, marketing and sales. Each group will be led by a separate senior vice president.

Radio Giant Faces Crisis in Cash Flow
Clear Channel, the radio station operator that was taken private last year, is facing mounting debt payments as media companies face a steep drop in advertising.

Updated: More Layoffs At Clear Channel; Up To 1,000 People This Time (Paid Content)
Radio behemoth Clear Channel is laying off more employees … as it struggles with declining ad revenue and a mountain of debt taken on in a buyout by private-equity firm Bain Capital and Thomas Lee Partners. The company may let go as many as 1,000 employees, or more than 6 percent of its staff. (Earlier today, the company had said about 590 people would lose their jobs, but the CEO later said on an internal conference call that the number would be closer to 1,000.) A person familiar with the situation said most of the cuts are occurring in programming and were primarily in small and mid-sized markets.

Al Jazeera Channel Cracks the U.S. Dial
Under an agreement with MHz Networks, a Falls Church-based educational broadcaster, AJE will become available today to households throughout the Washington area, and to cable and broadcast viewers in 20 other cities in a few months.

Hasbro Pays Discovery $300 Million To Reinvent Itself As Kids Content Maker (Paid Content)
Hasbro is effectively buying itself a stake in a new-look Discovery Kids, creating a 50-50 joint venture that will deliver family and kids TV and web content from late 2010. Whilst presented as a JV, Hasbro is actually buying its 50 percent stake by paying $300 million to Discovery Communications. The new entity will continue to hold the Discovery Kids Network’s US operations, but the pair say they will rebrand the network for the venture next year. There’s no name given yet, however, and Discovery Kids will continue to operate overseas. The JV will search for a president and general manager “immediately”, and Hasbro itself is also investing in building a new creative team to produce cartoons, live-action shows, game shows, digital and mobile content.

The deal is primarily about creating new TV distribution opportunities for Hasbro brands, but is referred to in the release as a “multi-platform initiative” that sees Discovery handed some control over Hasbro’s online efforts – the joint company will hold a minority interest in Hasbro.com.

Comcast 1Q profit up 6 percent on new customers
Comcast Corp., the nation’s largest cable TV provider, said Thursday that first-quarter earnings rose by 6 percent as the company signed up throngs of new customers for its digital cable, phone and high-speed Internet services.

@ LA Games Conference: Making Money From Social Games (Paid Content)
VCs have been pumping money into social-gaming companies like OMGPOP and Zynga because the startups have figured out how to do what the social networks themselves mostly haven’t: make money from users directly, not just through advertising. Players across Facebook, MySpace and other networks have been gobbling up millions of dollars worth of virtual goods, and while actual figures are hard to come by, attendees at the LA Games Conference did shed some light on how they enticed users to pay (and play).
Click through for more information.  I, for one, am completely baffled by people who pay for virtual goods. They’re the ultimate in vaporware.

@ LA Games Conference: What’s My ROI? The Best Metrics For Virtual Campaigns (Paid Content)
It may have been easy to get marketers to invest in virtual worlds two years ago—but the economy (and the Second Life backlash) has changed that. With budgets getting scrutinized across the board, companies like Linden Lab, Sulake (parent company of Habbo) and Stardoll need to try to convince advertisers that paying to brand virtual goods, set up in-world experiences, or otherwise run campaigns in their worlds is still a worthwhile investment. How do they do it? With metrics. LA Games Conference panelists offered some examples:

Recession is latest focus of games for change
With the recession impacting college students, MTV’s college network mtvU is turning to one medium it know will get attention to help teach students to cope with tough financial times — a video game.

As Part Of Entertainment Push, MSN Will Launch User-Created Fansites (Paid Content)
Looking to boost user engagement (and fill space cheaply), MSN said Wednesday it would use Wetpaint’s wiki-platform to let visitors edit and contribute photos, videos and text to new fansites hosted on its MSN Entertainment portal. MSN will launch more than two dozen such sites on its entertainment portal this year. For MSN, the arrangement provides a cheap way to bulk up the portal’s entertainment offerings. In January, MSN launched its Wonderwall celebrity site, to compete with AOL’s TMZ and Yahoo’s omg! Last week, the company also said it would give visitors the option of an entertainment-focused home page. Seattle-based Wetpaint, which also powers fansites on the websites of HBO, Showtime, and Fox, has raised more than $40 million in venture funding.

Study suggests doctors could add to Wikipedia
Researchers are suggesting that doctors could be spending more time writing and editing Wikipedia pages on medical topics, despite questions that have been raised about the collaborative online encyclopedia’s credibility.

HOW TO: Plan and Promote Events With Social Media (Mashable)
Events, whether they are a local tweetup, a championship game or the world’s largest conference, can be notoriously difficult to plan, promote, and execute. But the end result can be amazing, and that is why we plan them in the first place. Whether you need to work with organizers, generate buzz, or share post-party photos, social media should be a primary weapon in your arsenal. With the power to share comes the ability to spread the word, increase awareness, and accomplish your goals.
Click through for step by step suggestions.

General Mills Connects With Social Media Moms (Mashable)
Not long ago, General Mills set up a blog network called MyBlogSpark. Bloggers in the program have access to some of the newest General Mills products around, so long as they review the items on their blogs. This is a unique way to access and discuss General Mills products (i.e. Cheerios, Yoplait Yogurt). One of the other cool things about the MyBlogSpark program is that about 80% of its bloggers are moms. MyBlogSpark is a program to anyone with an interest in GM brands. According to AdWeek, so far about 900 people have signed up, meaning over 700 of the participants are blogging social media moms. There is no actual compensation for reviewing products, just insider access, some samples for review, and maybe a few freebies.

Most-Searched Term on Microsoft’s Live Search Is … ‘Google’ (Paid Content)
Microsoft’s Live Search revamp apparently cannot come soon enough. Hitwise data shows that the most commonly searched term on Live Search over the last four weeks has been “Google,” accounting for one percent of all queries. Number two? “Yahoo.” Granted, many people who go to Yahoo and Google to search are hoping to go elsewhere too. Or maybe they are flat-out confused. “Google” is the 10th-most searched term on Google itself (!)

YouTube Lets Video Publishers Export Their Stats (Mashable)
YouTube has been offering an increasing number of options to publishers for measuring engagement around their videos. Now, the YouTube Insight platform is letting you take that data anywhere you want, by making it exportable. In a blog post, the company notes that they’ve “added a link that allows you to export your Insight data into CSV files. CSV files are open format files that organize data so it can be moved and analyzed using common spreadsheet software such as Google Docs and Microsoft Excel.” That means all of your view counts, comment counts, demographic data, and other stats that YouTube tracks can all be exported to any platform that supports .CSV imports.

Marketers Still Holding On to TV Dollars
Third-Quarter Upfront Options Remain Open Past Deadline

Keeping the News Crawl Running During Ad Breaks
Media buyers and other executives say a channel’s news and information ticker can keep viewers tuned in and watching commercials.

Spammers Trying To Cash In on Swine Flu Frenzy
Worried about Swine Flu? If so, don’t let your fear and anxiety dupe you into clicking dubious links in emails. Spammers are increasingly using Swine Flu in subject lines and messages to take advantage of people’s fears of the rapidly-spreading Influenza strain, according to McAfee’s Advert Labs Blog.

iPhone siblings to land at Verizon Wireless?
An iPhone “lite” and an iPhone “media pad” may be offered by Verizon Wireless, according to sources quoted in stories from BusinessWeek and USA Today.

iTypeFastr jailbreak app helps speed iPhone typing
Having been an iPhone user for nearly two years now, I’ve heard pretty much every gripe there is to hear about the iPhone’s onscreen keyboard—I’ve even agreed with a few of them. But it’s not as if there’s much in the way of alternatives. However, if you’ve jailbroken your phone, you might consider taking a gander at the new keyboard app iTypeFastR.

Pure Digital releases new Flip camcorders
Pure Digital Technologies, makers of the popular Flip line of pocket camcorders announced today the release of two new pocket camcorders—the Flip $149 UltraSD and $200 Flip UltraHD.

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Yesterday was my birthday, so I took the day off. My birthday present to me was a webcam, so if I can ever figure out how to get YouTube to accept an upload, we may have some visits from Granny Bee.

Most See Obama as Different Type of Politician (Political Wire)
New York Times/CBS News Poll: “More than two-thirds of the poll’s respondents call Mr. Obama a different kind of politician, while just 1 in 4 say he is a typical politician. When those who called him different were asked what sets him apart, most said it was more a matter of his style of governing and his personal qualities than his policies.”
Because it doesn’t matter what you do, it only matters how you act and what you say.

And what others say about you:
OBAMA’S FIRST 100 DAYS: How the President Fared In the Press vs. Clinton and Bush (Project for Excellence in Journalism)
As he marks his 100th day in office, President Barack Obama has enjoyed substantially more positive media coverage than either Bill Clinton or George Bush during their first months in the White House, according to a new study of press coverage. 

Obama Redefining What It Means To Be A “Strong Leader”? (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
[T]he public seems to approve of Obama policies that his critics — most prominently, Dick Cheney — have tried to associate with weakness. Seventy one percent approve of his willingness to engage hostile foreign leaders. Fifty three percent back his release of the torture memos. A plurality of 49% support Obama’s decision to nix torture. Meanwhile, ninety percent credit Obama with being “willing to listen to different points of view” — a sharp contrast with his predecessor, whose single-mindedness and swagger were often hailed by his supporters as a sign of strength.

At a minimum, the public sees Obama as a strong leader despite the fact that his policies and personal attributes are regularly derided by critics as signs of weakness. The question is whether the public sees Obama as strong because of those policies and personal attributes, and whether those perceptions will harden and endure — something that could redefine conventional media definitions of leadership strength.
SO FAR, the public has tuned out Obama’s critics. They might not always. Didn’t the public once think that George Bush was a “strong leader”?

Obama’s First 100 Days “Remarkable”: Plouffe (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
In an email blasted out to supporters Tuesday morning, Barack Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe framed the president’s hundred days in office as a “largely symbolic” metric but one that contains “remarkable” achievements. In the Organize for America email, Plouffe also announced the launch of a new website that provides a state-by-state breakdown of the benefits bestowed by the administration’s policies (though the source of the data isn’t noted), as well as personalized stories of struggle and recovery from around the country.

Obama’s Report Card (Foreign Policy)
We asked some of the best foreign-policy minds in Washington and beyond to rate the U.S. president’s first 100 days in office. The result? 11 As, 16 Bs, 7 Cs, and a D.

[From] Ivan Krastev… In my view, a recent joke best summarizes his achievements. In the wake of the G-20 meeting, Obama, Sarkozy, and Putin were walking around a beautiful lake. In the middle of the lake, there was an island. “Let’s go there,” Obama suggested, and started walking on water to it. Sarkozy followed him. Medvedev also followed, but started sinking. “Should we tell him where the stones are?” Sarkozy whispered to Obama. “What stones?” Obama replied.

IOwnTheWorld.com

Obama’s first 100 days showed rhetoric loftier than actions  (By Vince Warren, The Progressive Media Project)
As President Barack Obama hits the 100-day mark on Wednesday, it’s time to take stock. Many of Obama’s words have been inspiring. His rhetoric represents a relief to those who watched with horror as the Bush administration systematically dismantled the U.S. Constitution and ignored international human rights standards. Yet in many areas of critical importance – like human rights, torture, rendition, secrecy and surveillance – his words have been loftier than his actions.

Obama Has Missed His Moment (by Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com)
Barack Obama has squandered his presidency. He had a fleeting moment to challenge the casino capitalism and financial recklessness of our economic and political elite. He could have orchestrated a state socialism that would have provided a safety net for tens of millions of Americans faced with dislocation and misery. The sums he has doled out to Wall Street could have been used to force companies to keep workers on the job or create new banks to open up credit. But he lacked the foresight and the courage to challenge entrenched power. And now we are headed down one of two frightening roads—massive deflation or hyperinflation. Neither will be pleasant.

In rant on Obama’s first 100 days, Kudlow says Obama started “war against investors, businesses, and entrepreneurs,” says “political decisions are replacing the rule of law” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Hannity says we’re celebrating “100 days of America going down the drain” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Hannity calls for new GOP Contract with America to take advantage of “opportunity” Obama has given them (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Specter switching parties, Dems will gain filibuster proof Senate (The Raw Story)
The Washington Post reports, “Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter [switched] his party affiliation from Republican to Democrat and announced … that he will run in 2010 as a Democrat…” “Specter’s decision would give Democrats a 60 seat filibuster proof majority in the Senate assuming Democrat Al Franken is eventually sworn in as the next Senator from Minnesota,” Chris Cillizza writes for the paper’s online The Fix column.

Would it were so! (by lambert at Corrente)
Michael Steele got a fundraising mailer out immediately: “[Specter's] defection to the Democrat Party puts the Democrats in an almost unstoppable position to pass Obama’s destructive agenda of income redistribution, health care nationalization, and a massive expansion of entitlements.” If only…
Well, it will be interesting to see how the Democrats spin their inevitable “inability” to pass legislation benefiting ordinary people with 60 seats in the Senate. It will be the fault of the Blue Dogs, of course. We’ll hear that gosh, those guys just HAVE to be re-elected. And my question is why? Why would they want conservatives in the Democratic Party?

Tortoise maintains lead, Achilles close second (by Michael J. Smith at Stop Me Before I Vote Again)
Curious how the Democrats are always approaching the capacity to govern — and the concomitant responsibility for what government does and doesn’t do — but never quite getting there… Whatever happened, I wonder, to people’s pattern-recognition skills? Why and how can anybody still repose any hope in these shabby con artists?

Less Than 2 Weeks Ago, Specter Warned of “Big Obama Spending Programs” (by Jake Tapper at Political Punch, ABC News)
At a press conference just 13 days ago…, Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Penn., said if Rep. Pat Toomey, R-Penn., beat him in the GOP primary “we lose the seat in the fall. He’s to the right of Santorum who lost by 18 points after spending $31 million as a two term senator. All that is standing between the Democrats and an avalanche are the 41 Republican Senators to to filibuster. If he’s the nominee we lose the seat and you have card check, and you have tax increases and you have all of the big Obama spending programs.”

“I am a Republican and I am going to run on the Republican ticket in the Republican primary,” he said. Asked how he responded to attempts by Toomey to link him to big spending programs, Specter said, “I voted against every tax increase, I have the backing of the taxpayers association, I supported a Constitutional amendment for a balanced budget and the line item veto. You can pick out a vote here or there. I have a very strong voting record on supporting a constitutional amendment for a balanced budget, line item veto. I voted against tax increases, voted to make the Bush tax cuts permanent…”

Specter Promises Obama To ‘Support Your Agenda,’ Hours Later Restates Opposition To OLC Pick (Think Progress)
President Obama was informed of Specter’s decision [Tuesday] morning and called to welcome him to the party. White House sources told ABC News that Specter pledged loyalty to Obama’s agenda: “At 10:32am, President Barack Obama reached Specter and told him ‘you have my full support’ and “thrilled to have you.’ Specter told the president, ‘I’m a loyal Democrat. I support your agenda.’ Just hours later, however, Specter reaffirmed his unfounded opposition to Obama’s pick to head the Office of Legal Counsel, Dawn Johnsen.
Click through to watch the video.

Gosh, if it wasn’t to support the Democrats’ agenda, why do you suppose Specter switched?
Specter Now Favored for Re-Election (Political Wire)
As a result of Sen. Arlen Specter’s decision to run for re-election as a Democrat, CQ Politics is changing its rating of the Pennsylvania U.S. Senate race to “Leans Democratic” from the tossup category, “No Clear Favorite.” Similarly, the Cook Political Report changed its rating to Leans Democratic and the Rothenberg Political Report now rates the race as Clear Advantage for the Incumbent Party.

What makes him think… (by Tengrain at Mock, Paper, Scissors)
…that the left wants him?

Specter: Smells like teen spirit (by lambert at Corrente)
The reaction at The Obama 527 Formerly Known as Daily Kos (427 recs): “BWHAHAHAHA HAHHAHA HAHHAHA HAHAHA HAHAHA HAHHAHA  HAHAHA HAHAHA HAHAHA HAHAHA HAHAHA HAHAHA HAHA!!”

And then, there’s the adult view:  “Crap[:] I hope this works out better than I expect, but 60 nominal Ds doesn’t equal 60 votes. Specter’s still free to be a dick in the Senate, and I expect the state Dem party to welcome him with open arms and push all challengers away from the primary. Though it does open the door for a non-insider candidate to run and perhaps have a more realistic chance than they would have otherwise.”

What Specter’s switch says about him, the Democrats and our political spectrum (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
[A] few brief points:
(1) The idea that Specter is a ”liberal” Republican or even a “moderate” reflects how far to the Right both the GOP and our overall political spectrum has shifted.
(2) Democrats will understandably celebrate today’s announcement, but beyond the questions of raw political power, it is mystifying why they would want to build their majority by embracing politicians who reject most of their ostensible views…  Specter is highly likely to reprise the Joe Lieberman role for Democrats: a “Democrat” who leads the way in criticizing and blocking Democratic initiatives, forcing the party still further towards Republican policies.
(3)  Arlen Specter is one of the worst, most soul-less, most belief-free individuals in politics.  The moment most vividly illustrating what Specter is:  prior to the vote on the Military Commissions Act of 2006, he went to the floor of the Senate and said what the bill “seeks to do is set back basic rights by some 900 years” and is “patently unconstitutional on its face.”  He then proceeded to vote YES on the bill’s passage.

So, how are those Blue Dogs helping us ordinary folks?
Senate to sink mortgage relief plan (AP)
The centerpiece of President Barack Obama’s plan to keep thousands of people from losing their homes amid the worst economic crisis in decades is headed for defeat next week in the Senate. Allowing people to seek mortgage relief in bankruptcy court is opposed by Republicans and enough Democrats to block it. They remain worried that the legislation would unleash a torrent of loan defaults, ultimately driving up mortgage rates and introducing fresh uncertainty to an already ailing economy. The rejection would deal a blow to the popular president pushing an ambitious agenda to stabilize the economy.

Arlen Specter supports the Healthy Parasite Act (by DCblogger at Corrente)
What Does Specter’s Switch Mean For Health Care Reform? “When it comes to health care reform, Sen. Arlen Specter may be one of the few (former) Republicans open to negotiation. A co-sponsor of the Wyden-Bennett health bill, Specter has been a strong proponent of reforming the health care system.” The healthy parasite act would disolve the current employer based system and replace it with a mandate that we all buy our plans individually.

Reid Will Keep Backing Specter — Even If He Keeps Opposing EFCA (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
This one raises questions about what Dems are really going to gain from Arlen Specter’s newly-minted status as a Democrat. Harry Reid’s office confirms to me that he will keep backing Specter in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary, even if Specter keeps up his opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act. Only a month ago, Reid suggested to reporters that Specter’s opposition to EFCA was a dealbreaker in terms of a party switch. “In coming out against card-check,” Reid said then, Specter “stopped everyone from being able to help him.” [Tuesday] Specter stated unequivocally that not only does he still oppose EFCA, he’ll also vote against bringing it to the floor for a debate.

But this is now not a dealbreaker for the Senate Majority Leader. I asked Reid spokesperson Jim Manley if Reid would support Specter in the primary if his EFCA position remained what it is today. “Senator Reid is going to support Senator Specter in the primary,” Manley replied. This makes it tougher for labor to mount a pro-EFCA primary challenger, obviously.

Obama Will Fundraise And Campaign For Specter If Asked: Gibbs (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
If there were any lingering doubts about how Arlen Specter would be welcomed in the Democratic Party, or if the party would welcome a primary challenge to the now-former Republican, they were put to rest during the White House Daily briefing on Tuesday afternoon. Asked if the president would aid the Pennsylvania Republican-turned-Democrat’s primary efforts, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs replied: “If the president is asked to raise money for Senator Specter, he will happily do it. If the president is asked to campaign for Senator Specter, he will be happy to do that as well.”

PA Gov. Rendell Promised Specter He’d Be “Unopposed” In Dem Primary (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
Here’s another incentive that may have persuaded Arlen Specter to switch parties: Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell guaranteed that he wouldn’t face anyone in a Democratic Primary. Rendell made the vow in a little-noticed interview with the Regional News Network in mid-March, which means he certainly privately promised Specter the same… Asked if Specter could win a Dem primary, Rendell said: “He’d be unopposed. The Democrats in the Senate would welcome him. We in Pennsylvania would welcome him. He’d be basically unopposed for the Democratic nomination.” That’s basically a guarantee by Rendell that he’d use his muscle to clear the primary field for Specter.
Click through to watch the video.

Specter’s switch underscores the GOP’s weakness (McClatchy)
Just over four years ago, a triumphant Republican Party re-elected a president, controlled both houses of Congress and reveled in its prospects for the future.

Good News for Republicans! (by William Kristol, a right winger)
I wonder if [Tuesday’s] Arlen Specter party switch … won’t end up being bad for President Obama and the Democrats. With the likely seating of Al Franken from Minnesota, Democrats will have 60 seats in the Senate, giving Obama unambiguous governing majorities in both bodies. He’ll be responsible for everything. GOP obstructionism will go away as an issue, and Democratic defections will become the constant worry and story line. This will make it easier for GOP candidates in 2010 to ask to be elected to help restore some checks and balance in Washington — and, meanwhile, Specter’s party change won’t likely have made much difference in getting key legislation passed or not. So, losing Specter may help produce greater GOP gains in November 2010, and a brighter Republican future.
Because, as Lambert says, EVERYTHING is ALWAYS GOOD for Republicans.  Always.

Limbaugh: “Arlen Specter is a liberal Republican. … People who are not really Republicans are now leaving” the GOP (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Limbaugh on Specter leaving GOP: “A lot of people — Specter, take McCain with you, and his daughter” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Austin Cline, Council for Secular Humanism (via Jesus’ General)

A Hundred Anxious Days (Washington Post)
In a South Carolina Town Where the Downturn Has Deepened Since the Inauguration, Two Obama Supporters Have Struggled, Going From ‘Fired Up’ to Tired Out

Below are a few lines from this article, showing you that while Democrats are laughing at the governor of Texas and mocking the April 15 tea parties, Republicans are busy laying the groundwork for their next takeover:

Childs has heard plenty of anti-Obama rhetoric. “Most people around here know where I stand and let me be,” she says. “People are too polite to be nasty.” So she shakes her head in disbelief as she reads the angry messages scrawled on the poster boards in front of her.

“Say NO to Obama and Socialism!”

“OBAMA’NATION.”

“Who cares what Obama says? America IS a Christian nation.”

Childs puckers her lips and listens as Greenwood residents take turns stepping to the podium and shouting through a megaphone. Their speeches revolve around the same themes Childs hears in her phone messages, except what she identified as the solution to Greenwood’s problems is what these speakers now disparage as the cause.

“We all know this president is the major problem,” David O. Davis III says. “I’ve got friends with families who are losing their jobs, getting laid off.”

“We’re struggling to pay our bills and get by,” Cathy Heitzenrater says. “We’re feeling disenfranchised from our own country and disappointed about who’s running it.”

“Vote the bum out,” R.J. Fife says.

Where is the barrage from the liberal side, reminding people over and over and over again that the financial crisis was brought on by George Bush and the greed is good mentality? Where is the catapulting of the truth from our side? Answer: it doesn’t exist. Liberals seem to think people will automatically know and understand who caused the problems, and won’t fall for right-wing propaganda—despite the evidence of people consistently falling for right-wing propaganda.

Swine Flu is a wag-the-dog for Sebelius (by Tengrain at Mock, Paper, Scissors)
[N]otorious woman-hating president of the conservative group Concerned Women for America, Wendy Wright, suggests that the swine flu pandemic is a tactic being used by our Evil Negro Overlord and Re-Education Camp Councilor, i.e., President Carebear, to push his failing HHS females ecretary nomination, Kathleen Sebelius through through the confirmation process.

If so, it worked:
Confirmed for HHS, Sebelius turns to health care, swine flu (McClatchy)
The Senate on Tuesday confirmed Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius as Health and Human Services secretary.

Paranoia pandemic: Conservative media baselessly blame swine flu outbreak on immigrants (Media Matters for America)
Summary: Conservative media personalities have baselessly blamed Mexican immigrants for spreading swine flu across the border, despite the fact that several reports have indicated that U.S. swine flu patients had recently traveled to Mexico.

Bachmann: It’s ‘interesting’ that the last swine flu outbreak also occurred under a ‘Democrat President.’ (Think Progress)
During an interview with PajamasTV [Wednesday], Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) falsely claimed that the last swine flu outbreak occurred under “another Democrat President, Jimmy Carter.” Bachmann, however, insisted she was not trying to blame either man for the outbreaks.
Click through to watch the video.

Limbaugh: Swine flu “is out there” “to cover up the mess that is the United States of America right now” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Savage doubts virus was transmitted from pigs, possibility “our dear friends in the Middle East cooked this up ” with “open border policies” in mind (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Media Overhyping Swine Flu? (Washington Post)
“Of course we’re doing too much to scare people,” said Mark Feldstein, a former correspondent for NBC, ABC, and CNN who teaches journalism at George Washington University. “Cable news has 24 hours to fill, and there isn’t 24 hours of exciting news going on. If you scare people, they’ll tune in more.”

Media Drumbeat Amplifies Coverage Of Flu Outbreak (New York Times)
Without the news media the public would be dangerously unaware of the swine flu outbreak, but perhaps without saturation coverage on cable news networks and the velocity of information on the Internet, the public would not be so hysterical, medical professionals said.

The last great swine flu epidemic (by Patrick Di Justo, Salon)
“This virus will kill 1 million Americans,” declared the U.S. in 1976. The panic then has a lot to teach us today.

Summers Says U.S. Economy to Decline ‘For Some Time’ (Bloomberg)
The U.S. economy will continue to contract “for some time to come,” said Lawrence Summers, director of the White House National Economic Council. “I expect the economy will continue to decline,” with “sharp declines in employment for quite some time this year,” Summers said … on “Fox News Sunday.”… Summers said the economy will pick up as manufacturers rebuild depleted inventories and consumers replace aging cars. “These imbalances can’t continue forever,” he said. “When they are repaired they will be a source of impetus for the economy.”

R.J. Matson

BofA, Citi urged to increase capital: report (Reuters)
U.S. regulators have told Bank of America Corp and Citigroup Inc they may need to raise more capital following stress testing of the two banks, The Wall Street Journal reported. The shortfall amounts to billions of dollars at BofA, the newspaper said on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the bank, adding it is likely the Federal Reserve will have determined other banks might also need more capital.
Oh, yes, we should help an AMERICAN bank, right?

I’m not making this up, part three (by Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire)
The Bank of America — which received $200 billion from the taxpayers because it is too big to fail, and which has fired 34,000 workers — now wants to hire 15,000 workers. In India. The Bank of America.

Bank of America Creates 15,000 New Jobs – in INDIA (by Alegre)
Their earnings have been shored up by 199.2 BILLION of our tax dollars and they’re firing American workers so they can hire people on the cheap in India.  I’m thinking the folks at SEIU are on the right track when they call for the firing of Ken Lewis… CLICK HERE to sign a proxy card – tell Bank of America to FIRE KEN LEWIS.

California pension fund lines up against Bank of America chief (McClatchy)
The country’s largest public pension fund announced today that it will vote against Ken Lewis and the entire board of Bank of America directors at the shareholders meeting in Charlotte tomorrow.

BofA rebrands Countrywide, symbol of mortgage meltdown (McClatchy)
As Bank of America Corp. officially puts its brand on former Countrywide Financial Corp. offices today, the Charlotte bank is also unveiling new initiatives aimed at improving mortgage lending for consumers. The changeover follows the Charlotte bank’s July 1 acquisition of Countrywide, which had become a symbol of the nation’s mortgage meltdown as it neared collapse early last year… “The new brand is Bank of America,” Barbara Desoer, head of home loans and insurance, said in an interview. “The promise is to always be a responsible lender and to help create successful homeowners.”

Citi Seeks Approval to Pay Out Bonuses (Wall Street Journal)
Citigroup Inc., soon to be one-third owned by the U.S. government, is asking the Treasury for permission to pay special bonuses to many key employees, according to people familiar with the matter. The request comes as Citigroup is grappling with broad government pay restrictions that could break apart its legendary energy-trading unit. People at that unit, Phibro, are threatening to leave because of pay caps tied to the U.S. bailout of Citigroup. Phibro has been the source of hundreds of millions of dollars in profits for the bank, and has paid out hefty compensation

Nationalize General Motors? UAW and U.S. government could own 89 percent of company under GM’s plan (AP)
General Motors, once the colossus of American capitalism, will become a leaner, government-owned company if the Obama administration goes along with 

UAW to own 55 percent of Chrysler stock: report (Reuters)
The United Auto Workers will eventually own 55 percent of stock in a restructured Chrysler under a deal reached by the two, the WSJ reported on Monday.
* Fiat SpA will eventually own 35 percent of a restructured Chrysler – wsj
* Under deal, US government and Chrysler’s secured lenders together will own 10 percent of restructured Chrysler -wsj

Limbaugh on auto bailout: “Don Obama has made Don Corleone look like Daffy Duck” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

How libertarian dogma led the Fed astray (by Henry Kaufman, thanks to Economist’s View)
The Federal Reserve has been hobbled by … major shortcomings that were primarily responsible for the current and several previous credit crises… My second major concern … is the Fed’s prevailing economic libertarianism. At the heart of this economic dogma is the belief that markets know best and that those who compete well will prosper, while those who do not will fail… By guiding monetary policy in a libertarian direction, the Fed played a central role in creating a financial environment defined by excessive credit growth and unrestrained profit seeking. … At a minimum, the Fed’s sensitivity to financial excesses must be improved.
Click through for the specifics.

I’m not making this up, part two (by Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire)
“Democracy is the current industry standard political system, but unfortunately it is ill-suited for a libertarian state.” – Patri Friedman, grandson of Milton Friedman. This (true) statement undermines decades of propaganda. When Miltie’s system failed in Chile (where he ran the economy under the dictator Pinochet), he blamed the lack of democracy.
Milton Friedman was the father of the libertarian “Chicago School” of economics.

The great crash of the “Chicago school” of economics (by Andrew Leonard at How the World Works, Salon, thanks to Economist’s View)
I think you can very well blame the Chicago school for the fiasco of growing income inequality in the U.S.  Nice triumph for deregulated capitalism, boys! Ronald Reagan listened closely to Milton Friedman and the Chicago school godfather’s disciples have been rife in the Republican administrations that have dominated the White House ever since the Californian swept into Washington and started blaming government for our problems. Well guess what? It didn’t work so well. The rich got richer and then screwed the pooch.

The Last Temptation of Risk (by Barry Eichengreen, thanks to Economist’s View)
What got us into this mess … were not the limits of scholarly imagination. It was not the failure or inability of economists to model conflicts of interest, incentives to take excessive risk and information problems that can give rise to bubbles, panics and crises. It was not that economists failed to recognize the role of social and psychological factors in decision making or that they lacked the tools needed to draw out the implications. In fact, these observations and others had been imaginatively elaborated by contributors to the literatures on agency theory, information economics and behavioral finance.

Rather, the problem was a partial and blinkered reading of that literature. The consumers of economic theory, not surprisingly, tended to pick and choose those elements of that rich literature that best supported their self-serving actions. Equally reprehensibly, the producers of that theory, benefiting in ways both pecuniary and psychic, showed disturbingly little tendency to object. It is in this light that we must understand how it was that the vast majority of the economics profession remained so blissfully silent and indeed unaware of the risk of financial disaster.

Value for value (by Steve Waldman, thanks to Economist’s View)
We want value for value, an ironclad commitment of root and branch reform in exchange for the unimaginable sums of money we are being asked to hand over… Congress would, because the public would, support large, explicit transfers, if they were attached to reforms sufficiently radical to prevent a recurrence, and suitably punitive towards the people who managed the system that brought us here. Value for value.

Obama’s Treasury sends bill to Capitol Hill that was drafted by bankster lobbyists (by lambert at Corrente)
The Times buried the lead on this one. I missed it, but Yves didn’t. From the Geithner profile: “A bill sent recently by the Treasury to Capitol Hill would give the Obama administration extensive new powers to inject money into or seize systemically important firms in danger of failure. It wasdrafted in large measure by Davis Polk & Wardwell, a law firm that represents many banks and the financial industry’s lobbying group.” Oopsie! Mr. Geithner also hired Davis Polk to represent the New York Fed during the A.I.G. bailout.

F.D.I.C. Chief Calls for Broader Powers for Agency (New York Times)
The chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation,Sheila C. Bair, said in a speech on Monday that her agency should have broader powers to take over and close a variety of financial institutions to prevent taxpayers from shouldering the losses on firms deemed too big to fail. Instead of just seizing commercial banks, Ms. Bair said the F.D.I.C. should be able to take over troubled insurers, bank holding companies and other insolvent financial institutions and force stockholders and bondholders to bear the cost. “Viable portions of the company would be put into the good bank, while the ailing portions would remain at the bad bank to be sold or closed over time,” Ms. Bair said at a speech at the Economic Club of New York.

Protesters disrupt foreclosure auctions on Sacramento courthouse steps (McClatchy)
A large crowd of protesters disrupted several foreclosure auctions today on the Sacramento County Courthouse steps, winning temporary cancellation of one Sacramento foreclosure and sending an auctioneer to the hospital with chest pains.

“Banker to the poor” gives New York women a boost (Reuters, thanks to InsightAnalytical)
Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, known as the “banker to the poor” for making small loans in impoverished countries, is now doing business in the center of capitalism — New York City. In the past year the first U.S. branch of his Grameen Bank has lent $1.5 million, ranging from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars, to nearly 600 women with small business plans in the city’s borough of Queens… Grameen America now operates by lending out money gathered through donations and money from payments on existing loans. The bank is applying for a U.S. credit union license to generate the deposits it needs to make more loans
Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is giving fuel oil to poor Americans. Muhammad Yunus is lending money to help poor Americans.  What is the American government doing to help poor Americans—oh right, our government is busy helping the already rich get richer.

New evidence of a secret torture prison (by John Goetz and Britta Sandberg, Salon)
It has long been clear that the CIA used the Szymany military airbase in Poland for extraordinary renditions. Now there is new evidence of a secret torture prison nearby.

GOP lawmaker: Although waterboarding is ‘more torture than not,’ we still shouldn’t have investigations. (Think Progress)
During an interview with WGN radio this morning, Rep. Don Manzullo (R-IL) veered slightly to the left of his GOP colleagues on the issue of whether waterboarding is torture and an effective tool of interrogation. After host John Williams recounted the story of Abu Zubaydah (and how all the valuable information he gave occurred before waterboarding took place), Manzullo replied, “Apparently waterboarding doesn’t work.” Williams then established that Manzullo believes that torture is illegal and asked, “Do you think waterboarding is torture?” “I would say its more torture than not,” Manzullo said. Despite his dance with reality, Manzullo firmly came back into the GOP camp, later arguing that no prosecutions should take place because it would be too much of a hassle. [Emphasis added.]

Why We Must Prosecute (by Mark J. McKeon, a prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia from 2001 to 2004 and a senior prosecutor from 2004 to 2006)
[W]e cannot expect to regain our position of leadership in the world unless we hold ourselves to the same standards that we expect of others. That means punishing the most senior government officials responsible for these crimes. We have demanded this from other countries that have returned from walking on the dark side; we should expect no less from ourselves… We cannot expect the rest of humanity to live in a world that we ourselves are not willing to inhabit.

Bernie Goldberg claims use of torture in some cases is “the moral position” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

O’Reilly says NY Times and MSNBC execs, Soros, ACLU’s Romero are “America-haters” for depicting America as a “torture nation” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Limbaugh on Obama’s view of American values: “We’re not gonna waterboard Khalid Shaikh Mohammad, we’re going to murder a million babies a year” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Bybee defends his torture memos as ‘legally correct’ and ‘a good-faith analysis of the law.’ (Think Progress)
Judge Jay Bybee finally “broke his silence” and talked to the New York Times about his legal memos which authorized torture. This past weekend, the Washington Post quoted anonymous friends of Bybee claiming that Bybee was apologetic for authoring the memos. Speaking for himself, Bybee said that’s not the case: [H]e said: “The central question for lawyers was a narrow one; locate, under the statutory definition, the thin line between harsh treatment of a high-ranking Al Qaeda terrorist that is not torture and harsh treatment that is. I believed at the time, and continue to believe today, that the conclusions were legally correct.” Other administration lawyers agreed with those conclusions, Judge Bybee said…

The Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility is currently conducting a review of Bybee’s work. The New York Times’s Charlie Savage recently reported that the review could find that Bybee’s office changed its legal views to cater to policy makers.

Kristol Now Thinks Torture Debate Is ‘Healthy’ If Democrats Are Also The Focus (Think Progress)
Many conservatives have expressed outrage that President Obama earlier this month released four-Bush era Office of Legal Counsel memos that detail the Bush administration’s legal justification for torture. Not only has the right criticized Obama for releasing the memos, but it has succumbed to defending the use of torture and argued vigorously that no official investigations should ensue. The Weekly Standard’s Bill Kristol has been leading the charge lately on Fox News… However, [Wednesday] night on Fox, Kristol pulled an about face, saying that any debate into the matter would be “healthy.” Why? Because he wants to include the Clinton administration.
Click through to watch a video compilation of Kristol’s comments.

Major defeat for Bush/Obama position on secrecy (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
The first sign that the Obama DOJ would replicate many of the worst and most radical arguments of the Bush DOJ was in the Jeppesen case, a lawsuit brought by five victims of the CIA’s rendition and torture program…  [Tuesday], … the appellate court resoundingly rejected the Bush/Obama position, holding that the “state secrets” privilege — except in extremely rare circumstances not applicable here — does not entitle the Government to demand dismissal of an entire lawsuit based on the assertion that the “subject matter” of the lawsuit is a state secret.  Instead, the privilege only allows the Government to make specific claims of secrecy with regard to specific documents and other facts — exactly how the privilege was virtually always used before the Bush and Obama DOJs sought to expand it into a vast weapon of immunity from all lawsuits challenging the legality of any executive branch program relating to national security 

In rejecting this radical secrecy theory, the court emphasized how the Bush/Obama doctrine, if accepted, would essentially place the President above and beyond the rule of law.
That’s what Obama asked for, Ophiles, to place himself above and beyond the rule of law. Just like Bush.

OBAMA PLANE PHOTO OP STARTLES NEW YORKERS (New York Post)
A jumbo jet being chased by a F-16 fighter jets buzzed Lower Manhattan [Tuesday] morning, panicking New Yorkers, many of whom were forced to evacuate their office buildings. It was not a terrorist attack, however, but a photo opportunity for Air Force One, sources told the Post.
See it on YouTube.

Feds Knew Flying a 747 Through NYC Would Be Terrifying and Still Kept It a Secret (by Owen Thomas at Gawker)
A government memo shows the Federal Aviation Agency predicted “public concern” over fighter jets flying near downtown Manhattan — and yet demanded that New York officials not explain the planes’ terrifying presence.

In the memo, a copy of which was obtained by WCBS-TV in New York, FAA official James Johnston acknowledged “the possibility of public concern regarding DOD (Department of Defense) aircraft flying at low altitudes.” Instead of proposing a public-awareness campaign to salve New Yorkers’ lingering 9/11 fears, however, Johnston threatened federal sanctions if the purpose of the flyover — staged to create a White House publicity photo of Air Force One flying past the Statue of Liberty — leaked out.

Air Force One Photo Op Could Cost Taxpayers Between $27,500 And $213,000 (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
The cost of an Air Force One photo-op over the Statue of Liberty that ended up frightening scores of New Yorkers likely stands between $27,500 and $210,000, according to official estimates of flight costs.

Limbaugh throws out another conspiracy theory: Maybe Air Force One was in NYC to replace Statue of Liberty with “one of Obama” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Exceptions to Iraq Deadline Are Proposed (New York Times)
The United States and Iraq will begin negotiating possible exceptions to the June 30 deadline for withdrawing American combat troops from Iraqi cities, focusing on the troubled northern city of Mosul, according to military officials. Some parts of Baghdad also will still have combat troops. Everywhere else, the withdrawal of United States combat troops from all Iraqi cities and towns is on schedule to finish by the June 30 deadline, and in many cases even earlier. But because of the level of insurgent activity in Mosul, United States and Iraqi military officials will meet Monday to decide whether to consider the city an exception to the deadline in the Status of Forces Agreement, or SOFA, between the countries.

Santorum: Reconciliation ‘Has Never Been Done Before’ — Except For When I Used It (Think Progress)
Last week, the White House increased the pressure to pass President Obama’s budget proposal this week by keeping the reconciliation language in place that would allow the budget — and the essential health care reforms it includes — to pass with 51 rather than 60 Senate votes. Adding his voice to the conservative hysteria over the use of reconciliation, former senator Rick Santorum declared today that such a move would “short-circuit the process” and “has never been done before”…

Of course, reconciliation has been used nearly 20 times since 1980, when it was first created. The New Republic notes that using reconciliation to pass health care reform fits into the historical pattern. “Whether reducing or increasing deficits, many of the reconciliation bills made major changes in policy. Health insurance portability (COBRA), nursing home standards, expanded Medicaid eligibility, increases in the earned income tax credit, welfare reform, the state Children’s Health Insurance Program, major tax cuts and student aid reform were all enacted under reconciliation procedures.”

Indeed, Santorum himself was the Senate Republicans’ point man in trying to push welfare reform through budget reconciliation in 1995, including it in a budget then-President Clinton opposed.

U.S. Senate joins House in backing $3.4 trillion budget (Reuters)
The Democratic-controlled U.S. Senate on Wednesday voted to approve the $3.4 trillion fiscal 2010 budget compromise, wrapping up a big political victory for President Barack Obama on his 100th day in office.

Global Warming Denier Michele Bachmann Named To House GOP ‘Energy Solutions’ Group (Think Progress)
Last month, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) announced the creation of the House GOP American Energy Solutions Group, meant to “work on crafting Republican solutions to lower energy prices for American families and small businesses.” Helping lead the way toward finding those solutions? Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), who [Monday] announced her appointment to the group… If Boehner and the House GOP were truly interested in promoting real solutions to America’s energy and environmental crises, Bachmann should be their last pick for the group. After all, she has made a name for herself by constantly repeating the most nonsensical, misleading, radical untruths about energy and the environment:

House Democrats Target Bachmann (Political Wire)
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee triggered a war of words Monday with a certain outspoken Minnesota congresswoman after it launched a new Web site, Bachmann Watch, CQ Politics reports. The site purports to highlight the “extreme rhetoric and false claims” Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) “makes to bolster her outrageous statements.” And it hits Bachmann for her assertions on cap-and-trade energy legislation, her record on earmarks, and government spending.

Bush Keeps Sinking (Political Wire)
Though former President Bush has been out of office for 100 days — and made a point to stay out of the headlines — his approval numbers sunk even further in the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, from 31% positive just before he left office to just 26% now. Not surprisingly, Dick Cheney’s approval numbers also went down, from 21% positive in January to 18% now. 

Roger Goodman to Leave ABC News ((TVNewser, Media Bistro)
Legendary ABC News director Roger Goodman is leaving day-to-day work at the network. Goodman will focus on his independent production company while still making himself available to ABC News as needed. Goodman was director for special projects for the network.

Global Pulse: Politics and Torture (Video) (Link TV)
Obama declassifies Bush administration documents that detail and attempt to legalize what some have called “torture techniques.” While the U.S media seem focused on the political ramifications, media worldwide present the brutality of torture and point the finger of blame directly at Bush.

CIA And The Washington Post: Joined At The Hip (by Melvin A. Goodman, The Public Record)
The Washington Post’s editorial pages have been particularly protective of the Central Intelligence Agency and its senior leaders — the ideological drivers for torture and extraordinary renditions policies.

How ’07 ABC Interview Tilted a Torture Debate (by Brian Stelter, New York Times)
An official’s claim that waterboarding yielded quick results was widely repeated, but has now been discredited.
Why have we never seen, in the New York Times, an account of how the Times tilted the (lack of) debate before we marched into Iraq?

Spook’s Torture Lie Made Waterboarding Cool (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
[Brian] Ross defended his source, but sounds a little bitter: “I didn’t give enough credit to the fiendishness of the C.I.A.” Right, because a news reporter didn’t have any reason, in 2007, to believe a representative of the CIA would provide false information about crucial decisions, or abet awful human rights abuses.

Business Reporters Confess News Sins While U.S. Economy Collapsed (Colorado Independent)
At the … Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW) conference, leading business journalists and editors explained how the media “blew it” in covering the economic meltdown.

‘US Media Puts American Society Into A Cocoon’ (by Danny Schechter)
The American people are getting a certain amount of information regarding news events that tends to divide the world on an “us and them” basis, insists the award winning documentary filmmaker, blogger, journalist, and media critic Danny Schechter in an exclusive interview with Russia Today.

Cheney for President (New York Times)
In his debut column, Ross Douthat writes that a Cheney campaign would have tested the Republican Party’s political viability.

Times Conservative’s Debut Is Awfully Liberal (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
When Ross Douthat was named Bill Kristol’s replacement at the New York Times, both liberals and conservatives were happy. Now we understand why: The “squishy” right-winger fools everyone into thinking he agrees with them… Basically, Douthat just wrote a column slamming Cheney, torture and various other things Democrats hated about the Bush presidency. Which is very much what one would expect from a columnist at the liberal Times. But Douthat’s conservative, and sounds conservative, so it’s not cliché. You see? Very cunning, this one.

Beck claims “the global warming movement… is about population control” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Hannity: “I think if anything, the Republican Party is moved to the left in recent years” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Sean Hannity Calls Porn Star a ‘Role Model’ (by John Cook at Gawker)
Sanctimonious Catholic scold Sean Hannity invited noted porn star Kim Kardashian on his show last night, and—literally—called her a “role model” for young girls. Hannity almost certainly has no idea who Kardashian is. He told her some girls look up to her because, unlike Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, Kardashian doesn’t drink. Then he asked her about her Playboy spread in a concerned, fatherly way: “Why Playboy? That’s the only thing I didn’t understand in your bio. That didn’t make sense to me.”

So that must mean the part of her bio where she taped herself having dirty naked sex with a man [NSFW], and the tape was fairly well-produced and well-lit—almost professionally so!—and then the tape was sold for $1 million? That part made perfect sense to you, Sean. Sean Hannity’s America is sounding like a better place to live every day.

First same-sex couple marries in Iowa (by Alex Koppelman at War Room, Salon)
The Iowa Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage in that state took effect Monday morning, and within an hour, the first couple to take advantage of it had wed. Melisa Keeton and Shelley Wolfe were married at 9 a.m. in a ceremony at a government building in Des Moines, the Associated Press reports. State law normally requires a three-day waiting period before marriage licenses take effect, but a judge waived that requirement in this case.

This is hardly the end of the fight over marriage in Iowa, though. Conservative legal groups are preparing for battle, with one seeking a plaintiff for a test case that would, they hope, establish a precedent allowing a county clerk to refuse a marriage license to a same-sex couple on the basis of their own conscience. And, given the state’s prominence in presidential primaries — and evangelicals’ influence in the Republican caucuses in Iowa — we can expect to hear more about this once the race for the GOP nomination kicks off.

Support for Gay Marriage Grows (Political Wire)
The latest New York Times/CBS News poll finds that 42% of Americans now say same sex couples should be allowed to legally marry. That’s up nine points from just last month, when 33% supported legalizing same sex marriage. In addition, there is a widening divide on gay marriage depending on the age of the voter with 31% of respondents over the age of 40 saying they supported gay marriage. By contrast, 57% under age 40 said they supported it, a 26-point difference.

Americans want a health care system that is uniquely … Swiss! (by hipparchia at Corrente)
From the Wonk Room at Think Progress: “Most notably, Obama has rejected a British/Canadian-like single-payer reform and most policy makers are looking for a ‘uniquely American solution’ that preserves the employer-sponsored system and creates a hybrid public-private partnership. In other words, American reforms would look a bit like the Swiss health system.”

Veterans Groups Go To Bat For EFCA (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
Adding a new dimension to the debate over the Employee Free Choice Act, a host of veterans groups is launching a new effort to help pass the union-backed legislation. In alliance with the AFL-CIO Union Veterans Council, the 20,000-member VoteVets.org will host events and rallies in a dozen key EFCA battleground states, including Arkansas, Pennsylvania, Nebraska, Indiana, Montana, Maine, and Alaska. Joined by veterans and union officials in those locales, these groups and the campaign as a whole seem likely to add a new element to the debate over the need for easier access to unionization.

Veterans comprise a significant portion of the union community. According to officials at the AFL-CIO, 2.1 million union members are vets, or 14 percent of all union members. Considering the respect they engender at home, having these groups and individuals on the frontlines of the pro-EFCA campaign puts a different type of political pressure on those senators whose position on the bill is still up in the air.

It’s time for politics to stop halting our technological progress (By Scot Rourke, Knight Center of Digital Excellence)
As communities plan ways to spend federal stimulus money – such as in health care, education and public safety – let’s not forget the need to invest in the equally important job of automating government itself. During my recent visit to Seoul, South Korea, I saw households with better digital infrastructure than some of our biggest businesses in the United States. I saw video distance learning with one teacher and one student running a camera in an empty classroom – and hundreds of thousands of kids watching online for free. I saw hundreds of government services conducted via remote, from a TV with a standard set-top box – no computer required.

What’s more, the South Korean government tracks customer, I mean citizen, satisfaction. All the while, taxpayer costs are plummeting, enabling a combination of lower taxes and increased investment in education and innovation. If our citizens could see what I have seen, they would accept nothing less.
Our citizens accept so much that it’s crazy. What will politicians reward their supporters with, if all the government jobs are automated? Pie in the sky, Scot. Pie in the sky.

Facebook Backer Wishes Women Couldn’t Vote (by Owen Thomas at Gawker)
Peter Thiel … is the former CEO of PayPal who now runs the $2 billion hedge fund Clarium Capital and a venture-capital firm called the Founders Fund. His best-returning investment to date, though, has been Facebook. His $500,000 investment is now worth north of $100 million even by the most conservative valuations of the social network. On the side, though, his pet passion is libertarianism and the fantasy that everything would be better in the world if government just quit nagging everybody. But, now he’s given up hope on achieving his vision through political means because, as he writes in Cato Unbound, a website run by the Cato Institute, all those voting females have wrecked things.

Media Matters for America headlines

• Stamp of approval: Media tout Obama polling falsehood

• Fox’s Henneberg repeats right-wing myth that hate crimes bill could gag ministers

• FNC’s Napolitano peddles paranoia about “swine flu,” Obama’s health care plan

• Wilson says Michelle Obama “was portrayed in some quarters as an angry woman” — but omits Fox

• Frisch: Fox News: 100 days of “opposition” to Obama

• Fox’s Angle repeated false and misleading claims on harsh interrogations

• Fox’s Cameron provides bad medicine in health care report

• The Hill reported Ryan and Gregg’s reconciliation criticism, omitted their prior support

• Baier ignored study’s finding that media coverage of Obama’s policies skewed negative

• VandeHei uncritically repeats Gregg’s reconciliation criticism

• Post reports GOP criticism of HHS vacancy, but not GOP’s role

• CNN’s Bash didn’t note economists’ argument that spending is necessary in recession

• Fox Nation gets an “F” for Obama rating falsehood

US Journalist Jailed in Iran ‘Very Weak’
An American journalist jailed in Iran for allegedly spying is vowing to remain on a hunger strike until she is freed. Roxana Saberi, who has been on a hunger strike for a week, was convicted more than a week of ago and sentenced to eight years in prison after a one-day trial behind closed doors.

Supreme Court upholds TV profanity crackdown
The Supreme Court upheld a U.S. government crackdown on profanity on television, a policy that subjects broadcasters to fines for airing a single expletive blurted out on a live show. In its first ruling on broadcast indecency standards in more than 30 years, the high court handed a victory on Tuesday to the Federal Communications Commission, which adopted the crackdown against the one-time use of profanity on live television when children are likely to be watching. The case stemmed from an FCC decision in 2006 that found News Corp’s Fox television network violated decency rules when singer Cherblurted out an expletive during the 2002 Billboard Music Awards broadcast and actress Nicole Richie used two expletives during the 2003 awards.

Online gambling bill coming: Frank
U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, chairman of the House of Representatives Financial Services Committee, said on Tuesday he would introduce a bill next week to overturn a three-year-old U.S. ban on Internet gambling… The European Commission, the EU’s executive, said late last month in a draft report that a U.S. Justice Department crackdown on European online gambling companies violated U.S. commitments under the World Trade Organization… EU online gambling firms lost billions of euros in value after the U.S. Congress in 2006 made it illegal for banks and credit card companies to make payments to online gambling sites.

Justice Dept. Opens Antitrust Inquiry Into Google Books Deal
The Justice Department has begun an inquiry into the antitrust implications of Google’s settlement with authors and publishers over its Google Book Search service. The inquiry does not necessarily mean that the department will oppose the settlement.

Why can’t we concentrate?
Twitter and e-mail aren’t making us stupider, but they are making us more distracted. A new book explains why learning to focus is the key to living better.

A Pulitzer for software development? Hard to believe!
“Who would have thought a few years ago that it would be possible to win a Pulitzer for software development?” writes Rich Gordon. “Politifact, of course, is software and a whole lot more. …Twenty years from now, I hope we’ll see thousands of journalists developing online software applications that inform, engage and enlighten the way Politifact does. The question is how we’ll get there.”

Death of Newspapers Foretold by Warren Buffett (by Jack Shafer, Slate)
Perhaps the most prescient voice on the fate of newspapers has been Berkshire Hathaway Chairman of the Board Warren E. Buffett. In a Feb. 28, 1992, letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, Buffett declared that media properties were losing their status as profit-spewing franchises.

ABC FAS-FAX: Newspaper Circulation Falls 7 Percent (Paid Content)
The steady downward spiral of newspaper circulation continues, as the Audit Bureau of Circulation released figures for 395 dailies that show circulation slipping 7 percent year-over-year to 34.4 million. As for the ad-heavy Sunday papers, ABC said circ fell 5.3 percent for the 557 participants to 42 million. The ABC measures are not complete; the organization only compiles data on papers will more than 50,000 circ level. The results were mostly negative, and even for those the reported positive numbers, at best, numbers were flat. For example, WSJ was one of the few that didn’t decline, but its .06 percent gain was nothing to celebrate.
Click through for a rundown of how some of the largest papers fell in circulation.

Media Darwinism: Which Sites Will Survive? (by Matt Pressman, Vanity Fair)
Although it has been 13 years since the launch of Slate and NYTimes.com, we are still in the early stages of the evolution of online media, and it remains to be seen which creatures will emerge from the primordial ooze adapted to survive in a harsh new environment.

Readers still want big papers to play a gatekeeper role
Jim Brady says if papers start letting real-time traffic drive their home-page promotion, they’re on the path to becoming Digg. “What Digg does is terrific, but it’s not what newspapers should be doing,” writes the ex-WP website executive editor. “There was nothing in our traffic history to suggest that stories about military veterans were of particular interest to our readers. But when Dana Priest and Anne Hull uncovered the poor conditions at Walter Reed Army Hospital, the story went global in hours. That kind of journalism will be increasingly at risk if we get too caught up in the race for page views.”

Google Plans ‘High-Quality News’ Passive Search, Expands Twitter Presence (by Will Sullivan at Poynter Online)
Earlier this week, Google began using Twitter to distribute headlines from Google News. And that’s not all Google has planned for helping readers find the news they want. The Wrap’s Sharon Waxman spoke with Google CEO Eric Schmidt last week at a party held by Arianna Huffington of the HuffingtonPost.com. Waxman reports Schmidt detailed an interesting plan to help struggling newspapers:

“In about six months, the company will roll out a system that will bring high-quality news content to users without them actively looking for it. Under this latest iteration of advanced search, users will be automatically served the kind of news that interests them just by calling up Google’s page. The latest algorithms apply ever more sophisticated filtering –- based on search words, user choices, purchases, a whole host of cues -– to determine what the reader is looking for without knowing they’re looking for it. And on this basis, Google believes it will be able to sell premium ads against premium content…

“Does The New York Times make more money from this arrangement, I asked? No, Schmidt confirmed, it won’t. But by targeting the stories that readers will want to read, it will get more hits out of the stories it has, which will drive its traffic and ultimately support higher advertising rates beside the stories.” 

The Shrinking Daily vs. The Daily Eric (Schmidt) (by Ken Doctor, writing at Paid Content)
As print shrinks, Google will replace its daily functionality, its daily utility—and it’s been on that road for awhile—with Google News, v2. It sounds like Google News, v1 meets Google IG meets AdWords for news, a new algorithm that knows us better than we know ourselves. Importantly—distinguishing itself from all the My Yahoo products that have come before—Google is recognizing how fundamentally lazy we all are. Google seems to be saying: You don’t have to do anything, we’ll be your new paperboy.

Of course, this digital paperboy keeps all the money from the collections, a bizarro turn on the old value chain. News producers used to get the money and pay a few pennies (Newsies-like) to the distributors. Now the distributors are making the collections, and keeping it… Add it all up, and the future gets clearer. And it’s in pixels. The big questions get bigger. Who will pay journalists to create the news? Who will distribute it? How will a new, fairer, stable ecosystem emerge?

Google’s CEO Gets an Official Seat at President Obama’s Table (Mashable)
The close ties between Google CEO Eric Schmidt and President Barack Obama are well-documented. Schmidt endorsed Obama’s Presidential campaign, and in the months since he has taken office, the leader of the world’s most popular search engine has also been a guest at The White House to discuss policy alongside some of the country’s top economists and financiers. Although Schmidt quickly took his name out of the running to become CTO of the USA after Obama was elected, today, he’s been officially named to a new role: that of a member of President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

That group, according to a statement issued today by The White House, will advise the President on “[formulating] policy in the many areas where understanding of science, technology, and innovation is key to strengthening our economy and forming policy that works for the American people.” It’s worth noting that Craig Mundie, Chief Research and Strategy Officer at Microsoft, is also on the list of advisers, so fear of Google getting unfair sway with the nation’s Chief Executive are probably a bit unfounded. Nonetheless, it probably doesn’t sit well with those that think Google already has just a bit too much power that the company’s CEO will now have a seat at the President’s table in a role that will clearly help define tech policy going forward.

Can news find a business model in the digital age? (by Edward Wasserman, Miami Herald)
For a century or so newspapers in the United States relied on the patronage of political parties; many papers abroad still do. In the 19th-century parties were replaced by the makers of consumer goods, who are now abandoning news media in favor of e-commerce sites and search-engine advertising. Who are the new subsidizers? In the [new] Op-Ed model it’s the contributing journalists themselves. Either they’re donating their work outright or they’re selling it for a fraction of what reporters who were making a living from it would need. Either way, the journalists are paying.

It’s not an ideal setup, but then, every subsidy system has its own drawbacks and distortions — partisan corruption when the parties ran the press, slobbering over local capitalists when the advertisers wrote the checks. With the Op-Ed model, it’ll be very hard to ensure coherence and consistency in coverage, let alone quality. It’ll also be difficult to keep people around long enough for them to develop depth and understanding if they must steal the time from their off-hours — or their day jobs — to keep the sites stocked with news. Worse, the problem of conflict of interest is huge and virtually endemic.
There’s conflict of interest and the potential for corruption in every situation where there’s only one source of revenue.  That’s why a combination of sources may be the best solution.

Sun-Times editor: You need reporters at the listening posts of the city and suburbs every day
“You need to back them up with decent salaries and health insurance and legal muscle when people start spraying you with subpoenas,” says Sun-Times editor-in-chief Don Hayner… “It is not a thousand disparate voices online lacking clarity and cohesion that will ferret out all the news. It is an organization that can pay someone to be on those beats day in and day out to systematically harvest the news.”

Mass. Congressional Delegation Urges NYT Co. to ‘Preserve’ Globe
Most of the Massachusetts congressional delegation, including Senators Edward M. Kennedy and John F. Kerry, have sent a letter to New York Times Co. chairman Arthur Sulzberger, expressing concerns about the threatened shutdown of the Boston Globe.

Politicos’ appeal to save the Globe poses a conflict
In a letter to Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Massachusetts lawmakers urge the Times “to treat the The Globe fairly and to work together on a solution to this immediate crisis that preserves the future of the newspaper.” The politicos probably acted with the best intentions, says j-school dean and ex-editor Tom Fiedler, but still “it poses a conflict for the Globe in some sense because clearly you have people who are being covered carefully by the Globe, especially its Washington bureau, weighing in on the paper’s fate.”

Murdoch’s Journal Threatens to Regain No. 1 Circ Spot
The Wall Street Journal is threatening to reclaim its weekday circulation crown from USA Today for the first time since September 1999. If USA Today falls another two percentage points while The Journal holds steady, The Journal will once again claim the largest paid weekday circulation in the U.S.

Politico Challenges the Post (by Jon Friedman at Marketwatch)
Forget the Democrats versus the Republicans or the Red State-Blue State rivalry. In the District of Columbia, the juiciest smackdown these days pits the established Washington Post against upstart Politico.com to see who will lead political coverage in the Beltway.

Investors Bet on Small-Market Papers
While big newspapers across the country fight for survival, the slice of the industry that serves small markets is drawing new investment from industry veterans. The buyers’ confidence reflects the divide between big-city papers and their relatively healthier brethren in smaller cities and towns.

Few former P-I subscribers have canceled their Seattle Times subscriptions
Times circulation veep Alan Fisco says only about 2% of 74,000 former Post-Intelligencer subscribers have chosen to cancel their subscriptions since the March 18 transition to one newspaper in Seattle.

NYT Co. May Sell Classical Radio Station
Beethoven and Bach could become the latest victims of the New York Times Co.’s financial crisis. Rumors are raging that top suits have discussed putting classical radio station WQXR (96.3 FM) on the block to shore up the company’s dwindling cash stash.

Forty Star-Ledger Buyout-Takers Launch News Site
So what do you do when you have lots of newspaper experience and a year’s salary from a recent buyout? You start a Web site. That seems to be the view of some 40 former Star-Ledger staffers who took a lucrative early retirement last fall and have since formed NewJerseyNewsroom.com.

NY Sun Considers Business Plan for Site
The New York Sun, defunct since September, has been publishing a bit lately online, and former editor Seth Lipsky said there’s a business plan for the site in the formative stages. Lipsky said not to read too much into the initial online items: “These are just some very, very early bulbs of spring (or late winter).”

Former Star-Ledger journalists launch news site
About 40 journalists who took the Star-Ledger’s buyout are now working for newjerseynewsroom.com, which mixes original reporting with links to other sites.

Baltimore Sun lays off several editors, more cuts expected
A Baltimore media blog reports those laid off include deputy managing editor Paul Moore, editorial page editor Ann LoLordo, op-ed editor Larry Williams, medical/science editor Patricia Fanning, copy desk chief John McIntyre, and several others.

NYT, Newspaper Guild agree to 5% pay cut
The Times will save $4.5 million if the union membership approves the deal. Non-union employees at the Times and other New York Times Co. properties had their pay cut earlier this month.

Chicago Tribune tries to keep laid-off reporter’s award
Two days after she was laid off from the Chicago Tribune, reporter Melissa Isaacson won the press club’s Best Feature Story award. “By the time she made her way up front to accept her plaque it had disappeared,” writes Michael Miner. “That’s because [Tribune managing editor Jane] Hirt (left) had hopped up from the Tribune table next to the dais to claim it for the Tribune. Isaacson tells Miner: “My friends asked me later if I got to bask in any of the applause, but there was no basking. I had to go find my award.”

Earnings: Time Warner Meets Expectations, Including AOL’s 23 Percent Rev Decline (Paid Content)
Time Warner reported results in line with expectations this morning: revenue declined 7 percent to $6.9 billion, operating income declined 9 percent to $1.2 billion, and earnings per share from continuing operations was $0.46.  As expected, advertising-reliant Time Inc. and AOL drove much of the declines, while cable-oriented Turner and HBO buoying the results with single-digit revenue gains.  Here are the highlights:

McGraw-Hill Media Division Profits Plunge 76%
BusinessWeek publisher McGraw-Hill reported a first quarter 2009 operating profit of $103.7 million, down 22.1 percent. McGraw-Hill’s media division saw profits plunge 76.4 percent to $2.8 million, compared to the same period in 2008.

Penton Cuts Workweek, Pay
Penton Media has reduced its workweek from five days to four, effective the week before Memorial Day through the week before Labor Day. The b-to-b publisher will also reduce employees’ pay. In a memo, CEO Sharon Rowlands said the first quarter was “the toughest in my business career.”

Portfolio R.I.P.
Portfolio, the two-year-old Conde Nast business monthly, was shut down yesterday morning. Portfolio launched two years ago with a large budget and a slew of big-name contributors. Its high profile made Portfolio the target of endless speculation from media watchers.

Portfolio would have suffered even in a so-so economy
That’s because the magazine was ill-conceived from the start, says James Ledbetter. “Anyone paying attention to the business journalism genre over the past decade would have realized that you can’t cover this world in a timely way if you publish only once a month.”

More Nasty News Ahead at Conde?
The demise of Portfolio has not halted the sense of unease inside Conde Nast. Many staffers are nervously watching for what might come in July, when Vogue, Vanity Fair, GQ, Glamour, and others that have largely escaped the 5 percent reduction in staff, will be shipping their September issues.

Earnings: Meredith Profits Plunge 45 Percent; Revs Drop 14 Percent (Paid Content)
Women’s magazine publisher Meredith Corp. saw Q1 net income sink 45 percent to $25.4 million ($0.56 per share) as revenues fell 14 percent to $338 million. The publisher of Ladies Home Journal and Better Homes & Gardens said ad revenues continued to be hit hard by the recession. Publishing ad revs declined 12 percent, while broadcast ad dollars tumbled 31 percent, due to lower automotive spending along with weakness in the Phoenix and Las Vegas markets.

Source Interlink to File for Chapter 11
Source Interlink Cos., publisher of Motor Trend, Automobile and Hot Rod, is expected to file for a pre-packaged Chapter 11 bankruptcy today, which will remove Ron Burkle’s Yucaipa Cos. as a shareholder and allow the company to get out from under nearly $1 billion of its $1.5 billion debt load.

Earnings: IAC Swings To Loss; Q1 Rev Dropped 10 Percent; Media & Advertising Down 22 Percent (Paid Content)
Barry Diller’s IAC lost $3.2 million on $332 million in revenue during the first quarter, part of a mixed batch of results that shows improvements in some areas but continued weakness in search and advertising. Revenue dropped 10 percent in the first quarter, down from $370.7 million in the same quarter last year—and that’s almost good given that revenue from the Media & Advertising segment, which accounts for nearly half of IAC’s haul, was down a whopping 22 percent.

Clear Channel Cutting 590 Radio Jobs
Clear Channel Communications Inc., the largest owner of U.S. radio stations, said Tuesday it is cutting 590 jobs, including some on-air personalities, in its second round of mass layoffs this year amid pressure from the recession and evaporating advertising budgets.

CBS’ TV.com Sees Surge in Video Audience
CBS’ significantly redesigned TV.com has seen its video audience skyrocket, as the former reference site has become a consistent destination for full-episode viewing of TV shows. TV.com’s unique viewer base soared by 401 percent to 3.5 million users from February to March.

MTV Bets on British Model for Daily Culture Show
MTV has been without a show that has defined pop culture since the demise of Total Request Live and is betting on a 25-year-old British model who dates a rock star to help fill that void. The Alexa Chung Show will be a mix of celebrity talk, music, and online interaction with viewers.

Sales Of Blu-Ray, Digital Downloads Up Big In First Quarter (Paid Content)
Some new kids on the block in home-entertainment continue to grow rapidly. Sales of Blu-Ray HD more than doubled in the first quarter, while digital downloads were up 19 percent, according to a report from the Digital Entertainment Group. Both formats are still a small piece of the overall pie—DVD sales were $2.9 billion in the quarter versus $230 million for Blu-Ray and $487 million for digital downloads. But Blu-Ray’s sales were up 400 percent last year, for a total of $750 million, and companies like Netflix and Blockbuster continue to make inroads against traditional DVD sales with digital delivery of home movies.

Hulu Overtakes Yahoo as Third Most-Watched Internet Video Site
Hulu.com was the third most-watched Internet video destination last month, overtaking Yahoo Inc. Hulu, whose owners include News Corp. and General Electric Co.’s NBC Universal, showed 380 million videos in March, compared with Yahoo’s fourth-place 335 million.

MLB.com By The Numbers: Subscription Sales Up 45 Percent; Nearly $1 Million From iPhone (Paid Content)
Three weeks into the 2009 baseball season, MLB.com is doing a lot better than Major League Baseball’s other New York-based franchises. According to numbers released by the league’s digital business MLBAM, subscription sales are up nearly 46 percent year-over-year to 400,000-plus for premium live game products MLB.TV and Gameday Audio. (MLBAM doesn’t break out the subscribers between video and audio or monthly and annual.) With that increase, it’s not surprising that video delivery is up, too—127.2 million streams, up 136 percent over 53.8 million in the first three weeks of the 2008 season.
Click through for additional highlights.

Technorati’s Blogcritics Gets A Makeover (Paid Content)
One of the web’s oldest online magazines, Blogcritics.org, is set to get a makeover Tuesday. The long list of text links to blog posts on the site’s front page has been replaced by an airy, photo-filled layout… [W]ith the redesign, Blogcritics, known mostly for its arts and culture reviews, hopes to attract additional advertisers and visitors. Blogcritcs’ 15 editors edit all posts before they are posted on the site. It’s a compromise between the heavily edited content on newspaper sites and the unedited posts on most blogs. With the makeover, writers’ profiles will now get more attention, with longer biographies and soon links to social media sites.

Shopflick Fuses Fashion With YouTube and Amazon (by Ben Parr at Mashable)
Shopflick is an interesting hybrid of YouTube, Amazon, and social networking. The website is dedicated to anyone who loves fashion (clothing, accessories, and jewelery primarily), indie goods, and shopping for them. Its primary purpose is to help you purchase fashionable items, but with far more information and entertainment than you’ll find at most shopping websites… Videos appear all across the website. If the item was featured in a show, a YouTube video will be available as well as photos of the item. This helps the fashion-savvy shopper see the item “in action” on a runway.

My favorite video feature, though, has to be “Meet the Designer,” which appears as a tab on almost every item. It provides a video interview or introduction from the designers of the product you are wearing. It’s easy to fall in love with a great designer in the world of fashion, and Shopflick has made sure it’s easy to follow your favorite designers with videos, designer-specific stores, and social features.

AOL’s Socialthing for Websites Ties it All Together (Mashable)
When AOL acquired lifestreaming service Socialthing back in August 2008, it actually had an idea what to do with it (it doesn’t always happen, you know). They’ve just launched Socialthing for Websites, which spreads the lifestreaming service over all websites that are willing to integrate it. It works like this: add Socialthing for Websites to your website, and you get a simple navigation bar at the bottom of the page. Through this interface, your visitors get a unified sign-on, the ability to chat and send instant messages with their friends, as well as syndication of data from other social networks (AOL’s own Bebo, as well as Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and others).

How Old Media Publishers Plan to Keep You on Their Sites (Paid Content)
Apture is an interesting service that enables site owners to add their own content-rich link icons to articles and blog posts – these little icons next to links allow users to hover over them to view a map, or a YouTube video, or a Wikipedia article related to the link. For instance, a link to a Flickr photo might have a camera icon next to it – hover over it to see the entire photo pop up in a widget without leaving the page. Likewise, a link to the music site Imeem adds a speaker icon and lets you play the music file in a pop up widget. Today Apture is announcing an important relationship with Reuters.com to place these multimedia widgets in its text.
I HATE those popups. Why don’t they make them dependent on a right click, or some other action by the user?

More Facebook On the Desktop: Xobni in Outlook (Mashable)
It hasn’t [been long] since Facebook opened up its developer API stream, but companies and applications have already jumped on the opportunity by expanding the functionality of their products. Just today, we’ve already highlighted the upcoming Facebook updates by Seesmic Desktop that will utilize the new Open Stream API. Now, email management software Xobni, which we featured as a great implementation of Facebook Connect, has taken advantage of the new features as well… [I]t will be possible to see the news feed items of your Facebook friends inside of Microsoft Outlook.

Xobni is a desktop software that creates profiles of all of your contacts, organizes them, and integrates with social networks and IM within Microsoft Outlook. It already integrates with Facebook, LinkedIn, and other networks by providing a way to look through social networking contacts. With the new additions Xobni is putting out later tonight, it will be possible to browse through the activities of your friends, comment on feed items, and like feed items, all from within the mail client.

Firefox 3.5 Beta 4 Now Available (Mashable)
The latest Firefox beta is called 3.5 beta 4, and although it sounds like a major change from the current stable version, it’s really just a successor to ye olde 3.1 beta. Thus, expect improvements, but don’t expect wonders. However, the good news is that this should be the last beta before the final version of Firefox 3.5 is out. Private browsing is one of those long-sought features that everyone else has, and although Mozilla has been testing it for a while now, it’s one of the “big” features in the latest beta. Besides private browsing mode, which lets you choose whether you want Firefox to retain possibly sensitive browsing data with one click.
Click through for highlights of additional features.

Microsoft Vine is Twitter for Emergencies (Mashable)
Microsoft has an early beta of a new product called Vine. Currently available for beta testers in Seattle, it’s a location-aware social networking application focused on being a robust means of local communication that’ll work even in times of emergency. It’s a desktop client (available for Windows only), and you can also post to it via e-mail or SMS. It gathers local news from 20,000 sources and displays it on a map. It lets you post alerts (short messages) and reports (longer posts). Finally, it integrates with Facebook, while Twitter integration will be added at a later date… Vine [offers] a lot that Twitter doesn’t. However, both Twitter and Facebook are growing extremely fast, and Vine is still in early beta. If Microsoft lets it linger too long, it might never catch up.

60% of Twitter Users Quit Within the First Month (Mashable)
We’re hearing some pretty amazing statistics about Twitter these days: growth from February 2008 to February 2009 was reportedly 1382%, with the incline increasing yet further in recent months. But like many social networks, it seems many people lose steam with the service. Stat tracking firm Nielsen reports today that a full 60% of users who sign up fail to return the following month. And in the 12 months “pre-Oprah”, retention rates were even lower: only 30% returned the next month. That’s good news, to some degree: retention rates have increased over time. But how does Twitter’s retention rate compare to Facebook and MySpace in the early days? Not well, says Nielsen.

Amazon Acquires Popular iPhone E-Reader App Stanza (Paid Content)
A small but potentially mighty acquisition by Amazon, which has picked up e-reader start-up Lexcycle and its popular iPhone application Stanza… Stanza is more than an iPhone app; it’s a desktop e-reader app for Mac and PC and a store for books. But it’s the iPhone app that grabbed people’s attention, allowing them to move beyond a browser experience into reader-friendly digital books via Apple’s iPhone or iTouch and prompting more than a half-million downloads in the first few months. Roughly 10 months after its July 2008 launch for iPhone, Stanza claims more than 1.5 million users.

Rapid Emergence of Vertical Ad Networks for Reaching Engaged, Targeted Audiences
comScore, Inc. … released the results of a study of vertical ad networks, which target ads to specific audiences online according to demographic or category content. Vertical ad networks include entities such as Adify Media, Federated Media, Glam Media and Travel Ad Network, among numerous others. The study showed that the collective reach of vertical ad networks tracked by comScore has increased substantially in the past year, from 21.5 percent of the total U.S. Internet audience in March 2008 to 57.1 percent in March 2009.

NBC.com Rolls Out Some New Video-Ad Options (Paid Content)
Since online video is the only advertising segment showing any real health these days, NBC.com is giving that area a little more concentration lately. It hopes to woo more sponsors to its site, especially as the network upfront season approaches, with a few new ad options for marketers and agencies… Advertisers will have the choice of six different placements for their video sponsorship. Among NBC.com’s new offerings are the pushdown, which lets users click to expand; the push-back, which begins as a 300×50 rollover and can also be enlarged to 300×250 with a user’s click; the homepage framing rail ad; a photo slide show unit; and pop-out ad player. And for some light targeting, there’s the “choose an ad,” which will showcase an array of different product lines from one advertiser.

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Greenpeace (thanks to a tip from Alegre)

After an Off Year, Wall Street Pay Is Bouncing Back‎ (New York Times)
The rest of the nation may be getting back to basics, but on Wall Street, paychecks still come with a golden promise. Workers at the largest financial institutions are on track to earn as much money this year as they did before the financial crisis began, because of the strong start of the year for bank profits. Even as the industry’s compensation has been put in the spotlight for being so high at a time when many banks have received taxpayer help, six of the biggest banks set aside over $36 billion in the first quarter to pay their employees, according to a review of financial statements. If that pace continues all year, the money set aside for compensation suggests that workers at many banks will see their pay — much of it in bonuses — recover from the lows of last year.
We give them billions of dollars after they failed miserably, they “lose” the month of December so that they can pretend to be making profits, and the Masters of the Universe still get their gigantic bonuses?  Ain’t it always the story?

Money for Nothing (by Paul Krugman)
From the 1930s until around 1980 banking was a staid, rather boring business that paid no better, on average, than other industries, yet kept the economy’s wheels turning. So why did some bankers suddenly begin making vast fortunes? It was, we were told, a reward for their creativity — for financial innovation. At this point, however, it’s hard to think of any major recent financial innovations that actually aided society, as opposed to being new, improved ways to blow bubbles, evade regulations and implement de facto Ponzi schemes…

One can argue that it’s necessary to rescue Wall Street to protect the economy as a whole — and in fact I agree. But given all that taxpayer money on the line, financial firms should be acting like public utilities, not returning to the practices and paychecks of 2007. Furthermore, paying vast sums to wheeler-dealers isn’t just outrageous; it’s dangerous. Why, after all, did bankers take such huge risks? Because success — or even the temporary appearance of success — offered such gigantic rewards: even executives who blew up their companies could and did walk away with hundreds of millions. Now we’re seeing similar rewards offered to people who can play their risky games with federal backing…

We can only hope that our leaders … carry through with real reform. In 2008, overpaid bankers taking big risks with other people’s money brought the world economy to its knees. The last thing we need is to give them a chance to do it all over again.

Good Government and Animal Spirits (by George A, Akerlof and Robert J. Shiller, thanks to Economist’s View)
An understanding of animal spirits — the human psychology and culture at the heart of economic activity — confirms the need for restoring the role of regulators… [W]ith animal spirits, waves of optimism and pessimism cause large-scale changes in aggregate demand… When demand goes down, unemployment rises. It is the role of the government to mute those changes… Its role is not to harness animal spirits but really to set them free, to allow them to be maximally creative… The challenge for the Obama administration, along with the U.S. Congress and our SROs, is to invent a new and better American version of the capitalist game.
Presuming that “creative” is what our masters want us to be…

Creativity, convention, and tradition (by Daniel Little at Understanding Society, thanks to Economist’s View)
[H]ere is an apparent conundrum of creativity and convention. Any performance or artistic work that is wholly determined by the relevant conventions is, for that reason, wholly uncreative… But … novelty without regard to the frame of tradition is incomprehensible and meaningless…

It is relevant here that we are led to refer to the audience. Because cultural products require the conveying of meaning; and communication of meaning requires some reference to conventions shared with the audience — whether in music, painting, literature, or hiphop. Meaning of any cultural performance is inherently public, and this means there have to be publicly shared standards of interpretation. The audience can only interpret the performance by relating it to some set of conventions or other. These may be conventions of representation, structure, or mythology; but the audience needs some clues in order to be able to “read” the work.
I’m thinking that the same is true in political commentary and persuasion. You can’t get too far ahead of the audience, or they will reject what you have to say. I wish I had the skill to help people get from what they want to believe to believing what is actually true, but I’m too blunt. It seems to be embedded in my DNA.

Oh, hey, it’s not just me:
The Sensible People Do Love Their Conventional Wisdom (by Susie at Suburban Guerilla)
I sometimes think the reason I’ve never really gotten that much recognition in the blogosphere is because I’ve never trusted sensible opinion and made no bones about it. And since I wasn’t seeking a career in Democratic punditry, I had no incentive to even simulate that trust. The fact that I’m not deferential to my betters has always been a problem in terms of career advancement. Oh well! It sucks to be Cassandra.

Meltdown notes: Beware Obama — and the guy AFTER Obama (by Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire)
If you want to know what will soon hit America, look at Dubai… Dubai teaches us just how callous rich people truly are. Unchained capitalism inevitably forges the chains of slavery. If and when Obama fails, a well-organized propaganda campaign will tell us that socialism has failed, even though socialism was never tried. We will be told — repeatedly — that the only solution is libertarianism, a.k.a. Milton Friedmanism. Propagandists always portray free market fundamentalism as the great untried panacea. In fact, it has been tried again and again — and it has failed again and again.

Free market fundamentalism is not the answer — unless the question is : What got us into this mess? I fear Obama. But I fear the guy coming after Obama far more. I don’t know his name, but I can give you his job description. He’ll be a salesman. He’ll be a charmer, as the best salesmen always are. I can already see his reassuring smile, I can already hear his patter, and I can already sense the scheme that lies behind the spiel. And I know his task: Turn America into Dubai.

But it doesn’t HAVE to be that way:
When textbook macro pays off (by Dani Rodrik, thanks to Economist’s View)
Macroeconomics doesn’t get much plaudits around now, but here is a real-life story that should hearten those who think the field is really broken.  It concerns Andres Velasco, a distinguished macroeconomist who is currently the minister of finance in Chile, and who also happens to be a good friend, colleague and co-author. Until the current crisis hit, Chile’s economy was booming, fueled in part by high world prices for copper, its leading export… Being fully aware of Latin America’s commodity boom-and-bust-cycles and recognizing that high copper prices were temporary, Velasco stood his ground and decided to do what any good macroeconomist would do:  smooth intertemporal consumption by saving most of the copper surplus.  He ran up the largest fiscal surpluses Chile has seen in modern times…

The surpluses accumulated during the good years has given the Chilean government unusual latitude in responding to the [current financial] crisis.  As a result, the economy is doing much better than its peers.  As Bloomberg reports, “the country’s economy is expected to grow 0.1 percent in 2009, as the region contracts 1.5 percent, according to the International Monetary Fund.” And does good economics pay off politically?  Eventually, yes.  Five months after being burned in effigy, Velasco is currently President Bachelet’s most popular minister.
I had a dream last night about seven fat cows and seven lean cows—oh wait, that story’s already been told.  Why can’t we save during the fat years to support us in the lean years, instead of the other way around?  Talk about your Ponzi schemes!

Before Tea, Thank Your Lucky Stars, by Robert Frank, Commentary, NY Times, thanks to Economist’s View)
THE link between success and luck is stronger than many people think… Contrary to what many parents tell their children, talent and hard work are neither necessary nor sufficient for economic success. It helps to be talented and hard-working, of course, yet some people enjoy spectacular success despite having neither attribute. (Lip-synching members of boy bands? Money managers who bet clients’ retirement savings on subprime-mortgage-backed securities?)

Far more numerous are talented people who work very hard, only to achieve modest earnings. There are hundreds of them for every skilled, perseverant person who strikes it rich — disparities that often stem from random events… Financially successful tax protesters seem blissfully unaware of how incredibly fortunate they are. To borrow from the late Ann Richards and her description of the first President Bush, they were born on third base and thought they’d hit a triple.
Long time readers: have I not been saying this for years? Why are liberals not conducting education campaigns to make people understand this important point? And to realize that the more you own, the more you benefit from the existence of government and its services? Which justifies higher rates of tax for people who own a lot.

Markets Cheer Stress Test Double Speak (by Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism)
Forgive me for sounding even crankier than usual, but the reason deception sells is that so many people line up for it.[*] [Emphasis added.] The release claiming to describe how the stress tests were conducted in fact provided no new information… Financial stocks did well on the belief that most of the big banks would get clean bills of health. But that was the plan from the outset, to validate that the system was more or less OK so that if the poor chump taxpayer had to stump up more money, it could be positioned as due to completely unforeseen events (thanks to having put on very big blinkers) yet still a good risk. 

The cheer seems a naive view. Citi is far from out of the woods, with a half trillion of foreign deposits, plus roughly $1 trillion in off balance sheet exposures (remember those SIVs, the watchword of late 2007?). Dislocation there would have far bigger ramifications. The Financial Times, looking at more or less the same fact set, comes to less upbeat conclusions. Is this the result of being further from the spinmeisters?
*As I said after last year’s election, “Most of the people WANT TO BE FOOLED most of the time.”

The lying will continue until confidence improves (by lambert at Corrente)
[T]he whole point of the stress tests is that they are a lie. The whole point is to lie, have everyone know it’s a lie, and get away with it; the worst kind of power trip imaginable. Only when our banksters are sure that they can keep lying — about their balance sheets, about their business practices, about their deals, about their fees, about their salaries — will “confidence” be restored. To the banksters, that is the very definition of confidence. Rahm already told us this, in the clearest possible language.

Bill Moyers’ Journal…–Simon Johnson and Michael Perino, author of new book on Pecora Commission, for the hour (by jawbone at Corrente)
Michael Perino, the author, seems less audacious than Simon (or Krugman or Stiglitz). This is a comment which sort of grew into live blogging of the discussion, but, fortunately, Moyers will have an excellent transcript up soon and the video is available at his site. While this financial failure has it’s own peculiarities, it’s still very much the same old/same old. Perino, the author of the book, is saying there’s a danger of going overboard, that just recently the questions have changed from “what went wrong” to “who caused this.” Moyers pushed back on that, saying aren’t both important.

Bear, AIG Dumped $74 Billion in Subprime, CDOs on Fed (Bloomberg)
The Federal Reserve took on more than $74 billion in subprime mortgages, depreciating commercial leases and other assets after Bear Stearns Cos. and American International Group Inc. collapsed. In its biggest disclosure of the securities accepted to stabilize capital markets, the Fed said yesterday it had unrealized losses of $9.6 billion on the assets as of Dec. 31. The bonds, swaps and notes were taken in from Bear Stearns, once the fifth-biggest Wall Street firm by capitalization, and AIG, which had been the world’s largest insurer… The central bank lent $2 trillion to financial institutions and hasn’t disclosed information about most of the collateral backing those loans.
We are proud, PROUD owners of toxic assets, and so happy that our masters don’t burden us with the silly details of what we bought.

Why don’t we turn the banks into regulated public utilities? (by lambert at Corrente)
James Kwak in Baseline Scenario quotes Nicholas Brady, of all people: “I believe that we need a simpler system centered on deposit-based banks. Under this approach, individual accounts in the depository banks would continue to be protected up to $250,000 and these banks would have access to the country’s central bank. These institutions would not be allowed to participate in markets involving inordinate leverage or equity transactions that would risk their deposit-protecting charter… First we should just come out and say it: the financial system that led us to the brink of disaster is broken.”

I don’t think that for Summers, Geithner, Emmanuel, or Obama, the idea that the financial system is broken is even on the table. The entire Obama administration plan — the stress tests, PPIP, the whole contraption — seems designed to let us avoid taking the truth serum, ever. It’s not going to work. And the insiders know this.

Where Are The Pitchforks? (by Susie at Suburban Guerilla)
John Emerson (h/t Avedon): “If there was ever a time for pitchfork populism, it’s right now. Unemployment is past 8% and still rising, and most people have seen a third to half of their retirement money disappear, and this was all the result of multimillionaires’ financial machinations. But so far we haven’t seen much public rage… Someone is going to be blamed, and the Republicans have figured out who: Clinton and Obama. But the Democrats are staying above the battle and refuse to ‘play the blame game’. This responsible, patrician, professional approach hasn’t worked for the Democrats for thirty or forty years, not even during normal times, and it’s certainly not going to work now. But the Democrats don’t realize this, and they’re so committed to their cool, professionalism that are unlikely to be able to deal with the politics of the impending disaster at all.”

At least there was a bit of action at the IMF meeting:
Protesters, police clash near IMF meetings in DC (AP)
More than 100 protesters upset with the way world leaders have handled the economic crisis clashed with police Saturday outside the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings. Authorities used batons and pepper spray when activists tried to march onto a prohibited street, and several people were pushed to the ground by police. The protesters swarmed officers unexpectedly, and police had to respond, said D.C. police Capt. Jeffrey Herold… Protesters claimed police responded without warning.

Finance Chiefs Back a Bolder IMF, Bigger Role for Emerging Nations (Washington Post)
Global financial chiefs agreed yesterday to reshape the International Monetary Fund, moving to broaden its mission and accelerate plans to give developing giants including China, Brazil and India more say within the institution. The IMF, which in recent years had become largely an advisory body to nations in crisis, will now be charged with aggressive monitoring of the global economy. Underscoring that role, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said yesterday that Washington had consented to a rigorous IMF review of the U.S. financial system for the first time since the fund was created at the end of World War II.

Health care happening (by Paul Krugman)
OK, it looks as if major health care reform is actually going to happen. Democrats have agreed that if Republicans try to block reform in the Senate, they will use the reconciliation process to bypass a filibuster. Republicans will, of course, scream that this is a terrible, terrible thing — something they themselves would never have done — except, of course, to cut food stamps, pass both major Bush tax cuts, and more. We’ll still have to see what the reform looks like — especially whether the public plan survives. But kudos to the Obama administration and the Democratic leadership: this is the big one, and so far it looks very, very good.

I can’t be as sanguine as the good perfesser:
Max Baucus can’t read polls (by DCblogger at Corrente)
I listened to a stomach-turningly dishonest colloquy with Senator Max Baucus last night on NPR. Baucus declared he wouldn’t “waste (his) time” fighting for universal care which had no political support. As we know, a majority of Americans and a majority of doctors support a Medicare for All system.

Health care reform (by Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire)
Health care reform is actually possible. The Republicans cannot filibuster. For the first time in my memory, the single-payer option is viable. Unfortunately, Obama and Pelosi seem wedded to the idea of keeping private insurers — otherwise known as USELESS LEECHES – in the system. Read this Corrente piece. A single payer activist has received the following feedback from Capitol Hill: “…Pelosi’s aide: ‘Where are the phone calls, e-mails and faxes in support of single-payer? Speaker Pelosi has been in favor of single-payer for a long time. Now make us do it.’”

Will calls and faxes do the trick? I’m captious, but I also believe in doing everything we can. Go here and learn how to do what needs to be done.  Inundate Pelosi’s office. Demand single payer. ALL DAY MONDAY, call her office and say “I want single payer!” Then call your own representative (if you do not live in Nancy’s district). Don’t let Nancy Pelosi get away with pretending that the people have not spoken. Make it clear — to her and to history — that if she does not put single payer on the table, she acts against the will of the people. [Emphasis added.]

Waterboarding Song Is Surprisingly Enjoyable (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
Jonathan Mann, he of the Paul Krugman tribute pop song, is back with a new tune on waterboarding. Actually, Mann uploads a new song every day, but this is the first one Dick Cheney can rock out to on the way to Starbucks each morning.
Click through to watch the video.  It really is good.

Spies Come Out to Criticize Memos’ Release (ABC News)
Former Bush CIA chief Porter Goss said in an op-ed [last week], that the Obama administration had “crossed the line” by releasing the memos. “We can’t have a secret intelligence service, if we keep giving away all the secrets,” he wrote. Goss excoriates lawmakers who say they were never given a full and clear picture about the interrogation tactics the CIA was considering using against high value terrorist suspects in U.S. detention. “In the fall of 2002, while I was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, senior members of Congress were briefed on the CIA’s ‘high value terrorist program,’ including the development of ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ and what those techniques were,” he wrote.

Colleen Rowley blogs about torture… (by Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire)
The 9/11 FBI whistleblower makes a guest appearance on BradBlog…, and her piece is a must-read. She quotes another former FBI agent, Ali Soufan: “There was no actionable intelligence gained from using enhanced interrogation techniques on Abu Zubaydah that wasn’t, or couldn’t have been, gained from regular tactics. In addition, I saw that using these alternative methods on other terrorists backfired on more than a few occasions — all of which are still classified. We have some idea as to nature of the backfiring, as when Khaled Sheikh Muhammed ‘confessed’ to a plot to destroy a building that had not been built at the time of his capture.”

Those who allow the occasional bit of paranoid speculation to color their worldview tend to suspect that false confessions were the point of Bush administration torture

Most Ops Officers Condemn Torture (by Larry Johnson, formerly with the CIA and the State Department, an international security expert)
There are a few apologists masquerading as “CIA veterans” touting the virtues of torture. But if you pick beneath the surface the so-called veterans–Mark Lowenthal and Marc Thiessen in particular–have zero field experience and really know nothing of how our men and women who serve overseas go about gathering intelligence. I am more impressed by the voices of those who have long experience in the field and know what it takes to get reliable information about potential threats. Who? Men like Ray Close (who served honorably for years in the Middle East as a Chief of Station), Haviland Smith (a retired CIA Station Chief who served in East and West Europe, the Middle East and as Chief of the Counterterrorism Staff), Milt Bearden (who helped organize the Afghan resistance against the Soviets) and Tyler Drumheller (former Chief of the European Division)…

If Americans want to listen to political clowns and hacks like Dick Cheney and Marc Thiessen, so be it. But know this. No American can delude themselves with the lie that most CIA field officers who actually work against these targets believe torture efficacious or moral.

The real test:
Torture and truthiness (by Joe Conason, Salon)
If Dick Cheney believes he can prove that torture saved us from terrorist attacks, why does he oppose a full investigation?

Upping the ante:
Freedom of Disinformation (by Joseph C. Wilson IV, writing at the Daily Beast)
Dick Cheney has called for declassifying memos he claims will vindicate the Bush administration’s torture policy. Now former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV urges the former vice president to extend his demand for transparency to his still-secret testimony in the Scooter Libby obstruction of justice case.

Military agency warned Bush administration in 2002 that its interrogation program was ‘torture.’ (Think Progress)
In a July 2002 document uncovered by the Washington Post, the military’s Joint Personnel Recovery Agency warned that the Bush administration’s interrogation program was “torture” and that it would produce “unreliable information.” JPRA is the military agency that ran the program known as Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE), “which trains pilots and others to resist hostile questioning.” JPRA warned in the 2002 document: The unintended consequence of a U.S. policy that provides for the torture of prisoners is that it could be used by our adversaries as justification for the torture of captured U.S. personnel.

Top of the Heap: The Democrats’ Teachable Moment on Torture (by Chris Floyd at Empire Burlesque)
Here is one of the most clear-cut points of national decision and self-definition that can be imagined. Clear, credible evidence of atrocity and conspiracy has been produced. The course prescribed by law is clear: criminal investigation and, if warranted, prosecution. If, as you claim, your state is founded upon the rule of law, then there simply is no choice in the matter: the torture program and all of its perpetrators, facilitators and instigators must be subjected to the due process of law, without fear or favor. If this does not happen, then your state, however modernized and sophisticated, is nothing but a gilded barbarism, a gangland, where the brute force of money, privilege and power hold tyrannical sway. There is no law, only the triumph of the will of corrupt and criminal factions as they preen and jostle for position atop a fetid heap of blood and filth.

President Barack Obama and the Democratic leaders have now openly joined the long-time Republican resistance to applying the law of the land to the torture program. What lesson, then, are we to take from this “teachable moment”? What does this decision, this act of self-definition, say about the true nature of the American system of government today? Where does it put our righteous, noble, God-professing leaders? Why, on top of that stinking heap, of course!

Amid Outcry on Memo, Signer’s Private Regret (Washington Post)
“I’ve heard him express regret at the contents of the memo,” said a fellow legal scholar and longtime friend, who spoke on the condition of anonymity while offering remarks that might appear as “piling on.” “I’ve heard him express regret that the memo was misused. I’ve heard him express regret at the lack of context — of the enormous pressure and the enormous time pressure that he was under. And anyone would have regrets simply because of the notoriety.”
Misused? Lack of context? Sorry he got caught? No way this man should be a federal judge.

Podesta Calls For Bybee Impeachment On CNN, Delivers Your Petitions To Congress (Think Progress)
Appearing on CNN’s State of the Union [Sunday] morning, Center for American Progress Action Fund President and CEO John Podesta called on Congress to commence impeachment hearings against Jay Bybee, should he decide not to voluntarily resign his seat on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals… Podesta added that he suspects the White House doesn’t agree with the call for impeaching Bybee. The other panelists — David Gergen and former Reagan chief of staff Ken Duberstein — disagreed with the call for impeachment.
Click through to watch the video.

Bybee’s ‘remoteness from the actual torturers’ increases his ‘degree of responsibility.’ (Think Progress)
Jon Eisenberg, one of the lawyers who is representing the plaintiffs in a case challenging Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program, writes in the Philadephia Inquirer today that Jay Bybee’s “remoteness from the actual torturers increases his degree of responsibility”: “Bybee did not write the torture memo he signed; it was written by John Yoo, then at the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel and currently a law school professor… Far from absolving him of guilt, his remoteness from the actual torturers – his thoughtlessness – increases the degree of his responsibility. His is a special kind of evil – the evil of nonchalance where there should be outrage.”

Appeals court rejects lawsuit by Guantanamo detainees (Boston Globe)
A federal appeals court yesterday for a second time rejected a lawsuit by Guantanamo Bay detainees who say they were tortured and denied religious rights… The Court of Appeals in Washington ruled against the detainees early last year, saying because the men were foreigners held outside the United States, they do not fall within the definition of a “person” protected by the act… [Emphasis added.] [Saturday], the appeals court reached the same conclusion… The Obama administration supported the case’s dismissal, arguing that holding military officials liable for their treatment of prisoners could cause them to make future decisions based on fear of litigation rather than appropriate military policy.

So the military should never, ever think about the possibility of being brought to justice if they do things that are morally wrong, no matter what they might have been told by a superior?  Not the standard I’d like to see.

Politics and the English language at WaPo (by lambert at Corrente)
When you get mildew, it’s never just one plant. Whatever rotted Broder’s sensibility and conscience infests everything. Take a look at this front page teaser today from Pravda on the Potomac:

It’s all here, isn’t it? All wrapped up in one little compact package.

Obama wants to limit the legal rights of all of us, not just the detainees:
Obama legal team wants to limit defendants’ rights (AP)
The Obama administration is asking the Supreme Court to overrule a 23 year-old decision that stopped police from initiating questions unless a defendant’s lawyer is present, the latest stance that has disappointed civil rights and civil liberties groups… Since taking office, Obama has drawn criticism for backing the continued imprisonment of enemy combatants in Afghanistan without trial, invoking the “state secrets” privilege to avoid releasing information in lawsuits and limiting the rights of prisoners to test genetic evidence used to convict them.

Unions See Specter Opening, Dangle Electoral Help For EFCA Vote (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
With poll numbers showing Sen. Arlen Specter in dangerous electoral water, union officials have begun presenting what amounts to a “get-out-of-jail-free” card for the Pennsylvania Republican: Recant your opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act, pledge to support the labor-backed bill, and we might be able to carry you to reelection… The senator’s abruptly-declared opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act was supposed to stop the bleeding he was experiencing among more conservative Pennsylvanians. Now, with evidence suggesting the opposite, union officials see an opening to win his vote back.

FEC Report: PACs Doubled Independent Expenditures for ‘08 Races (OpenSecrets.org)
Special interests appear to have made an unparalleled pre-emptive strike in the 2008 election cycle as they anticipated which legislative battles they’d face this year. According to an extensive report released by the Federal Election Commission today, political action committees spent $135.2 million on independent expenditures in the last election cycle in an attempt either to seat the congressional candidates and presidential hopefuls that would best promote their agenda or to defeat those they thought would not. That’s a 250 percent increase over their independent expenditures in the 2006 election cycle and a 100 percent increase over what they spent to influence elections in the last presidential election cycle in 2004.

Not surprisingly, the largest chunk of those independent expenditures ($58.6 million) came from labor unions, which were gearing up for another fight over the Employee Free Choice Act, a bill that would give workers more options for ways to unionize, including by collecting signatures from a majority of employees.
Click through for highlights of the findings.

GOP sees lessons, silver lining in Tedisco loss (The Hill)
“If you look at the recent voting in this district, having the race end in a virtual tie was pretty damned impressive,” said one House Republican leadership aide. “Would I rather have won than lost in the end?  Sure, but we should remember that this is the sort of Northeastern district where we got crushed in November of ’06 and ’08.  Getting to a push is real progress.” Though they expressed disappointment at the results, GOP officials like National Republican Congressional Committee chairman Pete Sessions (R-Texas) and Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele said they saw progress being made.

“The Republican Party must be competitive in districts like NY-20 if we are going to regain our Congressional majorities,” Steele said in a statement released Friday. “While we were unsuccessful in this race, the combined efforts of our candidate, the national and state parties and NRCC show that the GOP is going to invest the resources necessary to regain our majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.”
I, too, am surprised they came so close.  And I still can’t believe that Obama beat McCain by such a small margin—only because of the ginned up hysteria over the economy, the October Surprise that gave the election to Obama so that the Republicans could blame all of Bush’s failures on him. Which they’re now doing.  While the Democrats, as always, sit on their hands.

Masters of disaster (by Paul Krugman)
So Bobby Jindal makes fun of “volcano monitoring”, and soon afterwards Mt. Redoubt erupts. Susan Collins makes sure that funds for pandemic protection are stripped from the stimulus bill, and the swine quickly attack. What else did the right oppose recently? I just want enough information to take cover.

Texas governor’s secession talk a laughing matter on Capitol Hill‎ (Miami Herald)
There’s been an almost universal reaction in the halls of Congress to Gov. Rick Perry’s suggestion that Texas maybe, oughta, secede from the union. Laughter. “It’s known as a joking matter up here,” said Rep. Gene Green, D-Texas, who chuckled when he was asked about it earlier this week. “It doesn’t present Texas in the best way.”
Is this what Obama meant when he said he would change the tone in Washington, that Democrats could now laugh freely at legitimate concerns expressed by conservatives?  Perry didn’t say Texas would secede, the story is that “Gov. Perry Backs Resolution Affirming Texas’ Sovereignty Under 10th Amendment”.  But we must laugh, because we are all sixth graders now.

Secessionist Gov. Rick Perry asks for federal help to deal with swine flu. (Think Progress)
Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX), who was last making headlines for suggesting that Texas may consider seceding from the Union, is requesting help from the federal government to deal with a possible swine flu pandemic: Gov. Rick Perry [Sunday] in a precautionary measure requested the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provide 37,430 courses of antiviral medications from the Strategic National Stockpile to Texas to prevent the spread of swine flu. Currently, three cases of swine flu have been confirmed in Texas.
Think Progress is pretty consistently accurate, but as we saw above, Gov. Perry did not talk about seceding. But it’s hypocritical of him to talk about reserving rights while asking for more money from the federal government.

In GOP base, a ‘rebellion brewing’ (Politico, thanks to Alegre)
There was Sen. John McCain’s daughter and his campaign manager who last week demanded that their fellow Republicans embrace same-sex marriage. Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman – the most devoted modernizer among the party’s 2012 hopefuls – won approving words from New York Times columnist Frank Rich for his call to downplay divisive values issues. The party’s top elected leaders in Congress, meanwhile, spooked by being attacked as the “party of no,” were recasting themselves as a constructive, respectful opposition to a popular president.

But outside Washington, the reality is very different. Rank-and-file Republicans remain, by all indications, staunchly conservative, and they appear to have no desire to moderate their views. GOP activists and operatives say they hear intense anger at the White House and at the party’s own leaders on familiar issues – taxes, homosexuality, and immigration. Within the party, conservative groups have grown stronger absent the emergence of any organized moderate faction.

Antiabortion movement gets a new-media twist (Los Angeles Times)
Lila Rose, a UCLA student, goes undercover at Planned Parenthood clinics to pose as an underage girl pregnant by a 31-year-old. Her surreptitious videos go on YouTube, and inspire outrage.

George W Bush think tank plan provokes controversy as he begins to raise cash (The Telegraph)
Academics at SMU have mostly welcomed the plan to host Mr Bush’s presidential library, which will eventually house all the documents from his eight-year administration and be run impartially by the National Archive. But they fear that the George W.Bush Policy Institute – whose goal is to “further the domestic and international goals of the Bush administration” – will become a vehicle for propaganda, not least about the Iraq war.

Professor Thomas Knock, a noted historian and expert on presidential and diplomatic history, told The New York Times that the prospect of a George W.Bush policy institute within the walls of SMU that was “in no way beholden to academic principles or standards, responsible only to itself”, appalled him and many of his colleagues as well.

Obama May Sweep Aside TV Schedule  (Washington Post, thanks to Alegre)
President Obama might take an additional $9 million to $10 million out of the purse of the broadcast TV industry when he stages another of his news conferences next week to talk about his efforts to bail out the banking and automotive industries… Obama’s camp is asking for the 8 p.m. hour this coming Wednesday. That date, not coincidentally, marks his 100th day in office. He is expected to use the news conference to take control of the inevitable 100-days-in-office news-cycle blather — first-100-days navel-gazing being a time-honored journalistic tradition. Sadly for broadcasters, April 29 — Wednesday — also falls in the May sweeps ratings derby, which started last night.

Can CNN compete effectively with news delivered more or less straight?
Competitors and even some of CNN’s own staffers say recent trends suggest the answer may be no. “The people who watch these channels are news junkies,” MSNBC president Phil Griffin tells Bill Carter. “They’ve already had access to the headlines all day long on the Internet. In prime time you’ve got to stand out and make a splash.”
Because we need more performers and fewer reporters, don’t we?  Do you think Walter Cronkite ever worried about making a splash?

What’s the journalistic benefit of Atlantic owner’s off-the-record dinners? (Poynter Online)
David Bradley’s catered gatherings for journalists and newsmakers sound rather cozy, writes Howard Kurtz, “like some secret-handshake gathering of an entrenched elite. Are the top-level officials, strategists and foreign leaders there for serious questioning or risk-free spin sessions? And what exactly is the journalistic benefit if the visitors are protected by a shield of anonymity?”

Bronstein gives Dowd a tour of SF places where journalism had had an impact (Poynter Online)
They swing by police headquarters, the Castro, and the Giants’ ballpark. Phil Bronstein ends the tour by telling Maureen Dowd. “For people who still love print, who like to hold it, feel it, rustle it, tear stuff out, do their I. F. Stone thing, it’s important to remember that people are living longer. That’s the most hopeful thing you can say about print journalism, that old people are living longer.”

Sisyphus Shrugged – columnist fails to recognize mouldering corpse of undead irony, which then eats her brain (thanks to Susie at Suburban Guerilla)
[Y]ou, Maureen Dowd, are the woman who mainstreamed snark. So you kind of own the commentary career of William Kristol. You were the precipitating cause of Dana Milbank’s decline from a damn good reporter into someone who thinks the readers of his paper tune in to monitor the production of his gall bladder, and the godmother of Ron Fournier’s figleaf attempt to disguise naked political partisanship as a fearless determination to remain unspun. You, Red, are a shining symbol of the royal road to success that lies in writing low-content trash which amuses the folks your publisher or your great and good friend the managing editor network with.

And here’s the thing – lots of folks, now that they don’t have to write journalism with standards any more, are better at it than you are. They’re also younger and hungrier, and while they may not all have the sterling family political connections that got you your shot at the big time over others equally young and hungry who had to start a bit lower down the food chain, a lot of them are funnier, and smarter, and didn’t spend the last eight years writing think pieces about Hillary’s fat ankles.

As a matter of fact, since you don’t necessarily need a research department or actual reporting to do what you do, many of the people who are better than you at it write for blogs. After you, the deluge, sunshine. Hope you wore your hipboots.

Times Suppressed News of William F. Buckley’s Suicide Impulse (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
Christopher Buckley’s family tell-all has already made him some enemies. Will people look more kindly on the writer’s crusade to break the news of his father’s suicide urge? Buckley told the Washington Post his memoir has eroded his standing within Manhattan society, even prior to its release. It depicts his father Willilam F. Buckley Jr. relieving himself out of a car window, ditching Christopher’s Yale graduation in boredom and, apparently suffering dementia, planning a party for dead associates. The book also reveals that the conservative icon considered suicide in his last days, amid emphysema and a heavy regimen of pills, before heeding the Catholic Church’s prohibition against the act.

It turns out Sam Tanenhaus of the New York Times Book Review nearly broke this news first in the Times, two days after William F. Buckley’s February death — until Christopher Buckley strong-armed him… Instead, the news appeared weeks later in the gossip section of the New York Post, a seemingly odd venue for someone trying to protect his father’s image against sensationalism (the headline: “BILL BUCKLEY’S MORBID END”). The item was careful to credit Buckley’s book. Go figure.
The son of the Father of Modern Conservatism was another early Obama supporter.

FactCheck posted these new items during the week ending April 24, 2009 (Follow links to read complete answers)

Q: Did Obama delay the rescue of Captain Phillips?
A:  No. Military officials say that the claims being made in a widely circulated chain e-mail are false.

Q: Have 84 members of Congress been arrested for drunk driving in the last year? Have seven been arrested for fraud?
A: We judge these statistics to be not credible. They originated nearly a decade ago with a Web site that still refuses to provide any proof or documentation, or even to name those accused.

Congress and Progress
A liberal group’s ad claims Republicans in Congress oppose “progress.”

Helen Was Right
Veteran reporter Thomas got Obama’s bio right; press secretary Gibbs was wrong.

Hot Air on “This Week”
Rep. Boehner claims carbon dioxide isn’t “harmful to our environment.”

Drugs: To Legalize or Not (by Steven B. Duke, professor of law at Yale Law School, writing in the Wall Street Journal)
Decriminalizing the possession and use of marijuana would raise billions in taxes and eliminate much of the profits that fuel bloodshed and violence in Mexico.
Don’t go making SENSE, now!

The Original Bernie Madoff (by Frank Partnoy, Professor of Law and Finance at the University of San Diego, writing at the Daily Beast)
The forgotten saga of Ivar Kreuger—a financial fraudster from the 1920s who spun lies to friends and investors, was put under surveillance in his Park Avenue apartment, and sparked an epic bankruptcy scandal— provides valuable lessons for today’s economic crisis.

High school hell is great fodder for games
War is hell, but a few savvy developers have figured out an even more hellish and heart-pounding backdrop for games: high school. Bullets whizzing past your head? Pshaw. Just try surviving the cafeteria.
High school hell is great fodder for suicides.

Commentary: Addressing harassment and suicide prevention in schools
The affect of language and behavior can be deadly, especially in a school environment where young people are already highly impressionable and vulnerable. Unfortunately, this difficult lesson has been conveyed many times when young people resort to drastic and permanent measures to escape the despair of enduring constant bullying and harassment at school.

What if Susan Boyle Couldn’t Sing? (by Dennis Palumbo, Huffington Post)
Like millions of viewers, I was thrilled and moved when 47-year-old Susan Boyle wowed the judges and audience on Britain’s Got Talent with her superb singing. As everyone knows by now, the unmarried, “never been kissed” woman from a small village was greeted by both the audience and the talent show’s judges with derision when she first took the stage… Then Susan opened her mouth and sang. And her voice was so powerful, so achingly beautiful, so full of yearning, that even the usually heartless Simon Cowell was blown away. As were the other judges, and the audience, all of whom gave Susan a standing ovation. And now, online and elsewhere, Susan’s voice, and the story of her triumph on that stage, are known throughout the world…

But I can’t help wondering, what would have been the reaction if Susan Boyle couldn’t sing?… Would we still acknowledge that the derisive treatment she received before performing was callous, insensitive and cruel? The unspoken message of this whole episode is that, since Susan Boyle has a wonderful talent, we were wrong to judge her based on her looks and demeanor. Meaning what? That if she couldn’t sing so well, we were correct to judge her on that basis? That demeaning someone whose looks don’t match our impossible, media-reinforced standards of beauty is perfectly okay, unless some mitigating circumstance makes us re-think our opinion?
I guess I’ve heard the song, “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” most of my life, but one day—I don’t even remember when—it struck me as a pretty sad commentary on the other reindeer. They made fun of Rudolph until Santa gave his stamp of approval to Rudolph’s special gift. So it took intervention from a higher authority for the reindeer to appreciate Rudolph. Before that, they had bullied and shunned him. According to the song, it’s just great and wonderful that the other reindeer started loving Rudolph and letting him play their games.  They never had to learn a damn thing, so what will happen when the next unusual reindeer comes along? I hate that song now, because I’ve seen too many instances where the higher authority never appeared, and the stupids just kept on being stupid.

Media Matters for America headlines

On Fox, McInerney criticizes Gates for proposed F-22 replacement without noting ties to aircraft subcontractor

AP reported that Gore “bragged” he read energy bill, but he was asked if he had done so

Claiming “[e]verybody supported” interrogation methods, Scarborough misrepresents Holder

Fox omits Republican role in Sebelius confirmation delay

National Journal’s Taylor latest to advance debunked Library Tower claim

Huckabee falsely claimed Obama “toying with … criminal prosecutions” for CIA interrogators

Goler reverses meaning of Obama quote to falsely suggest he supports European-style health care

Media reported GOP reconciliation criticisms, ignored their previous support for process

100 days of myths and falsehoods

NRO’s Hemingway gets history wrong in accusing Begala of botching facts

Commentary: Not much to celebrate on World Press Freedom Day (Editorial, Miami Herald)
Monday is World Press Freedom Day, but don’t expect a party. According to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 125 members of the press are being held in prisons around the world. China, as usual, is leading the pack with 28 behind bars and Cuba is second with 21. At least 11 journalists have been killed worldwide in 2009, and now American reporters in Iran and North Korea have become pawns in international negotiations.

Oklahoma Man Arrested for Twittering Tea Party Death Threats
An Oklahoma City man who announced on Twitter that he would turn an April 15 tax protest into a bloodbath was hit with a federal charge of making interstate threats last week, in what appears to be first criminal prosecution to stem from posts on the microblogging site.

Obama Passing New Law To Allow Searching of PC’s, Laptops, and Media Devices (video at AfterDowningStreet.org)

Judge in RealNetworks Case Seals Court‎
U.S. District Court judge Marilyn Hall Patel sealed the San Francisco courtroom Friday where RealNetworks and several Hollywood studios began squaring off over the issue of whether Real’s RealDVD software can be legally sold. The decision came as a result of a motion by the DVD Copy Control Association, who argued that public testimony of aspects of the CSS copy-control technology would violate trade secrets.

Update: Coach who banned student reporters apologizes for “unacceptable” behavior
University of Wisconsin-Whitewater head football coach Lance Leipold has apologized to the campus newspaper for his use of inappropriate language to a reporter and his banning of student reporters from covering the team. He promises to cooperate with the paper in the future, says a release.

J-schools should teach students how to be storytellers
“It’s easy to teach people to become recorders of events or repeaters, transferring a message from one source to another,” writes former Rocky editor John Temple. “It’s difficult to teach people how to become storytellers. And, yes, of course I mean ‘all-platform’ storytellers.”
Paging Bob Somerby, paging Bob Somerby!  Story telling by the media, instead of plain old reporting, is what has gotten us into so much trouble.

Sun-Times’ city hall reporter had 600+ bylined stories last year
“I can tell you her great frustration was that — in an era of shrinking newspapers — there wasn’t room for hundreds more she wanted to write,” writes Mark Brown. Longtime Sun-Times city hall reporter Fran Spielman receives the Chicago Headline Club’s Lifetime Achievement Award tonight.
Give the woman a blog, Sun-Times, so she can write as much as she wants to.

Drop in Newspaper Circulation Accelerates
The rate of decline in circulation at the nation’s newspapers has accelerated since last fall, with industry figures showing a more than 7 percent drop compared with the prior year.

Publishers Seize on iPhone as Great White Digital Hope for Print
Industry Progressing from Replicas of Issues to Formats Better Suited to Small Screen

Google CEO bats down rumors about getting into the content creation business
Sharon Waxman says Eric Schmidt repeats what he’s said before: Google isn’t interested in creating original content. In about six months, he says, the company will roll out a system that will bring high-quality news content to users without them actively looking for it, and hopes to sell premium ads against that premium content. News orgs, however, won’t see more money for supplying the content. || More Waxman: What Huffington has attempted is working.

AOL Gets Political—And More Professional—As Content Rollout Continues (Paid Content)
AOL has been reworking its content strategy yet again—BusinessWeek’s Jon Fine half-jokingly estimates the Time Warner unit is on its 72nd revamp since 2001—this time with an eye towards politics.PoliticsDaily.com is the latest blog being rolled out by the portal’s programming unit, MediaGlow. In a conversation last week with AOL programming SVP Marty Moe, the site is a bit different than the series of blogs it has been rolling out last year.

INDenverTimes Troubles May Signal Difficulty of Replicating Newsrooms (by Amy Gahran at Poynter Online)
Funders of INDenverTimes — the independent online-only startup founded by former employees of the Rocky Mountain News — announced today they will not move forward under the original business model but will explore a different model for the site, without some of the journalists who created it.

Execs Talk Compensation at Festival of Media
Agency CEOs Say It’s Time to Alter Payment Model, Relationships With Clients

At Newspapers, New Levels of Job Insecurity
The fast-shrinking newspaper business set a new standard for job insecurity in the last couple of weeks. Winning your profession’s highest honor does not mean you get to keep your job, and neither does taking a bullet while at work.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newsroom staffers approve 6.6% pay cut
The vote was 86 to 46. If Milwaukee Newspaper Guild members hadn’t approved the proposal on Thursday, Journal Sentinel was prepared to lay off more newsroom staffers at the end of April.

Star Tribune union says it has a tentative deal on “painful and distasteful” concessions
The tentative deal calls for a 3% pay cut; a wage freeze that extends to the end of the current contract, July 31, 2011; a two-day furlough in each of the next two years; and other concessions. The agreement, which needs membership approval, prevents a filing to terminate the union’s contract in bankruptcy court.

It’s Official (and Hacked): 4chan Founder Sweeps Time’s Top 100 List (Mashable)
The Internet has different rules. The folks at Time just learned about it in a very amusing way, as their third annual poll for the world’s most influential person was topped by moot A.K.A. Christopher Poole, founder of the legendary meme breeding forum 4chan… One can easily argue that 4chan is one of the most influential sites on the Internet… However, the results of the vote have nothing to do with influence. If you think that this is the result of a fair vote, think again. The entire first 21 results, as noted days ago, are the result of an elaborate hack done by 4chan users.

Tierney collected $1.175M in salary and bonuses in ‘08
That’s somewhat higher than previously disclosed. Philadelphia Media Holdings CEO Brian Tierney’s compensation included $650,000 in salary, a $350,000 bonus for 2008, a $175,000 bonus for 2007 and $81,000 in transportation costs. Court filings also show payments of $50,000 to an Internet consulting company Tierney’s son Brian Jr. co-owns. The company, Clipper Global, has no website or phone number.

Keller: “I’m a little puzzled by WSJ’s evolving identity”
“Some days the front page is mostly general-interest news, like a cross between the Times and USA Today,” NYT executive editor Bill Keller e-mails Scott Sherman. “Then the next day you get a front like today [March 12], when the lead story (’EBay Retreats in Web Retailing’) is clearly aimed at core business readers. Some days the tone is FT (a top-of-the-page curtain raiser on the G-20 summit); some days it is tabloid populist (lashing the million-dollar-bonus recipients at Merrill). …Maybe they hope we’ll all keep reading just to see how they resolve their identity crisis.”

Graham: WP bought Foreign Policy for its “very, very remarkable audience”
Erik Wemple asks: Why would a company in the midst of a tanking media economy snap up a property like Foreign Policy, which is running year-after-year losses in the millions of dollars? Washington Post Co. CEO Donald Graham explains: Foreign Policy has “attracted a very, very remarkable audience — a tremendous number of policy makers and foreign ministers that advertisers want to reach. We know a little bit about selling to such an audience.”

Empire of Martha Marches On
David Carr: Martha Stewart is prevented by law from running her company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. But you get the feeling that no one else is allowed to run it without her say-so, either. Stewart is still very much the creative maypole of the franchise.

It’s Still Called PRWeek, but It’s Going Monthly
The magazine is shrinking its format, adding longer feature articles and charging for its Web site.

Scientific American Cuts Workforce 5 Percent; Mag’s President, Editor Prepare To Leave (Paid Content)
Scientific American has laid off 5 percent of its staff and is losing its president and its editor, Folio reported. President Steven Yee is preparing to step down from his post this summer.  He told Folio that the decision was related to the magazine’s “transition” into parent Macmillan’s Nature Publishing Group. He plans to go into what he would only describe as a “design-related entrepreneurial venture.” Also, editor John Rennie will exit his post after 15 years at the magazine. Executive editor Mariette DiChristina will serve as acting editor-in-chief.

Esquire says prediction of its demise is wrong
Douglas McIntyre, who recently angered many editors and publishers with his prediction that their papers will go under, has now targeted Esquire. He says the magazine won’t survive the downturn, which the Hearst title denies. “The Esquire brand has shown stunning vitality in the recent past,” say the editors.

Hearst Enters The Modern Age, Orders Agencies To Submit All Ads Via Portal (Paid Content)
Hearst Magazines has created an online portal—not for users, but for advertisers and agencies. AdAge notes the mag publishers is compelling marketers and agencies to send all advertising through its portal and will no longer accept ads delivered physically. The system will be fully in place this summer. Hearst hopes to make it easier to place ads across its various properties by requiring standard, uniform settings on the ads. This is also the idea behind the Online Publishers Association’s test of three distinct display ad formats.

Hearst also wants to give more flexibility to the lead time for when its print mags can accept ads. Magazines can lose potential revenue when an ad is submitted too late for publication and has to be dropped. The publisher has tried to reform the process and claims some success already. Hearst execs tell AdAge that Cosmopolitan’s has cut the lead time down from 48 days to 28 days. It expects to cut more when the system is in place.

Condé Nast Closes Portfolio Magazine
Portfolio, a business magazine that Condé Nast began publishing in April 2007 with much fanfare, will cease publication immediately.

Sirius Debt Challenges Aside, Satellite Radio Has Largely Lived Up To Expectations (by Rory Maher at Paid Content)
Sirius XM Satellite Radio has had an interesting 2009: it fended off rumors its burdensome debt would send it into bankruptcy, then reported that Q408 subscriber additions had plummeted. But, while the company’s debt issues have fueled speculation about the viability of its business, few reports explore whether the satellite radio industry as a whole has achieved success as a viable consumer product. With that in mind, I compared forecasts from one of the original analyst reports on satellite radio—published in 2002…—with benchmarks the industry achieved in 2008. The result may be surprising to some who have been negative on the industry’s prospects: it largely has lived up to expectations set way back in 2002, when the satellites were first being sent into orbit.

How Network TV Will Reinvent Itself (by Ronald Grover and Tom Lowry, Business Week)
For decades network TV has been about reach. Programmers traditionally chose shows with broad appeal, the better to get millions of viewers and, in turn, persuade national advertisers to buy those eyeballs. That era is essentially over and the networks are scrambling to adapt to a fragmented landscape where even popular shows are lucky to pull in 10 million viewers… In time, TV networks likely will start to look more like cable channels that have built audiences based on shows that cater to specific groups.
I’m no expert, but it seems to me that everyone in media needs to start thinking smaller, and that goes for book publishing, movie and TV show making, and maybe everything else, too. Think about works produced with smaller budgets—but many with higher quality, because no one is pretending to appeal to everyone. Aiming to recoup the cost of each production with maybe a small profit could be a viable business model.  And now and then there might be the lagniappe of a breakout hit that appeals to a vast audience.

For Fox, a Contest Offers a Chance to Hunt for the Next Big TV Show
In a partnership with the New York Television Festival, the network will solicit scripts from aspiring writers.

Facebook Makes It Easier For Developers To Play With Its Data (Paid Content)
Facebook is slated to give third-party developers like Playdom and LivingSocial greater access to its data—loosening the restrictions on the kinds of data they can pull into their applications, as well as what the apps can do with that info… Inside Facebook suggests that Facebook will let developers piggyback off of members’ “shared items,” or the articles, videos and other content that they post to their profiles; access to this info would give developers a better read on when and where specific content like videos and news articles started to “go viral,” and could help them create apps with more longevity.

Alaskans using Twitter to call out bad drivers
Forget about waving fists and wagging middle fingers, a few Alaska motorists are venting road rage with something more high tech: Twitter.

Online Video Ad Spend Still On Track To Generate $1 Billion By 2011 (Paid Content)
While ad spending in general craters, online video is still growing despite experiencing a significant slowdown. Interpublic Group’s Magna forecasts the US market for online video will grow by 32 percent this year, rising from $531 million in 2008 to $699 million in 2009.

Lambient Media
In U.K., Selling Train Tickets Using Sheep as Billboards

U.K. Insurer Says, ‘Help Yourself’
PruHealth Teams With JCDecaux Innovate to Dispense Free Goodies With a Message

Verizon 1st-qtr profit, revenue beat expectations
Verizon Communications Inc. said Monday its earnings grew 5 percent in the first quarter, boosted by its acquisition of Alltel Corp. and strong demand for its wireless, Internet and TV services.

Internet users ’could suffer brownouts due to YouTube and iPlayer’‎
Internet users will endure slower and less reliable connections from next year as websites such as YouTube and the BBC’s iPlayer cause online traffic to double, experts warn.

One Internet Village, Divided: In Developing Countries, Web Grows Without Profit
To serve emerging markets, companies like YouTube need to invest in expensive servers, but ad revenue for those countries doesn’t cover those additional costs.

G.E.’s Breakthrough Can Put 100 DVDs on a Disc
Experts say the breakthrough holds the promise of being a big step forward in digital storage with a wide range of potential uses.

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Larry Summers falls asleep during Obama’s meeting with credit card executives. (Think Progress)
[Thursday] President Obama met with credit card industry officials at the White House. After the meeting, he pledged to push for a law that would offer “strong and reliable” protections for credit card users in the United States. He called the session with the industry executives “open and productive conversation.” However, one person who seemed less than interested in the meeting was White House economic adviser Larry Summers, who fell asleep.

What, me worry?

Obama tells bankers: End credit card abuses (McClatchy)
Armed with letters from Americans hit hard by soaring credit card fees and rates, President Barack Obama warned credit card executives Thursday that he’d happily sign into law tough new regulations that are working their way through Congress.

Where Credit Is Due (by Jake Tapper at Political Punch, ABC News)
Sitting in the Roosevelt room in the private meeting, Mr. Obama told the executives that every day he reads 10 letters, winnowed from the thousands the White House receives…, and on average one of the 10 is someone complaining about unfair credit card company practices…

Mr. Obama outlined four core proposals that he’d like to see:
• Banning unfair rate increases and forbidding abusive fees and penalties;
• “No more fine print; no more confusing terms and conditions”;
• Having every credit card company “issue a plain- vanilla, easy-to-understand, simplest-terms-possible credit card as a default credit card that the average user can feel comfortable with”; and
• Requiring more accountability in the system, more effective oversight and more effective enforcement.

Some of the attendees from the credit card industry said the meeting was more “political theater” than anything else, more for the cameras than about substance.
Right.  Stopping gouging can’t possibly be about substance.

The Great Credit Card Battle To Come (by Robert Reich)
[G]etting tough on the banks’ credit card lending practices has [great] appeal for the Administration, politically. It puts the White House on the side of the people rather than Wall Street, on an issue that the public is becoming more and more upset about. And the Administration’s push could be enough to get reform legislation through Congress.

The bankers [were to] tell Obama [Thursday] that any new con[s]traints on credit card lending will cause the banks to reduce the amount of credit card lending they do, which will hurt the economy. But it’s a weak argument because it presupposes that any lending is good for the economy — even lending to people who don’t know what they’re getting into and can’t repay the loans. It’s the same argument banks used two years ago, when pre[s]cient observers warned that constraints had to be placed on mortgage lending practices. What may hurt the economy in the short term, we now know, may save it from even larger pitfalls to come.
I’m reminded of the arguments over fighting climate change. The anti-change forces say that any attempt to mitigate the consequences of pumping tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere will slow down the economy. But sometimes making an investment slows things down in the short run while paving the way for a huge new industry to establish itself. The objections aren’t based in science or even rationality, they’re based in partisan strategery. Right wingers are afraid of any success that might be attributed to any other ideology but theirs, so they believe must fight the fight against climate change. As Jared Diamond showed us in Collapse, when ideology stops people from facing the truth about their environment, the environment wins devastating victories.

Think about the choices: If we do something about climate change, we may slow the economy (more), but there’s a good chance of building a whole new economy with a sound basis on alternative energy sources; if we do nothing, all life on earth could be destroyed. That’s no choice at all, except to the dogmatically blind.

The evidence is starting to come in, evidence that will be denied, skewed, and rejected by the ideological right:
Cap-and-Trade Program Creates Green Jobs (Scientific American, thanks to Economist’s View)
The cap-and-trade program created by 11 Northeastern states has begun to deliver revenues that are being used to pay the salaries of new “green collar” workers

How denialism works (The Edge of the American West, thanks to Economist’s View)
The problem with Politico reporting of Amity Shlaes’s Forgotten Man that

Critics of the book, including economist Paul Krugman and historian Eric Rauchway, have challenged Shlaes’ use of data, noting, for example, that the unemployment statistics she uses do not count Works Progress Administration jobs. Shlaes defends her approach, arguing that make-work jobs are not evidence of economic growth and noting that President Barack Obama recently used the same data series she did in discussing unemployment during the Great Depression.

is not that it’s “they-said, she-said” journalism, but that it’s an inadequate representation of the truth. It’s not just Shlaes versus a famously shrill Nobelist and some dude at an ag university; it’s Shlaes versus the accepted academic consensus.

As previously noted, if you were a sufficiently honest and competent researcher located like Amity Shlaes near any number of world-class reference libraries simply out to find out the unemployment rate in the 1930s, you would not find the data Shlaes cites; you would find, in the authoritative reference work, an explanation of why it’s not best to cite the data Shlaes cites. Shlaes has to go out of her way to find other data… This may seem rather similar to the method used to deny that tobacco use causes cancer, or that human action promotes global warming: by making something seem complicated, by saying, well, there’s disagreement, Shlaes and other denialists undermine the entire academic enterprise.
Yes, and the same tactics are used to undermine the entire public discourse, as well. The national media have been helping Republicans win this wretched game for many years.

The Recovery to Come (by James K. Galbraith, thanks to Economist’s View)
Will what went down, come back up?… A future of short and incomplete expansions may be the most likely case, with no prospect for a return to full employment. For the working population of the country, this is no recovery at all. And it will be made all the worse [by] rising financial markets and premature declarations of victory, the gloating of the bailed-out… [Here are] four steps that would help to avert this future, and help to assure a long and relatively stable expansion, leading ultimately back to high employment.

- Treasury should change its bank plan, recognize that too-big-to-fail is also too-big-to-regulate, and too-big-to-regulate is also too-big-to-manage… Apart from the vast political power of the big banks, this is not a difficult choice.
- The unmet human disaster of this slump remains urgent, and the way to meet it is to strengthen, not weaken, the social safety net…
- For the long term, we should build institutions now, including a National Infrastructure Fund and a cabinet Department for Energy and Climate, capable of planning and funding the reconstruction of the country.  The point of this is to build expectations for a sustained expansion and also to give it a direction, charting the course that private investments will follow when they eventually return.
- Finally, we should recognize … that the rest of the world … lacks the mechanisms and the inclination to take action as we can… It is therefore quite possible that the rest of the world will not cooperate in economic recovery even if one gets started here. It is possible that credit, debt and exchange-rate crises still to come will overwhelm the capacity of the global system to cope. We should be prepared, if we can, to deal with that risk.

Government ultimatum sealed Merrill deal: Cuomo letter (MarketWatch)
The government threatened to oust Bank of America Chief Executive Ken Lewis if the bank didn’t go through with its acquisition of struggling investment bank Merrill Lynch, according to the results of an investigation by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo released Thursday. Hank Paulson, Treasury secretary at the time, told Lewis in December that the management and board of directors of Bank of America would be removed if the deal wasn’t closed, Cuomo said… Federal regulators also warned Lewis that a meltdown of the financial system could be triggered if the deal fell through.

Control without accountability (Interfluidity, thanks to Economist’s View)
It’s not exactly right to say that our don’t-ask-don’t-tell quasinationalization policy has given us “ownership but not control”. An assertive Treasury secretary has tremendous leverage over zombie bank managers. Instead, what we have is … control without accountability. An informal, unauditable, hydra-headed set of private managers and public officials controls how quasinationalized banks behave. Neither taxpayers nor shareholders have reason to believe that decisions are being taken in their interest. The informality and disunity of control impedes the kind of hands-on, detail-oriented supervision and risk management that ought to be the core preoccupation of bank managers. Exactly as opponents of nationalization feared, America’s large banks are poorly run behemoths that routinely make idiotic commercial decisions to satisfy tacit political mandates. No one really knows who is responsible for what.

And that’s not all that nobody can be held accountable for:
Government Watchdogs Warn of Lack of Oversight For Trillions in President’s New Spending Programs (by Jake Tapper and Matt Jaffe at Political Punch, ABC News)
The Government Accountability Office [Thursday] issued a report on the $787 billion stimulus bill called “RECOVERY ACT: As Initial Implementation Unfolds in States and Localities, Continued Attention to Accountability Issues Is Essential.” The GAO study asserts that officials from most of the states surveyed “expressed concerns regarding the lack of Recovery Act funding provided for accountability and oversight. Due to fiscal constraints, many states reported significant declines in the number of oversight staff — limiting their ability to ensure proper implementation and management of Recovery Act funds.”

Because the economic downturn has led to “fiscal constraints, many states reported significant declines in the number of oversight staff, limiting their ability to ensure proper implementation and management of Recovery Act funds.”
States: Thanks for the billions! We’d just love to tell you how we spent it all, but we just can’t afford to!

Pelosi Briefed on Waterboarding in ‘02 (Politico)
Nancy Pelosi denies knowing U.S. officials used waterboarding — but GOP operatives are pointing to a 2007 Washington Post story which describes an hour-long 2002 briefing in which Pelosi was told about enhanced interrogation techniques in graphic detail. Two unnamed officials told the paper that Pelosi, then a member of the Democratic minority, didn’t raise substantial objections.

Stop Me Before I Vote Again

Democratic complicity and what “politicizing justice” really means (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
Bush-defending opponents of investigations and prosecutions think they’ve discovered a trump card:  the claim that Democratic leaders such as Nancy Pelosi, Jay Rockefeller and Jane Harman were briefed on the torture programs and assented to them.  The core assumption here – shared by most establishment pundits – is that the call for criminal investigations is nothing more than a partisan-driven desire to harm Republicans and Bush officials (”retribution”), and if they can show that some Democratic officials might be swept up in the inquiry, then, they assume, that will motivate investigation proponents to think twice… Most people who have spent the last several years (rather than the last several weeks) vehemently objecting to the Bush administration’s rampant criminality have been well aware of, and quite vocal about, the pervasive complicity of many key Democrats in this criminality…

The reality is exactly the opposite (as usual) of what is being depicted in our media discussions.  The call for criminal investigations of torture and other forms of government criminality is the most apolitical and non-partisan argument one can make.  The ones who are trying to politicize the justice system and exploit the rule of law for partisan gain are those who are arguing against criminal investigations.

Obama Administration to Release Detainee Abuse Photos; Former CIA Official Says Former Colleagues ‘Don’t Believe They Have Cover Anymore’ (Political Punch, ABC News)
In a letter from the Justice Department to a federal judge…, the Obama administration announced that the Pentagon would turn over to the American Civil Liberties Union 44 photographs showing detainee abuse of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq during the Bush administration. The photographs are part of a 2003 Freedom of Information Act request by the ACLU for all information relating to the treatment of detainees — the same battle that led, last week, to President Obama’s decision to release memos from the Bush Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel providing legal justifications for harsh interrogation methods that human rights groups call torture.

Courts had ruled against the Bush administration’s attempts to keep the photographs from public view. ACLU attorney Amrit Singh tells ABC News that “the fact that the Obama administration opted not to seek further review is a sign that it is committed to more transparency.” Singh added that the photographs “only underscore the need for a criminal investigation and prosecution if warranted” of U.S. officials responsible for the harsh treatment of detainees… Calling the ACLU push to release the photographs “prurient” and “reprehensible,” Dr. Mark M. Lowenthal, former Assistant Director of Central Intelligence for Analysis and Production, tells ABC News that the Obama administration should have taken the case all the way to the Supreme Court.
How “prurient” and “reprehensible” was the Starr Report? And it was about truly unimportant stuff.

A Brief History of Torture (The Daily Show)
Jon Stewart rips apart the media’s tortured logic on covering torture.

Pressure grows on Obama to call for interrogation panel (McClatchy)
If growing political pressure doesn’t subside soon, President Barack Obama may have to do something he’s resisted doing since he took office: support a new investigation into how the Bush-era CIA interrogated suspected terrorists using techniques that are widely considered torture.

Reclaiming America’s Soul (by Paul Krugman)
It’s hard … not to be cynical when some of the people who should have spoken out against what was happening, but didn’t, now declare that we should forget the whole era — for the sake of the country, of course. Sorry, but what we really should do for the sake of the country is have investigations both of torture and of the march to war. These investigations should, where appropriate, be followed by prosecutions — not out of vindictiveness, but because this is a nation of laws. We need to do this for the sake of our future. For this isn’t about looking backward, it’s about looking forward — because it’s about reclaiming America’s soul.

A Nation of Laws, Oh Yeah (by paradox at The Left Coaster)
I’d like to state this to all the obnoxious assholes who so stupidly called me an Angry Liberal all these years: I told you so. Oh yes, I told you when you ripped up the law to steal an election you empirically demonstrated to Bush he could break any law he liked, why the hell not, since he got his job that way… I doubt very much real adherence to The Law will ever occur in my lifetime, and after Bush vs. Gore my base respect for lawyers and their clownshow courthouses never will.

Extreme? Radical? Embittered? Angry? Jesus, take a look around: two heinous, stupid futile wars, felons everywhere for torture in them, a smashed economy in horrifying ruins, pride and reputation for country in utter shameful desolation. All for Georgie and Dick, all from treating the The Law like toilet paper with Bush vs. Gore… We are a nation of alleged laws we have desperate problems enforcing equally to a heinous, sickeningly hypocritical degree, and throwing Bush felons in prison would be a tiny start in actually living the Rule of Law in the United States. That I can live with.

U.S. Soldier Killed Herself — After Refusing to Take Part in Torture (by Greg Mitchell, Editor & Publisher, writing at the Huffington Post)
With each new revelation on U.S. torture in Iraq, Afghanistan and Gitmo (and who, knows, probably elsewhere), I am reminded of the chilling story of Alyssa Peterson, who I have written about numerous times in the past three years but now with especially sad relevance. Appalled when ordered to take part in interrogations that, no doubt, involved what we would call torture, she refused, then killed herself a few days later, in September 2003. Of course, we now know from the torture memos and the U.S. Senate committee probe and various new press reports, that the “Gitmo-izing” of Iraq was happening just at the time Alyssa got swept up in it. Alyssa Peterson was one of the first female soldiers killed in Iraq. A cover-up, naturally, followed.

Notes From Underground: Prosecution, Power and the Poison Chalice (by Chris Floyd at Empire Burlesque)
A reader writes…: “There might be another reason [why Obama is not calling for prosecutions on torture]: a desire to win the case that’s built against the former administration and not taint or discredit it by inappropriate pressure to prosecute… Elizabeth de la Vega, a former federal prosecutor who has been calling for criminal investigations of the Bush Administration for years, has written an excellent article posted at truthout.org. In it she writes: ‘No smart lawyer who secretly wanted this entire issue to disappear would have released those torture memos… He may actually want to make inroads into the system, not just righteously rail against it from the outskirts.’”

A response from the outskirts: An interesting viewpoint. But the idea of Obama’s calculated “non-interference” in the decision-making process on prosecutions for torture seems hard to square with his very public, very forthright statements that none of the actual, physical perpetrators of the torture under question — the CIA agents — will face prosecution for their actions… What’s more, the very torture statutes under which any prosecution would take place very specifically rule out Obama’s justification for not prosecuting the CIA agents, i.e., “We were only following orders,” or “The higher-ups said it was OK.”… Obama released memos that he was legally required to release, while at the same time making very public claims that the CIA perpetrators of the torture would not be prosecuted, and quieter, “deep background” claims to favored press outlets that the officials who ordered the torture would not be prosecuted either…

Note too that we are dealing here with only a miniscule aspect of the entire torture program, which was by no means confined to the CIA’s “high-profile detainees.” Thousands of Terror War captives remain in U.S. custody, including many in black-hole sites in Afghanistan — captive whom Obama is, at this very minute, seeking to strip of every single vestige of legal redress… Couple this with Obama’s recent court moves seeking not only to defend but to expand Bush’s claim of authoritarian executive power… [W]e have an expanding war, an expanding military, an even-more entrenched and coddled oligarchy, the reach for even more draconian executive powers. Where exactly are the radical “inroads into the system” in all of this?
Chris needs your help to continue his important work, as do all of us, even—no especially—in these hard times. When I tried to make Bush accountable, I was a communist.  Now that I’m trying to make Obama accountable, I’m a stupid, white trash racist.

Liz Cheney Claims Waterboading Isn’t Torture Because Similar Tactics Were Used In SERE Training (Think Progress)
On MSNBC[Thursday], former State Department official Liz Cheney, who is the daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney, defended the infamous Bush-era torture memos that were recently released by the Obama administration. “The tactics are not torture, we did not torture,” said Cheney. To support her claim that the brutal techniques, such as waterboarding, that were authorized by the memos are not torture, Cheney invoked the common conservative argument that the techniques were derived from special forces training called Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Evasion (SERE)… Later in the interview, Cheney insisted that “We did not torture our own people. These techniques are not torture.”
Standing up for her daddy, isn’t that sweet? Why is she given a platform?  Wasn’t she fired from the State Department for bringing a handgun to work? Click through to watch the video.

Gates supported release of torture memos. (Think Progress)
Following President Obama’s decision to release four Bush administration legal memos authorizing torture, former Bush CIA director Michael Hayden and former Bush attorney general Michael Mukasey co-authored an Wall Street Journal op-ed decrying the move as “a terrible problem for our national security.” But Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who served in the Bush administration and is also a former CIA director, told reporters today that he supported Obama’s decision: “Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates indicated Thursday that he supported the release of sensitive memos on detainee interrogation methods last week because he viewed their ultimate disclosure as inevitable.”

Bush’s FBI Chief Not Backing Off Torture Views (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
Robert Mueller, the Bush-appointed FBI director, is not backing away from his claim in a 2008 interview that torture has not foiled any terror attacks on America, a view that directly contradicts Dick Cheney’s claims. I asked Mueller’s spokesperson, John Miller, whether he wanted to revise or clarify his view, now that some time has passed since he first expressed it, and Miller declined comment. So Mueller’s claim stands.

Cao open to torture prosecutions. (Think Progress)
[T]he Times-Picayune reported that Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao (LA) is one of the few Republicans in Congress who have agreed that the door to possible prosecutions for torture architects in the Bush administration should be left open: “…Rep. Anh ‘Joseph’ Cao, R-New Orleans, whose father, a former South Vietnamese Army officer who spent seven years in a North Vietnamese re-education camp after the fall of South Vietnam, [said,] ‘I agree we have to look to the future, not the past, but if people broke the law, I believe that no one is above the law and if people violate the law they have to face the consequences of what the law dictates.’”

Cheney Succeeding In Shifting Torture Debate? (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
In case you’re wondering whether Dick Cheney and other former Bushies are succeeding in shifting the torture debate on to the narrow question of whether torture has “worked,” [click through to see the] headline, photo, and article in [Wednesday's] New York Times… This is precisely what Cheney and other Bushies want the debate to be about: Whether torture has stopped terror attacks, as opposed to whether it’s moral, or detrimental to America’s global image, or a boon to Al Qaeda recruitment, or whether the architects of the policy broke the law and should be prosecuted… [I]t’s easy for the Cheney camp to muddy the waters and turn this into a matter of debate by citing unspecified classified info that supposedly supports the claim that it has saved lives — info that we’ll never see.
These masters of propaganda and persuasion probably don’t even care how many people actually believe their lies.  As in the courtroom, they only care about throwing doubt into the mix.

Three key rules of media behavior shape their discussions of “the ‘torture’ debate” (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
Here are three key rules for Beltway media behavior that, as always, are shaping what they say and do:
(1) Any policy that Beltway elites dislike is demonized as coming from “the Left” or — in this case (following Karl Rove) – the “hard Left.”…
(2) Nobody is more opposed to transparency and disclosure of government secrets than establishment “journalists.”…
(3) The single most sacred Beltway belief is that elites are exempt from the rule of law…

That elite-protecting consensus is the central affliction of America’s political culture.  It explains not only how we continuously shield our elites from the consequences of their crimes, but also explains the reason such crimes keep happening.  If you constantly announce to a small group of people that they will be able to break the law with impunity, you are rendering inevitable future rampant criminality. That’s just obvious…

Torture memos and Bizarro World, cont’d (by Eric Boehlert at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
We noted [Wednesday] the oddity of the press turning the release of the scandalous Bush-era torture memo into a problem for the Obama administration. i.e. Process over substance. [Thursday], the AP breathlessly illustrates the peculiar trend: “Shifting rhetoric at the White House on prosecutions related to interrogation policies”… The AP then unfurls a tick-tock look back from Sunday to Tuesday as it roots around with a what-did-they-know-and-when-did-they-know-it narrative of the Obama White House, not, y’know, the one that actually ok’d the law-breaking.

WaPo’s Kane explains why his paper avoids the term “torture” (by Jamison Foser at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
Washington Post reporter Paul Kane explains the reluctance to use the word “torture” to describe torture:… “You can’t call someone a convicted murderer until he/she has actually been convicted.” Understand? Get it? The reason we say ‘alleged’ murder and things like that is for our own legal protection. So we can’t be sued for libel. Take a look at financial reports on the newspaper business. We’re not going to do anything that leads to us losing any more money these days. So who does the Post think is going to sue them for libel if they refer to torture as ‘torture’?  It doesn’t seem like there is a long line of people who participated in harsh interrogations torture who are eager to litigate their conduct, but maybe I’m wrong.

Politico’s torture-friendly framing (by Jamison Foser at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
Politico’s Josh Gerstein and Mike Allen, on the torture debate: “Obama as a candidate embraced the view that torture is both wrong and ineffective. But now that he has full access to the same top-secret documents cited by Cheney, the question cuts more sharply: Does he agree or disagree with Blair that coercive tactics produce valuable intelligence?”… [E]ven if you stipulate that the efficacy of torture is worth considering, Politico skews that question as well, setting it up as a question of whether torture can “produce valuable intelligence.” A better version might be “does it produce valuable intelligence that could not have been otherwise gained, and can that intelligence be readily distinguished from false leads?” A bicycle will get you from New York to San Francisco, but if you have to be there tomorrow, it isn’t a particularly good choice.

Gallup To Release Poll On Bush Investigations (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
The political establishment will soon have a better sense of where the public stands on investigating the Bush administration for the possible torture of detainees. An official at Gallup confirms that the polling firm will be conducting a survey this weekend on criminal investigations into the Bush years… The last time Gallup polled this issue was on February 12, when the firm found that 62 percent of the public supported some sort of investigation into the “possible use of torture in terror interrogation.” Thirty-eight percent favored a criminal investigation, 24 percent favored an investigation by an independent panel, and 34 percent said they favored neither.

The shaming of America (by Gene Lyons, Salon)
In a 2002 advisory, Jay S. Bybee, subsequently appointed to the U.S. 9th District Court of Appeals by President George W. Bush, notes dryly that the practice of “waterboarding” — recognized as torture since the Spanish Inquisition — “constitutes a threat of imminent death,” but says it’s nevertheless legal because it doesn’t cause “prolonged mental harm” in a psychologically healthy subject… So here’s my question: Would Bybee, in his capacity as a federal judge, uphold a murder conviction in which witnesses had been waterboarded? A rape confession? Would it be all right for police to induce confessions by keeping suspects awake for 11 days by shackling them naked in a standing position, dousing them with ice water and smashing their heads into a wall? How about cramming them into coffin-size boxes for weeks? He thought that appropriate for terror suspects… If he had a particle of shame, he’d resign.

Gonzales Intervened on Harman Wiretap (Political Wire)
The New York Times has more on the Jane Harman-wiretap story that CQ Politics broke this week: “The director of the Central Intelligence Agency concluded in late 2005 that a conversation picked up on a government wiretap was serious enough to require notifying Congressional leaders that Representative Jane Harman, Democrat of California, could become enmeshed in an investigation into Israeli influence in Washington, former government officials said Thursday. But Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales told the director of the agency, Porter J. Goss, to hold off on briefing lawmakers about the conversation, between Ms. Harman and an Israeli intelligence operative, despite a longstanding government policy to inform Congressional leaders quickly whenever a member of Congress could be a target of a national security investigation.”

The reason: “To protect Ms. Harman because they saw her as a valuable administration ally in urging The New York Times not to publish an article about the National Security Agency’s program of wiretapping without warrants.”

Republicans Stall Vote on Sebelius (Political Wire)
Senate Republicans refused today to allow a confirmation vote on his health secretary nominee Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, the Washington Post reports. She is the last Cabinet member awaiting Senate approval. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) objected, “arguing that lawmakers needed more time to consider her ‘fairly contentious’ selection. A handful of Republicans have complained about Sebelius’ support for abortion rights and her failure to report the full extent of campaign contributions she received from a physician who performs abortions.”

Remind me again why we’re kowtowing to the forced pregnancy loons? (by lambert at Corrente)
They’re holding Sibelius up, and confirming her is going to require 60 votes (translation: Filibuster, except it’s not a filibuster when Republicans do it, and we have a free press, and up is down). Anyhow, what Reid should do is let ‘em filibuster. But the old-fashioned way. Where they have bring in matresses to sleep on the Senate Floor and read The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire into the record for sixty hours. When your enemy’s drowning, throw ‘em an anvil.

Key Dem Senator Likely To Vote Against Anti-Bush Obama Legal Nominee (by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line)
Uh oh. This could signal real trouble for a key Obama nominee under assault by the right: Office of Legal Counsel chief Dawn Johnsen, a fierce Bush critic who would be at the center of the war over whether Obama will meaningfully reverse a host of Bush-era legal policies. Democratic Senator Ben Nelson is all but certain to vote against Johnsen, Nelson spokesperson Clay Westrope tells me. Westrope confirms that while Nelson will take into account any further information that emerges, the Senator cannot now envision a scenario under which he’d support her — potentially making it an uphill climb to get her confirmed.

Rick Reyes, The New John Kerry: Afghanistan Vet Speaks Out Against War Before Congress (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday hosted a hearing of compelling politics and historical parallels, as an Afghan war veteran offered critical testimony of that war in front of a committee chairman who had done the same during Vietnam… [R]etired Marine Corporal Rick Reyes … has chosen to go public with reservations about the scope and direction of the military strategy his government is pursuing in a difficult terrain. Having supported Barack Obama in the 2008 election, he now is deeply skeptical about the president’s decision to send 17,000 more troops to Afghanistan….

Nearly 38 years earlier, John Forbes Kerry was in a similar spot. Called before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the three-time recipient of the Purple Heart declared that an “attempt to justify the loss of one American life in Vietnam, Cambodia or Laos by linking such loss to the preservation of freedom, which those misfits supposedly abuse, is to us the height of criminal hypocrisy.”

Will Harry Reid snatch defeat from the jaws of victory? (by DCblogger at Corrente)
Chris Bowers: “If Democrats provide cheaper and more accessible health care to Americans, Republicans have promised to publicly turn themselves into the biggest partisan assholes of the last forty years. Seriously. That is the actual political calculation Senate Democrats face on health care reform right now. It is the most obvious win-win political calculation Democrats have been presented with during my entire lifetime.” The Republicans plan the destabilize the country through a process of legislative sabotage. It would be easy for Harry Reid to expose this, but that depends upon whether he wants to.

A sane Republican?  Is it possible?
Rep. Ryan: Democrats have a ‘right’ to use budget reconciliaton. (Think Progress)
Congressional Democrats and the Obama administration have floated using “budget reconciliation” to pass health care reform — where only 51 votes would be required for approval of a bill — to bypass the increasing number of Republican filibuster threats. In response, Senate Republicans have said they would “grind the Senate to a virtual halt”; Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) explained that reconciliation would be “the nuclear war.” Today, GOP up-and-comer Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), however, said it is Democrats’ “right” to use budget reconciliation: “‘It’s their right. They did win the election,’ said Ryan, R-Wis. ‘…It is their right. It is what they can do.’”

Bill Calls For Easing Barriers to College for Undocumented Students (American Constitution Society)
U.S. Sens. Bob Menedez and Richard Durbin are promoting legislation that would allow states to ease barriers to college for thousands of undocumented students. U.S. News & World Report says: “The Dream Act would allow students who have lived in the country since age 15 to apply for conditional legal residence after graduating from high school. They would then be able to work and pay in-state college tuition rates. Those who attend college or join the military could ultimately become citizens.”

House votes to revive Bill Clinton’s COPS program (McClatchy)
Legislation that the House of Representatives passed overwhelmingly Thursday would send billions of dollars to thousands of communities to help them hire and retain 50,000 police officers.

Poor Widdle Bankers (by Susie at Suburban Guerrilla)
“Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and other Senate Democrats have spent the last several weeks negotiating with major banks, including JPMorgan, Bank of America and Wells Fargo, hoping to come to a compromise on bankruptcy legislation… The central debate is whether to allow bankruptcy judges to reduce — or cramdown — mortgages for homeowners who enter bankruptcy. The banking lobby strongly opposes allowing cramdown. Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), a key vote on the banking committee, dealt a blow to the bill Wednesday, telling the Huffington Post that he is ‘opposed to cramdown.’”

Norm Coleman is a sore loser.  Why won’t the press say so, cont’d (by Eric Boehlert at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
From the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: “Coleman asks state Supreme Court to take it slow” The Trib reports: “Coleman, a Republican, proposed to the court that his appeal of Democrat Al Franken’s victory in the recent Senate election trial be argued no sooner than mid-May, two weeks later than Franken suggested on Tuesday.” Coleman doesn’t even want the recount trial to begin until May, which was when some Minnesota court watches thought the case might conclude. As we noted earlier, as Coleman and his attorneys look over their recount legal options, they in no way have to be concerned about, or factor into play, the potential “sore loser” meme that could do real damage to his effort. They can play hardball with impunity because they’re getting a free pass from the press.

Source Says Tedisco Knows He Lost (Political Wire)
A GOP source on Capitol Hill says that Jim Tedisco’s (R) camp “has abandoned hope” of winning the NY-20 special election but that he “won’t concede the race” to Scott Murphy (D) “until technical legal questions surrounding voter residency issues are resolved,” Roll Call reports. Apparently, Tedisco believes the residency issues “could have a bearing on future races in New York. As such, the source said, Tedisco wants to see those issues resolved before ending the legal battle.” Meanwhile, the Albany Times Union reports Murphy’s lead expanded again to 401 votes.

Toomey Leads Specter by 21 Points (Political Wire)
A new Rasmussen Reports poll in Pennsylvania finds Pat Toomey (R) crushing Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) in a GOP primary match up, 51% to 30%. Key finding: Specter is viewed favorably by 42% of Pennsylvania Republicans and unfavorably by 55%.

What’s Up With the Governor of Texas? (by Jim Hightower, thanks to Alegre)
Facts aside, what’s going through Perry’s perfectly coiffed head is that polls presently show him losing his re-election bid in next year’s Republican primary. Thus, he’s scrambling to excite the most rabid of the Texas GOP fringe by posing as a courageous defender of Texas sovereignty against meddlers from Washington. His chief target is $555 million in federal money that would come to our state under Obama’s economic stimulus program. This is desperately needed money that would go straight into our nearly broke unemployment compensation fund, but he asserts that he will reject it, claiming that the federal dollars come with strings attached. …

Yes, comandante, but what about that other $16 billion or so in Obama’s stimulus money that you are going accept? For example, while you slap away funds to help working folks, you’re eagerly reaching out with your other hand to grab $1.2 billion of those filthy federal dollars to put into your pet project of saddling Texans with a network of privatized toll roads. If it’s a matter of principle, why not reject all federal money? Indeed, you used to be a cotton farmer who benefited from Washington’s crop subsidy programs – how oppressive was that for you?

Sarah Palin To Be Given Huge Engraved Assault Rifle (Huffington Post)
A custom firearms manufacture plans to give Sarah Palin a smokin’ gift at a May banquet of the National Rifle Association, according to RedState… The gift is an assault rifle custom-engraved with the image of a moose, the Big Dipper, a map of Alaska, and the words “In Honor of Governor Sarah Palin.” The governor could really mow down a moose with this thing, or perhaps spray several wolves from a helicopter, or, say, terrify one Levi Johnston.

As U.S. Attorney, Chris Christie Approved Warrantless Tracking Of Suspects Using Cell Phone GPS (Think Progress)
While serving as a U.S. attorney during the Bush administration, Christopher Christie, now a Republican candidate for Governor in New Jersey, tracked the whereabouts of citizens through their cell phones without warrants. The ACLU obtained the documents detailing the spying program from the Justice Department in an ongoing lawsuit over cell phone tracking… The new revelations about the cell phone tracking program under Christie is yet another example of the warrantless spying programs authorized under the Bush administration. Previous programs approved without a court order or warrant have included the secret program to monitor radiation levels at over 100 Muslim sites and the NSA spying program on the phone and e-mail communications of thousands of people inside the U.S. These programs run contrary to the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which forbids “unreasonable searches” and sets out specific requirements for warrants, including “probable cause.”

During his tenure as U.S. attorney, Christie also awarded his former boss, John Ashcroft, a $28-52 million dollar no-bid contract to “monitor a large corporation willing to settle criminal charges out of court.” Former Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach blasted the decision, saying that awarding a no-bid contract “suggests other political things, and that seems to me to be as wrong as it can be.” Christie also doled out “a multi-million-dollar, no bid contract to an ex-federal prosecutor who declined to criminally prosecute Christie’s brother on stock fraud charges two years earlier.”

RNC Confirms It: Steele Thinks Dems Are Leading Us “Down The Road To Socialism” (by Sam Stein at the Huffington Post)
RNC chair Michael Steele is in a political pickle right now, with right wingers exerting more and more pressure on him to start calling Dems “socialists.” Over a dozen members of the RNC’s conservative wing have introduced a resolution to officially designate the Democratic Party the “Democrat Socialist Party.” But Steele has refrained from labeling Dems with the S-word, instead preferring the term “collectivists.” How will Steele get out of this one? The ever crafty Steele has figured out a middle ground. An RNC spokesperson just confirmed to me that Steele does generally agree with party members who say Obama and Dems are socialists. But he doesn’t want the RNC to designate Dems socialists as a matter of official policy.

“He agrees with the notion that Obama and Democrats are taking us down the road to socialism,” the spokesperson told me. “But his opinion is that having specific resolutions to change the way we talk about Democrats is not the right message to be sending.”

Judge finds probable cause to charge Levy murder suspect (McClatchy)
A judge found Thursday that there was probable cause to charge Ingmar Guandique with the 2001 murder of Chandra Levy, even as Guandique’s attorneys denounced the evidence as flimsy.
Where does Gary Condit go to get his reputation back? I don’t at all like his politics, but he in no way deserved the treatment he received from a media obsessed with Democratic sex. Have any of the media people who hounded him ever apologized? And may I remind you that while the media fixated on Condit, the alarms at all our intelligence agencies were deafening, warning about an incipient attack on U.S. soil—the one that exploded on 9/11/01.

Mary Matalin Signs on as CNN Contributor (TVNewser, Media Bistro)
Mary Matalin has signed on as a CNN political contributor. Matalin will appear on various CNN shows as well as twice monthly alongside her husband, Democratic strategist and fellow CNN political contributor James Carville. Those appearances will be on State of the Union with John King beginning this Sunday.

BREAKING: Randi Rhodes to Return to Talk Radio (The Brad Blog)
Following a nearly two-month absence from the airwaves, Progressive radio talker Randi Rhodes is set to return, according to an announcement this afternoon from John Scott of San Francisco’s Green960 (KKGN). She will be syndicated by Premiere Radio Networks as reported in a video-taped announcement just posted on the Green960 website. Premiere is known for their national syndication of far-right talkers such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Dr. Laura and Glenn Beck. Rhodes, known by fans as the “Goddess of Progressive Talk”, had formerly been with NovaM Radio, which folded when she left, and at Air America Radio prior to that.

She’s back on the streets (by Joseph Cannon at Cannonfire)
The fucking whore[*] walks again — and now she’s whoring for a right-wing radio network.
Because it really is all about the money, i’n’t it?

*What Randi called Hillary Clinton at a so-called comedy show during the 2008 primary.

Bill O’Reilly Just Making Things Up About Nixon (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
Here’s Bill O’Reilly, correcting in-house libtard Alan Colmes’ ludicrous assertion that Richard Nixon shook hands with Mao Zedong, so it’s OK for Barack Obama to give Hugo Chavez a handjob. Nixon never touched Mao. “I don’t want to confuse you,” O’Reilly told Colmes, who was like, “OK.” If you know anything about the O’Reilly Factor host, you can see where this is going: Nixon totally shook Mao’s hand, on the same historic, initial trip where he similarly greeted Zhou Enlai. Not only that, but Nixon quoted Mao in a toast to the Chinese tyrant, during an endless communist orgy.

Are GE Shareholders really upset that MSNBC is a ratings success? (by Eric Boehlert at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
That’s what The Hollywood Reporter claims, although its report seems a bit fishy… “One shareholder at the Orlando, Fla., meeting was Jesse Waters, a producer of ‘The O’Reilly Factor.’ Waters asked a question at the meeting, then turned on the Fox News Channel cameras outside the venue and interviewed other shareholders who attended the meeting.” This is a classic stunt: buy minimal shares in a company in order to be granted access to the annual shareholder meeting where you might be allowed to ask the chairman a question. Are GE shareholders worldwide upset that MSNBC’s become a ratings hit in recent years? Outside of O’Reilly’s paid players, there’s no indication that’s the case.

Also, note that THR hyped the MSNBC “drama” at the shareholder meeting, but neither Bloomberg nor AP nor WSJ even mentioned the topic in their dispatches from GE’s annual confab.

Glenn Beck Calls Kettle Black (by Ryan Tate at Gawker)
Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly have had it with parent companies getting involved with the content of cable news! They are talking, of course, about News Corporation General Electric. Fox News … infiltrated General Electric’s shareholder meeting and inundated company executives with questions about why MSNBC is crushing so hard on Barack Obama and why CNBC is being turned into the president’s concubine or something… Rupert Murdoch’s minions are shocked — shocked — at the very idea that a media conglomerate would use its properties in concert with one another to advance its owner’s political line.
Don’t forget about the Fox News daily memo, telling pundits and so-called news reporters what to say.

Is Glenn Beck Dangerous? (by Troy Patterson, Slate)
Glenn Beck’s contemptuous sissy lisp is coming along nicely. He is, impressively, more snide than Sarah Palin, whose high-wattage yahoo-baiting anticipated Beck’s combination of mean anger, cheap humor, and, when talking policy, the occasional complete obfuscation of fact.

Morris on Obama’s foreign policy: “If you’re an enemy of America… he’s in bed with you… The way to get popular with this administration is to be an enemy of the United States” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Hannity accuses Obama of the “politicizing of our national security” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

On Fox, NY Post’s Peters compares possible torture prosecutions to “show trials” of Stalin, Mao, Castro, Chavez, McCarthy (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Burnett discusses whether “the government is over-extending itself” over the caption, “Dictator in Chief?” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Alongside “Communism?” graphic, Burnett promises to address whether America is “creating its own oligarchs” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Why is the Phildelphia Inquirer paying Rick Santorum $1,750 to a write a column? (by Eric Boehlert at County Fair, Media Matters for America)
And a bad one at that?… Even if newspapers were flush with cash, the Santorum pay scale is so far out of whack for the newspaper industry it’s crazy. Obviously major dailies, such as the New York Times, pay their staff columnists very well. But Santorum’s not on staff. He’s a glorified freelancer and major dailies often pay freelancers $300 per-column. So why $1,750 for Santorum? Or newspapers pick up syndicated columns and pay a laughably small amount for those; often less than $50. But the Inquirer’s paying (or was paying, pre-bankruptcy) Santorum $40K annually? Makes no sense.

Perhaps you should look at the payment in a larger context, Eric:
Fox News contributor Santorum latest to claim Obama “palling around” with Chavez (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Savage on Freddie Mac CFO’s reported suicide: “I don’t believe it…Somebody had this man executed” (video at County Fair, Media Matters for America)

Shimkus: Capping CO2 a greater ‘assault on democracy’ than 9/11. (Think Progress)
[Wednesday], Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) described President Obama’s energy plan as “the largest assault on democracy and freedom in this country that I’ve ever experienced.” Speaking at a hearing on the Waxman-Markey Clean Energy and Security Act — which caps global warming pollution to build a clean energy economy – Shimkus said that he feared this legislation more than the Clinton impeachment trials, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Click through to watch the video.

Media Matters for America headlines

• Foser: Gaps in the Right’s “banana republic” rhetoric

• FBN’s Sullivan falsely claimed DHS report “nam[ed] veterans groups as possible extremist groups”

• LA Times reported McConnell’s criticism of reconciliation without noting his past support of process

• Drudge hypes article claiming Gore “chickened out” from confronting skeptic

• CQ, AP ignore Boehner’s use of “torture” to describe techniques

• Wash. Times editorial distorts Rosa Brooks’ statement on Al Qaeda

• Kudlow echoes baseless Drudge headline on Obama supporters

• REPORT: Media favor process over substance in Obama press briefings

• Conservative media claim prosecution of Bush administration officials will turn U.S. into “banana republic”

• Fox News greets alleged torture with antics

• More Fox figures pick up tenuous claim that harsh interrogations thwarted L.A. plot

• Fox News’ Hemmer “keeping track of the stimulus money” — by lifting research from GOP website

Pirate Bay Appeal Accuses Judge of Copyright Bias
Lawyers for defendants in The Pirate Bay case are demanding a retrial. Four men were sentenced last week to one year in jail and ordered to pay $4.5 million to several copyright owners, including Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Bros., and Columbia Pictures, after being found guilty of enabling downloading of copyrighted material.

U.S. Journalists Must Stand Trial in North Korea
North Korea has decided to put two US journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, on trial. They have been under arrest since they were detained on March 17 on North Korea’s border with China. The pair, who work for Current TV, were reporting on Korean refugees living in China.

Saberi Goes On Hunger Strike, Chicago-Area Students Rally In Support
Roxana Saberi, an Iranian-American freelance journalist sentenced to eight years in an Iranian prison, began her hunger strike as students at her U.S. alma mater rally in her support.

Israeli cartoon mocks stereotypes, but not everyone’s laughing
Its creators and fans see a humorous series that resembles “South Park” — at least visually — and mocks Islamic terrorism. Its critics see a hate-filled cartoon that uses crude stereotypes to dehumanize Muslims, intensify Arab-Israeli divisions and inflame the conflict between Muslims and Jews.

Indian Police Drop Child-Selling Case, Rather Than Place Phone Call to England (Gawker)
The father of nine-year-old Slumdog Millionaire star Rubina Ali will not be charged with any crime for allegedly trying to sell her to undercover reporters for $300,000. Indian police couldn’t track down the reporters. It was always somewhat unclear what exactly went down in this case, and it seemed to boil down to a tabloid’s word versus the word of the father, Rafiq Qureshi. So it’s good to know the authorities WENT ALL OUT to get the testimony of every witness: “Police questioned Qureshi but were unable to track down the three journalists who carried out the alleged sting.”

6 years in prison for airing Hezbollah TV in NYC‎
U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman handed down a sentence of five years and nine months to Javed Iqbal, who had pleaded guilty in December to providing aid to a terrorist organization. Iqbal, 45, admitted as part of a plea agreement that he used satellite dishes on his Staten Island home to distribute broadcasts of Al Manar, the TV station of the Lebanon-based Hezbollah, which has been fighting Israel since the early 1980s and has been branded by the U.S. government as a terrorist group…

Iqbal’s lawyer, Josh Dratel, said his client didn’t intend to aid Hezbollah as he tried to build his Brooklyn-based satellite television company, HDTV Limited. Dratel called the airing of Al Manar “one discreet and narrow aspect” of an otherwise legitimate broadcasting company that also aired Christian programming, adult entertainment, a Jamaican channel and a gay and lesbian channel.
So much for the First Amendment.

Hollywood, RealNetworks square off on DVD copying
Hollywood calls it “rent, rip and return” and contends it’s one of the biggest technological threats to the movie industry’s annual $20 billion DVD market — software that allows you to copy a film without paying for it. On Friday, the showdown over the issue will take place in federal court in San Francisco, where an army of lawyers representing Hollywood will argue that RealNetworks Inc.’s DVD “ripper” is an illegal digital piracy tool… The same federal judge who shut down music-swapping site Napster in 2000 because of copyright violations will preside over the three-day trial, which is expected to cut to the heart of the same technological upheaval roiling Hollywood that forever changed the face of the music business.

How E-Pulitzers Can Elevate Journalism (by Roy J. Harris Jr., Christian Science Monitor)
Granting the prizes to more online work would raise standards.

Newspaper Traffic Rises 10 Percent, NAA Says, But Skips The Divide Between Print And Online-Only (Paid Content)
Here’s a slight balm for all the bad news about newspapers: websites tied to daily papers rose a collective 10 percent in Q1 to 73.3 million unique visitors, according to the Newspaper Association of America. That’s a little more than 43 percent of all U.S. internet users, the organization estimates, citing Nielsen Online figures… [G]rowth rates for online newspaper traffic appears to be slowing generally. In Q108, the number of uniques grew 12.3 percent.

WSJ Online Pricing Sends Mixed Market Signals (by Amy Gahran at Poynter Online)
A month ago, as I wrote earlier, I was willing to pay $10 a month to subscribe to The Wall Street Journal on my Kindle. I canceled that subscription last week, after the release of the WSJ iPhone application that provides free access to all Journal content. The iPhone app carries ads at the bottom of the screen, but I don’t mind. I also get audio and video content from WSJ through the app. Meanwhile, Subscribing to WSJ.com currently costs $89 per year. ($99 per year if you want the print edition, too.) And, as I noted elsewhere, WSJ’s own subscription page currently doesn’t even mention subscribing via Kindle. What’s going on with WSJ’s pricing?
Can’t the Kindle download ads?  If not, it’s a serious design flaw.

Gannett Puts Its Acquisition Strategy To The Test With Digital Media Network (Paid Content)
Gannett, which recently posted a 60 percent drop in profit and a 26 percent fall off in publishing revenues, has been banking on its ramped up internet offerings to eventually balance out the business. The latest Gannett gambit revolves around its an ad network that wraps around USAToday.com and included 100 local print and broadcast related websites. The network is part of a set of online tools to bring its various properties closer together on the web, including the much-hyped local/national web hybrid ContentOne.

NYT Foundation Suspends Gift Program
The New York Times Company Foundation announced on Thursday that it was suspending grant-making and the company’s matching gift program. “This is a difficult but necessary step,” said Michael Golden, vice chairman of the company and a board member of the foundation.

NYT Co. Sticks to May 1 Bargaining Deadline for Globe
Janet L. Robinson, chief executive of the New York Times Co., today said the company intends to stick to its May 1 deadline to gain $20 million in concessions from unions at the Boston Globe. Without concessions, the Times Co. has threatened to shutter the money-losing newspaper.

Will Sulzberger Pull The Trigger? (by Steven Syre, Boston Globe)
I went to The New York Times Co. annual meeting to find out if my boss’s boss, Arthur Sulzberger, would really shut down The Boston Globe if he couldn’t get $20 million in union concessions soon. The short answer: I don’t believe so.

Philly Newspapers Boss Tierney Made $1.175M in ‘08
Recent court filings show that Brian Tierney collected $1.175 million in salary and bonuses last year, somewhat higher than previously disclosed. Tierney’s compensation included $650,000 in salary, a $350,000 bonus for 2008, a $175,000 bonus for 2007, and $81,000 in transportation costs.

McClatchy 1Q Loss Widens Amid Advertising Meltdown
The McClatchy Co.’s losses widened in the first quarter amid an advertising meltdown that is increasing pressure on the publisher to meet commitments to lenders. The report released Thursday was far worse than analysts had anticipated.

So Which Magazine Would You Vote Off the Media Plan?
A recent request for proposals from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners on behalf of Elizabeth Arden pits mags against each other. “We need you to help identify a book that has carried any of our business that you should replace, or steal paging from,” reads the RFP.

New York Mag to Cut 2 Summer Issues
New York magazine is cutting two issues from its publishing schedule. The weekly title is anticipating that advertisers, who traditionally pull back during the summer months, will pull back more so in a recession. The issues dated June 22 and August 10 will not be published.

Earnings: Netflix Rides High On 68 Percent Profit Growth In Q1 (Paid Content)
Strong demand for cheap entertainment bolstered Netflix’s revenues, and lower subscriber acquisition costs boosted the company’s profits. Net income came in at $22.4 million for Q1 ($0.37 per diluted share), up 68 percent year-over-year (though down slightly sequentially.) Revenue came in at $394.1 million, up 21 percent year-over-year, and up 10 percent from the previous quarter. The company narrowly beat analysts’ estimates of an EPS of $0.33 on $391.1 million in revenue, per MarketWatch.
Click through for the highlights.

NPR Cuts to Include Thirteen Layoffs
National Public Radio said [Wednesday] it will lay off 13 employees and furlough all of its employees for five days over the next five months in the latest round of belt-tightening. The cuts are part of a series of measures that will help NPR close a projected $8 million budget gap during its current fiscal year.

AT&T’s U-Verse TV Service Adds Record Subscribers In First Quarter (Paid Content)
AT&T’s U-Verse TV service racked up a record 284,000 net subscribers in the first quarter, to give the telecoms company’s IP TV service a total base of over 1.3 million users. It also helped grow the number of net adds to AT&T Advanced TV services –which included bundled and satellite TV services—to more than 3.5 million… The surge in subscribers seems to have been boosted by AT&T’s introduction of its DVR service, that allows users to record TV programs to view when they want.

AOL’s New Plan: Content, Content, Content
Revenue-challenged and consummately uncool AOL is readying a blitz around Web content through its (unfortunately named) MediaGlow unit, which encompasses all of AOL’s content sites. There now are more than 70. And MediaGlow has previously disclosed plans to launch at least 30(!) more in 2009.

YouTube Joins The Real-Time Bandwagon (Paid Content)
Twitter. Facebook. And now YouTube, with a new feature that lets visitors see in real time which YouTube videos their friends are watching and what they are saying about them. It builds on the “friend activity” function on the site, which already shows what videos others are uploading and rating. The difference: now that information follows a user as he or she navigates around the site via a toolbar on the bottom of every YouTube page showing which friends are online and what they are doing… [T]he feature—if it’s widely adopted—should definitely facilitate the passing on of videos.

Wikipedia Strikes Mobile, Internet Content Deal With Orange (Paid Content)
One of Europe’s largest phone carriers, France Telecom’s Orange, has reached a deal with Wikimedia to provide its users with co-branded content. The content will be offered through specific Wikipedia channels on Orange’s mobile and internet portals, the two announced… Orange will place ads alongside Wikipedia content and the two will share the ad revenues. The financial details of the agreement were not disclosed, but Wikimedia called the deal ”an important new revenue stream”.

Yahoo To Close GeoCities; Latest Cutback Under New CEO Bartz (Paid Content)
During the company’s earnings call Tuesday, Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz said that she had decided to focus on the properties that generated the most traffic and therefore had the most economic value for the company. The latest Yahoo property that apparently did not fit that description? Free web hosting service GeoCities. Yahoo is now telling existing GeoCities customers that it will shut down later this year, according to SiliconTap.com… GeoCities is by far the most prominent property to be cut under Bartz. Yahoo bought the service for $3.6 billion 10 years ago and it continues to bring in large numbers of visitors. Compete.com puts traffic to the GeoCities.com domain at 13.5 million unique visitors in March. However, the free service had become somewhat outdated with the advent of free, easy-to-use blogging platforms. A