The Commentariat -- December 27

** David Savage of the Los Angeles Times: Supreme Court Justices Sotomayor & Kagan have shifted the debate during oral arguments to the left. ...

... Joan Biskupic of USA Today: Justice Sonia Sotomayor has become something of an advocate for prisoners, often protesting the Supreme Court's decisions not to hear prisoners' appeals. ...

     ... Update: Adam Liptak of the New York Times elaborates.

... Andrew Cohen, in The Atlantic, lists the year's top 10 must-reads in the law. I've linked to a number of them in the past; some I haven't read. With links. Cohen links to the text of David Souter's Harvard Commencement speech. Video of the speech is here.

** Jacob Weisberg of Slate: "... if [President] Obama has declared war on inequality, inequality seems to be winning." Weisberg lists the following major fails: (1) the tax-cut deal he made with Republicans; (2) outsized Wall Street & CEO compensation; (3) no increase in working-class wages; (4) more Americans without health insurance; (5) no improvement in education; (6) expansion of the estate tax deduction; 7 finally (7) there has been a real increase in income inequality. CW: Weisberg is wrong about one thing: he says, "income inequality never killed anybody." Yes, it does, according to statistical data gathered by Robert Wilkinson & Kate Pickett. ...

... Here's a pdf of Tim Noah's series on income inequality to which Weisberg refers. CW: I haven't read it yet, but I will. The abstract for Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker piece, which Weisberg also mentions, is here; the article is subscriber-only. ...

... Paul Krugman notes rising prices in the commodities market and attributes them to the fact that we're living in a finite world in which the U.S. is no longer the main player. ...

... James Surowiecki of the New Yorker states what should be -- but isn't -- the obvious: the rise in unemployment is the result of decreased demand. Surowiecki knocks down (as well as explains) the "structural" argument. He also says if we don't fix it, it will remain broke. ...

... The Editors of the New York Times again urge President Obama to stand up to Republicans, this time with regard to implementation of financial reform. "d expect Republicans to cut off financing for Dodd-Frank, adding that the law is a job killer. Could he be more wrong? Americans’ concern about financial reform is that it is too weak, not too strong. They are furious at the banks.... The Republicans’ intentions could not be clearer. What is unclear is the Democratic strategy — in Congress and the White House — for thwarting them."

Ashley Halsey of the Washington Post: "As the Obama administration works to harden domestic defenses against terrorism, some experts point to a potential vulnerability from thousands of flights that pass over the United States each week. Although the United States regulates overflights, the cargo aboard them is not screened to federal standards and passenger lists are not matched to names on the terrorist watch list maintained by the Transportation Security Administration."

Bill Carter & Brian Stelter of the New York Times compare Jon Stewart's advocacy for passage of the 9/11 responders bill with specific instances of reporting by Edward R. Murrow & Walter Cronkite.

Ben Smith & Byron Tau of Politico: Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour is living the high life at the expense of the poorest state in the nation. Many of his expenditures, especially his use of a Cessna jet to attend private & political functions, are highly questionable. CW: I don't think presidential hopeful Haley is going to enjoy seeing his sleazy shenanigans repeated laid out in the national media.

Oops, I missed this one: Karl Rove accidentally predicts President Obama will be re-elected in 2012. Via Ben Smith.

Your Goverment Screwing Crooks AND You. William Rashbaum of the New York Times: "An arm of the United States Marshals Service undervalued what could amount to untold millions of dollars in assets forfeited by white-collar criminals — including some from the family of Bernard L. Madoff — and sold them for far less than they were worth, according to a lawsuit filed in federal court in Manhattan." 

The Zombie Death Panel Brouhaha. Jay Solomon has a story in today's Wall Street Journal on the new Medicare guidelines that include end-of-life consultations, similar to the one by Robert Pear of the New York Times, to which we linked yesterday. Solomon includes a White House clarification/denial: "Reid Cherlin, a White House spokesman, said it was incorrect to suggest the policy of reimbursing end-of-life discussions was new. 'The only thing new here is a regulation allowing the discussions … to happen in the context of the new annual wellness visit created by the Affordable Care Act.'"

The Commentariat -- December 26

There's nobody out there, except for Sarah Palin, who can absolutely dominate the stage, and she can't stand on the intellectual stage with Obama. -- Juan Williams, on the Republican presidential field

Trading Places. Nicole Winfield of the AP: "Lasagna, veal and cake were on the menu Sunday as Pope Benedict XVI invited about 250 poor people to join him for a post-Christmas lunch and denounced as "absurd" new attacks on the faithful around the globe.... Last year, Benedict traveled to a Rome soup kitchen to join the poor for lunch after Christmas. This year he wanted to invite them to his home...." ...

... CW: I'm highlighting this report only because it reminded me of the Saturnalia, a popular Roman winter festival that helped early Roman Christians decide the winter solstice was a convenient time to place Jesus' birth. During the Saturnalia, masters & slaves switched roles, & masters waited on slaves at meals. Nice to see the pope adopting aspects of pre-Christian rituals.

History Lesson. Judy Dempsey of the New York Times: "In 2005, protests against ... whitewashed obituaries caused the German foreign minister and Green Party leader, Joschka Fischer, to commission a study of the [German Foreign] Ministry’s past. The result, a thick tome called 'Das Amt und die Vergangenheit,' or 'The Ministry and the Past,' was published this autumn. It became a best seller, shocking a public used to looking up at its diplomats as gentlemen who would never dirty their hands."

Future-Watch. Suzanne Gamboa of the AP: "The end of the year means a turnover of House control from Democratic to Republican and, with it, Congress' approach to immigration. In a matter of weeks, Congress will go from trying to help young, illegal immigrants become legal to debating whether children born to parents who are in the country illegally should continue to enjoy automatic U.S. citizenship."

Robert Pear of the New York Times: "When a proposal to encourage end-of-life planning touched off a political storm over 'death panels,' Democrats dropped it from legislation to overhaul the health care system. But the Obama administration will achieve the same goal by regulation, starting Jan. 1. Under the new policy, outlined in a Medicare regulation, the government will pay doctors who advise patients on options for end-of-life care, which may include advance directives to forgo aggressive life-sustaining treatment."

Carol Leonnig & T. W. Farnam of the Washington Post: "Numerous times this year, members of Congress have held fundraisers and collected big checks while they are taking critical steps to write new laws, despite warnings that such actions could create ethics problems. The campaign donations often came from contributors with major stakes riding on the lawmakers' actions." The reporters cite Sens. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Max Baucus (D-Mont.) & Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and some House members from both parties.

Ginger Thompson & Scott Shane of the New York Times: "The Drug Enforcement Administration has been transformed into a global intelligence organization with a reach that extends far beyond narcotics, and an eavesdropping operation so expansive it has to fend off foreign politicians who want to use it against their political enemies, according to secret diplomatic cables. In far greater detail than previously seen, the cables, from the cache obtained by WikiLeaks..., offer glimpses of drug agents balancing diplomacy and law enforcement in places where it can be hard to tell the politicians from the traffickers, and where drug rings are themselves mini-states whose wealth and violence permit them to run roughshod over struggling governments." ...

... New York Times Editors: the Federal Reserve allows banks to choose what entities with whom they'll do business. Major U.S. banks are refusing to process transactions intended for WikiLeaks, even though the group has not even been accused of a crime. The editors write that the Fed should not permit banks to unilaterally make such decisions.

David Barstow (who is not the David Barstow in the film below), et al., of the New York Times: the BP Gulf oil disaster "was a disaster with two distinct parts — first a blowout, then the destruction of the [Deepwater] Horizon. The second part, which killed 11 people and injured dozens, has escaped intense scrutiny, as if it were an inevitable casualty of the blowout. It was not.... The Deepwater Horizon should have weathered this blowout.... Crew members died and suffered terrible injuries because every one of the Horizon’s defenses failed on April 20." Related video & graphics.

Derek Kravitz of the Washington Post on the TSA's body scanners: "... many security experts say the machines are expensive window dressing meant to put the traveling public at ease.

Kate Pickert of Time on how the healthcare law, which the Senate passed last Christmas Eve, sunk the Democrats.

The Government We Deserve

Frank Rich, in noting the passing of amateur filmmaker Robbins Barstow, writes a Requiem for the American Dream. Barstow's New York Times obituary is here. And here is Barstow's home movie, "Disneyland Dream":

The Constant Weader Comments:

Thank you, Frank, for once again laying out the big picture and putting our newfound smallness in historical perspective. The fact is that we Americans are busy making ourselves small. Who killed the Disneyland dream? We did.

The main problem is that we have become a small-minded, selfish people. Instead of pulling together for progress, we have all becomes members of narrow special interest groups: greedy geezers, anti-choice, pro-choice, immigration reformers, border defenders, gay rights advocates, defenders of "traditional" marriage, militarists, corporatists, unions, anti-unionists, corn farmers, environmentalists, mountain-top strippers, loggers, home-schoolers, religious fundamentalists, non-theists, "real" Americans, intelligentsia. We are now defined by niche greed.

None of us wants to pay for anybody else's niche. Too bad if you're poor. Sorry you're sick. Out of work? Losing your job? Want better schools? Well, those aren't MY problems.

The tax-reduction mantra, and the tax-cut law the President so proudly rammed through Congress, are symptomatic of a great American pathology. Any half-sensible person can see that tax cuts are a sure path to the defeat of the American dream. In the halcyon days of the 1950s, when the Barstow family believed (with good reason) that anything was possible, federal tax rates were nearly twice what they are now, although they were decidedly more progressive; that is, the rich paid a larger share. And the rich were not as rich. Income inequality was exponentially smaller than it is today. The Barstows' dreams were not delusional; they were possible. Not any more.

In the last election, we voted out the only hope for a better American future. Admittedly, it was mostly hope, and not a lot of change. The cartoonist Darrin Bell perhaps put it best: "We're angry nothing's changed so we vote for those who've spent two years blocking change. Is America the only country that votes sarcastically?" Bell asks.

CLICK CARTOON TO SEE LARGER IMAGE.We have a President and Congress who revel in & depend upon the status quo. I don't care what they say they believe in; I've been watching what they do. Not much. We have a large percentage of the populace who likes it that way, too. Every social or public program that doesn't directly benefit ME is "socialism." Like the politicians, the American people say they want change, but the change many want is to return, not to the hopeful 1950s, but to the oppressive 1780s. These voters are not merely catatonic; they are regressive.

Because of the intense interest over the past two years in a Congress that was proposing grand things but doing almost nothing to change the status quo, Americans saw Washington -- and the Max Baucus/Mitch McConnell Senate in particular -- for what it is: a body that is broken, a legislative body that purposely does not legislate.

Now we are about to watch a new Congress that will be even more dysfunctional. However the Senate tinkers with the filibuster rules, it still won't do much. Besides, with a small Democratic majority in the upper chamber and a solid Republican majority in the House, it would be foolhearty to expect any progress. At all.

We are doomed by the choices we have made. Congress is abominable. The President is either a fool or a charlatan. But we narrow-minded, greedy, shortsighted citizens got the government most of us deserve.