The Ledes

Monday, June 30, 2025

It's summer in our hemisphere, and people across Guns America have nothing to do but shoot other people.

New York Times: “A gunman deliberately started a wildfire in a rugged mountain area of Idaho and then shot at the firefighters who responded, killing two and injuring another on Sunday afternoon in what the local sheriff described as a 'total ambush.' Law enforcement officers exchanged fire with the gunman while the wildfire burned, and officials later found the body of the male suspect on the mountain with a firearm nearby, Sheriff Robert Norris of Kootenai County said at a news conference on Sunday night. The authorities said they believed the suspect had acted alone but did not release any information about his identity or motives.” A KHQ-TV (Spokane) report is here.

New York Times: “The New York City police were investigating a shooting in Manhattan on Sunday night that left two people injured steps from the Stonewall Inn, an icon of the L.G.B.T.Q. rights movement. The shooting occurred outside a nearby building in Greenwich Village at 10:15 p.m., Sgt. Matthew Forsythe of the New York Police Department said. The New York City Pride March had been held in Manhattan earlier on Sunday, and Mayor Eric Adams said on social media that the shooting happened as Pride celebrations were ending. One victim who was shot in the head was in critical condition on Monday morning, a spokeswoman for the Police Department said. A second victim was in stable condition after being shot in the leg, she said. No suspect had been identified. The police said it was unclear if the shooting was connected to the Pride march.”

New York Times: “A dangerous heat wave is gripping large swaths of Europe, driving temperatures far above seasonal norms and prompting widespread health and fire alerts. The extreme heat is forecast to persist into next week, with minimal relief expected overnight. France, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece are among the nations experiencing the most severe conditions, as meteorologists warn that Europe can expect more and hotter heat waves in the future because of climate change.”

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Marie: Sorry, my countdown clock was unreliable; then it became completely unreliable. I can't keep up with it. Maybe I'll try another one later.

 

Commencement ceremonies are joyous occasions, and Steve Carell made sure that was true this past weekend (mid-June) at Northwestern's commencement:

~~~ Carell's entire commencement speech was hilarious. The audio and video here isn't great, but I laughed till I cried.

CNN did a live telecast Saturday night (June 7) of the Broadway play "Good Night, and Good Luck," written by George Clooney and Grant Heslov, about legendary newsman Edward R. Murrow's effort to hold to account Sen. Joe McCarthy, "the junior senator from Wisconsin." Clooney plays Murrow. Here's Murrow himself with his famous take on McCarthy & McCarthyism, brief remarks that especially resonate today: ~~~

     ~~~ This article lists ways you still can watch the play. 

New York Times: “The New York Times Company has agreed to license its editorial content to Amazon for use in the tech giant’s artificial intelligence platforms, the company said on Thursday. The multiyear agreement 'will bring Times editorial content to a variety of Amazon customer experiences,' the news organization said in a statement. Besides news articles, the agreement encompasses material from NYT Cooking, The Times’s food and recipe site, and The Athletic, which focuses on sports. This is The Times’s first licensing arrangement with a focus on generative A.I. technology. In 2023, The Times sued OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, for copyright infringement, accusing the tech companies of using millions of articles published by The Times to train automated chatbots without any kind of compensation. OpenAI and Microsoft have rejected those accusations.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I have no idea what this means for "the Amazon customer experience." Does it mean that if I don't have a NYT subscription but do have Amazon Prime I can read NYT content? And where, exactly, would I find that content? I don't know. I don't know.

Washington Post reporters asked three AI image generators what a beautiful woman looks like. "The Post found that they steer users toward a startlingly narrow vision of attractiveness. Prompted to show a 'beautiful woman,' all three tools generated thin women, without exception.... Her body looks like Barbie — slim hips, impossible waist, round breasts.... Just 2 percent of the images showed visible signs of aging. More than a third of the images had medium skin tones. But only nine percent had dark skin tones. Asked to show 'normal women,' the tools produced images that remained overwhelmingly thin.... However bias originates, The Post’s analysis found that popular image tools struggle to render realistic images of women outside the Western ideal." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The reporters seem to think they are calling out the AI programs for being unrealistic. But there's a lot about the "beautiful women" images they miss. I find these omissions remarkably sexist. For one thing, the reporters seem to think AI is a magical "thing" that self-generates. It isn't. It's programmed. It's programmed by boys, many of them incels who have little or no experience or insights beyond comic books and Internet porn of how to gauge female "beauty." As a result, the AI-generated women look like cartoons; that is, a lot like an air-brushed photo of Kristi Noem: globs of every kind of dark eye makeup, Scandinavian nose, Botox lips, slathered-on skin concealer/toner/etc. makeup, long dark hair and the aforementioned impossible Barbie body shape, including huge, round plastic breasts. 

New York Times: “George Clooney’s Broadway debut, 'Good Night, and Good Luck,' has been one of the sensations of the 2024-25 theater season, breaking box office records and drawing packed houses of audiences eager to see the popular movie star in a timely drama about the importance of an independent press. Now the play will become much more widely available: CNN is planning a live broadcast of the penultimate performance, on June 7 at 7 p.m. Eastern. The performance will be preceded and followed by coverage of, and discussion about, the show and the state of journalism.”

No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land. -- Magna Carta ~~~

~~~ New York Times: “Bought for $27.50 after World War II, the faint, water stained manuscript in the library of Harvard Law School had attracted relatively little attention since it arrived there in 1946. That is about to change. Two British academics, one of whom happened on the manuscript by chance, have discovered that it is an original 1300 version — not a copy, as long thought — of Magna Carta, the medieval document that helped establish some of the world’s most cherished liberties. It is one of just seven such documents from that date still in existence.... A 710-year-old version of Magna Carta was sold in 2007 for $21.3 million.... First issued in 1215, it put into writing a set of concessions won by rebellious barons from a recalcitrant King John of England — or Bad King John, as he became known in folklore. He later revoked the charter, but his son, Henry III, issued amended versions, the last one in 1225, and Henry’s son, Edward I, in turn confirmed the 1225 version in 1297 and again in 1300.”

NPR lists all of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize winners. Poynter lists the prizes awarded in journalism as well as the finalists in these categories.

 

Contact Marie

Email Marie at constantweader@gmail.com

Saturday
Nov132010

The Commentariat -- November 13

Dick Cavett, who's on a book tour, appears on Parker-Spitzer:

Thanks to reader Jeanne B., I linked to this Louisville Courier-Journal editorial excoriating Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell for his incredible duplicity. Rachel Maddow covers the story here:

... AND the Courier-Journal has more on Mitch's unmatched hypocrisy, this time related to his plan to file a brief in support of a lawsuit (go to page 2) challenging the Affordable Care Law. But what about McConnell's long-standing horror of "activist judges," the editors wonder. 

QE2 Is Not an Oceanliner. Timothy Aeppel of the Wall Street Journal describes "the Federal Reserve’s decision to restart a government bond buying program — known as QE2, shorthand for the second round of quantitative easing.... The idea is that buying up bonds should push the U.S.’s currently low inflation rate slightly upwards, so that real, or inflation-adjusted, interest rates are lowered. That should stimulate growth and hiring." He asks economists if it will work, & they pretty much say, "no."

Okay, two Republican pollsters Douglas Schoen & Pat Caddell, who get a lot of space in the Washington Post, have terrific advice for President Obama on how he can be remembered as "a great president." Get ready: "we believe Obama should announce immediately that he will not be a candidate for reelection in 2012." Thanks for nothing, boys.

It Would Be So Wrong to "Punish" Millionaires. Lori Montgomery of the Washington Post: "With tax breaks for millions of Americans set to expire Dec. 31, President Obama has opened the door to a compromise with Republicans, signaling a new willingness to accept tax breaks for the wealthy to avoid immediate tax hikes across the board."

Ben Armbruster of Think Progress: Eric Cantor: "I pledge allegiance to Israel." Cantor promises Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu in a private meeting that he, Cantor, will undermine Obama administration peace efforts...

...  ** Glenn Greenwald expands on the subject.

Karl Rove Claims He's for Social Welfare. Sort of. Jeanne Cummings of Politico: "In the 2010 midterms, Crossroads GPS and the American Action Network talked proudly of their political clout, spending millions across the country to buy TV ads to defeat Democrats.... Both groups now are under pressure to spend more noncampaign dollars than campaign dollars or risk running afoul of Internal Revenue Service rules.... In order to keep their donors secret, Crossroads GPS — which was founded with help from Bush advisers Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie — and American Action Network classified themselves as 501(c)(4) 'social welfare' groups rather than political organizations. But critics say ... in any plain-English reading of the law, Crossroads GPS and American Action Network are political groups, not 'social welfare' organizations...."

Kate Pickert of Time: "... the Affordable Care Act contains clear language allowing the federal government to take over major reform components that states refuse to implement. This means state leaders opposed to 'government takeovers' could be inviting just that."

Ethics-Free Supremes. Lee Fang of Think Progress caught up with Justice Samuel Alito as he entered a fundraising dinner for a far-right-wing organization which Alito has supported in the past. When Fang asked him if attending a fundraiser with RNC Chairman Michael Steele & big Republican donors, Alito told him, "It’s not important that I’m here.” Fang noted that conservatives Justices Antonin Scalia & Clarence Thomas had participated in similar events. But, as reader Jeanne B. pointed out, the conservatives Justices' political activities violate basic Federal Judiary guidelines, which state that "a judge should refrain from political activity."

Derek Kravitz of the Washington Post: "Following the uncovering of a terrorist plot last month to blow up cargo planes en route to the United States, the TSA has instituted a new type of pat-down of passengers.... If a full-body scanning machine shows something strange or a passenger declines to go through the machine..., an officer will perform a more personal search.... But the new pat-downs have prompted a growing backlash among pilots and flight attendants, civil liberties groups and security-weary passengers who say the touching goes too far."

In their usual hyperbolic way, the Huffington Post headline writers describe "shocking admissions" & "confessions" of foreclosure document robo-signers. This time, they're right.  William Alden & Ryan McCarthy for the Huffington Post: "In more than two hours of video footage recently uploaded to YouTube, three alleged 'robo signers' describe how they approved thousands of mortgage documents a day without reading them." With video clips & partial transcripts.

What's Wrong with this Policy? David Kocieniewski of the New York Times: "The government, which by its own admission has data that could be helpful in tracking down the thousands of missing children in the United States, says that taxpayer privacy laws severely restrict the release of information from tax returns. The privacy laws, enacted a generation ago to prevent Watergate-era abuses of confidential taxpayer information, have specific exceptions allowing the I.R.S. to turn over information in child support cases....But because of guidelines in the handling of criminal cases, there are several obstacles for parents and investigators pursuing a child abductor — even when the taxpayer in question is a fugitive and the subject of a felony warrant."

Harumph. Ted Koppel, in a Washington Post op-ed, remembers that "broadcast news was a more virtuous operation 40 years ago" & laments "the death of real news."

Witch Hunter-in-Chief. Joe Conason of Salon: Republican Rep. Darrell Issa plans to bring down the Obama administration for its scandalous use of road signs!

CW: I hate to give Glenn Beck any attention at all, but his anti-Semitic attack on George Soros are too disgusting to ignore. Cenk Uygur, a First Amendment advocate, calls for Beck's firing over his "horrific" misstatements on how a young Soros survived the Holocaust. The backstory by Michelle Goldberg in the Daily Beast. More detail from Matt Gertz at Media Matters. AND, from Brian Stelter of the New York Times: "Fox stood by Mr. Beck. Joel Cheatwood, a senior vice president at Fox News, said in a statement Thursday afternoon that the 'information regarding Mr. Soros’s experiences growing up were taken directly from his writings and from interviews given by him to the media, and no negative opinion was offered as to his actions as a child.'” Thanks to reader Helen S. for calling Beck's smears of Soros to my attention.

AP: "Antonin Scalia, 74, the longest-serving current justice, appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan, and Stephen Breyer, 72, appointed by Democrat Bill Clinton, shared the stage in front of a crowd of thousands during a West Texas event organized by Texas Tech University Law School. They particularly clashed on the question of capital punishment."

"Too Lazy to Write His Own Memoir." Ryan Grim: George W. Bush's Decision Points is "a mash-up of worn-out anecdotes from previously published memoirs written by his subordinates, from which Bush lifts quotes word for word, passing them off as his own recollections. He took equal license in lifting from nonfiction books about his presidency or newspaper or magazine articles from the time. Far from shedding light on how the president approached the crucial 'decision points' of his presidency, the clip jobs illuminate something shallower and less surprising about Bush's character: He's too lazy to write his own memoir."

The Devil Made Me Do It. AP: "Citing a shortage of priests who can perform ]the rite, the nation's Roman Catholic bishops are holding a conference on how to conduct exorcisms." The New York Times has a story, too.