Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungoverwe’ve been bailed outwe’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.
This Day in History
Nazi war crimes trial begins at Nuremberg; Robert F. Kennedy born; Britain’s future Queen Elizabeth II marries; Spain’s dictator Francisco Franco dies; Mexican Revolution begins; ‘Cabaret’ hits Broadway.
Breakfast Tunes
Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac
Elections remind us not only of the rights but the responsibilities of citizenship in a democracy.
I got asked by Richard and Emily today whether I thought Pelosi wouls win her Speaker’s race as if I knew something about politics, which I do actually because I write about it here every day and I read a ton of stuff that doesn’t make the cut.
What I told them was it was a virtual certainty.
Sure, there are 17, or 25, or 30 Democratic Representatives who have pledged to oppose her, Well, that’s whatever out of 237 or so and while it seems like a big deal that she could drop below the 218 in the Well of the House, there are some problems with that calculation.
First of all her opponents don’t have an alternate candidate. Don’t Marcia Fudge me, she doesn’t have nearly enough support and even if everything broke her way she could muster at best 50 votes and Pelosi would have 187. That’s 79% to 21%, a pretty crushing victory if you ask me and even if I’m optimistic about Pelosi’s strength the margin is too huge to overcome.
Second, there’s not just the one vote. Before the Speakership hits the House Floor (typically the first order of business in a new Congress) Democrats will have their own Leadership votes and if there is a rebellion in the Caucus they will soon realize the weakness of their electoral position. I expect there will be an attempt to defeat Pelosi and it will fail and the Representatives who pledged to vote against will go back to their constituents and say- “I did vote against her, in the Caucus, and she won and we lost. I kept my promise and I did my best.”
“Aha! But you voted for her on the Floor!”
“Well… yeah. I’m a Democrat- see that (D)? If I voted for Kevin McCarthy the House would still be under Republican control. Is that what you voted for? Should have voted for the Republican.”
Whatever support Marcia Fudge had in Caucus will melt like Ice Cream on bubbling asphalt (we have that kind of weather in Connecticut, don’t kid yourself).
And if the rebellion should carry the fight to the well, what will be the result? Even if Fudge keeps all her votes it will be 198 McCarthy, 187 Pelosi, and 50 Fudge.
And here’s the thing about Speakership races, they keep voting until someone has a majority. The only way to defeat Pelosi is for Democrats to vote for McCarthy.
The House would still be under Republican control. Is that what your constituents voted for? Should have run as a Republican, that way at least you wouldn’t be a lying hypocritical traitor. Good luck next cycle, you’ll need it.
Interestingly enough if you look at the bulk of Pelosi opposition it’s made up of ConservaDems so maybe they would, but there are definitely not enough of them and they should be Primaried out of the Party (or run out of town on a rail, pitchfork, torches, tar, and feathers optional).
Now so-called “progressive” (most of them are not all that Left) Democrats did the smart thing and cut themselves a deal.
It wasn’t a coincidence that moments after Nancy Pelosi promised progressive House leaders more power in the next Congress, a host of liberal groups announced they were supporting her for speaker.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal, who is expected to co-chair the House Progressive Caucus next year, left a Thursday night meeting with Pelosi in the Capitol and proclaimed that her members would have more seats on powerful committees and more influence over legislation.
The Washington state Democrat then phoned MoveOn and Indivisible with the news, and they promptly tweeted out support for Pelosi. Then, on Friday morning, Jayapal, previously uncommitted on whom she would back for speaker, gave Pelosi a full-throated endorsement.
…
She went on to note that the 15 to 20 Pelosi critics trying to oust her are more centrist in their ideology and goals than the rest of the caucus. If Democrats remove her, Jayapal argued, they would effectively be turning their backs on the voters who swept Democrats into power.
“That drive is not going to take us in the direction that we should go,” Jayapal said of the effort to depose Pelosi. “It’s going to be the opposite of what the election really told us, which is a much more diverse, progressive, bold agenda.”
Pelosi’s overtures also speak to progressives’ growing influence in the Democratic Caucus. The Progressive Caucus will increase its membership by at least 20 members next year, and comprise about two-fifths of the caucus. Its leaders intend to use those numbers to boost their power and agenda — starting first with committee assignments and leadership positions, then expanding into legislation.
Adding to that heft is their relationship with powerful groups on the outside — organizations that Jayapal argues are the main reason Democrats retook the majority.
“We coordinated very closely with them, and they actually told Pelosi that they won’t come out for her until [after] our meeting,” Jayapal said. “So we are leveraging our power in different ways within the caucus but also with our allies on the outside.”
Thursday’s meeting with Pelosi included Jayapal and current Progressive Caucus Co-Chair Mark Pocan (D-Wis.). One request to which Pelosi agreed was to give the Progressive Caucus proportional representation on what lawmakers call the “A committees”: the Appropriations, Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, Financial Services and Intelligence committees.
Jayapal and Pocan also asked for “expanded leadership that allows for more progressives in the top spots,” Jayapal said. While progressives would still have to run for and be elected to the positions, it would at least ensure there would be positions for progressives to run for.
Pelosi agreed with the idea, though it is unclear whether she will create a new position in leadership, as is being discussed behind the scenes now, according to several Democratic leadership sources. Since Pelosi, Hoyer and Assistant Leader James Clyburn have been leading the caucus for 15 years, there haven’t been many openings in leadership for progressives.
One progressive lawmaker, Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), is running for assistant leader, the No. 4 position. But he is expected to be defeated by Rep. Ben Ray Lujan (D-N.M.), who helped win back the House as head of the caucus’ campaign arm, lawmakers and aides predict.
A new leadership spot would create an opening for Cicilline, in theory, though he would have to be elected.
Pelosi did commit to enhancing the heft of the House Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, a panel recently created to give rank-and-file members more leadership opportunities — and stocked with progressive lawmakers. Pelosi agreed to a Progressive Caucus demand that those positions include a budget and staff; they currently have neither. Several progressive lawmakers are running for these positions again next year.
The group leaders also registered their concerns about “pay-go” rules with Pelosi. Under those rules, certain bills cannot be considered if they aren’t paid for. Progressives have long run on policy positions that would be expensive, from “Medicare for all” to free college tuition. Pelosi didn’t make any commitments, but she promised to bring those rules up for debate.
In a sign of the rising influence of the Progressive Caucus leaders, outside groups specifically held off on endorsing Pelosi until she committed to these asks. After the meeting, the progressive leaders called these groups to give them the green light to back Pelosi.
…
About 30 minutes after that meeting, progressives weighed in on Twitter.
“We strongly support and call on all members of the Democratic caucus to support @NancyPelosi for Speaker,” MoveOn.org tweeted at around 6:30 p.m.. “Were it not for her skilled and effective leadership, the ACA would not be law today. Dems must reject attempts to defeat her and move caucus to the right.”
Now is Nancy Pelosi “liberal” or “progressive” or Left?
No.
That’s simply a vile Republican canard because they want to label Democrats Communist Homosexuals. Nancy Pelosi has some monumentally stupid ideas like not Impeaching W for War Crimes or Trump for his Treason. Her latest stinker is to require super majorities to raise taxes which is both anti-Democratic (large and small ‘D’), and, among other Left priorities, pretty much strangles Single Payer in it’s crib. She still supports Pay-Go which MUST GO! If Republicans don’t care about deficits why should Democrats (and MMT also says that they don’t matter, only hyper-inflation does)?
I’m as ready as the next person to turf her out, but she’s held her Caucus together though 8 years of exile in an incredibly hostile environment and there are no Democrats with the skills to replace her.
Hopefully she uses her “bridge” period to develop the leadership necessary to move forward.
Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from> around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.
Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Pondering the Pundits”.
A week before the midterm elections, the president of the United States announced he would deploy up to 15,000 active duty military troops to the United States-Mexico border to confront a menacing caravan of refugees and asylum seekers. The soldiers would use force, if necessary, to prevent such an “invasion” of the United States.
Mr. Trump’s announcement and the deployment that followed (of roughly 5,900) were probably perfectly legal. But we are a bipartisan threesome with decades of experience in and with the Pentagon, and to us, this act creates a dangerous precedent. We fear this was lost in the public hand-wringing over the decision, so let us be clear: The president used America’s military forces not against any real threat but as toy soldiers, with the intent of manipulating a domestic midterm election outcome, an unprecedented use of the military by a sitting president.
The public debate focused on secondary issues. Is there truly a threat to American security from an unarmed group of tired refugees and asylum seekers on foot and a thousand miles from the border? Even the Army’s internal assessment did not find this a very credible threat.
Over the last several decades, many in the west have come to accept a remarkably narrow concept of what the economy and a democracy are for. The economy exists to make us rich, or at least pay the bills. It’s thought to be working when the stock market and the GDP rise. Democracy is voting for someone who is “on your side”. The two are linked when you vote for someone who promises to make you rich, or at least cut your taxes.
At the risk of stating what has become obvious in recent years, this materialistic view of the economy and democracy is at best thin and at worst dangerous. Prolonged economic dissatisfaction and our thin conception of democracy have left behind a spiritual hole that has driven voters across the United States, Europe and South America into the arms of angry populists and nationalists who offer a new spiritualism based on the nation.
But there’s another, nearly lost, democratic tradition, in which the goals of a democracy and a worthy civilization are irreducibly linked to the healthy development of its citizens along social, intellectual, and spiritual dimensions. In this older conception, a great democracy is one that serves as a cauldron for the building of good character and the pursuit of a worthwhile life – one that includes but also goes beyond mere material security.
“The one movie even Neil deGrasse Tyson can’t ruin.”- John Oliver
Hah. Rick Roll.
Seriously, last show of the season which is extremely disappointing. Oliver will return in February and I can’t wait. Losing regular programming for the next 2 and a half months is one of those things that make this such a SAD time of year.
I’ll just have to get by on Gold Rush and Curse of Oak Island.
If you’re an experienced cook or one who looks at the kitchen as a foreign country and are preparing a turkey on for Thanksgiving, or any time for that matter, our hero is Alton Brown and his absolutely fool proof method for roasting a turkey is here. No basting required which leaves you time for other tasks or enjoying your company. We repeat this post every year at this time. If you haven’t already purchased your bird, you need to do that today. A frozen bird needs at three days in the refrigerator to defrost. The best bet is a fresh turkey. While it may cost a few cents more, you’re assured that it’s thawed and ready to cook. So, get thee to the grocery store!
Revised from November 20, 2010 for obvious timely reasons.
I never went to cooking school or took home economics in high school, I was too busy blowing up the attic with my chemistry set. I did like to eat and eat stuff that tasted good and looked pretty, plus my mother couldn’t cook to save her life let alone mine and Pop’s, that was her mother’s venue. So I watched learned and innovated. I also read cook books and found that cooking and baking were like chemistry and physics. I know, that was Translator’s territory, but I do have a degree in biochemistry.
For you really geekie cooks here is a great article about the “Turkey Physics” involved in getting it all done to a juicy turn.
Cooking a turkey is not as easy as the directions on the Butterball wrapping looks. My daughter, who is the other cook in the house (makes the greatest breads, soups and stews) is in charge of the Turkey for the big day. Since we are again having a house full of family and friends, one the two 13 to 15 pound gobblers will get cooked outside on the gas grill that doubles as an oven on these occasions. Her guru is Alton Brown, he of Good Eats on the Food Network. This is the method she has used with rave reviews. Alton’s Roast Turkey recipe follows below the fold. You don’t have to brine, the daughter doesn’t and you can vary the herbs, the results are the same, perfection. My daughter rubs very soft butter under the skin and places whole sage leaves under the skin in a decorative pattern, wraps the other herbs in cheese cloth and tucks it in the cavity. If you prefer, or are kosher, canola oil works, too.
Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungoverwe’ve been bailed outwe’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.
This Day in History
President Abraham Lincoln delivers Gettysburg Address; Egypt’s Anwar Sadat becomes first Arab leader to visit Israel; Ford halts Edsel production; Bandleader Tommy Dorsey and actress Jodie Foster born.
Breakfast Tunes
Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac
We still think of a powerful man as a born leader and a powerful woman as an anomaly.
Thanksgiving Season? Nah, it’s time to shop. I have my eye on a Canon VIXIA HF R800 (Richard and Emily are constantly asking me what I want for ek’smas and I seldom have a good answer so I mostly tell them underwear- you can never have enough) which has incredible specs and is rated a best buy by many ($200). It might be a replacement for my Nikon Coolpix S9700 that has suffered some cosmetic damage and who knows what else, I’ve had it for about 4 years. They don’t sell it anymore and the current version would cost over $400 for not much improvement.
The main problem I have with the Nikon is the internal file system equates to about 2 Gigabytes max (32 Bit) which is fine for stills but a mere 24 minutes of video at a clip so when I film one of my Aunty Mame’s productions I have to scramble scene by scene and assemble it later.
The VIXIA HF R800 will do battery life (2 Hours) at a pop, has about the same resolution, slightly better optical zoom, and is also almost as small- 4.6 x 2.1 x 2.3 inches. It has an external Mic input (not to have one is a huge drawback for videography) and a standard Canon 43mm filter mount. So I requested $50 in extras (Filters, Macro and Wide Angle lenses). I have most of the other stuff (Tripod, U3 Memory, Cases) in stock. I also have serious portable batteries designed for pads and phones, 2.2 and 2.5 Amp (not milli, I could probably start a car if I had the right adapters) so if I rotate judiciously I estimate that with a spare ($16) I might operate for at least 8 hours without a wall socket.
It also takes stills. Cool huh?
Additionally I want 24 Eyeglass bags for keeping it all safe from scratches, which is about 18 more than I need but the marginal cost is $2. They’ll get used.
So I don’t really have any problem with Amazon other than political, they’re a horrible employer, have devastated the brick and mortar retail job market, and Jeff Bezos is an asshole only redeemed (slightly) by the fact Trump hates him because Bezos is a real Billionaire and Donald a poseur.
Oh, and he owns the Washington Post since it’s chump change to him.
My attitude about HQ2 is- why? Tired of the view? True it sets up power centers in the midst of the 2 Cities most important to the business- New York (Financial/Political) and D.C. (just Political) but people already fly to see you. How powerful is that?
Me? I’d be spending waaay more than my Prime membership on shipping and I get free books, music, and videos in the bargain.
Should it be broken up? Definitely yes! I’ll miss it though.
What’s the point? Live from New York it’s Saturday Night!
Ok, this is a terrible song and I hate it with a passion. It’s blatantly misogynistic and celebrates rape culture. On the other hand it was a sure fire hit with ladies dragging guys out of their chairs to the dance floor so they could wave their fingers and shout the lyrics at them.
It’s also kind of depressing in that Scenes from an Italian Restaurant kind of way. People don’t dance to that one so much, it changes tempo as does Dashboard Light, but it does it quicker and the uptempo parts are faster.
Or maybe people want to immerse themselves in mindless familiarity and not recognize the sadness of the lyrics (many never listen to the lyrics).
Scenes from an Italian Restaurant – Billy Joel
And Dashboard is not even a good song from Meatloaf (to be fair Italian Restaurant is not Joel’s best work either).
Here’s a much better one.
Hot Patootie
I’m told by my DJ buddy who’s met him personally that Meatloaf is a stone cold racist (since my buddy’s a Republican it takes a lot to shock him) and has personal hygiene problems (he stinks- Meatloaf, not my buddy).
What made it good from a DJ standpoint beyond the fact it was a sure fire hit was that it runs 8+ minutes which gives you time to take a leak, grab a bite, and figure out what the hell to do next.
Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungoverwe’ve been bailed outwe’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.
Cult leader Jim Jones and hundreds of followers die in mass murder-suicide in South America; Massachusetts high court rules gay couples can marry; Disney’s ‘Steamboat Willie’ premieres in New York.
THE TRUMP JUSTICE DEPARTMENT inadvertently revealed in a court filing that it has charged Julian Assange in a sealed indictment. The disclosure occurred through a remarkably amateurish cutting-and-pasting error in which prosecutors unintentionally used secret language from Assange’s sealed charges in a document filed in an unrelated case. Although the document does not specify which charges have been filed against Assange, the Wall Street Journal reported that “they may involve the Espionage Act, which criminalizes the disclosure of national defense-related information.”
Over the last two years, journalists and others have melodramatically claimed that press freedoms were being assaulted by the Trump administration due to trivial acts such as the President spouting adolescent insults on Twitter at Chuck Todd and Wolf Blitzer or banning Jim Acosta from White House press conferences due to his refusal to stop preening for a few minutes so as to allow other journalists to ask questions. Meanwhile, actual and real threats to press freedoms that began with the Obama DOJ and have escalated with the Trump DOJ – such as aggressive attempts to unearth and prosecute sources – have gone largely ignored if not applauded.
But prosecuting Assange and/or WikiLeaks for publishing classified documents would be in an entirely different universe of press freedom threats. Reporting on the secret acts of government officials or powerful financial actors – including by publishing documents taken without authorization – is at the core of investigative journalism. From the Pentagon Papers to the Panama Papers to the Snowden disclosures to publication of Trump’s tax returns to the Iraq and Afghanistan war logs, some of the most important journalism over the last several decades has occurred because it is legal and constitutional to publish secret documents even if the sources of those documents obtained them through illicit or even illegal means.
The Obama DOJ – despite launching notoriously aggressive attacks on press freedoms – recognized this critical principle when it came to WikiLeaks. It spent years exploring whether it could criminally charge Assange and WikiLeaks for publishing classified information. It ultimately decided it would not do so, and could not do so, consistent with the press freedom guarantee of the First Amendment. After all, the Obama DOJ concluded, such a prosecution would pose a severe threat to press freedom because there would be no way to prosecute Assange for publishing classified documents without also prosecuting the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Guardian and others for doing exactly the same thing.
As the Washington Post put it in 2013 when it explained the Obama DOJ’s decision not to prosecute Assange:
Justice officials said they looked hard at Assange but realized that they have what they described as a “New York Times problem.” If the Justice Department indicted Assange, it would also have to prosecute the New York Times and other news organizations and writers who published classified material, including The Washington Post and Britain’s Guardian newspaper.
Last year, the Trump DOJ under Jeff Sessions, and the CIA under Mike Pompeo, began aggressively vowing to do what the Obama DOJ refused to do – namely, prosecute Assange for publishing classified documents. Pompeo, as CIA Director, delivered one of the creepiest and most anti-press-freedom speeches heard in years, vowing that “we have to recognize that we can no longer allow Assange and his colleagues the latitude to use free speech values against us,” adding that WikiLeaks has “pretended that America’s First Amendment freedoms shield them from justice,” but: “they may have believed that, but they are wrong.”
Remarkably, the speech by Donald Trump’s hand-picked CIA chief and long-time right-wing Congressman sounded like (and still sounds like) the standard Democratic view when they urge the Trump administration to prosecute Assange. But at the time of Pompeo’s speech, Obama DOJ spokesman Matt Miller insisted to me that such promises to prosecute Assange were “hollow,” because the First Amendment would bar such prosecutions:
But the grand irony is that many Democrats will side with the Trump DOJ over the Obama DOJ. Their emotional, personal contempt for Assange – due to their belief that he helped defeat Hillary Clinton: the gravest crime – easily outweighs any concerns about the threats posed to press freedoms by the Trump administration’s attempts to criminalize the publication of documents.
This reflects the broader irony of the Trump era for Democrats. While they claim out of one side of their mouth to find the Trump administration’s authoritarianism and press freedom attacks so repellent, they use the other side of their mouth to parrot the authoritarian mentality of Jeff Sessions and Mike Pompeo that anyone who published documents harmful to Hillary or which have been deemed “classified” by the U.S. Government ought to go to prison.
During the Obama years, the notion that Assange could be prosecuted for publishing documents was regarded as so extreme and dangerous that even centrist media outlets that despised him sounded the alarm for how dangerous such a prosecution would be. The pro-national-security-state Washington Post editorial page in 2010, writing under the headline “Don’t Charge WikiLeaks,” warned:
Such prosecutions are a bad idea. The government has no business indicting someone who is not a spy and who is not legally bound to keep its secrets. Doing so would criminalize the exchange of information and put at risk responsible media organizations that vet and verify material and take seriously the protection of sources and methods when lives or national security are endangered.
In contrast to Democrats, Republicans have been quite consistent about their desire to see WikiLeaks prosecuted. As Newsweek noted in 2011: “Sarah Palin urged that Assange be ‘pursued with the same urgency we pursue Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders,’ and The Weekly Standard’s William Kristol wants the U.S. to ‘use our various assets to harass, snatch or neutralize Julian Assange and his collaborators.’” Some Democratic hawks, such as Joe Lieberman and Dianne Feinstein, joined the likes of Palin and Kristol in urging WikiLeaks prosecution, but the broad consensus in Democratica and liberal circles was that doing so was far too dangerous for press freedoms.
In the wake of the 2010 disclosures of the Iraq and Afghanistan war logs, Donald Trump himself told Fox and Friends’ Brian Kilmade that he believed Assange deserved “the death penalty” for having published those documents (a punishment Trump also advocated for Edward Snowden in 2013):
What has changed since that Obama-era consensus? Only one thing: in 2016, WikiLeaks published documents that reflected poorly on Democrats and the Clinton campaign rather than the Bush-era wars, rendering Democrats perfectly willing, indeed eager, to prioritize their personal contempt for Assange over any precepts of basic press freedoms, civil liberties, or Constitutional principles. It’s really just as simple – and as ignoble – as that.
It is this utterly craven and authoritarian mentality that is about to put Democrats of all sorts in bed with the most extremist and dangerous of the Trump faction as they unite to create precedents under which the publication of information – long held sacrosanct by anyone caring about press freedoms – can now be legally punished.
Recall that the DNC itself is currently suing WikiLeaks and Assange for publishing the DNC and Podesta emails they received: emails deemed newsworthy by literally every major media outlet, which relentlessly reported on them. Until this current Trump DOJ criminal prosecution of Assange, that DNC lawsuit had been the greatest Trump-era threat to press freedoms – because it seeks to make the publication of documents, which is the core of journalism, legally punishable. The Trump DOJ’s attempts to criminalize those actions is merely the next logical step in this descent into a full-scale attack on basic press rights.
THE ARGUMENTS JUSTIFYING the Trump administration’s prosecution of Assange are grounded in a combination of legal ignorance, factual falsehoods, and dangerous authoritarianism.
The most common misconception is that unlike the New York Times and the Washington Post, WikiLeaks can be legitimately prosecuted for publishing classified information because it’s not a “legitimate news outlet.” Democrats who make this argument don’t seem to care that this is exactly the view rejected as untenable by the Obama DOJ.
To begin with, the press freedom guarantee of the First Amendment isn’t confined to “legitimate news outlets” – whatever that might mean. The First Amendment isn’t available only to a certain class of people licensed as “journalists.” It protects not a privileged group of people called “professional journalists” but rather an activity: namely, using the press (which at the time of the First Amendment’s enactment meant the literal printing press) to inform the public about what the government was doing. Everyone is entitled to that constitutional protection equally: there is no cogent way to justify why the Guardian, ex-DOJ-officials-turned-bloggers, or Marcy Wheeler are free to publish classified information but Julian Assange and WikiLeaks are not.
Beyond that, WikiLeaks has long been recognized around the world as a critical journalistic outlet. They have won prestigious journalism awards including the Martha Gellhorn Prize for excellence in journalism as well as Australia’s top journalism award. Beyond that, it has partnered with the planet’s leading newspapers, including the New York Times, the Guardian, El Pais and others, to publish some of the most consequential stories of the last several decades One does not need to be a “legitimate journalism outlet” to enjoy the press freedom protections of the First Amendment, but even if that were the case, WikiLeaks has long possessed all indicia of a news outlet.
Then there’s the claim that WikiLeaks does more than publish documents: it helps its sources steal them. This was the claim made last night by former CIA agent John Sipher when trying to justify the Trump DOJ’s actions in response to concerns from a journalist about the threats to press freedom this would pose:
No. Assange's crime is aiding and abetting. He encouraged Manning to steal classified documents (similarly to how he encouraged Trump Jr. to claim the electron was rigged). He was not a place to publish whistle blowers. He was a thief and assistant to Putin.
What Sipher said there is a complete fabrication. When the Obama DOJ explored the possibility of prosecuting Assange, that was the theory it tested: that perhaps it could prove that WikiLeaks did not merely passively receive the documents from Chelsea Manning but collaborated with her on how to steal them.
But the Obama DOJ concluded that this theory would not justify prosecution because – contrary to the lie told by Sipher – there was absolutely no evidence that Assange worked with Manning to steal the documents. As the Post put it: “officials said that although Assange published classified documents, he did not leak them, something they said significantly affects their legal analysis.”
The same is true of WikiLeaks’ publication of the DNC and Podesta emails. Nobody has ever presented evidence of any kind that WikiLeaks worked on the hacking of those emails. There is no evidence that WikiLeaks ever did anything other than passively receive pilfered documents from a source and then publish them – exactly as the New York Times did when it received the stolen Pentagon Papers, and exactly as the Guardian and the Washington Post did when it received the Snowden documents.
Moreover, journalists often do more than passively receive information, but instead frequently work with sources before publication of articles: encouraging, cajoling, and persuading them to provide more information. Accepting the theory that a journalist can be prosecuted for doing more than merely passively receiving information – something that nobody has even proved Assange did – would itself gravely threaten to criminalize core aspects of journalism.
Then there’s the claim that WikiLeaks somehow stopped being a real journalism outlet because it acted to help one of the presidential campaigns at the expense of of the other. This is just another version of the false argument that only “Real Journalists” – whatever that might mean, whoever gets to decide that – enjoy the right to use a free press to disseminate information. That claim is pure legal ignorance.
But let’s assume for the sake of argument that it’s true that WikiLeaks acted to help the Trump campaign and therefore should be disqualified from the protections of the First Amendment. To see how pernicious this argument is, look at how it was recently expressed by former Pentagon official Ryan Goodman and Obama WH Counsel Bob Bauer in justifying the prosecution of WikiLeaks:
It is clear from disclosures by an internal WikiLeaks critic and other materials that Julian Assange targeted Hillary Clinton and sought to work with the Trump campaign and the Russians to secure her defeat. This is not a “legitimate press function.” And the conflation of Wikileaks’ plan of campaign attack with standard journalistic activity undermines important distinctions critical to the protection of the free press.
Just ponder the implications of this incredibly restrictive definition of journalism. It would mean that any outlets that favor one candidate over another, or one political party over another, are not engaged in “legitimate press functions” and therefore have no entitlement to First Amendment protections.
Does anyone on the planet doubt that outlets such as MSNBC and Vox favor the Democratic Party over the Republican Party, and the people they employ as journalists spent the last year doing everything they can to help the Democrats win and the Republicans lose? Does anyone doubt that MSNBC and Vox journalists spent 2016 doing everything in their power to help Hillary Clinton win and Donald Trump lose? No person with even the most minimal amount of intellectual honesty could deny that they did so.
Does this mean that Rachel Maddow and Ezra Klein – by virtue of favoring one political party over the other – are not real journalists, that they are not engaged in “legitimate press functions,” and thus do not enjoy the protections of the First Amendment, meaning they can be prosecuted by the Trump DOJ without the ability to claim the rights of a free press? To state that proposition is to illustrate the tyrannical impulses underlying it. As Marcy Wheeler, otherwise sympathetic to the arguments made by the Goodman/Bauer article, put it:
I agree with much of this analysis abt limits on 1A protection for Trump's conspiring w/Russians. But this claim would threaten a lot of journalistic activity and is fundamentally at odds with the early history of journalism in this country. pic.twitter.com/nBHkU69THI
As Dan Froomkin wrote in response to that article, he finds some of Assange’s actions “despicable” and “abhorred the heedless, unedited publication of the non-newsworthy and personally hurtful” emails that were released (I have expressed similar highly critical views about WikiLeaks’ publication decisions). But Froomkin nonetheless recognizes that “Assange remains a journalist” and that “In the Trump era, when the president of the United States is using his office to attack journalists and journalism itself, the First Amendment is a key bulwark of liberty.” That’s how people who actually care about press freedom – rather than pretend to care about it when doing so suits their political interests of the moment – will reason.
But that’s exactly the point. Neither the most authoritarian factions of the Trump administration behind this prosecution, nor their bizarre and equally tyrannical allies in the Democratic Party, care the slightest about press freedoms. They only care about one thing: putting Julian Assange behind bars, because (in the case of Trump officials) he revealed U.S. war crimes and because (in the case of Democrats) he revealed corruption at the highest levels of the DNC that forced the resignation of the top 5 officials of the Democratic Party and harmed the Democrats’ political reputation.
They’re willing to create a precedent that will criminalize the core function of investigative journalism because – even as they spent two years shrilly denouncing that most trivial “attacks on press freedom” – they don’t actually care about that value at all. They want to protect only the journalism that advances their political interests, while putting people behind bars who publish information that undermines their political interests. It is this authoritarian, noxious mentality that has united the worst elements of the Trump administration and the Democratic Party that pretends to find tyrannical actions objectionable but is often the leaders in defending them.
Julian Assange’s sanctuary in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London has been transformed into a little shop of horrors. He has been largely cut off from communicating with the outside world for the last seven months. His Ecuadorian citizenship, granted to him as an asylum seeker, is in the process of being revoked. His health is failing. He is being denied medical care. His efforts for legal redress have been crippled by the gag rules, including Ecuadorian orders that he cannot make public his conditions inside the embassy in fighting revocation of his Ecuadorian citizenship.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has refused to intercede on behalf of Assange, an Australian citizen, even though the new government in Ecuador, led by Lenín Moreno—who calls Assange an “inherited problem” and an impediment to better relations with Washington—is making the WikiLeaks founder’s life in the embassy unbearable. Almost daily, the embassy is imposing harsher conditions for Assange, including making him pay his medical bills, imposing arcane rules about how he must care for his cat and demanding that he perform a variety of demeaning housekeeping chores.
The Ecuadorians, reluctant to expel Assange after granting him political asylum and granting him citizenship, intend to make his existence so unpleasant he will agree to leave the embassy to be arrested by the British and extradited to the United States. The former president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, whose government granted the publisher political asylum, describes Assange’s current living conditions as “torture.”
His mother, Christine Assange, said in a recent video appeal, “Despite Julian being a multi-award-winning journalist, much loved and respected for courageously exposing serious, high-level crimes and corruption in the public interest, he is right now alone, sick, in pain—silenced in solitary confinement, cut off from all contact and being tortured in the heart of London. The modern-day cage of political prisoners is no longer the Tower of London. It’s the Ecuadorian Embassy.”
“Here are the facts,” she went on. “Julian has been detained nearly eight years without charge. That’s right. Without charge. For the past six years, the U.K. government has refused his request for access to basic health needs, fresh air, exercise, sunshine for vitamin D and access to proper dental and medical care. As a result, his health has seriously deteriorated. His examining doctors warned his detention conditions are life-threatening. A slow and cruel assassination is taking place before our very eyes in the embassy in London.”
“In 2016, after an in-depth investigation, the United Nations ruled that Julian’s legal and human rights have been violated on multiple occasions,” she said. “He’d been illegally detained since 2010. And they ordered his immediate release, safe passage and compensation. The U.K. government refused to abide by the U.N.’s decision. The U.S. government has made Julian’s arrest a priority. They want to get around a U.S. journalist’s protection under the First Amendment by charging him with espionage. They will stop at nothing to do it.”
“As a result of the U.S. bearing down on Ecuador, his asylum is now under immediate threat,” she said. “The U.S. pressure on Ecuador’s new president resulted in Julian being placed in a strict and severe solitary confinement for the last seven months, deprived of any contact with his family and friends. Only his lawyers could see him. Two weeks ago, things became substantially worse. The former president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, who rightfully gave Julian political asylum from U.S. threats against his life and liberty, publicly warned when U.S. Vice President Mike Pence recently visited Ecuador a deal was done to hand Julian over to the U.S. He stated that because of the political costs of expelling Julian from their embassy was too high, the plan was to break him down mentally. A new, impossible, inhumane protocol was implemented at the embassy to torture him to such a point that he would break and be forced to leave.”
Assange was once feted and courted by some of the largest media organizations in the world, including The New York Times and The Guardian, for the information he possessed. But once his trove of material documenting U.S. war crimes, much of it provided by Chelsea Manning, was published by these media outlets he was pushed aside and demonized. A leaked Pentagon document prepared by the Cyber Counterintelligence Assessments Branch dated March 8, 2008, exposed a black propaganda campaign to discredit WikiLeaks and Assange. The document said the smear campaign should seek to destroy the “feeling of trust” that is WikiLeaks’ “center of gravity” and blacken Assange’s reputation. It largely has worked. Assange is especially vilified for publishing 70,000 hacked emails belonging to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and senior Democratic officials. The Democrats and former FBI Director James Comey say the emails were copied from the accounts of John Podesta, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, by Russian government hackers. Comey has said the messages were probably delivered to WikiLeaks by an intermediary. Assange has said the emails were not provided by “state actors.”
The Democratic Party—seeking to blame its election defeat on Russian “interference” rather than the grotesque income inequality, the betrayal of the working class, the loss of civil liberties, the deindustrialization and the corporate coup d’état that the party helped orchestrate—attacks Assange as a traitor, although he is not a U.S. citizen. Nor is he a spy. He is not bound by any law I am aware of to keep U.S. government secrets. He has not committed a crime. Now, stories in newspapers that once published material from WikiLeaks focus on his allegedly slovenly behavior—not evident during my visits with him—and how he is, in the words of The Guardian, “an unwelcome guest” in the embassy. The vital issue of the rights of a publisher and a free press is ignored in favor of snarky character assassination.
Assange was granted asylum in the embassy in 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden to answer questions about sexual offense allegations that were eventually dropped. Assange feared that once he was in Swedish custody he would be extradited to the United States. The British government has said that, although he is no longer wanted for questioning in Sweden, Assange will be arrested and jailed for breaching his bail conditions if he leaves the embassy.
WikiLeaks and Assange have done more to expose the dark machinations and crimes of the American Empire than any other news organization. Assange, in addition to exposing atrocities and crimes committed by the United States military in our endless wars and revealing the inner workings of the Clinton campaign, made public the hacking tools used by the CIA and the National Security Agency, their surveillance programs and their interference in foreign elections, including in the French elections. He disclosed the conspiracy against British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn by Labour members of Parliament. And WikiLeaks worked swiftly to save Edward Snowden, who exposed the wholesale surveillance of the American public by the government, from extradition to the United States by helping him flee from Hong Kong to Moscow. The Snowden leaks also revealed, ominously, that Assange was on a U.S. “manhunt target list.”
What is happening to Assange should terrify the press. And yet his plight is met with indifference and sneering contempt. Once he is pushed out of the embassy, he will be put on trial in the United States for what he published. This will set a new and dangerous legal precedent that the Trump administration and future administrations will employ against other publishers, including those who are part of the mob trying to lynch Assange. The silence about the treatment of Assange is not only a betrayal of him but a betrayal of the freedom of the press itself. We will pay dearly for this complicity.
Even if the Russians provided the Podesta emails to Assange, he should have published them. I would have. They exposed practices of the Clinton political machine that she and the Democratic leadership sought to hide. In the two decades I worked overseas as a foreign correspondent I was routinely leaked stolen documents by organizations and governments. My only concern was whether the documents were forged or genuine. If they were genuine, I published them. Those who leaked material to me included the rebels of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN); the Salvadoran army, which once gave me blood-smeared FMLN documents found after an ambush; the Sandinista government of Nicaragua; the Israeli intelligence service, the Mossad; the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Central Intelligence Agency; the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) rebel group; the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO); the French intelligence service, Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure, or DGSE; and the Serbian government of Slobodan Milosovic, who was later tried as a war criminal.
We learned from the emails published by WikiLeaks that the Clinton Foundation received millions of dollars from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, two of the major funders of Islamic State. As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton paid her donors back by approving $80 billion in weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, enabling the kingdom to carry out a devastating war in Yemen that has triggered a humanitarian crisis, including widespread food shortages and a cholera epidemic, and left close to 60,000 dead. We learned Clinton was paid $675,000 for speaking at Goldman Sachs, a sum so massive it can only be described as a bribe. We learned Clinton told the financial elites in her lucrative talks that she wanted “open trade and open borders” and believed Wall Street executives were best-positioned to manage the economy, a statement that directly contradicted her campaign promises. We learned the Clinton campaign worked to influence the Republican primaries to ensure that Donald Trump was the Republican nominee. We learned Clinton obtained advance information on primary-debate questions. We learned, because 1,700 of the 33,000 emails came from Hillary Clinton, she was the primary architect of the war in Libya. We learned she believed that the overthrow of Moammar Gadhafi would burnish her credentials as a presidential candidate. The war she sought has left Libya in chaos, seen the rise to power of radical jihadists in what is now a failed state, triggered a massive exodus of migrants to Europe, seen Libyan weapon stockpiles seized by rogue militias and Islamic radicals throughout the region, and resulted in 40,000 dead. Should this information have remained hidden from the American public? You can argue yes, but you can’t then call yourself a journalist.
“They are setting my son up to give them an excuse to hand him over to the U.S., where he would face a show trial,” Christine Assange warned. “Over the past eight years, he has had no proper legal process. It has been unfair at every single turn with much perversion of justice. There is no reason to consider that this would change in the future. The U.S. WikiLeaks grand jury, producing the extradition warrant, was held in secret by four prosecutors but no defense and no judge. The U.K.-U.S. extradition treaty allows for the U.K. to extradite Julian to the U.S. without a proper basic case. Once in the U.S., the National Defense Authorization Act allows for indefinite detention without trial. Julian could very well be held in Guantanamo Bay and tortured, sentenced to 45 years in a maximum-security prison, or face the death penalty. My son is in critical danger because of a brutal, political persecution by the bullies in power whose crimes and corruption he had courageously exposed when he was editor in chief of WikiLeaks.”
Assange is on his own. Each day is more difficult for him. This is by design. It is up to us to protest. We are his last hope, and the last hope, I fear, for a free press.
“We need to make our protest against this brutality deafening,” his mother said. “I call on all you journalists to stand up now because he’s your colleague and you are next. I call on all you politicians who say you entered politics to serve the people to stand up now. I call on all you activists who support human rights, refugees, the environment, and are against war, to stand up now because WikiLeaks has served the causes that you spoke for and Julian is now suffering for it alongside of you. I call on all citizens who value freedom, democracy and a fair legal process to put aside your political differences and unite, stand up now. Most of us don’t have the courage of our whistleblowers or journalists like Julian Assange who publish them, so that we may be informed and warned about the abuses of power.”
What medical professionals will tell you about extreme diets is…
Well, they’re extreme.
Now if you have a paleo view of diets you primarily think of them as a way to control your weight and while an All Grapefruit diet can peel off the pounds and Grapefruits are not unhealthy (unless you’re taking one of the vast array of medications they interfere with) it lacks both variety and certain nutrients (though I can’t complain about the taste, I like Grapefruit).
Not every diet is as obviously fashionable as a Grapefruit diet but if you’re inclined to follow the fad you can be making some pretty unhealthy choices, take Gluten Free for example. Unless you have a very specific medical condition it provides no benefit at all (well, maybe it makes you feel virtuous) and deprives you of some things that are difficult to duplicate from other food sources.
Or in my particular case, periodically my Doctors and Nutritionists tell me to go Low Sodium. Not that I use a lot of salt, but I like my pasta seasoned and I eat in places where the amount of Sodium is not in my control fairly frequently. Sure I salt fried food but I don’t eat it that often and I almost never add it to anything else because I feel it’s kind of an insult tho the Chef, like ordering Beef Well Done and then slathering it in Ketchup so you can choke it down.
Also, I have in the past conformed religiously to their advice for periods of time long enough to have an effect and, in addition to making my food bland and tasteless, it sent my blood Sodium levels dangerously low. So now I just listen intently, nod my head, and ignore them. Since I have adopted this practice my levels have stayed steadily in the low normal range.
But I like food and have an appreciation for how it tastes and no particular allergies (though there are foods I don’t like) except to Bell Peppers (finally met a Nurse who has the same thing, so it’s real) and since every Chef in the world thinks their presentation enhanced with a garnish of colorful Bell Peppers I walk around with a brace of EpiPens (yeah, that bad and I don’t have to eat them, proximity is sufficient- they’re like Kryptonite to me).
Still, I wouldn’t say I’m a picky eater or not open to the exotic. If you didn’t tell me they were Sheep’s Eyeballs I’d probably think they were delicious. On the other hand there are things I’m not interested in- deep fried butter? Someone was bored and said- what’s the most ludicrous thing we can put in the Fry-a-lator.
My problem with Soy is that I think it rather tasteless and the consistency like Jello. This is good and bad in that it picks up the flavor of whatever you’re cooking it with so it makes a great extender. Taken alone it’s not much. Now there are methods of preparation and products other than Tofu that solve the texture problem, Soy Sauce is made with fermented Soy (not as icky as it sounds) and is an essential and strong Asian flavor, but I can’t say my diet is loaded with all things Soy. If you choose to practice Vegetarianism or one of it’s variations the added protein boost is highly desirable (though all Beans are like that).
Some Vegetarians, like some Atheists (but not me), tend to be uhh… evangelical about it’s benefits. Personally I don’t think a meal needs meat to be complete but I love me some Bacon and those dried up salty and artificially flavored Soy bits are not anything like smoked and cured Pork Belly.
Of course to real ‘Murikans it’s just Meat and Potatoes. Now Potatoes are great, loaded with Potassium and other vitamins and minerals (especially if you eat the skins which are so delicious that they’re served separately sometimes) and surprisingly low in calories if you bake them or roast them and don’t load them up too much with fat, but there are other Vegetables.
To some though it’s like Rolling Coal (taking your 7 MPG Pickup and De-Tuning it so it spews out even larger amounts of Air Pollution). Anything other than their gut and artery clogging diet is an emasculating trigger (Evangelical Vegetarians don’t help) and a sign of “Librul Political Correctness” (look, it’s just not ok to be a bigoted asshole in public).
Soy contains some trace quantities of Estrogen (which chromosome damaged Humans also produce naturally only not as much) and one of the older Right Wing Consipracy Theories is that it is “Feminising” men.
Folks, I have been to Comet Ping Pong. There is no basement.
Nutritionists have had many debates about the health benefits of soy products; some are very pro-soy, others are critical of it. Their debates are scientific in nature, but on the alt-right, soy is being discussed in stridently political terms—and one of the leading alt-right conspiracy theories is the “soy boy” conspiracy, which claims that soy products are a vast left-wing conspiracy designed to emasculate men and turn their bodies estrogenic.
The alt-right has an abundance of vocabulary that one doesn’t find in more traditional conservatism. In 2018, the term “soy boy” is as common on the alt-right as “cuckservative” (right-wingers who aren’t right-wing enough) and “snowflake” (a hypersensitive liberal or progressive). “Soy boy” isn’t a term that one typically encounters in more traditional conservative outlets like the National Review and the Weekly Standard, but alt-right outlets — from Alex Jones’ Infowars to the misogynist Return of Kings website—have been a frequent source of anti-soy conspiracy theories.
Jones has long been promoting conspiracy theories involving government operatives and “The New World Order” using products to turn male bodies estrogenic. In 2013, Jones argued that juice boxes were feminizing male children, declaring, “After you’re done drinking your little juices, you’re ready to go out and have a baby. You’re ready to put makeup on. You’re ready to wear a short skirt….You’re ready to put lipstick on.”
Jones has asserted that left-wing male commentators are often “latte addicts” and “soy addicts” who lack masculinity—and earlier this year, Jones’ colleague, Paul Joseph Watson posted an eight-minute video describing the alleged attributes of a “soy boy.”
Watson asked, “What is it about soy that turns men into such spineless wimps? Soybeans contain high amounts of phytoestrogens: organic compounds that mimic the female hormone estrogen in the human body. This reduces testosterone and lowers male sperm count.”
Watson elaborated, “Men with high estrogen take on feminine traits. They find it harder to handle stress. They become less assertive. They become low-energy. Their voices get higher, their genitals shrink.”
According to Watson’s video, “environmental estrogens” are causing males to develop female-like breasts—and one of the most prominent “environmental estrogens” is soy. The use of soy baby formulas, Watson said, suggests that “rather than people with already preexisting left-wing beliefs being attracted to vegan-style tofu soy diets, we’re actually creating an army of soy boys from birth.”
Alt-right blogger Mike Cernovich is not only a leading proponent of the bizarre Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which in 2016, claimed that Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was running a child sex ring in a Washington, DC pizzeria—he is also a strident critic of soy products, arguing that there is a correlation between liberal and progressive beliefs and use of soy products. And “soy boy” is one of his favorite insults.
…
In one on his anti-soy videos, Watson focused on “soy face” exclusively—arguing that because “soy boys” have lower testosterone, it shows in their facial expressions. Watson declared, “Look a little closer and see what soy face truly represents: weakness and fear….The globalist chemical warfare program to make men effeminate so they vote more like women and generally vote for left-wing policies and big government is still in full swing. But now that the testosterone-decimating effects of soy and plastics are being exposed, the reign of the soy boys is coming to an end.”
Health-related websites will continue to debate the merits of soy products, doing so in a non-political way. But to the alt-right’s conspiracy buffs, the use of soy is very much a political issue—and nothing says “giant left-wing conspiracy” like the abundance of mythical “soy boys.”
Sorry. Man boobs are a sign you’re getting old and out of shape, not that you’re eating too much Soy.
Welcome to the Stars Hollow Gazette‘s Health and Fitness News weekly diary. It will publish on Saturday afternoon and be open for discussion about health related issues including diet, exercise, health and health care issues, as well as, tips on what you can do when there is a medical emergency. Also an opportunity to share and exchange your favorite healthy recipes.
Questions are encouraged and I will answer to the best of my ability. If I can’t, I will try to steer you in the right direction. Naturally, I cannot give individual medical advice for personal health issues. I can give you information about medical conditions and the current treatments available.
You can now find past Health and Fitness News diaries here.
Thursday is Thanksgiving, already you say? It’s time to start planning. First, how many people are you cooking for? What are you cooking besides the traditional turkey? Have no fear. We’ll get to how to cook that bird to perfection tomorrow. There is this wonderful web site, Epicurious.com, that has the great recipes, menu planning and, best, it is free. Be careful though, it can become addictive. So whether you are cooking for one, two or 40, they have the recipes and plans to fit your holiday celebration.
The sweet potatoes, the turkey, the cranberry sauce—it’s all there. It’s just a little fresher, and a lot easier to pull off, than the menu Grandma would have made.
I never went to cooking school or took home economics in high school, I was too busy blowing up the attic with my chemistry set. I did like to eat and eat stuff that tasted good and looked pretty, plus my mother couldn’t cook to save her life let alone mine and Pop’s, that was her mother’s venue. So I watched learned and innovated. I also read cook books and found that cooking and baking were like chemistry and physics. I know, that was Translator’s territory, but I do have a degree in biochemistry.
Welcome to the Stars Hollow Gazette‘s 