Update: Robyn Blumer in the St. Petersberg Times has more on how the meatpacking plant abused the workers.

A New York Times editorial today takes on the meatpacking plant raids in Postville Iowa. It quotes from the essay of a professor and court interpreter at the subsequent criminal proceedings:

Dr. Camayd-Freixas’s essay describes “the saddest procession I have ever witnessed, which the public would never see” — because cameras were forbidden.

“Driven single-file in groups of 10, shackled at the wrists, waist and ankles, chains dragging as they shuffled through, the slaughterhouse workers were brought in for arraignment, sat and listened through headsets to the interpreted initial appearance, before marching out again to be bused to different county jails, only to make room for the next row of 10.”

[More...]

Nine U.S. soldiers were killed in Afghanistan today, more than any number since 2005. As Big Tent Democrat noted earlier, President Bush is now suggesting some troops may begin pulling out of Iraq in the coming months.

Pulling out for where? Home? Not so fast. We may just be trading one war for another.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned during a visit to Kabul last week that there are more foreign fighters, including al-Qaeda members, in Pakistan's tribal areas, militants who cross the border and launch attacks against U.S. and Afghan troops.

Mullen has said he hopes improved security in Iraq will allow troops to be shifted this year from Iraq to Afghanistan, where violence is rising.

One of the things that concerns me about Sen. Barack Obama is his many references to the need to step up the fight in Afghanistan. [More...]

The latest New Yorker cover has sparked a lot of justifiable outrage. Obama spokesman Bill Burton said:

“The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create. But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree."

What Obama Needs To Learn:

Politics is not a battle for the middle. It is a battle for defining the terms of the political debate. It is a battle to be able to say what is the middle.

Via Digby, according to the LATimes, I am Centrist because I support stem cell research, immigration, addressing global warming and nuclear nonproliferation. As Digby writes:

It's good for us when positions that have been considered left wing ideas are characterized as centrist. It signals that the public . . . have decided that on some issues, anyway, what was once considered left wing heresy is now mainstream.

That is called defining what the middle is. Obama and progressives need to keep pushing the middle in our direction. On Iraq, warrantless wiretapping and a whole range of issues. Obama still has not learned the lesson.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

One ramification of prosecutions that are tainted by politics, like that of Don Siegelman, is that every Justice Department investigation of a Democratic politician is now viewed with suspicion. It doesn't help when federal law enforcement authorities use tactics like this:

Sue Schmitz, [an Alabama] state representative, was arrested in the bathroom of her home while she was taking an early morning shower.... She is awaiting trial on charges that she accepted more than $175,000 in college salary for work she didn't perform.

Not the kind of accusation that creates a great risk of flight. They couldn't call and make an appointment for her to turn herself in? No wonder Alabama state senator Pat Lindsey says: "There's some bitterness there toward the U.S. attorney's office and the Department of Justice."

A lengthy article in today's Press-Register asks: Are Prosecutors Out Of Control? [more ...]

Ryan Lizza has a long article in the New Yorker on How Chicago shaped Obama. I haven't read it yet, but will update later this afternoon after I've had a chance to go through it.

Update: SusanG at Daily Kos has a review of Arianna Huffington's new book, Right is Wrong.

This is an open thread. Have a great Sunday.

This column in the WaPo today is quite good:

James Monroe had one, and so should we. That seems to be the theory behind the rampant and premature speculation among national security wonks about what kind of new doctrine President Obama or President McCain would use to guide U.S. foreign policy. But let's not get carried away thinking about what a McCain or Obama doctrine might be. In today's complex world, a president doesn't need to have a one-size-fits-all template for handling foreign affairs. In fact, the next president would be better off without one.

Indeed. Enough with the doctrines. More . .

So the "Far Left" position on Iraq troop withdrawal now becomes the "centrist" view. The NYTimes reports:

The Bush administration is considering the withdrawal of additional combat forces from Iraq beginning in September, according to administration and military officials, raising the prospect of a far more ambitious plan than expected only months ago.

Now, as usual, for reasons unknown, in the Village this is considered good political news for Republicans. Personally, I do not believe that but I also do not care. I want our troops out of combat in Iraq and anything that makes withdrawal from the Iraq Debacle more likely is welcome news.

Sully found a very interesting 1996 piece by Tom Edsall on Bill Clinton. I defy anyone to read it and tell me Barack Obama was not, until recently, reprising Bill Clinton's 1992 election campaign.

But what is really interesting is Edsall's focus on the mandate Clinton won in 1992:

Clinton not only overestimated the magnitude of his election victory but initially proceeded to govern as if cultural and social post-sixties liberalism had won, when in fact a moderated centrism had won.

Of course, that seemed to be what was possible in 1992 - a win for moderated Democratic centrism. In 2008, we can seek more for the mandate. We must. More . . .

A funny thing happened to Obama's "Move To The Middle" tour. After two weeks, it has abruptly ended, as the AP's Liz Sidoti writes:

Barack Obama has found something that eluded him during the primary season — contrast. And, he's basking in it. . . . [V]ast disagreements with McCain — on everything from economic philosophies to security proposals — seem to have given Obama license to more aggressively and enthusiastically go after his foe. . . . These days, Obama assails McCain's position on the issues every chance he gets. He levels his charges with a commonsense tone and lighthearted touch that couches the criticism while making his core argument: McCain and President Bush are the same.

"If you are satisfied with the way things are going now, then you should vote for John McCain," Obama says before rattling off a list of current concerns, including rising gas prices, home foreclosures and job losses as the country fights two wars.

Actors Josh Brolin and Jeffrey Wright were arrested in Shreveport today, along with some members of the crew filming the Oliver Stone movie "W." Apparently they are suspected of participating in a bar fight. Perhaps they were just getting into the spirit of the president's partying days at Yale.

Russ Walker, a former Yale classmate and friend from Oklahoma City, recalls returning from a party with Bush one night in college when the inebriated Bush dropped to the ground and started rolling in the middle of the street. "He literally rolled back to the dorm," recalled Walker. "It was raucous, teenage stuff that he perhaps grew out of later rather than sooner."

(Guest Post by Anita Thompson)

Hi. It's Anita Thompson. I'm sitting here in my hostess's spotless new living room as we make plans to go to dinner. So... Please forgive me for taking the lovely Jeralyn away from you for the evening. She smiled and asked me to put up tonight's open thread. So have fun posting, as we look forward to reading your comments when we return.

We have Hunter's favorite drink mix here to sip while we read: Bailys Irish Cream with a splash of Chivas. "It's the drink that's always good." he liked to say. It's called a Bif. I'm sure so many of the times Hunter and I would watch Jerri on TV while cheering her on, there were Bifs on the counter. So have fun with the open thread, and if you can, enjoy a Bif too. Your friend, Anita Thompson