Kevin Drum writes:

Although we should be spending more now to get the economy back on track, this is why a long-term deficit deal with teeth is something that both liberals and conservatives ought to be willing to compromise to achieve.

A "long term deficit deal with teeth" can not exist. The reason is one Congress can not bind future Congresses.

Case in point - the US government ran fiscal surpluses of $236.2 billion from 1998 to 2000. Indeed, the CBO projected trillion dollar surpluses beyond that. Guess what happened next? The massive Bush Tax Cuts plus two trillion dollar wars. Goodbye surpluses.

Stupid statement from Drum.

Speaking for me only

Apparently, Obama and the Dems are trying to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory on the debt ceiling negotiation:

The Senate's top two officials are working on what one aide called a "hybrid," fail-safe solution to the debt ceiling debate that could garner enough political support to pass Congress.

The plan, which is being hatched by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), would ensure that over $1.5 trillion in cuts over ten years be passed into law. It would also grant President Obama the authority to extend the debt ceiling through the 2012 election season while requiring him to propose -- but allowing him to ultimately veto -- cuts beyond those initial $1.5 trillion.

WTF? McConnell offered to do a clean raise of the debt ceiling (with some pointless votes) and Dems say no to that? They INSIST on spending cuts? In the middle of a recession? They deserve to lose.

Speaking for me only

Tomorrow is Stage 12 of the Tour de France with a mountaintop finish on the HC Luz-Ardiden right after going over the HC Col de Tourmalet (with a little Cat 1 climb just before that.) It has a chance to be epic as the Tour heads to the Pyrenees. See this preview and this one at Podium Cafe.

Got to get up early to watch it. The riders will be hitting the foot of the Col de Tourmalet around 9:30 EST. I'm finishing some work tonight because I'll be watching tomorrow morning.

Oh BTW, for those of you following the Women's World Cup - Abby Wambach? A Gator. Just sayin'

Open thread.

Major props to Christine Pelisek, Terry Greene Sterling and Christopher Dickey of The Daily Beast, who discovered the identity of the jailed fiance/husband of the hotel maid in the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case. He is Amara Tarawally, 35. Yesterday, Daily Beast reporters interviewed him at the Arizona immigration center.

Tarawally himself was arrested in July 2010 along with another African, a Mexican, and a U.S. citizen of Mexican descent, according to court records. Tarawally had produced almost $40,000 in cash to buy 114 pounds of marijuana from a man who turned out to be a police informant in Chandler, Arizona.

After a plea bargain, in which three felony charges were dropped and Tarawally copped to conspiracy to possess a large amount of cannabis, he served nine months in jail and was put on probation but immediately turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Tarawally is now behind the cinderblock walls and concertina-wire fences of a detention center in the desert town of Eloy, Arizona, awaiting a deportation decision.

The accuser's phone call in a Fulani dialect with Tarawally the day after the encounter with DSK may be the biggest problem for the state's case. Prosecutors believe she told him not to worry, she knew what she was doing and the man she accused had a lot of money. [More...]

Wired Magazine has released the full version of the instant messaging chat logs of Wikileaks suspect Pvt. Bradley Manning and Adrian Lamo.

Previously, Wired had published only portions of the logs, due to Manning's privacy interests. It's changed its mind. Why?

[I]ndependent reporting elsewhere has tipped the scale in favor of publishing. By all evidence, Manning is a figure of historic importance. Inasmuch as the conversations shed light on the personal pressures in Manning’s life at the time of his arrest, publishing the logs serves a valid news interest, and at this point we believe it will cause little additional harm to Manning’s privacy.

Update: The death toll is now at 21, with more than 100 injured. Indian authorities say fuel-filled, molotov cocktail type devices were used. Forensic experts on scene say the prime ingredient was ammonium nitrate, with RDX as a booster, and all of the devices contained shrapnel to maximize the damage. As of now, no one has taken credit, and it doesn't sound like they know who is responsible.

Original Post: The death toll now stands at 13 in last nights Mumbai bombings. 54 have been injured. The numbers could rise. Indian authorities believe it was a coordinated attack by terrorists.

Latest details available at NDTV twitter feed. Here's the official statement.

Mumbai police believe the Indian Mujahideen is behind the attacks.

The Nation has released an investigative report with details of a walled compound completed four months ago in Somalia, and a secret basement prison at the Somalia’s National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters. The CIA maintains an aircraft at the new compound, and CIA agents conduct interrogations of prisoners in the basement prison, some of whom are plucked off the streets. The U.S. is footing the bill for the salaries of the Somali intelligence agents.

At the facility, the CIA runs a counterterrorism training program for Somali intelligence agents and operatives aimed at building an indigenous strike force capable of snatch operations and targeted “combat” operations against members of Al Shabab, an Islamic militant group with close ties to Al Qaeda.

[More...]

Via Atrios and Krugman, Third Wayer William Galston claims to have discovered, appropriately in The New Republic, "a new theory" of our economic troubles - it is the household balance sheet due to the homeowners crisis:

Movement conservatives argue that the weight of a government that “spends too much, taxes too much, and borrows too much” [. . .] Keynesian liberals, meanwhile, counter that the problem is the collapse of demand and that the government’s failure to offer a large enough stimulus is consigning us to a rate of growth not easy to distinguish from stagnation. What if they’re both wrong? That’s the claim of Amir Sufi, a finance professor at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. The data tell a compelling story, he argues: “The main factor responsible for both the severity of the recession and the subsequent weakness of the economic recovery is the deplorable weakness of the U.S. household balance sheet,” which is, Sufi shows, “in worse condition than at any other point in history since the Great Depression.”

Heh. Tomorrow, Galston will invent the wheel.

Speaking for me only

It really is a battle royale in the conclaves of the GOP. Here is Murdoch's Wall Street Journal defending McConnell's cave:

The hotter precincts of the blogosphere were calling this a sellout yesterday, though they might want to think before they shout. The debt ceiling is going to be increased one way or another, and the only question has been what if anything Republicans could get in return. If Mr. Obama insists on a tax increase, and Republicans won't vote for one, then what's the alternative to Mr. McConnell's maneuver?

I think the alternative is obvious - extracting as much in spending cuts as you can. Is the WSJ seriously afraid of negotiating with the Obama Administration? The obvious move was the one Boehner was executing - take the spending cuts being offered by Biden and call it a day until the next hostage situation. Frankly, McConnell's move is inexplicable, not the least of which is because I do not think it can get through the GOP House.

In any event, it is fun to watch the GOP make a mess of a political negotiation for once. However it turns out, this is good news for the President's political fortunes.

Speaking for me only

Update: The storm has moved into Denver. The thunder is loud and flash flood warnings now include us. The cable tv just went out. (Added: It's back on now.) Internet probably won't be far behind. I better go find the flashlight in case power is next.

Tonight brings tornado warnings and more flash flood warnings. The Emergency Broadcast Service has been coming on every few minutes. So far, they are in surrounding counties to Denver, so no immediate danger.

A federal judge in Virginia has overturned a death sentence in a drug case saying the defendant was wrongfully convicted due to the lying testimony of accomplice who got a deal for life. The judge blasted the prosecution who claimed not to know the testimony was false: [More...]

Why do people confess to crimes they didn't commit? Frontline tonight is airing "The Confessions", the story of the Norfolk 4.

How could four men confess to a brutal crime that they didn't commit? Inside the incredible saga of the Norfolk Four -- a case that cracks open the justice system to reveal almost everything that goes wrong when innocent people get convicted.

Update: Netflix customers are not taking the news well.

Is Netflix shooting itself in the foot by raising prices 60% and de-bundling streaming from physical dvds?

Customers in the United States who want both services will pay $7.99 per month to rent one DVD at a time plus $7.99 for unlimited streaming, or a total of $15.98 per month, the company said on Tuesday. The previous cost of this plan was $9.99 a month.

I think the problem for Netflix is that its offerings are dated. The best of the new movies aren't available for streaming. Why pay $7.99 for a new movie on DVD from Netflix when you can get it the same day it's released in HD for $5.99 via On Demand? (And avoid the hassle of fast-forwarding through four or five previews?) [More...]