Don't Worry, He's Got It.

Open Thread.

Classic from 2009:

Recent history has proved that the president's Chess Match style will require a little more patience than we're accustomed to in order to see the endgame -- to see how this all plays out. [. . .] Chances are: he's got this.

Dentist day for me. Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

Matt Yglesias:

Kevin Drum pretends President Obama is fighting against cutting government spending:

[T]his poll does pretty clearly tell us [. . .] large majorities are pretty obsessed about cutting the national debt — and those large majorities cut across practically every demographic subgroup. If you want to know why President Obama is willing to cut a deal with Republicans to drastically cut federal spending, this is it. We liberals have miserably failed to make the case for stimulus spending, and as a result conservatives have spectacularly succeeded in reverting the American public to its default state of believing that the federal books should always be balanced, the same as household books. On this score, we've just been flatly outplayed over the past couple of years.

(Emphasis supplied.) What does Drum mean "we?" The President has not been willing, he has been EAGER, to cut government spending. He has been talking like this for over a year:

Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame, a Somalian man indicted in New York today was held for two months and interrogated on a U.S. Navy ship. The Obama Administration describes him as a militant with ties to AQAP and al Shabab, and says he was designated an "important target." My translation: He was on the kill or capture list and we decided to go for capture rather than kill this time. Next time could be different.

Obama officials say the new policy of holding detainees for interrogation on Navy Ships is much different than the previous Bush policy. The interrogations are more humane and they get Miranda warnings...after being interrogated. [More...]

A handy little primer, followed by some thoughts on the requirement of proof beyond a reasonable doubt and the presumption of innocence.

A Verdict of Not Guilty Includes:

• Based upon the evidence presented, we the Jury find that the defendant is absolutely 100% innocent.

• Based upon the evidence presented, we the Jury, cannot be absolutely sure that the defendant is innocent.

• Based upon the evidence presented, we the Jury are confident that the defendant is innocent.

• Based upon the evidence presented, we the Jury believe that the defendant is probably innocent. [More...]

It's been a long day here. Time for dinner and an open thread, all topics welcome.

I was driving to the jail to see a client when I heard on the radio the verdict would be announced at 2:15. The breathless commentators at HLN were in top form. One even announced Casey Anthony's parents were undoubtedly en route to the court, "hearts pounding in their chest" as if they were right there beside them. All of the commentators I heard predicted a guilty verdict -- citing the prosecution's closing argument. A few hedged their bets by saying juries are unpredictable. Not one called it for the defense. [More...]

The jury has reached a verdict. It will be read at 2:15 ET. I'll be offline but here's a place to discuss it.

Sounds like the jury knew yesterday as news reports today say the jurors arrived in nicer clothes this morning.

The Wall St. Journal and the New York Post are reporting the DA's office is likely to drop charges against Dominique Strauss-Kahn at or before his July 18 court date, due to the accuser's credibility issues and prosecutors' doubts as to whether a crime was committed.

There are new details about the accuser's actions after the encounter and how she encountered her supervisor. The WSJ reports:[More...]

Paul Krugman and Noah Smith discuss the critic of Keynesian economics John Taylor's conclusion that Obama's stimulus of 2009 had too much tax cuts and too little government purchases. Smith writes:

[Taylor] suggests [. . .] that tax rebates and transfer payments don't make for particularly good stimulus, because in a balance-sheet recession people will just use the money to pay down their debts. [. . . T]his is a reason why Keynesians often argue that government spending is a better approach to stimulus than tax rebates. On that note, Taylor notes that federal expenditures didn't rise by very much due to the ARRA[. . . .] This precisely echoes the complaints that Keynesians had about the ARRA: not enough federal government purchases, not enough infrastructure spending.

In response to these points, Taylor wrote:

[E]xperiences from the 1970s raise serious doubts about the political and operational feasibility of such discretionary fiscal policy. ...In a simple Keynesian model, all the government has to do to combat a recession is quickly increase government purchases, but the difficulty with doing so in practice is one of the classic arguments against discretionary fiscal policy.

Matt Yglesias seconds that emotion. The argument appears to be that the United States is ungovernable in a crisis that requires something other than a war. That our government is incapable of implementing the proper policy at this time. Indeed, that our government will implement that absolutely incorrect policy at this time. No one thought this before the past 3 years it seems to me.

Speaking for me only

Yesterday I wrote at length on details not adding up about the recorded phone call between Dominique Strauss-Kahn's accuser and her boyfriend/fiance/husband in the Arizona immigration jail on May 15, the day after the encounter at the Sofitel Hotel. The call was first reported by The New York Times.

When the conversation was translated — a job completed only this Wednesday — investigators were alarmed: “She says words to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I’m doing,’ ” the official said.

The Wall St. Journal has new details on the phone call , all coming from the prosecution and law enforcement. The article was written after the writer spoke with lead prosecutor Joan Iluzzi-Orbon. The new disclosures make even less sense. [More...]