Sam Stein's report on Sen. Jay Rockefeller's reluctance to pass a public option through reconciliation has led to a lot of frustration. However, as is usual with Rockefeller, I think his statement not only does not make sense, it is also pretty squishy (he's not known as Jello Jay for nothing.) Rockefeller said:

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.V.) [. . .] sa[id] that he thought the maneuver was overly partisan and that he was inclined to oppose it. "I don't think the timing of it is very good," the West Virginia Democrat said on Monday. "I'm probably not going to vote for that, although I'm strongly for the public option, because I think it creates, at a time when we really need as much bipartisan[ship] ... as possible. "

[MORE . . .]

There's the Olympics. And on the Bachelor, Women Tell All Nothing. Also, 24 and Life Unexpected.

The Center for Constitutional Rights has obtained new FOIA documents showing Congress knew much more about the CIA's secret rendition program and torture than previously disclosed. The new documents also highlight the role of Dick Cheney counsel Richard Addington. For example, a newly obtained February 4, 2003, CIA memo documents the role of Counsel for the Office of the Vice President (OVP) in analyzing and approving the CIA techniques. CCR says:

“Members of Congress must come clean about whether they encouraged or objected to torture during these many secret meetings with CIA officials and we need a complete accounting of Cheney’s counsel, David Addington’s, role in the creation of the torture program. These new documents show that the CIA may have lied to Congress about the role of interrogation techniques in detainee deaths and key members of Congress abdicated their oversight role. This new information points even more strongly to the need for a full criminal investigation of the torture program, up the entire chain of command.”

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Attorney General Eric Holder at a press conference after Nabijullah Zazi's guilty plea today praised the civilian courts as venues for terror trials.

In this case, as it has been in so many other ones, the criminal justice system has proved to be an invaluable weapon for disrupting plots and incapacitating terrorists, one that works in concert with our intelligence community and in concert with our military. We will continue to use it to protect the American people from terrorism.

Now, as I've stated on other occasions, the criminal justice system also contains powerful incentives to induce pleas that yield long sentences, and that gain intelligence that can be used in the fight, in the war against al Qaeda. We will use all available tools whenever possible against suspected terrorists.

Holder also decried the political motives of those in opposition: [More...]

Najibullah Zazi pleaded guilty today to three counts: conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction against persons and property in the U.S., conspiracy to commit murder in a foreign country and providing material support to a terrorist organization (Al Qaeda.) CBS has the transcript of today's hearing. Zazi said he went to Afghanistan in 2008 to join the Taliban to fight the U.S. military. While in Pakistan, he was recruited by al Qaeda to launch an attack in the U.S.

In entering his plea, the immigrant, Najibullah Zazi, admitted that he came to New York last year near the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks to kill himself and others on the subway using a homemade bomb — what he said was a “martyrdom operation” that he was just days away from executing until he realized he was under government surveillance.

The plea agreement is sealed. The DOJ press release describing the plot is here. Two of the counts to which he plead carry a maximum life sentence.

Zazi admitted that he brought TATP [Triacetone Triperoxide] explosives to New York on Sept. 10, 2009, as part of plan to attack the New York subway system.

[More...]

Via Atrios and Sadly, No!, WaPo Deputy Editorial Page Editor Jackson Diehl writes:

Tehran's leading agent [in Iraq] is Ahmed Chalabi, a Shiite who in 2002 played a major role in persuading the Bush administration to go to war. Now he has managed to have hundreds of candidates eliminated from the election on the mostly bogus grounds that they were or are loyalists of Saddam Hussein's Baath party. His targets are not just Sunni leaders but secular nationalists -- the two most important banned candidates are leading members of cross-sectarian alliances. The success of those tickets would be a triumph for Iraqi democracy -- and a huge setback for Iran.

Chalabi aims to become prime minister of the next government, which would be a disaster for Iraq and for Washington.

(Emphasis supplied.) Joseph Heller described the world and we live in the same endless loop. For those of you who forgot who Chalabi is.

Speaking for me only

Meteor Blades correctly pointed out that former Vice President Dick Cheney confessed to a war crime when he said "I was a big supporter of waterboarding." As I have written earlier, you can argue that we should be committing war crimes against suspected terrorists, but you can not deny that Dick Cheney has confessed to a war crime. Unless you are the AP's Ron Fournier. Meteor Blades details Fournier's inability to report fats. Fournier wrote "Whatever one might think of Cheney's interrogation policies, the former vice president has never been charged with a war crime, much less confessed to one."

Actually, whatever one might think of Cheney's interrogation policies, which included waterboarding, the one fact that is clear is that Cheny confessed to a war crime when he stated his role in the adoption of waterboarding as US policy. Because Cheney has not (and will not) be charged with committing war crimes, does not mean he has not confessed to them. Stalin was never charged with war crimes either. Does anyone doubt he committed them? Perhaps Ron Fournier.

Speaking for me only

The White House has released President Obama's proposed health care plan. Big Tent Democrat has the White House recap and some preliminary thoughts. I add mine below, from the various pages of the White House release.

The President’s Proposal builds off of the legislation that passed the Senate and improves on it by bridging key differences between the House and the Senate as well as by incorporating Republican provisions that strengthen the proposal.

The overview says it changes the Senate-passed bill and "reflects policies from the House-passed bill and the President’s priorities." Among the key changes it touts: It ends discrimination on pre-existing conditions and closes the Medicare "donut hole" gap in coverage. It increases the excise tax threshhold "from $23,000 for a family plan to $27,500 and starting it in 2018 for all plans." For singles, it is $10,500. (Why are singles always discriminated against?) [More...]

Via Ezra Klein (PDF):

Key changes include:

• Eliminating the Nebraska FMAP provision and providing significant additional Federal financing to all States for the expansion of Medicaid;
• Closing the Medicare prescription drug “donut hole” coverage gap;
• Strengthening the Senate bill’s provisions that make insurance affordable for individuals and families;
• Strengthening the provisions to fight fraud, waste, and abuse in Medicare and Medicaid;
• Increasing the threshold for the excise tax on the most expensive health plans from $23,000 for a family plan to $27,500 and starting it in 2018 for all plans;
• Improving insurance protections for consumers and creating a new Health Insurance Rate Authority to provide Federal assistance and oversight to States in conducting reviews of unreasonable rate increases and other unfair practices of insurance plans.

(Emphasis supplied.) [More...]

Are you watching the Olympics?

Figure skating: original dance; speed skating: women's 1500m Gold Medal final; freestyle skiing: men's ski cross Gold Medal final; skiing: men's super combined Gold Medal final; bobsled: two-man Gold Medal final.

What about NBC and the time delays? It's catching some criticism. Here's NBC's reasoning:

NBC has stuck to the longtime Olympic TV plan: Hold the best action until prime time, when viewership is biggest. Naturally, people can find out the results long before that footage airs. But NBC has exclusive rights to the footage before it airs, so it knows you won't see it until it shows it.

Or are you watching Jeff and Jordan in Chile on the Amazing Race, Desperate Housewives and Brothers and Sisters? Something else?

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

The new credit card rules go into effect tomorrow. Here's a summary from the Federal Reserve Board about the changes.

It's not all good news for the consumer.

In the end, Congress made banks give up some abusive tactics while allowing them ample time and latitude to dream up new ones.

Bottom line: The new day brings new fees. [More...]

Evan Bayh bylines an insipid NYTimes Op-Ed that bemoans the alleged rise of "partisanship" in the Congress. (Jefferson and Adams would likely be surprised that party politics is of recent vintage.) The funniest part of the piece to me was this anecdote:

While romanticizing the Senate of yore would be a mistake, it was certainly better in my father’s time. My father, Birch Bayh, represented Indiana in the Senate from 1963 to 1981. A progressive, he nonetheless enjoyed many friendships with moderate Republicans and Southern Democrats. One incident from his career vividly demonstrates how times have changed. In 1968, when my father was running for re-election, Everett Dirksen, the Republican leader, approached him on the Senate floor, put his arm around my dad’s shoulder, and asked what he could do to help. This is unimaginable today.

(Emphasis supplied.) Bayh does not report what his father's answer was to Dirksen but the obvious one would be this - don't run a Republican candidate against me. It is truly ridiculous. More . . .

Ezra Klein writes a peculiar column in the WaPo today in which he seems surprised that the President of the United States is considered the leader of his political party. Ezra writes:

The White House health-care summit on Thursday is supposed to mark a return to politics as it should be practiced -- the president leading the legislative process, the two parties talking things out, bipartisanship flowering, order restored.

For months, members of Congress have complained that the president should take a more active role in the health-care reform process. But the president of the United States is not, as we sometimes seem to think, the president of the United States Congress. He can sign or veto a bill, but that's about it. The president's powers within the legislative process -- as opposed to after its completion -- are unofficial and informal. He can give a speech or invite congressional leaders to the White House for a chat, but he has no firm control over the proceedings. Legislating is the legislature's job.

(Emphasis supplied.) How very quaint. Perhaps that vision would be a better one, but it has been a long time since such has been the case. This is has always been the silliest of defenses from the Village Dems for the Obama Administration -- the proclaiming of its legislative irrelevancy. More . .