Month: January 2014

So we all had a good laff last week over David
Brooks’
anti-pot column in the New York Times (read
Jacob Sullum and
Matt Welch for complementary smackdowns).

Russ “Mugger” Smith of the invaluable
Splice Today points out something worth remembering. The Times’
house editorial, which was published just two days after Brooks’
piece, is even worse, and not just because it supposedly carries
the imprimatur of the wise folks at the Gray Lady.
Writes Smith:

[The Times’ editorial] “The Marijuana Experiment” …
[takes] a very critical stance on the rapidly moving trend in
states across the country that have either legalized pot or are in
the process of doing so. The Times editorial
board is clearly against such a populist movement—even though:
abortion, check, gay marriage, check, unisex bathrooms, coming
up—and it’s my guess that one of Brooks’ superiors at the paper
suggested he write such an essay to gauge opinion. Otherwise, why
would the editor who presumably reads Brooks’ columns before
they’re published leave him open for such scorn?

Marijuana legalization—or decriminalization—is an issue that
gains supporters every day, so
the Times triumvirate of publisher Arthur
Sulzberger, Jr. (62), executive editor Jill Abramson (59) and
editorial page editor Andrew Rosenthal (57) knows the paper will
have to take a more definitive stand in the coming months,
particularly since New York’s governor and possible Democratic
presidential candidate Andrew Cuomo has proposed the very minor
step of allowing medicinal marijuana in 20 hospitals across the
state.

I don’t buy Smith’s suggestion
that Brooks was strongarmed into writing a column he didn’t believe
in, but Smith is right that
the Times house editorial is suffused with a slow-twitch,
pre-senility panic about all the terrors that might be unleashed
upon the world now that weed can be smoked without a potential
arrest harshing the buzz. Curiously, the Times editorial doesn’t
comment on whether the Colorado law is a good or bad thing,
choosing instead to lay out a litany of things that might go
terribly, terribly wrong.

The Times list of “what to watch for in the early stages of this
experiment” include under-age smoking, marketing to youths,
driving while drunk and high, and interstate
trafficking. About the only thing
missing from the list is  a Harry Anslinger-inspired
anxiety about whether easy access to dope will increase the
desire among “white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes,
entertainers, and any others.”

What does it tell you about the state of mainstream
establishment journalism when the liberal New York Times is
tut-tutting about “what to watch” for in Colorado at the same time
that the conservative National Review
is editorializing that “Colorado has become the first state to
make the prudent choice of legalizing the consumption and sale of
marijuana…”?

It tells you a lot – and nothing that reflects well on the
New York Times.

So we all had a good laff last week over David
Brooks’
anti-pot column in the New York Times (read
Jacob Sullum and
Matt Welch for complementary smackdowns).

Russ “Mugger” Smith of the invaluable
Splice Today points out something worth remembering. The Times’
house editorial, which was published just two days after Brooks’
piece, is even worse, and not just because it supposedly carries
the imprimatur of the wise folks at the Gray Lady.
Writes Smith:

[The Times’ editorial] “The Marijuana Experiment” …
[takes] a very critical stance on the rapidly moving trend in
states across the country that have either legalized pot or are in
the process of doing so. The Times editorial
board is clearly against such a populist movement—even though:
abortion, check, gay marriage, check, unisex bathrooms, coming
up—and it’s my guess that one of Brooks’ superiors at the paper
suggested he write such an essay to gauge opinion. Otherwise, why
would the editor who presumably reads Brooks’ columns before
they’re published leave him open for such scorn?

Marijuana legalization—or decriminalization—is an issue that
gains supporters every day, so
the Times triumvirate of publisher Arthur
Sulzberger, Jr. (62), executive editor Jill Abramson (59) and
editorial page editor Andrew Rosenthal (57) knows the paper will
have to take a more definitive stand in the coming months,
particularly since New York’s governor and possible Democratic
presidential candidate Andrew Cuomo has proposed the very minor
step of allowing medicinal marijuana in 20 hospitals across the
state.

I don’t buy Smith’s suggestion
that Brooks was strongarmed into writing a column he didn’t believe
in, but Smith is right that
the Times house editorial is suffused with a slow-twitch,
pre-senility panic about all the terrors that might be unleashed
upon the world now that weed can be smoked without a potential
arrest harshing the buzz. Curiously, the Times editorial doesn’t
comment on whether the Colorado law is a good or bad thing,
choosing instead to lay out a litany of things that might go
terribly, terribly wrong.

The Times list of “what to watch for in the early stages of this
experiment” include under-age smoking, marketing to youths,
driving while drunk and high, and interstate
trafficking. About the only thing
missing from the list is  a Harry Anslinger-inspired
anxiety about whether easy access to dope will increase the
desire among “white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes,
entertainers, and any others.”

What does it tell you about the state of mainstream
establishment journalism when the liberal New York Times is
tut-tutting about “what to watch” for in Colorado at the same time
that the conservative National Review
is editorializing that “Colorado has become the first state to
make the prudent choice of legalizing the consumption and sale of
marijuana…”?

It tells you a lot – and nothing that reflects well on the
New York Times.

The leader of Jabhat al-Nusra, the Al
Qaeda-linked rebel group fighting against the Assad regime, has
called for an end to the recent violence that has erupted between
different factions of Assad’s opposition.

In an audio recording Jabhat al-Nusra’s leader, Abu Mohammed
al-Golani, blames much of the recent violence on another group with
links to Al Qaeda, the Islamic
State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
Reuters has been unable to confirm the authenticity of the
recording, but reported that “it was posted on a Twitter account
used by the Nusra Front.”

Rebels in Syria recently
killed 34 foreign Al Qaeda-linked fighters, most of whom were
reportedly from ISIL.  

ISIL recently took control of the Iraqi city of
Fallujah, which is less than 50 miles west of Baghdad, and has
taken over parts of Ramadi, which like Fallujah is in the
Sunni majority Anbar province. According to an
Iraqi military spokesman, Al Qaeda-linked fighters have set up
a government in Fallujah and are the only source of order
there.

As Reuters’ reporting explains, ISIL’s activities in Iraq are
only part of a wider goal, namely the creation of “a radical
Islamic state out of the chaos of neighbouring Syria’s civil
war.”

Unsurprisingly, Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham
(R-S.C.) have
blamed President Obama for the fall of Fallujah, calling the
situation “predictable.”

In their
statement, McCain and Graham, who
have both argued for arming rebels in Syria, also say that the
Obama administration’s policy in Syria has failed. It is worth
keeping in mind that were the U.S. to have sent the weapons McCain
and Graham wanted to rebels in Syria there would have been a chance
that the weapons would eventually end up in the hands of ISIL, who
are now in control of Fallujah.

The news from the last few days has highlighted that groups like
ISIL are not ones that the U.S. should risk inadvertently
supporting.

The leader of Jabhat al-Nusra, the Al
Qaeda-linked rebel group fighting against the Assad regime, has
called for an end to the recent violence that has erupted between
different factions of Assad’s opposition.

In an audio recording Jabhat al-Nusra’s leader, Abu Mohammed
al-Golani, blames much of the recent violence on another group with
links to Al Qaeda, the Islamic
State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
Reuters has been unable to confirm the authenticity of the
recording, but reported that “it was posted on a Twitter account
used by the Nusra Front.”

Rebels in Syria recently
killed 34 foreign Al Qaeda-linked fighters, most of whom were
reportedly from ISIL.  

ISIL recently took control of the Iraqi city of
Fallujah, which is less than 50 miles west of Baghdad, and has
taken over parts of Ramadi, which like Fallujah is in the
Sunni majority Anbar province. According to an
Iraqi military spokesman, Al Qaeda-linked fighters have set up
a government in Fallujah and are the only source of order
there.

As Reuters’ reporting explains, ISIL’s activities in Iraq are
only part of a wider goal, namely the creation of “a radical
Islamic state out of the chaos of neighbouring Syria’s civil
war.”

Unsurprisingly, Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham
(R-S.C.) have
blamed President Obama for the fall of Fallujah, calling the
situation “predictable.”

In their
statement, McCain and Graham, who
have both argued for arming rebels in Syria, also say that the
Obama administration’s policy in Syria has failed. It is worth
keeping in mind that were the U.S. to have sent the weapons McCain
and Graham wanted to rebels in Syria there would have been a chance
that the weapons would eventually end up in the hands of ISIL, who
are now in control of Fallujah.

The news from the last few days has highlighted that groups like
ISIL are not ones that the U.S. should risk inadvertently
supporting.

California Attorney General
Kamala Harris has produced her title and summary for a ballot
initiative that would change the state’s constitution to permit
municipalities to make changes to future pension and health
benefits for its workers. Of course, they should be able to do so
now, but it only works one way. They can only be increased. This
ballot initiative, introduced by San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed (a
Democrat), would allow fiscally struggling municipalities to reduce
future benefits or require employees to contribute more moving
forward.

The Sacramento Bee notes that neither side is
exactly happy with how Harris has
summarized the amendment:

The initiative is now officially titled “Public Employees
Pension and Retiree Healthcare Benefits Initiative Constitutional
Amendment.” Harris’ summary says, among other things, that it
“eliminates constitutional protections for vested pension and
retiree healthcare benefits for current public employees, including
teachers, nurses, and peace officers, for future work
performed.”

Chuck Reed, the Democratic mayor of San Jose behind the measure,
has said he wants to give state and local governments the authority
to cut pension costs even if it means changing future benefits for
current workers. He said he thought the newly released language
isn’t clear and that the word “eliminate” is “pejorative.”

“You read this and you don’t know what we’re trying to do,” Reed
said. He said the summary focuses on the measure’s pension
takeaways when it should state that the initiative it also locks in
accrued benefits.

Harris’ summary is
here (pdf). The law requires the summary to be 100 words or
less. Given the complicated nature of pensions, it is a bit
challenging to write a satisfying summary of what pension reforms
would do. The latest draft of the full ballot initiative is

here (pdf). Reed is correct that Harris’ summary doesn’t
outright say that current benefits are protected from cuts by this
amendment, though she does make it clear that changes refer to
“future work.”

The unions, of course, feel like Harris’ summary doesn’t shed a
bad enough light on pension reform:

Organized labor said the language doesn’t emphasize the risk
they believe the measure poses to the retirement security of both
current and future public workers. The unions also wanted Harris to
cast the proposal as sanctioning the abrogation of contracts, since
pension and benefits health are normally negotiated.

“While the title and summary describes the repeal of
Constitutionally vested rights to pensions and retiree health care,
teachers, nurses, and firefighters – by far the largest groups of
municipal public employees – deserve to have voters know exactly
how their retirement security will be put at risk with this
measure,” the union coalition’s press release said.

How does the risk compare to what could happen to their
retirement security if their employers go
bankrupt, hmm?

The release of the summary now allows the initiative to be
circulated for signatures, so we may see where the public’s
loyalties lie. In California, voters passed
pension reforms in San Diego and Reed’s own San Jose in 2012.

A judge ruled in December, though, that pensions couldn’t be
cut in San Jose, hence the need for a constitutional amendment. A

Reason-Rupe poll in September shows that citizens want their
cities to deal with financial problems by reducing city employee
benefits and pushing them into 401(k)-style defined contribution
programs.

• Hundreds of passengers were
  
  stranded overnight on three Amtrak trains in Illinois due to
  snow drifts. They were
  rescued today and sent to Chicago, which may well be just
  another form of frozen torture.
• The Senate advanced another
  extension of unemployment benefits, but even if it passes it
  has a much tougher challenge in the House, as Republicans want cuts
  elsewhere to offset the costs and other concessions.
• The Environmental Protection Agency wants to force
  wood stoves to reduce their emissions by 80 percent by 2019.
  The rules won’t affect existing wood stoves.
• President Barack Obama endorses the
  repeal of the Authorization for Use of Military Force that
  permitted the war in Iraq, a White House official said today. After
  all, he clearly doesn’t believe drones count anyway.
• The former NBA players who have
  joined Dennis Rodman in North Korea are now expressing a little
  doubt about their decisions, as Rodman’s diplomatic skills with the
  media are a touch lacking.
• Iran has declined to participate in
  upcoming Syrian peace talks in Switzerland.

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You’d
be forgiven if, while looking at recent headlines about Iraq, you
thought it was the aughts again. Fallujah, the site of some of the
most intense fighting during the U.S. war in Iraq, is again at the
center of political violence in that country. The United Nations,
meanwhile, reported 7,818 civilians were killed in Iraq
in 2012, a casualty level not seen since the years of the Iraq War.
But while the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from the country in
December 2011 marked the end of the American war there, it did not,
and could not, mark the end of the influence of the war on events
in Iraq. Instead, writes Ed Krayewski, what’s happening in Iraq
follows the American war, the legacy of foreign policy
interventionism in action.

View this article.