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Ken Silverstein

From this author

[Commentary]

Shaky Foundations

The Clintons' so-called charitable enterprise has served as a vehicle to launder money and to enrich family friends.
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[Letter from Baton Rouge]

Dirty South

The foul legacy of Louisiana oil

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[Perspective]

On Brining and Dining

How pro-oil Louisiana politicians have shaped American environmental policy
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[Postcard]

The Most Cajun Place on Earth

A trip to one of the properties at issue in Louisiana’s oil-pollution lawsuits 
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[Browsings]

Secret Oil Company Memos on Pollution in Louisiana

"All of these practices are flagrant violations of the law.”
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[Controversy]

Anatomy of an Al Qaeda “Conference Call”

Dubious sources feed national-security reporter Eli Lake a fraudulent story for political purposes — once again
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[Perspective]

On the Selling of the Egyptian Coup to Liberals

How the mass killing of Islamists is being justified in America
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[Commentary]

A Brilliant Life: Remembering Alexander Cockburn

Alexander Cockburn passed away on July 21 at age 71. He wrote many pieces for Harper’s Magazine over the years, among them “The Tedium Twins,” a classic of humor writing…

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[Article]

The government’s man

How to read the résumé of a terrorist expert

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[Washington Babylon]

Signing Out

This is my last post here at Washington Babylon and I’ll be leaving my position as Harper’s Washington Editor (I will remain as a contributing editor to the magazine). I’ve…

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[Washington Babylon]

Broder and Woodward Still on Lecture Circuit

Two years ago, I wrote about private groups offering big speaking fees and perks to David Broder and Bob Woodward, even though both had talked in the past about the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Incumbency: The Democrats’ Best Hope

The scenario for the midterm elections remains grim for Democrats, but they have two factors working in their favor. First, the pathetic state of the GOP and second, and more…

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[Washington Babylon]

Plumbing the Depths: A review of Megan McCain’s new book

From Leon Wolf in the New Ledger: I initially had reservations about writing this book review at all. After all, it is clear to everyone who has read Meghan McCain’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

American Inequality: The making of a Banana Republic

From Tim Noah at Slate: When it comes to real as opposed to imagined social mobility, surveys find less in the United States than in much of (what we consider)…

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[Washington Babylon]

With Congress, Charity Begins at Home

Last year I posted an item about the James E. Clyburn Research and Scholarship Foundation, the personal charity of House Majority Whip James Clyburn. The foundation’s donors included a number…

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[Washington Babylon]

Chelsea’s Wedding and the Political Class

From Joe Bageant: How about them political elites, huh? Five million bucks for Chelsea Clinton’s wedding, 15K just to rent the air-conditioned shitters — huge chrome and glass babies with…

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[Washington Babylon]

Another Congressional Perk: College scholarships for pals

From the Dallas Morning News: Longtime Dallas congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson has awarded thousands of dollars in college scholarships to four relatives and a top aide’s two children since 2005,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Doh! Bachmann spells name wrong in registering her PAC

As Wonkette reported earlier today, Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota has formed her very own Leadership Political Action Committee, the slush fund of choice for the modern politician. Like many…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Obama’s Chances to Win Reelection

Nelson Hernandez (among others) took issue with my “clever analysis of President Obama’s excellent chances of re-election.” Hernandez made a number of good points, though he made several comments (for…

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[Washington Babylon]

About That “Year of the Insurgent” Narrative: And what new bogus storyline will the media find to replace it?

A few short months ago the media was filled with narratives about 2010 being the “Year of the Insurgent,” a storyline that was always overblown. That’s not because the public…

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[Washington Babylon]

Race and the Courts

From Stephen Bright, in the Fulton County Daily Report: The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ third ruling that a white supervisor calling black men “boy”—as in “Boy, you better…

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[Washington Babylon]

David Broder Rushed to Hospital for Emergency Craniorectal Procedure

David Broder of the Washington Post has long had his head so far up Washington’s ass that he is incapable of understanding that there are opinions in America beyond the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why Obama Will Win Reelection: Walter Mondale

With the Democrats looking to receive a solid (and well-deserved) drubbing in the mid-term elections, there’s much talk in the press about whether Barack Obama will be a one-term president.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Goldberg’s Case for War

James Fallows argues that Jeffrey Goldberg’s article in The Atlantic about the prospect of Israel attacking Iran is not actually an endorsement for such an attack, but that “the article…

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[Washington Babylon]

Jeffrey Goldberg’s Convenient Facts

Jonathan Schwarz and Glenn Greenwald demolish Jeffrey Goldberg’s new piece in The Atlantic. The former writes, “Jeffrey Goldberg has just written a long article about the chances of Israel attacking…

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[Washington Babylon]

Trouble for the Democrats’ Favorite Defense Lobbyist

From the Washington Post: Paul J. Magliocchetti was one of the most powerful and influential lobbyists in Washington not too long ago, known for steering campaign contributions to favored lawmakers…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hope and Change in the Middle East

From Laura Rozen: The 2010 Arab Public Opinion poll will be released Thursday at the Brookings Institution by Shibley Telhami, of the University of Maryland and Brookings’ Saban Center for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Jon Stewart Gives Up

And with good reason. Which side is worse? The Republicans who voted against a bill providing health care for 9/11 first responders? Or the Democrats who used a legislative trick…

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[Washington Babylon]

There Go The Midterms

Afghanistan + The Economy + Health Care Reform = this: Only 41% of those surveyed Tuesday through Sunday approved of the way Obama is handling his job, his lowest rating…

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[Washington Babylon]

AIG Teaches Rangel an Ethics Lesson

From Ruth Marcus: My favorite part of the ethics report on Charlie Rangel involves his efforts to “close” a $10 million gift “to create AIG Hall” as part of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Tom DeLay Shakedown: Disciple learned from the master

From the Washington Post: Days after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig sank in the Gulf of Mexico, a conservative nonprofit group called the Institute for Energy Research asked BP to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Cheery Economic News to Get Your Week Started

I missed this when it was published a few days ago. Worth a read. From James Kuntsler: I visited the Slate Political Gabfest podcast yesterday. These otherwise excellent, entertaining, highly…

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[Washington Babylon]

Your Stimulus Dollars at Work

Hmmm. I wonder how many times this sort of thing happened with stimulus money? And how many millions (billions?) were wasted? From the Post-Dispatch: When he applied for federal stimulus…

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[Washington Babylon]

Class: The unspoken word of the Shirley Sherrod affair

Michelle Singletary couldn’t quite bring herself to say the word — she used the term “” — but her column otherwise nailed the real story. Instead of focusing on the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Journolist Uproar: Pot, meet kettle

I don’t think all these Daily Caller stories demonstrate that Journolist was a grand liberal media conspiracy, and almost everyone writes intemperate, sarcastic emails from time to time that would…

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[Washington Babylon]

Spotty Record on Oil Rig Safety

From the New York Times: A confidential survey of workers on the Deepwater Horizon in the weeks before the oil rig exploded showed that many of them were concerned about…

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[Washington Babylon]

Our Federal Government: Job training program for energy lobbyists

From the Washington Post: Three out of every four lobbyists who represent oil and gas companies previously worked in the federal government, a proportion that far exceeds the usual revolving-door…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Latest Israeli Crime

From Haaretz: Lawyers for the Arab man convicted of rape by deception and sentenced to 18 months in prison, say they are considering an appeal to the High Court of…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Washington Post on the Sherrod Case: See no racism

The significance of the Shirley Sherrod affair is clear: an employee at the U.S. Department of Agriculture lost her job and was painted as a racist due to the release…

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[Washington Babylon]

BP’s Ticketmaster Service for California Pols

From Mother Jones: For more than a decade, BP has operated a hush-hush phone line that California lawmakers can call to request box seats to NBA games and concerts at…

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[Washington Babylon]

Newtie’s Big Ideas

“‘Consultants argue that public anger, if properly stoked, alone can carry the party over the finish line. In their view, getting bogged down in the issues is a distraction and…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Octavia Nasr Firing: CNN reporter canned for saying the speakable

From Glenn Greenwald (via Andrew Sullivan): Just to underscore how mild and mainstream were Nasr’s firing comments, consider this 2002 column from ultimate establishment centrist David Ignatius, expressing “sincere respect…

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[Washington Babylon]

Marlboro Kids

From the New York Times: Human Rights Watch, the group best known for documenting governmental abuse and war crimes, plans to release a report on Wednesday showing that child and…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Democrats: Running on empty

From Dana Milbank: It would not be accurate to say that Democrats are worried about losing control of the House in November. It would be accurate to say that Democrats…

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[Washington Babylon]

Your Tax Dollars At Work: Paying for sexual harassment

From Politico: Taxpayers have paid out nearly $1 million per year in settlements to congressional employees who have been harassed or otherwise treated badly by their political bosses over the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hole-In-One: Ethics “waivers” allow congress to keep golfing

From the Sunlight Foundation: To allow members of Congress and Hill aides to attend their annual fundraising golf tournaments free of charge, Washington’s premier partisan clubs get ethics waivers from…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care Firm Crawls Out From Under Rock: Congressman Boehner takes its money

Remember WellCare, the Tampa-based insurer that was accused of “bilking taxpayers of hundreds of millions of dollars by using fraudulent practices that were integral to the company’s profit-making,” says a…

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[Washington Babylon]

World Cup: Defeat for Van Diver, Van Whiner and Van Thug

Spain was clearly the best team in the World Cup and it deserved yesterday’s 1-0 victory over Holland. It controlled the ball and the tempo for most of the match,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Fellowship Travelers: State Department bars Nieman fellow as “terrorist”

From Associated Press: The U.S. government has denied a visa to a prominent Colombian journalist who specializes in conflict and human rights reporting to attend a prestigious fellowship at Harvard…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hand-to-Mouth at a Higher Level

From the New York Times: Whether it is their residence, a second home or a house bought as an investment, the rich have stopped paying the mortgage at a rate…

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[Washington Babylon]

What the Octavia Nasr Case Proves

From the Angry Arab: The dismissal of Octavia Nasr proves this: No matter how much you grovel and how much you insult Arabs and Muslims in the US, as Nasr…

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[Washington Babylon]

Palin’s Plans: Horndog wing will not be enough to carry her across the line

There’s been much speculation about Sarah Palin’s political prospects and the possibility that she will win high office in the 2012 elections. Yesterday Andrew Sullivan posted an item in which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Nixon and Kissinger: The Cheech and Chong of Political Murder

From Jeff Stein: President Richard M. Nixon and his national security adviser, Henry A. Kissinger, joked that an “incompetent” CIA had struggled to successfully carry out an assassination in Chile,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Media Filters: For Washington Post, Krugman not a reliable source but Wall Street analyst totally impartial

One of the more revealing examples of the mainstream media’s laughable claims of “objectivity” came in a Sunday Washington Post story about what lies ahead for the U.S. economy. Written…

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[Washington Babylon]

World Cup: Hands of God

Because I tend to root for Latin American teams at the World Cup (except for Argentina), I began to worry about the fate of its teams when the media narrative…

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[Washington Babylon]

World Cup: Holland deserved it

Holland 2, Brazil 1. In my last post, I noted that soccer is impossible to predict because so much depends on who scores the first goal, luck and poise. Brazil…

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[Article]

Tea Party in the Sonora

For the future of G.O.P. governance, look to Arizona

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[Washington Babylon]

BP: Corporate Code and political money don’t mix

From the Washington Post: BP, the global energy corporation whose massive oil spill is fouling huge swaths of the Gulf of Mexico, proclaims in its corporate code of conduct that…

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[Washington Babylon]

World Cup: Cream rises to top

There were a lot of upsets in the first round but the best teams have reached the quarter-finals at the World Cup: Argentina, Brazil, Germany and Spain (with Holland a…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Lowest Form of Life

From Matt Taibi: I thought I’d seen everything when I read David Brooks saying out loud in a New York Times column that reporters should sit on damaging comments to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Russian Spies and Campaign Finance

A reader, who asked to remain anonymous, sends along the following (slightly edited) email: There are many reasons to move to public financing of elections, the chief one of which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Nibbling at Reform

From Allen Sloan: One of the best pieces of advice I ever got was from a former editor, who told me how to handle topics that were likely to annoy…

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[Washington Babylon]

Washington Post: Now hiring

“Michael Hastings has never served his country the way McChrystal has,” says Lara Logan of CBS. Andrew Sullivan asks, “When will the Washington Post hire her?” You know the answer…

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[Washington Babylon]

Best Newspaper Lede of All Time

From a British sportswriter in 1966, before the World Cup game between England and Germany. Via Andrew Sullivan: Tomorrow, Germany will attempt to defeat us at our national game. It…

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[Washington Babylon]

From “The More Things Change” File

From Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington: Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) asked [Congress] to investigate and hold hearings on the extent to which White House…

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[Washington Babylon]

Guns to Somalia: Arms trafficking scheme exposed

From Laura Rozen: A federal grand jury in Miami, Florida has indicted an Israeli defense consultant and an American citizen of conspiring to transfer hundreds of AK-47s to the breakaway…

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[Washington Babylon]

So long U.S. Team: You will not be missed

Random World Cup observations: First, does anyone still want to argue about the mediocrity of the U.S. team, which was mercifully eliminated by Ghana on Saturday? In what was arguably…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Weigel Affair

I posted an item Friday morning about why I generally don’t enjoy blogs, saying, “Having one’s own opinion validated twenty times a day really isn’t all that stimulating, though that’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pre- and Post-Game Commentary

A number of emailers, not all necessarily friendly, have asked if I intend to post today after the U.S.-Ghana game. In fact, I don’t intend to comment, no matter what…

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[Washington Babylon]

Blogs and Double Standards

I don’t know much about Congressman Paul Kanjorski or whether he’s a racist, but I do know that if a Republican had said this — “We’re giving relief to people…

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[Washington Babylon]

Cry, Baby, Cry

It’s interesting how some teams lose a game at the World Cup and instead of complaining loudly about controversial officiating calls, take responsibility for the loss. For example, here are…

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[Washington Babylon]

Political Journalism’s “State Secret”

From Romenesko: Politico’s Gordon Lubold and Carol E. Lee wrote that “a beat reporter … would not risk burning bridges by publishing many of McChrystal’s remarks.” Their observation was then…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Real News From Afghanistan

No, it’s not about Stanley McChrystal. From AP: June has become the deadliest month of the Afghan war for the NATO-led international military force. An Associated Press count based on…

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[Washington Babylon]

The American Media Finally Realizes It Sucks

The Daily Show nails it again. Bonus: President Gretchen Carlson. Double Bonus: The Hooter’s Memorial at Iwo Jima.

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[Washington Babylon]

Letters on Arizona, Soccer

Email from Cheryl Cage, Democratic candidate for the Arizona State Senate, running against Al Melvin, in Legislative District 26, near Tucson: Your piece in the July Harper’s was, unfortunately, spot-on.…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Victory for Vanilla-Lovers: U.S. advances to second round

The U.S. ties two weak teams, England and Slovenia, and barely beats Algeria and not only advances to the second round but wins its group. Life really is unfair. Even…

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[Washington Babylon]

Laughing Matter? GOP insider alleges hush money paid to former RNC employee

From ABC: The Republican National Committee has doled out more than $100,000 to the top staffer let go after the embarrassing discovery that the party spent nearly $2,000 to entertain…

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[Washington Babylon]

The First Commandment: Kill the Grizzly

From Right Wing Watch (via Andrew Sullivan): Last week, researchers at Yellowstone National Park trapped a Grizzly Bear, tranquilized it and fitted it with a radio collar. Shortly after the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bloggers in Pajamas or Op-ed Writers in Depends? You choose

During the Dog Days of the Cold War, the Soviet Union used to send “Youth Delegations” to international diplomatic events composed almost entirely of doddering 60-year-old-plus hacks. That’s pretty much…

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[Washington Babylon]

Offshore: Where the money is

From The Mufson Report (formerly known as The Washington Post): Willie Sutton robbed banks because that’s where the money is. And oil companies venture into deep waters for exploration because…

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[Washington Babylon]

Mea Culpa: Landon Donovan Not Hateable

OK, OK, I have been convinced by readers that I was unfair to Landon Donovan. However, I still think he should never have claimed after the 2-2 draw with Solvenia…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Oil Spill Winners: As usual, K Street makes a killing

From the Washington Post: Companies involved in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill are hiring a bevy of high-priced Washington lobbyists and consultants to help them weather the crisis, as…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why I Hate Landon Donovan

I vowed not to write about the U.S. team again, but it’s really impossible not to. First, Landon Donovan is an ass. After the game he said the referee “stole”…

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[Washington Babylon]

Room Service, or how Japan’s lobbying for ending commercial whaling ban includes cash, hookers

From the Sunday Times, via TPM: Japan, in an effort to secure votes to allow commercial whaling, has bribed small countries with aid packages, plus spending money and prostitutes for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Gusher: Money from oil industry keeps flowing to congress

From the Washington Post: Lobbyists for BP hosted at least 53 fundraising parties for lawmakers and candidates in recent years — four of them since the explosion and oil spill…

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[Washington Babylon]

U.S. Lobbying Firm’s Kyrgyz Ties

APCO Worldwide, which wanted to represent Turkmenistan for me, has shady ties in Kyrgyzstan as well. From the Wall Street Journal: Weeks before ethnic clashes killed hundreds of people in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Arizona from the Right: A conversation with Senator Ron Gould

Senator Ron Gould bills himself as “the most conservative” politician in the Arizona state legislature, and he has the flat-top haircut to prove it; next to Gould, Sergeant Joe Friday…

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[Washington Babylon]

What’s The Matter With Arizona? A conversation with Senator Rebecca Rios

I have a piece in the July issue of the magazine (not yet available online) about the political looniness in the state of Arizona, which goes well beyond the issue…

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[Washington Babylon]

Save the Walruses: Oil companies unveil visionary green campaign

From Dana Milbank: Congressional investigators looking into the Gulf of Mexico oil spill found that BP and three other oil companies had filed “oil spill safety response plans” for the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Campaign Fundraisers and Votes: Purely coincidental

From the Washington Post: The Office of Congressional Ethics is investigating eight lawmakers who held fundraisers within 48 hours of a major House vote on a Wall Street reform bill…

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[Washington Babylon]

UNESCO Tables Grotesque Obiang “Prize”

In the face of a huge international uproar, I’m told UNESCO has decided today not to allow itself to be used (at least for the time being) by Teodoro Obiang,…

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[Washington Babylon]

World Cup Reaction

I received a number of nasty emails about my item yesterday on why I hate the U.S. soccer team. Keep them coming. Look, I admit my aversion to the U.S.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama and the Gulf Spill: The president’s role

From Rolling Stone: Like the attacks by Al Qaeda, the disaster in the Gulf was preceded by ample warnings – yet the administration had ignored them. Instead of cracking down…

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[Washington Babylon]

Huffington Post Allows Lobbyist to Take Dictator Out for Spin on its Site

A new story in AzeriReport describes how a lobbyist for the corrupt government of Azerbaijan used the Huffington Post as a bulletin board. The lobbyist in question is Jason Katz…

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[Washington Babylon]

Will UNESCO hop in bed with dictator for $3 million? Obama administration comes out against award

Tomorrow UNESCO will decide if it has any shred of dignity or if it will allow itself to be used by a corrupt African dictator for PR purposes. As I’ve…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why I (Still) Hate the U.S. Soccer Team

A year ago I laid out the reasons why I can’t stand the American soccer team. I felt the same way after its first World Cup game, though what I…

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[Washington Babylon]

Boot Helen Thomas: Howard Kurtz finally sees White House press as being too clubby

The Washington press corps is one big incestuous clusterfuck, but the instance in which Howard Kurtz criticized the beltway media was for its failure to lkick out Helen Thomas from…

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[Washington Babylon]

America’s Challenge: Fighting fools and perverts

From Daniel Byman and Christine Fair: They blow each other up by mistake. They bungle even simple schemes. They get intimate with cows and donkeys. Our terrorist enemies trade on…

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[Washington Babylon]

Twinkies: The raw materials

Ever wonder what goes into a Twinkie? Wonder no more. From coolhunting.com, via Andrew Sullivan.

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[Washington Babylon]

Big Tears: Congressman Melancon cries for the Gulf

Point One: The Washington Post reports today that Congressman Charlie Melancon of Louisiana is all choked up about the situation in the Gulf. “The real personification of the leak’s political…

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[Washington Babylon]

Don’t Try Contacting BP’s Wildlife Expert: He’s been dead for five years

From Associated Press: BP PLC’s 582-page regional spill plan for the Gulf, and its 52-page, site-specific plan for the Deepwater Horizon rig vastly understate the dangers posed by an uncontrolled…

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[Washington Babylon]

House Initiative on Corruption: Kill the watchdog

From Politico: The Office of Congressional Ethics, a powerful symbol of Democrats’ promise to “drain the swamp” in Washington, is in danger of having its power stripped after the midterm…

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[Washington Babylon]

Math Quiz: How many drinks does it take to end up in the wrong bed?

Barking up the wrong tree, via Andrew Sullivan, offers a guide (of sorts) to college drinking.

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[Washington Babylon]

Stop the Presses: Media blowhards fight for Helen Thomas’s chair!

Has the Helen Thomas affair prompted reporters to reflect on Middle East coverage? For example, is there a media bias that favors Israel? Is the plight of the Palestinians ignored?…

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[Washington Babylon]

Are Voters Angry?

Steven Taylor of Outside the Beltway writes: Ultimately, I would argue that if the re-elect race for the House is 85% or higher, then most of the media narrative that…

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[Washington Babylon]

BP Execs Promoted Despite Ignoring Safety Problems

From ProPublica: A series of internal investigations over the past decade warned senior BP managers that the company repeatedly disregarded safety and environmental rules and risked a serious accident if…

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[Washington Babylon]

Helen Thomas and “Objective Journalism”

Granted, Helen Thomas’ remarks were vile and disgusting, but it’s been hard to stomach much of the media commentary about her. For example, CBS correspondent Mark Knoller is quoted in…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Gulf Spill: A Drop in the Bucket

From William Minter: The estimates are at best approximate on both sides on the equation, but six weeks after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Jim Messina: Cracks in the “Mr. Fix It” Image

I wrote an item earlier this year about the journalistic practice of the “beat sweetener,” namely writing fawning profiles of top political officials in the hopes of currying favor for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Past Encounter With Future South Carolina Scandal Participants

I don’t have any particular insight into the ongoing political scandal in South Carolina, but I do know the two primary players involved: political consultant Will Folks and gubernatorial candidate…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dictator Plays Race Card in Seeking His Very Own UNESCO Award

The New York Times had a story today about a topic I have covered here several times lately: how Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, the dictator of oil-rich Equatorial Guinea, is…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Sesame Street Cover-up: Glenn Beck airs floatilla video previously suppressed by all news outlets except none

Thanks to the diligent work of Glenn Beck, the world has finally seen footage from the flotilla incident that shows Israeli soldiers being hit with clubs. Until Beck aired the…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on BP’s Oily Mess, in the Gulf and in Nigeria

The oil spill in the Gulf was the topic of an item posted yesterday, which cited the remarks of a man who grew up in Nigeria and now lives in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bob Woodward and the Iraq War

Former Washington Post reporter Lorraine Adams on Bob Woodward: I worked with him in passing at the newsroom, actually I worked with him on a few stories so I knew…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Gary Miller, the Rolling Stones, and Campaign Business

During the past few days I’ve reported here on Congressman Gary Miller’s misrepresentations about his military service. As I had noted in the original story, Miller has also been involved…

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[Washington Babylon]

BP’s Oily Mess: Welcome to the United States of Nigeria

I received an email from a reader this morning that said, “A friend from Nigeria now living in the U.S….said BP has made such a mess in Nigeria that generations…

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[Washington Babylon]

UNESCO’s Award for the Worst of the Worst

Yesterday I posted an item about how UNESCO may allow Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, the corrupt dictator who rules Equatorial Guinea, to endow a prize in his own name. In…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Trip Down Memory Lane: U.S. financed 1971 Bolivian coup

From digitalemunction.com: For nearly four decades, there’s been an open ques­tion about the 1971 coup that brought dic­ta­tor Hugo Banzer Suárez to power in Bolivia: was the U.S. gov­ern­ment involved?…

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[Washington Babylon]

UNESCO for Sale: Dictators allowed to buy their own prizes, for the right price

In the face of intense pressure from human rights and advocacy groups and a barrage of bad publicity, the lunkheads who run UNESCO are apparently reconsidering their decision to allow…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Congressman Miller’s “Service” During Vietnam War

After I posted an item yesterday about California Congressman Gary Miller misrepresenting his military service, Miller’s office contacted several of the publications I cited to correct the record. Miller told…

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[Washington Babylon]

Piracy on the High Seas

From David Grossman: How insecure, confused and panicky a country must be, to act as Israel acted! With a combination of excessive military force, and a fatal failure to anticipate…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Only Real Questions About the Israeli Attack

1. When will Israel call for an investigation into the incident? 2. When will the Washington Post editorial page cite the investigation in hailing Israel as the only “true democracy…

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[Washington Babylon]

“It has been a tremendous honor to have served”: Congressman Gary Miller’s Vietnam Odyssey

[Editor’s note: After this item ran, Miller’s office contacted Congress.org (and apparently several other publications cited below) to correct the misinformation about his military record.] Congressman Gary Miller of California…

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[Washington Babylon]

Facebook Privacy: What a joke

From The Onion: All 1,472 employees of Facebook, Inc. reportedly burst out in uncontrollable laughter Wednesday following Albuquerque resident Jason Herrick’s attempts to protect his personal information from exploitation on…

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[Washington Babylon]

The “Phantom” Motrin Recall

From the Washington Post: The company at the center of a massive recall of children’s Tylenol and other popular over-the-counter products tried to perform a “phantom recall” of defective Motrin…

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[Washington Babylon]

Industrial Warfare

From Steven Pearlstein: The biggest oil spill ever. The biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. The deadliest mine disaster in 25 years. One recall after another of toys from…

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[Washington Babylon]

J.D. Hayworth: Two-time nominee as dumb congressman

John McCain’s campaign has started running a web ad attacking his GOP primary opponent, J.D. Hayworth, ridiculing him for saying earlier this week that “we never formally declared war on…

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[Washington Babylon]

Day Traders: Members of congress set own rules on stock trades

In 2006, I wrote a piece about then-Congressman Jeb Bradley, who owned about $1 million in oil, gas and electric company stock, took over $45,000 in campaign contributions from energy…

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[Washington Babylon]

CIA’s Brainstorm: Saddam and Gomorrah

From Jeff Stein: During planning for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the CIA’s Iraq Operations Group kicked around a number of ideas for discrediting Saddam Hussein in the eyes of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Nelson: Do not ask this man to download music to your iPod

From the Washington Post: Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) has long pushed an amendment to limit those pesky and expensive transaction fees at automated teller machines, but his fellow senators didn’t…

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[Washington Babylon]

New lead in Times Square case

Interesting story from ProPublica: U.S. and Pakistani investigators are pursuing a new lead in the failed Times Square bombing: That a major in Pakistan’s army knew of Faisal Shahzad’s plans…

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[Washington Babylon]

Gold Fever

You’ve probably heard about Goldline, the precious-metals purveyor that buys advertising on the shows of a number of conservative commentators, most famously Glenn Beck. Beck, of course, is a big…

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[Washington Babylon]

Goldman Sachs Abroad: Helping the rich get richer

From Global Witness: The investment bank Goldman Sachs is backing an oil deal in Angola by U.S. firm Cobalt International Energy, despite a risk that local partners in the deal…

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[Washington Babylon]

Newt: I have here in my hand a list of names….

From Politico: Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich on Wednesday said that “secular socialism” has “infiltrated” the nation’s courts, the Congress, academia, the bureaucracy, Hollywood and the news media and is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Toyota: Testing well

From USA Today: For four decades, the company Toyota commissioned to investigate allegations of unintended acceleration has played a central role in many of the most heated auto safety debates,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Freedom Agenda for Egypt

From Adam Shatz in London Review of Books: Barack Obama, keen to break with Bush’s messianic talk about spreading democracy, has worked to rebuild trust with the Egyptian government. In…

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[Washington Babylon]

Real Financial Reform

Forget the Dodd bill. Read about and listen to Richard Duncan, who several years ago predicted the collapse of the housing bubble. Now he wants to break up the big…

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[Washington Babylon]

Political Masterpiece Theater

From Political Wire: The True Republican PAC is running an advertisement in Alabama’s GOP gubernatorial race attacking Bradley Byrne (R) because he supports the teaching of evolution in schools. Byrne…

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[Washington Babylon]

Everything You Wanted to Know About the British Election But Were Afraid to Ask

The Onion asks the question on the mind of all Americans: “Is David Cameron the one that was the British Obama, or is he the other guy that was the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Don’t Cry For Me, Florida

A real tearjerker from the St. Petersburg Times, about the difficulties faced by the unemployed. As Gov. Charlie Crist switched from Republican to independent in the race for U.S. Senate,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Political Donations from the Tax Master

“Attorney General Greg Abbott filed suit today against Houston-based TaxMasters and CEO Patrick Cox, accusing the company of deceiving customers with tax problems,” reports the Dallas Morning News. “Cox is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Afghanistan’s Western War

From Doug Bandow: The vast majority of passengers on my flights into and out of Kabul were white males, many with military-style haircuts and several with military tattoos. A few…

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[Washington Babylon]

Smearing Goldstone: Usual Suspects

From Matthew Yglesias: I find it a bit curious that strident defenders of Israeli foreign policy take a harder line on Richard Goldstone’s apartheid-era conduct than does Nelson Mandela and…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Bond Bored by Times Square Plot?

From the Wall Street Journal: [Senator Kit] Bond emerged Tuesday from a briefing arranged by the Justice Department for members of the intelligence panel and said he’s “not convinced by…

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[Washington Babylon]

Gulnara’s World Cup: Princess of the Uzbeks strikes again

From Eurasianet: The head of FC Barcelona, one of the most famous football clubs in the world, has had extensive dealings with Gulnara Karimova, the daughter of Uzbekistan’s president, according…

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[Washington Babylon]

As Oil Pours Into Gulf, Oil Industry Fights Anti-Corruption Measure

It takes real balls for the oil industry to fight against transparency and accountability in the middle of a massive oil spill, but that’s precisely what the American Petroleum Institute…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Alex Gibney on Casino Jack

Alex Gibney heads Jigsaw Productions and is the executive producer, director, and writer of the new movie “Casino Jack and the United States of Money,” which tells the story of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Blowback from Afghanistan

From the Washington Post: U.S. military officials in eastern Afghanistan thought they had come up with a novel way to stem the anger and disillusionment about government corruption that fuels…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Ensign Investigation, Undercover

From Channel 8 News in Las Vegas: Embattled U.S. Senator John Ensign awaits word on whether the Senate Ethics Committee will move forward with public hearings into scandals swirling around…

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[Washington Babylon]

The News Media’s $43 Million Man

Take this quiz from Vanity Fair and match up the salary of news executives with the size of their corporate layoffs. For example, which executive recently announced that some seven…

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[Washington Babylon]

Model Workers

From Politico: An immigration proposal circulated by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) would make it easier for foreign fashion models to work America’s catwalks. Just don’t bother asking Schumer’s office how…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hedge Funds Evading Regulation, With Ample Hired Help

From Politico: More than half the 83 lobbyists registered last year to work for the industries’ two trade groups, the Private Equity Council and the Managed Funds Association, have served…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Future of Palestine?

It’s not pretty. From John Mearsheimer: The Palestinians are not going to get their own state any time soon. They are instead going to end up living in an apartheid…

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[Washington Babylon]

The “A” Word: Anarchy is Somalia’s recipe for success

From Benjamin Powell: Perhaps the title overstates the situation slightly. It is hard to call any country mired in poverty an economic success. Yet by most measures Somalia’s poverty is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama X

From Gawker: Violent black radical Barack Hussein Obama X is learning about wind energy in Iowa, The Washington Post reports in a most unfortunate photo caption error. It appears Obama…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congress: Flying Blind on Afghanistan

From Roll Call: President Barack Obama dispatched more than 50,000 additional troops to Afghanistan with essentially no legislative debate….This silence is amazing because it is widely accepted that past administrations,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Palin’s Financial Rise

From New York: Sarah Palin is a singular national industry. She didn’t invent her new role out of whole cloth. Other politicians have cashed out, used the revolving door, doing…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Parties of Spend and Spend

Yesterday I noted here that the GOP had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on its recent meeting in Honolulu. Turns out, not surprisingly, that the Democrats are no more…

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[Washington Babylon]

They Oughta Pay Us

From Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, on the country’s worst governors: Number of miles Gov. Perdue flew in a private jet provided by a lobbyist to attend to…

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[Washington Babylon]

GOP’s Hawaiian Vacation: The party of spend and spend

From National Journal: The RNC spent more than $340K at a semi-annual meeting in Honolulu in Jan., the latest example of the party spending lavishly on itself while GOP officials…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dreaming of a Life in Hollywood? Stop

From The Onion: Saying that he’s had a few movie ideas kicking around for a while now, local resident and very depressing man Scott Norgren purchased screenwriting software Tuesday. “I’m…

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[Washington Babylon]

More from the UBS Whistleblower

Last week I posted an item here on an interview with Bradley Birkenfeld, a former banker who “blew the whistle on thousands of secret bank accounts rich Americans held at…

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[Washington Babylon]

U.S. Politicos Held Offshore Accounts with UBS

From the Daily News: A former banker who blew the whistle on thousands of secret bank accounts rich Americans held at Swiss giant UBS claimed Thursday some U.S. politicians also…

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[Washington Babylon]

Christopher “Dudus” Coke: Best name ever for (alleged) drug dealer

Interesting story from the Washington Post: Last fall, the blue-chip law firm of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips signed a $400,000 contract to lobby on behalf of the government of Jamaica,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Party Bosses and the Boss

I did an item awhile back about a fundraiser for Congressman Ed Towns that was hosted by the Entertainment Software Association and held at the Verizon Center during a show…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bad News: banks safer than biolabs

ProPublica talks with Charles S. Faddis, a former top operative for the CIA and author of a new book about “likely terror targets in the U.S.: dams, rail lines, military…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama: Not a Great Communicator

From Dana Milbank of the Washington Post, on yesterday’s nuclear summit: In the middle of it all was Obama — occupant of an office once informally known as “leader of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Funeral Decorum from Rep. Massa: Hit on attendees, yes, solicit the corpse, no

From the Washington Post: Just three months after Eric Massa was elected to Congress, his young male employees on Capitol Hill began complaining to supervisors that the lawmaker was making…

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[Washington Babylon]

Clinton Donor Figures in New Halliburton Bribe Document

From Saharareporters.com: Saharareporters has come into possession of a document which shows that several former Nigerian Heads of State, and in some cases their wives, were beneficiaries of Halliburton bribe…

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[Washington Babylon]

Media Reaction to New Evidence Implicating Kissinger in Murder: Yawn

The Associated Press reported a fairly amazing story over the weekend. It began: As secretary of state, Henry Kissinger canceled a U.S. warning against carrying out international political assassinations that…

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[Washington Babylon]

Teodoro Nguema Obiang: Part Imelda Marcos, part Cruella de Ville

As recently reported here, the U.S. government has been investigating Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, son of the dictator of oil-rich Equatorial Guinea, for money laundering and corruption. Obiang, who earns…

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[Washington Babylon]

Morris Dees: A Life Fighting Poverty

I’ve written in the past on various occasions about Morris Dees, head of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the bogus “civil rights organization” whose chief (and wildly successful) mission…

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[Washington Babylon]

Two Former Senators May Find Themselves Out of Board Positions with Kyrgyz Revolution

Looks like former Senators Bob Dole and Bennett Johnston are on the board of a Kyrgyz bank called AsiaUniversalBank (AUB). During its final weeks in power, the Kurmanbek Bakiyev regime…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s War Powers

From Eli Lake at Reason: When it comes to the legal framework for confronting terrorism, President Obama is acting in no meaningful sense any different than President Bush after 2006,…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Green is the iPad?

From the Washington Examiner: The Apple clientele is not homogenous — it’s got a few different species of hip. But watch closely the current iPad commercial and you’ll see Apple’s…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Mac McClelland on Burma

Mac McClelland writes “The Rights Stuff” blog for Mother Jones magazine and her work has also appeared in The Nation, GQ South Africa, Hustler, and other publications. She is the…

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[Washington Babylon]

If You Voted for McCain, This Man Will Touch Your Penis

And it’s covered by your insurance company. Check him out.

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[Washington Babylon]

Gambling Wars

In Alabama the hottest political issue is not deficits or job creation. It’s a computerized gambling machine called electronic bingo. Governor Bob Riley has launched a major effort to put…

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[Article]

Mad men

Introducing the defense industry's pay-to-play ad agency

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[Washington Babylon]

Washington Babylon on Break

Ken Silverstein is traveling. Washington Babylon will return next week.

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[Washington Babylon]

Is Pentagon in Bed with “Queen of the Uzbeks”?

Should the Pentagon be cutting deals with a company apparently controlled by the powerful daughter of Uzbekistan’s dissident-boiling dictator, Islam Karimov? As previously noted here, Gulnara Karimova has amassed a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Is Californistan Californicated?

If you missed this yesterday, from the Boston Globe, via National Review Online: Traditional Wall Street investors have taken note. Iraq is now considered a safer bet than Argentina, Venezuela,…

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[Washington Babylon]

When Will The U.S. Be Leaving Afghanistan? Never! (or not anytime soon)

A few months back I attended a panel on Afghanistan sponsored by the the Middle East Policy Council, which is headed by Frank Anderson, a former senior CIA official. The…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Khost Bombing: What went wrong?

The inestimable Jeff Stein is now writing for the Washington Post, and his debut “SpyTalk” column looks at the Khost bombing last December 30th, which killed seven CIA officers and…

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[Washington Babylon]

Liberian Justice, Brought to You by Lockheed

Emira Woods of the Institute for Policy Studies sent along this article from the Wall Street Journal: Lockheed Martin Corp. became the nation’s No. 1 military contractor by selling cutting-edge…

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[Washington Babylon]

News Flash: Republicans fail to block legislation (on student loans)

“Legislation hailed by supporters as the most significant change to college student lending in a generation passed the House on Sunday night,” reports the Washington Post. “The student aid initiative,…

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[Washington Babylon]

“Hate,” Immigration, and the Southern Poverty Law Center

I spoke at a panel last week sponsored by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), a conservative group, about its new report on the Southern Poverty Law Center. The report…

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[Washington Babylon]

That Acorn Sting

Initially, I had no problem with the sting pulled on ACORN by the conservative activists James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles. “It’s a serious matter when at least three different ACORN…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care, Waterboarding and Conspiracies

On balance, and for reasons not necessarily related to its contents, I suppose it’s better that the health care bill passed than not. But the Democrats, advocates, and (worst of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Campaign Dollars and the Financial Services Reform Legislation Debate

“U.S. tax authorities are expected to ‘very shortly’ launch another prosecution against a foreign bank similar to the tax evasion case they pressed against Switzerland’s UBS,” an Internal Revenue Service…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Richard Posner on Capitalism and Crisis

Richard Posner has been a judge on the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals since Ronald Reagan appointed him to that position in 1981. He is also a senior lecturer…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressional Spending: Whitewash is cheap

Congress is normally not shy about spending federal money, but according to a story from Roll Call, one committee is coming in under budget: ethics. Spending records indicate the House’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Pelosi Pledge: Change you can’t even believe

“The American people(1) voted to restore integrity(2) and honesty(3) in Washington, D.C.,(4) and the Democrats(5) intend to lead the most honest(6), most open(7) and most ethical(8) Congress(9) in history(10).” Nancy…

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[Washington Babylon]

Is a New Wave of Foreclosures Coming?

From the Washington Post: The housing market is facing swelling ranks of homeowners who are seriously delinquent but have yet to lose their homes, and this is threatening a new…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pork for Scandal-plagued NJ University: So much for congressional vetting of earmark requests

From ABC News: Department of Homeland Security investigators have contacted New Jersey officials with questions about the fate of federal grant money awarded to Stevens Institute of Technology to help…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Ensign’s Spirit of Bipartisanship

From the New York Times: Previously undisclosed e-mail messages turned over to the F.B.I. and Senate ethics investigators provide new evidence about Senator John Ensign’s efforts to steer lobbying work…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pay Day for Senator Corker’s Donors

From the New York Times: Senator Bob Corker, the Tennessee Republican who is playing a crucial role in bipartisan negotiations over financial regulation, pressed to remove a provision from draft…

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[Washington Babylon]

Revolving Door: Unsafe at any speed

From the Washington Post: Dozens of former federal officials are playing leading roles in helping carmakers handle federal investigations of auto defects, including those for Toyota’s runaway-acceleration problems. A Washington…

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[Washington Babylon]

Did Obama Advisor Resign Due to Federal Probe?

From ABC News: When the White House announced last week it would be losing the services of Lewis A. Sachs, one of the president’s top economic advisers, the reason given…

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[Washington Babylon]

Brooklyn Bridge For Sale In Washington: No Tie Between Campaign Money and Earmarks

From the Washington Post: House Appropriations defense subcommittee member James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) works hard at fundraising: Two to three times a week, he telephones contributors to ask for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congress Sticks It to Main Street Again?

From the Washington Post: When financial reform legislation finally lands on the Senate floor, a provision that advocates call the single most important item for Main Street investors will probably…

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[Washington Babylon]

Biggest Beneficiaries of the Jobs Bill? Not the jobless

From Taxpayers for Common Sense: The Senate is working on a compliment to the recently passed $15 billion jobs bill. This nearly $150 billion package is supposed to help the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Azerbaijan’s 11-Year-Old President

Nice story in the Washington Post: Even by the standards of a city that celebrates extravagance, it was a spectacular shopping spree: In just two weeks early last year, an…

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[Washington Babylon]

ABA Prez: Every human being entitled to legal representation — especially those paying cash

TPM ran an item yesterday in which American Bar Association President Carolyn Lamm made an emotional plea on behalf of the principle of legal representation for all. In response “to…

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[Washington Babylon]

PFC Schmuck

From Wired: In Israel, the military had to call off an entire operation after a trooper posted the time and place of an upcoming raid in the West Bank on…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Powerpoint Guide for Dictators

I noted here recently that two former Pentagon officials had pitched their services to the government of Guinea, which is accused of the massacre of over 100 civilians last September.…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Peter Hessler About Driving in China

Peter Hessler is a staff writer at the New Yorker, where he served as Beijing correspondent from 2000 to 2007. Harper Collins just released his latest book, Country Driving, which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Disaster Porn: A geography lesson from Rick Sanchez

On the Daily Show last night (video below), Jon Stewart highlighted Rick Sanchez’s coverage of the earthquake in Chile, saying that the CNN newsman reminded him of “a guy at…

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[Washington Babylon]

Defining Deviancy Down

Over the past month or so, the Supreme Court, Congress, and government agencies have taken a number of steps that, collectively, “define deviancy down” (in the words of one Washington…

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[Washington Babylon]

Desiree Rogers and the Danger of the Beat Sweetener

Poor Desiree Rogers. A victim of the Salahi State Crashing affair, she’s now out as White House social secretary, replaced by fundraiser Julianna Smoot. When she took the job a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama: The Republicans stole my lunch money

From Dana Milbank, in yesterday’s Washington Post: Our president is not a bully; in fact, he is the victim of bullying. He is bullied by Republicans on health care. He…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care and Meat Inspectors: Obama at the Health Care Summit

Poor Obama. It must be hard being so much smarter than his political opponents, which was so evident at yesterday’s health care summit. Of course, being smart doesn’t always lead…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sally Quinn Taken Out Back And Shot (or at least her column was)

Sure, you can get a column at the Washington Post simply by marrying Ben Bradlee–but apparently you can’t keep it forever. At least not if it’s as awful as Sally…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Upside of Guinea Massacre

From Africa Confidential: Blamed for the massacre of over 100 civilians last September, the junta in Conakry is trying to improve its image via a United States-based public relations company…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sting’s Lame Alibi: Why I did show in torture-loving Uzbekistan

A few months back I noted here that Sting has traveled to Uzbekistan and played a concert at the invitation of Gulnara Karimova, the daughter of dictator Islam Karimov. Now…

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[Washington Babylon]

Cronyism: The other surge in Afghanistan

From the Washington Post: Afghanistan’s biggest private bank — founded by the Islamic nation’s only world-class poker player — celebrated its fifth year in business last summer with a lottery…

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[Washington Babylon]

Washington Babylon on Break

Ken Silverstein is traveling. Washington Babylon will return next week.

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[Washington Babylon]

David Broder Loves Sarah Palin…And Dan Quayle

“The snows that obliterated Washington in the past week interfered with many scheduled meetings, but they did not prevent the delivery of one important political message: Take Sarah Palin seriously,”…

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[Washington Babylon]

GOP Fiscal Discipline Hits Hawaii

Watch the Republicans put their finger on the pulse of America. From the Daily Show.

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama: The Last to Catch On

From The Plum Line: At the private White House meeting today between Obama and Congressional leaders, the President and John Boehner got into a testy exchange, aides say, with Obama…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bad Weather Lightening Pockets of Congress Members

From an email sent out this afternoon by Bellwether Consulting Group, which raises money for Republicans: Subject: Canceled Events: Granger, Burr, Isakson & Griffin Due to the inclement weather forecast,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Electorate already lost faith in democracy, Supreme Court finishes things off

Writing for the majority in the Citizens United v. FEC case, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy stated: “The appearance of influence or access, furthermore, will not cause the electorate to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senate report details stretch Hummers, skirt-chasing attorneys, shrink-wrapped cash!

The senate is holding hearings and issuing a report today that shows how a number of corrupt African officials — and their American enablers — used the U.S. banking systems…

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[Washington Babylon]

In Aftermath of Court Ruling, McCain Facing Tough Re-election Challenge

From The Onion: In a landmark decision that overturned decades of legal precedent, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 Tuesday to remove all restrictions that had previously barred corporations from…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bottoms Up: Lobbyists win big for foreign rum maker

From ProPublica: A transfer of billions of dollars in federal aid from public projects in Puerto Rico to one of the world’s largest liquor conglomerates over the next 30 years…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Issa’s Joke: Dictatorship in Kazakhstan, and Washington D.C.

A bizarre congressional hearing yesterday, as Kazakhstan’s Foreign Minister, Kanat Saudabayev, testified before the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, which is co-chaired by Congressmen Benjamin Cardin and Alcee…

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[Washington Babylon]

Where Art Thou, Esme?

From Politics Daily: Somewhere in England, I so want to believe, lives a jazz-loving, relentlessly honest, incisively bright, deeply sentimental 78-year-old woman named Esmé who long ago befriended an American…

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[Washington Babylon]

Stop The Presses (no starch)!: Cosmo skewers the senate

“The treason of the Senate! Treason is a strong word, but not too strong, rather too weak to characterize the situation in which the Senate is the eager, resourceful, indefatigable…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care Lobbying: There goes the GDP of Grenada

From the New York Times: President Obama has blamed many factors for the stalling of his health care overhaul, from the recent special election in Massachusetts that deprived Democrats of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hitler: There’s an app for that

The latest in the Downfall parodies: Hitler on the iPad (via Huffington Post)…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Real State of the Union

From The Hill: A day after bashing lobbyists, President Barack Obama’s administration has invited K Street insiders to join private briefings on a range of topics addressed in Wednesday’s State…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bernanke-gate! What’s in those memos?

Looks like someone leaked some very specific information to Congressman Darryl Issa. In a letter sent yesterday to Congressman Edolphus Towns, chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Waterboarding Zubaydah: It didn’t work so well after all

From Jeff Stein: Well, it’s official now: John Kiriakou, the former CIA operative who affirmed claims that waterboarding quickly unloosed the tongues of hard-core terrorists, says he didn’t know what…

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[Washington Babylon]

They’re Back!!!! A Neocon Resurrection?

From Newsweek Had you Googled “neoconservative” and “death” that day, four days after the 89-year-old Kristol expired, you’d have found lots on their long-rumored—and for some, much-anticipated and -savored—demise. On…

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[Washington Babylon]

Al Qaeda: The Pentagon’s official historian

From Justin Elliott at TPM: When the Pentagon’s internal think tank decided in 2004 it needed a better understanding of Al Qaeda, it turned to an unlikely source: the terrorism…

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[Washington Babylon]

Industry: Failure of health-care reform means less money for us

From the Associated Press: Nearly as shaken by the Massachusetts vote were health care provider groups that have supported the Democratic effort, such as drug makers, hospitals and doctors. While…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Pillars of Afghanistan’s Economy: Drugs and bribes

From a new United Nations report: Poverty and violence are usually portrayed as the biggest challenges confronting Afghanistan. But ask the Afghans themselves, and you get a different answer: corruption…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama, Year One

Many Democrats and liberal bloggers are trying to convince themselves, publicly at least, that last night’s victory by Scott Brown was largely due to the poor campaign run by Martha…

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[Washington Babylon]

What the End of Democratic Rule Really Means

“Finally Americans will get the opportunity to see what it looks like when a filibuster-proof majority is squandered,” I wrote here last July, after Al Franken was declared the victor…

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[Washington Babylon]

Chasing The Two-Dollar T-shirt

My article “Shopping for Sweat: The human cost of a two-dollar T-shirt” appears in the current issue of Harper’s. For those wanting to know more, I was interviewed about the…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Haiti’s History

Jack Shafer at Slate writes to say that I was unfair to Tyler Cowen of Marginal Revolution in an item yesterday on Haiti. I had referred to a post which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Glenn and Sarah: A love story

I try not to blog about Glenn Beck because there’s really not much to say at this point, but in this instance Jon Stewart makes it impossible. Watch the Daily…

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[Washington Babylon]

Photos From Haiti

The Boston Globe has a stunning collection of photographs from Haiti. Hard to take.

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[Washington Babylon]

Haiti: Media provides sanitized history for American audiences

As I noted here yesterday, much of the media coverage (including the blogosphere) of the tragedy in Haiti lacks any sort of historical perspective and makes it impossible to understand…

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[Washington Babylon]

Haiti: A trip down memory lane

“In the wake of the devastating earthquake, American eyes are again turned toward Haiti—something that only seems to happen when yet another disaster strikes, and never during the daily chaos…

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[Washington Babylon]

Google, Paper Tiger

From Foreign Policy: Unlike many other honorable members of the technology blogosphere, I am not too excited about Google’s ultimatum to the Chinese government (if you have been living in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senate Race in Massachusetts: K Street vs. “The World’s Sexiest Man”

Interesting developments in the senate race between Democrat Martha Coakley and Republican Scott Brown: From the Washington Examiner: Coakley said in a debate Monday night that her opponent Scott Brown…

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[Washington Babylon]

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Peter Orszag But Didn’t Care Enough to Ask

From Gawker: What a wild few months for Office of Management and Budget stud-cum-nerd Peter Orszag! His lovechild is born! He’s engaged to not-the-mama! And he’s got the New York…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Could They Let Him Fly on a One-Way Ticket? They didn’t

From Justin Elliott at TPM: In a remarkable example of how bad information can travel far and wide, dozens of media outlets around the world have said Umar Abdulmutallab was…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Gregory Johnsen on Yemen

Gregory Johnsen, a former Fulbright Fellow in Yemen, is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. Johnsen co-runs the website Waq al-Waq with Brian O’Neill, a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Follow The Money, If You Can: Healthcare Reform

From the Washington Post: Many of the Washington interest groups that are seeking to shape final health-care legislation in the coming weeks operate with opaque financing, often receiving hidden support…

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[Washington Babylon]

The White House Party Crasher: My Neighbor

I woke up this morning and discovered that I live down the street from a private club headed by a man identified in today’s Washington Post as the third White…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Administration Blushing: Shades of Bush

OK, maybe this isn’t quite as bad (yet) as “Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US”, but it doesn’t look good. This from a Washington Post story on yesterday’s talk…

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[Washington Babylon]

Yemen: A primer

Face it, until recently many of you didn’t know for sure if Yemen was a country or an erectile dsyfunction medication. Now that Yemen has emerged as a major focus…

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[Letter from Cambodia]

Shopping for Sweat

The human cost of a two-dollar T-shirt

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[Washington Babylon]

AIG to U.S. Gov’t: Drop Dead

From the Washington Post: When word spread earlier this year that American International Group had paid more than $165 million in retention bonuses at the division that had precipitated the…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for John Scott-Railton on Cambodia

While completing a master’s degree at the University of Michigan, John Scott-Railton helped develop “participatory mapping” projects aimed at protecting the fragile property rights of poor families living in Phnom…

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[Washington Babylon]

It Could Happen Here

From The Onion, via Andrew Sullivan: In a sudden and unexpected blow to the Americans working to protect the holiday, liberal U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt…

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[Washington Babylon]

Subprime lending problem? What problem?

From the Washington Post: Foreclosures already pocked Chicago’s poorer neighborhoods but the downtown still was booming as the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago convened its annual conference in May 2007.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Toxic Green Cloud Over Copenhagen

Wonkette had a funny pre-climate change summit item about members of Congress, even conservative Republicans, fighting to go to Copenhagen. The story was headlined “Not EVERYONE In Congress Can Go…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care, Obama, and Leadership

From Robert Samuelson: Barack Obama’s quest for historic health-care legislation has turned into a parody of leadership. We usually associate presidential leadership with the pursuit of goals that, though initially…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Doing For Climate Change What He Did For Health Care

“President Obama called on world leaders to come to an agreement on climate change, no matter how imperfect,” the New York Times reported today. The Times also said that Obama…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Sweat of His Labor: Kristof and the global apparel industry

I have an article in the January issue of Harper’s called “Shopping for sweat: The human cost of a two-dollar T-shirt,” which looks at the apparel industry in Cambodia. That…

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[Washington Babylon]

Taibbi v. Liberal Blogosphere, Continued

Tim Fernholz of the American Prospect wrote me an email complaining about an item I wrote yesterday, which questioned the motives of those attacking Matt Taibbi’s piece on Obama in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Yes, We Have No Tomatoes: Costco’s missile defense shield for Palin

The Salt Lake City Tribune tells the tale of Helen Rappaport, a Utah woman who went shopping at Costco shortly before a Sarah Palin book signing event at the store:…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Strategy for Victory: Defeat

I mentioned in a post yesterday that liberal bloggers tend to exempt President Obama for blame over the failures of his administration. Some times it’s said that Obama inherited a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Taibbi vs. Obama (and the Liberal Blogosphere)

Unemployment stands at over 10 percent, meaningful health care reform is collapsing, and the banks have reaped huge profits thanks to the Obama administration’s policies. Naturally, liberal bloggers are upset–but…

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[Washington Babylon]

Will Tony Blair Eat Gonads One Day?

From the Daily Mail: Is there any way this country can officially disown Anthony Blair? Those of us who were never fooled by him now have to watch as he…

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[Washington Babylon]

Calling It In: The banks and Obama

From the New York Times: President Obama didn’t exactly look thrilled as he stared at the Polycom speakerphone in front of him. “Well, I appreciate you guys calling in,” he…

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[Washington Babylon]

Really Bad Lieutenant, Port of Call: New Orleans

From ProPublica: During the turbulent days after Hurricane Katrina made landfall, New Orleans police shot 10 civilians, at least four of whom died, according to interviews and internal police documents.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care Reform: It works after smoking a bong

If you missed this last week, here’s Robert Reich’s take: The public option is dead, killed by a handful of senators from small states who are mostly bought off by…

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[Washington Babylon]

This Can’t Be Good: Robert Kagan loved the Nobel speech

Robert Kagan, one of the intellectual architects of the Iraq War, is swooning over Obama’s speech. That’s scary: I don’t know what to say about an “Obama doctrine,” because based…

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[Washington Babylon]

Grade A: Defense contractors paid to review their own performance

From Politico: Defense contractors developing the Army’s largest modernization program — the Future Combat System — also were paid $91 million in 2007 to report back to the Pentagon on…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Daily Dumb: Gretchen Carlson edition

She never learned what a “czar” was while studying at Oxford. From the Daily Show: The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c Gretchen Carlson Dumbs…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Bankers’ Financial Protection Agency

From Public Citizen: The 16 representatives sponsoring two amendments that would weaken critical consumer protections in financial reform legislation have received at least $2.3 million from the financial services sector…

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[Washington Babylon]

From “The More Things Change” File: Congressional junkets

From the New York Times: Representative F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., a Wisconsin Republican, toured a prince’s vineyard and castle in Liechtenstein and spent an afternoon at a ski resort in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bennie Thompson’s Congressional Hearings? Priceless

From the Washington Post: At a hearing in late March, the nation’s credit card companies faced the threat of expensive new rules from an unlikely regulator: the House Homeland Security…

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[Washington Babylon]

Liberal’s lament: Afghanistan and Obama

From Garry Wills: I did not think he would lose me so soon—sooner than Bill Clinton did. Like many people, I was deeply invested in the success of our first…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sally Quinn: The life of the party

The Washington Post recently announced the winner of its “America’s Next Great Pundit” contest, and Kevin Huffman, (who Wonkette aptly described as “nothing more than a composite of all preexisting…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Washington Post on Desiree Rogers: “No detail escapes her eye”

“On the night of the Obamas’ first state dinner, White House social secretary Desirée Rogers glided past the rope line of press and photographers at 6:53 p.m., pausing to boast,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Afghanistan: The quagmire deepens

Last night’s speech on Afghanistan was typical Obama: instead of acting decisively, he splits the difference. The United States will send 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan but with a timetable,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Afghan Speech: The (TV) review is in

From Tom Shales: Would you buy a used war from this man? Americans might be seeing their bright, young president in a dark, new light this morning after watching his…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s “Freedom Agenda”

We recently witnessed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton telling Chinese leaders that their country’s human rights record was of little concern to the United States. Now over the weekend we’ve…

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[Washington Babylon]

“Black Friday”: Scenes from the front

From James Wolcott: The Baltimore TV stations likewise dispatched perky reporterettes to the nearby malls to interview shoppers who had camped out for hours to take advantage of “doorbuster” sales…

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[Washington Babylon]

Carolyn Lamm: A hero in her own mind

Carolyn Lamm, president of the American Bar Association and friend of the world’s dictators, wrote a letter complaining about an article about her in Foreign Policy, which I linked to…

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[Washington Babylon]

ABA President’s Curious Means of “Advancing Rule of Law”

From Foreign Policy: “Defending Liberty, Pursuing Justice” is the motto of the American Bar Association, and among the association’s four stated goals, one is to “advance the rule of law.”…

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[Washington Babylon]

Before I Vote, Let Me Check My Portfolio

From the Washington Post: When Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) this summer proposed a $4 billion tax on medical-device firms to help offset the cost of health-care reforms, an unusual mix…

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[Washington Babylon]

Not Funny: Reporter detained in Iran for ties to the Daily Show

From Newsweek(via Laura Rozen): I saw the flicker of a laptop monitor under my blindfold. Then I heard someone speaking. It was a recording of another prisoner’s confession. “It’s not…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Equatorial Guinea’s Oil-Sotted Crook

From Gawker: A tipster, who works on Rodeo Drive, says Teodoro Nguema Obiang, the Ferrari-driving big spender who plunders Equatorial Guinea’s oil wealth is dating a family member and just…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Marian Wang on “Lady Bloggers”

Marian Wang works and writes for Mother Jones. She previously was a freelance investigative reporter and blogger for The Chicago Reporter, the Chi-Town Daily News and ChicagoNow. Wang’s recent post,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Our SOB: Will State Department finally act against crook from oil-rich Equatorial Guinea?

It will be interesting to see if the State Department, which by order of a presidential proclamation and act of congress is required to bar corrupt foreign officials from American…

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[Washington Babylon]

U.S. Government Documents Crime Spree by Dictator’s Son: Why no action by the feds?

In 2004, George W. Bush issued Presidential Proclamation 7750, which barred corrupt foreign officials from entering the United States and ordered the State Department to compile a list of banned…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Much Does It Cost to Hire a “Respected Economist”?

From the Washington Post: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and an assortment of national business groups opposed to President Obama’s health-care reform effort are collecting money to finance an economic…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Washington Version of the Twinkie Defense

The New York Times reported over the weekend that dozens of statements from members of congress printed in the Congressional Record during the House debate on health care “were ghostwritten,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Blogger Junket to Uzbekistan: Torture chambers likely not among tour stops

A short while back I noted here that Gulnara Karimova, daughter and henchwoman of Uzbek dictator Islam Karimov, had recently hosted rock star Sting in Tashkent, the nation’s capital. Sting…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hold the Feta: Marine foils Florida “terror” plot

From the St. Petersburg Times: Marine reservist Jasen Bruce was getting clothes out of the trunk of his car Monday evening when a bearded man in a robe approached him.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congress: Not quite the People’s House

From Politico: As Washington reels from the news of 10.2 percent unemployment, the Center for Responsive Politics is out with a new report describing the wealth of members of Congress.…

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[Washington Babylon]

What’s the Term? “You got screwed”

From the Washington Post: Economists say that free trade generally promotes U.S. economic growth and a higher standard of living. In addition, proponents of free trade say, the U.S. job…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Idiocy Begins: Pundits and politicians on Hasan

From Jim Sleeper: Now that we know that Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan was steeping in a kettle of Islamicist paranoia and rage, Joe Lieberman will hold hearings to examine the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Green Jobs: Moving to China

From the Boston Globe: Little more than a year after cutting the ribbon at a new factory in Devens built with more than $58 million in state aid, Evergreen Solar…

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[Washington Babylon]

Employee Recommendation: A moron, but shows initiative

From The Smoking Gun: Meet Aaron Siebers. The 27-year-old Denver man, a Blockbuster employee, was skateboarding yesterday afternoon when he fell and ripped his uniform pants. Due to work last…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama and the Closing of the Arabian Mind

From Marc Lynch: Obama’s window is closing. Arab audiences see Guantanamo still open (including in an endlessly repeating al-Jazeera promo), US troops escalating in Afghanistan, Gaza still blockaded, and no…

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[Washington Babylon]

On Bended Knee: Gideon Levy on Obama’s Israel Policy

From Gideon Levy at Haaretz: Before no other country on the planet does the United States kneel and plead like this. In other trouble spots, America takes a different tone.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sting: Obama, Synchronicity, Hypocrisy

The biography of a celebrity asshole, in three short chapters. Excerpts below all come from news stories published in October of 2009. From the Associated Press, on Sting’s deep thoughts…

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[Washington Babylon]

Goldman Sachs: The casino always wins

From Greg Gordon at McClatchy : In 2006 and 2007, Goldman Sachs Group peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Mysterious $75,000 Inheritance

Here’s a bizarre story to read before going back to work today. From the Washington Post: Recently a professor of mine, whom I’d studied with 20 years ago at Bennington…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Wild West: Livingstone for governor

Neil Livingstone worked with Oliver North during the Iran/contra period and is now a beltway security consultant and terrorism pundit who publicly advocated for the war in Iraq and then…

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[Washington Babylon]

Members of Congress: Corrupt and incompetent is no way to go through life

From the Washington Post: House ethics investigators have been scrutinizing the activities of more than 30 lawmakers and several aides in inquiries about issues including defense lobbying and corporate influence…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Desmond Travers on the Goldstone Report

Desmond Travers was one of the four members of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, which produced the controversial Goldstone Report. Travers is a retired Colonel…

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[Washington Babylon]

High-level Reporting in Iraq

If you missed this item from Michael Massing — it was posted a few days ago — it’s definitely worth a read: What a delight it must be to be…

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[Washington Babylon]

Paying the Price for Democracy in Afghanistan

From ProPublica: The United Nations cannot account for tens of millions of dollars provided to the troubled Afghan election commission, according to two confidential U.N. audits and interviews with current…

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[Washington Babylon]

An Object Lesson in Governmental Failure: Derivatives reform

If you want to understand why Congress seems completely incapable of checking the power of Wall Street, look back to a hearing on the Hill last October 7, and the…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Latest Washington Indictment

From Reuters: A U.S. lobbyist has been charged with violating Sudanese sanctions regulations, acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign power, money laundering, passport fraud and making false statements,…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Ticking Clock of Corruption

From Seth Hettena: Vedomosti, a gutsy Russian business newspaper, has come up with a rather ingenious way of studying local officials for possible signs of corruption. (English Pravda version here.)…

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[Washington Babylon]

Special Alert: Stop what you’re doing and drink your bong water!

From Associated Press, via Andrew Sullivan: Bong water can count as a controlled substance, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a decision that raises the threat of longer sentences…

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[Washington Babylon]

Visclosky’s New Record in Pork: From incorporation to earmark in 16 days

From the Washington Post: It takes a while for most start-up companies to gain the confidence of a U.S. congressman and the promise of federal funds. But last year, a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sri Lanka, Lobbyists and War Crimes

In May, I wrote about how beltway lobbyists, led by Patton Boggs were cashing in big time on the war in Sri Lanka. The lobbying firm, I noted, was being…

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[Washington Babylon]

Weekend Read: Confessions of a G.O.P. hit man

Martin Eisenstadt’s new memoir, One Man’s (Wildly Inappropriate) Adventures with the Last Republicans, is essential reading for political junkies. Some readers of this blog may recall that Eisenstadt worked for…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Foreign Service Guide to the World’s Hot Spots and Hellholes

As Scott Horton recently noted a few months back, no country in the world but the United States “regularly hands out choice ambassadorships as a favor for campaign funding bundlers…A…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Washington Bubble and the Political Wink

I love when Washington political reporters inadvertently reveal that they live in a beltway bubble and talk to no one other than those inside of it. As was the case…

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[Washington Babylon]

Correction: Pork funneled to library, not museum

An email, slightly edited, from Martha Regula of the National First Ladies’ Library complaining about a piece I wrote discussing earmarks funneled to her institution: Let me point out just…

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[Washington Babylon]

They’re Back: Hill veterans back to lobby for drugmakers

From ProPublica: Four years ago, a group of lawmakers and aides crafted Medicare Part D, the prescription drug program for seniors that has produced billions of dollars of profits for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Oink: News from the federal pork investigation

The Washington Post reported over the weekend on the ongoing federal investigation into defense earmarks, saying that it was “increasingly focused on a former top aide to Rep. Peter J.…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Awful Is Richard Cohen: Let us count the ways

“Does any of this matter, or is it merely interesting?” Richard Cohen of the Washington Post asked about his own column in today’s paper. Since Cohen wrote it, you already…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama and the “Loony Left”

“Can I speak freely about the liberal whiners?” asks a well-connected Democratic strategist. “These are the same people who have never participated in, much less won, a campaign, who have…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Obama Cracks Down on Lobbyist Influence

From Politico: At a meeting last April with corporate lobbyists, aides to President Barack Obama and Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) helped set in motion a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign, primarily financed…

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[Washington Babylon]

Revealed: Bart Simpson behind helium balloon hoax

The story that captivated the nation ends with a whimper, not a bang. “A 6-year-old boy…thought to be inside a balloon that floated over Colorado for over two hours has…

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[Washington Babylon]

Too late to defeat the Taliban?

From IPS: A veteran Army officer who has served in both the Afghanistan and Iraq wars warns in an analysis now circulating in Washington that the counterinsurgency strategy urged by…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hasn’t Polanski Suffered Enough?

From Calvin Trillin: Celebrities would just be fools, To play by little people’s rules. So Roman’s banner we unfurl. He only raped one little girl.

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[Washington Babylon]

Not Much of a Sting

From TPM: [Congresswoman] Myrick and three other members of the Congressional Anti-Terrorism Caucus came to a news conference today armed with Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That’s Conspiring to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Newspapers: Not dead yet

From The Onion: According to a report published this week in American Journalism Review, 93 percent of all newspaper sales can now be attributed to kidnappers seeking to prove the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Gourmet Kitchen Cabinet

From Bloomberg: Some of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s closest aides, none of whom faced Senate confirmation, earned millions of dollars a year working for Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Citigroup Inc.…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Wall Street Way

Fom Steven Pearlstein in the Washington Post : Analysts at Goldman Sachs suggested Tuesday that, despite a 50 percent run-up in stock prices that has left the Dow Jones industrial…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Best and the Brightest, Redux

Rufus Phillips, Vietnam expert, as quoted by the New Yorker: I’m afraid the President, who seems like a supremely rational being, is trying to find the most rational policy option…

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[Washington Babylon]

Israeli Justice: Better never than late

From Associated Press: The Israeli military takes months to investigate whether its soldiers committed crimes against Palestinians in the West Bank, deliberately trying to dim chances of any prosecution, an…

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[Washington Babylon]

Repression at Harvard: First they came for the scrambled eggs

From The Awl: Harvard University and the New York Times are the high church bishoprics of the money culture’s permanent counter-reformation: elite northeastern institutions that compulsively monitor each other for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Large Insect Nearly Ends World Before 2012

From Wired: It sounds like the opening scene of a B movie: A giant bug lands on a truck driver transporting intercontinental ballistic missiles. The trucker swerves off the road,…

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[Washington Babylon]

You Can Fool Some of the People…

From Glenn Greenwald: While Obama’s popularity has surged in Western Europe, the changes in the Muslim world in terms of how the U.S. is perceived have been small to nonexistent.…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Joe Berlinger about Crude

Ted Trautman contributed reporting for this interview. Joe Berlinger is the director and producer of the new movie “Crude: The Real Price of Oil,” which tells the story of an…

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[Washington Babylon]

Stiffed by Obama: Dalai Lama told to take a number

From the Washington Post: In an attempt to gain favor with China, the United States pressured Tibetan representatives to postpone a meeting between the Dalai Lama and President Obama until…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Helps Oversee Vote Fraud in Afghanistan

Imagine if the Bush Administration were helping cover up the vote farce in Afghanistan? How much bloviating would be emanating from the liberal blogosphere at this point? From Peter Galbraith:…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Max Baucus is on PhRMA

From the Sunlight Foundation and the Center for Responsive Politics: From January 2007 through June 2009, Senator Max Baucus collected contributions from 37 outside lobbyists representing PhRMA, the pharmaceutical industry’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

War: Bipartisanship Republicans can get behind

Up until now President Obama has been unable to round up any Republican backing for his major initiatives. Finally, though, it appears that Obama’s call for bipartisanship has paid off.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Election Fraud and Pinching Derrieres: The U.N. mission in Afghanistan

From Laura Rozen: UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has announced that he is ending the appointment of American diplomat Peter Galbraith as his deputy special representative to the UN mission…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congress Cracks Down on Defense Fraud: But it was just by accident

From the Project on Government Oversight: Last week, the House inadvertently took a large step forward in protecting taxpayers from misbehaving contractors. The House passed the “Student Aid” bill that…

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[Washington Babylon]

Take Me to Your Leader

From Eric Spiegelman, via Politico: Ladies and gentlemen, your President is a robot. Or a wax sculpture. Maybe a cardboard cutout. All I know is no human being has a…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Acorn Fraud and the Media

Must read piece at Reason on the media’s response to the ACORN scandal. Highlight: One of the more convincing non-coverage defenses came from Austin American-Statesman Editor Fred Zipp (“First, it’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Show Me the Money!

From the Washington Post: Democratic political committees have seen a decline in their fundraising fortunes this year, a result of complacency among their rank-and-file donors and a de facto boycott…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Splendors of War

From the Guardian: The number of former servicemen in prison or on probation or parole is now more than double the total British deployment in Afghanistan, according to a new…

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[Washington Babylon]

Like Condi, Hillary Offering Photo Ops for Dictators

Remember those awful pictures of George W. Bush’s secretary of state Condoleezza Rice embracing an assortment of corrupt, brutal energy-rich dictators? Now Hillary Clinton is offering precisely the same service.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Likely Legacy: Failure in Afghanistan and Iraq

“Obama’s decision is complicated by a deepening domestic political divide and no guarantee of success whichever option he chooses,” the Washington Post wrote today in a story about Afghanistan. “One…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care Reform: Blue Dog Democrat Strikes it Rich

From ProPublica: Rep. Mike Ross — a Blue Dog Democrat playing a key role in the health care debate — sold a piece of commercial property in 2007 for substantially…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Peter Maass on the Violent Twilight of Oil

Luke Mogelson contributed reporting for this interview. Peter Maass, a contributing writer at the New York Times Magazine, is the author of Crude World: The Violent Twilight of Oil, which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Booze for Rockets: An American contractor on the Iraqi black market

From ProPublica: Last spring, the U.S. diplomatic mission in Iraq got a makeover, replacing the scandal-plagued Blackwater private security company with a firm named Triple Canopy. The new $1 billion…

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[Washington Babylon]

Underage Prostitution, Gotcha Journalism, and the Ethics of the Acorn Sting

I’ve always admired the work of ACORN and thought right-wing attacks on the group bordered on the hysterical, but that was a terrific undercover sting mounted by the two young…

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[Washington Babylon]

News Flash: Fourteen members of congress as corrupt as Don Young

From Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’s new report on the most corrupt members of congress: Rep. Young’s ethics violations stem from the misuse of his position to benefit…

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[Washington Babylon]

Doctor’s Lobby on Health Care Reform: Bend over, this won’t hurt a bit

From the Los Angeles Times: The American Medical Assn., after 60 years of opposing any government overhaul of healthcare, is now lobbying and advertising to win public support for President…

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[Washington Babylon]

Turkmenistan’s Friend in the Obama Administration

Before he was named as the administration’s special envoy on international energy, David Goldwyn advocated for closer ties to Stalinist Turkmenistan as head of the energy industry-endowed U.S.-Turkmenistan Business Council.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Not Reading the Health Reform Bill: Ignorance or bliss?

I was on NPR’s On The Media on Saturday to talk about conservative critics of the Obama administration’s health care reform bill who are arguing that legislation is being rushed…

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[Washington Babylon]

In Defense of Joe Wilson: Mark Slouka

Those of us at Harper’s appreciate rudeness no matter who is in charge. See this wonderful essay by Mark Slouka from June 2008: [S]urely one could argue that the American…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Lawnmower That Saved California

From the indispensable Center for Investigative Reporting: Soon after hijackers obliterated the World Trade Center towers eight years ago, Marin County received more than $100,000 in surveillance equipment to keep…

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[Washington Babylon]

Joe Wilson and the Belgian Arms Maker

First off let me say that I’m not picking on Congressman Joe Wilson of South Carolina because he called President Obama a liar. I’m all for the breakdown of political…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Joe Wilson: Confederate General

From Facing South: Rep. Joe Wilson is getting his 15 minutes of national fame after bellowing “you lie!” during President Obama’s health care address last night. But Wilson earned notoriety…

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[Washington Babylon]

Shocking: Wall Street Journal loves the rich

From David Cay Johnston: This morning’s page-one Wall Street Journal story on incomes in America contains many bungled facts and concepts in a single sentence, giving a false impression about…

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[Washington Babylon]

“I Am Getting Into Spanking Her”: California Assemblyman’s hands-on lobbyist policy

From Wonkette: Republican Michael D. Duvall, a California state assemblyman representing Orange County, loves family values and ethics, and thus is a member of the Rules Committee…He enjoys telling his…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Murtha’s Esteemed Colleagues

From the Center for Public Integrity: For months, a cloud has swirled around Congressman John Murtha (D-Pa.), chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, and the relationship that Murtha…

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[Washington Babylon]

How the Fed Buys Top Economists (and Journalists)

From Huffington Post: The Federal Reserve, through its extensive network of consultants, visiting scholars, alumni and staff economists, so thoroughly dominates the field of economics that real criticism of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Tea Party Death Express

From Lindsay Beyerstein: One of the featured corporate sponsors of the Tea Party Express had to pay millions of dollars to settle lawsuits for its role in a bus fire…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Dumbest Man in Washington D.C.

There may not be a bigger moron in Congress than Paul Broun of Georgia. His latest, as reported in the Athens Banner-Herald: U.S. Rep. Paul Broun is again raising the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Foreign Aid Making American CEOs Very Rich

From USA Today: Four chief executives whose government-funded non-profit corporations are paid to deliver U.S. foreign assistance earned more than half a million dollars in 2007, a USA TODAY review…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama, Coups and Banana Republics

“Two months after he was overthrown in a coup, Honduras’s ousted president said Wednesday that he sees little progress in U.S.-backed negotiations aimed at restoring him to power and has…

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[Washington Babylon]

Reading Richard Cohen: A fate worse than waterboarding

Like Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen, I too am “torn between my desire for absolute security and my abhorrence of torture.” How can one solve this dilemma? Easy–cancel your subscription…

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[Article]

Developmentally disabled

Why foreign aid to Afghanistan stays in America

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[Washington Babylon]

You Read It Here First: Obama is not God

From the Washington Post: [T]he criticism of Barack Obama has turned strikingly personal as some of his liberal media allies have gone wobbly on him. After playing a cheerleading role…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Many Lobbyists Does It Take To Get $7.4 Billion From the Pentagon?

From the Washington Post: President Obama ordered federal officials to disclose their contacts with lobbyists trying to influence how the government doles out money to jump-start the economy. Yet few…

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[Washington Babylon]

Cadaver News Network

From David Rothkopf: [CNN] has in fact recently transformed itself into the Cadaver News Network. Between its non-stop coverage of Michael Jackson’s demise (that was a guy who really knew…

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[Washington Babylon]

Ohio Terror Plot: Little Red Riding Hood held as person of interest

From the Port Clinton News Herald: Authorities fielded a flurry of calls Saturday from concerned residents who saw men in ski masks, Ghostbusters, ballerinas, ninjas and Little Red Riding Hood.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Florida GOP Politico’s Political Motto: Charge it!

From the St. Petersburg Times: Ousted House Speaker Ray Sansom racked up about $173,000 on his Republican Party-issued credit card, taking his family on a trip to Europe, making visits…

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[Washington Babylon]

Follow The Money, Please

From Public Citizen: Lobbyists and lobbying firms representing seven of the top 10 TARP recipients in the financial services industry as well as four of their major trade association allies…

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[Washington Babylon]

Georgia Republican Setting New Standard for Corruption

From the Atlanta Journal Constitution: U.S. Rep. Nathan Deal, a Republican candidate for governor in 2010, personally intervened with Georgia leaders to preserve an obscure state program that earns his…

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[Washington Babylon]

From The Tastes Like Chicken Files

“South Auckland man Paea Taufa was found roasting his pitbull terrier-cross in an umu pit at his home in Mangere,” reads a story in the New Zealand Herald. “The dog…

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[Washington Babylon]

Major Democratic Donor Arrested For Bank Fraud

The United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York issued a press release today announcing the arrest of Hassan Nemazee, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Nemazee…

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[Washington Babylon]

The White House and the Justice Department: Different approaches to UBS

The Justice Department is sending UBS bankers to prison: Former UBS banker, Bradley Birkenfeld of Weymouth, Mass., has been sentenced to 40 months incarceration by Judge William J. Zloch in…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Myth of the Obama Movement

“Grass-Roots Battle Tests The Obama Movement,” ran a headline in the Washington Post yesterday atop an article that looked at why health care reform has bogged down. The story examined…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Vote in Afghanistan

P.J. Tobia provides some interesting analysis: > Yesterday I met with a high-level official from the UN backed Election Complaints Commission(ECC.) The ECC ’s job is to look into allegations…

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[Washington Babylon]

UBS, Money Laundering, and Phil Gramm

From Investment International: > In his last years in the Senate, Gramm succeeded in blocking legislation that, in the words of The New York Times, would have made it easier…

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[Washington Babylon]

Wanted: Baby Jesus’ head

From Fox: > Police are looking for the people who stole the head of baby Jesus off a marble statue at a church in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. > “Somewhere someone is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Orly, the Queen of Israel

From Haaretz: She believes Obama poses a threat to Israel not only because of his support of radical Islamic groups such as Hamas, but also because of his “radical socialist”…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care Deadlock, Explained

From The Onion: After months of committee meetings and hundreds of hours of heated debate, the United States Congress remained deadlocked this week over the best possible way to deny…

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[Washington Babylon]

Coming soon: Vote fraud in Afghanistan

From IPS: Afghanistan’s presidential election has long been viewed by U.S. officials as a key to conferring legitimacy on the Afghan government, but Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his powerful…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Buchanan knows where the bodies are buried

From the St. Petersburg Times: On Aug. 1, the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office responded to a home burglary. Among the stolen items — original records that purportedly showed illegal reimbursements…

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[Washington Babylon]

The CIA and the Cockpit Lounge

Great read from the New York Post (via Talkingpointsmemo): On Dec. 4, 2001, five members of a Las Vegas-based charter crew were detained by Russian authorities after they landed without…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Webb: Burma’s man in Washington?

From Foreign Policy: The release of John Yettaw to Senator Jim Webb illustrates just how tricky the engagement calculus is. Yettaw is the Missouri man who said a vision compelled…

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[Washington Babylon]

Death is Cheap

From ProPublica: >The United States has turned to the cheapest labor possible. About two-thirds of the 200,000 civilians working under federal contracts in the war zones are foreigners. Many come…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Closing of the American Mind, Cable News Edition

Rick Perlstein provides the context and history: > It used to be different. You never heard the late Walter Cronkite taking time on the evening news to “debunk” claims that…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care’s Army of Lobbyists: Six for every member of Congress

From Bloomberg: If there is any doubt that President Barack Obama’s plan to overhaul U.S. health care is the hottest topic in Congress, just ask the 3,300 lobbyists who have…

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[Washington Babylon]

Transparently Phony

From ProPublica: Back in July, a software company named Smartronix landed an $18 million contract to build a Web site where taxpayers could easily track billions in federal stimulus money.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Ghosting Sarah Palin’s Facebook Page

From Gawker: Just before midnight, a “note” was posted on Sarah Palin’s Facebook page titled, “Concerning the “Death Panels.” Predictably, the media latched onto it and reported her thoughts. However,…

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[Washington Babylon]

There Is a God: Santorum mulling presidential bid

From Politico: Add former Sen. Rick Santorum to the list of potential 2012 Republican presidential candidates. POLITICO has learned Santorum will visit first-in-the-nation Iowa this fall for a series of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Afghanistan: More American aid money headed down the drain

“The United States will not meet its goals in Afghanistan without a major increase in planned spending on development and civilian reconstruction next year, the U.S. ambassador in Kabul has…

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[Washington Babylon]

Reader Replies on Anne Wexler: She was best since sliced bread (and probably a virgin as well)

A reader did not care for the item I posted a few days ago about Anne Wexler, the former Eugene McCarthy activist turned Fortune 500 lobbyist. (My item cited a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Trickle Down Recovery

From the Washington Post: The pile of economic data indicating that the worst of the recession is over just keeps growing. In the past few weeks, the government has reported…

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[Washington Babylon]

Anne Wexler: Burger Queen

Michael Kinsley has a good piece in the Washington Post today about the recently departed Anne Wexler, whose death has been widely mourned in Washington media circles. Wexler started out…

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[Washington Babylon]

Where In The World Is Your Member of Congress?

It’s going to be roughly 100 degrees today in Washington, but fortunately numerous members of Congress won’t have to suffer through the heat because they’re out of town on all-expense…

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[Washington Babylon]

I’ll Tase You, Bro’

From the Greensboro News-Record: A Homeland Security ban against using Tasers on immigration detainees could get in the way of a 287(g) compact between federal authorities and the Guilford County…

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[Washington Babylon]

Administrative Note

Ken Silverstein is away until August 5. Washington Babylon will return then.

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[Washington Babylon]

How Crazy is Glenn Beck?

Very, very crazy. The evidence is clear. And if you haven’t seen it, this is also fun.

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Sessions v. Sotomayor

From the indispensable Facing South, published by the Institute for Southern Studies: There’s more than a little irony in some of the questioning U.S. Sen. Jefferson Beauregard “Jeff” Sessions III…

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[Washington Babylon]

Democrats Weaken Key Bill Backed By Unions

I have a story in the current issue of the magazine about the corporate campaign to kill the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier for unions to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sotomayor Hearings: Content-free

From Jonathan Turley: This week, the public is again witnessing the ritualistic exercise of the confirmation of a Supreme Court nominee. Of course, the outcome of Sonia Sotomayor’s hearings is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Politico’s Parties

My piece earlier this week on Politico received some interesting commentary (and I’ll be discussing the article today with Glenn Greenwald, for his podcast at Salon). Columbia Journalism Review wrote…

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[Washington Babylon]

Health Care Lobbyists: Awful people, even by the Hill’s standards

From CQ: Just as Congress moves into high gear on health overhaul legislation, insurance trade groups with a big stake in the outcome are packing the halls of the Capitol…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sotomayor and the Democrats

Great piece from James Ridgeway: Sonia Sotomayor’s all-but-certain conifirmation will be a notable victory for the Democrats, and a long-overdue victory for diversity on the nation’s highest court. Whether it…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Coburn, Sotomayor, and I Love Lucy

From Immigration Prof Blog: Is this a great country, or what? Even though Alabama’s Jeff Sessions was blocked from a federal judgeship because of kooky statements about the NAACP and…

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[Washington Babylon]

Politico Not Exactly Virginal on Wall Between Reporting/Money

Politico recently caused a stir with its excellent story about the Washington Post‘s attempt to raise money with “salons” at the home of its publisher. But Politico itself is hardly…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Many Hondurans Supported Coup?

Take a look at this story: Did a CID-Gallup poll last week indicate that a plurality of Hondurans support the military coup against democratically elected President Zelaya? Yes, according to…

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[Washington Babylon]

P.J. in Afghanistan

Not O’Rourke, P.J. Tobia. A former reporter for the Nashville Scene, he’s currently reporting from Afghanistan. This is a great story about life in Kabul, complete with amazing photos: Here…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Michael Jackson Memorial: LA’s version of the Tim Russert funeral

An excerpt from a good piece by Chris Hedges about Michael Jackson: His memorial service—a variety show with a coffin—had an estimated 31.1 million television viewers. The ceremony, which featured…

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[Washington Babylon]

Honduran Kingmaker

A fascinating piece from today’s Washington Post about Allen Andersson, the rich American who helped bring Manuel Zelaya to power in Honduras in 2005: And then, there’s one of his…

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[Washington Babylon]

Administrative Note

Ken Silverstein is away until July 13. Washington Babylon will return then.

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[Washington Babylon]

A Few Facts About the Honduran Military Coup

There’s very little truth to anything you’ve read about the coup in American newspapers. President Manuel Zelaya is no radical. He approved a big minimum wage increase, which was desperately…

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[Washington Babylon]

Other Pay-to-Play Schemes at the Washington Post?

So the Washington Post got busted for its pay-to-play scheme. But publisher Katharine Weymouth clearly doesn’t see the problem — to hear it from her, the newspaper’s pitch to corporate…

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[Washington Babylon]

Editor Bill Wasik at Politics and Prose Monday Night

Attention Harper’s readers in Washington, D.C.: Make sure to go to Politics and Prose bookstore (5015 Connecticut Avenue) tonight at 7 p.m. to see senior editor Bill Wasik discuss his…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Clinton Foundation: It depends on how you define “is”

When Barack Obama nominated Hillary Clinton as secretary of state, he made her appointment contingent on her husband revealing the contributors to his foundation in order to avoid any questions…

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[Washington Babylon]

Absolute Last Word on Soccer: Fans make PETA activists look open-minded

Not since endorsing horse slaughter have I received so many angry emails from readers of this blog as I have in response to my recent posts about the lamentable American…

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[Washington Babylon]

Washington Post and Reporters For Sale to Highest Bidder

From Politico: For $25,000 to $250,000, The Washington Post is offering lobbyists and association executives off-the-record, nonconfrontational access to “those powerful few” — Obama administration officials, members of Congress, and…

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[Washington Babylon]

For Your Morning Viewing Pleasure

The Daily Show and the Colbert Report were both unmissable last night. The former featured segments on Iraq and Dick Cheney (whose balls are so big they can be seen…

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[Washington Babylon]

Clinton Boner Picture Identified

Yesterday I posted an item describing a picture (sent to me by several sources) of former President Bill Clinton posing for the camera with Gulnara Karimova, daughter of the dictator…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on the Awful American Soccer Team

I received dozens of replies to yesterday’s post about why I hate the American soccer team and was so happy to see it seize defeat from the jaws of victory…

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[Article]

Labor’s Last Stand

The corporate campaign to kill the Employee Free Choice Act

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[Washington Babylon]

Coleman Concedes: The good news and the bad news

From the New York Times: Nearly eight months after Election Day, Al Franken, a former comedian and an author, appeared certain on Tuesday to become the next United States senator…

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[Washington Babylon]

Clinton’s Latest Boner: Ex-president poses with dictator’s daughter

Two trusted sources have sent me a picture of former President Bill Clinton posing for the camera with a woman who the sources say is Gulnara Karimova, daughter of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Evil of Sam Zell

I used to work at the Los Angeles Times and still read it online regularly, although I rarely see a hard copy. I was just in Los Angeles for a…

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[Washington Babylon]

I hate the U.S. (Soccer Team)

Americans almost always interpret international sports victories as demonstrations of national superiority, so it was wonderful to watch the U.S. soccer team’s massive choke in the Confederation Cup final against…

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[Washington Babylon]

Snack Attack: Industry lobbies on junk food

From the Wall Street Journal: The food and beverage industries are coming around to support some efforts in Washington to limit the sale of junk food in school vending machines,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Administrative Note

Ken Silverstein is away until June 29. Washington Babylon will resume when he returns.

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama and political triangulation: the more things change…

First see this from the Washington Post: What does it tell you when banks, investment houses, insurance companies and derivatives traders are so pleased with their regulators that they are…

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[Washington Babylon]

Barack Hoover Obama

Kevin Baker has an excellent piece in the July issue of the magazine (available to subscribers) about the similarities between our current president and our thirty-first, Herbert Hoover: The comparison…

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[Washington Babylon]

Ensign Love Triangle

From Politico: The son of the couple at the center of the sex scandal that has engulfed Sen. John Ensign was being paid by the National Republican Senatorial Committee in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Ladies’ Men

From Politico: Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), whose name turned up in an investigation of an alleged prostitution ring in 2007, said Ensign was going through “personal difficulties they’re going through…

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[Washington Babylon]

Friend of Azeri Dictator Reportedly to be Named Ambassador to Baku

The indispensable Laura Rozen reported that Matthew Bryza, the deputy assistant secretary of state for Europe and Eurasian affairs, “is being recommended by supporters as U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan.” Rozen…

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[Washington Babylon]

Russian Oligarch Retains Advisory Firm Close to Hillary to Help Resolve Visa Ban

Intelligence Online reports that the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska has hired an advisory firm with close ties to Hillary Clinton to help him get a visa to enter the United…

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[Washington Babylon]

William Jefferson’s Attorney: a degree in advanced chutzpah

From the Washington Post: Federal prosecutors laid out their bribery case against former U.S. representative William J. Jefferson yesterday, telling jurors that he squeezed hundreds of thousands of dollars in…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Ensign scandal: Did girlfriend double-bill for utilities?

From the Washington Post: Ensign is considered a leading voice among social conservatives in the G.O.P. In 1998, as a House member running against Reid, he called on President Bill…

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[Washington Babylon]

Keep Guessing Who’s Coming to Dinner at the Obama White House

From MSNBC: The Obama administration is fighting to block access to names of visitors to the White House, taking up the Bush administration argument that a president doesn’t have to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Who Won in Iran?

It’s always so hard to know what’s really going on in places like Iran, given the combination of government repression/censorship and the Western-centric reporting of so many journalists. Ahmadinejad is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Glenn Beck’s Undistilled Looniness

“How do you look at Nazis and think they’re right-wing?” he asks. “We’re surrounded by people who want to control you.” The point of Beck’s raving–believe it or not–is that…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Energy Adviser: Brought to you by ExxonMobil

As Laura Rozen and I have reported, it appears that President Obama is soon to name David Goldwyn, an adviser to oil companies and dictators, to a key administration post,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Not Ready for Mt. Rushmore: The American Scholar looks at Reagan mythmaking

Just because it’s always good to look at the past with open eyes, here’s a new piece by Matt Dallek: Criticism of Reagan has been largely absent from the political…

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[Washington Babylon]

Is Secrecy on Drone Attacks Hiding Civilian Casualties?

From Inter Press Service: The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s refusal to share with other agencies even the most basic data on the bombing attacks by remote-controlled unmanned predator drones in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama to Name Oil Industry Crony to Top Position

As first reported here, international energy consultant David Goldwyn, “will likely be named U.S. special envoy for energy. That comes from an item yesterday by Laura Rozen at The Cable.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Government Vigorish: The Microsoft story

Ted Disante of Tucson wrote an interesting note about this item from last week, which referred to Washington as a gigantic lobbying operation: Here’s an additional tidbit to support your…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Myth of Gates as Defense Reformer

Dana Milbank had a good story in today’s Washington Post about Congress larding up the defense bill: This meeting of the Senate Military-Industrial Caucus will now come to order. The…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Ambassadorships for Sale

From the Washington Post: President Obama has been taking flak of late for giving fat-cat donors cushy ambassadorial posts. Despite some early signals that merit — knowledge of the local…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pentagon Flies the Friendly Skies

From the Center for Public Integrity: Despite the Pentagon’s big budgets, DOD personnel routinely accept free flights, accommodations, and hospitality from outside interests, according to a Center for Public Integrity…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Tom Daschle Effect: Terry McAuliffe crushed in Virginia

The former Clinton bagman goes down in Virginia. How delightful. As with Tom Daschle, Barack Obama’s misguided choice to run Health and Human Services, it seems Americans are tired of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Unprecedented Growth In Israeli Settlements

From the Israeli daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, via Americans for Peace Now: They are the focus of President Obama’s interest in the Middle East and are even liable to cause…

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[Washington Babylon]

Federal Court Legalizes Illegal Campaign Contributions

From Associated Press: A federal judge dismissed two of three campaign finance violation charges Monday against a prominent Los Angeles attorney for allegedly funneling $26,000 to Sen. John Edwards’ 2004…

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[Washington Babylon]

Depression Chic

The rich really are different. From the Los Angeles Times: Coffee tables made from barrels. Lamps crafted from brooms. Chairs swathed in burlap and sackcloth. Look at the some of…

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[Washington Babylon]

No NIMBY Problem in India on Jailing Terrorists

From Indian Express: Mumbai: On June 3, the high-security Arthur Road Jail saw a new superintendent taking charge….[J]ail superintendent Rajendra Dhamne…is responsible for guarding 26/11 gunman Ajmal Kasab, one of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Glazed or Cream-Filled? Jesus and Donuts

Life without Jesus is like a donut, because there’s a hole in the middle of your heart. Via Dan Savage.

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[Washington Babylon]

Doing Business With Phil Gramm’s Bank

From Bloomberg: California billionaire Igor Olenicoff had already invested $200 million with UBS AG in 2001 when his Swiss bankers ushered him to an underground vault in Geneva. Olenicoff, a…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Lobby

At times it seems like Washington is one gigantic lobbying machine. To wit: Insurers and drug companies are working to gut health care reform. Big Tobacco wrote the tobacco bill.…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Many Law Firms Does It Take to Figure out Where a Congressman Lives?

If you are Congressman Robert Wexler, the answer is three. Rep. Robert Wexler (D-Fla.) paid more than $6,700 in legal fees in the first quarter of this year, funds spent…

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[Washington Babylon]

Wells Fargo’s Stagecoach to Hell

From the Baltimore Sun: Wells Fargo loan officers guided minorities toward high-rate mortgages and joked that they were “riding the stagecoach to hell” for routinely steering prime-loan-qualified customers toward subprime…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bush Recount Helper Gets Prison Term For Public Corruption

From the Department of Justice: Defendant Mary McCarty was sentenced today to 42 months of imprisonment, to be followed by 3 years of supervised release. Defendant McCarty was immediately remanded…

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[Washington Babylon]

Cheery Photo-ops and Mud

From The Hill: In public, Senate Republicans have kept their distance from conservative attacks on Sonia Sotomayor— but behind the scenes, they have encouraged activists to keep their crosshairs trained…

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[Washington Babylon]

“Renegade”: From RW to BO, with love

From Politico: It was Barack Obama himself who first proposed that Newsweek reporter Richard Wolffe make a play to be this generation’s Theodore White—the legendary journalist whose insider account of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Speech, Pro and Con

The pro comes from M. J. Rosenberg: Mission accomplished. For the first time in memory, an American President spoke to Muslims and Arabs not as antagonists who need to take…

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[Washington Babylon]

Kim Jong-il’s Son: Cheese scholar, peacemaker (on the playground)

From the BBC: So little is known about Kim Jong-un – the youngest son and reportedly the named successor of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il – that even his date…

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[Washington Babylon]

Brian Williams, Head of the Presidential Puppy Corps

The media treated George W. Bush very well during the early days of his administration (as it does every incoming president) but the slavish devotion to Barack Obama is an…

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[Washington Babylon]

Who Will Tell The People?

From Politico: The congressional cussing caucus is in need of new members. The Capitol lost its prince of profanity when Rahm Emanuel left for the White House five months ago.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Cantor and Cockfighting

The former sheriff of Page County, Virginia, Daniel Presgraves, has been indicted on 22 counts of public corruption, including accepting bribes to protect cockfighting. Based on the indictment, Presgraves appears…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Visclosky Hit With Subpoena

From Politico last Friday: Rep. Pete Visclosky (D-Ind.) has been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury looking into the PMA Group, a once-high flying lobbying firm that collapsed after a…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Math Hasn’t Changed: $500,000 buys ambassadorship

From Bloomberg: Louis Susman has one thing in common with many of his predecessors nominated to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom: money. Susman, 71, a retired Citigroup…

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[Washington Babylon]

Conservative Critic: Sotomayor Exhibits Dangerous Bias Towards Rice and Beans

From The Hill: Sotomayor also claimed: “For me, a very special part of my being Latina is the mucho platos de arroz, gandoles y pernir — rice, beans and pork…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sharon Stone and the Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Chaka Kahn

From Starpulse: Sharon Stone flapped her way through a speech at the recent opening of a luxurious resort in Turkey – stunning the crowd with her admission she had never…

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[Washington Babylon]

Sotomayor And The Crafty Catholic Lobby

From David Rothkopf: I had to accept the reality that The Lobby existed exactly as described in best-selling literature and on well-respected blogs. After all, these clearly well-organized, crafty Catholic-Americans…

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[Washington Babylon]

You Don’t Know Jack

Now you do. An interactive guide from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington: For many years, Rep. Murtha has been treating our tax dollars like his own personal piggy…

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[Washington Babylon]

The 100 MPG Hummer: Suckers Wanted

Last week Raser Technologies announced a Capitol Hill event for its unlikely new product: an electric Hummer H3, which the company claims gets up to 100 miles per gallon. Even…

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[Washington Babylon]

Funny Numbers: the New York Times terror report

From Talkingpointsmemo: We’ve gotten our hands on the Pentagon report on which the New York Times based its front-pager last week asserting that 1 in 7 Guantanamo detainees “returned” to…

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[Washington Babylon]

The CIA’s Congressional Mumblers and Dissemblers

From Jeff Stein: A former deep-cover CIA operative says the spy agency’s congressional briefers routinely shade the truth or hide facts altogether from congressional overseers. “They mumble, they dissemble, and…

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[Washington Babylon]

Norm Coleman’s Donors and Remembering 9/11

I wrote yesterday about the non-profit group associated with former Senator Norm Coleman’s political donors, the Step Into World Peace foundation. The group’s website stopped working last week, after I…

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[Washington Babylon]

Israel and “Regime Change” in Iran

From Foreign Policy: Israeli media are reporting that a small and unconventional Iran office in the Israeli Ministry of Defense will be shut down. The 30-year-old office has been headed…

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[Washington Babylon]

Stepping Into It: Norm Coleman’s donors and their plans for “World Peace”

When I was writing last fall about then-Senator Norm Coleman’s friends and political donors, I received several tips about a curious Minnesota-based non-profit called the Step Into World Peace (SIWP)…

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[Washington Babylon]

More Trouble For Congressman Murtha

From yesterday’s Washington Post: Over the past five years, a local defense contractor with close ties to Rep. John P. Murtha, a Democrat who has represented southwestern Pennsylvania for three…

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[Washington Babylon]

CIA Discovery: Tribes in Afghanistan!

“US intelligence agencies have launched an intensive effort to examine the various tribes linked to the Taliban to determine whether some can be broken off through diplomatic and economic initiatives,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dictator/oil consultant being considered for senior administration position

Two sources have told me that David Goldwyn, a long-time advocate and consultant for the oil industry and energy-rich Third World countries, is on the short list for a top…

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[Washington Babylon]

Death in Libya: Political prisoner latest victim of Bush’s “Freedom Agenda”

Former President George W. Bush’s “Freedom Agenda,” a set of policies that exists only in the minds of Washington Post editorial page writers and senior fellows at the American Enterprise…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Flip-Flops on National Security

From, God help me, Charles Krauthammer: Observers of all political stripes are stunned by how much of the Bush national security agenda is being adopted by this new Democratic government.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dick Cheney IS 9/11

Jon Stewart describes the sexual potency of the Obama-Cheney “duel”on the Daily Show last night : “There is one unifying thread that runs through every strata of our media, and…

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[Washington Babylon]

Texas’s Latest Great Idea: Give guns to drunk frat boys

From the Houston Chronicle: The Senate today tentatively passed a controversial bill to allow college students who are at least 21 years old and licensed to carry concealed handguns to…

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[Washington Babylon]

And You Thought Congress Was Bad

From the Washington Post: Public fury has been rising over items that politicians have charged to taxpayers — a massage chair, pornographic movies, a moat cleaning, a plasma TV, horse…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Sound of the Revolving Door

From USA Today: More than one in four members of President George W. Bush’s Cabinet have landed jobs with consulting or lobbying firms in which they can help clients navigate…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Stimulus And The Nuclear Option

From the Washington Post: A private company was being paid $300 million by the federal government to clean up radioactive waste at two abandoned Cold War plants in Tennessee when…

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[Washington Babylon]

FDA Asks Industry to Help It Defend Miscarriage-Inducing Chemical

From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: As federal regulators hold fast to their claim that a chemical in baby bottles is safe, e-mails obtained by the Journal Sentinel show that they…

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[Washington Babylon]

Business Week: The Great Ethanol Scam

From the magazine’s current issue: More than one major transportation-based industry in America besides Detroit is on the ropes. For the fourth time in our history the ethanol industry has…

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[Washington Babylon]

Death, Lobbyists and Sri Lanka

I recently posted an item about the ongoing bloodshed in Sri Lanka and reported that the lobbying firm of Patton Boggs was being paid $35,000 per month by that country’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Corporate Front Man: Richard Berman manages the news on key labor-backed bill

Richard Berman, a prominent lobbyist for the food and restaurant industry, is one of the leading opponents of the hotly-debated Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would make it easier…

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[Washington Babylon]

FBI Investigates Former Senator Coleman: an empty suit?

From Huffington Post: The FBI is investigating allegations that former Senator Norm Coleman had clothing and other items purchased on his behalf by a longtime friend and businessman Nasser Kazeminy,…

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[Washington Babylon]

The More Things Change…

Via michaelmoore.com: Obama ’09: In a reversal, President Barack Obama objected on Wednesday to the release of dozens of photographs showing the abuse of terrorism suspects, fearing the pictures could…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Worst Writer in America?

From Wonkette: The worst writer in America, Richard Cohen — that thoughtless, valueless, condescending, sociopathic sexist poster-boy for the vapidity of the Washington Post’s opinion section — has written such…

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[Washington Babylon]

Laying the Body on Dick Cheney

Jesse Ventura on Larry King: Jesse Ventura: I would prosecute every person who was involved in that torture. I would prosecute the people that did it, I would prosecute the…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Murtha-Backed Biodefense Facility

I’ve posted several items over the past month on how Congressman John Murtha & friends have been supporting a controversial biodefense facility that would develop and manufacture “vaccines and other…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Death of Ibn al-Sheikh al-Libi

The Washington Post reports that a “former CIA high-value detainee, who provided bogus information that was cited by the Bush administration in the run-up to the Iraq war, has died…

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[Washington Babylon]

The White House Correspondents Dinner: “This is the real deal”

The description in the headline comes from Christian Slater, which is quite a testament to the multitudes that assembled at the dinner. A Washington Post reader had a different opinion:…

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[Washington Babylon]

Defense Plant Doesn’t Want Earmarked Money: But lobby firm gets it anyway

From the Kansas City Star: U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver likes earmarks. His rule: If they come to his district, federal funds are well worth wrangling over, especially for infrastructure repairs…

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[Washington Babylon]

Breaking: Left-Wing and Right-Wing Bloggers Both Upset

The Onion has the scoop: “When will the MSM dinosaurs realize that they’re TOTALLY irrelevant?” wrote 39-year-old part-time librarian James Last, commenting on coverage of Obama’s first 100 days in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Making Sense of the White House Correspondents Dinner

From Chris Lehmann: How does one make sense, after all, of an event where you can see Ashton Kutcher directly in the path of an onrushing Donald Rumsfeld? Where Michael…

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[Washington Babylon]

It’s Only Torture When They Do It

From Andrew Sullivan: Here we have it in broad daylight: the New York Times’ cowardice in the face of its own government. In an obit today, the editors manage to…

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[Washington Babylon]

G.O.P. Solidarity: It’s a holiday in Somalia

Experience the joys of small government.

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[Washington Babylon]

The League of Extraordinary Egos: Meet the Washington media

Washington is a town of self-indulgence, huge egos, and self-congratulation. A yearly ritual at which such traits are most grandly on display is nearly upon us. Tomorrow night is the…

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[Washington Babylon]

As Seen From Space: The global economic collapse

From Foreign Policy: Want to get a sense of just how bad things are? Take a spin on Google Earth. The latest issue of International Economy, edited by FP contributor…

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[Washington Babylon]

The View From Iraq

From Tom Ricks: If you haven’t yet reviewed the papers from the Midwest Political Science Conference, here’s a little gem that will tell you more about Iraqi politics than a…

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[Washington Babylon]

This is Health Care Reform

“Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said Thursday that so far a breakneck schedule for writing a health care overhaul into law remains on track, with a committee markup scheduled for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hearts and Minds in Afghanistan

From page 8 of today’s Washington Post: “The top U.S. commander in Afghanistan said Wednesday he had dispatched a joint U.S.-Afghan team to investigate U.S. airstrikes that killed more than…

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[Washington Babylon]

Biopork: New DHS Appointee Ties to Congressman John Murtha

“The Obama administration’s controversial pick to be the Department of Homeland Security’s geek-in-chief is either a leading authority on the deadliest terror threats — or a biowar chicken little, dangerously…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Conyers’ Super Bowl

From the Detroit News : Rep. John Conyers’ campaign committee spent nearly $46,000 on travel and transportation during the first three months of 2009, a figure far higher than his…

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[Washington Babylon]

Guess Who’s Coming to the Bailout?

From the Center for Public Integrity: The top subprime lenders whose loans are largely blamed for triggering the global economic meltdown were owned or bankrolled by banks now collecting billions…

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[Washington Babylon]

The CIA’s Foggy Crystal Ball

In December 2000, the National Intelligence Board, under the authority of the CIA, released a report called “Global Trends 2015: A Dialogue About The Future With Nongovernment Experts.” The experts…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Murtha Strikes Again

From the Washington Post: The headquarters of Murtech, in a low-slung, bland building in a Glen Burnie business park, has its blinds drawn tight and few signs of life. On…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Financial Crisis, the IMF and Karl Marx

The Atlantic has a good piece in its current issue called “The Quiet Coup: How bankers took power, and how they’re impeding recovery”, written by a former IMF official named…

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[Washington Babylon]

Global Economic Crisis Worsens: Dolph Lundgren latest victim of free-market capitalism

The Daily Mail reports that Dolph Lundgren is struggling to “maintain his trim physique” and was “displaying a slightly rounded tummy as he holidayed in the Mexican Riviera.” Indeed, as…

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[Washington Babylon]

Inside Israel’s Illegal Settlements Program

From Secrecy News: Last January 30, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz disclosed a secret Israeli government database on settlements in the occupied West Bank, and posted the Hebrew text of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Good Way to Start the Week: Jack Shafer eviscerates Cokie Roberts

From Slate: Each Monday, NPR Senior News Analyst Cokie Roberts trades four minutes of on-air blather about politics, the economy, and world events with whichever unlucky Morning Edition host has…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congress Stiffs Troubled Mortgage Holders

With swine flu, the retirement of David Souter, and the bankruptcy of Chrysler, the media didn’t devote much space to the Senate screwing nearly two million mortgage holders yesterday. The…

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[Washington Babylon]

Fundraising and Hate-mongering

From Alexander Cockburn at The Nation, wisely citing me about Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center, “the arch-salesman of hate-mongering”: Ever since 1971 U.S. Postal Service mailbags have…

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[Washington Babylon]

The GOP’s New Big Tent

From CNN: Coming soon to a battleground state near you: a new effort to revive the image of the Republican Party and to counter President Obama’s characterization of Republicans as…

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[Washington Babylon]

How you get to be dean of the Washington press corps

David Broder writes today, “It’s been more than four decades since Arlen Specter, senator from Pennsylvania, earned the nickname ‘Specter the Defector.’ With his decision this week to leave the…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Pope and the Dictator’s Son

From Foreign Policy: Belarussian President Aleksandr Lukashenko’s PR machine kicked into overdrive yesterday during a meeting with Pope Benedict. RFE/RL’s Luke Allnut notes that the Belarussian strongman’s adorable son Nikola…

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[Washington Babylon]

Swine and Flu

From Associated Press: Rep. Michele Bachmann says she finds it an “interesting coincidence” that the last swine flu outbreak in the U.S. occurred under a Democratic president — though her…

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[Washington Babylon]

Washington Lobbyists Cash In On War in Sri Lanka

It’s hard to know who bears more responsibility for the bloodshed in Sri Lanka, the government or the Tamil Tigers, but it’s clear that huge numbers of civilians are being…

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[Washington Babylon]

Financial Journalism’s Failure

From a letter to the Financial Times: So why did journalism fail? One only needs to examine the financial industry’s elaborate programmes to cultivate the media to realise that journalists…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dianne Feinstein’s Husband Hits Jackpot: with help from the senator

From the Washington Times: On the day the new Congress convened this year, Sen. Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation to route $25 billion in taxpayer money to a government agency that…

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[Washington Babylon]

Torture and the War on Terror

When reading this: A video tape smuggled out of the United Arab Emirates shows a member of the country’s royal family mercilessly torturing a man with whips, electric cattle prods…

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[Washington Babylon]

To New York With Love

From Chris Lehmann: My ill-starred tenure at New York magazine was, among other things, a crash course in the staggering unselfawareness of Manhattan class privilege. Sure, there was the magazine’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

The World is Flatter

From the Washington Post: The global economic crisis has hit home for Tom Friedman. When the New York Times columnist married heiress Ann Bucksbaum in 1978, he joined one of…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Kinder, Gentler Torture

The Daily Show segment last night, which captured Bush administration apologists offering up their latest justifications for torture, was riveting television. A particular highlight: this exchange between Chris Wallace of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Behind the “Clean Coal” Blitz

From The Center for Public Integrity: They’ve put the black rock on billboards in the swing states, and they’ve splashed it on full-page ads in CQ Weekly, Roll Call, Politico,…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Chavez Uproar: Open Veins and Closed Minds

Eugene Robinson just won a Pulitzer, but like most commentators he doesn’t seem to have read the book, Open Veins of Latin America, by Eduardo Galeano, a copy of which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congresswoman Harman and AIPAC: “This conversation doesn’t exist”

From CQ: Rep. Jane Harman , the California Democrat with a longtime involvement in intelligence issues, was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would…

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[Washington Babylon]

Wolcott on the Media: The tweet smell of success

I disagree with James Wolcott’s main thesis here that the media is “wired” towards Republican power. The Washington media is wired for power alone (and perhaps a tinge of celebrity).…

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[Washington Babylon]

Federal Raid on Lobby Shop Leaves Democrats Cash-Strapped

From the Washington Post: Three senior House Democrats revealed sharp declines in donations for the first quarter of 2009 after the shuttering of a lobbying firm that in previous election…

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[Washington Babylon]

More Reasons to Hate AIG

From ProPublica and the Los Angeles Times: Civilian workers who suffered devastating injuries while supporting the U.S. war effort in Iraq and Afghanistan have come home to a grinding battle…

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[Washington Babylon]

Oil Über Alles

Five years ago, the Securities and Exchange Commission opened an investigation into possible violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act by a number of major American energy firms operating in…

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[Washington Babylon]

State of Play: Congressional investigations

From the Washington Post: A House Democrat from Indiana has conducted an extensive audit of his political committees, after a lobbying firm that raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why Cutting Weapons Programs Won’t Be Easy

Defense Secretary Robert Gates’s recent decision to cut big ticket weapons systems (even as he was increasing defense spending by four percent overall) was met with predictable howls of outrage…

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[Washington Babylon]

Lobbying: More profitable, by far, than the cocaine trade

From the Washington Post: In a remarkable illustration of the power of lobbying in Washington, a study released last week found that a single tax break in 2004 earned companies…

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[Washington Babylon]

Corrupt Former Congressman Rested and Ready

Ready for talk radio: Three years after pleading guilty to federal corruption charges, former Ohio Rep. Bob Ney is back in the public spotlight. Ney will debut as a talk…

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[Washington Babylon]

Top Secret Plans, Get Yer Top Secret Plans Right Here

I noted here yesterday that Britain’s top counterterrorism official had been forced to resign after he was “photographed carrying a document that outlined details of a major antiterrorism operation.” Today…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Joe Barton’s Campaign Investment Strategy

From CQ: Texas Rep. Joe L. Barton ’s campaign reported losing $703,500 in the financial markets last year. A large chunk of those stock market losses — $196,900 — were…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pirates and the CIA: What would Thomas Jefferson have done?

“It was the sixth such attack this week and one of 66 this year by Somali pirates, a collection of shrewd businessmen and daring opportunists who have pulled off a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Britain’s Counterterror Chief: Quick but not swift

From the New York Times: Britain’s most powerful counterterrorism officer resigned on Thursday, a day after being photographed carrying a document that outlined details of a major antiterrorism operation in…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Red Cross Report and Manadel al-Jamadi

From Jeff Stein at CQ: There are 14 names in the confidential Red Cross report that surfaced last week on the CIA’s “ill treatment” of detainees. But you will not…

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[Washington Babylon]

Politicians, Hookers and the Weekly Standard

From the Marathon Blog: The Weekly Standard sets a new standard for hypocrisy in this week’s Scrapbook column that attacks Eliot Spitzer for trying to rehab his image in the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Louis Freeh: What some people will do for money

From the Los Angeles Times Former FBI Director Louis J. Freeh says $2 billion that flowed from a British arms manufacturer to U.S. bank accounts controlled by Prince Bandar bin…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on $1 Billion Murtha-Connected Biodefense Facility

A few weeks ago, I reported here on a plan by Congressman John Murtha’s friends and campaign donors to obtain up to $1 billion for a controversial project to build…

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[Washington Babylon]

Potato Chips: Now with real potatoes!

A Frito-Lay spokeswoman, quoted in the Washington Post: For Frito-Lay, a focus on real ingredients is a new way to help consumers overcome their guilt about eating snack chips. Last…

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[Washington Babylon]

Feds Exploring Congressman Visclosky’s Ties to Controversial Lobby Shop

The New York Times had a story over the weekend reporting that the feds are exploring links between Congressman Pete Visclosky of Indiana and the PMA lobby shop: Mr. Visclosky,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Joe Barton’s Favorite Charitable Cause: Joe Barton

From the Washington Times: The top Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee operates a tax-exempt foundation that has raised donations from the industries his committee oversees, while giving…

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[Washington Babylon]

Where’s the Financial Transparency Obama Promised?

This is an important story from Investors Business Daily: Accounting rule-makers on Thursday did all they could to make the nation’s credit nightmare go away — or at least go…

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[Washington Babylon]

Investigative Reporting Panel at Berkeley

Sorry for the late notice, but I’ll be appearing on an investigative reporting panel today at Berkeley. Details below: Investigative Reporting Seminar with Professor Lowell Bergman When: April 3, 2009,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Losing May Be Winning for Norm Coleman

From Politico: Even if Norm Coleman pulls off a long-shot legal victory in the extended Minnesota Senate race, Democrats are vowing to make him wish that he hadn’t. Separate and…

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[Washington Babylon]

First of the Alleged UBS Tax Cheats Charged

The guy is a yacht broker from Florida, which somehow comes as no surprise: Steven Michael Rubinstein, of Boca Raton, Fla., has been charged, via criminal complaint, with filing a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Geithner and Citibank: Helping a friend in need

Great story from ProPublica: Geithner, who maintained ties to senior bank executives and others in the financial world, had a particularly close relationship with former Treasury secretary Robert E. Rubin,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Katrina Contractor On Board at FEMA

From POGO: On March 4, 2009, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced that Jason R. McNamara will serve as the Chief of Staff for the Federal Emergency Management…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why are Gun Sales Up?

From the lows of mid-day March 6th through the close of trading yesterday, the Dow Jones is up 23%, the NASDAQ 100 is up 24% and the Russell 2000 is…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Politics of Reconciliation: How to count to $15 trillion

The Daily Show nails Judd Gregg. Nancy Pelosi too, though the Gregg clip is the highlight.

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[Washington Babylon]

Republican Math

From Conor Clarke : I’m still reading the Republicans’ alternative budget (pdf), but I did want to highlight this graph from Republican Paul Ryan’s Wall Street Journal op-ed on the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Lobbyists Hit Bailout Gold

From the Sunlight Foundation: Lobbying firms and special interests have filed nearly 1,700 new registration forms so far in the first quarter of 2009, a review of lobbying disclosure forms…

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[Washington Babylon]

MIA: $300 Million worth of helicopters

From Wired: Over the past two years, the U.S. military has paid $241 million to supply the Iraqi government with Russian helicopters – and received exactly none of those copters.…

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[Washington Babylon]

The (Gated) Fourth Estate

From Glenn Greenwald: In his just-released cover story on Paul Krugman’s status as Obama critic, Newsweek’s Evan Thomas includes these observations: “By definition, establishments believe in propping up the existing…

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[Washington Babylon]

Tortured Confession: Waterboarding and Abu Zubaida

From the Washington Post: In the end…not a single significant plot was foiled as a result of Abu Zubaida’s tortured confessions, according to former senior government officials who closely followed…

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[Washington Babylon]

Lobby Firm’s Libya Strategy Leaks

Libya’s exiled opposition (there is no domestic opposition allowed) got its hands on the lobbying strategy of Col. Moammar Qadaffi’s Washington lobbying firm, the Livingston Group. As reported by O’Dwyer’s:…

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[Washington Babylon]

New Depo from Case Linked to Norm Coleman: Senators “don’t make shit”

Remember all those stories last fall about various and sundry campaign donors to then-Senator Norm Coleman? Those donors, including a man named Nasser Kazeminy, seemed to take very good care…

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[Washington Babylon]

Rahm Emmanuel: Sleeping at wheel pays well

From the Chicago Tribune: Before its portfolio of bad loans helped trigger the current housing crisis, mortgage giant Freddie Mac was the focus of a major accounting scandal that led…

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[Washington Babylon]

This Sounds Vaguely Familiar: Where was Larry Summers in 1999?

Worth reviewing this story from the New York Times, November 5, 1999: Congress approved landmark legislation today that opens the door for a new era on Wall Street in which…

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[Washington Babylon]

Stiglitz: “This amounts to robbery of the American people”

From Reuters: The U.S. government plan to rid banks of toxic assets will rob American taxpayers by exposing them to too much risk and is unlikely to work as long…

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[Washington Babylon]

It’s Deja Vu All Over Again: Wall Street and Bill Clinton

“The Obama administration, after months of criticizing Wall Street, has been scrambling to woo top bankers and financiers to back its latest bailout plan,” the Wall Street Journal reported today.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Geithner in the Polls: Darling of the “Political Class”

From a Rasmussen poll yesterday: America’s Political Class gives Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner rave reviews: 76% have a favorable opinion of him. Two-thirds (66%) of the Political Class say Geithner’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Wall Street Math

One… Treasury Details Plan to Buy Risky Assets The Obama administration formally presented the latest step in its financial rescue package on Monday, an attempt to draw private investors into…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Sanders Blocking Key Obama Nomination

I reported back in February on the case of Gary Gensler, the former Goldman Sachs employee and derivatives cheerleader who President Obama nominated to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission…

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[Washington Babylon]

Hedge Fund Socialism

There’s already much debate about the merits of the administration’s plan to clean up toxic assets, but one person I spoke with – a well-connected Democrat representing a big investment…

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[Washington Babylon]

Doddering in the Polls

From Associated Press: While Dodd, 64, has only recently found himself in the nation’s political hot seat because of his role in the AIG bonus debacle, it has become clear…

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[Washington Babylon]

Jeffrey Goldberg and Israeli War Crimes

Jeffrey Goldberg is upset. “When the IDF fails to achieve its goal, and ends up inflicting needless destruction and suffering, it sullies not only its own name, but the name…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Murtha’s Friends Team Up on Big Biodefense project

As has been widely reported, two firms with close links to Congressman John Murtha–lobby shop PMA Group and defense contractor Kuchera Defense Systems–have recently been raided by the feds. Now…

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[Washington Babylon]

Eric Cantor: Still on UBS’s dole

As the economic crisis unwinds, House Republican Whip Eric Cantor has been a stern advocate for Main Street vs. Wall Street, has denounced the excesses of financial institutions, and just…

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[Washington Babylon]

News from Absurdistan

During both the Bush and Clinton years, the White House argued that the United States should “engage” with governments in the Caspian region, saying that such a strategy would do…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on Countrywide’s VIPs

From the Washington Post: Executives at Countrywide Financial, one of the biggest names of the housing boom, routinely violated internal company policies to provide below-market rates on home loans to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Dodd and the AIG Bonuses (Updated)

From Gawker: Two AIG executives fingered by the New York Post as recipients of blood-money bonuses personally donated to the presidential campaign of Chris Dodd, who inserted language into the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Can Those AIG Contracts Be Broken?

From Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post: The legal argument for honoring these ill-considered contracts is that a deal is a deal and that trying to abrogate them will only…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Schumer and AIG: A short timeline

U.S. News, March 17, 2009: “They should voluntarily return them. If they don’t, we plan to tax virtually all of it,” New York Sen. Chuck Schumer declared on the Senate…

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[Washington Babylon]

AIG and Congress: Washington on $53,000 a Day

A few highlights on AIG’s Washington influence buying scheme, from Open Secrets: In the last 20 years American International Group (AIG) has contributed more than $9 million to federal candidates…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Grassley to AIG Execs: Consider suicide

From AP: Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley suggested that AIG executives should accept responsibility for the collapse of the insurance giant by resigning or killing themselves. The Republican lawmaker’s harsh comments…

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[Washington Babylon]

Report: Israeli Appointee Barred from U.S. as “Intelligence Risk”

From the Washington Times: Uzi Arad, who is expected to serve as national security adviser in the next Israeli government, has been barred from entering the United States for nearly…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pork Gallery

From the Washington Post: Just because there’s still a Justice Department investigation rattling around you doesn’t mean lobbyists can’t contribute to buying a portrait for you to hang in your…

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[Washington Babylon]

Coming Soon: Colonel Qaddafi, Libya’s George Washington

From O’Dwyer’s: Libya paid more than $750K in fees since September to The Livingston Group for its work to improve ties with the U.S. That sum generated half of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Chas Freeman and Saudi Money

One of the most common charges hurled by the opponents of Charles Freeman Jr., who yesterday withdrew as chair of the Obama administration’s National Intelligence Council, was that he “headed…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Personal Bailout

From the New York Times: Top banking regulators were taken aback late last year when a California congresswoman helped set up a meeting in which the chief executive of a…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Freeman “Purge Trial”

From Jacob Heilbrunn in National Interest: Only now does Charles Freeman become truly interesting. Freeman, who has withdrawn from being named chairman of the National Intelligence Council, triggered an intense…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s War

Milt Bearden, who ran the CIA’s covert assistance to the Afghans from Pakistan during the Soviet occupation, has a good piece in National Interest: There is an unrelenting insurgency—we call…

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[Washington Babylon]

He Said, She Said

From the Chicago Sun-Times, via Justin Rood: Inverness Police say former Cook County Republican Chairman Gary Skoien admitted having two prostitutes in his children’s playroom when his wife walked in…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Post and Charles Freeman

An editorial in today’s Washington Post says that Charles W. Freeman Jr. “looked like a poor choice to chair the Obama administration’s National Intelligence Council” and criticized Freeman for suggesting…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Vitter Turns Tail

From Roll Call, via TalkingPointsMemo: Among Members of Congress, there’s a long-standing, proud tradition of the Airport Freakout. Add to the list of those who’ve indulged in meltdowns and temper…

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[Washington Babylon]

International Bankers and Corruption: How Citigroup does business abroad

London-based Global Witness has just put out a good report on how some major international banks, including Citibank, “have been dealing with some of the world’s most corrupt regimes.” Gavin…

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[Washington Babylon]

Citibank Does Baghdad: Iraqis beware, you might just want to put your cash under the bed

From Spencer Ackerman: Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld once observed that if you can’t solve a problem, enlarge it. In that spirit, take a look at this press conference in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Freeman Withdraws

Via Think Progress: Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair announced today that Ambassador Charles W. Freeman Jr. has requested that his selection to be Chairman of the National Intelligence…

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[Washington Babylon]

Citigroup: Sell Wal-Mart for fear of union

From MarketWatch: Citigroup Inc. lowered its rating on Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to hold from buy on Tuesday, citing concern that legislation intended to make it easier for employees to unionize…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dick Gephardt, Labor and Lobbying

I posted an item last week about former House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt, who had been very pro-labor during his long tenure in Congress. I noted that he’s now a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Romney 2012: Not an auspicious start in wooing conservatives

This past weekend’s National Club for Growth annual conference featured three dinner speakers. Thursday night: South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford. Friday night: South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint. Saturday night: former…

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[Washington Babylon]

Reply on Iraq Video

Last week, I posted a video showing an American military officer trash-talking a group of Iraqi police. Here’s a reply from Tim Hanes, former Captain, U.S. Army: No, this video…

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[Washington Babylon]

Media Fuels Tale of Obama-Limbaugh “Feud”

“GOP Fights Back Over Criticism of Limbaugh,” ran the headline in today’s Washington Post. “White House Is Accused Of Cynicism, Hypocrisy.” The accompanying story was written by Howard Kurtz and…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dick Gephardt: From NAFTA foe to the U.S. Chamber

Remember Dick Gephardt, the former House House Majority Leader, mortal foe of NAFTA and overall friend of the working class? He’s a lobbyist now of course, and his firm, Gephardt…

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[Washington Babylon]

Citigroup: Penny stock firm still spends millions on lobbying

Shares of Citigroup Inc., once the nation’s most powerful bank, fell below $1 a share Thursday. The stock fell to 98 cents in late morning trading, down 15 cents or…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Incredible Santelli: Watch and learn with CNBC

The Daily Show reports: “Wall Street is mad as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore — unless by “it” you mean $2 trillion in their own bail-out…

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[Washington Babylon]

David Frum on Rush: “A walking stereotype of self-indulgence”

From NewMajority.com: President Obama and Rush Limbaugh do not agree on much, but they share at least one thing: Both wish to see Rush anointed as the leader of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Democrats Vote Against Cutting Earmarks for Clients of PMA Group

An amendment to “prohibit taxpayer dollars from being earmarked to 14 clients of a lobbying firm under Federal investigation for making campaign donations in exchange for political favors for the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama vs. Bush on National Security Cases

From ProPublica: In a half-dozen national security lawsuits we’ve been following, the Obama administration has so far largely stuck by the positions taken by the Bush administration. (The one significant…

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[Washington Babylon]

Guess Who’s Profiting from Housing Meltdown?

From the New York Times: Whether they deserve to be or not, Countrywide Financial and its top executives would be on most lists of those who share blame for the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bush as Dark Knight: National Review’s list of top conservative movies

The Dark Knight ranks No. 12. Andrew Klavan offer this explanation: This film gives us a portrait of the hero as a man reviled. In his fight against the terrorist…

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[Washington Babylon]

McMeltdown: Cops respond to emergency McNuggets call

From The Smoking Gun: Angered that her local McDonald’s was out of Chicken McNuggets, a Florida woman called 911 three times to report the fast food “emergency.” Latreasa Goodman, 27,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Who is Blocking Amendment to Ban Earmarks From Raided Lobby Shop?

You would think that Congress would have an easy time halting earmarks obtained by a lobbying firm recently raided by the feds and the subject of an ongoing federal investigation.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pharmaceutical Lobby Pays Back Senator Hatch for Years of Service

From the Washington Times: The pharmaceutical industry that long has benefited from Sen. Orrin G. Hatch´s legislative efforts has directed large sums of money to a charity he helped found…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Dissent on that Porn Study

A few days ago I posted an item on a study that found that “[e]ight of the top 10 pornography consuming states gave their electoral votes to John McCain in…

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[Washington Babylon]

YouTube from Iraq

Via Mondoweiss, an amazing and disturbing YouTube video that shows an American military officer trash-talking to a group of Iraqi police. It doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence in the…

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[Report]

Invisible Hands

The secret world of the oil fixer

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[Washington Babylon]

Warren Buffett: Floating on $2.8 Billion

From Warren Buffett’s letter to the Shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Inc, February 27, 2009: We are fortunate that Berkshire’s two most important businesses – our insurance and utility groups –…

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[Washington Babylon]

Religion, Politics and Porn

From New Scientist: Eight of the top 10 pornography consuming states gave their electoral votes to John McCain in last year’s presidential election – Florida and Hawaii were the exceptions.…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Brief Guide to the Foggo Case Johns and Janes

Dusty Foggo, the CIA’s executive director under Porter Goss, was sentenced yesterday to more than three years in prison for funneling agency procurement contracts to an old friend and defense…

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[Washington Babylon]

Budget, High and Low

From Paul Krugman: The budget will, among other things, come as a huge relief to Democrats who were starting to feel a bit of postpartisan depression. The stimulus bill that…

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[Washington Babylon]

Rocky Mountain News, Farewell Edition

From the Rocky Mountain News: Colorado’s oldest newspaper will publish its final edition Friday. The Rocky Mountain News, less than two months away from its 150th anniversary, will be closed…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dusty Foggo to the Slammer

From Associated Press: A former high-ranking CIA official has been sentenced to more than three years in prison for a fraud scheme in which he steered procurement contracts to an…

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[Washington Babylon]

CIA Under Obama: Not much change?

From the Wall Street Journal: The Central Intelligence Agency’s new director outlined spy policies Wednesday, including an aggressive campaign in Pakistan, that underscored considerable continuity with the Bush administration. CIA…

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[Washington Babylon]

Murders in Iraq: Not fit for prime time

From Stars and Stripes: A videotape played Thursday in the trial of a U.S. soldier shows him describing how he shot two of four bound and blindfolded Iraqi prisoners in…

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[Washington Babylon]

New EPA Official’s Law Firm Lends Industry Helping Hand

The White House has nominated Jonathan Cannon to serve as Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, where he has previously worked under Presidents Reagan, Bush (senior) and Clinton. Cannon…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why No Attacks on U.S. Since 9/11?

From Slate, first part of what looks to be an interesting series: The 9/11 attacks were heralded as the harbinger of a new era of foreign-based terrorism in the United…

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[Washington Babylon]

Climate Change: There’s money to be made

From the Center for Public Integrity: The number of lobbyists seeking to influence federal policy on climate change has grown more than 300 percent in five years, with a slew…

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[Washington Babylon]

Government Details Case Against Former CIA Official

From ProPublica: Paramilitary agents for the CIA’s super-secret Special Activities Division, or SAD, perform raids, ambushes, abductions and other difficult chores overseas, including infiltrating countries to “light up” targets from…

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[Washington Babylon]

Controversial Lobby Firm Still Winning Earmarks: Congressional sponsors identified

Arizona Republican Jeff Flake put out a press release tonight saying that he had found “at least eight earmarks in the omnibus spending bill for clients of the PMA Group,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Jim Bunning: Stupid — the kind you don’t get better from

From the Courier-Journal: U.S. Sen. Jim Bunning predicted over the weekend that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg would likely be dead from pancreatic cancer within nine months. During…

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[Washington Babylon]

Spin, Spin: From Diplomat to Bechtel

From Eli Lake: A just-retired U.S. diplomat who led negotiations that restored full diplomatic ties between the U.S. and Libya has taken an important job with Bechtel, a major U.S.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Turkmen Dictator Finds Help in United States

For my book Turkmeniscam: How Washington Lobbyists Fought to Flack for a Stalinist Dictatorship, I posed as Kenneth Case, a businessman with energy interests in Turkmenistan. A number of beltway…

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[Washington Babylon]

Is Phil Gramm Involved in UBS Case?

A reader e-mailed with an interesting question: Former Senator Phil Gramm is a senior executive with Swiss banking giant UBS. According to the information filed Wednesday in the criminal case…

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[Washington Babylon]

Back to the Beach for Congressman Waters’s Husband?

A beltway insider with close ties to the State Department tells me that Sidney Williams, the husband of Congresswoman Maxine Waters, has expressed interest in getting back his old job…

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[Washington Babylon]

Clean Energy? A profile of oilman Ely Calil

I have an article in the March issue of the magazine about Ely Calil, a London-based international oil fixer (and friend, as I note in the story). Calil is one…

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[Washington Babylon]

Will Former Congressman Weldon Walk?

There’s a story making the rounds that former Congressman Curt Weldon will not be charged in a seemingly endless influence-peddling probe that dates back more than two years. “It has…

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[Washington Babylon]

WellCare’s National Health Care Plan

I mentioned last fall that this scandal was likely to blow down the road: It looks like the eruption is coming, as AP reports now: While Florida politicians were considering…

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[Washington Babylon]

Charity For Poor Funnels Money to GOP

From the Athens Banner-Herald: Officers of a Monroe-based charity that is under investigation by federal authorities donated nearly $50,000 to conservative candidates and causes in recent years, Federal Elections Commission…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Real Vetting Problem: Japanese minister quits after “drunken appearance” at news conference

From AP, via Talkingpointsmemo: Japan’s finance minister abruptly resigned Tuesday over allegations he made a drunken appearance at a G-7 news conference, shaking Prime Minister Taro Aso’s already deeply unpopular…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Nominee’s Past Includes Botched Privatization of Uranium Company

Chris Hayes had a nice piece not long ago about President Obama’s nomination of Gary Gensler to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). A long-time employee of Goldman Sachs,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Did Murtha’s Favorite Lobby Firm Use Straw Donors?

From the Washington Post: Marvin Hoffman is listed in campaign finance records as one of the many lobbyists with the powerful PMA Group donating money to lawmakers. But Hoffman is…

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[Washington Babylon]

What’s That in His Pocket?

From John Judis: There are many good things to say about the stimulus bill. But all in all, it wasn’t as good as it could be: It’s probably too small…

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[Washington Babylon]

Plouffing the Press

From the Washington Post: It takes a certain amount of nerve to have an event at the National Press Club and then ban the press from covering it. It takes…

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[Washington Babylon]

Joliet Jackhammer: New job for Blago?

From the Chicago Tribune: An unlikely suitor has stepped to the plate with a job offer for former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. The Joliet JackHammers, a Will County minor-league baseball team,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Austria’s History Lesson

From the Columbus Dispatch, via Talkingpointsmemo: “When (President Franklin) Roosevelt did this, he put our country into a Great Depression. He tried to borrow and spend, he tried to use…

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[Washington Babylon]

An Australian Reporter’s Take on the Middle East

Interesting interview about Middle East coverage at Columbia Journalism Review with Sydney Morning Herald foreign correspondent Paul McGeough. A few excerpts: People keep repeating that Hamas’s charter is opposed to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Homeland Security TV: Be Very Afraid

This is new to me: the Homeland Security Television Channel, “the world’s first online, on-demand television network dedicated to homeland security and global development.” The channel is also “dedicated to…

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[Washington Babylon]

American Arms Sales to Iraq: Signs of a long stay?

From Eli Lake: As President Obama weighs options for withdrawing U.S. combat troops from Iraq, the country’s military is purchasing American helicopters, cargo planes and tanks equipment that typically requires…

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[Washington Babylon]

Former CIA Official on Engagement With Hamas and Middle East Peace

Yesterday I posted the first part of a conversation with Emile Nakhleh, former head of the CIA’s Political Islam Strategic Analysis Program and author of the new book, A Necessary…

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[Washington Babylon]

Lobby Firm Raided by Feds Has Deep Links to Democrats

As noted here last night, the FBI has raided a lobby shop, PMA, which is closely enmeshed with Congressman John Murtha, chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. According to Taxpayers…

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[Washington Babylon]

Former CIA Official on Gitmo, Iraqi Elections and Iran Policy

Emile Nakhleh headed the CIA’s Political Islam Strategic Analysis Program until leaving the agency in 2006. During his tenure, he briefed top officials on issues related to Iraq and Afghanistan,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Feds Raid Another Firm Linked to Congressman Murtha

I’ve been writing for years about the indecently close ties between House Democrat John Murtha and the defense lobbying firm PMA, so was not surprised to learn, via ABC News,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Did Secret Payments Secure Kyrgyz Military Base?

From Laura Rozen: As the Kyrgyz Republic threatens to kick the United States out of its Manas air base, which it has been using as a major logistics and supply…

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[Washington Babylon]

Local Media Barred From Plouffe Speech in Azerbaijan

As I reported here yesterday, David Plouffe, Barack Obama’s former campaign manager, jetted off to Azerbaijan to give a speech at a university. Plouffe claimed he went to the country…

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[Washington Babylon]

Will Defense Get Cut?

From Stephen Walt: Obama’s plan to cut the Department of Defense’s budget request by roughly ten percent is a step in the direction of a more sensible foreign and defense…

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[Washington Babylon]

David Plouffe and the Call of Oil

Barack Obama took office just a few weeks ago and already David Plouffe, his campaign manager, appears to be doing quite well for himself. He’s already signed a lucrative book…

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[Washington Babylon]

Former High Times Publisher on the Phelps-Bong “Scandal”

From Mike Edison at the Daily Beast: George W. Bush never had to answer for his “youthful indiscretions.” Michael Phelps, not so lucky. Having been caught red-handed with a smoking…

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[Washington Babylon]

Note to Taxpayers: You just lost 30 percent on the federal bailout

From the Washington Post: The Bush administration received assets that were worth $78 billion less than the amount it invested as part of the massive infusion of capital into the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator David Vitter and the Inevitability of STDs

Jon Stewart’s take on the debate surrounding the economic stimulus bill. Make sure to watch the section (around the 4:30 mark) on Senator Vitter and family planning.

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[Washington Babylon]

So Who Did He Pay Off?

From a Justice Department press release today: WASHINGTON – A government contractor and former employee of the U.S. Department of the Treasury was sentenced in Washington today in connection with…

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[Washington Babylon]

Senator Coleman’s Finances: Does anyone see a pattern here?

From Politico: Norm Coleman has a strong interest in convincing voters that he hasn’t given up hope of returning for a second Senate term. But as the fight over Minnesota’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

What to Expect at Panetta’s Confirmation Hearing

From Spencer Ackerman: Thursday afternoon is Panetta’s long-awaited confirmation hearing. As something of a cipher on intelligence matters, Panetta can expect a tough hearing. With the CIA intimately involved in…

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[Washington Babylon]

General Zinni Gets Shafted

From Laura Rozen: When retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni told the Washington Times today that he was offered the job of U.S. ambassador to Iraq before being passed over in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Strategy for Managing G.O.P. Opposition: Cookies

Somehow, I doubt this approach is going to work. Obama won an overwhelming mandate, I wish he’d start acting like it. Can the shrill tone of Washington be changed through…

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[Washington Babylon]

Congressman Rangel Buys and Sells and Doesn’t Tell

From the Sunlight Foundation: House Ways and Means Chairman Charles B. Rangel predicted, on C-SPAN’s Newsmakers program that aired Sunday, Feb. 1, 2009, that his multitude of ethics woes would…

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[Washington Babylon]

More Donors to Congressman James Clyburn’s Personal Charity

Speaking of House Majority Whip James Clyburn’s Tom DeLay-style personal charity, which I reported here yesterday, here are a few more contributors: Nike, National Association of Realtors, BNSF Railroad, URS…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Daschle Affair and the Washington Bubble

Lesson No. 1 from the Tom Daschle affair is that Washington is completely clueless. As early as Monday, it was pretty apparent that Daschle was going to have a hard…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Mulling Radical Tax Plan

From Andy Borowitz: President Barack Obama is mulling a controversial new tax program that would require members of his Cabinet to pay taxes owed under the Federal tax code, the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Daschle’s Pontiac: When Tom was a penny pincher

Check out this old Tom Daschle campaign spot (via famousdc.com). Haunting.

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[Washington Babylon]

Daschle Watch

The news just keeps getting worse for poor Tom Daschle: Tom Daschle backed the patron who paid him a million-dollar salary and supplied him with a free car and driver…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Tom Daschle Scrambles to Make Ends Meet

From Emily Yoffe in the Washington Post. Like many Americans whose steady, reliable job has suddenly disappeared, Thomas Daschle cobbled together a bunch of gigs when he was laid off…

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[Washington Babylon]

DeLayed Reaction: House majority whip’s foundation has that old-time aroma

Think back to the terrible old days when the Republicans ran congress, and how companies seeking to win access and favor with the GOP would make “contributions” to the DeLay…

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[Washington Babylon]

That Was Fast: Obama staffer lands on his feet in private sector

Jeff Berman, the national delegate director for the Obama presidential campaign, has a new job: The international law firm Bryan Cave LLP (www.bryancave.com) announced today that Jeff Berman has joined…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Positive Spin on Tom Daschle: “The second-biggest whore for the health care industry in American politics”

Glenn Greenwald tells you everything you need to know about Tom Daschle: He embodies everything that is sleazy, sickly, and soul-less about Washington. It’s probably impossible for Obama to fill…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bush’s Plutocrat Assistance Program

From Bloomberg, via Laura Rozen: The average tax rate paid by the richest 400 Americans fell by a third to 17.2 percent through the first six years of the Bush…

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[Washington Babylon]

Tom Daschle: Secretary of Health and Public Speaking Fees

From the Associated Press: Tom Daschle collected nearly a quarter of a million dollars in fees in the last two years speaking to leaders of the industry President Barack Obama…

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[Six Questions]

Six Questions for Deborah Nelson on Vietnam War Crimes, and Why They Matter Now

Deborah Nelson is the Carnegie Visiting Professor at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism, University of Maryland at College Park. She is the author of the new book, The War…

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[Washington Babylon]

Joe Lieberman, Stand-up Comic: So did you hear the one about waterboarding?

Once inside the banquet hall, which is always off-limits to the media, the Alfalfans took turns trying to crack each other up. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) — the club’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Tom Daschle and the Old Boys’ Club

The Senate: shameless and clueless. From the Washington Post: Early reactions from the Senate have shown little need for much of a fight. No Senate Republican has stepped forward to…

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[Washington Babylon]

Slumdog Millionaires?

From the Washington Post: “Slumdog Millionaire” — or “Slumdog Crorepati,” as the Hindi-language version is known — received 10 Oscar nominations and has become the modern-day fairy tale of the…

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[Washington Babylon]

One Administration, Two Tax Cheats

First Timothy Geithner and his lame excuses, now this: Thomas A. Daschle, nominated to be secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, did not pay more than $128,000…

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[Washington Babylon]

A Trip Down Memory Lane With Michael Steele

Michael Steele, yesterday after winning the post of RNC chairman: “We have an image problem,” Steele said. “We’ve been misidentified as party that is insensitive, a party unconcerned about the…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Pentagon’s Iraq Expert

Turns out that Laurie Mylroie, dubbed “The Neocons’ favorite conspiracy theorist” by Peter Bergen, was working at the Pentagon not so long ago. Justin Elliott of TPM Muckraker reports: It’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Wall Street Tanked but Bonuses Thrived

From the New York Times: By almost any measure, 2008 was a complete disaster for Wall Street — except, that is, when the bonuses arrived. Despite crippling losses, multibillion-dollar bailouts…

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[Washington Babylon]

Voter Fraud Fraud

Remember last fall when Republicans claimed that they had discovered hundreds of cases of voter fraud in Ohio? A special prosecutor was even appointed to investigate. He has reported his…

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[Washington Babylon]

Not Just Republicans Questioning Stimulus Package

From the Washington Post: Republican criticism of the stimulus package that the House will vote on tonight has focused on its soaring price tag, but some Democrats on Capitol Hill…

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[Washington Babylon]

Early Test For Obama on Corporate Mergers

Terrific column in today’s Washington Post from Steven Pearlstein: Three things are indisputably true about the pharmaceutical industry: Over the past decade, there has been significant cross-border consolidation, involving major…

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[Washington Babylon]

Goldman Sachs Lobbyist Heads for Job at Treasury

From ABC News: Despite President Barack Obama’s pledge to limit the influence of lobbyists in his administration, a recent lobbyist for investment banking giant Goldman Sachs is in line to…

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[Washington Babylon]

GOP Marketing Makeover Hits Snag: How do you rebrand stupid?

“Let’s just say that, that, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of 9/11, is brought to the United States to be tried in a federal court in the United States, under…

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[Washington Babylon]

Fuld’s Gold: Lehman Brothers CEO sells mansion for a tenner

From the New York Times: Housing prices are falling around the country, but this one sounds hard to believe: A seaside mansion on Jupiter Island in Florida, bought for more…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bundling The Administration

I generally don’t trust my own reaction to political developments because my own views are too eclectic and non-representative to serve as any type of political weather vane. But I…

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[Washington Babylon]

Another Bailout for Big Banks?

The Institutional Risk Analyst looks at the “political battle building for the mind of Barack Obama on how to resolve, or not, the largest, most profoundly troubled US banks.” The…

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[Washington Babylon]

Big Game Hunting with John Murtha

Check out this story on last week’s raid on properties owned by businessmen close to Congressman John Murtha: The Tribune-Democrat has learned that federal raids on the businesses and homes…

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[Washington Babylon]

Non-Senator Coleman Still Hustling For Political Dollars

Norm Coleman of Minnesota is no longer a senator (at least for the time being) and he’s taken a job as a consultant with the Republican Jewish Coalition. But he’s…

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[Washington Babylon]

Dictator Suck-Up Watch

From Marc Lynch: On his first day in office, Barack Obama placed calls to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Jordan’s King Abdullah, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Excellent! What a perfect…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Off To Rough Start: Gitmo closed but mispelled names mar debut

Talkingpointsmemo points to a Time magazine article, “The Obama Team’s Debut: Not Quite Ready on Day One.” So while the new Obama Administration did jump out of the gate with…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Heir Apparent in New York: At least she’s not an heiress

I don’t know much about Congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand, who has reportedly been named to fill Hillary Clinton’s senate seat. But at least David Patterson didn’t turn this into a political…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Promises: Seven down, about five hundred to go

For those keeping track of how Obama fulfills his campaign promises, the St. Petersburg Times offers a handy interactive guide. He’s off to a relatively good start, but there’s a…

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[Washington Babylon]

More on the Murtha-related Raid

The CEO of Kuchera Industries and Kuchera Defense Systems, the two firms raided by the feds yesterday, was the director of a non-profit group that the Washington Post described in…

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[Washington Babylon]

Feds Raid Offices of Firm Tied to Murtha

Congressman John Murtha’s relationship with his campaign donors is a topic I’ve written about frequently in the past. Today the FBI raided the offices of one of those donors: Federal…

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[Washington Babylon]

Clinton Foundation Donors and Hillary’s Confirmation

The Senate seems likely to confirm Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State soon, but there’s still a hang-up over contributions to her husband’s foundation. I’ve been trying to get answers…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama Kitsch

Seth Hettena writes: How can you discuss Obama tackiness without mentioning this. Good point!…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Obama Doctrine?

Barack Obama’s inauguration speech had some nice moments. I especially liked the section near the end where he said: In the year of America’s birth, in the coldest of months,…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Road to Hell Is Paved with Stupid Celebrity Pledges

Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher and other stars make their pledges to Barack Obama. Low point, among many: Jason Bateman promises to flush “only after a deuce, never a single.” Is…

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[Washington Babylon]

Lobbying The Inauguration

From the Washington Independent: In November, Obama announced that his presidential inauguration committee would not accept donations from corporations, lobbyists, political action committees, or unions. The move appeared to set…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama: Inspiring Tackiness

Inauguration fever is cresting with the inevitable flood of Obama merchandise. Here are three candidates for the worst of the lot: In the “cute and cloying” category, there’s the “Obama,…

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[Washington Babylon]

Obama’s Middle East Dealmaker

Dennis Ross, Barack Obama’s proposed new Middle East guru/envoy, has gotten generally fawning coverage from the press. In Newsweek,, Michael Hersh wrote: “One man who will probably be running ahead…

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[Washington Babylon]

Civil Rights, Coffee and Race

Talkingpointsmemo notes a footnote to the new Inspector General’s report on the politicization of the Civil Rights Division at DOJ: In that incident in August 2004, Voting Section Chief John…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Way Florida Works

Congressman Kendrick Meek of Florida has announced that he will run for the U.S. Senate. Which may require that he answer some questions about this story from 2007: Boston developer…

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[Washington Babylon]

“I Should Have Wikipedia-ed Neville Chamberlain”: A pundit’s lament

The Daily Show takes us on a tour of pundit boot camp. Attack, you maggots!…

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[Washington Babylon]

Note To Retirees: If Bush Social Security plan had passed, you’d really be screwed

From the Washington Post: If your year-end 401(k) statement made you ill, I have one consolation for you: It could be worse. How’s that possible, given how horrible last year…

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[Washington Babylon]

Israeli War Correspondents

From Philip Weiss: The New Republic seems to depend on former IDF soldiers for more of its Israel coverage than just about anyone else. Benny Morris, Jeffrey Goldberg. And here…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bush Justice Department: It has a dream

Time is running out on the Bush administration but the Justice Department’s civil rights division is fighting to its last breath — to defend the rights of white people.

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[Washington Babylon]

And If That Last Item On The Economy Wasn’t Depressing Enough

From Eric Janszen: Economic data coming out this week reveal an economy in free-fall. The Stats Every single working day in the month of December 2008: 190 U.S. companies filed…

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[Washington Babylon]

How Bad Is The Economy?

From John Judis: Does Barack Obama understand the seriousness of the economic crisis? Yesterday, he laid out his economic agenda, and it was filled with all sorts of important exhortations…

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[Washington Babylon]

Scenes From Gaza

From the New York Times: The International Committee of the Red Cross said Thursday it had discovered “shocking” scenes — including small children next to their mothers’ corpses — when…

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[Washington Babylon]

Regime Change or Assassination? The media mulls foreign policy options in Zimbabwe

I’ve mentioned here on previous occasions how the American media covers foreign news through the prism of United States foreign policy. If the U.S. government deems a country to be…

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[Washington Babylon]

Rules of Etiquette From the New Surgeon General: How to order tiger penis

Classic investigative reporting from Stephen Colbert, who takes us behind the scenes at CNN’s special report, “Penis in Peril.” Colbert also explains how Sanjay Gupta threatens America’s traditional food pyramid.

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[Washington Babylon]

Dennis Ross: Could he be a three-time loser?

From Augustus Richard Norton: Reportedly, two-time loser to be given a third chance to fail by Obama: Dennis Ross who was a dead-hand on the wheel as peacemaker in the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Jeffrey Goldberg on Palestinian “Moral Failings”

Stunning remarks from the man who helped sell the Iraq War. Jonathan Schwarz tells the story.

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[Washington Babylon]

Washington Post Takes Critical Look at Obama’s SEC Pick

When Barack Obama picked Mary Schapiro as head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, her nomination was almost universally hailed in the press. Schapiro, it was said, was just the…

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[Washington Babylon]

Department of Bad Ideas

From Taxpayers for Common Sense: Of all the industries in line for a handout in this financially frightening time, the defense industry would seem to bring up the rear. After…

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[Washington Babylon]

Pay-to-Play at UNESCO

Is there a slimier United Nations department then UNESCO? In 2006, UNESCO awarded Uzbek dictator Islam Karimov with a medal for preserving Uzbekistan’s cultural heritage. Human Rights Watch said that…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Latest Obamamaniac: Commentary Magazine

From Commentary: So let’s get this straight: Robert Gates will be the Defense Secretary, we’re ramping up U.S. forces in Afghanistan and providing a reasonable period of time for a…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bret Baier: Why he sucks

Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post had a fawning story today about Bret Baier, who has just replaced Britt Hume as the head of Fox’s Washington newscast. “Hume was a…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Gaza Fallout

From Marc Lynch: However this round of violence ends — and it’s hard to see any scenario in which it produces remotely positive results for anyone involved — the outcome…

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[Washington Babylon]

Civilian To Head CIA

Michael Hayden will not be kept on at CIA, which, according to a source I spoke to over the weekend, will come as a relief to many at the agency.…

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[Washington Babylon]

Bookmark This

Foreign Policy has launched its newly revamped website, which has lots of great features, including two of my favorite bloggers: Laura Rozen on national security and foreign policy, and Marc…

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[Washington Babylon]

Will Hayden Stay at CIA?

Barack Obama still hasn’t gotten around to naming his CIA director, and there’s still talk that he might retain Michael Hayden. A former senior CIA official I spoke with thinks…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why Richardson Withdrew: Sí Se Puede

It’s not pretty. From the Washington Post: A grand jury in Albuquerque is looking into whether CDR Financial Products received a contract with the New Mexico Finance Authority because of…

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[Washington Babylon]

Why Israel Attacked

From Augustus Richard Norton and Sara Roy: Hamas’ strategic miscalculation in rejecting an extension to a six-month truce with Israel was a gift on a “golden platter” to Israel, as…

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[Washington Babylon]

Our Man in Kabul

From the New York Times: Kept afloat by billions of dollars in American and other foreign aid, the government of Afghanistan is shot through with corruption and graft. From the…

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[Washington Babylon]

The Internet War: Israel Spins The War Online

From Wired: Days after sending aircraft to strike Hamas militants in Gaza, the Israeli government is launching a campaign to dominate the blogosphere. Among other things, the Israeli military has…

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