Conservative Blogger
Tuesday, April 28, 2015
Parallel Universe: Hillary's campaign, media's nonstop scandal coverage
The sentence jumps out of Hillary Clinton’s op-ed piece on how she’s been listening to “everyday Iowans.”
“We can fix our dysfunctional political system and get unaccountable money out of it once and for all, even if that takes a constitutional amendment,” she writes in the Des Moines Register.
Um, is this the right time for Hillary to be talking about “unaccountable money”?
The optics of her fledgling campaign are mighty strange, almost like it exists in one universe and the media coverage occupies a parallel universe.
In her initial forays, Hillary is defiantly trying to avoid making news. Meeting with small groups of students and business owners, it’s all about the listening tour, the humble grandmother connecting with “everyday Iowans,” as she says in the piece. Pretty pictures, carefully choreographed scripts, and no hint of controversy.
But the media coverage of the campaign could not be more different. I’d say 99.9 percent of it is about the Clinton Foundation—which wealthy tycoons or foreign interests donated money or paid for Bill Clinton’s $500,000 speeches, who needed State Department approval for projects when Hillary Clinton ran the department.
With the candidate assiduously avoiding the press, Hillary is running one campaign and the media are covering another—a disconnect more dramatic than any I can recall in modern political history.
The Republican candidates, meanwhile, are engaging the media on their own issues—sometimes being put on the defensive, of course—or talking about the Clinton Foundation. Which Hillary isn’t talking about. Sometimes her surrogates are talking about it—mainly by attacking the messenger, conservative “Clinton Cash” author Peter Schweizer, although the New York Times, Washington Post and Fox News, among others, have done original reporting on the complicated story.
So which narrative will ultimately be persuasive to the voters: Hillary chatting about middle-class issues, or Hillary under fire for being the furthest thing from middle class?
Politico says Hillary, of “dead broke” fame, has always been the breadwinner in the family, having worked as a lawyer when Bill was drawing a $35,000 gubernatorial salary:
“Clinton’s compulsion to raise as much cash in the past two years (she commanded $200,000 to $300,000 a pop for anodyne spiels before such august groups as the National Association of Convenience Stores) doesn’t exactly fit in with her woman-of-the-people campaign. She had her reasons — Clinton dipped into her own savings to pay staffers before she formally announced earlier this month, a campaign spokesman told me. But her insistence on delivering paid speeches until the eve of her campaign announcement reflected a deeper pattern of behavior stretching back decades, a drive to maximize the family earning potential during periods when she’s off the public payroll, friends told me.”
Democratic strategist and Fox News contributor Joe Trippi is quoted as saying he doesn’t get it: “She had to give just one more speech? She just had to push it right up to the moment she announced? The family was going to fall off the cliff if she didn’t do that?”
Liberal Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus says Hillary is paying the price for a “toxic combination of sloppiness and greed.”
She says greed reminds her of “the Yiddish word, chazer. It means ‘pig,’ but has a specific connotation of piggishness and gluttony. This is a chronic affliction of the Clintons, whether it comes to campaign fundraising (remember the Lincoln Bedroom?), compulsive speechifying (another six-figure check to speak at a public university?) or assiduous vacuuming up of foundation donations from donors of questionable character or motives.”
In the end, without a smoking gun, the complicated allegations involving the foundation may blow over. But what won’t recede so quickly is the overall impression, fueled by media coverage, that the Clintons are up to their old shenanigans.
Staying in the bunker is ultimately a losing strategy, as we saw when a week of silence over her private email server led to that disastrous news conference. At some point, Hillary Clinton has to move beyond the photo ops and answer these questions. Only then can she reduce the huge gap between the way she is campaigning and the way she is covered.
Iraqi forces face their toughest test in push to retake Anbar Province from ISIS
BAGHDAD – Iraqi forces are on a westward push to retake Anbar, a sprawling Sunni-dominated desert province captured by the Islamic State group in their offensive last year. But as the battles for Tikrit and Ramadi have shown, it will be a hard slog for a much-diminished Iraqi army -- especially given Baghdad's reticence to arm Sunni tribesmen and local fears of the Shiite militias backing government forces.
Earlier this month, Iraqi forces captured the northern Sunni-majority city of Tikrit from the Islamic State group, but only with the backing from Iranian-trained and Iran-funded Shiite militias and U.S. airstrikes -- methods that cannot work in Anbar province.
The past weeks of seesaw battles in Anbar, with progress in areas like Garma east of Fallujah, a stalemate in the biggest city of Ramadi and an Iraqi rout near Lake Tharthar, show that the army still needs help. But relying on erstwhile Shiite militia allies may not be palatable to locals.
"The Iraqi soldiers fighting in Anbar are not well-trained enough for this battle. Many of the soldiers are there for the money, but the (Shiite militias), they are believers in this fight," said an Iraqi brigadier general involved in the Anbar campaign. "There isn't yet a clear plan to liberate Anbar because of the political and tribal disputes."
Speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to journalists, he said some tribes might be supportive but others were with the Islamic State group. He also lamented how soldiers would throw down their weapons and flee when hard-pressed.
On Friday, government reports of advances in Anbar were belied by an Islamic State attack on a water control system on a canal north of Islamic State-occupied Fallujah that killed a division commander and at least a dozen soldiers.
In the past few years, Iraq's army has been hollowed out by corrupt commanders siphoning off salaries and equipment and not training soldiers to do much more than man checkpoints.
A force that once numbered in the hundreds of thousands is now estimated by U.S. officials to be around 125,000 at best and probably a lot less, once all the so-called "ghost-soldiers" -- non-existent names on the payroll -- are purged.
The army has had some victories around Baghdad and in the eastern Diyala province with the help of Shiite militias. But if they were used in Anbar, it would only further alienate the Sunni population in the province, where the Islamic State group has been entrenched since January 2014.
Dhari al-Rishawi, a Sunni tribal leader in Anbar who helped form the Sunni militias known as Sahwa or Awakening Councils, which with the U.S. military drove al-Qaida out of the province in 2006, said people are terrified that the army will be bringing the Shiite militias.
"We know that if the militias are involved, there will be Iranian advisers and that would be a disaster because in this region there is a lot of sensitivity over Iranian interference," al-Rishawi told The Associated Press. "The tribes of Anbar are ready to fight the Islamic State and eject them but on the condition that the state arms them."
Plans to create a National Guard with Sunni fighters have stalled because the Shiite-dominated government suspects many of supporting the Islamic State group and refuses to arm them.
Under the former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the Sunni Awakening force was dismantled after the U.S. pulled out in 2011, further alienating the local population.
Since taking over large parts of the province, the Islamic State group hasn't been idle.
"In one and a half years, ISIS has become embedded within the civil structure of many portions of Anbar province and they have killed a lot of people that oppose them and the government wasn't able to do anything," said Richard Brennan, an Iraq expert at the Rand Corporation, using an alternate acronym for the group. "The government has to convince those remaining that it's worth the risk to oppose ISIS."
With the Islamic State in control of large parts of Ramadi as well as all of Fallujah -- a city the U.S. military only retook with difficulty in 2004 -- the Iraqi troops have some incredibly difficult urban fighting ahead of them. Also, the U.S.-led coalition would be unable to back the Iraqis with air power in dense urban combat.
So far, the bulk of the fighting has been done by the Iraqi special forces division, which continued to be trained and equipped by the Americans even after the U.S. withdrawal, but they can't be everywhere and the regular Iraqi army often hasn't been able to hold on to its gains.
In some places, it is the militias that have played this role, but that wouldn't agree with the disaffected Sunnis of Anbar.
"We are caught between the hammer of the Islamic State and the anvil of the militias and we don't know where to go," al-Rishawi said.
None shall pass: Texas prof flunks entire class, then quits mid-semester
A professor threw a Texas-sized tantrum flunking his entire class mid-semester and quitting after complaining that students mocked, threatened and ridiculed him, but the school said the failing grades won't all stand.
"I am frankly and completely disgusted,"Texas A&M Galveston, Professor Irwin Horwitz told his business management students in a blast e-mail, according to Inside Higher Ed. "You all lack the honor and maturity to live up to the standards that Texas A&M holds, and the competence and/or desire to do the quality work necessary to pass the course just on a grade level.
"I will no longer be teaching the course, and [you] all are being awarded a failing grade."
Horwitz said students had cheated, told him to "chill out," called him a "[expletive] moron" and spread false rumors about him. He told KPRC news he even felt unsafe in the classroom at times.
"None of you, in my opinion, given the behavior in this class, deserve to pass, or graduate to become an Aggie, as you do not in any way embody the honor that the university holds graduates should have within their personal character," he wrote to the students.
Horwitz has taught at Texas A&M since 1994 and has won recognition for both research and teaching. He told Inside Higher Ed that he had rarely failed students throughout his teaching career, but had never come across as terrible a class as his spring 2015 management course.
University officials told KPRC that the grades will be reassessed and the department head will take over Horwitz's class for the remainder of the semester. Some students needed the required course to graduate with business degrees in May.
A spokesman for the university told the education publication that "all accusations made by the professor about the students' behavior in class are also being investigated and disciplinary action will be taken" against students found to have behaved inappropriately. The spokesman said that one cheating allegation has already been investigated and the student cleared.
"No student who passes the class academically will be failed," the spokesman said. "That is the only right thing to do."
National Guard arrives in Baltimore as police commissioner admits rioters 'outnumbered us and outflanked us'
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National Guard troops arrived in Baltimore shortly after midnight Tuesday, almost nine hours after a confrontation between black youths and police at a city mall mushroomed into riots during which several businesses were looted and burned and over a dozen officers injured.
A few minutes earlier, city police commissioner Anthony Batts admitted that his officers were not prepared for the outbreak of violence that forced Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan to declare a state of emergency, activating the Guard, and Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake to announce a weeklong 10 p.m.-to-5 a.m. curfew, to take effect Tuesday.
"Yes, we planned for it. That wasn't the issue," Batts told reporters late Monday. "We just had too many people out there [for us] to overcome the numbers we had." The commissioner added that the rioters had pulled his officers to "opposite ends of the city" and had "outnumbered us and outflanked us."
Rawlings-Blake described Monday as "one of our darkest days as a city" as she surveyed fire damage.
"Too many people have spent generations building up this city for it to be destroyed by thugs who, in a very senseless way, are trying to tear down what so many have fought for," she added. "It's idiotic to think that by destroying your city, you're going to make life better for anybody."
Batts said the National Guard would be used to take control of what he called "structures and fixed posts" to support police efforts to regain control of the city's streets.
Baltimore City police said late Monday that two dozen people had been arrested. As the violence grew Monday, officers wearing helmets and wielding shields occasionally used pepper spray to keep the rioters back. For the most part, though, they relied on line formations to keep protesters at bay. After midnight Monday, authorities were still struggling to quell pockets of unrest.
The violence began hours after Monday's funeral for Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old man who died last week from a severe spinal cord injury he suffered in police custody. Gray's fatal encounter with officers came amid the national debate over police use of force, especially when black suspects, like Gray, are involved. Gray was African-American. Police have declined to specify the races of the six officers involved in his arrest, all of whom have been suspended with pay while they are under investigation.
Gray's family denounced the violence late Monday, saying it was not the way to honor him
"I think the violence is wrong," Grays twin sister, Fredericka Gray, said. "I don't like it at all."
The attorney for Gray's family, Billy Murphy, said the family had hoped to organize a peace march later in the week.
During Gray's funeral Monday, police released a statement saying that the department had received a "credible threat" that three notoriously violent gangs are now working together to "take out" law enforcement officers. A police source told Fox News several gangs, including Black Gorilla Family, Bloods and Crips all had “entered into a partnership to take out law enforcement officers.”
The confrontation that sparked the violence stemmed from an online call for a "purge" that would begin at the Mondawmin Mall in west Baltimore and end downtown. The phrase is a reference to the 2013 movie "The Purge", which takes place in a world in which crime is made legal for one night only.
Alerted to the warning, authorities mobilized police officers to the Mondawmin Mall in west Baltimore, within a mile of where Gray was filmed being arrested and pushed into a police van April 12. The shopping center is a transportation hub for students at nearby schools.
At 3 p.m., the time of the reported "purge," between 75 to 100 students on their way to the mall were greeted by police in riot gear. The students began throwing water bottles and rocks at the officers, who responded with tear gas and Mace.
As the crowds at Mondawmin Mall began to thin, the riot shifted about a mile away to the heart of an older shopping district near where Gray first encountered police.
Emergency officials were constantly thwarted as they tried to restore calm in the affected parts of the city of more than 620,000 people. Firefighters trying to put out a blaze at a CVS store were hindered by someone who sliced holes in a hose connected to a fire hydrant, spraying water all over the street and nearby buildings.
The smell of burned rubber wafted in the air in one neighborhood where youths were looting a liquor store. Police stood still nearby as people drank looted alcohol. Glass and trash littered the streets, and other small fires were scattered about. One person from a church tried to shout something from a megaphone as two cars burned.
Later Monday night, a massive fire erupted in East Baltimore that a mayoral spokesman initially said was connected to the riots. He later texted an AP reporter saying officials are still investigating whether there is a connection.
The Mary Harvin Transformation Center was under construction and no one was believed to be in the building at the time, said the spokesman, Kevin Harris. The center is described online as a community-based organization that supports youth and families.
Kevin Johnson, a 53-year-old resident of the area, said the building was to have been earmarked for the elderly. Donte Hickman, pastor of a Baptist church that has been helping to develop the center, shed tears as he led a group prayer near the firefighters who fought the blaze.
"My heart is broken because somebody obviously didn't understand that we were for the community, somebody didn't understand that we were working on behalf of the community to invest when nobody else would," he said.
The focus of the rioting later shifted back to Mondawmin Mall, as people began looting clothing and other items from stores which had become unprotected as police moved away from the area. About three dozen officers returned, trying to arrest looters but driving many away by firing pellet guns and rubber bullets.
Downtown Baltimore, the Inner Harbor tourist attractions and the city's baseball and football stadiums are nearly 4 miles away from the worst of the violence. While the violence had not yet reached City Hall and the Camden Yards area, the Orioles canceled Monday's home game against the Chicago White Sox for safety precautions.
On Monday night, Maryland Congressman Elijah Cummings and about 200 others, including ministers and mostly men, marched arm-in-arm through a neighborhood littered with broken glass, flattened aluminum cans and other debris, in an attempt to help calm the violent outbursts. As they got close to a line of police officers, the marchers went down on their knees. After the ministers got back on their feet, they walked until they were face-to-face with the police officers in a tight formation and wearing riot gear.
Related Image
Freddie Gray died April 19 of injuries suffered while in police custody, according to his attorney.
Many who had never met Gray gathered earlier in the day in a Baltimore church to bid him farewell and press for more accountability among law enforcement.
The 2,500-capacity New Shiloh Baptist church was filled with mourners. But even the funeral could not ease mounting tensions.
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