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Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 20, 2014 59 Comments
Ah, the comment section. Sometime later today into tomorrow, we will hit our 300,000th comment. In 6 years. That's not a lot compared to some websites, but it's a lot here. And the pace has picked up dramatically in the past couple of years. We seem to be running close to 10,000 comments a month (that's just a guesstimate). We "try" to keep things under control by not using third-party comment software such as Disqus -- which means you have to register here specifically. That cuts down on drive-by commenters and flame throwers, which helps keep the comment section relatively (by comparison to other websites) civil. But it also cuts down on the number of people who comment, and likely cuts down on our traffic. Having massive fights in the comment section is what drives some websites to have several hundred to several thousand comments for a single post. That's not to say sometimes things don't get rough, but we appreciate that our commenters generally don't go there. Policing the comment section is a drag, and with our volume and staff, difficult. In the end, though, I think it's worth keeping comments open. It creates a sense of community and shared purpose. We have shared election victories and losses, graduations, promotions, deaths and births. Some commenters have crossed the cyber/real world barrier, and communicated off site with each other, and with me. I count some of our commenters as real world friends now, and the comment secton was how I located one of our authors (Andrew Branca).

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Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 20, 2014 46 Comments
Two New York City policemen were shot dead ambush style in their patrol car. The initial evidence is that it was a revenge killing, but caution that in such events initial evidence can be wrong. From The NY Post, Gunman kills self after 2 NYPD cops shot dead ‘execution style’ as ‘revenge’ for Garner:
Two uniformed NYPD officers were shot dead Saturday afternoon as they sat in their marked police car on a Brooklyn street corner — in what investigators believe was a crazed gunman’s execution-style mission to avenge Eric Garner and Michael Brown. “It’s an execution,” one law enforcement source said of the 3 p.m. shooting of the two officers, whose names were being withheld pending family notification of their deaths. The tragic heroes were working overtime as part of an anti-terrorism drill when they were shot point-blank in their heads by the lone gunman, who approached them on foot from the sidewalk at the corner of Myrtle and Tompkins avenues in Bed-Stuy. “I’m Putting Wings on Pigs Today,” a person believed to be the gunman wrote on Instagram in a message posted just three hours before the officers were shot through their front passenger window.

More ABC News Videos | ABC World News (Update) The murdered policemen have been identified as Rafael Ramos and Wenjin Liu.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 20, 2014 16 Comments
Yesterday the FBI announced that the North Koreans were behind the Sony hack. Now the North Koreans are denying it, via BBC:
North Korea has offered to hold a joint inquiry with the United States into a cyber-attack on Sony Pictures, strongly denying US claims that it is behind it. Its foreign ministry accused the US of "spreading groundless allegations", which the joint probe would refute. Without addressing Pyongyang's idea, a US spokesman insisted that North Korea must admit "culpability" ... On Saturday, the North Korean foreign ministry said: "As the United States is spreading groundless allegations and slandering us, we propose a joint investigation with it into this incident." "Without resorting to such tortures as were used by the US CIA, we have means to prove that this incident has nothing to do with us." The statement said there would be "grave consequences" if the Americans rejected their inquiry proposal.
If not North Korea, then who? Here are four possibilities via NY Mag:

Posted by Mike LaChance on December 20, 2014 6 Comments
The ultra-liberal state of Vermont never liked Obamacare but not for the reasons most Americans object to the law. Vermont felt it didn't go far enough and was determined to establish its own single payer system. As of this week, that plan is dead. Sarah Wheaton of Politico:
Why single payer died in Vermont Vermont was supposed to be the beacon for a single-payer health care system in America. But now its plans are in ruins, and its onetime champion Gov. Peter Shumlin may have set back the cause. Advocates of a “Medicare for all” approach were largely sidelined during the national Obamacare debate. The health law left a private insurance system in place and didn’t even include a weaker “public option” government plan to run alongside more traditional commercial ones. So single-payer advocates looked instead to make a breakthrough in the states. Bills have been introduced from Hawaii to New York; former Medicare chief Don Berwick made it a key plank of his unsuccessful primary race for Massachusetts governor. Vermont under Shumlin became the most visible trailblazer. Until Wednesday, when the governor admitted what critics had said all along: He couldn’t pay for it.
Advocates of a single payer healthcare system may not realize just how bad this news is for them. Vermont was their best shot. John Fund of National Review noted this:
Health-care experts from outside Vermont point out some of the implications. “It’s a very liberal state, and its leaders spent years trying to design a system that would work,” Grace-Marie Turner of the Galen Institute observes. “If Vermont can’t make it work, single-payer can’t work anywhere in the country where the economy has free and competitive markets. It’s more evidence that centralized government health care is simply not workable in America.”
All is not lost for the Green Mountain state. One of their senators might even run for president.

Posted by Amy Miller on December 20, 2014 10 Comments
The tech policy community has momentarily banded together to nail the Federal Communications Commission to the wall over what seems to be a big data meltdown regarding hundreds of thousands of public comments the agency received regarding its Net Neutrality deliberations. Gizmodo has a nice rundown of what we know so far:
New analysis of the data the FCC recently released about the process shows that the agency lost and/or ignored a whole bunch public comments. How many is a whole bunch? Oh, about 340,000. Fight for the Future, a pro-net neutrality group, just announced a pretty major discrepancy in the number of comments it helped submit. In total, the organization helped drive 777,364 commenters to post on the FCC's antiquated comment site. Fight for the Future CTO Jeff Lyon says that "at least 244,811 [comments] were missing from the data" recently released by the FCC. On top of that, a new Sunlight Foundation study found that 95,000 of the comments the FCC did release were duplicates. ... The Sunlight Foundation admitted that there were some discrepancies in the data. The FCC also admitted to Jeff Lyons that nearly a quarter of a million comments were indeed missing from the data it released. Lyons wondered, "As of right now, the failure point is still unclear: Did the FCC simply fail to export these comments, or did they actually fail to process them in the first place?"
While we don't yet know the answer to Lyons' question, we do know that pro-Net Neutrality groups were nervous about the pro/con comment breakdown. The Sunlight Foundation released a report accusing "[a] shadowy organization with ties to the Koch Brothers" of skewing the results with a form letter writing campaign, causing pro-NN groups and tech bloggers to cry foul. Why? Probably because conservatives absolutely crushed them when the final comment tally rolled around.

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Posted by Mike LaChance on December 20, 2014 7 Comments
Last night on Special Report with Bret Baier, Charles Krauthammer commented on the economic aspects of Obama's new policy on Cuba. Dr. K is skeptical and frankly, who could blame him? From National Review:
Krauthammer: Liberalization Hasn’t Worked in Vietnam or China, Won’t Work in Cuba “In the early days of the Cold War, the very early days, there was a semi-tongue-in-cheek proposal that, instead of having bombs on the B-52s, we ought to fill them with nylons and drop them over the Soviet Union. As a result, there will be a revolution, they’re going to become capitalists.” “This is exactly the same idea for Cuba,” he continued. “It hasn’t worked for Vietnam or China, if your objective is to liberalize it. And the bulk of the benefit is going to go to the military and the repressive apparatus. That’s the argument against normalization.”
Here's the video: It certainly does seem like there's more to the Cuba story, doesn't it?

Posted by Amy Miller on December 20, 2014 58 Comments
Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) had some strong words for fellow senator Rand Paul (R-KY) over his libertarian take on the end of the Cuban trade embargo. So strong, in fact, that Paul decided to take the fight to the internet. During his Thursday night appearance on "The Kelly File," Rubio had this to say about Paul and his anti-embargo cohorts:
"Like many people that have been opining, he has no idea what he's talking about," Rubio said Thursday night on Fox News's "The Kelly File." Earlier on Thursday, Paul had voiced support for Obama's surprise move on Wednesday to open an embassy in Cuba as well as ease economic and travel restrictions. "The 50-year embargo just hasn't worked," Paul said. "If the goal is regime change, it sure doesn't seem to be working, and probably it punishes the people more than the regime because the regime can blame the embargo for hardship." ... "Look, Venezuela's economy looks like Cuba's economy now," Rubio said. "You can't even buy toilet paper in Caracas. And there's no embargo on Venezuela. What Venezuela has in common with Cuba, is they both have adopted radical socialist governmental policies. "And I would expect that people would understand that if they just took a moment to analyze that, they would realize that the embargo is not what's hurting the Cuban people," Rubio added. "It's the lack of freedom and the lack of competent leaders."
Not to be outdone by a fellow prospective presidential contender, Paul took to Facebook for what many are now calling an ill-advised rant: paul-on-rubio The trolling continued on Twitter:

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on December 19, 2014 9 Comments
There are plenty of deep and meaningful reasons to enjoy the holiday season. And then there are the small holiday hallmarks like Christmas lights, which happen to be one of my favorite parts of this time of year. christmas lights blinking Interestingly enough, NASA says you can actually see Christmas lights from space. According to their study, light intensifies 20% - 50% in large metropolitan areas this time of year. Which makes perfect sense when you watch the light displays on these awesome houses.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 19, 2014 26 Comments
We have extensively covered the Wisconsin John Doe investigations. The extremely abbreviated version is that Milwaukee County prosecutor John Chisholm has led two distinct investigations of conservatives in Wisconsin. John Doe No. 1 targeted Scott Walker's term as Milwaukee County Executive. That case is over, and no wrongdoing by Walker was uncovered. John Doe No. 2 involved allegations that a wide range of Wisconsin conservatives engaged in illegal coordination with Walker in the Recall Election, which Walker won. John Doe No. 2 has resulted in federal and state litigation, with conservative individuals and groups asserting that the wide-ranging seizure of records violated their constitutional righs. Currently, the probe effectively is shut down by a state court judge's ruling refusing to issue any more search warrants, and a federal court's decision that Wisconsin could not apply the state campaign laws so as to prohibit issue coordination.  A separate federal case on that legal point may be headed for the U.S. Supreme Court. Now some more information, via M.D. Kittle at Wisconsin Reporter, who has been the leading reporter covering the various John Doe proceedings and cases, regarding yet another lawsuit, against the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board. Rogue agency defied judges to carry out partisan probe of Wisconsin conservatives:
Agents for the embattled state Government Accountability Board continued a zealous campaign finance investigation into dozens of conservative groups even after judges who preside over the board voted to shut it down, according to a previously sealed brief made public Friday. The documents, from an updated complaint filed by conservative plaintiffs in a case against the GAB, appear to support claims that the campaign finance, ethics and election law regulator is a rogue agency. They also show that the GAB considered using the state’s John Doe law to investigate key state conservatives and even national figures, including Fox News’ Sean Hannity and WTMJ Milwaukee host Charlie Sykes.

Posted by Amy Miller on December 19, 2014 8 Comments
First, they came for the team's trademark protection, and everyone spoke up because we are a nation who loves football. Then, they came for the media's right to say the team name on-air, and we all spoke up because we are, again, a nation who loves football---and hates it when politics interferes with our enjoyment of it. Yesterday the Federal Communications Commission rejected a petition challenging the legality of using the Washington Redskins team name name in on-air broadcasts. From the National Journal:
The author of the petition, George Washington law professor John Banzhaf III, argued that the "derogatory racial and ethnic slur" is deeply offensive to American Indians. The word amounts to obscenity and profanity, which the FCC bans from the airwaves, Banzhaf said. ... Banzhaf's petition had asked the commission to reject the license renewal of WWXX-FM, a radio station owned by Redskins owner Daniel Snyder that had repeatedly said the team's name on the air. Instead, the FCC renewed the license, saying it found "no serious violations." But in an interview, Banzhaf said he expected the defeat and that it's really just "round one" of the fight. He is asking the FCC to reverse past decisions, so he didn't expect the Media Bureau to side with him, the law professor said. He plans to appeal the decision to the full commission and, if necessary, to the federal courts.
I'm sure he will appeal, and I'm nearly equally sure his arguments against use of the "Redskins" name will continue to fall apart. The FCC's ruling is comprehensive, thorough, and based in both FCC and Supreme Court case history.

Posted by Amy Miller on December 19, 2014 21 Comments
A story of rape is a story of power, degradation, and disrespect. It's the kind of story that makes you want---no, need---to shower with a lye bar and Brillo pad after you've heard it. A story that ends with, "and it was pretty much rape" has the same effect on me, but for a completely different reason. We have another he-said-she-said nightmare hitting the news out of Virginia. A John Doe and former Washington & Lee student has filed a federal lawsuit claiming that the university expelled and discriminated against him in order to avoid negative attention, and that W&L Title IX officer Lauren Kozak routinely counsels female students that “regret equals rape.” Here we go again. Same song, different verse:
John Doe claims that twice, he had consensual sex with a student identified in the lawsuit as Jane Doe. The first encounter occurred in his room at the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity house where they went after an off-campus party on Feb. 8. Both had been drinking, he said. He claims they sat on chairs in his room and talked for about an hour. He said Jane Doe then said that while she doesn’t usually have sex with a man when she first meets him, she found him very interesting. He said she moved toward him, initiated kissing, took off her clothes except for her underwear and got into bed with him. He said at no point did she say she did not want to have sex. He claims she spent the night, that he contacted her later through Facebook and that they had sex again in early March. He said she told her friends she had a good time. But at a Pi Kappa Phi St. Patrick’s Day party a few weeks later, Jane Doe left when she saw him kissing another woman, who is now his girlfriend.
Well, haven't we all been there.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 19, 2014 38 Comments
The speculation as to who the U.S. government thinks was behind the Sony hack is over. The FBI now is on record blaming North Korea, via NBC News:
The FBI on Friday formally accused the North Korean government of the hacking attack that led Sony Pictures Entertainment to cancel the movie "The Interview." "North Korea's actions were intended to inflict significant harm on a U.S. business and suppress the right of American citizens to express themselves," the bureau said in a statement. "Such acts of intimidation fall outside the bounds of acceptable state behavior." U.S. officials had said privately earlier in the week that they suspected North Korea. The FBI said Friday that technical analysis had revealed links to North Korean-developed malware, including lines of code and encryption algorithms.
Here is the full FBI statement (via Business Insider):

Posted by Andrew Branca on December 19, 2014 22 Comments
A Texas Court of Appeals has ordered a new trial for a Houston man, Raul Rodriguez, convicted in 2012 of murder for the shooting death of a neighbor, Kelly Danaher, in 2010, on the grounds of defective jury instructions on self-defense, according to reports by ABC news and other news agencies.  (A full-length copy of this order is embedded at the bottom of this post.) The first trial found Rodriguez guilty of murder, and resulted in him being sentenced to 40 years. The facts of the case are somewhat ambiguous on detail, but in general they consist of an amalgam of a loud, drunken party, long-simmering neighborhood disputes, and incredibly poor judgment on the part of a retired fire-fighter in electing to exercise his concealed carry license by bringing his pistol to a confrontation.  A tragic outcome was entirely predictable. A particularly remarkable part of this case is that Rodriguez himself recorded the events of the conflict in an almost 20-minute video.  A portion of the video recorded by Rodriguez is here.  Roughly 15 preceding minutes are missing from this version, but the relevant end-stages of the conflict are captured, and the video ends with the first gun shot.  Reportedly several shots were fired, including one which injured another party goer, in addition to the fatal round that struck Danaher.

Posted by Casey Breznick on December 19, 2014 11 Comments
In the race to the bottom, the Russian ruble has finally surpassed oil as a worse-performing asset. Over the year, the ruble has tumbled 46% while WTI, the price measure of North American oil, has fallen 42%. Most likely, each will end the year even lower. But the claimant to the title of the Worst Performing Asset of the Year is neither oil nor the ruble. Bitcoin, which the public has seemingly forgotten about, has taken that title with a precipitous plunge in value of 57% from $732 to $316. [caption id="attachment_109945" align="aligncenter" width="600"]Bitcoin2014] Chart from by www.bitcoinchart.com[/caption] In comparison, the Argentine peso is down 24% on the year despite the Argentine government defaulting on its debts a few months ago. For Bitcoin, 2014 was simply not a good year. In fact, the bad market news started in early December, when Bitcoin tumbled from nearly $1200 to just above $500 in a few days after BTC China, China’s largest bitcoin exchange, announced it would no longer accept Chinese yuan deposits. Bitcoin managed to climb back above $900 in early January, but come early February any hope of restoring bitcoin’s value was lost.

Posted by New Neo on December 19, 2014 30 Comments
Marco Rubio, among others, believes that Obama is a bad negotiator, the worst since Carter:
I don't know what [Obama's] intentions are. His foreign policy is at a minimum naive, and perhaps even truly counterproductive to the future of democracy in the region. Just last week we imposed sanctions on human rights violators in Venezuela, but the people who are supporting the Venezuelans in conducting those violations -- literally the Cubans have taken over the Venezuela government, we're actually lifting sanctions on them. How absurd is that? And it's just par for the course, all of these tyrants around the world know the United States can be had. At a minimum I will say this, the president is the worst negotiator we've had as president since at least Jimmy Carter and perhaps in the modern era.
But Rubio is wrong; Obama is not a bad negotiator at all. He is a faux negotiator. And perhaps Rubio even knows this (the hint being "at a minimum") but feels he can't say it or he will be labeled a kook. But I can say it: Obama's intentions here were almost certainly to prop up the Castro government and concede to them, and the negotiations were an excuse to do that. There were no reluctant concessions on the part of Obama, there were eager concessions. As Rich Lowry writes, it's not so much about whether it was time to loosen economic sanctions or not (reasonable people differ on this), it's about how it was done:
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