Monday, August 3, 2020. Joe Biden continues to dither and postpone selecting a running mate, government criminals are caught on tape in Iraq torturing a teenage boy, and more.
It's Monday August 3rd and Monday August 17th -- 14 days from now -- the Democratic Party's national convention is supposed to kick off. If all goes as planned, Joe Biden will be declared the Democratic Party's presidential candidate at the convention.
Matt Purple (AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE) took a moment to note Joe's accomplishments:
Imagine being a progressive forced to vote for Joe Biden. There aren’t enough clothespins in the world to hold your nose. Biden has lately tried to make inroads with the left, jumping onboard the post-George Floyd campaign for racial justice and releasing an economic plan that encompasses many progressive priorities. But even that can’t mask the smell of his support for the Iraq war, his authoring of the 1994 crime bill, his backing of 1996 welfare reform legislation.
Oh, and he essentially wrote the Patriot Act too. Here he is bragging about that during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in 2002, featuring, natch, a smirking Robert Mueller:
Video is in article and
here at CSPAN site. The corporate press is trying hard to sell Joe but there's not a lot of interest. Or a lot interesting. So they keep returning to the topic of who he might pick for vice president.
Joe Lockhart pops up at CNN with a lot of nonsense of epic proportion.
White House spokesman Joe Lockhart was dismissive of the story, which appeared in a Wall Street Journal interview. She also spoke to The Post’s Steve Dunleavy.
“I spend very little time reading the Wall Street Journal editorial page,” Lockhart said. “They lost me after they accused the president of being a drug smuggler and a murderer.”
Broaddrick said she chose to tell her story now because rumors were rampant after NBC reporter Lisa Myers taped an interview with her in January that the network has not yet aired.
Broaddrick said she is speaking out because NBC News “threw me to the wolves.”
This is the man to write about women in 2020? Oh, CNN, you are so hopelessly f**ked up beyond repair.
Joe throws words out but none of them make sense -- is he going senile?
Here's the reality that he ignores and everyone else does as they build up this contest for vice president: Kamala does not control her hive.
I pity the poor soul who gets on the wrong side of the K-Hive. Kamala Harris has been on Joe's short list for months and months -- as the press has endlessly repeated. If Joe picks someone other than Kamala, the K-Hive will go nuts.
I've already shared that, if it were me, I'd go with Karen Bass. She brings the most to the ticket -- including energy. But the press has played this out over and over -- again because it's cheap to produce this 'coverage' and because there's nothing remotely interesting or newsworthy about Joe or his campaign. And when the running mate is announced, there will be hurt feelings.
Sally Field, for example, is pulling for Elizabeth Warren to be the running mate. A lot of people are pulling for Elizabeth. She got a lot of primary votes. If it's not Elizabeth, some will be mad. If it's not Susan Rice? No one's going to give a damn because she was never a popular nominee, she was someone the press worked to promote.
And why? Because she wants the slot. I called out an idiot here for a piece he wrote on Susan. You probably know who I mean. A pathetic e-mail followed where he whined I was mean and rude and didn't I realize he was asked by Susan supporters to write that piece?
I'm not so mean that I'm naming him right here (but I believe we all know who I'm talking about). If I were to name him, I think he'd lose his job because he's paid by a newspaper and if he's writing pieces because people outside the paper are asking him to, that's something he needs to disclose to readers and to his newspaper. If he fails to disclose it, that's ground for termination.
I'm not surprised by the e-mail. Susan Rice was said to be pulling in every favor she had to create enthusiasm for her selection. It never took place. America's never loved Susan Rice and they still don't.
A number of Americans passionately love Kamala Harris. Not picking her would create a backlash. Not picking Susan Rice would create a yawn.
Joe Biden is dithering. He was supposed to tap his running mate the first week of August, but has now postponed the announcement to Aug. 10. It’s the first consequential decision of his campaign, one that could determine whether he wins or loses in November, and he’s blowing it. The extension, and the ongoing uncertainty it suggests, casts Biden as wobbly.
It also reduces any zip that the eventual announcement might have. It’s not a great beginning for a candidate constantly tweeting that the country needs “strong leadership.”
Peek notes, "The first and most important job of Biden’s VP pick will be to boost turnout on Nov. 3. No presidential candidate has engendered less excitement among members of his own party than Biden; he desperately needs his VP pick to provide some sizzle." It's a reality that Joe Lockhart not only ignores, he outright dismisses. Why, he thunders on in 1992, Bill Clinton was urged not to pick someone from the south or someone like him but by golly Bill picked Al Gore and look what happened!
What happened? Two White men won in a different electorate in a three-way race -- Bill, incumbent George H.W. Bush and H. Ross Perot.
Joe Lockhart is desperately out of touch.
Anything's possible.
That said, Texas last went for a Democrat in a presidential election in 1976. That was Georgia's Jimmy Carter. Barack Obama, at he height of his popularity, did not carry Texas in 2008. But Joe's going to?
Anything's possible.
Should, however, Joe lose the election, the decision to commit big resources to Texas is a decision that many will point to as a mistake.
Back to the other Joe, Lockhart. Last week,
he wrote another worthless opinion piece for CNN in which he argued Joe Biden should not debate Donald Trump -- it was also a column that three times mentioned Austin Powers -- are you getting yet just how out of touch Joe Lockhart is?
What is the point of CNN paying Joe Lockhart?
Is it to educate people about democracy? If so, he doesn't need to be advocating for no debates. We had debates during the Civil War. At a time when campaigning face to face has been curtailed, we especially need to see candidates on the debate stage. What Lockhart is proposing is not democracy and shame on him and shame on CNN.
We already don't have fair debates because we've allowed the Democrats and the Republicans to control the debates. Now Joe's proposing an election -- a presidential election -- with no debates. These things have a way of snowballing and Joe's proposal needs to be rebuked.
Turning to Iraq. Last night's "
Even when the criminals are caught on tape, no one gets punished in Iraq" noted that even when criminals -- government forces -- are caught on tape kidnapping and torturing Iraqi civilians, the worst new prime minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi can offer is to put the man over those forces, General Saad Khalaf on house arrest. He didn't arrest anyone. He just put one supervisor on house arrest. Not real arrest, mind you. Real arrest would be taking him down to a jail. Instead, he's at home where his servants wait on him and where he plays on the internet and watches TV and -- that's not an arrest. It's certainly not an arrest for torture.
Despite the violations, kidnappings and assassinations that have targeted activists throughout the years by Iraq’s security forces and unknown militias, the country was still shocked by a video that showed a teen being tortured by Interior Ministry forces.
The video, which emerged on Saturday and was recorded some three months ago, showed Hamed Saeed Abed, 16, being beaten and insulted by the Ministry’s Law Preservation Forces for allegedly throwing Molotov cocktails at them during a protest. Abed was stripped naked, while one of the security forces shaved his head. Others asked him about his mother’s skin color, insulted her and his family.
The shocking video and the ensuing uproar prompted Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi to order an investigation into the assault.
His spokesman said: “The prime minister and supreme commander of the armed forces ordered an immediate probe into the unethical and unprofessional treatment of a citizen.”
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi met with a teen protester abused by security officers on Monday and told him the men were in custody and would face trial.
Hamid Saeed, 16, was reportedly assaulted by three members of the Interior Ministry’s Law Preservation Forces and stripped naked, with videos of the abuse shared online.
He and his mother were threatened with sexual assault, he was also beaten and had his hair cut with a blade.
Videos of the incident and of the boy explaining what happened have gone viral in Iraq, sparking a backlash against security forces accused of heavy-handed tactics that have caused over 500 deaths in the months of anti-government street protests.
Mr Al Khadimi's Twitter account shared photographs of the prime minister meeting Mr Hamid.
“The prime minister received Hamid Saeed, who was subjected to an immoral and unlawful attack. The perpetrators were arrested and relieved from their positions after an investigation,” a statement from his office said.
It said the officers in question had been referred to the judiciary.
رئيس مجلس الوزراء : أن ما حدث من اعتداء على هذا المواطن يجب أن لا يعامل وكأنه يمثل السلوك العام للأجهزة الأمنية،فقواتنا البطلة سبق أن ضحّت ومازالت تضحّي وتقاتل من أجل العراق،أمّا من يستغل وجوده داخل القوات الأمنية لغرض الاعتداء فلن يواجه سوى العقوبة والملاحقة القانونية. Translate Tweet
رئيس مجلس الوزراء : أشعر بالألم والحزن لما حدث، وإن ثقافة استمراء الإعتداء على المواطن من قبل بعض ممن يستغل موقعه، هي أمر يتوجب المعالجة الحازمة، وان ماحدث يمثل مشهدا للاعتداء على كرامة المواطن ينتمي الى كل ماحاربناه خلال كل السنوات الماضية، وسنحاربه لنمنع تكراره. Translate Tweet
رئيس مجلس الوزراء يستقبل الحدث حامد سعيد بعد اطلاق سراحه والذي تعرض الى اعتداء غير أخلاقي وغير قانوني وشكل على اثرها القائد العام للقوات المسلحة لجنة تحقيقية قامت بتشخيص اسماء المتجاوزين من قوات حفظ القانون وفسخ عقودهم واحالتهم للقضاء . Translate Tweet
Video evidence of the assault. This is where the world sees if the criminals will truly be punished or not.
