Prairie Weather

Coming up at 10 ET, a roundtable on "the definition of torture," with Scott Shane, reporter, New York Times; Elisa Massimino, Washington director, Human Rights First; John McLaughlin, former acting director of the Central Intelligence Agency; senior fellow at the Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS); Lee Casey, lawyer in private practice and former staff director of the Federal Legal Counsel in the Justice Department during the Reagan and first Bush administrations; Ken Robinson, former intelligence and special operations commander

Also (same time), a debate about the debate last night, with Julie Mason, national political correspondent, The Houston Chronicle; Joe Klein, columnist for Time magazine and author of "Politics Lost: How American Democracy Was Trivialized By People Who Think You're Stupid"; Harold Jackson, editorial page editor, The Philadelphia Inquirer; Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic Monthly

Later, for debate junkies, more here.

Has Obama made himself "a minor candidate on the fringes of the action"?

Well, we didn't watch or listen to the debates.  Instead, we watched a harrowing film about the depredations of the US military in El Salvador.  Authorized by earlier presidents.  We do not want even the slightest chance of electing a president ever again who will engage in that kind of imperialism.  Draw a line in January 2009.  Ask:  which of the current candidates gives us the assurance that he or she will not preside over that kind of America?

We turn to Walter Shapiro who seems to notice the same things we notice when it comes to presidential "debates."   

We like Joe Biden (as distinct for being hot to give him the Oval Office). 

The tag-team questioning of Brian Williams and Tim Russert yielded not only heat (perhaps inevitable as we reach the highly combustible point in the campaign calendar) but also light. Not only light interludes (Joe Biden's epic put-down of Rudy Giuliani: "There are only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun and a verb and 9/11"), but also enlightening moments that illuminated the choices facing the Democrats.

10 out of 10 for Joe Biden. 

Barack Obama -- this was supposed to be the night when he cut Clinton down to size -- failed, embarrassingly.  Obama, Shapiro concludes,stays with his "smooth-jazz style, and his supporters should accept that it is not likely to change no matter how much they may crave red-meat rhetoric. Obama's signature line -- delivered after Clinton bobbed and weaved her way through another question without quite answering -- was 'Let's broaden the conversation here.'" 10 out of 10 for Obama as a mensch.  As for Obama as presidential candidate, we leave the judgment to Shapiro.

A stranger to politics who had somehow missed the outbreak of "Obama mania" -- the nearly $80 million he raised, the often rhapsodic press coverage and the huge crowds -- might have assumed from watching Tuesday's debate that the Illinois senator was a minor candidate on the fringes of the action.

John Edwards was flying high.

This may have been Edwards' best debate, as he displayed the smiling aggressiveness that had eluded him when he was going head-to-head with Dick Cheney as the 2004 vice-presidential nominee. Again and again, Edwards took lines from his stump speech and made them seem fresh as debate responses. Edwards rattled off a litany of Clinton's zig-zag comments on topics ranging from Iraq to Iran to Social Security before concluding harshly, "I think the American people ... deserve a president of the United States that they know will tell them the truth."

As Edwards continued banging away with drumbeats of criticism throughout the evening (saying of Clinton's Iran position, "Our responsibility as presidential candidate is to be in 'tell the truth' mode all the time"), the cameras caught Clinton glaring at Edwards with daggers darting from her eyes before turning on a smile when she was asked to respond.

Clinton ...is a Clinton is a Clinton is a Clinton.

She came out fighting, claiming that the constant GOP attacks are her reward for "standing against the Republicans, George Bush and Dick Cheney." Even though some of her answers seemed consciously baffling in their imprecision, she stuck to her candidate-speak, poll-tested talking points...

Then she screwed up, first supporting a policy, then saying she didn't support it.  The trial lawyer caught it and went for the jugular.

That was the moment when Edward pounced with the quickness of a trial lawyer who has realized that an opposing lawyer has just made a fatal error that undermines her case. "Unless I missed something," Edwards said with ill-disguised glee, "Senator Clinton said two different things in the course of about two minutes ... America is looking for a president who will say the same thing, who will be consistent, who will be straight with them. Because what we've had for seven years is double-talk from Bush and from Cheney." All that was missing was a Marvel comic-book exclamation like "Pow!" or "Whap!"

Obama did himself no favors, apparently, while Edwards experienced a kind of comeback.

Clinton's caution may still prove galling, despite her political artistry. Obama's blandness could cost him his featured role as the designated giant-slayer. Edwards retains the potential to mount a major breakthrough, though his is a high-wire act of smiling and snarling at the same time. Dodd, Biden and even Bill Richardson still have a chance of making this more than a three-candidate contest. And judging from the collective performances Tuesday night, Democratic voters have reason to be uncharacteristically upbeat about their presidential choices -- seven candidates who come across as anything but dwarfs.

Playing with matches

NPR had a description yesterday of Mexicans who had crossed the border illegally and gotten caught by the wildfires which swept through the chaparral south of San Diego.  People on fire and badly burned tried to get help along the highways.  Charred bodies were found later on the ground.

Those burning bodies came to mind while reading this:

A prosecutor will be asked to consider the case of a boy accused of starting a massive wildfire by playing with matches.  Fueled by ferocious desert winds, the fire quickly spread, burning more than 38,000 acres and destroying 21 homes.

The boy, whose name and age were not released, admitted to sparking the fire on Oct. 21, Los Angeles County sheriff's Sgt. Diane Hecht said Tuesday. "He admitted to playing with matches and accidentally starting the fire,'' she said in a statement. ...

The fire began in an area near Agua Dulce and quickly spread. It was among 15 or so major wildfires that killed 14 people, destroyed some 2,100 homes and blackened 809 square miles from Los Angeles to the Mexican border last week.

Sheesh! Vetoes aren't good enough. He wants to show off power.

According to a report in today's Washington Post, Bush is planning to issue more administrative orders.  He's frustrated by Congress' unwillingness to rubber stamp his policies.

The White House plans to try implementing as much new policy as it can by administrative order while stepping up its confrontational rhetoric with Congress after concluding that President Bush cannot do much business with the Democratic leadership, administration officials said.

According to those officials, Bush and his advisers blame Democrats for the holdup of Judge Michael B. Mukasey's nomination to be attorney general, the failure to pass any of the 12 annual spending bills, and what they see as their refusal to involve the White House in any meaningful negotiations over the stalemated children's health-care legislation.

White House aides say the only way Bush seems to be able to influence the process is by vetoing legislation or by issuing administrative orders.

Steny Hoyer gets it.

House Democratic leaders fired back at Bush with strong rhetoric of their own. "The president wants the same complacent, complicit Congress that was a co-conspirator in a coverup of what was going on in this country," said House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.).

Now what? Mukasey refuses to respond. Next move?

Pssst .... Let's waterboard Mukasey and then ask him afterwards whether it was torture, okay?

Mukasey, whose nomination to replace Alberto R. Gonzales has become less certain because of his refusal to offer an opinion on waterboarding, also wrote in a letter to Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee that he did not know if U.S. interrogators had used waterboarding because he is not cleared to receive classified information.

Right.  Highly credible response, um, sort of ...  Let's waterboard Mukasey and then ask him afterwards whether it was torture?  Please?

But by continuing to resist invitations to declare waterboarding illegal, Mukasey seems certain to heighten tensions between the administration and congressional Democrats, many of whom have said their votes hinge on whether the former federal judge agrees that waterboarding constitutes torture.

All the Democratic candidates have said they will vote against Mukasey because of his waterboarding position -- or unposition, to be more accurate. 

So, now what? 

Let's waterboard Mukasey and then ask him afterwards whether it was torture.  C'mon, Pat.  What say, Arlen?

White House bait and switch

Big deal.  The White House "finally" turned over the requested documents to the Senate Judiciary Committee.  Not.  Here's what Senator Leahy announced today after receiving four documents:

“I was encouraged when the White House provided four documents for review concerning this Administration’s position on torture. Now we learn that three of those long-delayed documents have already been in the public domain. I am again calling on the White House to provide a declassified version of the memorandum of March 13, 2003, and to promptly fulfill my longstanding requests for documents relating to this Administration’s policies, both past and present, on torture.”

Dream on.