ThinkFast: December 10, 2009
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on December 11th, 2009 5:36 am by HL
ThinkFast: December 10, 2009
In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech this morning, President Obama called his own accomplishments “slight” in comparison to past winners and spoke at length about the irony of winning the award as a wartime president. He evoked the concept of “just war” to argue for the use of force that is “necessary” and “morally […]
In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech this morning, President Obama called his own accomplishments “slight” in comparison to past winners and spoke at length about the irony of winning the award as a wartime president. He evoked the concept of “just war” to argue for the use of force that is “necessary” and “morally justified.”
Five young Muslim American men from suburban Washington “who disappeared late last month were detained in Pakistan on Wednesday in a police raid on a house linked to a militant group.” One of the men left behind a video “calling for the defense of Muslims in conflicts with the West and suggesting that ‘young Muslims have to do something.’”
Hate radio talker Rush Limbaugh is “criticizing” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for allowing Democrats “to debate and vote on amendments” during the health care debate. He has “questioned McConnell’s strategy a few times” this week, “joining a chorus of growing critics.” McConnell aides called Limbaugh’s show to explain, but he “did not seem to buy it.”
“A bare majority of Americans support President Obama’s plan to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan,” a new CBS News/New York Times poll found. “But many are skeptical that the United States can count on Afghanistan as a partner in the fight or that the escalation would reduce the chances of a domestic terrorist attack.”
“A recent pay increase for Afghan troops and police appears to have resulted in a surge of applicants,” said a top U.S. military official. Half of December’s recruiting objective was met in the first seven days, while “in the three previous months, recruiting fell short of targets.”
Yesterday, the UK Meteorological Office released a statement signed by 1,700 scientists in Britain expressing the “utmost confidence” in the “scientific basis” that global warming is “due primarily to human activities,” undercutting skeptics in the wake of the right-wing “Climategate” scandal.
To fight global warming, American businessman and philanthropist George Soros suggested that climate financing be boosted with some $100 billion in Special Drawing Rights from the International Monetary Fund. Soros called the current proposal of $10 billion insufficient.
Following a City Council vote of 7-1, the city of Berkeley “mailed coat hangers to 20 members of Congress on Wednesday in protest of the anti-abortion amendment in the House version of the federal health care bill.” The “metal coat hangers were mailed with a protest letter to members of the House of Representatives who voted in favor of the amendment but have a history of supporting abortion rights.”
South Carolina lawmakers defeated a measure to impeach Gov. Mark Sanford (R) yesterday but recommended a formal rebuke for his trips to Argentina to see his mistress. ”We can’t impeach for hypocrisy. We can’t impeach for arrogance. We can’t impeach an officeholder for his lack of leadership skills,” said GOP Rep. James Harrison.
And finally: Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) can’t understand why she’s so polarizing because she considers herself “a lovable little fuzz ball.”
Palin Refuses To Say If She?d Debate Gore On Climate Change: ?It Depends On What The Venue Would Be?
In an interview with NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell yesterday, former Vice President Al Gore pushed back against Sarah Palin’s anti-Copenhagen conference Washington Post op-ed by saying that “the global warming deniers persist in this air of unreality.” “The scientific community has worked very intensively for 20 years within this international process, and they now say […]
In an interview with NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell yesterday, former Vice President Al Gore pushed back against Sarah Palin’s anti-Copenhagen conference Washington Post op-ed by saying that “the global warming deniers persist in this air of unreality.” “The scientific community has worked very intensively for 20 years within this international process, and they now say the evidence is unequivocal,” said Gore.
Palin responded to Gore yesterday afternoon on her Facebook page, saying that “he’s wrong in calling me a ‘denier.’” Palin added that she believed “Climategate” proved that the “findings” of “the leading experts” in climate science “are flawed, falsified, or inconclusive.” On Laura Ingraham’s radio show today, Palin continued her attack on Gore. But when Ingraham asked if she would be willing to debate Gore on the issue, Palin demurred, saying that if it was in the wrong “forum” she would “get clobbered”:
INGRAHAM: Would you agree to a debate with Al Gore on this issue?
PALIN: Oh my goodness. You know, it depends on what the venue would be, what the forum. Because Laura, as you know, if it would be some kind of conventional, traditional debate with his friends setting it up or being the commentators I’ll get clobbered because, you know, they don’t want to listen to the facts. They don’t want to listen to some reasonable voices in this. And that was proven with the publication of this op-ed, where they kind of got all we-weed up about it and wanted to call me and others deniers of changing weather patterns and climate conditions. Trying to make the issue into something that it is not.
INGRAHAM: But what if it’s an Oxford-style, proper debate format. I mean, he’s going to chicken out. I mean, if you challenge him to a debate, do you actually think he would accept it?
PALIN: I don’t know, I don’t know. Oh, he wouldn’t want to lower himself, I think, to, you know, my level to debate little old Sarah Palin from Wasilla.
Listen here:
