The Iran Hostage Crisis And Republican Perfidy

Despicable codger Ben Barnes finally confirms what many have suspected since 1980:  Ronnie Reagan's dirty tricksters were involved in delaying the release of American hostages in Iran for political advantage.  DK's Mark Sumner summarizes:

Ben Barnes is 84, but in 1980 he was the youngest speaker of the Texas  youngest speaker of the Texas House of Representatives and on his way to becoming lieutenant governor. He was also a close ally of former Texas Gov. John Connally. At Connolly’s request, Barnes took on a very special role in 1980—travel the Middle East and convince Iran to not release U.S. hostages, so that Ronald Reagan could beat Jimmy Carter.

As The New York Times reports, Barnes has sat on this story for the last 43 years. However, with President Carter currently in hospice care, Barnes has decided to reveal the plot, and the role he played in sabotaging Carter’s campaign.

“History needs to know that this happened,” said Mr. Barnes. “I think it’s so significant and I guess knowing that the end is near for President Carter put it on my mind more and more and more. I just feel like we’ve got to get it down some way.”

The plot was simple enough. Connally and Barnes traveled “to one Middle Eastern capital after another” over the summer of 1980, as U.S. hostages were being held in Tehran. On every one of those stops, they passed along the same message for the new leadership in Iran: Don’t make a deal with Carter. Wait for Reagan. He’ll give you a much better deal.

When they arrived back in the United States, Connolly checked in with Reagan’s campaign chair, and future Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, William Casey. For his role in “torpedoing” Carter’s chance at reelection, Connolly hoped to be rewarded with the job of Secretary of State. He was not.

Completely ignored in this strategy was that every day of captivity put the lives and health of the hostages in Iran at risk. In addition, the military planned and attempted to execute a rescue operation in which eight U.S. service members died and another four were injured. Prolonging the crisis created a risk every day to the lives of those in Iran, and to members of the U.S. military. It also created ongoing harm to U.S. standing abroad and to national security in general.

Previous investigations into suspicions that Iran has been pressured to wait until after the election to make a deal had focused on the idea that Casey met directly with representatives from Iran. They had not focused on Connally or how messages might have been passed along through other officials in the Middle East. Multiple people confirmed that Barnes had told them all or part of the story at the time, and a check of flight records shows that Connally traveled to Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Israel in July of 1980 on what he called “private business.”

A note found in Connally’s records, taken in the middle of that trip, shows how closely he was coordinating with the Reagan campaign:

 

“Nancy Reagan called—they are at Ranch he wants to talk to you about being in on strategy meetings.” 

The Iranian government announced the release of the hostages after the election. Jimmy Carter was there to welcome them home on what should have been the first day of his second term, but was instead his last day in office.

Ronald Reagan would go on to eight years of deceiving the public, destroying the nation’s infrastructure, and promoting a racist, misogynist, anti-gay agenda that would metastasize into the modern Republican Party. And he got there just the way most people always suspected he did.  (our emphasis)

Carter may have lost the 1980 election anyway, even without the hostage crisis dominating the news for 444 days.  But the Republican dirty tricksters certainly helped give Reagan a powerful cudgel to beat Carter over the head with for over a year, with a powerful assist by the corporate media.  But just consider the sheer evil and perfidy of allowing American citizens to languish in an Iranian prison for untold days simply to have that electoral cudgel to wield. All the while wrapping themselves in the flag like the cheap hypocrites that they always were.

If you think Republicans were different then than they are now, keep this in mind.

(Image:  the hostage- day count, courtesy of our ever- Republican- wired media)

Monday Reading

As always, please go to the links for the full articles/ op eds.

We know this is coming. So, in the spirit of forewarned is forearmed, McKay Coppins has an excellent report on the disinformation campaign to re- elect dangerous dolt Donald "Impeached Forever" Trump, starting with how clicking "like" on the Trump campaign Facebook page opened a Pandora's box of alternative reality:

I was surprised by the effect it had on me. I’d assumed that my skepticism and media literacy would inoculate me against such distortions. But I soon found myself reflexively questioning every headline. It wasn’t that I believed Trump and his boosters were telling the truth. It was that, in this state of heightened suspicion, truth itself—about Ukraine, impeachment, or anything else—felt more and more difficult to locate. With each swipe, the notion of observable reality drifted further out of reach.

What I was seeing was a strategy that has been deployed by illiberal political leaders around the world. Rather than shutting down dissenting voices, these leaders have learned to harness the democratizing power of social media for their own purposes—jamming the signals, sowing confusion. They no longer need to silence the dissident shouting in the streets; they can use a megaphone to drown him out. Scholars have a name for this: censorship through noise.

Because we know this social media strategy bleeds into the "mainstream media's" coverage, the effects are multiplied many times over, to audiences that would otherwise not have any exposure to Trump's campaign ads.  Trump's stooges will be deploying every weapon in their arsenal to maintain power for this loathsome creature and his enablers.  The Democratic Party is the only institution standing in the way of a president- for- life Trump. A failure to recognize and aggressively combat this disinformation strategy would be the most consequential case of political malpractice in our nation's history. Coppins concludes:

The political theorist Hannah Arendt once wrote that the most successful totalitarian leaders of the 20th century instilled in their followers “a mixture of gullibility and cynicism.” When they were lied to, they chose to believe it. When a lie was debunked, they claimed they’d known all along—and would then “admire the leaders for their superior tactical cleverness.” Over time, Arendt wrote, the onslaught of propaganda conditioned people to “believe everything and nothing, think that everything was possible and that nothing was true.”

Leaving the rally, I thought about Arendt, and the swaths of the country that are already gripped by the ethos she described. Should it prevail in 2020, the election’s legacy will be clear—not a choice between parties or candidates or policy platforms, but a referendum on reality itself.

Forewarned is forearmed.

On a more positive note, political scientist Rachel Bitecofer, who nailed the results of the 2018 midterm elections, has a prediction for 2020:

[A]nd today her model tells her the Democrats are a near lock for the presidency in 2020, and are likely to gain House seats and have a decent shot at retaking the Senate. If she’s right, we are now in a post-economy, post-incumbency, post record-while-in-office era of politics. Her analysis, as Bitecofer puts it with characteristic immodesty, amounts to nothing less than “flipping giant paradigms of electoral theory upside down.”

Bitecofer’s theory, when you boil it down, is that modern American elections are rarely shaped by voters changing their minds, but rather by shifts in who decides to vote in the first place. To her critics, she’s an extreme apostle of the old saw that “turnout explains everything,” taking a long victory lap after getting lucky one time. She sees things slightly differently: That the last few elections show that American politics really has changed, and other experts have been slow to process what it means.

Sure, there will be Republican voter suppression and the aforementioned fire hose of lies, likely on an unprecedented scale.  But Bitecofer believes the threat Trump poses to the Republic is the unique motivating and unifying factor that will produce what wins elections, regardless of the Democratic nominee:  turnout.

Anytime you hear Trump boasting about "his" economy, remember this:

President Donald Trump has always exaggerated the strength of his jobs record, claiming to have brought about an unprecedented hiring boom when, in fact, payrolls have been growing at a somewhat slower pace than they had been during Barack Obama’s final years in office. But it turns out, the reality of it was even weaker than the official data let on.

On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released its latest batch of employment numbers, along with its annual benchmark revisions adjusting its estimates from prior months. Before, the government believed that the U.S. had added 223,000 jobs per month in 2018, the year that the GOP’s tax cuts and new, higher spending levels took effect. It has now lowered that estimate to 193,000 per month, a significant drop.

Here’s how this changes the story of the past few years. Based on the old numbers, it looked like Trump had inherited a steady economy but gave hiring a boost in 2018 through some deficit-fueled stimulus. Based on the new numbers, it looks like he inherited a steadily growing economy and didn’t do much at all. Trump’s deficits likely juiced employment growth a bit, while his trade war likely undercut it. (The Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes probably muted growth in 2018 a bit too.) In the end, the economy has added fewer jobs in every year of his presidency than it did during Obama’s final one. There never was much of a Trump bump.

There are some good graphs at the link that illustrate the points.

On the Oscar beat, kudos to producers Barack and Michelle Obama for "American Factory", winner of the Best Documentary Feature (Steven Bognar, Julia Reichert and Jeff Reichert):

Congrats to Julia and Steven, the filmmakers behind American Factory, for telling such a complex, moving story about the very human consequences of wrenching economic change. Glad to see two talented and downright good people take home the Oscar for Higher Ground’s first release. https://t.co/W4AZ68iWoY

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) February 10, 2020

Suck on that, Trump!

Finally, please check out Infidel 753's always- excellent link round- up for a much, much more comprehensive gathering of links to interesting posts from the last week.  He does the curating, you get to enjoy.

Tweets Of The Day -- If They Can't Win, They'll Cheat And Steal

Two more examples of why Democrats should never be tempted to play nice with the New Nazi/ Republican Party:

Michigan Republicans have also introduced an anti-democratic proposal to take power away from the newly elected Democratic governor and attorney general before they take office: https://t.co/n8qbEj22GM

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 1, 2018

In Wisconsin, Republicans have put forward a wildly anti-democratic proposal to strip powers from the newly elected Democratic governor and attorney general before they take office, cut early voting, and improve their chances in a state Supreme Court race: https://t.co/Ysz3GLVMoR

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 1, 2018

Fraudster Rick Scott Claims Fraud In Florida Senate Race (UPDATED)

As Charles Pierce would say, "those rats won't f*ck themselves."

Florida Republican Gov. Rick "Batboy" Scott is using his office to interfere in the Senate election vote counting:

Florida Gov. Rick Scott suggested there was “rampant fraud” and called for law enforcement to investigate two counties over their election practices as the Republican’s lead in the state’s U.S. Senate race continued to shrink Thursday evening.  

As the Senate contest between Scott and Sen. Bill Nelson appeared headed toward a recount, Scott repeatedly accused liberals of trying to “steal” the election from him in Broward and Palm Beach counties. He called out the supervisors of elections, Democrats Brenda Snipes and Susan Bucher, by name, on the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate the way the counties were counting ballots. 

Scott should know all about fraud. (Remember who this slimeball ran against: Sen. Bill Nelson, a former astronaut and man of unquestioned integrity.  WTF, Florida?)

And as far as we can recall, elections in Florida are only stolen by Republicans. So this is yet another Republican effort to interfere with ballot counting while Scott has a tiny -- and shrinking -- lead. Get ready for another Brooks Brothers riot! (Right on schedule!)

Democrats should have learned their lesson from 2000, and Nelson has already assembled a top notch legal team for the mandated recount. But Democratic organizations from the DNC to the Florida state party need to step up and help counter this blatant attempt to steal another election.  Every vote counts, and every seat in the Senate counts.

UPDATE:  Sen. Nelson's office responds --

“The tone, the tenor and [Scott’s] behavior last night is not suggestive of a campaign that believes it’s winning,” Marc Elias, the Nelson campaign’s lead recount lawyer, said on a call with reporters. 

“This is not a third-world dictatorship,” Elias said, referring to Scott’s “veiled threat or suggestion that he was somehow going to involve law enforcement.” 

“We don’t let people seize ballots when they think they’re losing,” he continued.

UPDATE II:  It's not just Florida;  the weasels are pulling a similar stunt in the tight Senate race in Arizona that they're suddenly losing.

(Photo:  Gov. Batboy)

Republican Dirty Tricks -- Virginia Edition (UPDATED)

Let's start with the PAC fronted by spineless weasel Squeaker of the House Paul "Lyin'" Ryan and its efforts to smear the Democrat running against tea bagger Rep. Dave "The Wurst" Brat:

A former C.I.A. officer running for Congress accused a super PAC aligned with Speaker Paul D. Ryan on Tuesday of improperly obtaining her entire federal security clearance application — a highly sensitive document containing extensive personal information — and then using it for political purposes. 

Abigail Spanberger, the Democratic candidate challenging Representative Dave Brat of Virginia, sent a cease-and-desist letter to Corry Bliss, the executive director of the Congressional Leadership Fund, which has raised more than $100 million to help Republicans in the midterm elections. She demanded that the super PAC destroy all copies of the form and agree to not use the information in any fashion.

The article details how the PAC got its weasel paws on the classified document.  What was the information they extracted to smear Spanberger?  Must be something really incriminating, right?

... Ms. Spanberger said in the interview that she had become suspicious that the application had been leaked because Republican-aligned groups conducting “push polling” in the race had been asking respondents whether they knew she had once taught at the Islamic Saudi Academy in Alexandria, Va., an international baccalaureate program. 

One of her supporters received a call from the polling company and reported that she was asked if she would be less likely to support Ms. Spanberger if she knew that the candidate had taught at a school funded by the Saudi royal family that had “numerous students arrested for terrorism,” Ms. Spanberger said. [Ed.: but we thought Republicans loved the Saudi royal family.]

A recent graduate from the University of Virginia at the time, Ms. Spanberger returned to the United States in 2002 after teaching in Germany and earning a master’s degree. She applied for a job at the C.I.A. that year and was told in December that she had a conditional offer pending her background check, which she was told could take at least six months. 

She waited tables in the interim, and a colleague asked her if she would be interested in a temporary job teaching English at the academy to cover for another instructor’s maternity leave, Ms. Spanberger said. (our emphasis)

This, of course, is all to remind us that Republicans never tire of using racial/ ethnic/ religious boogymen to scare their witless supporters to the polls.  It also reminds us that they will stop at nothing, even trafficking in classified documents, to smear opponents in their desperation (in this case, a former CIA operative and Girl Scout leader for crap's sake running against Brat, who never served his country in any capacity).  "Culture of corruption," indeed.

Here's Spanberger's web site if you want to support her in what will be a close election.

But that's not all!  Virginia has another congressional race where Republican ratf*cking has also taken place:

An election fraud scandal is roiling Virginia’s 2nd Congressional District, which Rep. Scott Taylor ... an iron-pumping, flag-wearing former Navy SEAL, has represented for most of one term. 

Forty-one voters and counting [Ed.: it's up to 4 dead people and 59 fraudulent signatures as of this week] have asserted in affidavits that their signatures — or the signatures of their relatives, both living and deceased — were forged in order to get the 2016 Democratic congressional nominee on the ballot as an independent. 

The apparent aim of the alleged forgery scheme was to split Democratic voters between last cycle’s nominee, Shaun Brown, and this year’s nominee, Elaine Luria. 

As it happens, Taylor’s own paid campaign staffers collected the signatures in question — and indicated that they “witnessed the signature of each person who signed this page” and “understand that falsely signing this affidavit is a felony.”  

Elaine Luria served in the Navy for 20 years, where she was imbued with a sense of duty and honor that apparently escaped Taylor during his service.  Adding to this is the fact that Taylor has been out there touting the need to protect elections from "mass voter fraud."  The weasel, like Republicans in general, has no shame (or sense of irony).

Here's Luria's web site if you want to support her and defeat the Republican ratf*ckers.

Let's flip these two seats.

UPDATE:  Some 200 national security and intelligence officials are now calling for an investigation into the release of Spanberger's file.

Progressives Beware

Right-wingers are already engaging in a massive digital effort against Hillary Clinton, and they're hoping you join in:

For months now, America Rising has sent out a steady stream of posts on social media attacking Mrs. Clinton, some of them specifically designed to be spotted, and shared, by liberals. The posts highlight critiques of her connections to Wall Street and the Clinton Foundation and feature images of Democrats like Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, interspersed with cartoon characters and pictures of Kevin Spacey, who plays the villain in “House of Cards.” And as they are read and shared, an anti-Clinton narrative is reinforced.

America Rising is not the only conservative group attacking Mrs. Clinton from the left. Another is American Crossroads, the group started by Karl Rove, which has been sending out its own digital content, including one ad using a speech Ms. Warren gave at the New Populism Conference in Washington last May.

Republicans and their plutocrat dark money dirty tricksters can be counted on to try to undercut Clinton, as they would any other Democrat they see as a threat to their return to power.  Progressives need to be savvy and not amplify the messages these ratf**kers will be sending out from now until election day.