This and More

Low Down
One of Mr. Obama’s ambitions on taking office was to forge a new, more positive American image in the Muslim world. But the drone strikes, along with the president’s failure to carry out his promise to close the Guantánamo Bay prison in Cuba, have helped drive the United States’ approval rating to new lows in many Muslim countries. In Pakistan, for instance, 19 percent of those surveyed by the Pew Research Center had a positive view of the United States in the last year of George W. Bush’s presidency. By last year, the approval rating had fallen to 12 percent. (NYT, 5/21/2013)

We could cite this as yet another failure of the Obama presidency, but that misses the real issues. First, a foreign policy should not be built around "getting other countries to like us." Second, Muslims in the Middle Eastern countries are never going to like us. 


Starstruck
Anthony D. Weiner, once a rising star of New York politics whose career cratered over revelations of his sexually explicit life online, announced an improbable bid on Wednesday for the job he has long coveted: mayor.
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In the new campaign video, Mr. Weiner describes himself as a champion of the city’s middle class, and decries rising rents, inadequate schools, overregulated neighborhood businesses, and a paucity of “good jobs with benefits.”
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Last year, though, Mr. Weiner moved from Forest Hills, Queens, to Gramercy Park in Manhattan, where he lives in a four-bedroom luxury apartment with Ms. Abedin and Jordan. (NYT, 5/22/2013)

How excited are you that Weiner is back? Us, too. It should be just a very short time before new pictures of Weiner's awesome pecs show up.

New Yorkers are understandably thrilled that Weiner is going to fight for the middle class....from his four bedroom luxury apartment.


Ghostly
Even the panel’s fiery chairman, Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, after blasting Apple for creating “ghost companies” that diverted billions of tax dollars from American coffers and caused needy seniors to go without meals, had some kind words for Mr. Cook and his company.

“We love the iPhone and the iPad,” Mr. Levin said, going on to commend Mr. Cook and two other executives for voluntarily appearing before the Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations. “I know it’s not easy to come in front of a spotlight but it’s important for us.” (NYT, 5/21/2013)

Next up before Levin, the Koch brothers, who can expect similar praise from the chairman. Just kidding!


Limits
The claim that the ongoing IRS scandal is limited to low level employees is falling apart. 
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Former Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller… retires

Joseph Grant, Commissioner of Tax Exempt and Government Entities... retires.

Lois Lerner, Head of Exempt Organization…says she will invoke her 5th amendment right to not incriminate herself when called before Congress on Wednesday.

Holly Paz, Director of Exempt Organizations, subpoenaed to Washington to be interviewed by members of Congress.

All of this IRS leadership, in Washington D.C. 

Then one level down is Cindy Thomas, the highest ranking employee in Cincinnati in this Tax Exempt and Government Entities Department that no one in Congress is talking to... yet.  (Fox19.com, 5/21/2013)

The Washington Post's Richard Cohen wrote an entire column yesterday claiming that Republicans were picking on the IRS when it was really all about overworked low level employees (there's that phrase again) who he - using a fictional composite - named Mitzie. No word from Cohen today yet.