I got that letter from your attorney, Governor. See? I saved the stamp.

Open Thread below...

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I've always wondered how Green Day would fare in a long concert. Their music is so relentlessly anthemic, I always wondered if they'd be able to sustain the electricity necessary for those kinds of songs -- especially for the audience.

So I caught their kickoff concert for its world tour last night at Key Arena in Seattle. And you know what? They somehow pull it off.

Now, Billie Joe Armstrong was quoted in the Seattle Times as vowing to put on five-hour shows on this tour, and last night was only three and a half hours, including the warmup act, The Bravery. But no one really cared, because it was probably the most sustained high-energy performance most of us have seen in years.

How did they manage to keep it electric? By connecting with the audience.

The band opened with a number of selections from 21st Century Breakdown, but quickly began sprinkling in hits from American Idiot (including "Holiday," which I managed to catch on rather grainy vid). If you were coming for the Green Day hits alone, you went away sated, because they were all there. ("Basket Case" in particular was awfully good.)

But Billie Joe made it work by working hard to connect to the audience. In this video, you can see him calling a 10-year-old up onstage to help with the dancing. At other times, he invited audience members up to sing, too, with varying degrees of success, but it was cool. And in what looked like it could have been a classic prearranged stunt, he even had one young audience member climb up onstage and play the rhythm guitar part for "Jesus of Suburbia." Rather well, I might add.

It might have been schtick, but it worked. The audience was electrified, and the music made it even more so. It was a great, great show. If the rest of the dates on the tour are up to this level of play, it should be a very good tour indeed.

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Understatement of the year. The GOP still has a huge problem with racism and doesn't seem too terribly concerned about remedying it any time soon. Powell takes their racist cheerleader in chief Rush Limbaugh to task for his statements about Judge Sonia Sotomayor being a reverse racist.

KING: We are about to have a Supreme Court nomination confirmation hearing, and it is clear now from all involved that we're going to have a spirited conversation about affirmative action. It is an issue that you have discussed many times over the course of your life.

Any advice for the senators in both parties as this goes forward? Let me ask you first if you know Judge Sotomayor?

POWELL: No, I do not.

KING: She's from the Bronx.

(CROSSTALK)

POWELL: She's from my neighborhood, yes. She seems like a very gifted and accomplished woman. She certainly has an open and liberal bent of mind, but that's not disqualifying. But she seems to have a judicial record that seems to be balanced and tries to follow the law.

And so I hope we do have a spirited set of hearings. And Supreme Court confirmation hearings tend to always meet that standard. And she ought to be asked about everything from both the left and the right. What we can't continue to have is to have somebody like a Judge Sotomayor who is announced, and based on one simple tricky but nonetheless case at the Supreme Court has now decided, have her called a racist, a reverse-racist, and she ought to withdraw her nomination because we're mad at her.

Fortunately the senators who will sit on this hearing in the Judiciary Committee after a few days of this kind of nonsense said, let's slow down, let's examine her qualifications the way we're supposed to at a confirmation hearing.

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South Carolina residents have been riveted by the unstable behavior of their Governor Mark Sanford, but they have other things to be very nervous about and they should be.

Terrified residents canceled Fourth of July plans and holed up in their homes Friday as investigators hunted a serial killer believed to have shot four people to death.
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Plenty of evidence links the killings, though officials have not yet determined how the victims are connected or if they knew whoever shot them, said Cherokee County Sheriff Bill Blanton.

"Yes, we have a serial killer," he said at a news conference in this rural community 50 miles south of Charlotte, N.C.

So far, all investigators have to go on is a sketch of a suspect and a description of a possible getaway vehicle, though police would not say who provided that information.

The latest victims were found in their family's small furniture and appliance shop near downtown Gaffney around closing time Thursday. Stephen Tyler, 45, was killed, and his 15-year-old daughter was shot and seriously injured. Tyler's wife, his older daughter and an employee found them in Tyler Home Center, County Coroner Dennis Fowler said.

A day earlier and about seven miles away, family members found the bodies of 83-year-old Hazel Linder and her 50-year-old daughter, Gena Linder Parker, bound and shot in Linder's home. Blanton would not say if Tyler and his daughter were also bound. The killing spree began last Saturday about 10 miles from Tyler Home Center, where peach farmer Kline Cash, 63, was found shot in his living room. Blanton said the killer may have first spoken with Cash's wife about buying hay. She left and came home a few hours later to find her husband's body. Investigators said it appears he was robbed, but they have not determined if anything was taken in the other killings.

The John Douglas book called Mind Hunter, is a pretty fascinating look (it gets interesting about 80 pages in) at how the FBI developed the profiling methods we see used today. Robert Ressler coined the term "Serial Killer," and also wrote a book about his experiences: Whoever Fights Monsters: My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI. He interviewed many of these killers in jail to better understand their behavior. He was interviewed by Thomas Harris, who then wrote two of the greatest novels on the subject, Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs. Both were made into excellent movies, (Who can forget Hannibal Lecter in Manhunter or SOTL's?) but South Carolina hopes that's not the case here. Let's hope he's caught quickly.

David Broder in the Washington (Republican Propaganda) Post:

The saga of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and his Argentine romance has been such ripe fodder for the gossip mills that the essential governmental question has almost been forgotten.

Whether Sanford can resolve the mess he has made of his personal life is of little concern to anyone but the people involved.

But when he disappeared for five days, telling no one in his administration or even his security detail where he had gone, he did something totally irresponsible. Had any kind of emergency occurred, South Carolina would have been leaderless.

At the moment Sanford abandoned his duties in secret pursuit of private pleasure, he in effect tendered his resignation.

The Legislature should insist he follow through on it.

Now while I agree with the sentiment that Sanford abandoned his job to follow his little brain, er...heart to Argentina, I'm struck by the difference in Broder's tone from his coverage of Bill Clinton's infidelities:

One of the most revealing statements Broder -- or, perhaps, any political journalist -- has ever made came in 1998. In November 1998, after nearly a year of public opinion polls showing, basically, that people liked Bill Clinton and wanted the Lewinsky investigation to just go away, and of the Washington journalist/pundit crowd vehemently disagreeing, the Post published an article by Sally Quinn attempting to explain the disconnect (which lives on to this day).

Quinn famously quoted Broder explaining why the "Washington Establishment" -- which under anybody's definition includes both Broder and Quinn -- was so angry at Clinton: "He came in here and he trashed the place ... and it's not his place."

Broder's implication -- that Washington was his place, not the president's -- is arrogant enough. But Broder's other comment speaks volumes: "The judgment is harsher in Washington. We don't like being lied to."

What a difference ten years can make. Of course, it has nothing to do with Sanford being a Republican, does it, Dean Broder?

This Wall St. Journal article also says that despite the cutbacks in teaching jobs even for programs like Teach for America, the number of students working toward teaching certifications is rising:

Jacqueline Frommer thought her career path was set when she landed her dream job last summer teaching fourth grade in Pompano Beach, Fla. Last month, she got laid off. Ms. Frommer, 25 years old, said in college she was told teaching was among the steadiest jobs around. Now "there is no job security anymore," she said.

In a sign of how severe the employment downturn is getting, even schoolteachers, an occupation once viewed as recession proof, are feeling the pain.

Education jobs grew steadily in recent years amid rising enrollment and government efforts to reduce class sizes. Now the increase in teaching positions has leveled off as school districts struggle with budget pressures. The demographic bulge caused by children of baby boomers -- the so-called echo boom -- has also begun to wane.

Los Angeles Unified School District laid off 2,500 teachers this spring. Broward County, Fla., Ms. Frommer's district, cut 400 school jobs. Rochester, N.Y., laid off 300 teachers.

Other districts have avoided cuts by negotiating pay reductions and enacting furloughs and hiring freezes. In June, education jobs actually ticked up 0.5% nationally to just under 3.1 million on a seasonally adjusted basis. But the number of education-related jobs has declined in six of the past 12 months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That contrasts with annual growth of about 3% over the past 15 years in the education field. In the past year, education jobs have grown at about half that rate. Most in demand are teachers in math, science and special education. College instructors have also been in high demand.

Many of the layoffs came in June as teachers prepared to say goodbye to their students for summer. Union and state rules require schools to give teachers notice before the end of the school year if their jobs won't be there in the fall.

Heather Clutter, an elementary teacher in Desert Hot Springs, Calif., learned 15 minutes before the end of the last day of school in early June that she was one of 200 teachers being laid off in the area -- just weeks after learning she was pregnant.

"You always think of teaching as a safe profession. Once you get in, you're there, you'll be able to retire," she said. "Not so much right now."

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This Week with George Stephanopoulos marks the passings of actor Karl Malden, Nixon aide Herbert G. Klein and former Tennessee Titans quarterback Steve McNair. In addition, the Pentagon released the names of 7 soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, during this first week of the US "pullout" of troops in Iraq.

Army PFC Steven T Drees, 19, of Peshtigo, WI
Army PFC Peter K Cross, 20, of Saginaw, TX
Army SSG Timothy A David, 28, of Gladwin, MI
Army SFC Edward C Kramer, 39, of Wilmington, NC
Army SGT Roger L Adams Jr, 36, of Jacksonville, NC
Army SGT Juan C Baldeosingh, 30, of Newport, NC
Army SPC Robert L Bittiker, 39, of Jacksonville, NC

According to iCasualties, the total number of allied soldiers killed in Iraq is 4,639, in Afghanistan, 1,209. During this same week, 82 Iraqi civilians were killed. For the month of June, IBC reports 517 civilians killed, 62 of whom were children.

I just loved this little tidbit from Paul Krugman this morning:

David Broder has a column this morning calling for bipartisanship. I know, you’re shocked. But what struck me was this bit about Al Franken:

Franken, the loud-mouthed former comedian, will be the 60th member of the Senate Democratic caucus …

Two points.

First, implicit in this characterization of Franken is the notion of the Senate as a decorous gentlemen’s club. I doubt that club ever existed in reality; but in any case, these days the World’s Greatest Deliberative Body is, not to put too fine a point on it, chock full o’ nuts. James Inhofe: I rest my case.

Second, Al Franken’s dirty secret is that … he’s a big policy wonk.

I used to go on Franken’s radio show, all ready to be jocular — and what he wanted to talk about was the arithmetic of Social Security, or the structure of Medicare Part D.

In fact, the only elected official I know who’s wonkier than Al Franken is Rush Holt, my congressman — and he used to be the assistant director of Princeton’s plasma physics lab. (The campaign’s bumper stickers read, “My Congressman IS a rocket scientist.”)

So what will Franken do to the level of Senate discourse? He’ll raise it.

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Well, we've already had Mary Matalin defending Palin's decision to step down as Governor of Alaska. Now, no surprise, it's Bill Kristol's turn. Is it just me, or does anyone else think the man doesn't look like he believes a word that's coming out of his mouth? More than usual I mean.

Even though Kristol admits that the move is "high risk", he defends it as some sort of brilliant strategy where Palin can now go campaign full time and become the Obama administration's chief critic. Good luck with that Bill. As Juan Williams points out, Palin can no longer even say that she's a one term Governor of Alaska.

I thought conservatives didn't like it when someone decided to "cut and run". I guess that's okay if you're the object of their affection and want to cut and run for President.

John Amato:

It's no wonder why William the Bloody is defending Palin's decision to bail out. He's the one who pushed McCain big time to make her his VP.

Jane Mayer explains it all took place on a cruise in her piece: How John McCain came to pick Sarah Palin.

Palin received two memos from Paulette Simpson, the Alaska Federation of Republican Women leader, noting that two prominent conservative magazines—The Weekly Standard, owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, and National Review, founded by William F. Buckley, Jr.—were planning luxury cruises to Alaska in the summer of 2007, which would make stops in Juneau. Writers and editors from these publications had been enlisted to deliver lectures to politically minded vacationers. “The Governor was more than happy to meet these guys,” Joe Balash, a special staff assistant to Palin, recalled.

On June 18, 2007, the first group disembarked in Juneau from the Holland America Line’s M.S. Oosterdam, and went to the governor’s mansion, a white wooden Colonial house with six two-story columns, for lunch. The contingent featured three of The Weekly Standard ’s top writers: William Kristol, the magazine’s Washington-based editor, who is also an Op-Ed columnist for the Times and a regular commentator on “Fox News Sunday”; Fred Barnes, the magazine’s executive editor and the co-host of “The Beltway Boys,” a political talk show on Fox News; and Michael Gerson, the former chief speechwriter for President Bush and a Washington Post columnist.

Kristol fell in love with Palin, kinda like Sanford fell in love and called his Argentinian girlfriend his soulmate.

The most ardent promoter, however, was Kristol, and his enthusiasm became the talk of Alaska’s political circles. According to Simpson, Senator Stevens told her that “Kristol was really pushing Palin” in Washington before McCain picked her. Indeed, as early as June 29th, two months before McCain chose her, Kristol predicted on “Fox News Sunday” that “McCain’s going to put Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska, on the ticket.” He described her as “fantastic,” saying that she could go one-on-one against Obama in basketball, and possibly siphon off Hillary Clinton’s supporters. He pointed out that she was a “mother of five” and a reformer. “Go for the gold here with Sarah Palin,” he said. The moderator, Chris Wallace, finally had to ask Kristol, “Can we please get off Sarah Palin?”The next day, however, Kristol was still talking about Palin on Fox. “She could be both an effective Vice-Presidential candidate and an effective President,” he said. “She’s young, energetic.” On a subsequent “Fox News Sunday,”

Kristol again pushed Palin when asked whom McCain should pick: “Sarah Palin, whom I’ve only met once but I was awfully impressed by—a genuine reformer, defeated the establishment up there. It would be pretty wild to pick a young female Alaska governor, and I think, you know, McCain might as well go for it.” On July 22nd, again on Fox, Kristol referred to Palin as “my heartthrob.” He declared, “I don’t know if I can make it through the next three months without her on the ticket.”

And now Kristol is forced to back Palin's weird decision to quit on the people of Alaska to pursue her own agenda. Way to go, Bill.

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The Patron Saint of the GOP Ronald Reagan had one unalterable law of politics, his Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not speak poorly of your fellow Republicans.

And for those of us well-practiced in the art of reading between the lines of Conservo-speak, it's quite humorous to see the lengths the GOP bobbleheads will go to spin Sarah Palin's cutting and running in a positive light.

Soon-to-be successor Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell tries to spin this as a cost-saving measure, as the state has been paying dearly for the cost of all the ethics investigations. Now the fact that people feel it necessary to actually conduct ethics investigations seems to matter less than the cost of them. Karl "I belong in jail" Rove finds Palin's move "perplexing," worrying that it sends a message that you can drive an executive out of office through ethics investigations. Um, isn't that what your party tried to do for eight years with Clinton, Karl? I don't think Palin is the precedent here.

But former Arkansas governor and current FNC pundit Mike Huckabee all but calls Palin a wimp for her "risky strategy", claiming that he had it far tougher in Arkansas than she has it in Alaska, and her actions will do nothing to keep her and her family from being chased by the media:

WALLACE: Governor Huckabee, almost every politician is on the firing line. You may not have been to the degree as governor of Arkansas that Sarah Palin was once she achieved national prominence. But what about this argument, “I’m doing this for my state because the attacks against me are getting in the way?”

HUCKABEE: Well, if that had been the case for me, I’d have quit about my first month, because I was a Republican governor in a state where 89 percent of my legislature were Democrats.

I had constant ethics complaints filed against me, even by newspaper editors, and a lot of it was because if they can’t attack you on policy, what they do -- they just absolutely bombard you with personal attacks and keep you tied up in court, make you hire lawyers. Been there, done that.

Arkansas was a tough political environment, period, even tougher for a Republican, and one of the things you have to do is just decide, “Look, they’re not going to, you know, chase me out.”

Now, what they do -- they throw all this stuff at you, and then they say, “Oh, there’s a pattern of ethical issues.” Actually, what the pattern is is a pattern of phony charges being filed by the opposition party.

The danger that Sarah Palin faces -- and let me be very quick to tell you, in the way of full disclosure, I’m a Sarah Palin fan. I like her personally. I like her points of view. I think she’s right on the issues. The challenge that she’s going to have is that there will be people who say, “Well, look, you know, if they chase you out of this, it won’t get any easier for you at other levels of the stage.”

While neither pundit will actually admit that Palin's bizarrely rambling and incoherent speech on Friday was a boneheaded move on her part, both do admit that it raised more questions than answers and in national politics, that can be the kiss of death, as her ill-fated campaign for the VP slot showed.

HUCKABEE: Well, it’s a risky strategy, and nobody knows whether it’s going to pay off or not. And even if she did get out, primarily because of the -- a feeling of being chased, that’s not going to stop if she continues in politics.

The only way that stops is for her to completely exit the stage and the spotlight. And on that point, I totally agree with Karl.

I think the one thing that I wondered about tactically was hastily calling a news conference that ended up raising more questions than it did answer them.

And my political mentor, Ed Rollins, the other day on his radio show brought that up, that you don’t call a press conference that creates questions. You call one to resolve them.

No one could have predicted that Palin was completely out of her depth for national politics, could they?

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What on earth is going on here? On "This Week" this morning, Biden shrugs off possible Israeli action against Iran with "Whattaya gonna do?". But Joe, while Israel is certainly a sovereign nation, it's one that's heavily subsidized by the United States and we certainly do have a say. Didn't you just give them the go-ahead signal to bomb Iran?

Seems to me this is the moral equivalent of sending detainees to other countries to be tortured and then saying, "That wasn't us!"...

STEPHANOPOULOS: But there will be engagement -- if the Iranians want to...

(CROSSTALK)

BIDEN: If the Iranians seek to engage, we will engage.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And meanwhile, the clock is ticking...

BIDEN: If the Iranians respond to the offer of engagement, we will engage.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But the offer is on the table?

BIDEN: The offer's on the table.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And meanwhile, Prime Minister Netanyahu has made it pretty clear that he agreed with President Obama to give until the end of the year for this whole process of engagement to work. After that, he's prepared to make matters into his own hands.

Is that the right approach?

BIDEN: Look, Israel can determine for itself -- it's a sovereign nation -- what's in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Whether we agree or not?

BIDEN: Whether we agree or not. They're entitled to do that. Any sovereign nation is entitled to do that. But there is no pressure from any nation that's going to alter our behavior as to how to proceed.

What we believe is in the national interest of the United States, which we, coincidentally, believe is also in the interest of Israel and the whole world. And so there are separate issues.

If the Netanyahu government decides to take a course of action different than the one being pursued now, that is their sovereign right to do that. That is not our choice.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But just to be clear here, if the Israelis decide Iran is an existential threat, they have to take out the nuclear program, militarily the United States will not stand in the way?

BIDEN: Look, we cannot dictate to another sovereign nation what they can and cannot do when they make a determination, if they make a determination that they're existentially threatened and their survival is threatened by another country.

STEPHANOPOULOS: You say we can't dictate, but we can, if we choose to, deny over-flight rights here in Iraq. We can stand in the way of a military strike.

BIDEN: I'm not going to speculate, George, on those issues, other than to say Israel has a right to determine what's in its interests, and we have a right and we will determine what's in our interests.

One day after her rambling resignation speech in Wasilla, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was a no-show for July 4th events in her state. But that didn't stop her from issuing yet another statement on Facebook, attacking the media for the "different standard [it] applies for the decisions I make." As it turns out, it is Sarah Palin who is holding herself to a different standard; in March 2008, she slammed Hillary Clinton for whining about her own treatment at the hands of the press.

To be sure, the only inkling Palin gave about her new "higher calling" was that it will doubtless continue to feature her now trademark proclamations of victimization by the political media. In her statement, she labeled the press reaction to her cutting and running "predictable," adding:

"How sad that Washington and the media will never understand; it's about country. And though it's honorable for countless others to leave their positions for a higher calling and without finishing a term, of course we know by now, for some reason a different standard applies for the decisions I make."

During a Women and Leadership event back in March 2008, Governor Palin was asked about Senator Clinton's response to media scrutiny - and criticism - she received on the campaign trail during the Democratic primaries. Palin made it clear to moderator Karen Breslau of Newsweek that she considered Clinton's conduct unbecoming. Hillary, she insisted, needed to just "plow through":

"Fair or unfair, I think she does herself a disservice to even mention it...When I hear a statement like that coming from a woman candidate with any kind of perceived whine about that excess criticism or, you know, maybe a sharper microscope put on her, I think, man, that doesn't do us any good. Women in politics, women in general wanting to progress this country. I don't think it's, it bodes well for her -- a statement like that...It bothers me a little bit hearing her bring that attention to herself on that level."

Here's the full Newsweek video of Palin complete response. For more on Palin's post-election take on the media "stinkers" who caused "disappointment in my heart about the world of journalism today," visit Perrspectives.

During her now 10 month-long media victimization campaign, Sarah Palin has time and again revealed her fundamental misunderstanding of the First Amendment and Americans' free speech rights. Now as she prepares to exit the Alaska Governor's mansion, her confusion - and thin skin - is again on display.

On the Fourth of July of all days, Palin's lawyer Thomas Van Flein issued a warning that his client would bring defamation claims against bloggers and media alike speculating on rumors of a criminal investigation involving the Governor:

To the extent several websites, most notably liberal Alaska blogger Shannyn Moore, are now claiming as "fact" that Governor Palin resigned because she is "under federal investigation" for embezzlement or other criminal wrongdoing, we will be exploring legal options this week to address such defamation. This is to provide notice to Ms. Moore, and those who re-publish the defamation, such as Huffington Post, MSNBC, the New York Times and The Washington Post, that the Palins will not allow them to propagate defamatory material without answering to this in a court of law. The Alaska Constitution protects the right of free speech, while simultaneously holding those "responsible for the abuse of that right." Alaska Constitution Art. I, Sec. 5. http://ltgov.state.ak.us/... These falsehoods abuse the right to free speech; continuing to publish these falsehoods of criminal activity is reckless, done without any regard for the truth, and is actionable.

As Moore herself noted regarding her reference on MSNBC to the lingering questions surrounding the construction of the Palin home and the Wasilla sports complex (a story first raised last year by the Wayne Barrett in The Village Voice):

"I haven't defamed the governor, I reported on speculation and rumor in Alaska. ... It's not my rumor; it's been out there for 10 months and the First Amendment protects me," Moore said. "Even if I didn't say it's 'rumors and speculation,' I'm still protected -- I would just lose credibility, which I'm not willing to do."

UPDATE: For its part, as the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday, "the FBI's Alaska spokesman said the bureau had no investigation into Palin for her activities as governor, as mayor or in any other capacity."

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The Satirical Political Report: Why Sarah Palin's resignation is DEVASTATING to the GOP.  Naturally, on Independence Day, one day after she quit her job, this narcissist insisted that we pay attention to her on the internet.

Newshoggers: Where's my monkey wrench?

Seeing the Forest: It Was About The Oil

Bob Cesca's Awesome Blog: The Enemy Within? 

Raw Dawg Buffalo: united states of entertainment

onegoodmove: Buncha kewel links

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Filling in for Lou Dobbs, CNN's Kitty Pilgrim asks Howard Kurtz and Robert Thompson if they think the Michael Jackson story has received too much coverage or not. They already got their answer in the poll they put up during the interview....so duh...the answer is yes. And could you manage to do this spot without using it as another excuse to show Michael Jackson footage in the background the entire time?

Transcript below the fold.

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