And yet...I've enjoyed reading this exchange

on James Fallows' blog:"Is there any 'Reasoned' defense of the Atlas Shrugged Guy?"

Hearing both sides of an argument (even though most of the responses have been overwhelmingly on the progressive side) has encouraged me to re-examine my own assumptions about business owners and taxes.

The discussion began on November 5th with this installment: "What if the GOP Loses? 'Atlas Shrugged' vs. 'The Fire Next Time."  James Fallows then posted responses to the 'Atlas Shrugged' business owner, "No Love for the 'Atlas Shrugged' Guy." The 'Atlas Shrugged' business owner re-entered the fray here, "The 'Atlas Shrugged' Guy Pushes Back!" And Fallows provided a wrap-up here, "By Popular Demand: One Last Immersion in the World of the 'Atlas Shrugged' Guy," but then continued the discussion here, "Let's Get Back to the Atlas Shrugged Guy."

To all those business owners whining

over the Affordable Care Act, Matt Yglesias has a thoughtful response: "Keep Tipping Your Servers," in Slate, 16 November 2012.

November Morning in My Garden

I have written a lot about gardening since beginning this blog in 2007, when I was living with my family near Atlanta. (My first post about gardens, here.) I love gardening. It's a sanity-maintaining exercise, requiring hard work as well as organizational and aesthetic skills. It's also a philosophical enterprise, as one confronts the cycle of the seasons. Voltaire used the garden as a metaphor for how we should live, as a corrective between optimism and despair. Taking my camera into the garden encourages me to look more closely at the burgeoning life there that we often overlook in our busyness. Some people look to the stars for perspective on our place in the universe; I look to my garden.

Here in the middle of November, my garden in southeast Louisiana is still full of life.

Compare the size of this bee--in relation to the length of the flowers--to that of the bee below.

I like the watercolor effect of this photo.

These little guys are prolific in my garden, and I like capturing them in different poses. Here one hides in a pot of mums.

This lizard is in camouflage among the basil and tarragon.

another view of a lizard in my potted chrysanthemums

purple basil blooms

leafy dill--I am interested in seeing how long it survives through the winter.

Take Back Your Slur, Senator McCain

Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham have been leading the attack against President Obama's selection of Susan Rice, US Ambassador to the UN, as a nominee for Secretary of State in Obama's second presidential term. In that attack, John McCain has accused Susan Rice of misleading the public on the Benghazi attack in Libya, suggesting that she mouthed talking points of the White House and dismissing Rice's insistence that she was using information provided by the CIA.

Here is what Senator John McCain has said:

Those talking point (sic) that the ambassador used did not come from the CIA. They come from the White House. Who in the White House – was it the president of the United States? Was it one of his people? – who was it who gave her talking points that clearly indicated something for which there was no basis in fact? (Chris McGreal, "Republican senators set up showdown over possible Rice nomination," The Guardian, 15 November 2012)

Now CBS News has discovered the CIA talking points that Susan Rice was given, proving that Rice has been telling the truth all along: she was communicating information from the known intelligence at the time. See "CIA talking points for Susan Rice called Benghazi attack 'spontaneously inspired by protests,'" CBS News, Washington, 15 November 2012.

Take back your bitter, partisan-hack slur, Senator McCain.

(h/t, live updates from Richard Adams, for The Guardian)

 

More Than You Want to Know: The Petraeus Affair and Our Sex Scandal Obsession

Update, 19 November 2012: Well, this is good news: "Pew: More Americans Following 'Fiscal Cliff' than David Petraeus Investigation"

Yes, it was asking too much that we "be spared the salacious details of General David Petraeus's extramarital affair", as the narrative continues to dominate the headlines and the plot line thickens. So, here I am providing, for anyone interested in all the developing details, a list of news articles that have followed all the minutiae of the tangled tale. Maybe there is something huge here, hidden in the volumes of e-mails that have come to light, but so far the situation seems to be a sad tale of infatuation, obsession, adultery, and jealousy, with a little bit of a petty political paranoia and too-ready access to the privacy-prying power of the FBI. 

Nothing reported so far seems to be a national security issue....but, then, who knows. Before it's over, maybe the FBI will be poking through all our e-mails and discovering all our petty little secrets.

ALL THE DETAILS, updated as discovered, or until I tire of the updates, which was yesterday, 18 November 2012:

"CIA Director David Petraeus resigns, cites extra-marital affair," Andrea Mitchell and Robert Windrem, on nbcnews.com, 9 November 2012.

"Petraeus Resigns over Affair with Biographer," Fred Kaplan, in Slate, 9 November 2012.

"Woman Linked to Petraeus is a West Point Graduate and Lifelong High Achiever," Michael D. Shear, The New York Times, 9 November 2012.

"A Brilliant Career with a Meteoric Rise and an Abrupt Fall," Scott Shane and Sheryl Gay Stolberg, The New York Times, 10 November 2012.

"CIA Chief Resigns over Affair," Devlin Barrett, Siobhan Gorman, and Julian E. Barnes, in The Wall Street Journal, 11 November 2012.

"Veteran: Paula Broadwell 'Not the Type' to Have Affair," Reena Ninan and Alyssa Newcomb, ABC news, 11 November 2012.

"Motives Questioned in FBI Inquiry of Petraeus E-mails," Scott Shane and Charlie Savage, The New York Times, 12 November 2012.

"Here's the e-mail trick Petraeus and Broadwell used to communicate," Max Fisher, The Washington Post, 12 November 2012.

"Petraeus 'ghostwriter' clueless to affair," Vernon Loeb, The Washington Post," 12 November 2012.

"Exclusive: Paula Broadwell's Emails Revealed," Michael Daly, The Daily Beast, 12 November 2012.

 "FBI Agent In Petraeus Case Under Scrutiny," Devlin Barrett, Evan Perez, and Siobhan Gorman, in The Wall Street Journal, 13 November 2012.

"Patraeus investigation ensnares commander of U.S., NATO troops in Afghanistan," Craig Whitlock and Rajiv Chandrasekaran, The Washington Post, updated 13 November 2012.

"Scandal Widens; US General's E-mails 'Flirtatious,'" Peter Yost and Robert Burns, Associated Press, 13 November 2012.

"Who is Jill Kelley and Why is Everyone Obsessed with Her?," Henry Blodget and Grace Wyler, Business Insider, 13 November 2012.

"There's Something About Jill Kelley," Elspeth Reeve, The Atlantic Wire, 13 November 2012.

"Petraeus friend Jill Kelley found place hosting military parties," Tampa Bay Times staff and wires, Tampa Bay Times, 13 November 2012.

"Jill Kelley requested 'diplomatic protection' in 911 call," myfoxmobile, 13 November 2012. (h/t, Josh Marshall, "Just Gets Better and Better," TPM, 13 November 2012.)

"Jill Kelley is an 'honorary consul' of South Korea,"Josh Rogin, on the Foreign Policy blog, "The Cable," 13 November 2012.

"General Confusion," David Weigel, Slate, 13 November 2012. 

 "FBI investigating how Petraeus biographer Broadwell obtained classified files," Sari Horwitz, Greg Miller, and Karen DeYoung, The Washington Post,"
13 November 2012.

"Tampa is Seen as Social Link for Unfolding Scandal," Michael S. Schmidt and Sheryl Gay Stolbert, The New York Times, 13 November 2012.

"Jill Kelley Loses VIP Privileges at Military Base," Luis Martinez, The Blotter at ABC News online, 14 November 2012.

"Veteran F.B.I. Agent Helped Start Petraeus E-mail Inquiry," Michael S. Schmidt, Scott Shane, and Alain Delaquérière, The New York Times, 14 November 2012.

"Meet the Shirtless FBI Agent from the Petraeus Love Pentagon," Adam Clarke Estes, The Atlantic Wire, 14 November 2012.

"What Was in Paula Broadwell's 'KelleyPatrol' E-mails?," Elspeth Reeve, The Atlantic Wire, 15 November 2012. 

"Jill Kelley outraged other military liaisons with her flirty ways," Jessica Vander Velde and William R. Levesque, Tampa Bay Times, 15 November 2012.

" In Petraeus' fall, a familiar tale of power and its dangerous allure," Michael Doyle, Frances Robles, and Greg Gordon, McClatchy Newspapers, 16 November 2012.

"The Wonderful World of Jill and Scott Kelley," Elspeth Reeve, The Atlantic Wire, 16 November 2012.

"Petraeus scandal: Jill Kelley and the Tampa society set," Emma Brockes, The Guardian, 16 November 2012. [These last few articles are just precious in their descriptions of social snobbery.]

OPINIONS

"A General Lesson," Fred Kaplan, in Slate, 10 November 2012.

"When a C.I.A. Agent had Scores of Affairs," Stephen Kinzer, The New York Times, 10 November 2012.

"How I was Drawn into the Cult of David Petraeus," Spencer Ackerman, on the blog Danger Room: What's Next in National Security, on the website of Wired, 11 November 2012.

"The David Petraeus-Paula Broadwell Affair: The Danger of Male Mentors?," Jenna Goudreau, Forbes 12 November 2012.

"The Siren and the Spook," Frank Bruni, The New York Times, 12 November 2012.

Petraeus the paper tiger," Joshua Foust, Need to Know Opinion, PBS online, 12 November 2012.

"How Paula Broadwell Wronged Her Readers," Laura Miller, Salon, 13 November 2012.

"The Real Petraeus Scandal," Joan Walsh, Salon, 13 November 2012.

"Petraeus situation: You asked, I answer," Thomas E. Ricks, on his blog The Best Defense, on the Foreign Policy website, 13 November 2012.

"Stop Judging, You Prudes," Katie Roiphe, Slate, 13 November 2012.

 "What the Heck, FBI?," Marc Ambinder, on his blog The Compass, in The Week, 13 November 2012.

"Paula Broadwell, A Hanger-On in King Petraeus's Court," Noam Scheiber, in The New Republic's blog The Plank, 14 November 2012. 

"When did Socialite Become an Insult?," Libby Copeland, Slate, 16 November 2012.

"The media's woman blaming," Jennifer Vanasco, Columbia Journalism Review, 16 November 2012.

FALLOUT

"FBI investigation into Petraeus's love life may damage ties to other agencies," Tom McCarthy, The Guardian, 13 November 2012.

"Panetta Orders Review of Ethics Training for Military Officers," Elisabeth Bumiller, The New York Times, 15 November 2012.

ADVICE

 "My Secret Strategy for Avoiding Petraeus-Style Email Pitfalls," James Fallows, on his blog on The Atlantic's website, 12 November 2012.

"A Cheater's Checklist," Emily Yoffe ("Dear Prudie"), Slate, 13 November 2012.

BIGGER ISSUES?

 "Questioning the Brass," Thomas E. Ricks, The New York Times, 11 November 2012.

"The Real David Petraeus Scandal," Robert Wright, The Atlantic, 12 November 2012.

"Petraeus Case Raises Fears About Privacy in Digital Era," Scott Shane, The New York Times, 13 November 2012.

"FBI's abuse of the surveillance state is the real scandal needing investigation," Glenn Greenwald, The Guardian 13 November 2012.

"The Petraeus Legacy: A Paramilitary CIA?," Jeremy Scahill, The Nation, 14 November 2012.

"Forget Petraeus: The Real Scandal Is Generals' Corrupt Weapons Procurement," Dina Rasor, Truthout, 14 November 2012.

 "Collateral damage of our surveillance state," Julian Sanchez, Reuters, 15 November 2012.

"Paula Broadwell's Big Mistake," Andrew Leonard, Salon, 16 November 2012.

Scenes from a Fall Garden

Gulf fritillary on violas, November 2012

At Christmas I no more desire a rose

Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled shows;

But like of each thing that in season grows.

(Shakespeare, Love's Labours Lost, 1.1)

Here in southeast Louisiana, the seasons overlap, with flowers of the summer blooming into the fall. A couple of weeks ago, I transplanted pansies, violas, and snapdragons into a flower bed that also has second-generation zinnias blooming in it, zinnias that re-seeded and sprouted from my summer bounty of flowers. These zinnias are short, their stunted growth having responded to the shorter day length, and surely the first frost will rebuke their green impudence.

This summer, I transplanted baby aloe vera plants from a large aloe vera that I have growing in a pot (several generations removed from the original plants that I dug up from the yard of a great-aunt several years ago). I am interested in seeing how well they can survive a southeast Louisiana winter--though, given enough warning, I will probably try to protect them from freezing temperatures.

Bumblebee almost comatose on my basil, November 2012

Yesterday, before a cold front blew into the area, the backyard was full of pollinators, especially gulf fritillaries, which seemed to like the violas almost as much as the zinnias, though the still-blooming red salvia remained their favorite. The strangest sight we've seen in our garden is that of huge bumblebees clinging to basil flowers on chilly days, waiting for the weather to warm. Today, with highs in the low 60s, I found three bumblebees tightly holding onto the Genovese basil blossoms, impervious to my poking and prodding among the leaves as I photographed them. They moved their antenna but little else. The smaller honeybees, though, were busily flying around the blooms, gathering pollen. The cooler temperatures do not seem to affect them as much. Or, perhaps, these bumblebees are nearing the end of their natural life (usually, only the queen survives the winter by hibernating), and the scents of the garden are providing some kind of bumblebee comfort here at the end. 

The tomatoes we planted as an experiment in fall-growing tomatoes--which we have never grown successfully in the past--have tiny green tomatoes on them, but I doubt if those fruits will ripen on the vine. The gourmet mesclun mixes that I planted among the tomatoes are producing far more bountifully, for those plants are truly growing in season, as are the radishes.  Tom and I have been enjoying the most wonderful salads from those greens, for which I prepare a very simple lemon juice and olive oil dressing (heavy on the lemon juice), seasoned with a little sea salt and freshly ground pepper.

Tom holds up sweet potatoes on a runner

Fall 2012 sweet potatoes

Tom dug up the sweet potatoes yesterday. He had planted sweet potato slips later than usual, so our crop wasn't a large one, but it was satisfying, nonetheless, to see the pile of sweet potatoes grow as he turned over the manure-enriched soil of our vegetable garden. He is also increasing the size of our "big" garden, which, when it's complete, should be approximately 50 feet long by 20 feet wide. The 8 ft.X8 ft. beds we put in behind our house our first year here will now be primarily planted with herbs and flowers--and the occasional winter greens.

I planted seeds of curly-leaf parsley in the late spring. The seeds sprouted, and though they suffered a bit from the hot weather, the plants grew well enough during the summer to provide meals for a slew of gulf fritillary caterpillars. After I had planted the parsley seeds and transplanted some flat-leaf parsley plants, I overheard an experienced Louisiana gardener say that she planted parsley in the fall. My parsley plants do seem happier in this cooler fall weather, but I will continue to plant parsley in the spring, too, so that there will be plenty of food for those caterpillars.

Radishes, tomatoes, and mesclun mixes & 2nd generation zinnia

Even as we are gathering the fruit of our fall garden, I am already thinking of spring, which will come much too early. According to NOAA, this past spring was the warmest spring on record, and "March was the warmest March on record by far." I hope to be better prepared this next year for an early onset of spring.

This Democrat is watching

Ms. Warren’s adversaries are said to be trying to keep her off the banking committee, where she could push for more regulation, while her admirers want her to be on it. “Her strategy will depend on what happens,” said Simon Johnson, a professor at the M.I.T. Sloan School of Management. “If she doesn’t get on the banking committee, then she’ll take a more outspoken approach.” He said that Democrats as a whole had not followed through on several issues of financial reform, so “it matters a great deal” where Ms. Warren is assigned. “Not putting her on banking would make the Democratic Party look like a creature of Wall Street, which, by the way, it is,” Professor Johnson said. “But they don’t like to be too explicit about it.”

Katharine Q. Seelye, "New Senator, Known Nationally, Sometimes Feared", in The New Yorks Times, 10 November 2012.

Misplaced Bitterness over Business

I'm getting all kinds of stories in my news feed of employers laying off people because they think the Affordable Care Act is going to destroy business--or, rather, they're using that assumption as an excuse to fire people who don't agree with them. An anonymous caller to C-Span--he said he was "Stu," from Williamson, Georgia, where he owns a "relatively small aviation service company"--described how he reduced the hours of his part-time workers so that he would not have to comply with what he claims he would be required to do under the Affordable Care Act, offer health care to part-time employees who work 30 hours a week. And he says that he fired two people whom he suspected had voted for Obama!

Where do people like this come from? Mordor?

According to a government information flyer for small businesses:

the health care law does not require businesses to provide insurance. For businesses with fewer than 50 full-time and full-time equivalent employees, there are no consequences for not providing health insurance. (quotes here and below from "Small Businesses and the Affordable Care Act," a link to which can be found on the Health.gov website: Newsroom: Brochures, Posters, and Outreach")

In addition, the on-line brochure calms the small business owner's fear of higher taxes associated with the Affordable Care Act:

There are no new taxes on small employers in the law. The health care law does not require any business to provide health insurance for their employees. However, starting in 2014, a large employer may have to pay an assessment if it does not offer affordable insurance and one of its employees gets tax credits to purchase insurance in the Exchange. These assessments do not apply to businesses with less than 50 employees. Large employers that do not offer health benefits coverage at all may be required to pay an assessment of $2,000 per year for each full- time employee, excluding the first 30 full-time employees.  Larger employers that do offer health benefits coverage that is unaffordable or lacks minimum value may be assessed a payment of $3,000 per year for each full-time employee receiving federal financial assistance. However, this payment cannot exceed the assessment the business would pay if it did not offer health care coverage. 

Note: the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services estimates that fewer than 2% of large American employers will have to pay these assessments.

Small business owners can also find more information here-- "Small Business and the Affordable Care Act," or on the IRS website, here-- "Small Business Health Care Tax Credit for Small Employers."

But, no, instead, small business owners such as Stu, who are disappointed that their presidential candidate did not win, would rather respond in ignorance and take out their bitterness on other people than face facts: the re-election of Barack Obama is not going to cause businesses to fail. The bone-headedness of business owners might, though.

These kinds of bitter, malicious, and vindictive responses to the re-election of President Barack Obama astound me.  

More on Business Owners from Mordor:
"Coal CEO Prays for Deliverance from Obama, Fires Workers," by Mark Joseph Stern, in Slate, 9 November 2012.

Still Gardening

Nineteen years ago my family and I moved from Texas to northeast Minnesota, where we lived for about three years. A month after we moved to Minnesota, I was shocked to look out the picture window of our living room to see snow falling on the first day of October. We had to cover our tomatoes in June to protect them from frost.  Yet we learned to love the area, and we adjusted to a short, cool gardening season. We hated to leave.

Now, here in southeast Louisiana, we're already in the second week of November, and my garden is still green. The tarragon and the heat-loving basil are still alive. I've planted pansies and snapdragons, but the lantana has put out new blooms. There are even very small tomatoes on the tomato plants we planted in August.

While I miss the seasons of northeast Minnesota (around Cloquet and Duluth), I love the fact that I can garden through the fall, and even through the winter, in southeast Louisiana. The cilantro that went to seed in the spring has re-seeded, and the greens and salad mixes I planted in late September are ready for the table. This week, I picked a satsuma from one of our satsuma plants and peeled it there in the sun, savoring its sweetness.

Soon I'll need to cut back the lemongrass and pile up straw around it to protect it from the cold, and we'll have to wrap our banana trees. But I'm enjoying still the bounty from my garden.
 

Too Much to Ask?

Is it too much to ask that we be spared the salacious details of General David Petraeus's extramarital affair? The man has served his country and has resigned as CIA Director. I do not want to know the name of the other party involved in the affair. I do not want details about how Holly Petraeus, General Petraeus's wife, is coping with her husband's infidelity. Can we move on and let the Petraeus family heal in private? How about dealing with climate change, instead? Or the economy?

Update:
Well, of course, it was too much to ask. I've done my share of reading about the details:
"Petraeus Quits; Evidence of Affair was Found by FBI," Michael D. Shear, in The New York Times, 9 November 2012.

"Petraeus Resigns Over Affair with Biographer," Fred Kaplan, in Slate, 9 November 2012.

This is Bitterness

The owner of a coal company with headquarters in Utah who made it mandatory for his employees to attend a Romney rally in August and docked their pay for the same day because he closed the mine for the rally, has now layed off 102 miners. (h/t Think Progress--more on the coal mine owner's strong-arm techniques here: "Coal Miner's Donor, by Alec McGillis, in The New Republic, 4 October 2012)

Maybe James Fallows will follow up with news of the writer to his blog who said he would shut down his business if Barack Obama were re-elected.
 

The Day After

This is how my world looks the day after the 2012 presidential election. The only difference is that the sun is shining; yesterday was cloudy.

I do not get television reception here, and I don't subscribe to cable, so I missed the up-to-the-second updates on the polls. Instead, I would periodically check online to see how the numbers were adding up for President Barack Obama. So I didn't get that euphoric feeling one gets when news outlets first flash their announcements of the predictive winner. About forty minutes after Fox News called President Obama the predictive winner and Karl Rove argued to wait until more numbers came in, I checked Facebook, where my daughter had posted that now she could finally go to bed and another young friend posted "Obama ++." I sighed with relief.

I spent this historic occasion alone, crocheting, drinking a little wine and, later, hot chocolate, and watching Miss Marple Mysteries on Netflix, with two cats curled at my feet, a perfect picture of womanish old age. Tom, my husband, was at a meeting out-of-state, at a location where he could get no cell phone or internet connection. He has yet to respond to the celebratory message I e-mailed him last night.

Life goes on, as it would have done had Romney won, except that Mitt Romney was unable to move his party away from the lunatic fringe toward a more sane center, and thus all of President Barack Obama's achievements--most notably,  the Affordable Care Act--would have been lost. Now Obama's legacy will remain, and, according to Steve Kornacki, on Salon,  even Mitt Romney will benefit from this election, going down in history as the man who made Obamacare possible with the prior health care system he enacted in Massachusetts that served as the pattern for the Affordable Care Act.  History might well forget that Romney was pressured to disavow his healthcare program in order to maintain support of that radical fringe in his party.

Yes, I voted for Barack Obama, but I also voted against a recalcitrant Republican Party. I voted against obstructionism. I voted against torture.  I voted against all those radicals who showed up at rallies screaming that Barack Obama was a socialist or Hitler or the Anti-Christ. I voted against whoever put up that huge roadside sign along I-12 in Livingston Parish, Louisiana, advertising "Satan as Barack Obama." I voted against hate. I voted against racism. 

I sure hope the Republican Party can see that a lot of people voted against the far-right wing of their party as much as for Barack Obama. But I don't hold out much hope in the short term. No, the Republican Party needs to be cast out into the wilderness for a while, and that would mean losing Congress as well as the White House, and that didn't happen this election cycle. It needs to happen. 

I don't believe in the permanent ascendency of one political party because I think when one party governs for too long, that party loses its edge and falls into corruption. We need at least two parties, and I wish we could have a viable third party. But those parties should put the needs of the country ahead of partisan politics. Sure, they do and should have different views of governing, but they need to hammer out their differences in compromise. In that respect, the Republican Party failed miserably, as its leaders were far more determined to obstruct anything a Democratic president tried to achieve than they were determined to govern. And in their obstructionism, they pandered to racism.

 As Jacob Weisberg says, Mitt Romney lost because he had to cast himself as a right-wing extremist in order to win the nomination of his party.  Romney

had to pass muster with his party’s right-wing base on taxes, immigration, climate change, abortion, and gay rights. Many of his statements on these issues were patently insincere, but that was hardly reassuring. Romney’s very insincerity and flexibility made it improbable that he would stand up to the GOP’s hyper-partisan congressional wing once elected any more than he had during the primaries. [Jacob Weisberg, "Why Mitt Lost," in Slate, 7 November 2012]

I hope that leaders of the Republican Party realize this and do some soul-searching.

Meanwhile, we've got some serious issues to address in the four years ahead, and at the top of the list should be climate change, civil rights, and economic opportunity for those who have suffered the most from the financial crisis.

Two Hours Before the Polls Close

This is how the world looks where I live--two hours before the polls close. I could attend a local party to watch news anchors tally the election, but I'm just not up to it. I watched much of the Republican and Democratic conventions in 2008; this year, I waited to see clips online the next day. I feel very strongly about this election, but I don't feel much like celebrating, even if my candidate wins (and I truly hope he does). This year's presidential election has been a long slog--maybe they always are, but this year the slog has seemed particularly wearing. I'm just ready to gather those radishes and spicy greens from my fall garden and to begin planning my spring garden....hoping climate change doesn't screw up the weather too much where I live. [philosophical smile]