Times reporters call bullshit on senators' surveillance claims

In recent weeks, as Congress moved toward passage of a law limiting the NSA's access to phone metadata, I've appreciated the bullshit buffer that Times reporters Jennifer Steinhauer and Jonathan Weisman have inserted into their coverage.

Back on May 23, when the Senate rejected the House bill it eventually passed on June 23, Steinhauer reported a garden variety Senatorial security alarm, then, a few paragraphs later, provided a little factual context:

Obama can't quite keep it simple

[11/15: several updates at bottom]

In response to the first 'fiscal cliff' question in his press conference today, Obama seemed to shut the door on any alternative to letting the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% expire -- that is, to raising the top marginal income tax rate. But there was a little sliver of light along the doorjamb, and when Chuck Todd pushed on it, Obama swung the door open.

First, this seemed all but definitive:

QUESTION: You’ve said that the wealthiest must pay more. Would closing loopholes instead of raising rates for them satisfy you?

OBAMA: I think that there are loopholes that can be closed, and we should look at how we can make the process of deductions, the filing process easier, simpler. But when it comes to the top 2 percent, what I’m not going to do is to extend further a tax cut for folks who don’t need it, which would cost close to a trillion dollars.

Pulping the bully approach to presidential leadership IV

Here is the best evidence yet that Obama's low-profile approach to beginning the long process of budget/tax reform is on target.  Never mind Republicans' alleged glee at his refusal to roll out a grand plan -- they are begging him, Jake Sherman reports, to expose himself:

House Republicans were giddy when President Barack Obama took a pass on entitlement reform in his 2012 budget, ripping him for punting on the future of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

But when they’re pressed for answers about what needs to happen on entitlements, Republicans are punting right back, saying the president needs to take the lead and come up with his own ideas

Before stating their own policy prescriptions, no fewer than a dozen GOP lawmakers and aides Wednesday said that it is Obama’s responsibility to put forth ideas on entitlement reform.

“We need his leadership,” Ways and Means Republican Rep. Wally Herger (Calif.) said. “If it’s something this big to get through, it’s very important for the president to lead.”

Rep. Steve Scalise, the Louisiana Republican who sits on the Energy and Commerce Committee, said that the “president looks very small if he doesn’t lead on this issue.” Rep. Patrick Tiberi, an Ohio Republican cozy with Speaker John Boehner, said “you can’t have a big issue that impacts Americans without presidential leadership.” And Rep. Austin Scott (R-Ga.), the president of the anti-Obama freshman class, said “quite honestly, he has a responsibility to America” to put forth his ideas and lead.

Mr. President, Republicans have a playbook for you: Over the Cliff, by Hugo First.

Meanwhile, back in the Senate, the WSJ's Jonathan Weisman reports, negotiations continue apace among a new gang of six toward a plan with at least some resemblance to Bowles-Simpson (including, apparently, a lot of magic asterisks). Weisman notes pointedly that two of the six, Dick Durbin and Tom Coburn, are "personally close to President Obama."  Nonetheless, despite further GOP blandishments, the admin is hanging back:

No crusade in the SOTU?

Matt Yglesias was onto something -- if only administration thinking -- when he wrote:

It sounds silly to call for less presidential leadership, but I think the evidence suggests that what’s needed here is actually a very vague and generic endorsement of the concept of tax reform plus some themeless pudding. Frances Lee’s important book Beyond Ideology: Politics, Principles, and Partisanship in the U. S. Senate argues persuasively that what happens when a president tries to “lead” on an issue like this is that a dynamic of partisan polarization kicks in. What you really need to get tax reform is for some hard-working members of congress from both parties to take the initiative in hammering out a framework and building support on the Hill. If such a thing happens, the White House should of course try to play a constructive role. But jumping all over the issue and a creating a dynamic where tax reform becomes “a key priority for the Obama administration” that opportunists on the right want to kill for the sake of a political win would not be a constructive intervention.

Today, the WSJ's Jonathan Weisman relays (alleged) administration thinking in advance of the State of the Union address:

The president will try to keep the deficit conversation in broad terms, fearing that detailed proposals would put Republicans, Democrats and Washington interest groups into a defensive crouch before real negotiations can take place, according to those officials [familiar with the speech]. White House officials, for instance, have assured Democratic lawmakers that the president will not explicitly call for cuts in Social Security benefits, though he will say changes are needed to put the program on a solid fiscal footing.

Battle of the Bush surrogates: Burt trumps Bolton in WSJ

I like this quote selection by the WSJ's Jonathan Weisman, covering the U.N. Security Counsel's unanimous passage of "a nuclear-safeguards resolution drafted by the Obama administration to lay the legal framework for military and diplomatic action against nations that use civilian nuclear technology for military purposes." It captures the whole difference in worldview between the administrations of Bush Sr. and W.

First, John Bolton, Bush Jr.'s never-confirmed "ambassador" to the U.N., fulminates:

It's passing a resolution that doesn't have any impact on the real world that undercuts the credibility of the Security Council.

Next, Richard Burt, arms-control negotiator for Bush Sr., now with arms control group Global Zero. Burt

said similar proposals were put forward by the administration of George W. Bush. But they went nowhere.

"What the administration is trying to do is lay the groundwork for proposals that are formally adopted at the NPT conference next year," he said. "The administration views all this as part of the process of establishing a real international consensus against proliferation."

End of article. Way to frame it, Weisman.