News Nuggets 956

DAYLEE PICTURE:  Sequoia rings for a tree in Yosemite.  From National Geographic.

UP-FRONT BOOK REVIEW NUGGET!!
Seat of Power: A Review of The Passage of Power, Robert Caro’s New L.B.J. Book (Bill Clinton) from the New York Times
"Even when we parted company over the Vietnam War, I never hated L.B.J. the way many young people of my generation came to. I couldn't. What he did to advance civil rights and equal opportunity was too important. I remain grateful to him. L.B.J. got to me, and after all these years, he still does. With this fascinating and meticulous account of how and why he did it, Robert Caro has once again done America a great service."

Afghanistan Speech a Good Night’s Work for Obama (Michael Gerson) from the Washington Post
"There is no serious prospect of negotiations with Taliban leaders if they believe that America can simply be outwaited. So Obama was informing the Taliban that this approach would be met by American drones and special operations forces. Obama was also putting the Pakistanis on notice that the American withdrawal from Afghanistan will not be precipitous, and that American interests in the region will be defended."

Dissident Exits Embassy After China Agrees to Deal, U.S. Says from the New York Times
"Chen Guangcheng, a blind lawyer, left the American Embassy in Beijing on Wednesday after China’s government pledged that he would remain safe, American officials said."

Tanks, Jets or Scholarships? (Thomas Friedman) from the New York Times 
"Let’s stop sending planes and tanks to the Arab world and start sending scholarships instead. Just look at the difference it’s making in Lebanon."

An Overview of Syria’s Armed Revolution (Derek Henry Flood) from the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
"...the FSA [Free Syria Army] is foremost a national liberation movement determined to overthrow the al-Assad regime through a war of attrition. The FSA would prefer a rapid paced revolution, but as the prospect for an external military intervention evaporated over the course of the past year, the rebels have had to be self-reliant while hoping for touted help from individual nation-states. The FSA sees a campaign of protracted warfare coupled with an increase in military defections as its only realistic way forward."

After the Post-Revolution: A Review of Eight Pieces of Empire: A Twenty Year Journey Through the Soviet Collapse by Lawrence Scott Sheets (Matthew Kaminski) from the New Republic
"Beyond the European Union’s new eastern frontier are countries, without exception, marked to this day by repression, obscene corruption, or violent conflict. Lawrence Scott Sheets spent two decades in these lands. Eight Pieces of Empire: A Twenty Year Journey Through the Soviet Collapse, a memoir of the collapse and aftermath, is not a happy tale."

Occupy Movement Stirs Across The Country from Talking Points Memo
"The Occupy Wall Street movement marked May 1, International Workers Day, with demonstrations and gatherings across the country. It was the movement’s most visible day since last year, when encampments in major cities were forcibly dismantled. Crowds of varying sizes manifested in a number of cities, while reports of scuffles with police, arrests, and vandalism came in throughout the day."

How Obama Got Bin Laden: A Detailed Account From ‘Showdown’ by David Corn (David Corn) from the Daily Beast
"In a meticulously reported account from Showdown, veteran journalist David Corn details the tense deliberations leading up to the decision to raid the Abbottabad compound on May 1, 2011."

Obama is Both Commander, Campaigner in Chief Ahead of bin Laden Anniversary (Dan Balz) from the Washington Post
"Rarely has a president blended the role of commander in chief with that of campaigner in chief quite as vividly as President Obama has done in the days surrounding the first anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s death."

Obama Earned the Right to Tout Osama Bin Laden Raid (Richard Clarke) from the New York Daily News
"Therefore, voters should be advised to look carefully at claims that are made by both sides, and stick to the facts. Ten facts that tell the true story: ..."

Barack Obama Killed Osama Bin Laden. Period (Fred Kaplan) from Slate 
"The Republicans have glommed on to a neat rhetorical trick: When Barack Obama does something indisputably admirable or effective, simply pretend that he had nothing to do with it."

Obama’s Stealth Mission to Afghanistan Shakes Up the Campaign (Howard Kurtz) from the Daily Beast
"The president’s Afghan visit capped a campaign to highlight bin Laden’s killing. Howard Kurtz on how he outmaneuvered Romney."

GOP Attacks on Obama’s Bin Laden Ad Misguided (Mark McKinnon) from the Daily Beast
"Bush campaign adviser Mark McKinnon on why the GOP’s complaints only help the Democrats."

Richard Grenell Hounded from Romney Campaign by Anti-gay Conservatives (Jennifer Rubin) from the Washington Post
"Richard Grenell, the openly gay spokesman recently hired to sharpen the foreign policy message of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, has resigned in the wake of a full-court press by anti-gay conservatives."

Man Down in Power City (Josh Marshall) from Talking Points Memo
"This is “bitch slap politics” at its best or its worst, depending on your measure. Through the day, Romney struggled to find a way to say that the President deserved credit for his decision but that anyone else would have done just the same thing. ... Against that backdrop, the sudden
resignation of Romney’s new foreign policy spokesman Richard Grenell came at just the wrong time since it told just the same story about Romney as the Obama campaign has been telling all week: Romney is weak."

Our Do-Almost-Nothing Congress (Dana Milbank) from the Washington Post 
"To call this 112th Congress a do-nothing Congress would be an insult — to the real Do-Nothing Congress of 1947-48. That Congress passed 908 laws. To date, this one has passed 106 public laws. Even if they triple that output in the rest of 2012 — not a terribly likely proposition — they will still be in last place going back at least 40 years."

HOLLYWOOD NUGGET!!
How Samuel L. Jackson Became His Own Genre (Pat Jordan) from the Sunday New York Times Magazine
"What it takes to be the highest-grossing actor of all time."

WOMEN IN AFGHANISTAN NUGGET!!
Why Afghan Women Risk Death to Write Poetry (Eliza Griswold) from the Sunday New York Times Magazine
"A new literary network revives an old Pashtun tradition."