Noah Shachtman:
Last Wednesday, in the hours after a horrific chemical attack east of Damascus, an official at the Syrian Ministry of Defense exchanged panicked phone calls with a leader of a chemical weapons unit, demanding answers for a nerve agent strike that killed more than 1,000 people. Those conversations were overheard by U.S. intelligence services, The Cable has learned. And that is the major reason why American officials now say they're certain that the attacks were the work of the Bashar al-Assad regime -- and why the U.S. military is likely to attack that regime in a matter of days.
But the intercept raises questions about culpability for the chemical massacre, even as it answers others: Was the attack on Aug. 21 the work of a Syrian officer overstepping his bounds? Or was the strike explicitly directed by senior members of the Assad regime? "It's unclear where control lies," one U.S. intelligence official told The Cable. "Is there just some sort of general blessing to use these things? Or are there explicit orders for each attack?"
More questions than answers. Important point, since we seem to be on the brink of military strikes.
In case you were curious, here's the Guardian from a few days ago:
Stefan Mogl, a Swiss chemical weapons expert and former arms inspector, said: "There's a significant number of videos of children's faces and of adults who seem to have been exposed, that show typical symptoms of acetylcholinesterase inhibition poisoning, which coincides with a nerve agent."
Mogl told the Guardian it was very likely the agent used was sarin. "The significance is, it's not a single case. One person with constricting of the pupils, or with excessive salivation, or with spasms, or gasping for air, one single incident is not very significant, but … I came to the conclusion that there is a likelihood of nerve agent poisoning and this should be thoroughly investigated. You see children dying, people with very severe effects. I've seen a lot of people with uncontrolled muscle movement."
More politics and policy below the fold.
WaPo:
The Obama administration believes that U.S. intelligence has established how Syrian government forces stored, assembled and launched the chemical weapons allegedly used in last week’s attack outside Damascus, according to U.S. officials.
The administration is planning to release evidence, possibly as soon as Thursday, that it will say proves that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad bears responsibility for what U.S. officials have called an “undeniable” chemical attack that killed hundreds on the outskirts of the Syrian capital.
Can't see how that gets walked back.
Dana Milbank:
Why lies about Obama stick
“Obama derangement syndrome is running pretty high right now among a certain segment of the Republican base,” Tom Jensen, director of Public Policy Polling, told me. “There’s a certain segment of people who say, ‘If you’re going to give me the opportunity to stick it to Obama, I’m going to take it.’ ”
In other words, a large number of that 29 percent who said Obama was responsible for the Katrina response knew that he wasn’t but saw it as a chance to register their displeasure with the president. Obama has driven a large number of Republican voters — Jensen puts it at 15 to 20 percent of the overall electorate — right off their rockers. And to that, there is only one thing to say.
Heckuva job, Barry.
Harold Meyerson:
Of all the commemorations of the March on Washington, the one that will best capture its spirit isn’t really a commemoration at all. Thursday, one day after the 50th anniversary of the great march, fast-food and retail workers in as many as 35 cities will stage a one-day strike demanding higher wages.
Sadly, the connection between the epochal demonstration of 1963 and a fast-food strike in 2013 couldn’t be more direct.
Glenn Thrush:
King and Obama — born 32 years apart — both learned that an African-American leader needs to link racial equality to the broader cause of economic justice that included white, working- and middle-class Americans in order to avoid failure, backlash and marginalization.
To that end, Obama will spotlight his fallen hero’s unfinished economic agenda when he celebrates the 50th anniversary of King’s 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech on Wednesday, leveraging an event most Americans view as strictly a racial milestone into something bigger — and more useful to a struggling president: A rationale for his second-term agenda.
Michael Tomasky:
Impeaching Obama May Be Absurd But That Won’t Stop the Right Wing Fringe
The case is that Obamacare constitutes “taxation without representation.” But wait; didn’t Congress, the people’s representatives, vote to pass it? Yes, it did. And wait again; didn’t the Supreme Court—didn’t John Roberts himself—rule that Obamacare passes constitutional muster expressly because the mandate is in effect a tax? Yes, it and he did. So what’s the beef? Well, this is where the mainstream media have left you, citizen, in the lurch. The problem is that “the White House has been changing the law without involving Congress following the Supreme Court ruling and that multiple sections of the implementation of Obamacare are unconstitutional.”
I’m not going to get into the details, because they aren’t important or compelling. It’s all madness.