| Morning Jolt
. . . with Jim Geraghty April 30, 2014 Good morning! When you have a moment, check out my latest roundup of the federal bureaucracy run amok over on NRO's homepage… White House E-Mail: 'Underscore that These Protests Are Rooted in an Internet Video' KABOOM. In short, the Obama administration's lies about Benghazi came about exactly as we expected: one of the political guys telling the national security appointees what to say. Republicans say e-mails released Tuesday on the attack in Benghazi, Libya, include "the smoking gun" that shows a White House official urged that the assault on the U.S. consulate be blamed on a protest that never happened. The e-mails, obtained by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request, include one in which White House official Ben Rhodes lists "goals" for then-U.N. ambassador Susan Rice to meet in explaining the attack and protests occurring across the Middle East that week to the American public. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans died in the assault, which the White House subsequently acknowledged was an al-Qaeda-linked terror attack. The e-mail, sent to various officials including White House spokesman Jay Carney, said one goal was "to underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy." Another goal was "to reinforce the president and administration's strength and steadiness in dealing with difficult challenges." Rhodes is assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser for strategic communication and speechwriting. During appearances on five Sunday news programs, Rice did blame the attack on Sept. 11, 2012, on a protest against an anti-Islam video produced by an American. So did Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and President Obama would not say whether it was a terrorist attack until several days later. The CIA station chief in Libya reported from the beginning that the attack was an al-Qaeda-linked operation and that there was no protest. Though there was some dispute over the manner of the attack, former CIA deputy director Mike Morell testified earlier this month that he had no idea where the story about a video protest came from when he saw Rice make the claim on television. Well, now we know. Yes, Rhodes' speechwriting always focused in the foreign-policy realm. He was a longtime assistant to Lee Hamilton, then joined Obama as a speechwriter in 2007. But this guy's not an expert on Libya. There's no way he was in any position, from Washington, to overrule the assessment of the folks on the ground. He's a message guy. And he quickly concluded -- accurately -- that the administration's obvious ill-prepared presence in Libya and failure to organize timely rescue efforts on the 9/11 anniversary represented a serious threat to the president's reelection. They needed a scapegoat; the video was the best option at hand. A perfectly ironic quote from a 2010 profile: "I very much wanted to be a fiction writer." Guess he finally got that chance. Illinois Governor's Anti-Crime Program May Have Committed Crimes Indictments of Illinois governors: it's not a question of 'if', but 'when' and 'for what'! In this case, there are allegations of Pat Quinn using state funds to run a slush fund to award his allies. Even by Illinois standards, this looks pretty brazen: Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez issued a sweeping grand jury subpoena seeking records tied to Gov. Pat Quinn's troubled Neighborhood Initiative Program – including those for a grant involving the husband of Cook County Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown. The Sun-Times previously reported that almost seven percent of the $2.1 million in funds given to the Chicago Area Project meant to combat crime in West Garfield Park went to Brown's husband, Benton Cook III… The state's Auditor General, William Holland, slammed the program in a February audit, saying Quinn's administration didn't "adequately monitor" how state grant dollars were spent or on whom; community organizations that hired people with those funds weren't maintaining time sheets; and city aldermen dictated where funding was to be steered. Political opponents likened the program to a "political slush fund." The Quinn administration has said the program was set up in response to a violent summer over 2010 and later, in 2012, the governor supported legislation that moved oversight of the program from the Illinois Violence Prevention Authority to the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority. This is the detail that a previous Illinois governor might have called golden: "In his review, Holland further found that the state did not allow for a competitive, open application for the money and instead sought recommendations from Chicago aldermen as to what community organizations should get money in the Neighborhood Recovery Initiative program." Gee. The governor takes a pile of money and claims it's for crime prevention, and then asks a bunch of Chicago alderman where to spend it? Who could have foreseen something going wrong with that plan? Ah, the Persistent Popularity of the 'Unpaid Contributor Model'… This news is generating some hubbub in my circles: FreedomWorks, a Tea Party affiliated group, recently announced to their stable of paid bloggers that they would be shifting over to an "unpaid contributor model," and that all contracts made with the group would be terminated in 30 days… There's been a lot of discussion about whether what a blogger generates -- whether it's original reporting, or analysis, or red-meat arguments -- is of value to a conservative organization that isn't explicitly devoted to journalism. Actually, it undoubtedly is worth something, but the question is how much. If there are people almost as good who are willing to work for free, it may be tougher to justify the expense of paying a writer. I hear through the grapevine that a large chunk of the high-dollar conservative donor base just doesn't see supporting online writing as worthwhile, or generating enough return-on-investment. They want to contribute to political victories, not just a compelling message or new information. As one person put it, examining the number of paid blogging gigs in progressive organizations, "what has never made sense to me is that the side that supposedly values free market and business thinks people should work for free and the free-lunch side is paying their bloggers." Then again, it's these conservative donors' money, not mine, and they're free to donate or not donate as they see fit. However, I would urge them to be a bit wary of organizations that spend their money running television commercials in the final weeks of a campaign, when the ad rates are highest, the ad breaks are most crowded with political messages, and the early voters have cast their ballots already. Ace has a good, nuanced look at conservative political organizations and their fundraising here. ADDENDA: It's very hard to assess the quality of a coming movie from a cast, but there's that little flicker of excitement with this news: "The Star Wars team is thrilled to announce the cast of Star Wars: Episode VII: Actors John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, Oscar Isaac, Andy Serkis, Domhnall Gleeson, and Max von Sydow will join the original stars of the saga, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill, Anthony Daniels, Peter Mayhew, and Kenny Baker in the new film." 
Then again, the problem with the prequels wasn't an untalented cast. Good actors turned in increasingly "meh" performances as the series wore on, perhaps worn down by Lucas' disinterest in actors. We've seen Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman and Samuel L. Jackson turn in way better performances than their prequel efforts, and everyone who loathes Hayden Christensen should watch his performance in Shattered Glass, the docudrama about The New Republic's serial fabulist Stephen Glass. Come to think of it, the prequels were full of solid enough performances, particularly among the villains: Christopher Lee, Ian McDiarmid, Temura Morrison… Two names on that list jump out. Andy Serkis is well-known for being Hollywood's most effective motion-capture actor, with his movements and expressions forming the template for Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movies, as well as the Planet of the Apes movies. As for Max Von Sydow, we can only hope he's one of the new villains…
 He doesn't even have to change his wardrobe. Just show up and speak with understated menace, Max. From Our Sponsor:
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