1/ A remarkable article from the Wall Street Journal, remarkable in that the WSJ is a conservative paper, and owned by Rupert Murdoch...... The article is titled "Tax the Superrich or Riots will Rage in 2012"...... OK then...... SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. (MarketWatch) — What a year. Rage in London, Egypt, Athens, Damascus. All real. Just a metaphor in the new “Planet of the Apes” film? No, much more. Warning: More rage is dead ahead. Across our planet a new generation is filled with rage. High unemployment. Raging inflation. Dreams lost. Hope gone. While the super -rich get richer and richer. Listen to that hissing: The fuse is rapidly burning, warning us. Wake up before the rage explodes in your face. This firestorm is endangering America’s future. From forces outside, yes. But far more deadly, from deep within our collective psyche. We have lost our moral compass. We are self-destructing. Crackpot warning? No. This warning comes from the elite International Monetary Fund. A recent IMF report looked at “the causes of the two major U.S. economic crises over the past 100 years, the Great Depression of 1929 and the Great Recession of 2007,” writes Rana Foroohar, an economics editor at Time magazine. “There are two remarkable similarities in the eras that preceded these crises. Both saw a sharp increase in income inequality and household-debt-to-income ratios.” And in each case, “as the poor and middle-class were squeezed, they tried to cope by borrowing to maintain their standard of living.” But the rich “got richer, by lending, and looked for more places to invest, bidding up securities that eventually exploded in everyone’s face. In both eras, financial deregulation and loose monetary policies played roles in creating the bubble. But inequality itself — and the political pressure not to reverse it, but to hide it — was a crucial factor in the meltdown. The shrinking middle isn’t a symptom of the downturn. It’s the source of it.” Today the consequences of the meltdown still haunt us — there’s more to come. 2/ Love the title of this column from Thomas Friedman..... "Obama, Tiger, Golf and Politics"..... But the message is less inspiring. The President needs to get tougher and, frankly, lead. Good article....... Without his own Grand Bargain on the table — imprinted on the mind of every American — Obama has been left playing defense, playing to get the least-bad deal, or playing not to lose. That’s what’s producing all the “What happened to Obama?” talk and its silly variants. (He’s a loser; he’s not very bright; he’s Jimmy Carter.) It’s all nonsense. Obama is smart, decent and tough, with exactly the right instincts about where the country needs to go. He has accomplished a lot more than he’s gotten credit for — with an opposition dedicated to making him fail. But lately he is seriously off his game. He’s not Jimmy Carter. He’s Tiger Woods — a natural who’s lost his swing. He has so many different swing thoughts in his head, so many people whispering in his ear about what the polls say and how he needs to position himself to get re-elected, that he has lost all his natural instincts for the game. He needs to get back to basics. It’s crazy what’s happening in America today: We’re having an economic crisis and the politicians are having an election — and there is almost no overlap between the two. The president needs to bring them together. But that can only happen if he stops playing not to lose and goes for broke himself. Our problems are not insoluble. We need a Grand Bargain — where each side gives something on spending, taxes and new investments — and we’re on our way out of this. Run on that, Mr. President: At best you’ll generate enough public pressure (now totally missing) to shame sane Republicans into joining you, and we’ll get a deal, and at worst you can run in 2012 on a platform, which, if you win, will actually give you a mandate for the change the country needs. 3/ Imagine you get a call from an angry Jack Nicholson - it might sound something like this....one minute..... And continuing the Jack Nicholson theme, imagine if "The Shining" were marketed as a rom/com.......one minute.... 4/ An excellent essay from the grand old man of the left - Noam Chomsky. Incisive, always logical and most interesting. The first half of the story is history which I found instructive, but join the piece halfway through to save time...... The final 'compromise' on the crisis -- more accurately, a capitulation to the far right -- is the opposite of what the public wants throughout, and is almost certain to lead to slower growth and long-term harm to all but the rich and corporations, which are enjoying record profits. Few serious economists would disagree with Harvard economist Lawrence Summers that "America's current problem is much more a jobs and growth deficit than an excessive budget deficit," and that the deal reached in Washington in August, though preferable to a highly unlikely default, is likely to cause further harm to a deteriorating economy.Not even discussed is the fact that the deficit would be eliminated if the dysfunctional privatized health care system in the US were replaced by one similar to other industrial societies, which have half the per person costs and at least comparable health outcomes. The financial institutions and pharmaceutical industry are far too powerful for such options even to be considered, though the thought seems hardly Utopian. Off the agenda for similar reasons are other economically sensible options, such as a small financial transactions tax. Meanwhile, new gifts are regularly lavished on Wall Street. 5/ "I Believe" from the "Book of Mormon", the hugely successful Broadway musical. This song was sung at the Tony awards by Andrew Rannell.....wonderful...... I want my own planet..... 6/ Remember Casey Anthony? The righteous outrage about the violent killing of her little girl? Then why isn't there any indignation about the cruelty we are inflicting on the kids of America? We have a growing crisis among the nation’s children, yet our policies ignore that reality at best and exacerbate it at worst. According to a report issued this week by the Guttmacher Institute, the unintended pregnancy rate has jumped 50 percent since 1994, yet a July report from the institute points out that politicians are setting records passing laws to restrict abortion. It said: “The 80 abortion restrictions enacted this year are more than double the previous record of 34 abortion restrictions enacted in 2005 — and more than triple the 23 enacted in 2010.” Add to this the assault by conservatives on Planned Parenthood, and what are we saying? This is what we’re saying: actions have consequences. If you didn’t want a child, you shouldn’t have had sex. You must be punished by becoming a parent even if you know that you are not willing or able to be one. This is insane. 7/ Clarence Thomas, the Supreme Court justice, is rightly reviled as an extreme right wingnut, but this fascinating article from the New Yorker explains how dangerous he is, and how his reading of the Constitution sways the court more than we might otherwise think.... They also confirm he is a corrupt, porn-addicted scumbag.... An excellent article, fair and balanced....... It has been, in certain respects, a difficult year for Clarence Thomas. In January, he was compelled to amend several years of the financial-disclosure forms that Supreme Court Justices must file each year. The document requires the Justices to disclose the source of all income earned by their spouses, and Thomas had failed to note that his wife, Virginia, who is known as Ginni, worked as a representative for a Michigan college and at the Heritage Foundation. The following month, seventy-four members of Congress called on Thomas to recuse himself from any legal challenges to President Obama’s health-care reform, because his wife has been an outspoken opponent of the law. At around the same time, Court observers noted the fifth anniversary of the last time that Thomas had asked a question during an oral argument. The confluence of these events produced the kind of public criticism, and even mockery, that Thomas had largely managed to avoid since his tumultuous arrival on the Court, twenty years ago this fall. These tempests obscure a larger truth about Thomas: that this year has also been, for him, a moment of triumph. In several of the most important areas of constitutional law, Thomas has emerged as an intellectual leader of the Supreme Court. 8/ The wonderful "Addicted to Love" with Robert Palmer......love the lead guitarist...... 9/ With Hurricane Irene inflicting as yet uncounted damage on the east coast of the US including New York City, here is a most relevant story on the economic toll these weather disasters are causing. Eric Cantor is rightly being hauled over the coals by demanding any federal disaster aid be paid for with budget cuts, but for once he has a point. http://www.addictinginfo.org/ Not a good one, but a point. If you accept climate change will bring more and more of these disasters, how is the country going to pay for it? The weather this year has not only been lousy, it has been as destructive in terms of economic loss as any on record. Normally, three or four weather disasters a year in the United States will cause at least $1 billion in damages each. This year, there were nine such disasters. They included the huge snow dump in late January and early February on the Midwest and Northeast, the rash of tornadoes this spring across the Midwest and the more recent flooding of the Missouri and Souris Rivers. The disasters are responsible for at least 589 deaths, including 160 in May whentornadoes ripped through Joplin, Mo. These nine billion-dollar disasters tie the record set in 2008, according to a report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The total damage done by all storms, tornadoes, flooding and heat waves so far this year adds up to about $35 billion 10/ Carl Hiaasen with commentary on how assisted living home operators are buying off Florida pols [so what's new], so good luck keeping granny safe.... We truly are living in the most corrupt State in a polarised, dysfunctional and corrupt country...... Anyone who's been following the Miami Herald's investigation of the wretched conditions in some of Florida's assisted living facilities might wonder how the state could have cruelly turned its back on so many sick and helpless people. The answer is as simple as it is sickening: Money. Florida doesn't spend enough of it enforcing the laws and regulations governing the facilities, while the industry spends a fortune buying off key state lawmakers with campaign donations. Todays video - Crazy Marriage Proposal..... Todays joke - something different....Dave Barry's saga about colonoscopy...... |
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Davids Daily Dose - Sunday August 28th
Monday, August 22, 2011
Davids Daily Dose - Monday August 22nd
1/ This story is a perfect illustration of the wholesale corruption of our institutions by big money, in this case Wall Street. The SEC is responsible for investigating malfeasance in the stock markets, and has been blatantly covering up crimes by the big players..... Matt Taibbi with an excellent investigation of how the oligarchs have captured this regulator.... Imagine a world in which a man who is repeatedly investigated for a string of serious crimes, but never prosecuted, has his slate wiped clean every time the cops fail to make a case. No more Lifetime channel specials where the murderer is unveiled after police stumble upon past intrigues in some old file – "Hey, chief, didja know this guy had two wives die falling down the stairs?" No more burglary sprees cracked when some sharp cop sees the same name pop up in one too many witness statements. This is a different world, one far friendlier to lawbreakers, where even the suspicion of wrongdoing gets wiped from the record. That, it now appears, is exactly how the Securities and Exchange Commission has been treating the Wall Street criminals who cratered the global economy a few years back. For the past two decades, according to a whistle-blower at the SEC who recently came forward to Congress, the agency has been systematically destroying records of its preliminary investigations once they are closed. By whitewashing the files of some of the nation's worst financial criminals, the SEC has kept an entire generation of federal investigators in the dark about past inquiries into insider trading, fraud and market manipulation against companies like Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and AIG. With a few strokes of the keyboard, the evidence gathered during thousands of investigations – "18,000 ... including Madoff," as one high-ranking SEC official put it during a panicked meeting about the destruction – has apparently disappeared forever into the wormhole of history.If you prefer video, here Matt Taibbi sits down with Keith Olbermann....4 minutes..... 2/ Air Swimmers....very cool......2 minutes..... 3/ Charles Blow with a thoughtful column on the President.....not good for Obama........ In 1970, the Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori coined the phrase “uncanny valley.” In the field of robotics, and increasingly in computer animation, it refers to the theory that people feel good about robots — up to a point. When they start to look almost real, but not quite, we experience an eerie and unsettling sense of revulsion. I have often thought that there must be an uncanny valley of politics, a point at which particular politicians rouse our discomfort because there’s something about them that people connect with, but there’s something else about them — intangible, unbelievable and not relatable — that produces a sense of unease. It can be found in the “Artificial Intelligence” of Michele Bachmann and her pull-the-string-in-the-middle- But one person I never thought would fall into this valley was Barack Obama, the charismatic candidate who electrified the electorate in 2008 and whom many saw as the fulfillment of the dream of the even-more-electrifying Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Yet here Obama is, down in the valley, struggling to connect with the American people and failing, increasingly coming across as dispassionate to some and outright revolting to others. Of course, Republicans haven’t helped. They’re absolutely committed to, and obsessed with, his failure. But that cannot be the excuse. Great leadership isn’t shaped in the absence of opposition but in the presence of it. Great leaders draw us together by our universal humanity; they galvanize the wills of the willing; they draw clarity from the spigot of chaos. But that is not how this president is performing at this critical moment, and people are growing increasingly unhappy with him. 4/ And more woes for Obama - the media chatter on Hillary is growing......with calls for her to primary him.... I do have to say, looking back, I wish it had turned out differently. I can't imagine the hatred for a woman President would be as great as the 40% of white Americans who just can't accept a black man is in the White House..... As Democratic disgust with Obama’s debt fumbling spreads, Clinton supporters recall her '3 a.m. phone call' warnings—and angry, frustrated liberals are muttering that she should mount a 2012 challenge.At a New York political event last week, Republican and Democratic office-holders were all bemoaning President Obama’s handling of the debt-ceiling crisis when someone said, “Hillary would have been a better president.” “Every single person nodded, including the Republicans,” reported one observer. 5/ Golfers - can you do these tricks? I want to try the one using the driver soon, but will need a willing volunteer......boys? Two minutes...... 6/ You may remember last week I sent out an article from the Daily Kos about Alan Grayson, the story basically saying that the reason he lost was that he was a progressive.....so suck it up and support our extremely centrist President..... Needless to say Alan Grayson has a response, which is below......well written and realistic..... When I went to the Daily Kos website earlier today, I was surprised to see three – count ‘em, three – diaries about me. One of them drew over 600 comments. Hey, I’m not that important. I’m just a former Congressman. There are 10,000 former Members of the House of Representatives. And 9000 of us are dead. The debate is about whether it helped or hurt my campaign that I ran as a progressive in 2010. Let me give you the short answer. In 2010, it just didn’t matter. I could have cured cancer in October, and I still would have been defeated in November. Because there was a “D” next to my name. Not a “P,” for progressive, but a “D,” for Democrat. Let me try to shed some light on this -- with some facts about my district, my 2008 race, and my 2010 race. http://www.dailykos.com/story/ 7/ Some of Jon Stewart's best shows are when he rips into Fox News, and here's a good one.....two clips, 5 minutes and 6 minutes.......... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ 8/ Amazing Chinese acrobats using the Russian Bar....whatever that is......4 minutes.... http://www.youtube.com/watch? 9/ Rick Scott and the Republican legislature are turning down federal funds for the elderly, the poor and even dying children....but they accepted $2 million for abstinence training.... How do these bastards sleep at night? In recent months, Florida politicians have turned away millions of federal dollars meant for Floridians in need. There was money for the disabled. For the elderly who can't afford medicine.Even for dying children who need help from hospice. In each and every case, the money was there — paid in part by Florida taxpayers. But Florida Republicans turned it down, claiming they didn't want anything to do with "Obamacare." How very convenient for them and their subsidized health-care plans. When you're getting taxpayers to underwrite your $8-a-month insurance policy, the life-and-death woes of the commoners probably seem far removed. Turning down this money didn't save you a single cent. Other states were ready to take the money. Even other conservative leaders who opposed to the Affordable Care Act couldn't be so callous as to reject ready money for constituents in need. So Florida continues to send more money to Washington than it gets back … with the blessing of Gov. Rick Scottand House Speaker Dean Cannon. Except this story gets more interesting. Because it turns out, Florida didn't turn down all of the money authorized by the Affordable Care Act. While Florida Republicans turned down, gave back or refused to apply for more than $50 million in funds, they did accept $2 million …. to promote abstinence. 10/ Julianna Marguiles was just nominated for an Emmy for her performance in 'The Good Wife", in my humble opinion the best show on TV.....it a combination of dirty politics, a busy law firm and complex personal relationships with a lawsuit every episode, i.e. great TV... This is an interview with her with clips from recent shows..... Playing Alicia Florrick, the brilliant and career-driven wife of a disgraced politician on CBS’s 'The Good Wife,' Julianna Margulies is again nominated for an Emmy Award. Jace Lacob talked with her about Alicia’s love life, crashing the Governor’s Ball, and wigs.As the title character in CBS’s genre-busting The Good Wife, Julianna Margulies’s Alicia Florrick has been put through the emotional ringer in the show’s second season. After she reunited with Peter (Chris Noth), her disgraced politico husband, recently reelected to state’s attorney, she discovered that he had previously slept with her best friend, legal snoop Kalinda Sharma (Archie Panjabi), and promptly kicked him out of their home. (In fact, she boxed up his belongings and leased him an apartment while he celebrated at his victory party.) 11/ The always excellent Carl Hiaasen on the Republican hostility to the EPA......they must hate clean water, air you can breathe and healthy children..... Dutifully following their Tea Party scripts, most of the Republican presidential candidates have declared war on the Environmental Protection Agency. They claim that the economy is being smothered by regulations designed to keep our air and water safe. No iota of evidence is being offered, and in fact the record profits of big energy companies indicate a spectacular lack of suffering. But listen to Rep. Michele Bachmann’s promise to an Iowa crowd about one of her first presidential priorities: “I guarantee you the EPA will have doors locked and lights turned off, and they will only be about conservation. It will be a new day and a new sheriff in Washington, D.C.” Granted, Bachmann is a witless parrot who has no chance — absolutely zero — of being elected to the White House. But her hatred of the EPA is shared by Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, who is considered a GOP frontrunner. Like Bachmann, Perry refuses to accept that global warming is real. He launched a lawsuit to stop the EPA from enacting rules to limit greenhouse gasses from oil refineries, power plants and other industrial sources. Perry likes to whine that “EPA regulations are killing jobs all across America,” a statement that draws more cheers in his native state than in the rest of the country. In fact, polls show that a large majority of Americans are worried about air and water pollution, and hold a positive view of the EPA. Nothing kills jobs like an environmental catastrophe, as the Gulf Coast gravely experienced during (and after) the BP oil spill last year. The true cost of that accident to the economies of Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida is probably incalculable, although surely many billions of dollars were lost. Read more: 12/ An early Beyonce video....unusual in that it's in B/W, she plays a cop, and there's an undertone of sexual and racial tension...... Interesting clip, and a great song......5 minutes.... 13/ The next time you go out with prescription medicines not in the original bottle you could be arrested and sent to jail.... Don't believe me? Read with our wonderful legislature has done now...... And even though a Federal judge has ruled the law unconstitutional, Florida prosecutors are ignoring this ruling.... Rick Scott wants to fill those prisons all right....... Williams didn't know the drug, clonazepam, was a controlled substance, she said, and she didn't realize that by carrying it, she was committing a felony. "The whole thing was just a mess," she said Friday. The law that snagged Williams, a psychology student at the University of Central Florida, is now being challenged by hundreds of drug defendants across the state. That's because on July 27, U.S. District Judge Mary S. Scriven declared it unconstitutional, ruling that it violated an individual's right to due process. 14/ OK - a couple of car stories... Like the Mini? Want a luxury one for $50k? Or a two seater coupe that looks.....a little weird? Coming soon..... Also on the premises, and making its North American debut, is the Coupe, the brand’s first two-seater. The car, whose three-box exterior lines might take some getting used to for hardcore fans of the brand, will come in three flavors, priced from $22,000 to $31,900, depending on engine options chosen. Horsepower output ranges from 121 to 208, with the most potent combination, in the John Cooper Works version, achieving a claimed 0-to-60 m.p.h. time of 6.1 seconds and a 149 m.p.h. top speed. Mini is “accepting orders, as of now.” The new Audi A7 vs the Mercedes CLS 550......which is the winner? WGAS....they're both droolers.... But if you want a beautiful car for a realistic price, check out the Volkswagen CC..... For many middle-aged buyers, crisis-averting red sports cars are out. Instead, the runaway trend is the “four-door coupe,” a description that seemed to be less of an oxymoron after the success of the 2005 Mercedes-Benz CLS-Class. Seemingly within weeks, companies began to imitate the CLS’s eye-catching hillock of a roof, first with the more mainstream Volkswagen CC. The movement has recently produced some unexpected offshoots like the Aston Martin Rapide and the Porsche Panamera. Even a family sedan, theHyundai Sonata, should remember to thank Mercedes for its curvy style. Now two new models are going head to pretty head in a battle for luxury buyers: the Audi A7, with a supercharged V-6 and hidden-hatchback layout, and a redesigned CLS550, formidably powered by a new twin-turbo V-8. It’s not always wise to choose a car for its seductive looks, but here you can’t go wrong: both cars are fine performers beneath their handsome skins. And since these are personal-reward cars, if one or the other fulfills your dreams, and you have the cash to burn, I’d say go for it. Yet I’d still urge any infatuated shopper to test-drive both cars: their on-road impressions may surprise you. Todays video....a School answering machine message..... from Australia.... Todays redneck joke A small zoo in Georgia obtained a very rare species of gorilla. Within a few weeks the gorilla, a female, became very difficult to handle. Upon examination, the veterinarian determined the problem. The gorilla was in heat. To make matters worse, there was no male gorilla available. Thinking about their problem, the Zoo Keeper thought of Bobby Lee Walton, a redneck part-time worker responsible for cleaning the animal cages. Bobby Lee, like most rednecks, had little sense but possessed ample ability to satisfy a female of any species. The Zoo Keeper thought they might have a solution. Bobby Lee was approached with a proposition. Would he be willing to mate with the gorilla for $500.00? Bobby Lee showed some interest, but said he would have to think the matter over carefully. The following day, he announced that he would accept their offer, but only under five conditions: "First", Bobby Lee said, "I ain't gonna kiss her on the lips." The Keeper quickly agreed to this condition. "Second", he said, "She must wear a 'Dale Earnhardt Forever' T-Shirt." The keeper again readily agreed to this condition. "Third", he said, "you can't never tell no one about this." The keeper again readily agreed to this condition. "Fourth", Bobby Lee said, "I want all the children raised Southern Baptist. Once again it was agreed. And last, Bobby Lee said, "I'll need another week to come up with the $500.00. |
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Davids Daily Dose - Wednesday August 17th
I have had an epiphany......and before you jump to conclusions, here's the definition...
Wikipedia - An epiphany (from the ancient Greek ἐπιφάνεια, epiphaneia, "manifestation, striking appearance") is the sudden realization or comprehension of the (larger) essence or meaning of something. The term is used in either a philosophical or literal
I have been doing this blog/newsletter for a couple of years now, and as regular readers of DDD know one of the main themes I try to share with you is the growth and power of corporations in our democracy and how they and their money have corrupted every institution we have. But although the problems are very serious, I have always had faith that the good sense of the American people would see what's happening to them and vote the bastards out, and life would get a little fairer.
But one never gets the complete picture....until now. This article below is the scariest analysis of what is actually happening I have seen.....
It shows we are a society of gross inequity of wealth, where the top .01% of the elites completely control this country and indeed most of the world. There's an economic war going on, and 99% of the people are losing......
Read it all - the first 1/3 of the story is a little dry and heavy on stats, but clearly shows how desperate things are at the bottom of society. The whole article will take you about 20 minutes, so pour yourself a glass of wine - you'll need it....
And because you are reading this on your computer at home, you are middle class and may think you are immune to the changes coming - but you're not. If the elites have their way, we will all be poor.
This article should be read by everyone in America, so please forward this to anyone you care about.....it's non-partisan and the future may be equally bleak for all of us,
[D] and [R], unless we wake up............
And once you have read it, run any news story in the corporate or indeed any other media through the filter of this article - from the riots in London, the European economic crisis, our corrosive politics [slash benefits and the safety nets] and even Rick Scott's drive to privatize the Florida prison system. You will see the hidden agenda behind actions, policies and legislation that may have puzzled you before....
Somewhere in the near future it's going to be a crime to be poor, and if you cause any trouble - jail for you boyo......
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