1/ Long but fascinating article from New York Magazine about the Obama strategy for the November elections - although they will be outspent 2 to 1 by a combination of Romney and the right wing SuperPacs they are still confident the President will be reelected.....but it will be a squeaker......
Good reading if you are interested in politics......required reading if you're a Democrat......
David Plouffe sits in his White House office, just a few steps from the Oval, staring at an oversize map of these United States. It’s late afternoon on May 9, two hours after Barack Obama’s declaration that his evolution on gay marriage has reached its terminus. The president is down the hall and on the phone, discussing his decision’s theological implications with several prominent African-American pastors—while Plouffe is being queried about its political dimensions by a querulous Caucasian reporter. The map at which Plouffe is gazing isn’t the electoral kind with the states shaded blue and red; as a federal employee, he notes wryly, “I’m not permitted to have one on the wall.” But given the way his head is hardwired, I’m pretty sure Plouffe is seeing those colors regardless.
The question of whether Obama’s new stance narrows or widens his path to victory in November is one that Plouffe and his comrades have been agonizing over since early this year, when their boss returned from vacation and told them he wanted to take the plunge. The possible political benefits are clear: jazzing up young voters, ginning up gay dollars. As are the costs: turning off socially conservative Democrats and independents, particularly in four pivotal swing states—Iowa, Ohio, North Carolina, and Virginia. But as to the net effect of the announcement on Obama’s ability to accumulate 270 electoral votes, his adjutants are unable to render a firm verdict. “I think there is more upside potential than downside potential,” Plouffe says. “But is there a scenario where it’s harder? Yes.”
2/ Lord Barack takes on Sir Romney of the Northlands - surprisingly good parody of the upcoming election, if it was being held in the middle ages with "Game of Thrones"......an amusing 4 minutes.......love the weaselly Santorum character.....
3/ According to a University study watching Fox News makes you stupid.........something we know instinctively has been researched and confirmed......
People who work at Fox News might like to think that they are despised by real journalists only because they are conservative and most journalists are liberal. Anyone who read the admiring obituaries of William F. Buckley Jr. in mainstream and liberal
But Fox does not. The reason is not because it holds a set of values that others may not share. And that is only partially because it claims to be “Fair and Balanced” when it is neither.
Rather, it is because it fails the fundamental test of journalism: are you informing your audience? According to a new study by Farleigh Dickinson University, Fox viewers are the least knowledgeable audience of any outlet, and they know even less about politics and current events than people who watch no news at all.
Respondents to the survey were able to answer correctly an average of 1.8 of 4 questions about international news and 1.6 out of 5 questions about domestic affairs. “Based on these results, people who don’t watch any news at all are expected to answer correctly on average 1.22 of the questions about domestic politics, just by guessing or relying on existing basic knowledge,” said Dan Cassino, the poll’s analyst.
“The study concludes that media sources have a significant impact on the number of questions that people were able to answer correctly,” wrote Cassino and his colleagues. “The largest effect is that of Fox News: all else being equal, someone who watched only Fox News would be expected to answer just 1.04 domestic questions correctly—a figure which is significantly worse than if they had reported watching no media at all. On the other hand, if they listened only to NPR, they would be expected to answer 1.51 questions correctly.”
4/ Not only does it make you stupid, but if you watch Fox News you are watching Republican TV - have a look at the 4 minute video shown on "Fox and Friends"......it's like an attack ad from a SuperPac......
It isn't that they don't have the right to put out this kind of stuff, but the problem is that there is a pretense that it's actual news, "fair and balanced"......it's neither......
"Fox and Friends" aired a remarkable four-minute video on its Wednesday show.
The video, which the hosts of the show advertised as taking a "look back" at President Obama's four years in office, could easily be mistaken for a Republican attack ad. It was aired multiple times throughout the show. (UPDATE: Fox News later issued a statement disavowing the ad and attributing it to an associate producer. See the statement below.)
"We decided to take a look back at the president's first term to see if it lived up to hope and change," host Gretchen Carlson asked at one point, introducing the video.
In the video —which is labeled as a "Fox and Friends Presents" production — viewers see images of Obama talking about jobs contrasted with footage of homeless people. There is dark, foreboding music, and statistics about the unemployment rate, the rise in the number of food stamps, and the national debt, among other things.
5/ Jon Stewart is back from a 2 week break, and rips Roger Ailes [head of Fox News] a new one for calling him a socialist.....excellent 8 minute segment.......
Jon Stewart devoted part of a segment on Tuesday night to, well, himself. He took aim at Fox News head Roger Ailes saying he recalled a conversation they had at a bar, in which Stewart confessed he’s basically a socialist. Well, Stewart said, Ailes had a confession of his own agenda. He then went on to clarify what he really meant.
6/ Economics is always clearly and simply explained by Simon Johnson, and in this article he tells us how the Euro zone is doomed to break up.......the European news is full of this crisis, and the issue is the authorities still believe in austerity by the problem governments, Greece and now Spain....but the voters aren't having it.....
So get ready for eventual chaos......which depends on how long can the euro zone hold together. Johnson's story is a little technical in the middle, but very clear towards the end. He is basically saying the same as Paul Krugman......
This is big deal folks, serious shit......
In every economic crisis there comes a moment of clarity. In Europe soon, millions of people will wake up to realize that the euro-as-we-know-it is gone. Economic chaos awaits them.
To understand why, first strip away your illusions. Europe’s crisis to date is a series of supposedly “decisive” turning points that each turned out to be just another step down a steep hill. Greece’s upcoming election on June 17 is another such moment. While the so-called “pro-bailout” forces may prevail in terms of parliamentary seats, some form of new currency will soon flood the streets of Athens. It is already nearly impossible to save Greek membership in the euro area: depositors flee banks, taxpayers delay tax payments, and companies postpone paying their suppliers – either because they can’t pay or because they expect soon to be able to pay in cheap drachma.
The troika of the European Commission (EC), European Central Bank (ECB), and International Monetary Fund (IMF) has proved unable to restore the prospect of recovery in Greece, and any new lending program would run into the same difficulties. In apparent frustration, the head of the IMF, Christine Lagarde, remarked last week, “As far as Athens is concerned, I also think about all those people who are trying to escape tax all the time.”
7/ Donald Trump - what a certified asshole he is, now reviving the birther issue......Stephen Colbert gives us a wonderful 4 minute segment on 'the Donald".....
Donald Trump and his birther crusade just won't go away. On tonight's Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert examined the latest in Trump's ridiculousness and explained what it means for Mitt Romney.
8/ The best stories about complex issues are the human ones - here is a painful tale of one man's end of life care, and how it and millions of other examples are bankrupting us all......and causing pain and misery along the way........
The lesson of this story is that if you don't want this to happen to you, you need
1/ a living will, with your wishes clearly stated and
2/ a medical surrogate who will say "NO" to the medical system, which will keep you on the machines till you run out of money unless someone makes the hard decisions......
Why Did Her Husband’s End-of-Life Care Cost So Much?
May 28, 2012 1:00 AM EDT$33,382 for one hospital stay. $43,711 for the next. And a final $14,022 for the last three days of life. This is the price tag of dying in America.
On Thursday, Nov. 8, 2007, my husband, Terence Foley, lay down on the floor of a doctor’s examining room and refused to get up.
For seven years Terence and I had fought against his kidney cancer. The disease was now spreading to other parts of his body. He was exhausted and coughing. So worn out he couldn’t sit upright. He twisted and squirmed trying to make himself comfortable. I bundled his jacket under his head and covered him with my coat.
He was clearly very sick, yet we still weren’t giving up. Our oncologist, Dr. Keith Flaherty, believed that an experimental treatment would gain Terence more life. Meanwhile, he had sent us to this lung specialist, hoping he could attack one of the tumors and make Terence more comfortable while we waited for the new medicine to take effect.
Instead, shaking his head, the doctor we had never met before admitted Terence to an advanced-cancer-care ward at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital. And then an entirely new set of doctors took over, and there began the kind of end-of-life drama that unfolds in hospitals across the country every day.
During those four days Terence had his blood drawn—eight times. Urine collected at least twice. There was a CT scan of his chest and an MRI of his brain. A physical therapist dropped by several times. A nutritionist talked about cancer fatigue, decompensation, and calorie needs. Over the stay, at least 29 professionals—nurses, physical therapists, a nutritionist, and nine M.D.s—attended to his needs. We had never met any of them before, and I don’t recall ever meeting the majority of them even then.
9/ Amazing 2 minute video of traffic at a busy intersection in India.....organised chaos......and pedestrians as well......seems to work though.......
10/ One of the surprising things about Canada is how to reconcile the "kindler gentler America" image with the wholesale destruction of the environment that is happening in the Alberta tar sands oil fields......
The explanation is simple - the Canadians elected a right wing government, who immediately proceeded to overrule their scientists and embrace the oil companies and their money.......
This is an open letter from someone on the inside who is speaking up......
Dear Everyone,
My name is Naomi. I am Canadian. I worked for Environment Canada, our federal environmental department, for several years before our current Conservative leadership (under Stephen Harper) began decimating environmentalism in Canada. I, along with thousands and thousands of federal science employees lost any hope of future work. Their attitude towards the environment is ‘screw research that contradicts the economic growth, particularly of the oil sands’. They have openly and officially denigrated anyone that supports the environment and opposes big-money oil profit as ‘radicals’ (http://tinyurl.com/7wwf8dp).
Every day in Canada, new information about their vendetta on science and the environment becomes quietly public and keeps piling up. I have been privy to much first-hand information still because I retain friendships with my ex-colleagues (though my blood pressure hates me for it).
While I was working there, scientists were effectively muzzled from speaking to the media without prior confirmation with Harper’s media team (http://tinyurl.com/7bnsqp4) – usually denied, and when allowed, totally controlled. Scientists were threatened with job loss if they said anything in an interview that was not exactly what the media team had told them to say. This happened in 2008. The public didn’t find out for years.
11/ A video from Australian TV, asking Americans simple questions about the world........a little unfair because anyone with the answers would be edited out, but overall our fellow citizens are pretty ignorant of geography and world affairs.....because they don't teach geography any more in school, and TV news doesn't cover world news unless it's a crisis.......
So maybe this video isn't unfair after all......5 minutes......and quite amusing......
12/ And similar to the Canadian story the truth will out eventually - FCAT is the universally despised student scoring system used in Florida, but this year the scores plummeted.
Why? Read on.......the author tells us how the scoring centers produce corrupt results.....
The scores for the writing portion of this year's FCAT (Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test) plummeted so precipitously that the abilities of the Sunshine State's student writers aren't being called into question, the very validity of those scoring statistics are. While I don't want to say "I told you so" regarding the dubiousness of those statistics, I did tell you so, as my 2009 book highlighted in great detail all the ways the numbers produced by the for-profit testing industry cannot be trusted.
Especially the stats produced at Pearson scoring centers around the country, where I worked for some 15 years.
On the first project I worked scoring student essays, I had to pass a qualifying exam to stay on the job. When I failed that qualifying exam (twice), I was unceremoniously fired. So were half the original hundred scorers who'd also failed the tests. Of course, when Pearson realized the next morning they no longer had enough scorers to complete the project on time, they simply lowered the "passing" grade on the qualifying test and put us flunkies right back on the job.
Yes, those of us considered unable to score student essays 12 hours before were welcomed back into the scoring center with open arms, deemed "qualified" after all.
Such duplicity was not an aberration in my experience, as for a decade and a half I saw every sort of corporate chicanery and statistical tomfoolery. The test-scoring industry seemed focused on getting deadlines met, projects completed, and scores put on tests, but only then was any thought given to meaningful scores being put on them.
13/ Wow - the new video from Madonna "Girls Gone Wild".....erotic, sensual and as raunchy as any music video put out by Lady Gaga......and the dancing and choreography is incredible......
14/ A Florida DEP [Department of Environmental Protection] official was suspended after she refused a permit to a North Florida ranch trying to declare a dry area a wetland......
It's a complex story, but shows the routine corruption of anything environmental in Rick Scott's Florida......
Florida's top state wetlands expert has been suspended after she refused to issue a permit on a controversial project — one that she said her boss was willing to bend the rules to approve.
The project: turning a North Florida pine plantation into a business that attempts to make up for wetlands that are wiped out by new roads and development. At stake: millions of dollars in wetland "credits" that can be sold to government and developers.
The problem, according to a May 9 memo from Department of Environmental Protection wetlands expert Connie Bersok, is that the owners want the DEP to give them lots of wetland credits for land that isn't wet.
After being told by Deputy Secretary Jeff Littlejohn to ignore the rules she had followed on other permits, Bersok wrote, "I hereby state my objection to the intended agency action and refusal to recommend this permit for issuance."
Two days later, Bersok was suspended pending an investigation, her personnel file shows. She declined to comment for this article without DEP permission. DEP officials would not allow a reporter to speak with her. A spokeswoman would not discuss her case.
15/ And more on Florida, this time the purge of the voter rolls by Rick Scott - Rachael Maddow with a wonderful analysis of how Jeb Bush stole the 2000 election for his idiot brother, and now the Rickster is trying to do it again for our pet Mormon.......
If you care about the integrity of Florida's elections, watch this 17 minute piece from the best commentator on the air......
16/ Summer TV, the wasteland of reruns and Kardashians....but the Daily Beast has found some new shows worth watching.....
Unfortunately the best one, "Damages" with Glenn Close and Rose Byrne, is on Direct TV. And the new season of "True Blood" is on HBO.......
Todays video - some lads get bored at the airport.......
Todays Jewish joke
Her two female parrots have picked up a bad habit. Any time she has visitors, the two parrots embarrass her by saying, in unison, "Hi ! We're prostitutes. Want to have some fun?"
To her surprise, the rabbi breaks into a smile, explaining that he has two male parrots which he has trained to pray and who've become very observant, spending much of the day praying in their cage.
He's confident that if the woman brings her two parrots over to his house, his two parrots will exert such a positive influence that her birds will turn into model parrots.
The next day the woman drives over to the rabbi's house and brings her two parrots into his home. As she looks around, she notices a large cage with two parrots, each wearing a little yarmulke while they rock back and forth in prayer.
Sure enough, as soon as she places her female parrots in the cage, they shout out to their male counterparts: "Hi! We're prostitutes. Want to have some fun ?"
One of the rabbi's parrots immediately turns to the other, squawking: "Moishe, put the fucking book down. Our prayers have been answered!"
Todays school jokes - notes from some young British students
Todays drinking and driving joke
I would like to share an experience with you, about drinking and driving.
As you well know, some of us have been known to have had brushes with the authorities
on our way home from the odd social sessions over the years.
Knowing full well I may have been slightly over the limit, I did something
Sure enough I passed a police road block but as it was a bus they waved it past.
I've never done before: I took a bus home.
I arrived home safely without incident,
which was a real surprise as I have never driven a bus before and am not
sure where I got it.
No comments:
Post a Comment