Happy New Year everyone......
1/ You may have heard something about the "Trans Pacific Partnership", but not much substance because this major trade deal has been negotiated in secret by the Obama administration. Why the secrecy? Because if we the public ever get wind of the real implications of this giveaway to the global corporations we would all go ballistic......
The excellent Bill Moyers sits with two experts on this treaty and spell out the implications......29 minutes of intelligent discussion.....long, but it's worth it.
I also found their explanation of what happened under NAFTA most enlightening, as under this bill signed by President Clinton most of the US car industry has moved to Mexico or Canada.....and the Trans Pacific partnership is MUCH worse.....
You will be seeing a concerted effort to fast track this disgusting giveaway to the oligarchy through Congress next week .....a bipartisan screwing of us all coming soon.......
Yves Smith and Dean Baker on Secrets in Trade
November 1, 2013
A US-led trade deal is currently being negotiated that could increase the price of prescription drugs, weaken financial regulations and even allow partner countries to challenge American laws. But few know its substance.
The pact, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), is deliberately shrouded in secrecy, a trade deal powerful people, including President Obama, don’t want you to know about. More than 130 members of Congress have asked the White House for greater transparency about the negotiations and were essentially told to go fly a kite. While most of us are in the dark about the contents of the deal, which Obama aims to seal by year end, corporate lobbyists are in the know about what it contains.
And some vigilant independent watchdogs are tracking the negotiations with sources they trust, including Dean Baker andYves Smith, who join Moyers & Company this week. Both have written extensively about the TPP and tell Bill the pact actually has very little to do with free trade.
2/ One of the reasons news bloopers are so amusing is that because these news readers take themselves so seriously it's great to see them at a more human level, although a few think on their feet and make the best of whatever silliness is happening......this is a 14 minute supercut of the best bloopers of 2013.....
Being a news anchor may seem simple at first glance. Who wouldn’t want to saunter into work, be coiffed and made up by professional stylists, and sit comfortably while reading the news off of a teleprompter? However, television reporting has some harsh realities. From waking up at 3:30 a.m. (or earlier) to collect and convey the morning’s headlines, to bravingblustering storms, to coping with the vagaries of on-the-spot reporting, to feeding a 24-hour news cycle, newscasters have it tough.
Which is why we present this supercut of 2013’s best news bloopers, courtesy of YouTube user NewsBeFunny, with utmost respect for the individuals involved.
3/ Another really good column from Paul Krugman with his commentary on not just the unemployment rate, but the fact the recession has given employers the power to make people with a job work harder, take more responsibility, work more hours and even have their pay cut. In a weak economy the answer to employees who object is "there's the door".......
Everyone I know who is still working in a large corporation says the same thing......more work, more insecurity, same pay.....
The Fear Economy
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: December 26, 2013 1146 Comments
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More than a million unemployed Americans are about to get the cruelest of Christmas “gifts.” They’re about to have their unemployment benefits cut off. You see, Republicans in Congress insist that if you haven’t found a job after months of searching, it must be because you aren’t trying hard enough. So you need an extra incentive in the form of sheer desperation.
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times
Paul Krugman
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As a result, the plight of the unemployed, already terrible, is about to get even worse. Obviously those who have jobs are much better off. Yet the continuing weakness of the labor market takes a toll on them, too. So let’s talk a bit about the plight of the employed.
Some people would have you believe that employment relations are just like any other market transaction; workers have something to sell, employers want to buy what they offer, and they simply make a deal. But anyone who has ever held a job in the real world — or, for that matter, seen a Dilbert cartoon — knows that it’s not like that.
The fact is that employment generally involves a power relationship: you have a boss, who tells you what to do, and if you refuse, you may be fired. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing. If employers value their workers, they won’t make unreasonable demands. But it’s not a simple transaction. There’s a country music classic titled “Take This Job and Shove It.” There isn’t and won’t be a song titled “Take This Consumer Durable and Shove It.”
So employment is a power relationship, and high unemployment has greatly weakened workers’ already weak position in that relationship.
We can actually quantify that weakness by looking at the quits rate — the percentage of workers voluntarily leaving their jobs (as opposed to being fired) each month. Obviously, there are many reasons a worker might want to leave his or her job. Quitting is, however, a risk; unless a worker already has a new job lined up, he or she doesn’t know how long it will take to find a new job, and how that job will compare with the old one.
And the risk of quitting is much greater when unemployment is high, and there are many more people seeking jobs than there are job openings. As a result, you would expect to see the quits rate rise during booms, fall during slumps — and, indeed, it does. Quits plunged during the 2007-9 recession, and they have only partially rebounded, reflecting the weakness and inadequacy of our economic recovery.
Now think about what this means for workers’ bargaining power. When the economy is strong, workers are empowered. They can leave if they’re unhappy with the way they’re being treated and know that they can quickly find a new job if they are let go. When the economy is weak, however, workers have a very weak hand, and employers are in a position to work them harder, pay them less, or both.
Is there any evidence that this is happening? And how
4/ OK lads - time for the best fails of 2013 from TwisterNederland......mayhem, pain and possible hospital visits, drunks doing really dumb stuff, car accidents and a couple of spectacular mobile crane disasters......12 minutes of chaos mostly from Europe......
5/ This is a new perspective on energy - a former BP geologist debunks the optimism here in the US about energy supplies, and argues "peak oil" is real and we have passed this point already, and in about six years there will be serious price rises in the cost of energy.......
It's a nerdish piece with bits of industry jargon thrown in, but sounds pretty convincing because we certainly can't believe the oil industry numbers or the news media......
A former BP geologist speaks out on the danger of peak oil. Photograph: Ben Stansall/AFP/Getty Images
A former British Petroleum (BP) geologist has warned that the age of cheap oil is long gone, bringing with it the danger of "continuous recession" and increased risk of conflict and hunger.
At a lecture on 'Geohazards' earlier this month as part of the postgraduate Natural Hazards for Insurers course at University College London (UCL), Dr. Richard G. Miller, who worked for BP from 1985 before retiring in 2008, said that official data from the InternationalEnergy Agency (IEA), US Energy Information Administration (EIA), International Monetary Fund (IMF), among other sources, showed that conventional oil had most likely peaked around 2008.
Dr. Miller critiqued the official industry line that global reserves will last 53 years at current rates of consumption, pointing out that "peaking is the result of declining production rates, not declining reserves." Despite new discoveries and increasing reliance on unconventional oil and gas, 37 countries are already post-peak, and global oil production is declining at about 4.1% per year, or 3.5 million barrels a day (b/d) per year:
"We need new production equal to a new Saudi Arabia every 3 to 4 years to maintain and grow supply... New discoveries have not matched consumption since 1986. We are drawing down on our reserves, even though reserves are apparently climbing every year. Reserves are growing due to better technology in old fields, raising the amount we can recover – but production is still falling at 4.1% p.a. [per annum]."
6/ No idea how he does this, but it is an astonishing feat of magic and illusion.......an amazing trick, because it must be a trick - isn't it? Five minutes.....
7/ The excellent Matt Taibbi with a political story on how the Republicans are fighting amongst themselves. If you are interested in US politics, this will be a fascinating read......
Karl Rove
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
The holidays are a great time in politics. Every year it's the same: the minute the last bits of wrapping paper have been cleared away, and Grandpa has passed his last puff of holiday gas, you can always retreat to the inside pages of the news section and find some embarrassing/despicable PR fiasco that some politician somewhere has just tried to sneak past vacationing America.
This year was no different. In a fitting homage to past holiday-season embarrassments like the Iran-Contra pardons or Bill Clinton's signing of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, the Republican Party last week quietly declared war on itself, in the process essentially confessing to a generation of failed governance and dumbed-down politics.
The news came in the Wall Street Journal, where the Chamber of Commerce disclosed that it will be teaming up with Republican establishment leaders to spend $50 million in an effort to stem the tide of “fools” who have overwhelmed Republican ballots in recent seasons. Check out the language Chamber strategist Scott Reed used in announcing the new campaign:
Our No. 1 focus is to make sure, when it comes to the Senate, that we have no loser candidates… That will be our mantra: No fools on our ticket.
The blunt choice of words is no accident. All year long, as they’ve crept closer and closer to having to face the reality of a Ted Cruz presidential candidacy in 2016 (with Cruz maybe picking recently-redeemed Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson as his more moderate running mate?), the Beltway’s Republican kingmakers have drifted into ever more alarmist language about the need to change course.
It’s been a transparent effort to reassure industry donors that the party's future isn't a bottomless pit of brainless Bachmanns and Cruzes and Santorums, all convinced our Harvard-educated president is a sleeper-cell Arab and that Satan is a literal being intent on conquering Nebraska with U.N. troops.
Earlier this month, for instance, former House Majority Leader and cause-betraying Tea Party progenitor Dick Armey complained that Republicans have been getting whipped at the polls because "we had a lot of candidates quite frankly that did dumb things out there." And way back in March of last year, Karl Rove himself, speaking on behalf of his Crossroads SuperPAC, told Fox News Sunday that "our goal is to avoid having stupid candidates." Rove’s group is reportedly also involved in this new $50 million effort.
The Chamber's announcement was met with howls of outrage from Tea Party-friendly voices, who naturally took immediate offense to the prospect of boycotting "fools" from the political process.
"Misguided," said Chris Chocola, president of the Club for Growth. "Insane," sneered conservative activist Cleta Mitchell.
Tom Borelli, senior fellow for Armey’s old FreedomWorks group, quite correctly complained that the Chamber and their Republican allies were trying to defy the conservative base by hijacking the party and keeping it in the pocket of big-money interests. "The tea party is about lowering costs," Borelli explained to Newsmax. "[The Chamber will] want regulations to favor big business."
There’s almost no end to the comedy of this story.
8/ And to follow up, a most amusing song from a folk singer with an anthem to the Tea Party........."I Want My Country Back"........wonderful satirical lyrics, about three minutes.....
9/ I remember seeing "Purple Rain" in the cinema....it was an enjoyable movie, but Prince is not a great actor so the movie didn't flow like it should have. He is, however, a wonderful stage performer and this is the clip from the soundtrack of him doing the song Purple Rain in the final scene from the film. This includes his classic guitar solo.......
His Royal Purpleness at his best......
10/ Just when you think we have hit the low point of stupidity in this country, another report comes along that just boggles the mind. According to Pew Research [a respected independent firm] 53% of Republicans believe mankind was created in our present form 10,000 years ago. The report breaks beliefs in evolution down by religion, age, ethnicity and political affiliation......and it certainly confirms my impression of the way the Republican Party has evolved in a very short time - the Party of the stupids.....
Just amazing......no wonder these angry old white people consistently vote for the rich bastards who are screwing them......
According to a new Pew Research Center analysis, six-in-ten Americans (60%) say that “humans and other living things have evolved over time,” while a third (33%) reject the idea of evolution, saying that “humans and other living things have existed in their present form since the beginning of time.” The share of the general public that says that humans have evolved over time is about the same as it was in 2009, when Pew Research last asked the question.
About half of those who express a belief in human evolution take the view that evolution is “due to natural processes such as natural selection” (32% of the American public overall). But many Americans believe that God or a supreme being played a role in the process of evolution. Indeed, roughly a quarter of adults (24%) say that “a supreme being guided the evolution of living things for the purpose of creating humans and other life in the form it exists today.”
These beliefs differ strongly by religious group. White evangelical Protestants are particularly likely to believe that humans have existed in their present form since the beginning of time. Roughly two-thirds (64%) express this view, as do half of black Protestants (50%). By comparison, only 15% of white mainline Protestants share this opinion.
There also are sizable differences by party affiliation in beliefs about evolution, and the gap between Republicans and Democrats has grown. In 2009, 54% of Republicans and 64% of Democrats said humans have evolved over time, a difference of 10 percentage points. Today, 43% of Republicans and 67% of Democrats say humans have evolved, a 24-point gap.
These are some of the key findings from a nationwide Pew Research Center survey conducted March 21-April 8, 2013, with a representative sample of 1,983 adults, ages 18 and older. The survey was conducted on landlines and cellphones in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3.0 percentage points.
11/ Now this is a revelation.
An excellent column in the Times, with commentary on the money and resources being poured into life extension, i.e. slowing down the aging process. The story mentions two of the oligarchs behind these efforts, and because of their funding behind these efforts we should take these possibilities seriously......but there is a problem - money.
These treatments to extend life will be incredibly expensive, and I can't ever foresee this being covered by any of our present insurances.....so who will be living to 120?
Billionaires......the 0.01% will be lording over us all for our lifetimes......
It is probably wise to take Thiel’s idea of an end to aging (or at least its radical postponement) seriously. Any extrapolation from technological progress over the past quarter-century makes the notion plausible. At least seriously enough to ask the question: Do we want this Shangri-La? Do we want a world of boomerang generations where, like Prince Charles still awaiting his big job, we’ll be lucky to come into an inheritance at 80?
More seriously, given limited natural resources, already aging populations, spreading megacities, a dearth of jobs in the developed world, severe strains on health services, disappearing pensions and growing inequality, the idea of radically extending life (initially for the rich, one assumes) seems ominous — even if human adaptability and ingenuity are always underestimated.
Then there are the deeper moral issues. Nature can, of course, be improved upon or we would still be dying of polio. But it would be rash to imagine that tampering to this degree with our human lot and altering so radically the delicate equilibrium of humankind and nature will not produce plenty of Donald Rumsfeld’s “unknown unknowns,” deathless monsters of our own creation. Radical life extension smacks of an intemperate claim to have unlocked the fundamental mystery of life. That is dangerous territory.
This year, the Pew Research Center found that in the United States, where current life expectancy is 78.7 years, 56 percent of American adults said they would not choose to undergo medical treatments to live to 120 or more. Their median ideal life span was 90. A small majority said radical life extension would be bad for society. Americans, it seems, are ready to wear their trousers rolled rather than be seduced by eternal youth.
12/ A wonderful one minute commercial for Purina dog food......I wonder how many takes [and dogs!] it took to get this footage......
13/ A fascinating essay from an Australian paper, written by a yachtsman who sailed the Pacific and saw major problems along the way. This is truly a frightening story.....we may have lost the Pacific Ocean.....
The ocean is broken
By GREG RAY
Oct. 18, 2013, 10 p.m.
IT was the silence that made this voyage different from all of those before it.
Not the absence of sound, exactly.
The wind still whipped the sails and whistled in the rigging. The waves still sloshed against the fibreglass hull.
And there were plenty of other noises: muffled thuds and bumps and scrapes as the boat knocked against pieces of debris.
What was missing was the cries of the seabirds which, on all previous similar voyages, had surrounded the boat.
The birds were missing because the fish were missing.
Exactly 10 years before, when Newcastle yachtsman Ivan Macfadyen had sailed exactly the same course from Melbourne to Osaka, all he'd had to do to catch a fish from the ocean between Brisbane and Japan was throw out a baited line.
"There was not one of the 28 days on that portion of the trip when we didn't catch a good-sized fish to cook up and eat with some rice," Macfadyen recalled.
But this time, on that whole long leg of sea journey, the total catch was two.
No fish. No birds. Hardly a sign of life at all.
"In years gone by I'd gotten used to all the birds and their noises," he said.
"They'd be following the boat, sometimes resting on the mast before taking off again. You'd see flocks of them wheeling over the surface of the sea in the distance, feeding on pilchards."
But in March and April this year, only silence and desolation surrounded his boat, Funnel Web, as it sped across the surface of a haunted ocean.
14/ The Times does a weekly piece in the Travel section titles "36 Hours In...", and last week it was South Beach.....if you haven't been to Miami Beach for a while, it's changed. Boy has it changed.......
36 Hours in South Beach, Miami Beach
Cindy Karp for The New York Times
Clockwise from top left: view from Juvia; the Colony Theater; bikes on the beach; a margarita with Coronas; lifeguard stand. Middle: a dish at Juvia.
By STEPHANIE ROSENBLOOM
Published: December 25, 2013
A weekend in South Beach ought not to begin with “What to pack?” but rather, “What to pursue?” Do you long for the South Beach of painted-on dresses, frozen margaritas and electric neon? The South Beach of stylish new (or renovated) hotels (Gale, Lord Balfour, SLS South Beach) and restaurants (Yardbird Southern Table & Bar, Khong River House, Tongue & Cheek)? Or the South Beach of yesteryear, of pastel Art Deco buildings, museums and monuments? Perhaps you simply crave ...the beach. Miami can be whatever you want it to be — laid back, decked out, gay, straight, a family recess, a single’s playground — which is precisely what makes it such an effortless getaway. In this dreamland at the southern tip of Miami Beach, you can choose your own adventure.
Todays video - time for the "Trunk Monkey" collection again.......funny commercials.....
Todays oldies jokes
Getting Older
A mechanic was removing a cylinder head from the motor of a Harley motorcycle when he spotted a well-known heart surgeon in his shop.
The surgeon was there, waiting for the service manager to come and take a look at his bike.
The mechanic shouted across the garage, "Hey, Doc, can I ask you a question?"
The surgeon a bit surprised, walked over to the mechanic working on the motorcycle. The mechanic straightened up, wiped his hands on a rag and asked, "So Doc, look at this engine. I open its heart, take the valves out, fix 'em, put 'em back in, and when I finish, it works just like new. So how come I get such a small salary and you get the really big bucks, when you and I are doing basically the same work?"
The surgeon paused, smiled and leaned over, and whispered to the mechanic... "Try doing it with the engine running."
******************************
GETTING OLDER? ME TOO.
A distraught senior citizen phoned her doctor's office.
"Is it true," she wanted to know, "that the medication you prescribed has to be taken for the rest of my life?"
"'Yes, I'm afraid so,"' the doctor told her.
There was a moment of silence before the senior lady replied, "I'm wondering, then, just how serious is my condition because this prescription is marked
'NO REFILLS'."
***********************
An older gentleman was on the operating table awaiting surgery and he insisted that his son, a renowned surgeon, perform the operation.
As he was about to get the anesthesia, he asked to speak to his son.
"Yes, Dad, what is it?" "Don't be nervous, son; do your best, and just remember, if it doesn't go well, if something happens to me, your mother
is going to come and live with you and your wife...."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Aging:
Eventually you will reach a point when you stop lying about your age and start bragging about it.
------------------------------
The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for.
------------------------------
Some people try to turn back their odometers.
Not me!
I want people to know why I look this way.
I've traveled a long way and some of the roads weren't paved.
********************
When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to youth, think of Algebra.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You know you are getting old when everything either dries up or leaks.
------------------------------
One of the many things no one tells you about aging is that it is such a nice change from being young.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Ah, being young is beautiful, but being old is comfortable.
*********
First you forget names, then you forget faces.
Then you forget to pull up your zipper....
it's worse when you forget to pull it down.
````````````````
Todays relationships joke
How men and women record things in their diaries.
Wife's Diary:
Tonight, I thought my husband was acting weird. We had made plans to meet at a nice restaurant for dinner.
I was shopping with my friends all day long, so I thought he was upset at the fact that I was a bit late, but he made no comment on it.
Conversation wasn't flowing, so I suggested that we go somewhere quiet so we could talk. He agreed, but he didn't say much.
I asked him what was wrong; He said, 'Nothing.
I asked him if it was my fault that he was upset.
He said he wasn't upset, that it had nothing to do with me, and not to worry about it.
Wife's Diary:
Tonight, I thought my husband was acting weird. We had made plans to meet at a nice restaurant for dinner.
I was shopping with my friends all day long, so I thought he was upset at the fact that I was a bit late, but he made no comment on it.
Conversation wasn't flowing, so I suggested that we go somewhere quiet so we could talk. He agreed, but he didn't say much.
I asked him what was wrong; He said, 'Nothing.
I asked him if it was my fault that he was upset.
He said he wasn't upset, that it had nothing to do with me, and not to worry about it.
On the way home, I told him that I loved him.
He smiled slightly, and kept driving. I can't explain his behavior. I don't know why he didn't say, 'I love you, too.'
When we got home, I felt as if I had lost him completely, as if he wanted nothing to do with me anymore. He just sat there quietly, and watched TV. He continued to seem distant and absent.
Finally, with silence all around us, I decided to go to bed. About 15 minutes later, he came to bed. But I still felt that he was distracted, and his thoughts were somewhere else. He fell asleep; I cried. I don't know what to do. I'm almost sure that his thoughts are with someone else. My life is a disaster.
Husband's Diary:
He smiled slightly, and kept driving. I can't explain his behavior. I don't know why he didn't say, 'I love you, too.'
When we got home, I felt as if I had lost him completely, as if he wanted nothing to do with me anymore. He just sat there quietly, and watched TV. He continued to seem distant and absent.
Finally, with silence all around us, I decided to go to bed. About 15 minutes later, he came to bed. But I still felt that he was distracted, and his thoughts were somewhere else. He fell asleep; I cried. I don't know what to do. I'm almost sure that his thoughts are with someone else. My life is a disaster.
Husband's Diary:
A two-foot putt ... who the hell misses a two-foot putt ?
Todays golfer joke
Sal Wallerstein was at the country club for his weekly round of golf. He began his round with an eagle on the first hole and a birdie on the second.
On the third hole he had just scored his first ever hole-in-one when his cell phone rang... It was a doctor notifying him that his wife had just been in a accident and was in critical condition and in ICU.
The man told the doctor to inform his wife where he was and that he'd be there as soon as possible. As he hung up he realized he was leaving what was shaping up to be his best ever round of golf.
He decided to get in a couple of more holes before heading to the hospital. He ended up playing all eighteen, finishing his round shooting a personal best 61, shattering the club record by five strokes and beating his previous best game by more than 10. He was jubilant....
Then he remembered his wife. Feeling guilty he dashed to the hospital. He saw the doctor in the corridor and asked about his wife's condition.
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