1/ Our country's best financial reporter, Matt Taibbi, with an excellent story on what the "vampire squid" banks are up to now, and it's not good news.
The megabanks are investing in commodities and corporations that actually make things, with the result of higher prices for everyone, and huge profits for Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan Chase. Since they own the Congress and the regulators that are supposed to have oversight of them, don't expect any action soon......
Devious Scam Yet
Banks are no longer just financing heavy industry. They are actually buying it up and inventing bigger, bolder and scarier scams than ever
C
Wall Street had spent much of that era arguing that America's banks needed to become bigger and badder, in order to compete globally with the German and Japanese-style financial giants, which were supposedly about to swallow up all the world's banking business. So through legislative lackeys like red-faced Republican deregulatory enthusiast Phil Gramm, bank lobbyists were pushing a new law designed to wipe out 60-plus years of bedrock financial regulation. The key was repealing – or "modifying," as bill proponents put it – the famed Glass-Steagall Act separating bankers and brokers, which had been passed in 1933 to prevent conflicts of interest within the finance sector that had led to the Great Depression. Now, commercial banks would be allowed to merge with investment banks and insurance companies, creating financial megafirms potentially far more powerful than had ever existed in America.
But the crazy thing is, nobody at the time quite knew it. Most observers on the Hill thought the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 – also known as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act – was just the latest and boldest in a long line of deregulatory handouts to Wall Street that had begun in the Reagan years.
All of this was big enough news in itself. But it would take half a generation – till now, basically – to understand the most explosive part of the bill, which additionally legalized new forms of monopoly, allowing banks to merge with heavy industry. A tiny provision in the bill also permitted commercial banks to delve into any activity that is "complementary to a financial activity and does not pose a substantial risk to the safety or soundness of depository institutions or the financial system generally."
Complementary to a financial activity. What the hell did that mean?
2/ Jon Stewart is at his best when he is dismembering Fox News, and this is an excellent one......about two minutes.....
Terror on Bulls#%t Mountain
The residents of Bulls**t Mountain champion the same "job lock" they once railed against. (02:01)
3/ Frank Rich with his usual insightful commentary on the events of last week, including the hapless John Boehner, Hillary and NFL's Michael Sam..........
Every week, New York Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich talks with contributor Eric Benson about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week: John Boehner's surrender on debt-limit fight, new revelations about Hillary Clinton from a friend's papers, and what Michael Sam's decision to come out of the closet means for the NFL.
Three years ago, Republican House Speaker John Boehner implemented a strategy of debt-limit brinksmanship, threatening the country with default if the Democrats didn't offer steep spending cuts. Yesterday, Boehner abandoned that strategy, and, amid howls from his party, brought a clean debt-limit bill to the House floor. (It passed, primarily with Democratic votes.) What does Boehner's surrender mean for his party and his speakership? And how big a victory was it for the Democrats and President Obama?
This was a temporary victory for what remains of the Republican Establishment, and that’s about it. The right’s extortion tactic — give us what we want or we’ll blow up Washington — was proven a political fiasco (as if any proof were needed) by the October shutdown. According to Robert Costa of the Washington Post, Boehner told his caucus that this time, “we’re not going to make ourselves the story.” So his change in tactics was intended to decouple the GOP brand from obstructionism, and to placate Wall Street donors who prefer order to market-roiling chaos. But most of the Republican base doesn’t believe in this temporary truce. Nor do most Republican members of the House — 199 voted against Boehner, only 28 with him. (Many among those 28 are either affiliated with the leadership or are retiring from the House at the end of this term). Even some party leaders, Paul Ryan and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (who gave the GOP’s rebuttal to Obama’s State of the Union last month), sided with the rebels.
4/ I know this is juvenile humour, I know this is dumb teenage male stupid, but it's still "guy" funny.....one minute of farting, Olympic farting......boys back me up on this one.......
Sorry ladies.....
5/ A second Frank Rich, on Olympic media coverage vs Kiev, and legislation going through Republican statehouses that allow businesses to refuse to serve gays....
Note - as of this morning Arizona has a bill on Governor Brewer's desk!
Every week, New York Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich talks with contributor Eric Benson about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week: troubling questions about the Sochi Games and a look at the latest legislative move by opponents of gay marriage.
The Olympics have a history of turning a blind eye toward politics, with notorious instances like the Nazi-hosted 1936 Berlin Games and the 1968 Mexico City Games staged amid global protests and the bloody Tlateloco Massacre. This week, the streets of Kiev exploded as Ukraine's Putin-backed President Viktor Yanukovych cracked down on his country's anti-government, pro-Western protestors (presumably with the assent of Putin) setting off days of bloodshed. Did the IOC make a grave mistake in handing these games to Russia? And what, if any, should be the response of the IOC, athletes, and the Olympics media to this conflict?
There’s no way to know now, but history could well end up judging the Sochi Games as harshly as it does the notorious Berlin Games. Already Garry Kasparov, the chess champion and anti-Putin dissident, is making the analogy. He notes that “Hitler in 1936 was seen as a thoroughly respectable and legitimate politician” and argues that the current IOC chairman, Thomas Bach, a German, should “have learned something from history.” If Putin’s authoritarian agenda of harsh and violent repression keeps metastasizing in Russia, Ukraine, Syria, and elsewhere — a likely prospect once the Games are over and he is liberated from acting within its spotlight — Sochi may be remembered, as the Berlin Games are, as a giant propaganda gift bestowed on him by dupes and quislings.
The athletes are mere pawns in the chess game between Russia and the West. They should do what their individual consciences dictate. The Ukraine’s 43 competing athletes have shown remarkable bravery in that regard, asking to wear black armbands to symbolize the “deep pain” and the “sorrow and sympathy” they feel over the loss of their fellow countrymen. That the IOC has shut down this mild, earnest protest is shameful. At least the committee has not yet tried to silence the figure skater-turned-commentator Johnny Weir, who is now wearing his hair in “a traditional Ukrainian braid” to show solidarity with the Ukraine protestors.
6/ When you see any type of food product in the supermarket labelled "natural", don't buy it! It's meaningless BS put there to reassure you their chemicals are good for you......
A good four minute video [below] on the way Big Ag tries to fool you.....but we're smarter than they are, aren't we? Watch this amusing little life lesson.....
And I read this week that Horizon organics [milk, dairy] has grown so big they are using factory farming and are in danger of losing their organic certification.....but they won't of course, because they have lobbyists.....
A public education campaign was launched this week to highlight the benefits of organic “Foods made with the use of toxic persistent pesticides and even genetically engineered (GE) ingredients are being labeled as natural,” said Gary Hirshberg, chairman of Stonyfield Farm. “Only organic guarantees that food is produced without the use of toxic persistent pesticides, hormones, antibiotics or genetically engineered ingredients. Only organic gives you complete piece of mind.”
The public education campaign will include videos to help consumers understand the how the “natural” label can be used to confuse shoppers. The videos were developed by the recently launched agency Humanaut with help from advertising icon Alex Bogusky.
“Only organic is produced in a way that Mother Nature would recognize as natural,” said Sarah Bird, chief marketing officer for Annie’s, Inc. “Many products that claim to be ‘natural’ are made with ingredients you couldn’t find in nature—including artificial flavors or colors, synthetic preservatives, high fructose corn syrup and genetically engineered ingredients.”
Natural claims have been added to everything from cooking oils made from genetically engineered crops to ice cream made from cows pumped full of growth hormones.
“Many consumers mistakenly believe that foods labeled as ‘natural’ are better than food that has been certified as organic,” said Lewis Goldstein, vice president of brand marketing at Organic Valley. “Organic food starts with organic farming, from the ground up. Only organic is subject to tough, enforceable standards created by the USDA designed to insure that our families can count on their food being produced in ways that protect their health, the environment and the welfare of farm animals.”
This is the video, "The Natural Effect".....four minutes, and amusing......
7/ A seriousish Bill Maher, with some pithy talk on politicians with, of course, some wonderful zingers. This is Maher as an activist/comedian, and he is very effective......
In his show-ending New Rule Friday night, Bill Maherrevealed the secret to presidential campaign success: run as soon as you can, because the longer you wait, the more baggage you have, and the more sick and tired people are of you. Maher said this is whyPresident Obama won in 2008, because he was a “blank canvas” upon which people could project their hopes and dreams.
Why? Because parties that nominate the “older guy who’s waited his turn,” like Al Gore or Mitt Romney, they lose, because there’s no “romance” or “mystery.” Or in the case of John McCain, “a pulse.”
Maher brought up Hillary Clinton‘s baggage, though mostly to mock how Republicans are making Monicagate a big deal, as if Hillary was “in on it.” He also took a few swipes at Chris Christie, who was a shining and well-respected candidate in 2012, but is now “350 pounds of toast.”
8/ The Comcast/ Time Warner merger is a disaster for consumers.....a monopoly will become even larger and more inefficient.....this is the vampire squid of the media world.....
Comcast has announced a deal to acquire Time Warner Cable. Photograph: Andrew Burton/Getty Images
As Comcast pushes regulators to approve its just-announced deal to buy out Time Warner Cable, it'll make one essential point: the acquisition won't visibly change the competitive landscape for TV and internetcustomers.
Nice try. Regulators and competition authorities are supposed to consider the public interest when looking at such deals. In no way does the public interest benefit from this one (as Michael Hiltzik pointed out in the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday).
We're talking immense scale with this deal. Comcast – which completed its takeover of NBC Universal a year ago in a deal that never should have been allowed in the first place – is the nation's biggest cable company, with about 21m subscribers. Time Warner Cable, the second largest, has 11m. According to the Wall Street Journal, the combined company will sell off what amounts to 3m of those subscribers in order to keep its overall market share slightly below a mythical threshold that raises worries about too much market power.
The public interest is not served when a company that provides one-third of all cable TV service in America replaces two smaller ones (which were plenty big in the first place). It is not served when that company already owns one of the four major broadcast networks, a major movie studio, several cable channels (including CNBC, which will assuredly be boosterish) and other properties.
And the public interest is distinctly not served when what's already the largest and most important internet service provider becomes vastly more so.
9/ Guy video alert!
The new Corvette is incredible looking, and the reviews of the car say it's the best Corvette yet.... a stock model tops 200 mph on a closed highway in Texas......very cool......four testosterone filled minutes......
On December 11, 2013, a 700 HP Hennessey C7 became the first 2014 Corvette Stingray to break the 200 mph barrier by reaching a maximum speed of 200.6 mph. This was achieved on a closed section of the Grand Parkway which connects I-10 to Hwy. 290 on the west side of Houston, Texas. Officials from TxDOT, Texas DPS and TransCore were on hand to witness the testing of the EZ tag toll system.
10/ And here's a guy article....you've seen the ads for "Low T" pills, but it's an invented condition designed to screw with your head......read this, and don't worry - even if you are addicted to HGTV or like Judy Garland, you don't have "Low T" and you don't need this awful drug......
Don’t Ask Your Doctor About ‘Low T’
By JOHN LA PUMAFEB. 3, 2014
Benjamin Marra
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — A FUNNY thing has happened in the United States over the last few decades. Men’s average testosterone levels have been dropping by at least 1 percent a year, according to a 2006 study in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.
Testosterone appears to decline naturally with aging, but internal belly fat depresses the hormone further, especially in obese men. Drugs like steroids and opiates also lower testosterone, and it’s suspected that chemicals like bisphenol A (or BPA, commonly found in plastic food containers) and diseases like Type 2 diabetes play a role as well.
Men feel the loss. Clinical testosterone deficiency, which is variously defined as lower than 220 to 350 nanograms of testosterone per deciliter of blood serum, can cause men to lose sex drive and fertility. Their bone density often declines, and they may feel tired and experience hot flashes and sweats.
But “low T,” as the condition has been labeled, isn’t nearly as common as the drug ads for prescription testosterone would have you believe. Pharmaceutical companies have seized on the decline in testosterone levels as pathological and applicable to every man. They aim to convince men that common effects of aging like slowing down a bit and feeling less sexual actually constitute a new disease, and that they need a prescription to cure it. This is a seductive message for many men, who just want to feel better than they do, and want to give it a shot, literally.
The problem is that prescription testosterone doesn’t just give your T level a boost: it may also increase your risk of heart attack. It can add huge numbers of red blood cells to your bloodstream and shrink your testes. In some men, it increases aggression and irritability.
11/ Five delicious moments when Fox News hosts are crushed by their expert guests, two are with the bombastic bully O'Reilly.......three wonderful minutes.....
Every once in a while, the truth sneaks through on Fox. For more, visit mediamatters.org
12/ If you're poor, you're toast......[mostly] red states have privatized the collection of fines, and the result is a profit driven system that sinks the poor deeper in debt.....I can hear them now - "Bring Back the Poorhouses!"
CREDIT: SHUTTERSTOCK
For those who can afford it, many misdemeanor violations and traffic violations are punished with a fine that can be paid the very same day. But for those who can’t, those same offenses may become subject to a punishment much more menacing, in a profit-driven system of private probation that imposes interest and fees with a threat of jail time on those who are often least able to pay.
In one Georgia instance documented in an extensive new Human Rights Watch report, a man who stole a $2 can of beer ended up in jail for failure to pay a $200 fine that ballooned into more than $1,000 under the supervision of a private probation firm. Thomas Barrett’s entire income — which included selling his own blood plasma — was less than the monthly fee imposed by the private probation firm.
In Mississippi, a woman who had paid off her entire $377 fine for driving without a license was being threatened with arrest for failure to pay so-called “supervision fees” being charged by a private probation firm. Court officials told Human Rights Watch the firm had no authority to threaten arrest.
In Alabama, judges have enforced the threats of probation companies to impose jail time for those who fees and fines that piled up from private probation.
More than 1,000 courts around the country are shifting the burden of monitoring payment of fines to private probation firms, sentencing hundreds of thousands of individuals each year to their supervision. In what is perhaps the most extensive documentation of the practice of privatizing another aspect of the criminal justice system, Human Rights Watch finds that these firms are subject to scant monitoring by local governments and courts, free to impose fees and fines in amounts that are not regulated by any government entity.
13/ These GoPro cameras are something else - here one falls from a plane , still working, and ends up in a pig pen.....say hello porky!! One minute......
14/ Mary sent me this one, and I have no idea why.......it doesn't mention anything to do with a garage......
37 Things In Your Home To Get Rid Of Right Now
- The extra packet of buttons that came with a cardigan that you've since donated
- Stained t-shirts you've had since college
- The ratty towel you've been using in lieu of a bath mat
- Holiday cards
- The treasure trove of plastic grocery bags under your sink
- Unidentified foil-wrapped things in your fridge or freezer
- 2013's calendar
- Promotional mugs or glasses that came free with a meal
- Piles of ticket stubs, old transit passes, etc., to concerts, movies and places you don't really remember going to in the first place
- Any receipts that have accumulated in your pockets or purse (unless it's something you'll need come tax time)
- All the stacks of magazines you haven't touched in months
15/ Remember a song called "Luka" from Suzanne Vega from the late 80's? This is a live version recorded for NPR, with an amazing guitarist Gerry Leonard accompanying her.......a lot of the comments under the video mention the astonishingly good quality of the sound, excellent geetar music!
This is an interesting song and caused some controversy when it came out, as it's about child abuse....haunting lyrics then, and disturbing images in your head now if you listen to the lyrics. Luka is three minutes or so, but the set is 18 minutes.....
16/ The scum we have running our state are taken to task by Carl Hiaasen in the Miami Herald......Rick "Skeletor" Scott and Evil Pam Bondi have filed an amicus brief in a lawsuit ........about Chesapeake Bay? Huh?
Read on......see what our slimy, revolting, corrupt Governor is up to now......an excellent story from Carl Hiaasen....
Muddying the waters far from home
BY CARL HIAASEN
CHIAASEN@MIAMIHERALD.COM
Your tax dollars hard at work:
The state of Florida has joined a lawsuit aimed at blocking a massive cleanup plan for Chesapeake Bay.
The Chesapeake Bay.
And, no, you can’t make this stuff up.
Last week, Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi filed a brief — paid for with your taxes — attacking the legality of the Chesapeake Bay Clean Water Blueprint.
The plan was devised by six bay area states, the District of Columbia and the federal government. Its mission is to improve water quality in the rivers, streams and estuaries of the Chesapeake region.
A federal judge upheld the terms of the so-called blueprint, which will limit the amount of pollution being dumped, but the ruling is being appealed.
Why would the state of Florida try to obstruct the cleanup of public waters hundreds of miles away from our own? Because Bondi and Gov. Rick Scott are complete tools.
They aren’t suing on behalf of the citizens of Florida; they’re suing on behalf of big agricultural and development interests that don’t want the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency enforcing clean-water laws anywhere.
Todays video - the trailer scene from "Kill Bill 2", where Uma Thurman fights her one-eyed sister.......amazing piece of cinema in such a small area.....has one bit that's not for the squeamish.......
Zoe Bell and Monica Staggs jointly won two 2005 Tarus stunt awards for the Best Fight / Best Stunt by a Woman combination for the trailer fight scene from 'Kill Bill 2". Doubling Uma Thurman (the Bride) and Daryl Hanna (Ellie Driver) respectively their performance is the best Girl Fight ever put on film. The gruesome ending is
Todays blond jokes
TROUBLEA blonde pushes her BMW into a gas station. She tells the
mechanic it died. After he works on it for a few minutes, it is idling smoothly.She says, 'What's the story?'He replies, 'Just crap in the carburetor'She asks, 'How often do I have to do that?'SPEEDING
TICKETA police officer stops a blonde for speeding and asks her very nicely if he could see her license.She replied in a huff, 'I wish you guys would get your act together.
Just yesterday you take away my license and then today you expect me to show it to you!'RIVER
WALKThere's this blonde out for a walk. She comes to a river and sees another blonde on the opposite bank 'Yoo-hoo!' she shouts, 'How can I get to the other side?'The second blonde looks up the river then down the river and shouts back, 'You ARE on the other side.'AT THE DOCTOR'S OFFICEA gorgeous young redhead goes into the doctor's office and said that her body hurt wherever she touched it.'Impossible!' says the doctor.. 'Show me.'The redhead took her finger, pushed on her left shoulder and screamed, then she pushed her elbow and screamed even more. She pushed her knee and screamed; likewise she pushed her ankle and screamed. Everywhere she touched made her scream.The doctor said, 'You're not really a redhead, are you?'Well, no' she said, 'I'm actually a blonde.''I thought so,' the doctor said, 'Your finger is broken.'KNITTINGA highway patrolman pulled alongside a speeding car on the freeway. Glancing at the car, he was astounded to see that the blonde behind the wheel was knitting!Realizing that she was oblivious to his flashing lights and siren, the trooper cranked down his window, turned on his bullhorn and yelled, 'PULL OVER!''NO!' the blonde yelled back, 'IT'S A SCARF!'BLONDE
ON THE SUNA Russian, an American, and a Blonde were talking one day.The Russian said, 'We were the first in space!'The American said, 'We were the first on the moon!'The Blonde said, 'So what? We're going to be the first on the sun!' The Russian and the American looked at each other and shook their heads.'You can't land on the sun, you idiot! You'll burn up!' said the Russian.To which the Blonde replied, 'We're not stupid, you know. We're going at night!'IN A
VACUUMA blonde was playing Trivial Pursuit one night... It was her turn. She rolled the dice and she landed on Science & Nature. Her question was, 'If you are in a vacuum and someone calls your name, can you hear it?' She thought for a time and then asked, 'Is it on or off?'FINALLY,
THE BLONDE JOKE TO END ALL BLONDE JOKES!A girl was visiting her blonde friend, who had acquired two new dogs, and asked her what their names were. The blonde responded by saying that one was named Rolex and one was named Timex. Her friend said, 'Whoever heard of someone naming dogs like that?' 'HELLLOOOOOOO......,' answered the blonde. 'They're watch dogs'
Todays religious joke
Todays golf joke
A golfer hits his ball into a yard next to the golf course..As he goes to get it a man in the yard says, "Don't you see the sign? It says, "Private property Stay Out! "The golfer says, "I'm sorry I did not see it. That is my ball there. May I have it, please?"The man says, "It's in my yard and so it's my ball now."The golfer looks at the man and says, "I understand."He then walks back to the golf cart, gets another golf ball, then walks back and throws it into the yard.The man says, "What is that for?"Gentleman replies, "I consider myself a gentleman, and I believe every prickshould have two balls."
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