A new poll on the Massachusetts Senate race has state Attorney General Martha Coakley dominating the field with 37 percent support from registered Democrats and unenrolled voters, who are eligible to vote in the primary. That is more than double her nearest challenger, with 14 percent backing Boston Celtics co-owner Steve Pagliuca and 13 percent supporting Congressman Mike Capuano.

What are the stances of these candidates on issues? Amazingly, in a state where seven out of ten representatives have endorsed HR 676, the United States National Health Care Act, only one candidate out of four Democrats and one Republican supports Medicare for All, and that's Mike Capuano. Even his support is not the most avid, since he doesn't talk about it very often and has sometimes qualified it with "if I were emperor." But support is still support, and he's an HR 676 cosponsor.

In contrast, Martha Coakley supports a plan that is quite different: the so-called "strong public option," no doubt meaning the version that the CBO estimated in July would cover only about 10 million people after it was implemented. In the recent white paper released by her campaign, she says:

The full version of this blog post is available at ZBlogs. (You'll need to click the link twice. New visitors are redirected to the Emergency Funding Appeal.)

Did I get your attention?

 

I realize that many bloggers are Democrats and believe in universal health care.   I used to feel that way.

 

This is the best blog for the liberal who is starting to have doubts about his idealogy:

http://mises.org/

 

Capitalism has given us a great standard of living. Perhaps your journey from Liberal to Libertarian can begin today.

In order to decide whether or not you are part of a community, part of a culture, part of a nation; you must examine your values. I mean if all those around you worship something that you despise, you are the odd man out.

I have decided that I am not a very good American. It has to do with my likes and dislikes. So I figure it is a genetic disorder. I must admit all my disagreements with American Culture. Supposedly, if we first admit our faults we may have an opportunity to take more steps in the healing process and I might become a good American after all.

 

GRACE KELLY

I despised Grace Kelly (Her Serene Highness The Princess of Monaco") when I was ten. Do you realize that The American Film Institute ranked her #13 amongst the Greatest Female Stars of All Time?

I would have no problems at all rating her one of the thirteen worst actresses I have ever seen on the screen. Her affectations in speech and in her walk did nothing for a young boy or an old slob like me. Phony, phony, phony. She died drunk driving an automobile.

She had grown up as the daughter of a millionaire in Philly, went to the finest schools while living in the finest neighborhoods. She did not apply herself in school and got theatrical parts due to the American love for Cinderella. And she was one of those two faced traitors who chose 'duel citizenship' when our country absolutely bans such things.

I remember watching High Noon and thinking...this is the dumbest movie I ever saw.

HIGH NOON

Plot: This stupid film is supposed to be number 27 on the 'all time list'. I mean, we are supposed to believe that a little 22 year old aristocratic cream puff just falls in love with a 51 year old alcoholic in some dirt town in what is supposed to become New Mexico. Just after the wedding, we find out that,  them liberal and corrupt politicians up north let loose some killer the sheriff had brung down a few years earlier.

And one by one the local citizens demur as Cooper begs for a posse to stop black bart or whatever the frick he is from comin to destroy the town. I have to admit that the last demurer gives the all time dumbest line ever given in a western; a line that would be repeated in thousands of films and TV Westerns:

But I have a wife and children Sheriff.

As if only gay caballeros can ever take up the challenge to rid this earth of Black Barts.

Even his own deputy demurs and sits in a bar getting drunk all day. Lloyd Bridges (whom I have always idolized) plays the spiteful coward who had somehow inherited Cooper's old lady friend. He is mad because he does not get to be the new sheriff in town after Cooper leaves. The showdown between Cooper and Black Bart's men is so badly shot that it  DEFIES credulity. I mean the film does not flow,

Rather, it continues in fits and starts, badly choreographed. And the stunt man for Cooper performs feats that no 51 year old alcoholic could achieve.

Needless to say, I never liked Cooper either. His aw shucks persona just pisses me off. I must admit, having sat through the film recently,  it was fun to see actors like Elam who would go on to appear in some of the greatest westerns ever made, like Once Upon a Time in The West.

 

JULIA ROBERTS

 

I just got through watching buttlips (the first buttlips that I can remember) in the Pelican Brief. Her feigning of fear and such is sooooooooooooooo aggravating; I suddenly remembered why I could never sit through the damn movie. I just cannot stand looking at this pretense of thespianism.

I have never hit a woman or a child in my life, but I swear to god almighty (blesses himself) I have the strongest urge to just slap her silly in this film if only to wake her up and challenge her affectations.

Just take a minute and think of someone like Susan Sarandon. She would not stand for some director telling her to curl up her 90 lb body in some chair wearing some oversized undershirt panting and sobbing and such.

The plot is terrible anyway. I mean I could see the conservative oligarchy plotting to kill some liberal Supreme Court Justices in order to solidify the fascist America in which we now reside, but one billionaire oil guy would never do this alone.

I mean I like pelicans and all, but we are facing the economic torture of millions of Americans everyday due to the fascists who sit on our present court together with our fascist legislators.  Instead of pelicans, why not choose asthmatic children as the victims of fascism; those who die in Emergency rooms all over this country every year.

 

JOHN WAYNE

 

I hate John Wayne and I do not think I need to lay out my reasons here. He was a bad actor, a bad husband, a bad father and a bad fascist repub.

 

JIMMY STEWART

 

I hate Jimmy Stewart. I mean I hate Rear Window, It's a Wonderful Life, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I despise all his films except for Harvey. Psychosis is charming to me in a way which may explain my unamericanism.

In the fifties he would wear a rug that I would not put on my dog and in his fifties he always had some 22 year old like Novak or Kelly fawning over him.

And compare his movies and his 'acting ability' to someone like Henry Fonda. Come on!!!!

He was a life long repub and fascist.

 

BOB HOPE

 

I hate Bob Hope. I hate Bob Hope's movies. Can you imagine, the idiot could not understand why he never received an Oscar nomination?

Patty cake patty cake baker's man.  Fine, five year olds might enjoy Hope/Crosby slap stick.

Oh I know, he would take half naked girls overseas and 'celebrate' our troops. But I just know he did it for the money. He died a billionaire when a billion dollars was a lot of money.

RONALD REAGAN

Bedtime for Bonzo.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwIOEN6XamA

Do not even get me started. I hope he and Wayne are stuck in some hell hole in hell; forced to watch their own movies.

So there you have it. Oh I idolized and still do idolize Douglas Fairbanks & Son, the Barrymores, Henry Fonda,  Errol Flynn, Carol Lumbard, Cary Grant (30's & 40's anyway), along with hundreds of others on the so called 'Silver Screen'.  But I was taught somewhere or other that if you can't stand Grace Kelly, Gary Cooper, Julia Roberts, John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, Bob Hope or Ronald Rayguns....well you just aint a real American.

 

p.s.:  I am out of sorts and cigs for twelve more hours, so please forgive my callousness today. And I pick a day where I will stay up 25 instead of 24 hours. Go figure.

And that is where the interview begins with Ms. Scozzafava, she seems to be grinding her teeth, looking down at her feet, probably wondering what went wrong with this campaign, how did it go so terribly wrong?

I asked one simple question, "Assembly woman Scozzafava, why doesn't Sarah Palin like you"? The look on her face when I asked that question, if looks could kill, and all that, but all of the sudden her anger didn't seem directed at me, all of the sudden a waterfall of bitterness came raining down upon us.

"I didn't know", she began, "when I got into this race that Sarah Palin even knew who I was, well I am pretty sure she did not know who I was, but somehow she decided to make it known she was in support of a challenger of mine  that weird guy from the Conservative Party. I don't know what happened, and then all of the sudden people were talking sides like this was a life or death situation, some epic struggle over who will control the party, and when I turned around they were all against me, I mean do you know what it is like to have a guy like Newt Gingrich support you in NY's 23rd,", she took one long deep breath and sighed, I thought I would get another question in. She continued with a look of disbelief in her eyes, "It is NY state for God's sake", she exclaimed, "we're not reactionaries, there are so few of us left in congress, how will they expand the party if they keep kicking us out"! She slowed and looked right at me. I slowly got my thoughts together, "Are you endorsing anyone in the Race"? Her eyes seemed to be looking right through me, her expression was intent, deliberate and she seemed as to be choosing her words each one with care.  She looked hard right into my eyes, "It is increasingly clear that pressure is mounting on many of my supporters to shift their support. Consequently, I hereby release those individuals who have endorsed and supported my campaign to transfer their support as they see fit to do so. I am and have always been a proud Republican. It is my hope that with my actions today, my party will emerge stronger and our district and our nation can take an important step towards restoring the enduring strength and economic prosperity that has defined us for generations. You can either vote for Sauron the Conservative Party candidate or Bill Owens Pro-Choice, Pro-Woman, Pro-Environment, Pro-Jobs, Pro-Infrastructure. It is your choice." With that she smiled at me slyly, promptly rose from her chair, turned on her heel and left the Deli.

The issue of election reform vs CFR has come back up in recent comments made in my last post on strategic state-level election reform as the way to subvert populism and restore trust in the two major parties.  Why strategic election reform trumps election reform is an issue I delved into earlier.

 

Another issue is whether my editorial prescription for election reform is simply a complicated way to get Proportional Representation (PR)?    My short answer is yes and no.  Yes, I want PR used in part of our political system.  No, I do not want it used as extensively as it is used elsewhere and, in my editorial series, I make my case for strategic election reform, as such, on both pragmatic and idealistic grounds.  I want us to use both winner-take-all and winner-doesn't-take-all elections.  Furthermore, I wd like to see both open list and closed list version of PR used in different types of elections.  There is no one right election rule and when that is understood, it'll be a lot easier to make election reforms. 

 

I mean, it's normal, I know it's been going on for some time -Democrats go on TV. They're allowed there. They're almost welcome there. And they've been doing this for almost 150 years now, or whenever they invented TV. So is it possible that these little political maggots some day one day get together and actually pretend to hone a coherent messagefor their 15 seconds of fame? I mean, not to be crude, but I prepare more for my morning shit than these people do, and I'm not paid in the 6-7 figure bracket for that morning shit.
If you need to know what I'm talking about (the lame Democrat TV appearance side of things, don't worry, though I find it more disgusting than the scatalogical side of the argument), you can just click here:http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/for-fox-sake-by-digby-in-battle-of-fox.html It takes a bit to get there, but the lead-up is quite good as well -the arguments that everyone should memorize for dealing with the "Fox News is really a news outlet, honest Injun" meme. And then that woman, supposedly a Democrat, likely dug up from the remains of a failed alien close encounter, appears.For 8 seconds her cover is golden - she's a member of an intelligent race intent on governing the planet in an intelligent fashion. And then they mess with her programming, by asking a followup question - unheard of in modern media practice, at least not when it comes to politicians, but she's just an industry hack, so immediately her transistors melt and she breaks into"what the hey" and starts to emulate the ways of other Democratic droids - "did I say that? Oh no, I didn't mean to be partisan, let me take off this Big D t-shirt, no, I meant, like what, you see, because, no, we're not the same, huh? Could you repeat the question? Oh,got it, I don't make categorical statements, because I have not been progra.... I don't want to be unfair and stereotypical...."
Your spokespeople are automatons and zombies. Your opponents are also automatons and zombies, but at least they have competent programmers. Your spokespeople are programmed for FAIL. Your opponents are programmed for CHUTZPAH and IRRATIONAL SELF-CONFIDENCE. Which do you think will win the battle of the Titans? Someone hand me that Lousville Slugger over there. I've got some kneecaps and ankles to break. Jesus on a pogostick, it's hard to get worse than this. Unless Jon Stewart gets cancelled. If I weren't a replicant I might get emotionally upset. As it is I'll take it out in a little ultra-violence. Better than getting upset. You earthlings could learn a thing or two, about technology, about basic android response. It's clobbering time.

Fund Manager to individual investors on Thrusday: Open your wallets. At the close of the markets on Thursday, Jeffrey Kleintop jumped at the chance to blow bubbles, maybe hoping for the little guy to throw more of his savings into the market after the Dow closed up 2.1%. 

As reported by Bloomberg: 

Oct. 29 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks rallied, sending benchmark indexes to their biggest advance since July, after the economy returned to growth following the worst contraction in seven decades. Treasuries dropped and the dollar and yen weakened, while commodities surged. 

...

"The stock rally is not over yet," said Jeffrey Kleintop, who helps oversee about $247 billion as chief market strategist at LPL Financial in Boston.  "The stock market can celebrate.  This news is an important confidence boost, in particular to individual investors."

But then Friday came. Dow down 2.5%. Oops!  Klientop's bubbles blow away.  Here he is on Reuters,  the next day, lamenting the lack of confidence of individual investors:
 

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks fell on Friday, the day after logging their best gains in three months, as sectors that have led the rally pulled back.

 

Several reports pointed to a mixed economic picture on the heels of a government report that showed gross domestic product grew at its best rate in two years. Midwest area manufacturing was strong, but consumer sentiment slipped this month.

 

"Confidence still strikes me as shockingly low," said Jeff Kleintop, chief market strategist at LPL Financial in Boston.  "Consumers are still very pessimistic, and that is evident in individual investors' hesitancy to embrace this rally."

I came late to the bash Lieberman party. Orthodoxy, or knee jerkism has never much appealed to me and I do not expect or even want politicians to agree with me on every issue. I voted for Presidents Carter and Clinton twice in general elections each even though their version of a Democratic Party is not mine, nor that of Presidents Franklin D Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John F Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, but they were better candidates than their opponents, so I did what one does.

Moreover, the state Attorneys General who fought back when the Reagan Justice Department abandoned so many of its traditional functions (at least since the Kennedy years), included Connecticut's Lieberman and that was worthy of some respect, it seemed to me.

Read more »

Well here we go again. Someone has decided I am not me again. I dont know why this keeps happening maybe its becouse I say what I want here and people dont believe that someone could feel that way I just dont know.

 At least this time faroff did give me a complement and said I wrote like a b average graduate. And considering that just today I got my GED papers in the mail that was kinda nice. I thought my writing was getting better. Now I know it is.

 I dont know why anyone would come on here and purposely decieve people. What would be the purpose  I dont blog about politics very often so that couldnt be it. Well I only have one thing to say  to the people that dont believe I am me  well just dont read my blogs that would solve the problem.

 Now to the friends that I do have here I want to add thanks for being my friend I saw that some of you stuck up for me and that was nice. I dont blog as much as I use to becouse nothing is going on in my life right now . I sit at home probably 23 out of the 24 hours so theres not much to blog about.

  And to the ones that asked about my son  he is doing a lot better but his short term memory is gone. They say it was becouse his brain went without air to long. But he is now taking his diabetes a lot more serious and seems to be a lot happer.I guess if you cant remember what happened the day before there isnt much to stress on. lol

 Well that is all for now and I hope everyone is having a wonderful halloween!!!!

With the "success" of the nutcase wing of the wingnut party in NY 23 by chasing out Scozzafava the zealots are tasting blood in the water and other wingnut candidates have got to be worried.
Starting with Crist in Florida. Rubio has been gaining and I am sure this will give him a new breath of fresh air, and new funding, in his attempt to knock off the "establishment' candidate in the primary.
Blunt in Missouri is also facing a locally grown nutcase in his primary. Since his state is a relatively "inexpensive" media state a shoot of funds from the true believers to fund the Blunts opposition will go a long way.
This will probably put the end to any hope that Kirk would have in illinois as well.
Over all this "victory" by the extreme will make any rethuglican candidate run so far to the right to appease the crazy's that it will be difficult for them to scramble back into the realm of the sane in the general election.
This poses a risk for the D's as well. 
Since now the rethuglicans with a minimal level of sanity will be looking for a new home it is important for the D's not to let them in.
If they are allowed in they will simply pull the D's to the right and start them on that slippery slope to insanity that they did to the R's when they gave the nutcases any consideration.
This will pull the entire debate further to the right alienating the Democratic base and effectively disenfranchising even more voters who will not have a political party that represents the interests of the working, the teachers, the poor, the non delusional and those that truly care about humanity, the world and their country instead of ideologues so enamored with theories and myths that they would sacrifice all on the alter of their fantasies.
Let the so called Rethuglican moderates fight for their party and bring it back into the realm of the sane. If they do not have the courage to face down the monster they have created they are worthless to any other political interest.

I received about 2 hours ago in the mail a card from the Fairfaz County [VA] Republican Committee signed by Anthony Bedell, their Chairman.  It starts "Dear Absentee Voter" and does on and suggests at one point to call them at 703-766-4467 if I have questions about absentee voting. 

 

There are a couple of problems with this missive.  I have not requested an absentee ballot. I did a "walk-in" vote earlier this week in conformity with VA law. I always vote and am a notorious yellow dog Democrat. I am on the "Webb List."  VA does not have party registration, but there is what is called the "Webb List."  The "Webb List" consists of those people who voted in the primary that nominated Jim Webb for the US Senate. Nothing else was on the ballot, and these voters are considered to be the hardest of the hard core Democratic voters. The data is readily available.  It is reasonable to assume anyone on this list will vote Tuesday and vote a straight ticket.  This card is designed to create confusion.  Although I am knowlegable about VA election law, I had to think for a minute about whether I would be challenged. 

 

If any recipient calls the Republican Committee you can bet they will be told that they cannot vote Tuesday because they are on the absentee list.  [I have already verified I am not on the list; had I been, then someone would have filed a false application in my name. I have also notified the VA Democratic Party voter protection officials.]  There are other lies they will tell to keep people from voting.

 

What you can do.  If you know a VA voter, forward this to them, and if they have received such a mailing and need reassurance, they should call their local Democratic Party (check the telephone book) or the Democratic Party of VA in Richmond or check their web site.  Most VA counties have good and accurate voting information on their web sites.

 

During "walk in" voting in Fairfax County which ends at 5 PM today,  there have been numerous attempts by Republican poll watchers to supress voting.  For example, a voter comes in, is listed on the voting register as legal, the voter does not have the identification specified by VA law but states his/her name and address as listed on the register, the Republican will "demand" they go back and return with a "legal" ID.  VA law, however, in this precise situation provides for the voter to sign an "Affirmation of Identity" and vote on the regular machine.

As one of the best under the influence writers suggested: We are now delving into " A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream".

Dee Scozzafava has been caught in the crossfire of the American Dream, the one where the dream is blown to pieces. I just can't help think of several passages from the great pieces/book by Thompson, they seem to be appropriate no matter what era we live, with a few tiny tweaks. 

"There was every reason to believe republicans were heading for trouble, they'd pushed their  luck a bit far. They'd abused every rule the party lived by--burning the locals, abusing the tourists, terrifying the help, but never ever shit on each other!  The only hope now,  was the possibility that they'd gone to such excess, with that gig, that nobody in a position to bring the hammer down on them (the voters) could possibly believe it . . . When they brought their  act into this town, they brought it in heavy. They didn't  waste any time with cheap shucks and misdemeanors. They went straight for the jugular. Get right into the muck and threw their loyal member under the bus. The mentality of republican politics is so grossly atavistic that a really massive in-fighting brawl  often slips by unrecognized."

I know Hunter! WTF? Dee Sozzafava, pro-choice, North Eastern Yankee republican tossed aside by republican in-fighting, so R's support the who again, the Conservative Party candidate, who the fuck is that? Seriously? Okay I am down with that because all this benefits the Democrat.

But isn't it true that these party splitters are really " the Menace--not in disguise, but stone-obvious former drug abusering, with a flagrantly cranked-up act that was intended to push all the way to the limit . . . not to prove any final, political point, and not even as a conscious mockery: It was mainly a matter of life-style, a sense of obligation and even duty. If the voters were gathering  for a three way scuttle,  they feel the "real conservatives" should be represented. Beyond that, they'd been out of their heads for so long now, that a gig like this seemed perfectly logical. Considering the circumstances, I  am quite sure they feel totally meshed with their  karma."

We can rewrite Fear and Loathing just for this episode the irony never ends, nor does the humor. 

Let the Meltdown continue!!!

Obama slew the last one. Remember the Recession? And what people thought about his handling of it?

Here's John Authers in today's  FT

This rally ..is now arguably the biggest such turnaround in the past hundred years.

The common assumption ...was that the crisis could not end until the biggest US banks were nationalized......Many were unimpressed by the Obama administrations debut

Then the government's much derided "stress tests" .....restored confidence.

 And not only the capitalist press  but , I sort of remember, even in this  TPM  non- bastion of capitalism,Obama's selection of Geithner and Summers was greeted with muted applause.

Guess what? Obama succeeded. He didn't do what was wanted by  the Authers of the world or by a sizeable TPM contingent. But it worked.He was smart enough not to do what a lot of us wanted.To see that what he needed at that time , to deal with that problem ,was Geithner and Summers. Horses for courses.

So since he got that right, what makes us think he's not also smart enough to see that when it's time to deal with the next problem, say income inequality, he won't see that what he needs is some else?

Two months ago Dragon #2 was breathing fire according to media's health experts and political bloviators. Guess what ?. The reports of  the death of Health Care Reform seem to have been much exaggerated .Can't say the same for Dragon #2  last seen emitting tepid puffs.

And when it comes to Afghanistan what makes us think that because he knew that McChrystal was the Geithner of an anti insurgent campaign he'll fail to see that he needs a non- McChrystal for the non- anti- insurgent  campaign to which I expect/hope he's going to shift ?I forsee four scaly legs in the air and a cold droopy tail switching its last.

Hey, it's fun winning a few. Relay and enjoy it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

China is fast becoming the new economic engine of the world. They are revving up now, as  we did about 120 years ago, during our time of "manifest destiny" and railroad-enabled continental expansion. The 21st century will be the era of Chinese expansion and swelling GDP.

But China's impulse to economic power has not always been so well-focused; their long plodding  path to world leadership was  punctuated by a few false starts. Two of the most notable of their newfound prosperity's costly pangs were the "Great Leap Forward" of the late 1950s, and the "Cultural Revolution" of the late 1960s.

These events took place on the other side of the world from where I grew up here in the USA. I had no significant knowledge or understanding of them, being caught up as I was in the bourgeois pop-culture comfort of American childhood and teen angst.

But I have learned something about what was happening in China during those perpetually revolutionary times. Earlier this year, I read a book about it: Wild Swans, by Jung Chang. She was a woman born in 1952, the year after me.  This summer I visited Sichuan province, where Ms. Chang grew up and played her part in the tumultuous "Cultural Revolution" as a teenager while I was an American kid.

Her father, Wang Yu, had been the governor of Sichuan province in the early 1950s. He had served the people of China in that capacity as a dedicated, competent communist party official. Ms. Chang writes in chapter 23 of Wild Swans:

"It was then (the early '50s) that the Communists were at their most popular--just after they had replaced the Kuomintang, put an end to starvation, and established law and order..."

 But fifteen or so year later her father was denounced and humiliated as a "capitalist roader," someone  whose personal accomplishments and political identity did not fulfill the shifting requirements of chairman Mao's fickle finger of favor.

Why was he denounced after many years as a loyal agent of the party?

Among the many political mechanisms of Maoist control during the cultural revolution of the late 1960s was the regular practice of gathering peasants to denounce former leaders whom the party had determined were counterrevolutionary. In the commune at Deyang, Sichuan, where she lived and worked in 1969, Ms. Chang recounts one such public humiliation that she had witnessed.

"A 'speak bitterness' session was organized for the peasants to describe how they had suffered under the Kuomintang, and to generate gratitude to Mao, particularly among the younger generation." (Wild Swans, Anchor edition, 1992, page 417)

Local party organizers conducted a meeting in which they criticized former officials whose alleged malfeasance and incompetence  had caused a terrible famine years earlier. On this particular occasion, they singled out one cringing forty-year old man--now  working among them as a forced laborer--to be insulted. He had been the leader of the production team during the Great Leap program of industrial development about ten years earlier.

But this man had been appointed by the communist party; he was not a Kuomintang leader. The zealous peasants were confused and misled. They pointed to him and proclaimed their accusation: "... that man ordered the (other working) men away to make steel, and half the harvest was lost in the fields." He had been one of the dedicated cadres who supervised gathering up woks and other metal resources to be re-smelted into industrial goods, thus supplanting essential agricultural works with misguided industrial programs.  

What a dear price was paid for those force-engineered steel products extracted from Chinese productivity during  the Great Leap Forward--famine in the countryside. The same thing had happened 35 years prior in Stalinist Russia.

Such were the meddlesome policies of party-mandated, best-laid plans of proletarian mice and men--and  their vindictive aftermaths during the unpredictable political swings of the Cultural Revolution. This unfortunate official had been guilty of towing the party line, having told his charges that they were "in the paradise of Communism now and did not have to worry about food." But now, a decade and a famine later, he was being officially blamed and maligned, just as the author's governing father had been.

Ms. Chang later sought out the humiliated production manager  and asked for his story. He said: "I had to carry out orders... Of course, I didn't want to lose my post."

Just  following orders. Where have we heard that before?

This fickle dynamic of human inconstancy is something to ponder now that the world's cultural revolutionaries of forty years ago are now its financiers.

Be careful, Mr. Hu. Don't let your country suffer the fate of Governor Yu.

 

http://www.freshbizopps.com

In September, the Administration apparently "changed course" (again), this time deciding that it WOULD reveal the names of White House visitors, except for a "small group" that in doing so would have national security concerns.  
http://www.npr.org/blogs/politicaljunkie/2009/09/obama_reverses_course_will_rel.html

Of course, after the initial campaign promise of real transparency, the Administration in June decided it WASN'T a good idea - (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31373407/ns/politics-white_house/)

So now after we got all excited in September that we would actually be getting what was promised, the list revealed by the White House yesterday only had 110 names on it ?!?!?
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/33556933

Nothing has changed in Washington.


 

With FCC Chair Julius Genachowski working to assure that major carriers can't tie up the Internet, the usual suspects are up to doing the bidding of the major corporations. John McCain, as per the lying asshole he is, has introduced into his caucus a bill he has feloniously named Internet Freedom Act of 2009. Could he possibly be a bigger liar? Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) has introduced legislation in the house called, Real Stimulus Act of 2009. This is another laugher of a lie. This article also contains a very nice graphical depiction of global Internet cost / speed relationships. As you might imagine U.S. customers are definitely getting screwed in this globally competitive marketplace. Nothing new with that. You can read about it here.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/10/house-senate-get-separate-bills-to-kill-net-neutrality.ars

Some people I used to read at peak oil webblog The Oil Drum have formed their own weblog, The Automatic Earth, which focuses on the economic crisis.

This is a very wide-ranging article with many helpful graphics, a few pieces of which I have quoted here:

The Case for Deflation

Deflation is ultimately psychological. Without trust we will see hoarding of the cash which will be very scarce in the absence of the credit that currently comprises the vast majority of the effective money supply. The combination of scarce cash and a very low velocity of money will be toxic.

Money is the lubricant in the economic engine and without enough of it that engine will seize up as it did in the 1930s, when farmers dumped milk they couldn't sell into ditches while others were starving for want of the money to buy food. There was plenty of everything except money, and without money, one cannot connect buyers and sellers.

Potential buyers will have no purchasing power as they will have lost access to credit and their ability to earn an income will be hit by spiking unemployment. Those who still have jobs will find that they have no bargaining power and there is therefore no wage support.

Sellers and producers will have no market and will themselves lose the means to purchase supplies or raw materials for the things they would like to produce.

If conditions remain frozen for any length of time, they will go out of business. The deeper the collapse, the more protracted the trough and the more difficult the eventual recovery.

...

Unemployment will go through the roof as the prospects for selling most goods and services decline dramatically. In the developed world we are nations of middle men - generally service economies where we make a living figuratively taking in each other's laundry.

Most of us produce relatively little. Even those who do will find almost no market for their exports, and those who could find buyers may not be able to send shipments as credit contraction prevents shippers from getting the letters of credit they need to ship goods. ...

Unfortunately middlemen are almost completely expendable, and the services of others are likely to become unaffordable for the majority very quickly. While there will be a huge surplus of labour, and the few who retain purchasing power will be able to hire anyone they want for very little, most people will have to do everything for themselves, as poor people have done throughout history and as most of the population of the world does now.

Not only will we lose access to the paid labour of others, but we will lose our virtual energy slaves as well. This will represent an enormous fall in the standard of living for the vast majority.

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Either nobody understands the recent financial meltdown, or nobody who understands it can explain it to anyone who doesn't. This resembles a certain period in the history of India when everyone knew someone who had seen the "Indian rope trick," but no one had seen it themselves.

In the "Indian rope trick," a magician holds one end of a rope and throws the other end high up into the clouds. Then his boy-assistant (jamoora) climbs the rope and slowly disappears.

So anyone who has seen the "Indian rope trick" is obviously insane, and likewise with anyone who claims to understand the recent financial meltdown. Although a few traders probably understood a few varieties of vanilla derivatives, like the most basic credit default swaps, all that vanilla was compounded over multi-national networks with much more exotic flavors like Asian options, "path-dependent" options like lookbacks, and options depending on a multitude of related or unrelated indices, like Altiplano, Annapurna, and Atlas options.

This was a mix which literally ran away to infinity through a garden of forking paths and mutually dependent asymptotic series summed over terms which themselves depended on hypothetical truncations of other asymptotic series, and so on.

So it was already almost impossible to understand enough about this mess to understand that you didn't understand it, and it was exponentially more difficult to understand that nobody understood it, and...

Here we are again exactly where we began, because no one who understood that no one understood the infinite tangle of derivatives could explain that no one understood them to anyone who didn't already understand that no one understood them.

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It seems CNN and Anderson Cooper's AC360 are in the tank and falling further behind in the ratings wars. It further seems that this has presented reason for the "Cable News Network" to emulate Fox News in a desire to manufacture controversy and report it as news rather than simply report on events as they are presented. How else to explain the decision to run with their story headlined H1N1 Vaccines to be Offered to Guantanamo Bay Detainees.

To their credit, CNN does not invent facts in this instance to create a controversy out of whole cloth such as Fox Noose has done on issues ranging from Death Panels to Liz Cheney's credibility as a national security expert. Nevertheless, they have diligently whipped up the emotional "I hate Arabs and other terrorists" crowd by reporting this Dog-Bites-Man story as a newsworthy item and then use it as bait for the usual demagogues to construe it as a controversial attack on American sensibilities.

First the facts as reported in the article:

1.) "The Pentagon will offer the H1N1 vaccination to detainees at the U.S. facility at Guantanamo Bay, officials there said Friday."
2,) "...the decision (is) based on U.S. government assessments that people held in detention facilities are at high risk for the pandemic"
3.) "Base officials had not received the vaccinations and did not know when they were expected to arrive"

End of story.

Pretty unremarkable stuff, no? One would expect that we provide detainees with standard medical care such as flu vaccinations in keeping with our commitment to the Geneva Conventions (if not out of simple belief in humanitarian principles). And, as the article points out, Guantanamo is waiting for its delivery of the vaccine just like virtually every other health care outlet in the country.

But then CNN takes the story a bit further and includes comment from an intellectually challenged demagogue (Rep. Bart Stupak of Michigan), who reacts predictably with a dehumanizing swipe at the detainees and a tour through some kind of parallel universe that haunts his grasp on reality.

"As long as Americans must wait to receive the vaccine, the detainees in Guantanamo Bay should not be given preferential treatment to receive the H1N1 vaccination," Stupak said in a letter to Secretary of the Army John McHugh. "Until this shortage is addressed, I urge Pentagon officials to reconsider this decision to vaccinate terrorist detainees ahead of Americans who are waiting."

The real story here is that an elected Congressional Representative would be so quick to pander to the "I hate Arabs and other terrorists" crowd as to totally misread a simple news account about providing unexceptional medical care to prisoners in our keeping.

But you'll find none of that in the CNN article.

Indeed, on the Friday edition of AC360 John King interviewed Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) about the health care debate, and just couldn't resist baiting him with an opening question about the "controversial decision" to provide vaccinations to Gitmo prisoners. On cue, the mad dog teabagger Republican foamed at the mouth in outrage over this manufactured travesty wherein Gitmo prisoners are supposedly being given preferential treatment over the rest of us Americans who just hate what Obama is doing to this country.

King was satisfied with the response for its "newsworthiness," and so offered no correction to the abhorrent misrepresentation of the facts of this story. Having raised the issue as a legitimate controversy of his own making, I suppose it would have been difficult for King to ask in follow-up "Excuse me, Mr. Pence, but where have you seen it reported that the detainees were to be given the vaccine ahead of anyone else now waiting for it to be delivered?"

If they wish to present themselves as a legitimate news outlet, CNN has a responsibility to point out any facts that get in the way of a good story. Indeed, in this case it is incumbent upon a journalist to actually point out the way in which a non-controversial action undertaken by the government is being manipulated by demagogues to spread fear and resentment among the populace.

CNN has instead chosen to become a willing tool of the hate-mongering demagogues as a rather transparent means to boost their ratings. It is Lou Dobbs gone viral, and there is no vaccine that will protect us from the diseased "journalism" at CNN that now competes with Fox to appeal to our basest fears, prejudices, intolerance, and tribalism as a means by which they can capture and hold our attention.

My wish for Fox and now CNN is a pox on both their houses, because the pandemic they otherwise invite with their diseased "journalism" leads directly to fascism as the only way in which to protect us from "the other" they so willfully vilify. And THAT'S a developing news story they are incapable of reporting for reason that they've already surrendered journalistic integrity for the reward of higher ratings in an entertainment medium.

Hatred. Intolerance. Fear. Anger. Demagoguery. Tribalism.

CNN will be there to report it as it happens.

Pictures at Eleven.

Today I found from internet that Paul Twohig of Hilton Head, S.C., a former Starbucks Coffee U.S. senior vice president who jumped ship to work for Dunkin' Donuts, has agreed to pay $500,000 to settle a lawsuit that accused him of violating a non-competition agreement, according a written statement issued late Tuesday by Stacey Krum, a spokeswoman for Starbucks.  In many countries' laws and labor contract between employee and employer, we can find the non-competition term.  After termination if an employee want to work for a competitor, he/she should report to their former employer and get the approval.  If they don't do that, they will lose money.  So, maybe we are all employees.  We should read carefully before signing labor contracts and don't forget the term after termination.

I finished reading another one of ThearP's posts , Thanks Thera, I can't tell you how moving that story was. It gives one pause to know there are folks who are against health reform and in particular a publicly run health insurance option. One does have to wonder how anyone could be against reform.  I was jarred by Thera's report. A boy left alone, maybe with a father that isn't so great, all because as a society we failed Terri Lynn. She worked hard, she deserved to have access to health care, because she is an American, and for no other reason. I have to say paying more in taxes that make sure everyone has access to health care seems a small price to pay, so that argument seems a harsh canard. Makes a human cringe at just hearing that kind of cold response. Sends shivers down ones spine, I never expect humans to have such disregard for the already living.
When I think about how little we seem to care for one another, I wonder if there ever was a time when it might have been different.
Greed,  greed in the Gordon Gekko mold, a mean greed, one that cares nothing for victims and those who ultimately lose out in this society, because for someone to be a big winner in this society, someone must also be a big loser, even when they try as hard as they can.
Our legislators must know how strongly we feel about this, it is the only way we can continue to move forward with solid reform, with a strong regulatory arm within the legislation.
First everyone must contact Harry Reid's Office, and your own senator, t is really important, even if you have to mail it via snail mail.
Make sure he  and they know, you know about rule 22. Demand rule 22 be set aside in order for a traditional filibuster to take place, no procedural filibusters should be allowed for this issue . This is more than important than anything but jobs and getting out of all these wars we seem to be in.. We have to fight for people like Terri Lynn and those who have gone before her and those who will inevitably go after her, leaving children, spouses, parents, our world, because we owe it to them, we must get something done and what ever happens there must be a publicly run insurance option. As American's we not only deserve this option, we demand
this option.
Oh and one more think, Joe Lieberman can suck it!
Link to US Senators:
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
Harry Reid:

522 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING WASHINGTON DC 20510

(202) 224-3542

Web Form: reid.senate.gov/contact/index.cfm

Well you can call his officemoving

NOT!!! 

Just thought I would give this post a title to get your attention and provoke a little anger and hopefully effect you enough to call that Congress critter, or the White House, AGAIN, to advocate for a public option.  I have been thinking long and hard about this Trigger Option and it just seems like such BS.  It's a totally contrived designation of "Bad Enough" that suggests it is not bad enough already.  We'll take effective action when it really gets bad, and this is not bad enough.  Essentially, 44,000 people dying needlessly in this a nation purported to be the "greatest nation on Earth" is not bad enough. 

For whom?!?!?! 

In my humble opinion, this is already bad enough.  I'm not at all keen on the idea of designating a trigger to give the health insurance thieves another chance.  They have had their chances, and they have failed miserably in providing services.  Did they have no warning people would rebel and reject the notion that they were the only source of help, their private corporation, and that we could not help ourselves and each other after being so completely abused at their hands?  Frankly, I think they never considered it as a possibility, but there were warnings.  They've witnessed Medicare and Medicaid develop in response to a deplorble lack of health services.  They've seen Clinton take a run at changing the system.  Why?  Because it desperately needed change.  Why?  Because it would not, and could not, change itself.  Now we want to give them yet another chance?  Didn't the threat of Clinton's efforts influence them sufficiently to moderate their greed?

How many dead are too many?

I'm just wondering what the trigger will be?  I'm in favor of a body count, if we need to designate a trigger.  If we lack any capacity to judge the behavior of the health insurance industry and its determination to stop healthcare reform, and we feel we must give them one more chance, let's count the bodies.  Evidently, there are those who think the lives already lost should not be sufficient to take away the reins from these malevolent corporate beast.

I am not in agreement with any monetary consideration related to premiums or any other financial measure because we have seen how the data can be so easily skewed and manipulated.  We should also note that a Progressive will not inhabit the White House indefinitely and we need something soon to ensure it survives the next Progressive fall from grace, the next inevitable moment of human weakness.  What if we have a trigger mechanism, and the President in power declines to pull that trigger?  Much the same, the previous President ignored the regulations in place to allow his friends and acquaintances to pilfer the treasures of massive financial institutions.  How can we put so much faith in an unknown future when the past reveals so perfectly clear that these industries have no intention of playing fair?

This changes NOW!

We have it in our reach to make a fundamental change in the way we obtain health care.  We have the precursors of Medicare and Medicaid that show us how to achieve a decent program providing services to the American people - ALL THE PEOPLE!!!  We have the experience of making concessions so fresh in our memories with the oh-so-quaint "donut hole".  Why was this not named "The Bermuda Triangle", where qualified people somehow disappear, and then mysteriously reappear, all the less suited to take care of themselves, much the poorer, with even less the capacity to turn things around then ever before in their lives.  These predators feasted on our seniors, and now we are discussing a trigger somewhere in the future?!?!

44,000 dead.  There is NOTHING wonderful about triggers. 

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I was just reading this article from WaPo by Lori Montgomery. It's ostentatiously titled "CBO: House bill's health-care spending would dwarf Senate proposal's." It claims that: 
 

The health package released Thursday by House leaders would increase federal spending on health care by nearly $600 billion over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, a dramatic increase that dwarfs the expansion envisioned by the latest Senate bill.

And in general:

less than half of the cost of the House coverage expansion would be offset by other changes, leaving the government spending $598 billion more on health care by 2019 than it otherwise would have -- seven times more than under the Senate package.

Only problem is, this seems to me to be a complete misinterpretation of CBO's numbers.

The CBO actually says:

Net Change in the Federal Budgetary Commitment to Health Care 85 598

This is not a change in spending. Rather, it's a change in the amount of federal revenues raised from outside the health care system that are being spent inside the health care system. The Senate has a much smaller figure, unsurprisingly, because it taxes employer sponsored health coverage and doesn't rely on a tax on the rich that is unrelated to health care. The spending for each bill is:

Gross Cost of Expanded Insurance Coverage 829 1,055

What's particularly unnerving is what a big deal the writer apparently thinks this "revelation" is:

The first measure, impact on the federal budget deficit, has been widely reported: The House bill would reduce deficits over the next decade by $104 billion while the Senate Finance Committtee bill would reduce deficits by $81 billion. 

Yes, the first (accurate, real) measure has been widely reported. But look--I've got this. 

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I've been following strings dealing with our economic woes, with interest, and have noted that most  of the posters have exhibited frustration, fear, and anger relative to the unemployment  situation.  I, also, sensed that most posters are expecting that this weak economy will pass.  I, fortunately, have never been the victim of a "reduction in forces."  ( Was asked to resign a couple of times, but those events were self-inflicted).  I do know what it feels like to be "a day late and a dollar short!"

We have all been informed what opinions are like.
If you have not been informed, ask around...Someone will inform you.  So here is my opinion on the economy and our future:

Eric Hoffer, author, longshoreman and adviser to John Kennedy wrote some lengthy dissertations relative to economics.  One of his strongest assertions (not exactly quoted) was that no successful economy was ever created that did not create "material" products that another tribe, hamlet, city , state or country was not desirous of.  Be the object grain, spices, machinery or sea shells, objects preferably manufactured from raw materials taken from same area of origin, optimized the success of the trade relationship.  Hoffer emphasized that service industries created little stability because knowledge knows no boundaries.

I drove the turnpikes from Chicago to the East coast, for the first time, in the early-sixties.  At night, the polluted skies were aglow from the towering stacks of refineries, steel mills and various other heavy manufacturing industries.  This stretch of America was the backbone of our middle class.  Today, that same stretch is known as "The Rustbelt."  If you have read this far, it isn't necessary for me to explain the sundry forces that decimated our manufacturing base.  As off-shoring decimated our middle-class, our tax base was equally decimated.  Then, followed the deterioration of our infrastructure.  How could our middle class sustain its' standard of living?  Easily!  Loosen the credit standards!  Import CCPS (Cheap Chinese Plastic S**t) as a replacement for items that had once been manufactured here.  Capital for internal investment has left our shores years ago.

Some skills can't be off-shored, but there will never be enough jobs available to off-set those which are gone...Forever.  This country is undergoing drastic economic change.  We are not experiencing a "dip" in our economy.  What the future holds, I have no idea.  I don't buy that America's ingenuity will return us to the word-prominence we once enjoyed.

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Bo and I drove down to Cerrillos that warm weekday afternoon to check out some land on which to potentially build our homes and studios. After walking the rolling hills to the property's corners, we drove down Goldmine Road and checked into Mary's Bar for a cold one. Mary's is one of those country bars that in spite of its' uniqueness seem ubiquitous here in New Mexico. There was an older Anglo, with salt and pepper beard and ponytail on the porch of the bar along with a couple of local vatos shooting the shit. We never saw Mary or anyone else in her employ that day. After selecting a couple of beers from the cooler, we left what we thought was an appropriate amount of cash on the bar, and went outside to drink with the others.

An animated conversation ensued with the longhair and myself leading the discussion. In time a joint was produced out of nowhere and passed around. We introduced ourselves, and our new friend reciprocated, telling us his full name, "Cornelius Joseph McFadden". It seemed a mouthful, but he added that we could call him Neal.

Stories were traded, with his side of the conversation spanning accounts of his small gold mining operation, to smuggling marijuana across the Mexican-American border decades earlier. That particular tale ended with Neal's incarceration in Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary, and his assertion that his then friend, Tim Leary, had sold the smuggling operation out in order to relieve some pressure which he was feeling from the feds as a result of his own legal problems. Neal had no soft spot in his heart for Leary.  Seven years in the Big House will do that, I suppose.  Then the discussion turned to Richard Alpert, aka Baba Ram Das, Tim's cohort at Harvard, Millbrook, and beyond and their exploration of the psychotropic benefits of LSD and human consciousness. Neal professed a love and respect for Ram Das, calling him "my guru". He was a powerful and interesting guy, and it was an afternoon that stuck with me. I vowed to look Neal up when I would finally move to New Mexico a couple of years hence.

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A little something for Devil's Night, for Halloween, for All Hallow's Eve, an Injun storyteller's favorite legend to tell at this time of year.  The Windego.  Retold by me.  And pronounce like this:  Win-dee-goh.  It's a rather long story so you might want to get a cuppa hot cider, spiced or spiked, your choice, get comfortable where you sit, turn the lights down a little.  Set the mood.

After all, it's time for trick or treat......


                                                   .................................hahahahaha.

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Sean got to the Castle Bar with the full intent of making the shuttle a designated driver. The word was that Frank was awake, like nothing had happened. But they were keeping him in the hospital for observation.

He looked for his favorite table and there was Bernice from accounting with a pitcher and two mugs. She had not even taken a sip out of general courtesy along with the personal protocol never to drink alone.

Oh Bernice, you made it.

Hi Sean. We are all set. How is Frank?

Sean quickly grabbed a mug, which Bernice had filled, and drank it down like it was a canteen full of water and he was in the desert.

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In a story you have to read to believe, Lou Dobbs has apparently developed his own conspiracy theory concerning an apparent hunters bullet that hit the top of his house during hunting season in an area full of hunters according to the New Jersey State Police who responded to the incident (side note: the NJ State Police spokesman apparently chuckled at the description of events that Lou Dobbs gave concerning the incident).  It seems Lou has been getting threatening phone calls, which he chose never to report to any law enforcement agency, concerning his stance on immigration issues.  While discussing the "shooting" on his radio program Dobbs brought up criticism from immigrant advocacy groups in an apparent round about attempt at pointing the finger at such groups for the incident. 

If someone ever shoots at me, I hope their aim is so poor they hit the top of my house, which I imagine is much lower to the ground than the mansion Lou Dobbs has bought with money peddling racial hatred.  What a bizarre, sad world some people live in.

Via ThinkProgress, both the Baucus Bill and the plan put forward by Pelosi will enroll some more people but most will not be in the Public Option and it will not cover everyone:

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CBO: Public Option To Attract Only 6 Million Enrollees & Doesn't Offer Lower Premiums

The public option would attract about 6 million enrollees by 2019 and charge premiums that are "somewhat higher than the average premiums for the private plans in the exchanges." This is because the public option would "engage in less management of utilization" by its enrollees and "attract a less healthy pool of enrollees," the office concludes. Moreover, since the House bill expands Medicaid up to 150% of the federal poverty line, it's possible that the enrollees that would have enrolled in the public option went into Medicaid instead.

Below is a comparison of the relevant provisions in the House and Senate Finance Committee legislation:

	CBO Score Of House Bill	CBO Score Of Baucus Bill
Costs	Reduce deficits: $104B/10yrs Cost: $894B/10yrs Spends on subsidies: $605B/10yrs On Medicaid/CHIP: $425B/10yrs On Small Employer Credit: $25B/10yrs	Reduce deficits: $81B/10yrs Cost: $829B/10yrs Spends on subsidies: $461B/10yrs On Medicaid/CHIP: $345B/10yrs On Small Employer Credit: $23B/10yrs
Insured	Uninsured reduced by: 36M Uninsured in 2019: 18M In Exchanges: 30M | Public Plan: 6M In Medicaid: 15M	Uninsured reduced by: 29M Uninsured in 2019: 25M In Exchanges: 23M In Medicaid: 14M
Revenue	Mandate penalty: $33B/10yrs Pay-Play penalty: $135B/10yrs New taxes: $572B/10yrs	Mandate penalty: $4B/10yrs Free rider penalty: $23B/10yrs New taxes: $196B/10yrs
Medicare and Medicaid	Total savings: 426B/10yrs Medicare Advantage: $170B/10yrs	Total savings: 404B/10yrs Medicare Advantage: $117B/10yrs

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With a Single Payer solution it would be everybody in and nobody out - AND it would save a heck of a lot more money for everyone.