Thursday Mashup (6/30/11)

Gosh, didn’t Little Tommy Friedman just tell us the other day that “China had a peaceful internal transformation from Maoist Communism to capitalism”? If so, then please explain this (here)…

China has boomed during three decades of economic reform, and has in many respects tried to distance itself from the Mao era, when tens of millions died from deprivation and state-directed violence. But Communist Party leaders still promote the myths and icons of that time to instill patriotism and loyalty in the population.

The latest iteration, started by the ambitious party chief of Chongqing, Bo Xilai, is centered on singing Communist classics, and has been copied by central leaders for a nationwide mobilization to celebrate the 90th anniversary.

Party officials have told schools, state-owned companies and neighborhood committees to organize choirs to sing red songs and stage musical numbers, celebrating Maoist classics like “The East is Red” and “Without the Communist Party There Would be No New China.” In Chongqing, even prisons are holding singalongs, and one psychiatric hospital has prescribed it for patients.

The revival has moved well beyond just red songs in this municipal area of 31 million, whose urban core is built on foggy hills overlooking the Yangtze and Jialing Rivers. In initiatives reminiscent of the Mao era, the government has ordered each cadre to live with a family in the countryside for a month, transmitted Maoist slogans to residents via text message, and told Chongqing Satellite Television to fill prime-time hours with educational red programming and cut all commercial advertising.

I wonder if this supposedly benevolent world economic power will remind its people of the following (here)…

Within the first two decades of communist China’s existence, upwards of 60–70 million people died. They died from purges, murder, malnutrition, starvation, the collectivization of agriculture and an overall complete transformation of society through totalitarian communism. This happened primarily under the Great Leap Forward (1957–60) and the Cultural Revolution (1966–69).

An entire nation and its people were forcibly molded into one gigantic social laboratory. Private possessions were eliminated, from clothes and hygiene products, to pots and pans, to the most basic liberties, from speech to press to conscience. “Private fires” for cooking food were banned, with the only permissible smoke being that which emanated from collective kitchens.

And yes, I know who and what Paul Kengor is, but if anyone has proof that he’s wrong, please let me know.

And in other news, a certain V.D. Hanson is still an idiot (here)…

…one thing seems unclear: How does an attack on private jet travel square with (Obama’s) present efforts to wow Wall Street fat cats and the junkets to Vail, Martha’s Vineyard, and Costa del Sol? Or for that matter with the once tax-exempt Kerry yacht, the private-jet networking of green capitalist Al Gore, and Nancy Pelosi’s government-paid-for jet flights back to the Bay Area?

As I remarked to a friend recently, sometimes when I write these posts, I feel like a hotel maid or something like that, as in, “I just cleaned up one mess, and here you go making another!”

As noted here…

(The supposed Pelosi plane controversy is) just as dumb today as it was in February of 2007. That's when frustrated Republicans, aided by the press, completely manufactured the claim that the new Speaker of the House was going all diva on the Pentagon and demanding use of huge military planes to fly her and her pals around the country.

Virtually none of the allegations were true. In fact, the line of attack became so irresponsible that even the Bush White House stepped in to wave the GOP and the press off the "silly" story.

The Media Matters post also tells us that Pelosi supposedly demanded a 42-seat Air Force carrier.

Uh, no.

Update: And yes, I realize Hanson was trying to attack Obama about the corporate jet tax loophole - here is a response.

Continuing, I really should tend to the latest corporate media garbage; as noted here, Mark Halperin called President Obama a “dick” because Number 44 had what Halperin considered the gall, I suppose, to criticize Congress on not raising the debt ceiling yet, with remarks along the lines of “Sasha and Malia (the first daughters) get their homework done a day early,” or something (and yes, Halperin apologized).

As noted here…

Halperin was typically wrong on the supposed “grand bargain” of deficit reduction (here).

He said Obama didn’t have an alternative to Paul Ryan’s budget (remember that one?), even though Number 44 presented his budget in February (here).

Halperin told us Obama gave an economic “soliloquy” here (see, other “regular guy” politicians just talk to us, but effete Kenyan Marxist former community organizers who are too busy killing bin Laden to show us his Hawaiian birth certificate give “soliloquies” – sure).

He called financial reform “typically ignorant” Washington overreach here.

Halperin said Obama was more “polarizing” than Dubya or Bill Clinton here, as if it’s somehow Obama’s fault that the ratio between Dem approval and Repug disapproval is higher because the Repugs are often so irrational with their cases of Obama Derangement Syndrome.

He said Obama hasn’t installed an “economics commander in chief,” or something, which I’m sure would be news to Tim Geithner, whether you like the guy or not (here).

Halperin resurrected one of the all-time zombie lies here, saying the former PA Governor Bob Casey, Sr. was denied the opportunity to speak at the 1992 Democratic National Convention because he was pro-life (Actually, it’s because he didn’t endorse the Clinton-Gore ticket – at least one other pro-life Dem was given the opportunity to speak…I will research this further if anyone compels me to do so, but I know this is correct).

And how can we forget this little “Photoshop” number from Halperin involving Sen. “There’s Something About Mary” Landrieu?

Also, I thought this Atrios post today was particularly timely (time for another blogger ethics panel, I guess).

I’m in total agreement with kos on this (big surprise, I guess). MSNBC or any other corporate media outlet shouldn’t can Halperin because he was uncivil; they should do it because he doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about.

Oh, and here is another interesting postscript, IMHO, concerning the original matter that Halperin so stupidly commented on (Heaven forbid that actual work would get in the way of "Orange Man" and his tee time, to say nothing of the other flotsam currently in charge of the U.S. House).

Further (local stuff coming up), it’s been awhile since I checked on our PA-31 State House Rep Steve Santarsiero; here is the latest…

HARRISBURG, June 28 – State Rep. Steven J. Santarsiero, D-Bucks, this week voted against a bill that would strip away victims' right to be fully compensated for their injuries and instead protect those responsible for those injuries – including corporate wrongdoers who harm innocent victims.

Santarsiero said the legislation (S.B. 1131) would repeal "joint and several liability" in Pennsylvania, a legal concept that ensures injured parties in civil cases receive full compensation even if some parties responsible for the injury are unable or unwilling to pay.

Santarsiero said under current law, a victim who has been injured or harmed by more than one wrongdoer is permitted to recover 100 percent of his/her damages from any one of the wrongdoers who are found legally liable. Under this proposed legislation, wrongdoers would only be responsible for the percentage of damage they are found liable for. If one party doesn’t have money to pay their share of the damage, the victim would not be able to recover that amount.

"Repealing the joint and several liability law would significantly erode an injured person's ability to be made whole," Santarsiero said. "Victims of wrongdoing need and deserve protection under Pennsylvania law."

And…

HARRISBURG, June 29 – State Rep. Steven J. Santarsiero, D-Bucks, today released the following statement after the House of Representatives approved a $27.149 billion state budget bill for the 2011-12 fiscal year:

"I voted 'no' on the state budget because it puts a disproportionate burden on students in Pennsylvania, while at the same time letting big corporations and big oil and natural gas companies off the hook from having to pay their fair share of taxes.

"This budget slashes funding to our public schools by nearly $1 billion – an unprecedented attack on public education that will hurt our kids and cause school districts to raise local taxes in order to make up for the loss in revenue.

"Both of our local schools will feel the pain of this budget, receiving significant decreases in total education funding for 2011-12. Council Rock will receive $904,824 less in total education funding, while Pennsbury will see a $1.706 million decrease.

"The Pennsylvania Constitution requires that the General Assembly provide for 'the maintenance of a thorough and efficient public education' for the children of our Commonwealth. This budget, and some of the other legislation that the Republican majority is trying to pass, would not maintain public education. On the contrary, they would dismantle public education.

"With its devastating cuts to higher education – $200 million – this budget shows an incredible lack of foresight into the best interests of Pennsylvania's future and a shocking misplacement of priorities.

"What makes this budget especially harsh is the fact that we have at least $700 million in surpluses that could be used to restore many of these painful cuts. In addition, we are sitting on a great economic boon with our rich supply of Marcellus Shale natural gas, yet Republicans are choosing to ignore this potential revenue source.

"I would understand if there were not other sources of revenue available, but those things are there and yet Republicans have not proposed to take advantage of either.

"This budget is NOT a no-tax budget, as Republicans are claiming. It is a TAX-SHIFT budget, with middle-class homeowners and seniors being forced to pick up the tab through higher local property tax hikes.

And speaking of the person primarily responsible for this atrocity, this article from Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Daily News yesterday tells us more about the often-cozy ties between one Governor Tom “Space Cadet” Corbett and the natural gas industry, dating back to Corbett’s election as PA Attorney General in 2004.

Just another day in the life of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, virtually a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Republican Party; heckuva job, voters (and to contact Steve, click here).

Finally, today is the 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s ruling that the New York Times and the Washington Post could publish the “Pentagon Papers”; as noted here, they were recently declassified and publicly released (with Daniel Ellsberg and New York Times reporter Neil Sheehan as the primary individuals behind the story...more here).

In the matter of the Wikileaks case (which I and a whole lot of other people consider to be today’s equivalent of the Pentagon Papers case), Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor said here that she believed a case involving Wikileaks would one day be heard before the High Court, which I suppose is inevitable (and to me, the only reason why “Scalito” and company wouldn’t be deferential to the executive branch of our government would be in the event that it was still headed by a Democrat).

And speaking of both Number 44 and Wikileaks, this tells us what we can do on behalf of Pfc. Bradley Manning, the alleged “Wikileaker,” if you will, to Julian Assange (the last I checked, the whole “innocent until proven guilty” thing still applied, didn’t it, Mr. “Constitutional Scholar” President?).

Wednesday Stuff

Gosh, look what the right-wing's supposed economic genius is up to. Wonder if the bloom is off the rose for our Beltway media's fair-haired boy?...



...and I would have put down Laura Meckler of the Murdoch Street Journal a little less politely, but the net effect is the same; good job, Mr. President (and leave it to the AP to come up with this total non-story...I'll trade a "gaffe" like this for the almost-weekly pratfalls of Former President Highest Disapproval Rating In Gallup Poll History)...



...and more like this...a lot more...



...and this is a video that's probably more appropriate for the fall or winter, but don't expect me to be able to remember it for that long.

Tuesday Stuff

(Not sure about posting tomorrow, by the way...)

Happy 85th birthday to the one and only Mel Brooks; I can't think of anyone else who could have come up with this clip (from "History of the World Part 1")...



...and maybe the question is too obvious, but I'm keen to ask it anyway; what kind of "religious values" does Governor Bully seriously think he's imparting to his kids by blowing off a constituent, but sucking up to Joe Scar when both ask just about the very same question (here)...



...and I give you the human gaffe factory known as Moon Unit Bachmann (and I would say this is a bit of untidy business - Stephanopoulos might as well be arguing with a table lamp)...



...and I guess these videos have been a bit edgy lately - so is this one :-).

Tuesday Mashup (6/28/11)

I read over this item today on the supposed “negotiations” on the debt limit, and I had some thoughts (I put negotiations in quotes because we’re dealing with the nativist political bunch that is only interested in “moving the goalposts” on this and just about every other issue).

To begin, I don’t believe it should be necessary for the president of the United States to involve himself (or herself, one day) in negotiations over raising the debt limit, which, as noted here, should be automatic. However, the Repugs and their noise machine (along with our utterly pliant corporate media) have, as usual, allowed demagoguery to reign in place of common sense to the point where it is necessary for President Obama to do just that (witness the utterly ridiculous decision to cave on Dubya’s stinking tax cuts, which generate absolutely nothing but wealth for people who definitely don’t need it – more on that here, as if we need it).

I thought Atrios had some good stuff on this, as noted here. Also (and you’re not going to believe this), but I thought David Brooks of the New York Times actually made sense on this also as follows (here)…

(Obama) has not educated the country about the debt challenge. He has not laid out a plan, aside from one vague, hyperpoliticized speech.

I’ve heard about Obama supposedly looking towards The Sainted Ronnie R as a political “guiding light” of sorts, and I took that to mean that Number 44 seeks to imitate the delivery of a “message” that The Gipper honed through years of Hollywood acting and serving as the puppet of General Electric Corporation. Well, our “hopey changey” chief executive could do a better job, I think, of explaining (in a White House prime time address to the nation) exactly why we need to get rid of the Bush tax cuts and how we need to make smart financial decisions to help our economy to recover for real (some graphical stuff might be a good idea too, pictures generally being better than words and all that...and reminding about this can't hurt either).

(By the way, I’ll have more to say about BoBo later.)

Next, Juan Williams of Fix Noise bloviates as follows (here, on the subject of marriage equality and the recent vote in New York state)...

“[I]n the black community, people just can’t understand Obama on this issue because there just is not the strength of support for any form of gay union, gay marriage, civil [unions],” Williams said. “That’s what happened in California if you recall in terms of that referendum that sunk this effort in California. I don’t think the black community is going to walk away from President Obama on this but it is a fascinating dynamic to sit down with black ministers, black social leaders and talk about this. I mean they are back in the ‘50s on this subject.”

I have a feeling that Williams (who I consider to be a wingnut in liberal disguise, let’s not forget) is definitely overplaying his hand on the whole “blacks-don’t-like-gay-marriage-because-of-black-clergy-and-social-leaders” thing, particularly when, as noted here, African Americans now support marriage equality by 51 to 48 percent (a small margin to be sure, but progress).

At least Williams hasn’t calling for “profiling” of gays (as if that’s possible anyway), unlike here.

Further, I must tell you that I’m having a hard time with a recent decision by Hangin’ Judge JR and The Supremes (not the Arizona campaign finance decision that invalidates a key part of that state’s law that triggered state payments of matching funds for publicly financed candidates whenever their privately funded opponents outspent them, bad though that decision is, as noted here).

What I’m having a particularly hard time with is the recent decision that struck down a California law that banned the sale of video games to minors, as noted here.

Including this rationale…

“No doubt a State possesses legitimate power to protect children from harm, but that does not include a free-floating power to restrict the ideas to which children may be exposed,” (Justice Antonin) Scalia wrote, noting that even fairy tales such as “Snow White” and “Cinderella” feature graphic descriptions of violence.

The court reiterated that the basic principles of free speech do not vary by medium and called the law’s attempt to restrict children’s access to depictions of violence “unprecedented and mistaken.”

“This country has no tradition of specially restricting children’s access to depictions of violence,” the court stated.

Sooo...as far as The Supremes are concerned, when the young one hunts Nazi zombies in “Call of Duty” as well as other creatures in “Left For Dead,” or these “zealot” things in “Halo Reach” (all X-Box games for the benefit of the uninitiated)…that’s the same as watching the witch turn into the dragon in “Sleeping Beauty”? Or watching Edmund Dantes exact his revenge in “The Count of Monte Cristo”?

I think that is seriously whacked, people.

And get a load of this from Hangin’ Judge JR hisself (along with “Strip Search Sammy”)…

“Although the California statute is well-intentioned, its terms are not framed with the precision that the Constitution demands, and I therefore agree with the court that this particular law cannot be sustained,” wrote Justice Samuel Alito in a concurring opinion joined by Chief Justice John Roberts.

Gee, somehow I don’t think this decision was “framed with the precision that the Constitution demands” either.

I cannot believe that I’m actually in the same camp with Silent Clarence Thomas on this, but I am…

In a dissenting opinion, Thomas argued the freedom of speech doesn’t include the right for minors to access content without going through parents or guardians. He argued the nation’s Founders intended speech to minors that bypasses their parents to be excluded from the First Amendment.

“The historical evidence shows that the founding generation believed parents had absolute authority over their minor children and expected parents to use that authority to direct the proper development of their children,” Thomas wrote.

A little heavy handed, but I think he’s on the right track here.

However, I believe Justice Stephen Breyer (who, as far as I’m concerned, should be in charge of this bunch) got it right (he also dissented with Thomas)…

“But what sense does it make to forbid selling to a 13-year-old boy a magazine with an image of a nude woman, while protecting a sale to that 13-year-old of an interactive video game in which he actively, but virtually, binds and gags the woman, then tortures and kills her?” Breyer said.

“What kind of First Amendment would permit the government to protect children by restricting sales of that extremely violent video game only when the woman — bound, gagged, tortured and killed — is also topless?”

Nail. Hammer. Head.

Listen, if the video game sellers think the fine for selling M-rated games to minors is too high (I think it’s $1,100 in CA), or if they’re seeking some other type of a sanction as a penalty, I have no issue with that.

However, this ruling also states that video game labeling is “unconstitutional.” Really?

Then tell me where this “slippery slope” ends, Justices Scalia, Alito, Kennedy, Roberts, Kagan, Ginsburg and Sotomayor (and I’m surprised that the last three joined in this decision). Does this mean that, if a particular case is brought before the Court, they would be disposed to do away with the motion picture rating system also?

Call me any name you want if you don’t think I’m really a liberal for opposing this, but it’s a funny thing – your perspective on this stuff definitely changes when you become a parent. And I don’t see where having to deal with an “M” label on a video game that is particularly violent or filled with sexual content is too big of a price to pay.

(And given some of the atrocious rulings of the Roberts court, why do I have a sick feeling that the challenge to this monstrosity from Ohio will be the death knell for Roe v. Wade? Love to be wrong, though…)

Finally, I simply must return to David Brooks because, in a column today criticizing Obama once again, he came up with this lulu…

In 1961, John F. Kennedy gave an Inaugural Address that did enormous damage to the country. It defined the modern president as an elevated, heroic leader who issues clarion calls in the manner of Henry V at Agincourt. Ever since that speech, presidents have felt compelled to live up to that grandiose image, and they have done enormous damage to themselves and the nation. That speech gave a generation an unrealistic, immature vision of the power of the presidency.

I felt like my jaw dropped about a foot the first time I read that, so I had to read it again. I actually thought it was a goof…but no, we’re talking about BoBo here, so he was definitely serious.

Gee, I wonder what kind of “enormous damage” BoBo is talking about?

Only an utterly vain, jaded, well-kept and self-centered right-wing corporate media shill like Brooks could concoct something like that.

Reading that paragraph reminded me once more of how grateful I am that I have a historical frame of reference that extends prior to the year 1980 or so. I can vividly recall when this country embarked on great goals to improve the quality of life in this country and our competitiveness among other industrialized nations (encouraged in JFK’s inaugural address)…and succeeded at those goals (cleaning up our environment, mobilizing our industrial might during wartime to defeat the Axis powers, building the interstate highway system, etc.). We didn’t spend weeks and months arguing about whether or not trying to achieve those goals was the supposedly “proper” role of the federal government and whether or not the states were supposed to take ownership of these projects instead (or, as former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert once put it, more or less, “we once landed a man on the moon, and now we can’t even build a tunnel to New York City,” a reference to this).

I don’t know how many of you recall the film “Born on the Fourth of July” starring Tom Cruise and directed by Oliver Stone, based on the book by Ron Kovic (he served in Vietnam before he became paralyzed due to a spinal cord injury suffered in combat). The movie begins with Kovic and his family watching Kennedy’s inaugural address in rapt attention, hanging on every word uttered by our 35th president. That scene was replayed across the nation that day.

Here is more on the speech as well as recollections from Ted Sorenson (who had an awful lot to do with it) here; as Sorensen noted, the intent of the speech was to accomplish multiple objectives, one of which was to assure other elderly world leaders (particularly Harold Macmillan, Charles De Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer) that the U.S. intended to continue honoring its international obligations.

Yes, with the passage of time and 20-20 hindsight, we can look back on the Bay of Pigs fiasco and other Kennedy missteps as the product of inexperience and a certain degree of hubris which, I’m sure, everyone who holds that office possesses to one degree or another. However, Kennedy’s inaugural address was (and remains) a stirring vision of what America once was and could be one day again (to say nothing of the rest of the world as well).

And of all the memorable quotes from the speech noted in the Wikipedia article and the Sorenson story, this is one of the ones that has stuck with me the longest over all these years…

- If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.

No wonder BoBo hated it.

Monday Mashup (6/27/2011)

I had an item left over from last week that I guess I didn’t feel like getting to, so I’ll give it a shot now here…

…the greatest responsibility for the collapse of the housing market and the near "Armageddon" of the American economy belongs to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and to the politicians who created and protected them. With a couple of prominent exceptions, the politicians were Democrats claiming to do good for the poor. Along the way, they enriched themselves and their friends, stuffed their campaign coffers, and resisted all attempts to enforce market discipline. When the inevitable collapse arrived, the entire economy suffered, but no one more than the poor.

Yeah, I know this is about what you would expect from Mona Charen of clownhall.com; yet another zombie lie about how Fannie and Freddie supposedly are primarily to blame for the near-cratering of our economy.

In response, I give you the following (here)…

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac did not, by themselves, cause the subprime mortgage crisis. Legislative attempts to rapidly wind down Fannie and Freddie will not prevent another recession. Worse yet, it could further harm the housing market.

…

It was the preponderance of exotic loans in addition to subprime borrowers that made Fannie and Freddie's loan acquisitions so toxic.

It is critical to understand, however, that because of regulations, they took on less of these loans than most banks. According to several analysts, they increased their acquisition of these loans to maintain market share in what had become a very competitive market.

…

As GSEs, Fannie and Freddie weren't required to offset the size of their loan portfolio with enough capital from stock sales to cover it. This was a result of both their lobbying efforts and the fact that their loans were insured, so they felt they didn't need to. Instead, they used derivatives to hedge the interest-rate risk of their portfolios. When the value of the derivatives fell, so did their ability to insure loans. (Source: NYT, Fannie, Freddie and You, July 14, 2008).

This exposure to derivatives proved their downfall, as it did for most banks. As housing prices fell, even qualified borrowers ended up owing more than the home was worth. If they needed to sell the house for any reason, there would lose less money by allowing the bank to foreclose. Borrowers in negative amortization and interest-only loans were in even worse shape. Even though subprime and Alt-A loans only made up 17% of Fannie and Freddie's portfolio, they were responsible for over half of their losses in 2007.

…

Elimination of Fannie and Freddie will dramatically reduce the availability of mortgages and increase the cost. Banks have not, and would not, step in to guarantee mortgages. Studies have shown that, without Fannie and Freddie, mortgage interest rates could go as high as 9-10%. This would damage the housing market before it's had any chance to recover.

As noted here, though, misinforming about the root causes of our current economic crisis is something that comes naturally for Charen (Fannie and Freddie are hardly perfect, but they were trying to hold onto their market share threatened by those primary market offenders and TARP beneficiaries who, of course, utterly escape blame in Charen’s column).

Also, this CNN story tells us that our dreaded 112th Congress, while it decried federal spending, paid out $6.1 million in bonuses to congressional staffers.

I don’t have a problem with fair compensation for a hard day’s work, but I do have a problem when one of the most extreme offenders was elected by the racist-sign-and-funny-hat crowd but will still claim to burnish his tea party “bona fides.” As the story tells us…

Rep. Dennis Ross, R-Florida, held a hearing on the subject in March, opening with a strong statement, "Our taxpayers can no longer be asked to foot the bill for these federal employees while watching their own salaries remain flat and their benefits erode."

But as he criticized federal workers as being overpaid, Ross reported $8,750 in what looks like bonuses to his personal office staff. His office did not respond to a request for clarification and comment.

Oh, and Ross also came up with the idea of selling off 70 percent of Utah that is federally owned (here); why he is interested in such a potential sale on the other side of the country, far away from his constituency, is something I cannot imagine.

In addition, I’ve noticed a great deal of wingnut harrumphing out on those Internet tubes over a segment on the Pledge of Allegiance during NBC’s recent coverage of the U.S. Open golf tournament (leading to this charming moment by Repug U.S. House Rep Todd Akin of Missouri). Apparently, the source of the outrage is the network’s omission of the phrase “under God” when reciting the Pledge, for which the network has apologized.

I wonder if those who are complaining are aware of the fact that the “under God” phrase was only added to the Pledge in 1953 (and I also wonder if they’re aware of the “Bellamy salute” that used to be practiced when reciting the Pledge, which looked suspiciously like the salute given to a certain Nazi Germany Fuhrer, as noted here)?

Finally, The Moustache of Understanding was in rare form yesterday in the New York Times (here)…

The most important truth about the Middle East: It only puts a smile on your face when it starts with them. If it doesn’t start with them, if they don’t have ownership of a new peace initiative, a battle or a struggle for good governance, no amount of U.S. troops kick-starting, cajoling or doling out money can make it work. And if it does start with them, they really don’t need or want us around for very long.

I can’t think of a word to describe my astonishment upon reading that paragraph, considering that it also came from the person responsible for this.

Continuing…

As for how the cold war ended, that’s easy. It ended when the two governments — the Soviet Union and Maoist China, which provided the funding and ideology propelling our enemies — collapsed. China had a peaceful internal transformation from Maoist Communism to capitalism, and the Soviet Union had a messy move from Marxism to capitalism. End of cold war.

I realize that Friedman absolutely has a huge man crush on the country that is fast becoming the world’s premier economic power (aided in no small part by our stupidity in aiding that process particularly in the IT industry, at the expense of workers in this country), but I don’t sense much of anything that is “peaceful” about that nation (this provides the context Friedman chooses to ignore).

Continuing…

Since then, we have increasingly found ourselves at war with another global movement: radical jihadist Islam. It is fed by money and ideology coming out of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Iran. The attack of 9/11 was basically a joint operation by Saudi and Pakistani nationals. The Marine and American Embassy bombings in Lebanon were believed to have been the work of Iranian agents. Yet we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, because Saudi Arabia had oil, Pakistan had nukes and Iran was too big. We hoped that this war-by-bank-shot would lead to changes in all three countries. So far, it has not.

Gosh, Mr. “The Mall Is Flat,” from what I recall, the most vocal media cheerleader for Dubya’s Not-So-Excellent Adventure In Iraq (his “war by bank shot” if you will) was one person…YOU!!!!

As noted here, Friedman once said (infamously) that Democrats voted “with their noses plugged” for Al Gore and John Kerry when both ran for the White House.

I wonder if he wrote this column in the same posture?

Sunday Stuff

Yes, it is indeed awesome that same-sex marriage rights won in New York on Friday (here), but lest we forget about Silent Clarence Thomas and his little....how would you put it?..."influence" issue, Rachel Maddow and Ian Millhiser remind us here (just because we don't have Anthony Weiner to kick around any more doesn't mean that the Thomas thing has gone away)...

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

...and by the way, here's a mellow little tune about obsession :-).

Friday Stuff

I give you Republicans talking out of both sides of their faces yet again (here)...



...and here's a cheery, uplifting tune to take us into the weekend (sorry, no "Hollywood ending").

Friday Mashup (6/24/11)

This post from The Hill tells us the following…

Attention federal employees: it is against the law to doodle horns or a halo on the official portrait of President Barack Obama if the photo is displayed in your cubicle. It’s also against the law to hang Vice President Joe Biden’s smiling mug upside-down. The Hatch Act, passed in 1939 and last amended in 1993, directs federal employees to only showcase the president’s picture in “an official size and manner,” according to the U.S. Office of Special Counsel.

The government’s photo regulation was just one of the many idiosyncrasies of the law under fire from Democrats and Republicans at a House Oversight & Government Reform Committee hearing Tuesday. The committee is starting the process of updating the law for the e-mail era (not to mention Facebook and Twitter).

Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) plans to introduce legislation to reform the archaic act after the August recess, with changes slated to take effect with the inauguration of the next president in 2013. Ethics experts say it will be a heavy lift to pass the measure by the end of President Obama’s first term, despite broad, bipartisan consensus that the law creates ridiculous rules. After all, it’s Congress.

Actually, when discussing The Hatch Act, the issue isn’t really Congress, but our prior ruling cabal’s disregard of the Act; as noted here, “Deadeye Dick” Cheney, among others, violated the Act by intervening in the Klamath River project in Oregon, funneling water to drought-stricken farmers and, in the process, killing thousands of sockeye salmon that were legally protected under the Endangered Species Act.

And for good measure, it is noted here that, in 2006, Bushco officials repeatedly violated the Act by engaging in political activities for Republican candidates (including our own “Mikey The Beloved” Fitzpatrick), leading to the Obama Administration decision to abolish the White House Office of Political Affairs (OPA), probably the main source of the Hatch violations.

(In response, here is wingnuttery alleging that former EPA employee Shirley Sherrod, who of course was smeared by the human stain Andrew Breitbart, was guilty of Hatch violations, and here is Murdoch Street Journal nonsense alleging Obama Hatch violations over the did-he-get-a-job-offer-or-didn’t-he-who-cares Joe Sestak business.)

However, no discussion of Hatch Act abuse under Bushco is complete without mentioning former Government Services Administration head Lurita Doan, who, as noted here, appeared completely befuddled when called to testify about agency abuse (including running up credit card charges such as $14,000 for Internet dating services and a dinner at a Ruth's Chris Steakhouse in Orlando, Fla.- OMB and its former head Jim Nussle were also involved) before then-chairman Dem Rep Henry Waxman (as noted here, Doan “(signed off on) a briefing for top G.S.A. managers — organized by the White House and delivered by a Karl Rove political operative — on targeted Democratic politicians.”

And I’m not sure how the Hill writer arrived at the conclusion that the ACT “prohibit(s) partisan political activity but allow(s) nonpartisan political activity,” but I do agree that the Act very definitely needs to be revisited.

How about no political activity by government officials? With no exceptions. Ever.

Next, I suppose it wouldn’t be a Friday without more nonsense from Christine Flowers of the Philadelphia Daily News (here)…

Whenever we talk about religious objections to same-sex marriage, someone invariably raises the specter of theocracy.

But these same folks don't seem to be equally interested in what happens when someone's spiritual beliefs make them vulnerable to civil or criminal penalties. It's all well and good to say that religious institutions won't have to perform same-sex ceremonies. But that doesn't protect those organizations from civil lawsuits or insulate them from prosecution for hate speech if, for example, a priest were to condemn homosexuality from the pulpit. It also puts their tax-exempt status in danger.

Funny, but the only person I see threatening the tax-exempt status of the Catholic Church is a teabaggin’ Republican – as noted here…

It’s on between the Tea Party and the Catholic Church in New Hampshire.

Republican State Rep. and Tea Party leader Andrew Manuse (R-Derry) told the Catholic League he will be filing legislation in the New Hampshire House to strip the Roman Catholic Church of its tax exempt status because Bishop John McCormack spoke against proposed budget cuts at a recent State House rally, according to Bill Donohue, the President of the Catholic League.

“I am now considering a bill to remove the Church’s tax exempt status in New Hampshire, for you have clearly shown that you no longer want it,” Manuse says in the e-mail.

Sources at the State House have confirmed to NH Journal that Manuse indeed intends to file such legislation.

Last week, McCormack joined several thousand protesters to oppose Republican-sponsored budget cuts.

“Never in the nearly 18 years I have spent as president of the Catholic League have I seen more totally irresponsible statements issued by the lawmakers in any one state,” said Donohue in a statement. “Why doesn’t Manuse go right ahead with his bill to remove the Church’s tax-exempt status? We’d love to present his e-mail in court.”

However, lest anyone think I’m inclined to give Donahue credit for anything whatsoever (a person who serves in no official capacity as a spokesman for the Catholic Church, let’s not forget), I should also point out this.

Finally, armchair warrior and former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson of the WaPo chastised President Obama this week as follows (here)…

Obama’s meandering leadership in the Afghan war is difficult even to summarize. In 2009, against considerable pressure, he made an effective counterinsurgency campaign possible by announcing a surge of 30,000 troops. He immediately complicated that strategy by setting a July 2011 deadline for the beginning of withdrawal — signaling that American resolve was temporary and that it might be possible for enemies to outwait the onslaught. But Obama minimized the confusion by making his drawdown schedule conditional on circumstances in Afghanistan.

There are a lot of directions I can go with this, I realize, but I would ask that you bear with me a bit while we go back in time by about three years and two months and witness the following from April 8th, 2008…

Is al-Qaida a greater threat to U.S. interests in Iraq, or in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region? Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Joe Biden asked ambassador Ryan Crocker that question today, got an honest response, and set the Bush administration's talking points back quite a bit.

…

As Spencer Ackerman noted, Crocker was in an untenable position: "Give the correct answer and humiliate the Bush administration [or] give the administration's answer and look like a fool." He went with the prior.

DDay added, "The Ambassador to Iraq just admitted that Iraq is not the central front in the war on terror. He just admitted that the potential for Al Qaeda to gain a beachhead in Iraq should the United States withdraw is minuscule compared to the already-established beachhead along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. He admitted that the global fight against terror is currently misdirected."

So basically, then-Senator Joe Biden got Ambassador Ryan Crocker to admit that Iraq isn’t the “central front” on the Now And Forever You Godless Commie Li-bu-ruul And Now Damn The Torpedoes And On To Benghazi War On Terra! Terra! Terra!, but the Afghan/Pakistan border is where the front is located.

So what did Gerson write about three weeks later? This…

It is a central argument of the Bush administration that the outcome in Iraq is essential to the broader war on terrorism -- which is plainly true. When it comes to Sunni radicalism, the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan are a single struggle.

Gee, I wonder if Gerson’s TV was broken and didn’t hear what Crocker had to say?

Oh, and by the way, despite the fact that a drawdown of 10,000 troops is, as far as I’m concerned, a token gesture, this tells us that Obama is a lot more in tune with public opinion on the Afghan war than Gerson is, or probably ever will be.

Thursday Stuff

Just because I didn't see the speech on Afghanistan doesn't mean I can't have an opinion or two about the whole thing, amplified by K.O. here (and sorry for the triple negative in that statement)...

Update 6/24/11: Here is link to Keith's comment; I try to avoid having audio automatically play when accessing a web site (that's why, when I'm not at home, I always turn the sound card control to mute to prevent any, shall I say, inconveniences).

...and I thought this was a nice, mellow little summer-ish kind of tune.

Thursday Mashup (6/23/11)

This tells us that the Obama National Labor Relations Board is trying to implement a rule that would shorten the amount of time it would take a workforce to join a union…

Union elections have been heavily tilted in favor of business for many years now, because of the long lag times between the announcement and the actual election, and because of how businesses use that time to intimidate and harass employees. Even despite this, 63% of all union elections succeeded in 2009, a testament to worker desire to join together to fight for their rights. If the process were streamlined and made more fair, there would not only be a better rate of victory, there would probably be more elections.

So you just knew that the U.S. House Repugs had to oppose it (here)…

The chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee harshly attacked on Tuesday proposed new rules from the National Labor Relations Board designed to drastically shorten the period workers have to consider a vote to join a union.

Rep. John Kline, Minnesota Republican, who is the panel’s chairman, said in a statement that the NLRB, now dominated by appointees of President Obama, “continues to push an activist agenda at the expense of our nation’s workforce.”

“Not only will this misguided proposal to expedite union elections undermine an employer’s lawful right to communicate with his or her employees, it will cripple a worker’s ability to make an informed decision,” Mr. Kline warned.

Which of course is total bullshit – FDL also tells us the following…

In a parallel action, the Labor Department announced a rule that would force public disclosure of the consultants hired by employers to union-bust. This rule expands the 1959 Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act to close a loophole that employers used to bring in anti-union consultants, saying they merely provided “advice.”

Oh, and by the way, as noted here, Kline also sponsored an amendment blocking a rule that, in essence, would stop for-profit colleges from gouging students and turning them into debt slaves.

Next up on our parade of right-wing House miscreants is Paul Broun of Georgia, opining over at The Daily Tucker (here)…

I often say that Washington can learn a lot from using some good ole Georgia common sense.

Earlier this month, after one of my town hall meetings, a mayor of a small town in my district told me a story about the struggles her city has been facing. With the economy in the worst state since the Great Depression, unemployment has shot through the roof and many businesses in Hoschton, Georgia have been forced to downsize or shut down completely.

The mayor, Erma Denney, told me about how tough times have also required her to make some bold choices about Hoschton’s budget. Ultimately, in efforts to keep the town afloat, she ended up slashing their budget by a whopping 67 percent. Mayor Denney said to me, “Everything has to be put on the table… nothing can be impossible to cut.”

Washington: take note.

In response, I give you the following:

Broun had no problem here with the potential of 250,000 employees getting laid off as a result of his party’s games with the debt limit, saying they should get a “real job.”

He also did and said nothing in response to a “shoot Obama” comment from one of his constituents (here).

He also encouraged lawbreaking by telling people not to fill out their census forms (here).

Just like every other Repug, he said here that everyone has health care because they can go to an emergency room (Remember that one? And that’s particularly ridiculous since Broun is apparently a doctor).

He called for an investigation into the Council on American-Islamic Relations, rightly termed a “witch hunt” by Glenn Greenwald (here).

And as noted here he said that health care reform and the stimulus will “kill people by denying care”; he said that Obama and the “Socialist elite” were planning to “declare martial law”; and in his book “The Backlash,” Will Bunch documented Broun’s ties to the “Oath Keepers,” a “fast-growing, ultraradical organization that spreads unsubstantiated fears of Obama confiscating guns and placing U.S. citizens in concentration camps.”

Actually, I don’t know who is more repulsive; Broun, or the life forms that continually send him back to Congress every two years.

And that’s probably an appropriate transition into this week’s Area Votes in Congress writeup (here – getting to this today because I just don’t know about posting tomorrow)…

House

2012 farm, food budget. Voting 217-203, the House passed a bill (HR 2112) to appropriate $17.3 billion in discretionary spending for the Department of Agriculture and related agencies in fiscal 2012. The bill would cut spending by nearly 14 percent below 2011 levels to meet targets in the Republicans' 2012 budget plan. The bill would provide $2.2 billion for the Food and Drug Administration, down $284 million from 2011 levels, and $171 million for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, down $32 million.

The bill would sharply cut discretionary spending for domestic food initiatives such as the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program and aid for community food banks. But it would fund an increase of more than $7 billion, to $108.3 billion, in mandatory 2012 spending for crop subsidies, food stamps, school lunches, and other entitlements whose levels are set by formula, not by congressional appropriators.

A yes vote was to pass the bill.

Voting yes: Charles W. Dent (R., Pa.), Michael Fitzpatrick (R., Pa.), Jim Gerlach (R., Pa.), Frank A. LoBiondo (R., N.J.), Pat Meehan (R., Pa.), Joseph R. Pitts (R., Pa.), Jon Runyan (R., N.J.), and Christopher H. Smith (R., N.J.).

Voting no: Robert E. Andrews (D., N.J.), Robert A. Brady (D., Pa.), John Carney (D., Del.), Chaka Fattah (D., Pa.), Tim Holden (D., Pa.), and Allyson Y. Schwartz (D., Pa.).

Less money to regulate our food and drugs, less for poor women and young children, and less for regulating commodities including the price of oil…remember this vote the next time you hear about what an upright “family man” with his six kids Mikey the Beloved supposedly is (also remember this the next time J.D. Mullane blames Obama for $4-a-gallon gas).

Food-safety funds. Voting 193-226, the House defeated an amendment to add $1 million to HR 2112 (above) to help the Food and Drug Administration implement a 2010 law that greatly expands its authority over domestic and foreign companies that handle raw and processed foods. The $1 million was to have been transferred from a variety of Department of Agriculture administrative accounts.

A yes vote was to spend more on food safety.

Voting yes: Brady, Carney, Dent, Fattah, Holden, LoBiondo, Schwartz, and Smith.

Voting no: Fitzpatrick, Gerlach, Meehan, Pitts, and Runyan.

Not voting: Andrews.

Of course – who needs safe food, right (take a bow, teabaggers…e coli, here we come! And good for Dent, Smith and LoBiondo to act like adults here, unlike Saint Mikey).

Breast-feeding funds. Voting 119-306, the House defeated an amendment to strip HR 2112 (above) of its $85 million for a program that educates mothers about the health advantages of breast feeding. The counseling is part of the WIC nutrition program for low-income families.

A yes vote was to defund the breast-feeding program.

Voting yes: Pitts.

Voting no: Andrews, Brady, Carney, Dent, Fattah, Fitzpatrick, Gerlach, Holden, LoBiondo, Meehan, Runyan, Schwartz, and Smith.

Joe Pitts has cast all kinds of awful No votes, but this has to be one of his very worst. Leave it to this supposed paragon of morality, who will yammer all day long about the unborn, to not give a damn about these kids once they pop out of mommy’s belly.

Want to know why this matters, Pancake Joe? Click here..

Veterans' suicides. Voting 184-234, the House defeated a bid by Democrats to spend an additional $20 million in fiscal 2012 for services to prevent suicides by veterans of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. The vote occurred as the House passed a bill (HR 2055) appropriating $72.5 billion for military construction programs and the Department of Veterans Affairs in 2012. The $20 million was to have been offset by cuts elsewhere in the bill.

A yes vote was to increase spending to prevent veterans' suicides.

Voting yes: Brady, Carney, Fattah, Holden, and Schwartz.

Voting no: Dent, Fitzpatrick, Gerlach, LoBiondo, Meehan, Pitts, Runyan, and Smith.

Not voting: Andrews.

At a certain point, I just have no words for my disgust (here).

Senate

Ethanol subsidies. The Senate voted, 73-27, to end tax subsidies and trade protection for the U.S. ethanol industry. The measure would end refundable tax credits for refineries that blend ethanol with gasoline, saving the Treasury $6 billion annually. The credits amount to 45 cents per gallon of ethanol. The amendment also would repeal a tariff of 54 cents per gallon on imported ethanol. Critics noted that U.S. refineries need no financial incentive because they are required by law to undercut this domestic alternative to foreign oil. The underlying bill (S 782) remained in debate.

A yes vote was to end ethanol subsidies.

Voting yes: Thomas Carper (D., Del.), Chris Coons (D., Del.), Frank Lautenberg (D., N.J.), Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), and Pat Toomey (R., Pa.).

Voting no: Bob Casey (D., Pa.).

This week, the House debated the 2012 defense budget and a revamp of U.S. patent laws, while the Senate took up a bill streamlining the process for confirming presidential appointees (which, judging from how they’ve moved at slower than a snail’s pace on Obama appointees, I would say is long overdue).

Finally, I came across some truly ripe stuff from Michael Grunwald of Time (here)…

There was a telling confrontation at last week’s Netroots Nation gathering of progressive activists, interrupting a panel discussion on “What to Do When the President Is Just Not That Into You.” A bisexual volunteer for President Obama reelection campaign approached the stage to hand a flyer to Dan Choi, a gay former Army lieutenant and a leading crusader for the repeal of don’t-ask-don’t-tell. Choi dramatically ripped up the flyer and declared that he wouldn’t support Obama.

And why should he? What has Obama ever done to help gays serve openly in the military? Other than repeal don’t-ask-don’t-tell, so that gays can serve openly in the military? Ah, “the professional left,” never happy unless it’s unhappy.

I will admit that I’m not sure what else Obama can do about “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” that he hasn’t already done (open to any new information on this if anyone has anything). And yes, he could stop this squishy hand-wringing on marriage equality when the country is plainly moving in that direction with or without his help (also, don’t ask me to comment on Obama’s speech last night on Afghanistan because I didn’t see it due of home renovations to Le Manse Doomsy, currently allowing us a single TV that has been thoroughly monopolized by the young one…sounds like Number 44 was going for half a loaf once again, though I honestly am not sure what else he could do at the moment; yes, I want to see the wars end, but it’s all about winning over those “independent” voters…like it or not, that’s the political calculation anymore).

However, Grunwald uses this column as an opportunity to “punch the DFHs” once again for complaining about the “stim” (yes, for the hundred and fiftieth time, it was too small…and gee, maybe if it had been a trillion and a half, say, then the effects would have lasted into the 2010 midterms and the Dems would not have gotten wiped out) and the fact that a public option was not included in health care reform (yes, there was a window when it enjoyed popular support before the whole sausage-making boondoggle behind the whole enterprise ended up turning people off, and yes, it would have encouraged competition and lowered costs).

(And by the way, I’m not providing links in the prior two paragraphs because I’ve already posted about this stuff many, many, many times, but I must keep bringing this up because of Grunwald and his fellow corporate media minions. However, I will provide a link here to a Media Matters post in which Grunwald agrees with Flush Limbore’s assessment about the BP spill…way beyond a joke all the way around - the reality point of view is here)

Grunwald concludes his column with this…

It’s easy for activists to complain about imperfect achievements like the stimulus or Obamacare, especially when they’re not among the 3 million Americans who would’ve been unemployed without the stimulus or the 50 million Americans who would’ve been uninsured without Obamacare. Complaining is what activists do. And bloggers are right that Obama hasn’t made a consistent case for liberal politics or Keynesian economics, allowing anti-government Republicans to hijack the national debate. But making a case is what bloggers are supposed to do.

That’s a preposterous statement upon first glance. However, when you think about it, I suppose it’s true.

Particularly when politicians and a supposedly free, objective media entertaining all points of view equally refuse to make those cases themselves.

Wednesday Stuff

I would call this a cautionary history lesson with an important message...



...and HAPPY BIRTHDAY TODD! (no video - only a tune of his which is vastly underrated, IMHO).

Wednesday Mashup (6/22/11)

Memo to The Hill: The Sainted Ronnie R died seven years ago.

Also, it looks like Mark Krikorian of Irrational Spew Online is getting ready to call the civility police (here)…

Look, I understand that conservatives disagree on Libya, and more generally over how expansive our foreign policy should be. But this name-calling is inappropriate…

Oh, that’s a good one.

Here, Krikorian helped to amplify the “anchor baby” threat (I would say that constitutes name calling); here, he called Obama an “effete vacillator”; here, he called an immigration rally an "illegal-alien-palooza"; and here, he said Haiti is a “basket case” because “it wasn’t colonized long enough.”

Once more, a conservative looks into the mirror and sees everyone and everything but himself.

Continuing, Philadelphia’s conservative house organ of record tells us the following here (on the matter of the recent Supreme Court ruling that tossed the class action lawsuit filed by women employees of Wal-Mart)…

The misconceptions about this case begin with the identities of the real combatants. On NPR's Marketplace this week, Slate's Dahlia Lithwick described the plaintiffs as "1.5 million female employees of Wal-Mart who are trying to file a class-action suit." But, of course, most of those women are not "trying" to do anything of the sort.

Rather, a relative handful of them have hired lawyers, and those lawyers daringly sought to get themselves declared the legal representatives of the other 1.496 million (or however many), who have expressed no inclination whatsoever to sue.

The individual who wrote this really should acquaint himself with what a class action lawsuit truly is, which is an action by “any member of a class of plaintiffs” (the fact that the suit was brought on behalf of 1.5 million female employees although it wasn’t initiated by each of those employees doesn’t automatically make it invalid).

I took a little while to think this over, though, because, though this is yet another case of the High Court of Hangin’ Judge JR doing the bidding of its corporate masters, I wasn’t sure about this action on the legal merits, though I see plenty of grounds for it.

Jonathan Turley can do a much better job of explaining it, and I think he does so here…

As anticipated, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favor of Wal-Mart in an important workplace discrimination case. The Court divided 5-4 in adopting more stringent standards for future cases. From the outset, I viewed this as an extremely bad case that would likely make bad law for those fighting workplace discrimination. It now has.

In Wal-Mart v. Dukes, all of the justices agreed to reverse the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in the case which would have affected up to 1.6 million women and billions of dollars in damages.

That was the easy part. The justices, however, divided on the elements needed for future such cases. It divided along ideological lines with Justice Antonin Scalia holding that the court must require common elements to be the basis for such class actions.

Yeah, leave to Scalia as usual, who seemed to think the plaintiffs couldn’t establish a standard of discrimination “on a classwide basis.” And for good measure, Scalia and his pals also made it damn difficult for a plaintiff to recover lost wages as a result of a class action (the four dissenting judges, Ginsburg, Kagan, Breyer and Sotomayor, believing the Wal-Mart workers had a case, would have sent the case back to the Ninth Circuit…for good measure, a New York Times Op-Ed chimed in on this here).

However, as Think Progress reminds us here, this wasn’t even the worst class action ruling by The Supremes this term (TP is having a fundraising appeal at the moment – they’re doing heroic work, and they could use any scratch you can send over to them).

Further, I give you the odious Ron Johnson at The Daily Tucker (here)…

Prior to being elected to the United States Senate last November, I spent 31 years building a plastics manufacturing business in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. My educational background is in accounting and finance, but when you help start a business from scratch, you wind up doing just about everything. I operated machinery, loaded trucks and railcars, hired and trained the staff, kept the books, paid taxes, purchased raw materials, sold our finished products, did payroll, opened mail, emptied trash, and made coffee.

Why am I telling you this?

Because I’m not in the least bit unusual. Every day, millions of hard-working business owners, and the good people that work with them, struggle to build a good life for themselves and their families. They are the backbone of America. They work hard and play by the rules. And they live within their means.

Why can’t Washington?

I get really fed up with Johnson in particular mythologizing his supposed business chops; as noted here, he got a “hand up” from government bonds and “stim” funds (neither of which is illegal, of course, but some honesty about this would be nice). Oh, and Johnson also used prison labor to get out of paying a fair wage for a hard day’s work.

Besides, I think it’s more than a bit of a contradiction for Johnson to now be praising our supposedly wonderful system of free enterprise in this country when he once reminded us how great Communist China supposedly is, as noted here.

Update 6/25/11: Tisk, tisk, tisk (here)...

And speaking of dictatorships ruled by an individual with an iron fist, this tells us that Ed Snider, chairman of the Philadelphia Flyers hockey team, has been the primary force behind the team’s efforts to sign Russian goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov, formerly of the Phoenix Coyotes (I haven’t touched on sports for a little while, so I guess I’m overdue)…

LAS VEGAS - If there were ever any doubt about who controls the Philadelphia Flyers, Ed Snider put that to rest yesterday.

The Flyers' chairman and founder, now 78, is no omnipresent figurehead. He is still the one pulling the strings.

Snider made it clear that he is the one who wants (Bryzgalov) in a Flyers uniform next season, setting in motion a directive at the end of last season that put general manager Paul Holmgren on a mission.

The Flyers acquired Bryzgalov's rights on June 7.

"It had to be done," Snider told the Daily News, just after arriving here for tonight's NHL Awards show at The Palms Casino and Resort. "I was part of making it happen. It was hard to sit there and watch the Stanley Cup final, knowing what [Tim] Thomas was doing for Boston."

Some thoughts…I have to admit that Paul Holmgren has done a better job as the GM of this club than I thought he would, but the fact that he hasn’t been given the clout to tell Snider to butt out is pretty sad. Also, Boston won the Stanley Cup because of Thomas, sure, but also because the team (and I hate to admit this, but it’s true) did a superb job of finding role players who could step up and take some of the burden off the team’s stars (Brad Marchand, Rich Peverley, Chris Kelly, and former Flyer Dennis Seidenberg…also Nathan Horton – I think that stray elbow that put him out for the finals ended up being the turning point of the series, something I'm sure Aaron Rome of Vancouver will be thinking about for a long time).

The Flyers have some age issues to deal with, particularly among their defensemen, as well as talent issues among their forwards (there are guys who definitely have benefitted playing with Mike Richards and Danny Briere in particular who, I think, would not have comparable numbers otherwise…see Ville Leino, Scott Hartnell, possibly Dan Carcillo). Signing a marquee goaltender for about one-tenth of your entire salary cap won’t fix that stuff also.

(And I know it’s not in Snider’s DNA to congratulate the winning team on its victory if they’re not wearing orange and black, so I might as well not even go there.)

Besides, I’d heard from one of those Internet tubes somewhere that they’re also looking at Florida Panthers goalie Tomas Vokoun, who I think would be a better fit for a much lower price (all they need is someone to buy time for Flyers’ netminder Sergei Bobrovsky for maybe a year or two).

And I wonder if I’m the only one who sees this as a “Nixon Goes To China” moment for Snider, who once detested the Soviets, partly for good reason, and subsequently refused to scout or draft them or have much of anything to do with them, though he now is doing his best to curry the favor of a Russian player (and a guy who would be the second Russian goalie on the team).

Finally, “The Pericles Of Petticoat Junction” strikes again (here)…

When President Obama voted present on the Iranian uprising and Secretary Clinton described the monstrous Assad as a “reformer,” completely absent was any awareness that both countries are repressive, cruel, and intolerant of dissent…

In response, I give you this from President Obama…

…in too many countries, calls for change have thus far been answered by violence. The most extreme example is Libya, where Muammar Qaddafi launched a war against his own people, promising to hunt them down like rats. As I said when the United States joined an international coalition to intervene, we cannot prevent every injustice perpetrated by a regime against its people, and we have learned from our experience in Iraq just how costly and difficult it is to try to impose regime change by force -– no matter how well-intentioned it may be.

But in Libya, we saw the prospect of imminent massacre, we had a mandate for action, and heard the Libyan people’s call for help. Had we not acted along with our NATO allies and regional coalition partners, thousands would have been killed. The message would have been clear: Keep power by killing as many people as it takes. Now, time is working against Qaddafi. He does not have control over his country. The opposition has organized a legitimate and credible Interim Council. And when Qaddafi inevitably leaves or is forced from power, decades of provocation will come to an end, and the transition to a democratic Libya can proceed.

While Libya has faced violence on the greatest scale, it’s not the only place where leaders have turned to repression to remain in power. Most recently, the Syrian regime has chosen the path of murder and the mass arrests of its citizens. The United States has condemned these actions, and working with the international community we have stepped up our sanctions on the Syrian regime –- including sanctions announced yesterday on President Assad and those around him.

The Syrian people have shown their courage in demanding a transition to democracy. President Assad now has a choice: He can lead that transition, or get out of the way. The Syrian government must stop shooting demonstrators and allow peaceful protests. It must release political prisoners and stop unjust arrests. It must allow human rights monitors to have access to cities like Dara’a; and start a serious dialogue to advance a democratic transition. Otherwise, President Assad and his regime will continue to be challenged from within and will continue to be isolated abroad.

So far, Syria has followed its Iranian ally, seeking assistance from Tehran in the tactics of suppression. And this speaks to the hypocrisy of the Iranian regime, which says it stand for the rights of protesters abroad, yet represses its own people at home. Let’s remember that the first peaceful protests in the region were in the streets of Tehran, where the government brutalized women and men, and threw innocent people into jail. We still hear the chants echo from the rooftops of Tehran. The image of a young woman dying in the streets is still seared in our memory. And we will continue to insist that the Iranian people deserve their universal rights, and a government that does not smother their aspirations.

And as noted here, we recently marked the two-year anniversary of the death of Neda Soltan.

Not to fear, though – Hanson will be onboard the fall “conservative cruise” along with a cadre of wingnut luminaries. Book your reservations early.

I suppose an untimely November Caribbean hurricane is probably too much to ask for, but I’ll pray for one anyway.

Tuesday Stuff

God, did I miss "Countdown" (here)...



…and happy 60th birthday to Nils Lofgren (take it easy on the back flips, OK?).

Tuesday Mashup (6/21/11)

Over the weekend, former Bushco IRS head Mark Everson wrote the following (here, about our current economic mess)…

It will take decades to fully untangle the causes of the 2008 financial crisis…

Really? I would say that the causes have been pretty well defined at this point…inflating the housing bubble by “securitizing” crappy mortgages re-bundled as AAA-rated assets, peddling them all over the place (with life forms such as those at Goldman Sachs making money off the front end selling them and making money off the back end by hedging them with credit default swaps), then watching in horror as they imploded and jobs evaporated…of course, years of Republican budget profligacy including putting two wars and Dubya’s stinking tax cuts “on the card” didn’t help either…shall I go on?

Everson claims here that lawyers and accountants “who were once the proud pillars of our financial system have become the happy architects of its circumvention.” After having just gotten around to watching “Enron: The Smartest Guys In the Room,” and witnessing the willing collaboration of the Arthur Andersen accounting firm in Enron’s ruinous scams, I really can’t argue that (to say nothing of the company’s lawyers).

Still, to me, this sounds a bit like a bank robber who gets caught and ends up suing the manufacturer of the weapon he used in his crime, because (he argues) that he would have gotten away with it had the gun not misfired (for some reason, Everson seems to give our supposedly august financial titans a pass here).

The column argues that companies should separate the role of a board chairman from a chief executive, as Everson puts it, though it kind of makes me wonder why that needs to be pointed out, given that someone holding two or more roles like that potentially opens the door for conflict of interest.

Everson also argues for abrogation of attorney/clients privilege within corporations trading in securities, to which I respond, yeah, just watch and see how long THAT stands up when it is challenged in the Supreme Court of Hangin’ Judge JR, who never met a corporate “person” he didn’t like (how about stringent enforcement of the existing rules for agencies charged with policing these entities like the SEC, as well as providing enough funds to hire enough agents to do their jobs as successfully as possible?).

Everson continues…

(One) idea is for corporations to reassess their compensation practices for financial and legal executives. Just as some large businesses are moving to separate the position of board chairman from that of chief executive in order to provide for stronger governance, companies might also consider development of a new pay scheme for their financial and legal personnel. This would mean paying handsome, multiyear fixed salaries to the chief financial officer, the general counsel and their top deputies — but without offering the opportunity for equity participation. Such an approach would sharply limit the temptation to inflate shareholder value at the expense of business substance.

It would also sharply limit the desire of a CEO to grow his or her company if they knew that they didn’t have an equity stake in that company (and somehow I have a feeling this would also cause them to believe that they could screw up with impunity).

I am hardly a business genius, but I still found this to be head-scratching stuff from Everson, who once had the brilliant idea to privatize IRS tax collection in 2004, though it ended up costing more than it generated before it was mercifully repealed by a Democratic Party-run House (here); froze more than 120,000 low-income taxpayers’ refunds on suspicion of fraud without notifying them or giving them a chance to respond and also eliminated the highly convenient and inexpensive Tele-File program (here); and resigned as head of the Red Cross because he had an “inappropriate relationship” with a female subordinate (here).

Everson also came up with the brilliant idea here of encouraging tax preparers to sell tax data to third parties, and from there "once in the hands of (those) third parties, tax information could be resold and handled under even looser rules than the IRS sets, increasing consumers' vulnerability to identity theft and other risks" (an observation made by a former Dem Illinois senator, a fellow named Barack Obama).

There are a lot of reasons why I’m glad that Everson is basically out of the picture when it comes to matters of federal governance, and one is that I don’t have to look at that self-satisfied mug of his anymore (though I’m sure that Red Cross thing brought him back down to earth just a little bit).

Next, I give you the latest from the U.S. House Repugs and their non-jobs agenda (here)…

The House is scheduled to vote Tuesday on whether to repeal an election commission set up after the controversial 2000 presidential election.

Members plan to vote on H.R. 672, which would repeal the Election Assistance Commission. That commission was established in 2002 after confusion and controversy over ballots in Florida for presidential election between then-Vice President Al Gore and then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush.

The commission was set up under the Help America Vote Act approved in 2002. That law created the commission, which set voting guidelines for states, and to distribute funds to states that could be used to update voting equipment.

Rep. Gregg Harper (R-Miss.), the sponsor of H.R. 672, says repealing the commission would save $14 million a year and that it can safely be repealed because the commission's work has been completed. He said that in 2010, the National Association of Secretaries of State renewed their request to repeal the EAC, which has "served its purpose."

Sooo…The Repugs are trying to save $14 million, while our total deficit remains at about $14 trillion, over $10.6 trillion of which was racked up under Bushco.

And doing it on the backs of poor, elderly and minority voters. Nice.

In response, Dem House Rep Bob Brady of PA tells us the following in defense of the EAC (here)…

While the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) was a creation of Congress, the bulk of its services and guidance is intended to support and assist state and local election operations. As such, it is misguided and presumptuous for Congress to propose its termination unilaterally, without the input of the state and local election officials who rely on its resources in executing their most crucial functions.

In a Congressional Research Service report titled “How Local Election Officials View Elections Reform: Results of Three National Surveys,” most local election officials found the services provided by the EAC moderately important. [i] In the same survey, the degree to which election officials found the EAC helpful improved significantly in 2008, when compared to responses from a similar survey conducted in 2006. Comparing both surveys, we find that 65% of 2008 survey respondents found the EAC “Moderately helpful,” compared to 35% in 2006.[ii] And in 2008, the percentage of respondents who found the EAC less helpful dropped from 46% in 2006 to 18% in 2008.[iii] These trends suggest marked improvement in the functioning and/perception of the EAC, by those who works closest with it. It’s also important to note that we have yet to see the results of the 2010 survey, yet here we are, having a hearing on an opportunistic bill that was introduced in uncertain budgetary times under the guise of cutting costs.

Most of what the EAC does is advisory, providing guidance to state and local election boards to ensure fair and efficient elections. This is not someone’s pet project – it is a crucial, frontline effort to ensure the integrity of our elections system. I can think of very few, more worthwhile expenditures of taxpayer resources.

The misery of the wretched 112th Congress drags on.

Finally, this New York Times story tells us the following…

MOSCOW — Andrei Sakharov was one of the best-known dissidents of the Communist era — a celebrated physicist persecuted for crusading for human rights and against Soviet brutality. He won the Nobel Peace Prize, and came to personify the struggle to create democracy here.

Yet when a group of college students at the Russian Law Academy in Moscow were asked the other day for their views on his legacy, they fumbled. Most seemed never to have heard of him.

“One of our professors talked about him in a lecture,” said Maria Danilyants, 17, an aspiring lawyer, who was one of the few who recognized the name. “But I don’t really remember now exactly what he said.”

Many of Sakharov’s admirers are alarmed that memories of his achievements are fading, especially among young people, before his ideals have fully taken hold. Sakharov spent his life challenging government shortcomings, but today’s youth seem to easily look past them, if they notice at all.

A nuclear physicist who helped design the Soviet Union’s first hydrogen bomb, Sakharov spurned the Soviet elite to become a dissident. He championed human rights, spoke out against nuclear weapons and opposed the Soviet war in Afghanistan. His work earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975, as well as a long stint of house arrest and exile.

He died in 1989, two years before the dissolution of the Soviet Union and before many of today’s college-age Russians were born.

The story tells us that a web site has been created called the Sakharov Movement, intended to spur interest once more in this titan of the struggle for human rights, not just in the former Soviet Union, but throughout the world (made even more timely by the recent passage of Elena Bonner, Sakharov’s widow).

The Times story concludes with the following…

Many young people, however, follow different ideals.

Asked about his heroes, Suren Khachtryan, 18, another student at the Russian Law Academy, responded without hesitation: “Roman Abramovich and Mikhail Prokhorov,” two of Russia’s billionaire businessmen.

“They are successful, shrewd and intelligent,” he said.

Asked about Mr. Sakharov, he replied, “Who?”

This reminds me of the Chinese students who have no recollection of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, which also occurred in 1989, the year Sakharov died.

And sorry, but I’m hard pressed to determine which is a more depressing development (and just remember to blame liberals for historical ignorance, as the Repug presidential candidate with a "Google problem" does here...yeah, right).

Saturday Stuff

Three words in response to this latest “New Rules” segment from Bill Maher – Nail. Hammer. Head. (and I don’t mean only about “Goodhair” Perry)…



…and in case I don’t post tomorrow, best wishes for a happy Father’s Day.



Update: RIP Big Man.

Friday Stuff

And once more (in a related item), I think this bears repeating.

If it weren’t for the fact that former Repug House Rep Chris Lee of New York stepped down in the wake of his shirtless little number on craigslist advertising for a date (a bit of a problem with him being married and all), I would also have encouraged Weiner to ride it out, though I’ll admit that the whole Vitter thing (as I and others have definitely noted) is enough of a precedent for Weiner to stay put too, which he won’t do now of course. Weiner should pay a price for his stupidity, but I’m not sure that resignation is it.

However, this clip from Rachel Maddow (and Cenk Uygur at the end) should be watched because it dissects perfectly the means in which the GOP plays the media to its advantage, almost always with the cowering acquiescence of spineless Democrats (and the media rabble including Breitbart of course and his minions along with the single-digit-IQed Howard Stern refugee…I once defended Stern at this site, but I’m done with that, particularly after that recent, pitiable Rolling Stone interview…”ooh, I’m so insecure but I’ve got so much money while I make jokes about women’s bodily functions…”).

I get what Rachel is saying here. However, the media and the Repugs know what works for the political DNA of this country, which is gratuitous titillation at the expense of reasoned, informed dialogue. And one day, when our society is dust and whatever comes after us writes our epitaph, that will be listed as the official cause of death (yep, living up to the name of this blog again, I know – by the way, that line from Pat Buchanan that Cenk tells us about should be tattooed on a body part of every Democratic member of Congress, and it probably wouldn’t hurt to do that to our POTUS and veep too)…

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Note: If you get tired of waiting for the video to load, try this instead.

…and on a much lighter note, the young one (who I alluded to earlier) has been singing this song all day, for obvious reasons.