Alternet, RJ Eskow.
"...They're offended because they didn't meet with the president? From the looks of things they're lucky not to be meeting with the warden..."
Sunday, January 02, 2011
Income inequality and chutzpah
Why Inequality Matters
January 1, 2011
Higher Taxes on Top 1% Equals Higher Productivity
Michael Hudson: History of US shows economy grows when top tier tax rates and workers' wages are high
"...Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times provides these grim statistics: “C.E.O.’s of the largest American companies earned an average of 42 times as much as the average worker in 1980, but 531 times as much in 2001. Perhaps the most astounding statistic is this: From 1980 to 2005, more than four-fifths of the total increase in American incomes went to the richest 1 percent.” (November 6, 2010)..."
Michael Barone is an idiot and a tool. Read this nonsense and laugh.
Ezra Klein says basically Oooh, deficit is bad and infrastructure is crumbling, but:
"...Here's the good news: Infrastructure investment is the best deal in the economy right now. Government borrowing costs are lower than they've been since the 1950s. Unemployment in the construction sector is above 15 percent, which means companies are desperate for work and bids to complete projects are coming in low. A weak global economy means cheap raw materials. Bottom line? These investments are more affordable now than they're likely to be in a few years. We'd be foolish to miss this opportunity..."
Right. Remember when taxes were our way of investing in the infrastructure and in America?
January 1, 2011
Higher Taxes on Top 1% Equals Higher Productivity
Michael Hudson: History of US shows economy grows when top tier tax rates and workers' wages are high
"...Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times provides these grim statistics: “C.E.O.’s of the largest American companies earned an average of 42 times as much as the average worker in 1980, but 531 times as much in 2001. Perhaps the most astounding statistic is this: From 1980 to 2005, more than four-fifths of the total increase in American incomes went to the richest 1 percent.” (November 6, 2010)..."
Michael Barone is an idiot and a tool. Read this nonsense and laugh.
Ezra Klein says basically Oooh, deficit is bad and infrastructure is crumbling, but:
"...Here's the good news: Infrastructure investment is the best deal in the economy right now. Government borrowing costs are lower than they've been since the 1950s. Unemployment in the construction sector is above 15 percent, which means companies are desperate for work and bids to complete projects are coming in low. A weak global economy means cheap raw materials. Bottom line? These investments are more affordable now than they're likely to be in a few years. We'd be foolish to miss this opportunity..."
Right. Remember when taxes were our way of investing in the infrastructure and in America?
Fuggedaboutit. Unless you are some Goldman Sachs punk selling US infrastructure revenue to some sheik in Abu Dhabi so he has some place to park his oil profits and watch them grow you don't matter.
It's a brave new world for those with enough chutzpah. Yes, I said chutzpah, and since I lived some of my early life in a working class Jewish neighborhood, I don't mean the "good" kind. I mean the kind that would sell your mother if it might make a profit. Or keep some crooked politician in office.
I'm almost finished reading Taibbi's Griftopia. It's disturbing, the class war exposé.
Danny Schechter and Matt Taibbi speak.
It's a brave new world for those with enough chutzpah. Yes, I said chutzpah, and since I lived some of my early life in a working class Jewish neighborhood, I don't mean the "good" kind. I mean the kind that would sell your mother if it might make a profit. Or keep some crooked politician in office.
I'm almost finished reading Taibbi's Griftopia. It's disturbing, the class war exposé.
Danny Schechter and Matt Taibbi speak.
Friday, December 31, 2010
America's Tienanmen and Blogger of the Year 2010
We will continue using the internet and blogging until the danged internet service providers figure out a way to slow down the loading of our sites, and speed up the loading of their preferred sites. They are working on it, and the way the regulatory agencies (the FCC in this case) are busy handing out concession
http://www
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Happy New Year
Project Censored Top 10 Stories. (not all of the top 25 Project Censored. stories happened in 2010, but they're the ones that were chosen for the 2010 book)
1. US Congress Sells Out to Wall Street
2. US Schools are More Segregated Today than in the 1950s
3. Toxic Waste Behind Somali Pirates
4. Nuclear Waste Pools in North Carolina
5. Europe Blocks US Toxic Products
6. Lobbyists Buy Congress
7. Obama’s Military Appointments Have Corrupt Past
8. Bailed out Banks and America’s Wealthiest Cheat IRS Out of Billions
9. US Arms Used for War Crimes in Gaza
10. Ecuador Declares Foreign Debt Illegitimate
Tweet
LA rebel artists defy attempts at censorship
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Study: Conservatives have larger ‘fear center’ in brain
By Daniel Tencer
Tuesday, December 28th, 2010 -- 5:43 pm
"...At the same time, conservatives' brains were also found to have a smaller anterior cingulate -- the part of the brain responsible for courage and optimism..."
Yeesh, tell me something I don't know. I was raised by the idiots.
Tuesday, December 28th, 2010 -- 5:43 pm
"...At the same time, conservatives' brains were also found to have a smaller anterior cingulate -- the part of the brain responsible for courage and optimism..."
Yeesh, tell me something I don't know. I was raised by the idiots.
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Rape rampant in US military
Statistics and soldiers' testimonies reveal a harrowing epidemic of sexual assault in the US military.
Dahr Jamail Last Modified: 21 Dec 2010 13:22 GMT
Sexual assault within the ranks of the military is not a new problem. It is a systemic problem that has necessitated that the military conduct its own annual reporting on the crisis.
A 2003 Air Force Academy sexual assault scandal prompted the department of defense to include a provision in the 2004 National Defense Authorization Act that required investigations and reports of sexual harassment and assaults within US military academies to be filed. The personal toll is, nevertheless, devastating.
Military sexual trauma (MST) survivor Susan Avila-Smith is director of the veteran’s advocacy group Women Organizing Women. She has been serving female and scores of male clients in various stages of recovery from MST for 15 years and knows of its devastating effects up close.
“People cannot conceive how badly wounded these people are,” she told Al Jazeera, “Of the 3,000 I’ve worked with, only one is employed. Combat trauma is bad enough, but with MST it’s not the enemy, it’s our guys who are doing it. You’re fighting your friends, your peers, people you’ve been told have your back. That betrayal, then the betrayal from the command is, they say, worse than the sexual assault itself.”
On December 13, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other groups filed a federal lawsuit seeking Pentagon records in order to get the real facts about the incidence of sexual assault in the ranks.
The Pentagon has consistently refused to release records that fully document the problem and how it is handled. Sexual assaults on women in the US military have claimed some degree of visibility, but about male victims there is absolute silence.
Pack Parachute, a non-profit in Seattle, assists veterans who are sexual assault survivors. Its founder Kira Mountjoy-Pepka, was raped as a cadet at the Air Force Academy. In July 2003 she was member of a team of female cadets handpicked by Donald Rumsfeld, at the time the secretary of defense, to tell their stories of having been sexually assaulted. The ensuing media coverage and a Pentagon investigation forced the academy to make the aforementioned major policy changes.
Report reveals alarming statistics
Mountjoy-Pepka often works with male survivors of MST. She stated in a telephone interview that four per cent of men in the military experience MST. “Most choose not to talk about it until after their discharge from the military, largely because the post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in over 60 percent of MST cases is too overwhelming,” she informed Al Jazeera.
Last week the Pentagon released its “annual report on sexual harassment and violence at the military service academies”. At its three academies, the number of reports of sexual assault and harassment has risen a staggering 64 percent from last year.
The report attributes the huge increase to better reporting of incidents due to increased training and education about sexual assault and harassment. Veteran’s Administration (VA) statistics show that more than 50 percent of the veterans who screen positive for MST are men.
According to the US Census Bureau, there are roughly 22 million male veterans compared to less than two million female vets.
In Congressional testimony in the summer of 2008, Lt. Gen. Rochelle, the army chief of personnel, reported the little known statistic that 12 percent (approximately 260) of the 2,200 reported rapes in the military in 2007 were reported by military male victims.
Due to their sheer numbers in the military, more men (at a rough estimate one in twenty), have experienced MST than women.
Shamed into silence
Billy Capshaw was 17 when he joined the Army in 1977. After being trained as a medic he was transferred to Baumholder, Germany. His roommate, Jeffrey Dahmer, by virtue of his seniority ensured that Capshaw had no formal assignment, no mail, and no pay. Having completely isolated the young medic, Dahmer regularly sexually assaulted, raped, and tortured him.
Dahmer went on to become the infamous serial killer and sex offender who murdered 17 boys and men before being beaten to death by an inmate at Columbia Correction Institution in 1994.
Capshaw reflects back, “At that young age I didn’t know how to deal with it. My commander did not believe me. Nobody helped me, even though I begged and begged and begged.”
The debilitating lifelong struggle Capshaw has had to face is common among survivors of military sexual assault.
Later during therapy he needed to go public. Since then he says, “I’ve talked to a lot of men, many of them soldiers, who are raped but who won’t go public with their story. The shame alone is overwhelming.”
In 1985 Michael Warren enlisted in the navy and for three years worked as a submarine machinist mate on a nuclear submarine. One day he awoke to find another soldier performing fellatio on him.
He recollects with horror, “I was paralyzed with fear. I was in disbelief... shame. When I reported it to the commander he said it was better for me to deal with it after being discharged. Nobody helped me, not even the chaplain. The commander at the processing centre wouldn’t look me in the face. When I filled out my claim later they didn’t believe me. It’s so frustrating.”
Armando Javier was an active duty Marine from 1990 to 1994. He was a Lance Corporal at Camp Lejeune in 1993 when he was raped.
Five Marines jumped Javier and beat him until he was nearly unconscious, before taking turns raping him. His sexual victimization narrative reads, “One of them, a corporal, pulled down my shorts and instructed the others to ‘Get the grease’. Another corporal instructed someone to bring the stick. They began to insert the stick inside my anus. The people present during this sadistic and ritual-like ceremony started to cajole, cheer, and laugh, saying “stick em’ – stick-em’.”
Extreme shame and trauma compelled him not to disclose the crime to anyone except a friend in his unit. He wrote in his account, “My experience left me torn apart physically, mentally, and spiritually. I was dehumanized and treated with ultimate cruelty, by my perpetrators… I was embarrassed and ashamed and didn’t know what to do. I was young at that time. And being part of an elite organization that values brotherhood, integrity and faithfulness made it hard to come forward and reveal what happened.”
The reality of being less equal
Women in America were first allowed into the military during the Revolutionary War in 1775 and their travails are as old. Drill instructors indoctrinate new recruits into it at the outset by routinely referring to them as “girl,” “pussy,” “bitch,” and “dyke.”
A Command Sergeant Major told Catherine Jayne West of the Mississippi National Guard, “There aren’t but two places for women - in the kitchen or in the bedroom. Women have no place in the military.”
She was raped by fellow soldier Private First Class Kevin Lemeiux, at the sprawling Camp Anaconda, north of Baghdad. The defense lawyer in court merely wanted to know why, as a member of the army, she had not fought back.
The morning after the rape, an army doctor gave her a thorough examination. The army’s criminal investigation team concluded her story was true. Moreover, Lemeiux had bragged about the incident to his buddies and they had turned him in. It seemed like a closed case, but in court the defense claimed that the fact that West had not fought back during the rape was what incriminated her. In addition, her commanding officer and 1st Sergeant declared, in court, that she was a “promiscuous female.”
In contrast, Lemeiux, after the third court hearing of the trial, was promoted to a Specialist. Meanwhile his lawyer entered a plea of insanity.
He was later found guilty of kidnapping but not rape, despite his own admission of the crime. He was given three years for kidnapping, half of which was knocked off.
The long term affects of MST
Jasmine Black, a human resources specialist in the Army National Guard from June 2006 to September 2008 was raped by another soldier in her battalion when she was stationed in Fort Jackson, South Carolina. She reported it to her Sexual Assault Response Coordinator (SARC) and the Military Police, but the culprit was not brought to book.
After an early discharge due to MST and treatment at a PTSD Residential Rehabilitation Treatment Program (PRRTP) facility, she was raped again by a higher-ranking member of the air force in February 2009.
Administrator for a combat engineering instruction unit in Knoxville, Tennessee, Tracey Harmon has no illusions. “For women in the military, you are either a bitch, a dyke, or a whore. If you sleep with one person in your unit you are a whore. If you are a lesbian you are a dyke, and if you don’t sleep with other soldiers you are a bitch.”
Maricela Guzman served in the navy from 1998 to 2002 as a computer technician on the island of Diego Garcia. She was raped while in boot camp, but fear of consequences kept her from talking about it for the rest of her time in the military. “I survived by becoming a workaholic and was much awarded as a soldier for my work ethic.”
On witnessing the way it treated the native population in Diego Garcia, she chose to dissociate from the military. Post discharge, her life became unmanageable. She underwent a divorce, survived a failed suicide attempt and became homeless before deciding to move in with her parents. A chance encounter with a female veteran at a political event in Los Angeles prompted her to contact the VA for help. Her therapist there diagnosed her with PTSD from her rape.
The VA denied her claim nevertheless, “Because they said I couldn’t prove it … since I had not brought it up when it happened and also because I had not shown any deviant behavior while in the service. I was outraged and felt compelled to talk about what happened.”
While it will go to any length to maintain public silence over the issue, the military machine has no such qualms within its own corridors. Guzman discloses, “Through the gossip mill we would hear of women who had reported being raped. No confidentiality was maintained nor any protection given to victims. The boys’ club culture is strong and the competition exclusive. That forces many not to report rape, because it is a blemish and can ruin your career.”
The department of defence reported that in fiscal year 2009, there were 3,230 reports of sexual assault, an increase of 11 percent over the prior year.
However, as high as the military’s own figures are of rape and sexual assault, victims and advocates Al Jazeera spoke with believe the real figures are sure to be higher.
Veteran April Fitzsimmons, another victim of sexual assault, knows what an uphill battle it is for women to take on the military system. “When victims come forward, they are ostracized and isolated from their communities. Many of the perpetrators are officers who use their ranks to coerce women to sleep with them. It’s a closely interwoven community, so they are safe and move fearlessly amongst their victims.”
Her advice to women considering joining the US military?
“The crisis is so severe that I’m telling women to simply not join the military because it’s completely unsafe and puts them at risk. Until something changes at the top, no woman should join the military.”
This is the first in a two part series on sexual harassment in the US military. The second part in the series will be published in the coming week.
Research support was provided by the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute.
Dahr Jamail Last Modified: 21 Dec 2010 13:22 GMT
Sexual assault within the ranks of the military is not a new problem. It is a systemic problem that has necessitated that the military conduct its own annual reporting on the crisis.
A 2003 Air Force Academy sexual assault scandal prompted the department of defense to include a provision in the 2004 National Defense Authorization Act that required investigations and reports of sexual harassment and assaults within US military academies to be filed. The personal toll is, nevertheless, devastating.
Military sexual trauma (MST) survivor Susan Avila-Smith is director of the veteran’s advocacy group Women Organizing Women. She has been serving female and scores of male clients in various stages of recovery from MST for 15 years and knows of its devastating effects up close.
“People cannot conceive how badly wounded these people are,” she told Al Jazeera, “Of the 3,000 I’ve worked with, only one is employed. Combat trauma is bad enough, but with MST it’s not the enemy, it’s our guys who are doing it. You’re fighting your friends, your peers, people you’ve been told have your back. That betrayal, then the betrayal from the command is, they say, worse than the sexual assault itself.”
On December 13, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other groups filed a federal lawsuit seeking Pentagon records in order to get the real facts about the incidence of sexual assault in the ranks.
The Pentagon has consistently refused to release records that fully document the problem and how it is handled. Sexual assaults on women in the US military have claimed some degree of visibility, but about male victims there is absolute silence.
Pack Parachute, a non-profit in Seattle, assists veterans who are sexual assault survivors. Its founder Kira Mountjoy-Pepka, was raped as a cadet at the Air Force Academy. In July 2003 she was member of a team of female cadets handpicked by Donald Rumsfeld, at the time the secretary of defense, to tell their stories of having been sexually assaulted. The ensuing media coverage and a Pentagon investigation forced the academy to make the aforementioned major policy changes.
Report reveals alarming statistics
Mountjoy-Pepka often works with male survivors of MST. She stated in a telephone interview that four per cent of men in the military experience MST. “Most choose not to talk about it until after their discharge from the military, largely because the post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in over 60 percent of MST cases is too overwhelming,” she informed Al Jazeera.
Last week the Pentagon released its “annual report on sexual harassment and violence at the military service academies”. At its three academies, the number of reports of sexual assault and harassment has risen a staggering 64 percent from last year.
The report attributes the huge increase to better reporting of incidents due to increased training and education about sexual assault and harassment. Veteran’s Administration (VA) statistics show that more than 50 percent of the veterans who screen positive for MST are men.
According to the US Census Bureau, there are roughly 22 million male veterans compared to less than two million female vets.
In Congressional testimony in the summer of 2008, Lt. Gen. Rochelle, the army chief of personnel, reported the little known statistic that 12 percent (approximately 260) of the 2,200 reported rapes in the military in 2007 were reported by military male victims.
Due to their sheer numbers in the military, more men (at a rough estimate one in twenty), have experienced MST than women.
Shamed into silence
Billy Capshaw was 17 when he joined the Army in 1977. After being trained as a medic he was transferred to Baumholder, Germany. His roommate, Jeffrey Dahmer, by virtue of his seniority ensured that Capshaw had no formal assignment, no mail, and no pay. Having completely isolated the young medic, Dahmer regularly sexually assaulted, raped, and tortured him.
Dahmer went on to become the infamous serial killer and sex offender who murdered 17 boys and men before being beaten to death by an inmate at Columbia Correction Institution in 1994.
Capshaw reflects back, “At that young age I didn’t know how to deal with it. My commander did not believe me. Nobody helped me, even though I begged and begged and begged.”
The debilitating lifelong struggle Capshaw has had to face is common among survivors of military sexual assault.
Later during therapy he needed to go public. Since then he says, “I’ve talked to a lot of men, many of them soldiers, who are raped but who won’t go public with their story. The shame alone is overwhelming.”
In 1985 Michael Warren enlisted in the navy and for three years worked as a submarine machinist mate on a nuclear submarine. One day he awoke to find another soldier performing fellatio on him.
He recollects with horror, “I was paralyzed with fear. I was in disbelief... shame. When I reported it to the commander he said it was better for me to deal with it after being discharged. Nobody helped me, not even the chaplain. The commander at the processing centre wouldn’t look me in the face. When I filled out my claim later they didn’t believe me. It’s so frustrating.”
Armando Javier was an active duty Marine from 1990 to 1994. He was a Lance Corporal at Camp Lejeune in 1993 when he was raped.
Five Marines jumped Javier and beat him until he was nearly unconscious, before taking turns raping him. His sexual victimization narrative reads, “One of them, a corporal, pulled down my shorts and instructed the others to ‘Get the grease’. Another corporal instructed someone to bring the stick. They began to insert the stick inside my anus. The people present during this sadistic and ritual-like ceremony started to cajole, cheer, and laugh, saying “stick em’ – stick-em’.”
Extreme shame and trauma compelled him not to disclose the crime to anyone except a friend in his unit. He wrote in his account, “My experience left me torn apart physically, mentally, and spiritually. I was dehumanized and treated with ultimate cruelty, by my perpetrators… I was embarrassed and ashamed and didn’t know what to do. I was young at that time. And being part of an elite organization that values brotherhood, integrity and faithfulness made it hard to come forward and reveal what happened.”
The reality of being less equal
Women in America were first allowed into the military during the Revolutionary War in 1775 and their travails are as old. Drill instructors indoctrinate new recruits into it at the outset by routinely referring to them as “girl,” “pussy,” “bitch,” and “dyke.”
A Command Sergeant Major told Catherine Jayne West of the Mississippi National Guard, “There aren’t but two places for women - in the kitchen or in the bedroom. Women have no place in the military.”
She was raped by fellow soldier Private First Class Kevin Lemeiux, at the sprawling Camp Anaconda, north of Baghdad. The defense lawyer in court merely wanted to know why, as a member of the army, she had not fought back.
The morning after the rape, an army doctor gave her a thorough examination. The army’s criminal investigation team concluded her story was true. Moreover, Lemeiux had bragged about the incident to his buddies and they had turned him in. It seemed like a closed case, but in court the defense claimed that the fact that West had not fought back during the rape was what incriminated her. In addition, her commanding officer and 1st Sergeant declared, in court, that she was a “promiscuous female.”
In contrast, Lemeiux, after the third court hearing of the trial, was promoted to a Specialist. Meanwhile his lawyer entered a plea of insanity.
He was later found guilty of kidnapping but not rape, despite his own admission of the crime. He was given three years for kidnapping, half of which was knocked off.
The long term affects of MST
Jasmine Black, a human resources specialist in the Army National Guard from June 2006 to September 2008 was raped by another soldier in her battalion when she was stationed in Fort Jackson, South Carolina. She reported it to her Sexual Assault Response Coordinator (SARC) and the Military Police, but the culprit was not brought to book.
After an early discharge due to MST and treatment at a PTSD Residential Rehabilitation Treatment Program (PRRTP) facility, she was raped again by a higher-ranking member of the air force in February 2009.
Administrator for a combat engineering instruction unit in Knoxville, Tennessee, Tracey Harmon has no illusions. “For women in the military, you are either a bitch, a dyke, or a whore. If you sleep with one person in your unit you are a whore. If you are a lesbian you are a dyke, and if you don’t sleep with other soldiers you are a bitch.”
Maricela Guzman served in the navy from 1998 to 2002 as a computer technician on the island of Diego Garcia. She was raped while in boot camp, but fear of consequences kept her from talking about it for the rest of her time in the military. “I survived by becoming a workaholic and was much awarded as a soldier for my work ethic.”
On witnessing the way it treated the native population in Diego Garcia, she chose to dissociate from the military. Post discharge, her life became unmanageable. She underwent a divorce, survived a failed suicide attempt and became homeless before deciding to move in with her parents. A chance encounter with a female veteran at a political event in Los Angeles prompted her to contact the VA for help. Her therapist there diagnosed her with PTSD from her rape.
The VA denied her claim nevertheless, “Because they said I couldn’t prove it … since I had not brought it up when it happened and also because I had not shown any deviant behavior while in the service. I was outraged and felt compelled to talk about what happened.”
While it will go to any length to maintain public silence over the issue, the military machine has no such qualms within its own corridors. Guzman discloses, “Through the gossip mill we would hear of women who had reported being raped. No confidentiality was maintained nor any protection given to victims. The boys’ club culture is strong and the competition exclusive. That forces many not to report rape, because it is a blemish and can ruin your career.”
The department of defence reported that in fiscal year 2009, there were 3,230 reports of sexual assault, an increase of 11 percent over the prior year.
However, as high as the military’s own figures are of rape and sexual assault, victims and advocates Al Jazeera spoke with believe the real figures are sure to be higher.
Veteran April Fitzsimmons, another victim of sexual assault, knows what an uphill battle it is for women to take on the military system. “When victims come forward, they are ostracized and isolated from their communities. Many of the perpetrators are officers who use their ranks to coerce women to sleep with them. It’s a closely interwoven community, so they are safe and move fearlessly amongst their victims.”
Her advice to women considering joining the US military?
“The crisis is so severe that I’m telling women to simply not join the military because it’s completely unsafe and puts them at risk. Until something changes at the top, no woman should join the military.”
This is the first in a two part series on sexual harassment in the US military. The second part in the series will be published in the coming week.
Research support was provided by the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Karzai Releasing Scores Of Drug Traffickers In Afghanistan, WikiLeaks Cables Show
Do you really think that big natural gas and big mining interests give a sh*t whether dope dealers are caught?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Sunday, December 26, 2010
2010 Business Year In Review: The AP's Top 10
on re-writing the financial rules - "Republica
Oh puhleeeeee
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
13 Bankers
P. 148.
"The collapses of Enron, WorldCom, and other high-flying companies in 2001-2001 also should have made clear that free markets did not deter fraud on their own."
No shit Sherlock.
Umm, with the spoiled ass frat boys in charge of not only regulating finance, but running the country some of us knew that something stunk to high heaven even if we had no idea at the time what securitized bundling of mortgages, or credit default swaps were. I'm hoping that somewhere in this book before I finish it are some simple steps to turning regulatory agencies back into regulatory agencies instead of allowing them to continue whoring for the banksters. I certainly knew something stunk in May of '06 when I temped at a JP Morgan office that processed mortgages for 4 days and I had never laid eyes on a mortgage file, nor did I know anything about banking. And they didn't want me learning.
OK, finished the book. Three things screamed at me constantly as I read 13 Bankers:
1) Too Big to Fail is TOO FUCKING BIG
2) These banking crises keep happening when the greedy push for and get deregulation through our bought and paid for congresswhores.
3) Obama has a chance to reform, re-regulate and stop the next economic crisis, and it will be catastrophically devastating if he doesn't.
Yeesh I hate Republicans. No, I really hate them.
They are insane.
Strapped Cities Hit Nonprofits With Fees
DECEMBER 27, 2010
Saturday, December 25, 2010
Christmas Day'10
Well, besides my major head up ass present fail things are good. I discovered that if you catch the flamage quick enough you can still save a BBQ tri-tip. Yummy food and great company last night. Relaxed today.
Friday, December 24, 2010
Christmas Eve '10
Update 25th 9:50 pm Your Christmas Tree's Twitter Page
And I did not have anything to do with the tree, I refused.
Top 5 Lame Duck Winners For 2010
Brian Beutler | December 24, 2010, 8:25AM
And I did not have anything to do with the tree, I refused.
Top 5 Lame Duck Winners For 2010
Brian Beutler | December 24, 2010, 8:25AM
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Huh?
Got an e-mail from dear 'ol Dad telling me that an uncle that I never even met died 3 weeks ago.
Let me repeat -- Huh?
Can someone please tell me that that is not normal? I know that he was a lot older than dear 'ol Dad, but hey, I met an uncle that I missed 25 years with due to my adoption, so something is weird here with my family.
Let me repeat -- Huh?
Can someone please tell me that that is not normal? I know that he was a lot older than dear 'ol Dad, but hey, I met an uncle that I missed 25 years with due to my adoption, so something is weird here with my family.
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Who needs to visit a lake,
When your front yard has become one?
Totally random insertion, but IKEA sucks ass, thank you. And their return policy sucks ass also. It may look wonderful when you buy something, but the whole fucking staff had to approve a recent return. Fortunately, the fact that they could use a measuring tape saved the day. Well, and I don't make a habit of returning shit so when I need to return something and you question me I can be a real bitch. A real LOUD bitch.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Shit
Update II it's back up
Update: My landline is out and I can't get a technician out here until the 26th? Wow, my piece of shit cell phone should be oodles of fun to make the Christmas Day calls on.
Every time it rains these ancient phone lines go out, and mine is out. In other fun news, if you access the internet via cell phone get ready to be reamed some more by Corporate Amurika.:
AT&T, Comcast Must Treat Web Traffic Equally as FCC Passes Neutrality Rule
By Todd Shields - Dec 21, 2010 11:22 AM PT
"The Federal Communications Commission approved the so- called net-neutrality rules by a vote of three to two today. Supporters argued that Internet providers, which also own some of the content they deliver online, may interfere with videos and services owned by others such as Google Inc.
The agency also affirmed that providers may charge subscribers based on how much data they consume. The pricing issue has become more important as companies including Netflix Inc. stream movies and other data-hungry content over the Web."
Net neutrality? More like neutered neutrality.
By David Gewirtz | December 21, 2010, 11:47am PST
"My take: like the health care bill, this is an area that desperately needed quality government attention. Instead, it got politicized, neutered, and gutted to the point where we might have actually been better off if they left the darned thing alone.
Aren’t politicians frickin’ wonderful?
Update: My landline is out and I can't get a technician out here until the 26th? Wow, my piece of shit cell phone should be oodles of fun to make the Christmas Day calls on.
Every time it rains these ancient phone lines go out, and mine is out. In other fun news, if you access the internet via cell phone get ready to be reamed some more by Corporate Amurika.:
AT&T, Comcast Must Treat Web Traffic Equally as FCC Passes Neutrality Rule
By Todd Shields - Dec 21, 2010 11:22 AM PT
"The Federal Communications Commission approved the so- called net-neutrality rules by a vote of three to two today. Supporters argued that Internet providers, which also own some of the content they deliver online, may interfere with videos and services owned by others such as Google Inc.
The agency also affirmed that providers may charge subscribers based on how much data they consume. The pricing issue has become more important as companies including Netflix Inc. stream movies and other data-hungry content over the Web."
Net neutrality? More like neutered neutrality.
By David Gewirtz | December 21, 2010, 11:47am PST
"My take: like the health care bill, this is an area that desperately needed quality government attention. Instead, it got politicized, neutered, and gutted to the point where we might have actually been better off if they left the darned thing alone.
Aren’t politicians frickin’ wonderful?
Monday, December 20, 2010
The Great Islamophobic Crusade
Mr. Blumenthal
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
I'm so glad my friends told me which roads to take
Mudslides, flooding close roads including PCH; 'huge' storm expected Monday afternoon
December 20, 2010
Yeesh, I thought the 101 was bad. Whoo, talk about being grateful that my friend knows LA traffic. I am.
December 20, 2010
Yeesh, I thought the 101 was bad. Whoo, talk about being grateful that my friend knows LA traffic. I am.
r u fn kdn?
Monday, Dec. 20, 2010
Pope: Church must reflect on what allowed abuse
Reflect?
How about they follow the paperwork trail and quit moving the pedophile priests when they get caught? Or they "train priests" to spot the pedophiles before they get a church? Holy moly, the geniuses at work in the Vatican...wow, they're almost as brilliant as the GOP:
House GOP Crushes Bill That Would Protect Against Child Marriage
Rachel Slajda | December 20, 2010, 8:55AM
Yeah, what else are these fuckers going to do while we are bombarded with ads for cars that nobody can afford. Ho Ho Ho's , that's our congresswhores!
Pope: Church must reflect on what allowed abuse
Reflect?
How about they follow the paperwork trail and quit moving the pedophile priests when they get caught? Or they "train priests" to spot the pedophiles before they get a church? Holy moly, the geniuses at work in the Vatican...wow, they're almost as brilliant as the GOP:
House GOP Crushes Bill That Would Protect Against Child Marriage
Rachel Slajda | December 20, 2010, 8:55AM
Yeah, what else are these fuckers going to do while we are bombarded with ads for cars that nobody can afford. Ho Ho Ho's , that's our congresswhores!
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Honey, I'm home
(crickets)
ps, did you know that LA traffic on a Friday night, during the holidays, in the rain sucks ass?
ps, did you know that LA traffic on a Friday night, during the holidays, in the rain sucks ass?
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Tired
Long drive, next day a marathon shopping trip and the revelation that the overtly political major is hated as is the political junkie mother.
That would be me.
Ok then.
I suppose child needs more time to make up mind regarding career goals. Ok, no problem, but snarling at mom does not help, and mom does not have to live with it.
That would be me.
Ok then.
I suppose child needs more time to make up mind regarding career goals. Ok, no problem, but snarling at mom does not help, and mom does not have to live with it.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Saturday, December 11, 2010
wikileaks documentary
Tweet
2 car bombs in Stockholm.
The Swedish news agency TT said it had received an email warning 10 minutes before the blasts, which took place either side of 5 p.m. (12 p.m. EST), with a threat to Sweden and its people.
It said the threat was linked to Sweden's contribution to the U.S.-led NATO force in Afghanistan, where it has 500 soldiers, mainly in the north.
A local news agency, TT, said it had received an e-mail shortly before the blasts, which said it was now time for Swedish people to die "like our brothers and sisters".
Hmmm. Why does this "get the 500 soldiers out of Afghanistan" e-mail stink to high heaven to me?
Friday, December 10, 2010
Weekend At Bernie's
I love Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) I do I Do IIIIIII DOOOOOOOOO! I can't believe I missed this, I was busy all day.
(hat tip Glenn Greenwald tweet)
The Truth-O-Meter Says: TRUE
In 2007, "the top 1 percent of all income earners in the United States made 23.5 percent of all income," which is "more than the entire bottom 50 percent."
Bernie Sanders on Tuesday, November 30th, 2010 in a Senate floor speech
Bernie Sanders, in viral speech, says top 1 percent earn more than 23 percent of U.S. income
(hat tip Glenn Greenwald tweet)
The Truth-O-Meter Says: TRUE
In 2007, "the top 1 percent of all income earners in the United States made 23.5 percent of all income," which is "more than the entire bottom 50 percent."
Bernie Sanders on Tuesday, November 30th, 2010 in a Senate floor speech
Bernie Sanders, in viral speech, says top 1 percent earn more than 23 percent of U.S. income
Thursday, December 09, 2010
#WikiFear: What Are They Afraid Of?
Yup, they had to throw Assange in jail at all costs, even to their appearance of credibility.
Cuban dissidents in order to sting Assange on some bs rape charge that was dropped in August --http://articles.cnn.com/2010-08-21/world/sweden.wikileaks.charge_1_julian-assange-molestation-charge-arrest-warrant?_s=PM:WORLD.
Cuban dissidents? Yeesh, something out the the CIA's playbook in 1963
Assange had to be stopped before he released the bank documents.
http://www.dailyfinance.com/story/media/wikileaks-bank-documents/19738054/
"WikiLeaks to keep releasing cables despite Assange arrest"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/dec/07/wikileaks-cables-julian-assange-arrest
Bwaaah ha ha ha ha ha hahahahahahahaaaaaa
About Wikileaks
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Cuban dissidents in order to sting Assange on some bs rape charge that was dropped in August --http://art
Cuban dissidents
Assange had to be stopped before he released the bank documents.
http://www
"WikiLeaks to keep releasing cables despite Assange arrest"
http://www
Bwaaah ha ha ha ha ha hahahahaha
About Wikileaks
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
You Don't Know Jack
You Don't Know Jack (c) 2009 HBO
Let me be perfectly clear about how I feel about Jack Kervorkian. He is brilliant in a country with a lot of morons brainwashed by religion in it. He pushed the boundaries and he may have technically broken the law but I believe very deeply in physician assisted suicide and I do not believe what he did was wrong.
Let me be perfectly clear about how I feel about Jack Kervorkian. He is brilliant in a country with a lot of morons brainwashed by religion in it. He pushed the boundaries and he may have technically broken the law but I believe very deeply in physician assisted suicide and I do not believe what he did was wrong.
We have the choice to end our pet's suffering, but grandma can't make the choice to end hers?
How fucking barbaric is that?
Wednesday, December 08, 2010
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