December 2010
57 posts
7 tags
Re: Several of The Big Lies
dont-bs-me-bro:
Sorry, you are free to believe what you like, but this graph proves none of that, because it only goes back to Jan. 2010. It ignores the first 11 months of Obama’s adminstration, and seasonal changes in employment from quarter to quarter, year over year. It simply is not possible to examine just the most recent 11 months of data and draw any kind of big picture conclusions about...
5 tags
Me Talk Presidential →
Great inside tale from Matt Latimer, a former Bush speechwriter, set in and around the time what ultimately became TARP took shape:
When White House press secretary Dana Perino was told that 77 percent of the country thought we were on the wrong track, she said what I was thinking: “Who on earth is in the other 23 percent?” I knew who they were—the same people supporting the John McCain...
7 tags
7 tags
“…nobody, and I mean nobody, in a position of influence within the GOP...”
– Paul Krugman, reacting to the shocking news that the rising GOP House Majority will be moving to change the rules in ways “clearly designed to pave the way for more deficit-increasing tax cuts in the next two years. These rules stand in sharp contrast to the strong anti-deficit rhetoric that...
7 tags
4 tags
Behold: Totally Awesome Criticism →
Excellent analysis from Dave von Ebers of the Obama administration’s continuation of the wrongheaded indefinite detention policies that concludes thusly:
Obama is wrong to continue the Bush policy of indefinite detention of Guantánamo detainees, and the Executive Order we’re about to see will exacerbate, not solve, that problem. I disagree – vehemently, even – with what the President’s...
3 tags
Net Neutrality →
Can’t wait for this exciting future to become a reality:
The idea? Make it possible for your wireless provider to monitor everything you do online and charge you extra for using Facebook, Skype or Netflix. For instance, in the seventh slide of the above PowerPoint, a Vodafone user would be charged two cents per MB for using Facebook, three euros a month to use Skype and $0.50 monthly for...
6 tags
I didn't know you cared →
Larry David is excited about his tax-cuts extension:
After years of coveting them, I’ll finally be able to afford blueberries. Did you know they have a lot of antioxidants, which prevent cancer? Cancer! This tax cut just might save my life. Who said Republicans don’t support health care?
Just think of the jobs that will create…
6 tags
“There’s much for them to be angst-ridden about. If they think it’s...”
– Mitch McConnell, never one to beat around the bush, describing the prospects for bipartisan comity in the Senate in the next Congress.
I’m sure we’ll all be very sick of the media pushback against what is clearly pure partisan politics, precisely what the 93% of the public says it is...
4 tags
Respectable Buisinessmen's Club
Haley Barbour (R. Gov MS): You heard of the Citizens Councils? Up north they think it was like the KKK. Where I come from it was an organization of town leaders.
Citizens Council: The Citizens’ Council is the South’s answer to the mongrelizers. We will not be integrated. We are proud of our white blood and our white heritage of sixty centuries.
3 tags
3 tags
Ricky Gervais on God →
You won’t burn in hell. But be nice anyway.
Yep.
6 tags
“He’s a bitter man now, who can barely tolerate the fact that he lost to...”
– Joe Klein reflects on the fall from grace of one John McCain.
It’s both strong stuff and true, but the sad part is that he was always like this, it’s just that he was the MSM’s particular darling because he would sit there with them on Bullshit One and tickle their own bottomless...
3 tags
Is long-term solitary confinement torture? →
Yes.
3 tags
“That last one sounded a little low.”
– Yankees pitcher Lefty Gomez, reputedly commenting on the work of the late Bob Feller after three pitches had “blown by him.”
9 tags
Recap and Trade
Mike Huckabee, 2007: I also support cap and trade of carbon emissions. And I was disappointed that the Senate rejected a carbon counting system to measure the sources of emissions, because that would have been the first and the most important step toward implementing true cap and trade.
Mike Huckabee, 2010: In a recent internet post, a contributor makes the claim that I supported cap-and-trade in late 2007 while running for President. To put it simply, that's just not true.
McCain|Palin 2008 platform: ...will establish ... a cap-and-trade system that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions. A cap-and-trade system harnesses human ingenuity in the pursuit of alternatives to carbon-based fuels.
Palin, in VP debate: [Ifill asks "Do you support capping carbon emissions?"] I do. I do.
Palin, 2010: I am deeply concerned about President Obama’s cap-and-trade energy plan, and I believe it is an enormous threat to our economy. It would undermine our recovery over the short term and would inflict permanent damage.
Lemkin: What's remarkable is that she didn't call it "Cap and Tax." They think you have the memory of a goldfish. And, it seems, they are mostly right. We shall never speak of any of this again.
3 tags
“I think that marketers like “cloud computing” because it is devoid of...”
– Richard Stallman holds forth on ChromeOS (and cloud computing in general). Methinks he is not impressed. He also raises some interesting points on government prying, and their improved ability to pry if your data is in the cloud; though it is my understanding that they’d still need a warrant...
8 tags
“You can’t jam a major arms control treaty right before Christmas....”
– Senator Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), explaining his highly principled opposition to NewSTART. Which I still think is most likely a dead letter. And, frankly, now that I know The Lord has come out categorically agin it, well, I fear for ‘Merica. Somebody get Pat Robertson on the horn.
7 tags
Jon John: Cornyn and Thune
Reporter 1: Senator Thune, I was just looking at the list of earmark requests that you requested this year [in the Omnibus spending bill] and it adds up to over a hundred million dollars
Thune: I support those projects, but I don't support this bill [to which my own earmarks are attached; I do not support it because of earmarks.]
Reporter 2: Going through this bill, there is earmark after earmark from the both of you, millions of dollars in earmarks, why do you have any credibility on this?
Cornyn: Because we're going to vote against the bill.
Reporter 3: It appears like you're saying one thing and doing another.
Cornyn: Not at all,
Thune: [also stepped in to defend their stance on the Omnibus]
GOP aide: We've got to leave it there - we've got to get going.
3 tags
Yglesias on Holbrooke: The Last Statesman →
Holbrooke seems almost like the last statesman, a figure plucked from a time when diplomacy really mattered and America was represented abroad primarily by diplomats rather than generals.
Must read.
6 tags
“[The GOP members of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission are issuing their...”
– Paul Krugman getting all shrill again while noting the invincible ignorance held in seemingly infinite supply by the GOP and their various political enablers.
7 tags
Mitch McConnell, Earmark Opposer →
Mitch McConnell plans to filibuster an omnibus spending bill because of the earmarks larded onto it. Worth noting that he personally added several of these earmarks to the bill. Your 2010 GOP, staunch earmark opponents as recently as a week ago:
the legislation includes provisions requested this year by McConnell, including $650,000 for a genetic technology center at the University of...
6 tags
“I really think Senate Democrats should consider taking advantage of their...”
– Matt Yglesias. Everyone can go for Chinese. Think of the comity. And the lack of labels.
8 tags
The Numbering Shall Be Eight
Ezra Klein relates that an array of left-leaning interest groups have signed onto a letter spelling out an eight point description of what the Senate should be doing on the first day of the next Congress:
On the first legislative day of a new Congress, the Senate may, by majority vote, end a filibuster on a rules change and adopt new rules.
There should only be one opportunity to filibuster...
8 tags
Death-spiral Escape Hatch →
Paul Starr of the American Prospect provides a way to lose the mandate and but also not destroy the private insurance system:
The law could give people a right to opt out of the mandate if they signed a form agreeing that they could not opt in for the following five years. In other words, instead of paying a fine, they would forgo a potential benefit. For five years they would become...
7 tags
8 tags
Poison Pill Revisited →
Jonathan Gruber sums up the wages of partial repeal (be it legislative or judicial) of the Affordable Care Act:
Removing the Affordable Care Act’s mandate would eviscerate the law’s coverage gains and greatly raise premiums. And going further by only keeping the market reforms and the small business tax credit would virtually wipe out those coverage gains and cause an enormous premium...
2 tags
Are Stieg Larsson and Dan Brown a match for... →
givemesomethingtoread:
Not least among the reasons for the bafflement of the industry (and fellow writers) is the amateurishness of the books – something, curiously, that Larsson has in common with Brown. Readers, publishers and writers alike can agree that John Grisham, Robert Harris, Tom Clancy or Danielle Steel build up their massive readerships by knowing precisely what they are doing; they...
6 tags
I reject the word
Incoming Speaker John Boehner: We have to govern. That's what we were elected to do.
Leslie Stahl: But governing means compromising.
Boehner: It means working together.
Stahl: It also means compromising.
Boehner: It means finding common ground.
Stahl: Okay, is that compromising?
Boehner: I made it clear I am not gonna compromise on my principles, nor am I gonna compromise...
Stahl: What are you saying?
Boehner: ...the will of the American people.
Stahl: You're saying, "I want common ground, but I'm not gonna compromise." I don't understand that. I really don't.
Boehner: When you say the word "compromise," a lot of Americans look up and go, "Uh-oh, they're gonna sell me out." And so finding common ground, I think, makes more sense. [...]
Stahl: Why won't you say you're afraid of the word [compromise]?
Boehner: I reject the word.
Lemkin: I'll give the Obama team 45 minutes to dig up the old Rhythm Corps song "Common Ground" and get Clinton out to the lectern to run a few bars for us.
6 tags
5 tags
“bernie sanders filibuster” 2nd on Google trends hot search only to...”
– Mike Memoli.
Twitter, you complete me.
5 tags
Fair and Balanced →
Leaked emails tell us what we’ve known all along:
Fox executives regularly defend the network by claiming that the right-wing propaganda on Hannity and its other opinion shows is entirely separate from its news programming, which they insist is objective. But Sammon’s email gives credence to allegations that news from Fox’s Washington bureau is being deliberately distorted to...
3 tags
STDs and Assange →
By far the clearest, most comprehensive explanation of the nature and extent of the charges currently filed against Julian Assange. Please read before posting your next whinge about whether or not Assange is some form of sub-human monster or merely a lesser incubus.
3 tags
2 tags
Howard Dully’s Lobotomy →
In 1966, Howard Dully became one of the youngest recipients of an “icepick” lobotomy at the age of 12. The psychiatrist who administered the procedure, Dr. Walter Freeman, believed that mental illness was tied to overactive emotions, and that this procedure of cutting the brain dulled the errant feelings, and “cured” the patient. Howard Dully was brought in for the procedure because his...
6 tags
“The end result [of Elizabeth Edwards pushing her husband to make a comprehensive...”
– Ezra Klein remembers.
The Edwards campaign really had an outsize impact on the de facto Democratic platform as a whole, “progressivizing” it much more than Kucinich ever did; presumably because Edderds was seen as a very serious candidate, at least in the early going, and had to be...
4 tags
Step in Front of the Telescreen →
Wal Mart, long known to be target number one of al Qaeda, is going to be taking part in a Department of Homeland Security fear indoctrin…er, “See Something, Say Something” terrorism interdiction program. At Wal Marts around the country.
“If you see something suspicious in the parking lot or in the store, say something immediately,” Napolitano said in the video [to...
3 tags
“…I don’t think there’s a single Democrat out there, who if...”
– Barack Obama, perhaps being a bit testy on the reaction of the left to his strategy and overall leadership style thus far.
And, basically, he’s right. The key issue, though, is the pervasive perception that when the GOP is in charge, they get the policy they want to the letter, often with...
6 tags
Quiet Down, We're Playing the Inside Game →
Good roundup of the Bush tax cut extension negotiations by Ezra Klein:
When the deal was cut, the president took an oblique shot at their preferences, saying “the American people didn’t send us here to wage symbolic battles or win symbolic victories.” And this came a mere week or two after the White House announced a federal pay freeze. The pattern, for progressives, seems clear:...
3 tags
“I can’t help but think that if news organizations put a tenth of the amount of...”
– Felix Salmon
As he also notes, the real nut is that when they re-report each other, they tend to do it very, very poorly. For some reason, though, the MSM is categorically opposed to providing a link, even when the story is about a specific website.
4 tags
The Hall of Cached Page Titles
Facebook: Error
Twitter: Over Capacity
Tumblr: We'll be back shortly
5 tags
4 tags
“…climbing Mt. Everest is only half as deadly as trying to actively kill...”
– araneae, a Hacker News commenter getting to the heart of the matter. As usual.
4 tags
The President's Last Stand Was No Stand At All →
robertreich:
The deal the President struck with Republican leaders is an abomination. It will cost $900 billion over the next two years — larger than the bailout of Wall Street, GM, and Chrysler put together, larger than the stimulus package, larger than anything that’s come out of Washington…
And don’t think for one second that the GOP won’t be out there, probably today,...
5 tags
9 tags
“Since all the evidence says that elections depend on the rate of change of...”
– Paul Krugman, caught in the act of being exactly right. Couple this with the decision to let these Bush tax cuts expire in an election year again, and you’ve got recipe for disaster.
On what planet do these (so called) Democrats live? Do they expect to learn from the messaging disaster they...
3 tags
8 tags
“[President Obama] announced a pay freeze for federal workers. This was an...”
– Paul Krugman bringing the shrill. Excellent stuff.
Find me a single MSM story that in any way frames this as a GOP minority temper tantrum and willful, dangerous obstructionism in the face of overwhelming public opinion. This is before you even get to utterly foolish in light of the GOP’s...
5 tags
One of These is Satire, One is Hard News
CNN's Brooke Baldwin: I will spare you the figures and the math [on deficit reduction] because it quite simply makes my eyes glaze over.
Malibu Stacy: Thinking too much gives you wrinkles
7 tags
