There are the commenters who think their every utterance profound
And emailers who demand the discussion does go round and round
Along with tweets of anguish from those who barely try
And the PR spam from flunkies whose methods are awry
With the endless whines of bloggers who are pissed that they've been dissed
They'd none of them be missed, they'll none of them be missed.
He's got them on a list, he's got them on a list
And they'd none of them be missed, they'll none of them be missed.
Monday, February 07, 2011
Late Night
Rock on.
Incumbents
These are points not made often enough. Back in the dark ages when I still taught Econ 101, one thing I'd make a point of telling my students is that any time you hear business interests extolling the virtues of competition you can know with certainty that they are 100% full of shit. Incumbent businesses desire policies which reduce competition, not policies which increase it.
"Running"
I don't really think Palin will seriously run for president, but she will pretend to. Should be fun!
With A Cherry On Top
I'm not believer in the perfection of the economy as we have constructed it, but roughly speaking if businesses thought they could make profitable investments, they probably would be doing so. "Boosting aggregate demand" is a task the president should take on, but pleading with rich assholes to invest is pretty pointless.
Big Money
I've missed a couple of their recent movies, including True Grit (so far), but it's nice that the Coen Brothers are actually making real money for a change. I haven't loved all of their movies, but they're almost always at least in the "glad I saw it even if it wasn't awesome" category.
Now I just need to interest them in the biopic of a humble baby blue blogger.
Now I just need to interest them in the biopic of a humble baby blue blogger.
Corrupt
Obviously it isn't like taking bribes or something, but I do think powerful politicians should stay out of minor local issues they have personal concerns about instead of throwing their weight around in inappropriate ways.
Good News Of The Day
The twitter machine tells me Jane Harman is quitting Congress.
I'm sure all of the people who contributed to her last campaign feel great. Also, too, good riddance.
I'm sure all of the people who contributed to her last campaign feel great. Also, too, good riddance.
What The Hell Is Wrong With You People
I sort of understand conservatives on some issues that I don't agree with them about, but the opposition to contraception is insane. Yes I "get it" in the sense that I get that they just want women to be punished for having sex, but I also "get it" in the sense that I know very few of them have the large broods many of them would have if they themselves stuck to the no contraception rule.
Tunnel Hell
I have no idea how proposal B will fly when Governor Casino killed proposal A, but who knows.
Sunday, February 06, 2011
Greedy Players Force Impoverished Owners To Increase Ticket Prices
Not really, of course, but if the past is any guide I expect the owners to have much greater support in the media generally than will the players. The propaganda will be catapulted.
And liberals should care and side with labor, even if some of the players do make a lot of money. This is about how the pie gets split, and that matters even if it is a really big pie.
And liberals should care and side with labor, even if some of the players do make a lot of money. This is about how the pie gets split, and that matters even if it is a really big pie.
Things No One Believes
I've got nothing against the concept of bus rapid transit, but it will often lose the fight against the Jesus-blessed rights to on street parking and more lanes for drivers. People cite the flexibility of buses, given the existence of the street network, as a blessing, but it's also a curse.
I doubt many in LA are aware of this.
Lots of people use the mass transit system in LA that lots of other people are basically unaware of. It's interesting.
I doubt many in LA are aware of this.
Wilshire is L.A.'s densest business and residential corridor, and it's among the city's biggest traffic nightmares at rush hour, which is why devoting a lane in each direction to bus use only is a good idea. More people already travel by bus than by car along the route during peak hours, and a fast bus lane would lure even more out of their cars, reducing pollution and radically reducing commuting times for bus riders.
Lots of people use the mass transit system in LA that lots of other people are basically unaware of. It's interesting.
Sunday Bobbleheads
Meet the Press has John Kerry and Zombie James Baker.
Face the Nation has a bunch of people you've never heard of.
This Week is in Cairo.
Document the atrocities!
Face the Nation has a bunch of people you've never heard of.
This Week is in Cairo.
Document the atrocities!
Morning Thread
by Molly Ivors
Frank Rich explains it all to you.
Frank Rich explains it all to you.
Unable to watch Al Jazeera English, and ravenous for comprehensive and sophisticated 24/7 television coverage of the Middle East otherwise unavailable on television, millions of Americans last week tracked down the network’s Internet stream on their computers. Such was the work-around required by the censorship practiced by America’s corporate gatekeepers. You’d almost think these news-starved Americans were Iron Curtain citizens clandestinely trying to pull in the jammed Voice of America signal in the 1950s — or Egyptians desperately seeking Al Jazeera after Mubarak disrupted its signal last week.
The consequence of a decade’s worth of indiscriminate demonization of Arabs in America — and of the low quotient of comprehensive adult news coverage that might have helped counter it — is the steady rise in Islamophobia.
Saturday, February 05, 2011
Dumb And Dumber
Chris Christie goes to Illinois to rescue them from the tyranny of high taxes.
oh, wait...
Gov. Christie flew to Illinois on Friday, trying to sway corporate leaders to bring their business east.
His administration did not release details of the meetings, "in the interest of discretion," said Michael Drewniak, a spokesman for the governor.
oh, wait...
Christie, along with governors in Indiana and Wisconsin, has been trying to pry jobs from Illinois after Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn signed a record 67 percent tax increase Jan. 12.
Illinois raised its flat personal income tax rate to 5 percent from 3 percent, but that is below New Jersey's graduated rates for taxable incomes above $40,000, Quinn's press secretary, Brie Callahan, said in an interview last week. And while the Illinois corporate rate is increasing to 7 percent from 4.8 percent, that is still below New Jersey's 9 percent rate, she said.
Friday, February 04, 2011
A Cunning Plan
So who wants to be ho to my pimp. I'm thinking we can go to the banksters and ask for retirement planning or about the tax deductability of work uniforms and videotape the shocking results.
Doesn't Much Matter
No there's nothing there, but just you can get the media to run with any story about teen girls and sex and every party involved is in fault even if there's no fault that can actually be defined.
Parking Hell
While often people think I'm writing about giant skyscrapers when I use the word "urban," I'm really just mostly talking about development which is at least somewhat pedestrian friendly and not quite entirely car-centric. There are a lot of places in this country that started out as "nice suburbs" in the way that people envisioned them and then grew to be too-dense-but-not-quite-dense enough, in that they're pretty choked with traffic and lack the free infinite parking that people expect but which are not really walkable for most people. Often there's an unwillingness to go one way or another, to start throwing up parking garages at great expense or to start trying to maximize the potential benefits of density.
Modern Activism
I guess we can't beat the banksters' lobbyists, so we should spend all of our time trying to hurt their delicate feefees. Let the mocking begin!
7
Obviously the engineering issues are above my pay grade and I'm no expert on all thing New York, but there definitely would be some advantages to extending the 7 train to New Jersey.
It's the purple one, extension would be to the west under the Hudson. People from New Jersey would finally have one seat access to delicious Szechuan cuisine in Flushing.
It's the purple one, extension would be to the west under the Hudson. People from New Jersey would finally have one seat access to delicious Szechuan cuisine in Flushing.
The Big Mistake
Assholes Timmeh And Larreh.
Letting bankruptcy judges deal with this would have really solved all of these problems. They fucked up.
In the fall of 2008, Democrats saw a good opportunity to pass cramdown. The $700 billion TARP legislation was being considered, and lawmakers thought that with banks getting bailed out, the bill would be an ideal vehicle for also helping homeowners. But Obama, weeks away from his coming election, opposed that approach and instead pushed for a delay. He promised congressional Democrats that down the line he would “push hard to get cramdown into the law,” recalled Rep. Miller.
Four months later, the stimulus bill presented another potential vehicle for cramdown. But lawmakers say the White House again asked them to hold off, promising to push it later.
An attempt to include cramdown in a continuing resolution got the same response from the president.
“We would propose that this stuff be included and they kept punting,” said former Rep. Jim Marshall, a moderate Democrat from Georgia who had worked to sway other members of the moderate Blue Dog caucus [5] on the issue.
“We got the impression this was an issue [the White House] would not go to the mat for as they did with health care reform,” said Bill Hampel, chief economist for the Credit Union National Association, which opposed cramdown and participated in Senate negotiations on the issue.
Privately, administration officials were ambivalent about the idea. At a Democratic caucus meeting weeks before the House voted on a bill that included cramdown, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner “was really dismissive as to the utility of it,” said Rep. Lofgren.
Larry Summers, then the president’s chief economic adviser, also expressed doubts in private meetings, she said. “He was not supportive of this.”
Letting bankruptcy judges deal with this would have really solved all of these problems. They fucked up.
Thursday, February 03, 2011
Thursday Night
Looking at Brian Williams on the teevee it occurs to me that Brian Williams is really quite the fan of Brian Williams.
America Fuck Yeah
I'm just going to throw this out for discussion. I'm certainly not one who imagines that there was a golden age of the press, so this isn't that kind of nostalgia, but I do seem to remember that back during the Cold War and aftermath there was more upfront acknowledgment that we engaged in a lot of Realpolitik. Sure, we were still the good guys, but it wasn't farting in church to suggest that some things we did foreign policy-wise weren't all about the peeance and freeance, but just trying to rig the world in our favor. Post-9/11 especially it became America-hating to even suggest that we were less than pure in any of our motives. With the Egypt situation unfolding I'm sensing a very slight exhale in the media, opening the door to actually talking about this stuff again.
The Pimp And Ho Thing Will Never Get Old
It doesn't really matter what's in the video, the fact that the possibility of underage sex in any way is raised, and the Planned Parenthood personnel don't immediately pull out their guns and perform a citizen's arrest on everyone within 3 miles of the offense is enough to prove... well, something, and it's really bad!
People trying to defund Planned Parenthood want women to be punished if they have sex. Punished with babies, diseases, and potentially death. That's all it's about.
People trying to defund Planned Parenthood want women to be punished if they have sex. Punished with babies, diseases, and potentially death. That's all it's about.
Maybe Bill Gross Reads This Humble Blog
As I have been saying for some time.
As a profession we have failed miserably at our primary function – the efficient and productive allocation of capital:
Also, Everyone In Philly Puts Provolone On Their Goddamn Cheesesteaks
Or whatever the hell they want. That's why the shops offer options.
Our political coverage is back to full stupid. Welcome to the presidential election season.
Our political coverage is back to full stupid. Welcome to the presidential election season.
Thursday Is New Jobless Day
415K new lucky duckies. Still too high.
Monthly jobs report comes out tomorrow.
Monthly jobs report comes out tomorrow.
Wednesday, February 02, 2011
Austerity
It doesn't matter what happens in the UK, the austerity crowd will never give in. The only thing potentially standing in their way is the presidential election calendar. Hopefully it is enough.
I Bet He'll Listen To You
This is just from the front page teaser, not the op-ed itself, but a growing pet peeve of mine is editorial pages telling people in power what they "must" do. Yah, whatevs.
Mubarak must step aside and allow fair and free elections.
Jobs
Actual number comes out Friday, but ADP estimate says private sector job gains +187K. If true that would be good news, though not good enough.
"Food"
One of the points Marion Nestle makes routinely is the conflict between the USDA's role as a developer of nutritional standards, and as an advocate for US food producers.
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Don't Call It An Earmark
This dumb but also pretty funny.
In other words, we'll just define them out of existence.
"However, the handwriting is clearly on the wall. The President has stated unequivocally that he will veto any legislation containing earmarks, and the House will not pass any bills that contain them. Given the reality before us, it makes no sense to accept earmark requests that have no chance of being enacted into law.
"The Appropriations Committee will thoroughly review its earmark policy to ensure that every member has a precise definition of what constitutes an earmark. To that end, we will send each member a letter with the interpretation of Rule XLIV (44) that will be used by the Committee. If any member submits a request that is an earmark as defined by that rule, we will respectfully return the request.
In other words, we'll just define them out of existence.
Stop Whining
My local transit authority is far from perfect and hilariously inept at times, but today apparently there was a small fire on one of the subway lines and judging from the twitter people are livid that their commute has been affected
Sometimes things happen. Like fires.
Sometimes things happen. Like fires.
Deep Thought
At the very least the events in Egypt have sparked a long overdue public discussion about the reasons for our support of corrupt oppressive dictatorial regimes.
Aggressive Ignorance
Conservative global warming deniers aren't obligated to buy the argument that global warming can lead to more and more intense winter storms, but they all pretend they've never heard it before. It's snowing! In Winter! ALGOREISFAT! BUAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAAH!
Austerity
Thankfully Chris Christie has hundreds of millions to invest in the prime engine of economic growth, the casino.
Not Actually Optimistic
No I don't really think that HCR being struck down in whole or even in part means my crazy ideas which are simple and save money are likely to be enacted.
I'm Not Sure What Judicial Activism Is
Even when their side does "it," I still think it's a very poor term which most of the time means "rulings I don't like." There are judges who are more or less deferential to the other branches, and there are judges who are total hacks who will contradict themselves across rulings, or make absurdly stupid arguments, in order to achieve whatever political/policy ends they want to achieve, but "judicial activism" is a bad frame which suggests that it's somehow illegitimate for the judiciary to act. Call out the hacks for being what they are, but don't call them "activists."
We're Laughing At You
I know that decadent coastal liberal elitists like myself aren't supposed to laugh at the True Patriot Americans who watch Glenn Beck's show, but really... If you're a genuine fan of the ravings of this lunatic then you deserve to be laughed at.
When Did This Happen
Ok, great, Barbara Bush supports gay marriage, blah blah. But when did we start giving a crap about the political views of the progeny of politicians? It's really getting creepy.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)