Sunday, March 15, 2009

Weekend Update - Ides of March Edition



  • Thinking of uplifting your spirits about the sagging economy? Looking for something to do this weekend that'll get you back in the groove? Well, don't go shopping. You may be the only person in the store. Mark Morford reports.

  • You know just the other day I was hanging out at Starbucks, and I was saying "Gee, $787,000,000,000 just doesn't sound like enough to get this economy back on track. I think we're gonna need more..." Where does this madness end?

  • Darth Cheney came out of his Death Star and criticized President Obama. Shouldn't the Dickster be in jail?

  • Pardon me, but this is goddamned ridiculous. The American International Group, which has received more than $170 billion in taxpayer bailout money from the Treasury and Federal Reserve, plans to pay about $165 million in bonuses by Sunday to executives in the same business unit that brought the company to the brink of collapse last year. In most civilized countries, these people would be lined up against a wall and shot.

  • This is the stuff that makes bloggers cheer. Remember Pat Boone? The all-too-white idiot who kept trying to re-do Little Richard songs? He's not just getting old, he's losing his mind. Check out this bizarre story.

  • While we enjoy a couple strips of bacon as well as the next person, maybe it's time we paid attention to where that bacon comes from. "Pimples from hell...?" Ohmygawd.

Sunday, March 8, 2009

Weekend Update - March 8th



  • Check out the new Carl Faddis video over on the left, "Just Like You." This was originally a training video for LTD operators, produced by Carl, and Richard Shrope. Carl wrote the beautiful song, and the people you see in the video are people I work with every day, employees and passengers. It is so well done that other transit organizations around the U.S. are picking it up and using it for training. Click on it and prepare to have your cockles warmed.

  • "How is it that no one but you and a few manic fringe writers seem to notice that President Obama is either A) a thinly veiled socialist commie instigator hell-bent on destroying America from the inside out, or B) nothing more than a cleverly disguised corporate-loving Bush clone because, oh my God, haven't you seen his policy on H1Bs and faith-based initiatives and his nefarious plan to take over the banks and, um, something else you can't quite remember right now but you're sure is really, really damning?" Mark Morford.

  • Mark Rich: "Some Things Don't Change in Grover's Corner."

  • Senator "Big" John Cornyn is circulating a petition demanding that the Obama administration come clean about it's "conspiracy" campaign to smear Rush Limbaugh. I'd start laughing but my head already hurts.

  • Look, I've got a better idea than this. The government should first freeze all prices just as they are now for one year, then issue all taxpayers who are worth less than $5 million a tax free check for $1,000,000. Everybody becomes a millionaire. Bills would be paid off, banks would flourish, the stock market would soar, the auto industry would operate in the black, people could afford health insurance, we could afford to go to the Olive Garden on a weekend, etc. Of course there'd be some problems, but the benefits would greatly outweigh them. Oh, I know I'll hear from some of you saying no, you can't just give people money but Hey! it's a better idea than giving the BANKS trillions of dollars!

  • This week's picture is of Diogenes, who supposedly carried a lamp through the streets of Athens during daylight, looking for an honest man. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Newt Gingrich.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

An Interesting Explanation


I do not always agree with Paul Krugman, but on occasion he comes out with a line that knocks me over.

In this piece he draws a historic link between past conservative praise and current economic disaster. He writes:

This may explain the almost eerie correlation between conservative praise two or three years ago and economic disaster today. “Reforms have made Iceland a Nordic tiger,” declared a paper from the Cato Institute. “How Ireland Became the Celtic Tiger” was the title of one Heritage Foundation article; “The Estonian Economic Miracle” was the title of another. All three nations are in deep crisis now.

So Krugman's observation almost suggests that if you want to see a financial train wreck in the making, read the ravings of the anti-regulatory right... and then wait for two to three years for that economy to tank. In short, the current laissez-faire intellectual leanings of the conservative movement that regulation is bad, "bureaucrats" are bad and that "free markets" are possessed with an eerie ability to just get everything right, like it was magic. Somehow this week that idea is not playing too well, as the world's stock markets retch up some more of their guts.

What is fascinating is that the conservative think tanks like the Cato Institute and the Heritage Foundation have no news ideas, nor apparently any ability for self-analysis. They must know what they have been saying, lobbying for and speaking out for, and how that approach has played out in the real world. One would think that they would be immersed in a dark period of reflection, for having botched things so badly. Are they? Do you really need to ask?

Arthur


Sunday, March 1, 2009

The Revenge of the Krauthammer


"Obamaist Manifesto"? Gosh, that sort of sounds familiar, doesn't it? Oh, wait, we are meant to conflate that term with the "Communist Manifesto" which was written by Karl Marx in 1848.

Now when you read Krauthammer's piece you are not meant to do any research, or any thinking, or to know what a monumental dumbass Krauthammer is for making such an absurd claim. Obama and his agenda an attempted Socialist or Communist takeover of our economy and society? Hardly, in fact, very, very far from it. But Krauthammer doesn't really care if you read his editorial, or if you think about it or that you may even be capable of critical thought... all he wants you to remember is the catch-phrase he has so proudly invented or borrowed from one of his wingnut buddies. Oh, snap! as the young folks would say, he got Obama with that one! Well, no, he didn't, but this is one of the opening volleys in the "War to Save Reaganism" which is a near cousin of Bill O'Reilly's "War to Save Christmas". The conservative and not-so-conservative rightwing of our country are badly frightened. People who are scared often do desperate and dangerous things. Some of the desperate and dangerous things they plan to do is to try to "take down" President Obama and torpedo his legislative agenda, the stimulus package and any and all changes in the status quo that he proposes. Because on their merits they are wrong? Nope, because if he succeeds the Republican Party is going to be in far, far, far worse trouble than it currently is. And it is in trouble. The Republican Party is trying to edge Senator Jim Bunning of South Kentucky out of the 2010 primary because they are afraid he is going to lose. Bunning, described by those who know him as a "loose cannon" has said that if they screw with him he is going to immediately resign and let the Democratic Governor appoint a Democrat to replace him and let the Republican Party choke on it. This is called "unity". But what is it that the GOP is so worried about? and why are they trashing FDR so much these days, saying that New Deal thing actually prolonged the Depression, contrary to what everyone thinks.

Because FDR and the New Deal came close to destroying the Republican Party. The Senate then had 96 members (pre-Alaska and Hawaii) and in the 1930 election the GOP held 48 seats, the Democrats held 47 and the Farmers Party held 1. Bipartisan as all get-out, eh? But then in the 1932 election that swept FDR into office he had long enough coattails to run the GOP down to 35 Senators and in 1934 their numbers fell to 25. Do the math and you can see that left the Democrats with 70 Senate seats. That is a very comfortable filibuster-proof majority. But wait, in the 1936 election only 17 Republican Senators were seated. 17 Republicans and 76 Democrats. Ouch. That is the historic scenario that the Republican stalwarts are having nightmares about. They are terrified that they screwed up so badly that it will take a generation, or more, before anyone trusts them again, and since the bias towards the Democratic Party becomes more extreme in younger voters, as Republican voters age the demographics of the electorate do not look promising.

So we are going to see a lot of mud and name slinging, a lot of anger and invective. It may be a bit like the death throes of a rabid mammoth. Interesting to watch, but dangerous to get too close to. There are going to be more rants like this, believe me. But with any luck the marginally deranged Senator Jim Bunning will make good on this threat to resign and Al Franken will have his Senate race in Minnesota confirmed and there will be 60 Democratic Senators. That will on the one hand be fun, but with great power comes great responsibility. I hope we can keep it together.

Arthur

Weekend Update - March 1st



  • President Obama. President Obama. Just keep saying it over and over. Feels good, doesn't it? Well, it feels better than doing your taxes. Everyone Mark Morford knows is feeling a little bipolar right now.

  • Republican Party Chairman Rush Limbaugh even came down hard on Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal for his silly little speech the other night. But there's something really strange about Rush, and this isn't the first time we've felt that way.

  • El Rushbo closed out the 36th Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Saturday, the day we lovingly call The Day the Republican Party Jumped the Shark, he "got so many feverish standing ovations that they could have done without the seats in the conference hall. The politically deranged appeared going through some sort of exorcism frenzy as Rush refused to apologize for wanting Obama to fail and for repeatedly describing "liberals" and the "Democrat Party" as the "enemy."'

  • Our Frank Rich writes of Obama's speech last Tuesday in " The Ecstasy and the Agony."

  • Joe "The Plumber" Wurzelbacher suggests that some members of Congress should be shot. No really, I'm not kidding. Read it yourself. And a video, too.

  • We hear that Bill O'Reilly is scheduled to speak at a fund raising event for rape victims. Sit down, take off your hat, scratch your head, and say "What?"

  • And finally, what do you do to Tibetan Monks who insist on setting themselves on fire? Shoot them, of course.

Peggy Noonan Gets On The Bus


This is one of the first articles I have read that poses the stark question; so what's it gonna be, punk? are you feeling lucky today? Do you Republican Congresscritters feel lucky, lucky enough to wish, to scheme, to work to make President Obama fail, in hopes that the country would not suffer equal or worse damage? To put it bluntly, we're all in this together. A lot of Democrats went along with the Republicans' Great Conservative Experiment Ride. And some got badly injured for doing so, as did our economy, our international standing and by many measures the health of our armed forces. Now it is time to try something different, and now it is time for Republicans to either (a) give it a chance to succeed, or (b) throw their bodies and those of their constituents in front of the bus.

Peggy Noonan just had an epiphany. And she wrote about it in the Wall Street Journal, in a convincing manner. Noonan occupies an interesting position in the cosmos. Since she ghost-wrote (okay, since she was the speechwriter for) many of Reagan's most lauded speeches, Noonan is in some ways a surviving part of Ronald Reagan. She can write the speech he is no longer alive to give and people somehow kind of sense that. To the extent that is true, or that we accept my peculiar claim, Ronald Reagan just told the Republican Party to suck it up and help save the country.

Will they listen? Some will not. Some are so wedded to one or another niche issue that they would rather have their flesh chewed off by rabid weasels than accommodate that silver-tongued young liberal. Others are not so wedded to the "rabid weasels" option, as appealing as offbeat martyrdom might be. My guess is the Republican members of the Senate and House break down into three groups: fiscal conservatives, social conservatives and champions of business. Some others probably combine a bit from one basket with a bit from another, but all of them seem to like being in Washington and hope that by staying there they will become really important and make a lot of money. I hope that I am not shocking anyone by suggesting that politicians (a) love power (b) love money, and (c) sometimes vote not out of principle, but to pursue a strategic or financial goal. I realize these are harsh and stunning accusations for me to make publicly, but someone had to say it. What Noonan wrote is an acknowledgement that for an important segment of the Republican establishment, the game is over. How many will listen to her and start to buck Party cohesion is yet to be seen. We don't need many. What some of the more sensible Republicans in the Senate have got to be noticing this week is that Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins got some of what they wanted inserted into the omnibus stimulus bill, while the rebel forces got zip. Oh, and the Republican Party got dinged a couple of points in popularity polls. Ooops.

One last thought on Noonan. Have you ever noticed how many of the pundits who appear on television are former speechwriters and political operatives? David Frum, Pat Buchanan, Peggy Noonan, Bill Moyers, Chris Matthews and the list goes on. What qualifies a speech writer to speak on important issues? or are they featured merely because they can turn a good phrase? That's my guess, but it doesn't tell us whether they have the common sense of a chicken, or whether we ought to care what they say or think, yet people seem to.

Arthur

The Right Stuff


(Arthur sent this last Tuesday evening, right after President Obama's televised speech.)


I had no idea that Barack Obama could channel Franklin Delano Roosevelt so effectively. After tonight I can believe that he has studied Roosevelt's talks and approach, judging by his "State of the Budget" speech. Great stuff.

What made FDR great was that he called on Americans to unite and undertake great works, well beyond the sphere of their own immediate interests. Obama told High School students that they owed it to our nation to graduate from High School, and then get at least a year of job-training, college or certification. They OWE it to our nation. Wow. There went the drop-out rate, shrinking to an acceptable level. Hey, if a kid is in reform school, that may slow up the process of their education a bit, but why should it? If we set a 100% graduation rate from High School, what then? What then? What impact would that have on our country and the worst areas and our most down-trodden populations. I think a lot. My guess is that teachers all over the country were crying and shouting out loud as they listened tonight. One hell of a speech.

And then afterwards that hopped-up little tick Bobby Jindal came out to give a response, apparently written last week, full of bullshit talking points that have been debunked already, but Jindal has never let facts get in his way. What a blow to the Indians to see an Indian-American who is so full of crap, who talks like a cracker. The bad kind.

I am feeling better about things, after seeing the speech. See, that's how it works, when it is done right. It is the same unfathomable knack that Winston Churchill had. Churchill in many ways was a moron, but boy could he give a barn-burner of a speech. When he told the British people that they were going to be going out into the hedgerows and fields to fight German invaders with pitchforks, instead of people saying "Are you joking?" the Brits thought it sounded like a good way to die, if the Germans were thick enough to consider invading. See, it takes a certain knack to make a situation that sucks seem like a noble and uplifting cause. I liked a lot of the specifics in Obama's speech. Behind the scenes he has hired a pit bull to drive a tractor through the middle of the defense budget, to root out the appropriations awarded in return for lobbyists providing Congressmen with hookers. Indeed, this new initiative could cause a recession in the Hooking Industry, if honest government catches on. Perhaps there should be a bail-out or retraining program? I'm not sure what the obvious career path is for a laid-off hooker, but presumably something in the Service Industry?

Okay, sorry... having too much fun tonight. Great speech, hopeful sign of a lot of important legislation that will be coming. Three things were mentioned (a) energy independence (b) education, and (c) health care. That comes the day after our Kaiser medical plan (for two people) went up from $1227 to $1,573. You do the math. A year back it was $973. What a difference a year makes. The cost of healthcare in this country is nuts. Something major needs to be done, and fast.

Great speech, great priorities. In the last eight years the priorities seemed to be (a) sow fear and hatred (b) deregulate just because we could, and (c) blow up foreign countries and spend lots of money on no-bid contracts. I cannot tell you how glad I am that we've moved on from those days. Please note that nowhere in tonight's speech was the buzz-word "Islamofascist" used. For that small blessing, and much else, I am truly, truly grateful.


Arthur