Tag: rant

Torture by Gag – US Policy.

Apparently some of our best soldiers are less “fabricky” than others. They threaten the “fabric” of our troops.

But, if GAGGED their “fabricity” remains intact, thus that they are often decorated and rise within the ranks of our fine armed services.  



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Are you fucking kidding me?

Oh, celebration music.

It’s June, and time for weddings, graduations — many rights of passage that resurrect the Pachelbel Rant.

A great weekend to all.

The DRC, Sudan, and Looking Forward.

Dave Waldman writes on Obama’s reluctance to prosecute for torture:

That poses an extraordinarily broad array of difficulties, not the least of which is that it’s an open an ongoing threat to the greater Obama agenda, which is itself often invoked as a reason for not dabbling in the “distraction” of “looking backward.” But unless we can demarcate Cheneyism — the “anything goes” philosophy as explicitly illegal, unconstitutional and illegitimate, its continued existence (and threatened practice by future administrations) calls into question the value and durability of the whatever parts of the Obama agenda are ultimately implemented, on detainee policy or anything else.

Last week, the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations had a hearing entitled Confronting Rape and Other Forms of Violence Against Women in Conflict Zones: DRC and Sudan. The US Senate wishes to tackle rape as a weapon of war. Barbara Boxer feels we are in good position to affect the atrocities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Sudan.

Could this be the dumbest idea on the economy?


So why shouldn’t the Fed just keep cutting interest rates? Why not lower the target interest rate to, say, negative 3 percent?

So suggests Harvard Professor N. Gregory Mankiw in the New York Times.

So, let’s pay people to borrow money?  At a time when household debt is about one whole year of GDP, individuals should borrow more?

If that’s not weird enough, Professor Mankiw goes on to note that no one will lend at negative interest rates.  Unless…

Off With Their Heads: Fixing Failing Companies

Time after time we see layoffs as the solution to a company’s woes.  For example, of the 598,000 newly unemployed individuals in the US in January of 2009, 163,000 of these were laid off from the 500 largest US companies.  Some lowlights:

Jan. 26: Following the acquisition of the small drug outfit Wyeth for $68 billion, Pfizer closes five factories and cuts 15% of total workforce (19,000 workers).

Jan. 26: Sprint Nextel pink-slips 8,000 workers–recording more than $300 million in severance charges but saving $1.2 billion a year in labor costs.

Jan. 30: Caterpillar increases previous layoffs from 20,000 to 22,110, and share price hits 52-week low.

Here’s the question: does this really help a company?

Here’s the answer: probably not.

Another question:  what would help these companies?

Another answer: replace the management!

We’ve heard some whining about President Obama forcing out GM CEO Waggoner.  Maybe he’s onto something?

NOM, NOM, NOM. Fibbers extraordinaire

Also posted on Daily Kos. I figured I would share here, too.

First, I know that I am preaching to the proverbial choir on this. Please comment, but this diary is as much for lurkers, trolls, and freepers as it is for this community.

Second, I am an entrenched GLBT ally. I have no direct and solely personal interest in same sex marriage, but I have family, friends, and online friends who are. That’s more than enough for me to get involved.

Third, and this will come as the shocker of the week, but it turns out that the National Organization for Marriage is a bunch of liars.

Fourth, I haven’t gone off on a good rant in a while and I don’t have a date this Friday evening (or most Friday evenings for that matter). So this is my outlet for righteous indignation.

Fifth: I am the sort of person who reads methodology sections in academic papers. I actually enjoy this sort of thing.

Prosecuting Those Responsible.


(After quantifying US casualties on September 11, 2001.)

These measurements obviously did not capture the full meaning of September 11. A familiar terrorist threat announced itself that day with frightening new proximity and ambition. But decision made in the White House, in response, had incomparably greater impact on American interests as a society.

Barton Gellman in Angler – The Cheney Vice Presidency, page 132.

It is entirely by design that bringing abusers of power to justice will be riddled with setbacks. The Bush 43 leaders and high level advisors used deliberate sleight of hand to insure their prosecution was improbable. They are counting on the fact that the decision to prosecute them is entirely political, and that willingness to to spend political capital for crimes gone by will be small. But they’ve also fortified their steps with subtleties that make it harder to figure what went wrong.

It will take a lot more than just energizing the left wing behind the cause and supporting Senator Leahy to bring lawbreakers to justice. We have to convince the American mainstream if we are going to make prosecution happen. A mainstream that has demonstrated time and again that they are certain to miss the subtlety.

Not Your Grandfather’s Depression

Headline (albeit a small one) in Sunday’s LA Times: “20% in Los Angeles County Receive Public Aid.”

Headline in Sunday’s Nashville Tennessean: Homeless Kids Flood Shelters and Schools.

Headline on the cover of this week’s The Economist: The Collapse of Manufacturing.

Paul Krugman noted on Saturday that the current situation bears resemblance to the Great Depression. Maybe this is no surprise to some of us. But I can’t help thinking it’s worse.

Burris: IOKIYAR!

Also posted at Kos

Roland Burris spoke to Rod Blagojevich! Name a Politician in Illinois who hasn’t? We all knew he was lying…but in the matter of lies…this was a tiny one.

Heck Bill Clinton lied too and he got Impeached!

George Bush lied….so what.

The difference was, “under oath”!

Bush testified, but not under oath, with no transcripts and with Cheney to help him out.

Burris got videotaped.

Maybe he needs to change parties.

A Coal Day in Hell

God works in Mysterious Ways

Right as they are on the brink of selling “Clean Coal Technology” to the American Public, Kingston Tennessee gets buried in 300 million tonnes of coal sludge. Its now in the watershed.

Have a nice fucking day, morons. Nothing like cadmium in your water cocktail with a nice fat lead stick to swizzle it and a sprinkle of mercury bits on the brown foam topping.

For the sake of a job, you have been poisoning yourselves, your children and grandchildren for a hundred years. How long will the denizens of Tennessee, West Virginia and Kentucky put up with Coal Mining not only for its irresponsible lack of environmental control, when will they figure out its just a bad overall idea, plain and simple?

Whether or not you believe in God, this is one of those moments where you have to think “Instant Karma” and think it a grand scale wake the fuck up call.

“Clean” coal is like saying “Dry” rain.

Proof of both is now soaking the Earth.

writing in the raw: who are we?

i am left with this one question: who are we?

cattle? feudal serfs? indentured servants? are we trapped? who’s in charge, anyway?

i only realize now that the real turn in my political perception happened after the Nov 2005 elections, when Democrats regained a slim majority in Congress. when i expected everything to happen. accountability. push-back at FISA, the Military Commissions Act, the Patriot Act, more oversight of the captains of industry and financial markets. i really thought, listening to the likes of Henry Waxman that the sane people, once again, had some meaningful influence over politics and policies.

what slowly began to dawn on me was that the people i thought would work to restore our country had sabotaging us all along.

so when i read Cheney on Wiretapping: “Congress said we could”

Cheney Rats Out Dem Leadership as His Co-Conspirators

The Issue is Black & White, and redundant. Separate but Equal = Bigot.

I just surfed past 30 seconds of Morning Joe Scarborough Country and heard Joe Mika and Pat all whine:

as soon as someone who’s against gay marriage is called a bigot, the conversation is over.  Oh the humanity, it’s so awful, if you are a conservative Christian who believes in traditional marriage you’re a bigot, oh my Gosh this is so terrible, to be labeled a bigot!

Nodding heads all around the table.

FUCK YOU PAT! YOU ARE A BIGOT!

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