I’m in Philly this morning, preparing to drive down to the Jersey shore, so don’t expect much from me in the way of posting today. I’ve been working on a monster post on the future of newspapers — a very simple thesis that’s extremely complicated to explain — but I just can’t seem to get it right, so… maybe tomorrow.
Anyway, just thought I’d give folks a heads up.
I hope everyone celebrated Liberation Day!
And so the brownie crumbles …
Howdy folks–
Light posting==Joke Time
This is a good chuckle–
Here is some food for thought–
You will see ObaMao being held more & more responsible for the economy. Frankly, I believe Congress has even more responsibility since they make the laws…but, life ain’t fair.
Monday, August 02, 2010
When Capital is Just Smoke and Mirrors.
In yesterday’s NYT, David Stockman wrote a great piece. The former Republican Director of the Office of Management of the Budget, has a blistering attack on the Republican party.
He laos, however, raises an issue that effectgs Dems too .. the support the USA has had for development of a financial industry. Stockman questions whether investment banks add to US productivity. If not, we are turning productive capital into useless smoke.
A good example may be First Data Corporation. This monster company makes its buck off of taxing credit transactions between banks. This company, evaluated at something like 26 billion dollars was taken private by KKR and then tried to go public with an IPO in December. What went wrong with First Data? The IPO did poorly .. maybe because the price of smoke went down after the great Bush collapse?
Have you seen “QUEEN” PELOSI’S NEW JET !!! And the Dummocrats talk about Sarah’s dresses???
“Queen” Pelosi wasn’t happy with the small USAF C-20B jet, Gulfstream III that comes with the Speaker’s job … OH NO! “Queen” Pelosi was aggravated that this little jet had to stop to refuel, so she ordered a Big Fat, 200-seat, USAF C-32, Boeing 757 jet that could get her back to California without stopping! I understand that a former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, flew commercial most of the time.
Many, many legislators walked by and grinned with glee as Joe informed everyone of what Queen Nancy’s Big Fat Jet costs us, the hard working American tax payers, literally thousands of gallons of fuel every week.
Since she only works 3 days a week, this gas guzzling jet gets fueled and she flies home to California every Friday and returns every Monday, at a cost to the taxpayers (YOU and ME are those taxpayers!) of about $60,000, one way!
As Joe put it ….”Unfortunately we have to pay to bring her back on Monday night and that costs us another $60,000!” Taxpayers, that is $480,000 per month and that is an annual cost to us of $5,760,000!!!
No wonder Queen Pelosi complains about the cost of this war … it might cramp her style and she is styling on my back and yours. I think of the military families in this country doing without and this woman, who heads up the most corrupt Congress in the history of our country, keeps fueling that jet while doing nothing. Seems like if Pelosi ever gets around to “draining the swamp”, she needs to start with herself!
“Queen” Pelosi wants you and me to conserve our carbon footprint. She wants us to buy smaller cars and Obama wants us to get a bicycle pump and air up our tires. Who do these people think they are??? Dummocrat motto is … Don’t do as I do … JUST DO AS I SAY!
SJ @ 5: One of the things which hit me the other day was when I realized that business has been effectively finding ways to charge us for items which used to be free.
Examples:
Water. Well, it wasn’t free, you had to pay your local municiple wate supply a utilities fee. But you still have to pay the fee if you want bath water, etc. It’s just that the cost of drinking water from the tap was nominal. But over the past couple of decades, the beverage industry (Coke, Pepsi) have convinced people that drinking tap water is dangerous or tastes bad, so now we pay between a buck to two bucks (or more) for bottled water. And anti-tax people are fighting against any fee increases which would allow us to improve our municiple supplies. Same old story – starve government until it starts to fail, then make a lot more money selling similar services at a substantial profit.
TV. You used to get your TV service for free, as long as you had an antenna and a television with a receiver. Cable TV was a luxory. But in many places now, free TV reception is nearly impossible (I live in a shadow where that occurs). So you pay $50.00 (sometimes more) for TV service. Sure, you get a lot more channels, and the reception is clearer, but the option of doing without and living with the cheaper (free) alternative is rapidly dissapearing.
Paying with cash. When I was growing up, you paid with cash. Nobody took a cut out of the transaction, except for sales tax. But after years of scaring people out of paying with cash (it’s safer not to carry cash!), the financial industry has most of us addicted to plastic. They even had commercials a year or so ago to try to convince people that it was “discourteous” to pay with cash, because it allegedly slowed down the transaction lines causing everyone behind them to have to wait longer. In the meantime, the financial industry scrapes off revenue from both sides of the transaction – they charge the merchant a transaction fee, and they charge the customer interest or monthly or annual credit card fees. Now it’s actually getting more difficult to pay with cash – you can’t rent a car or a hotel room with just cash, and I’ve seen more and more signs at registers refusing to take cash payments of larger than $20’s.
JHK in today’s Clusterfuck Nation:
Here: http://kunstler.com/blog/2010/.....-fall.html
Happy Monday!
Support Seattle’s Team in the World Series!
I had my Ferrari hand washed by members of the Seattle Squadron Ball Team yesterday!
I got a great hand wash and feel good about supporting the Squadron!
The car wash and a garage sale, return next Sunday: Oneil Chiropractic Clinic, just west of the 15rth Ave E Safeway.
$1 hot dogs and chips!
noon to 4PM.
This graphic should be in every Progressive’s arsenal of facts:
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~lken.....ygraph.pdf
(Average Income: Top 1% v. Middle 60% and Bottom 20%)
Cyn….
That “story” is now nearly 2 years old. And the Sargeant at Arms and the Military chose her jet. (Research much?)
And if Congressman Reichert were speaker of the house……
Hang on…
Had to wipe up the latte that came out of my nose laughing at that. All better now.
And if any other Rep from the West Coast were speaker, they’d have the new jet.
Mock scandal. And an old one too.
# 6: Are you still bringing up this garbage? I note that you are cutting and pasting from right-wing e-mail spam, since it quotes the allegations which are re-printed word-for-word on Snopes.com two years ago, which has already proven the claims to have only a small sprinkling of fact, but mostly false.
“Mostly False” Allegations from Nov. 11, 2008
After 9/11, President Bush issued an executive order requiring the House Speaker to travel in an aircraft with secure communications, since they are the third in line to the Presidency (if the Pres. and Vice-President should die or become incapacitated). Of course, at the time the Speaker of the House was also a Republican. Cynical manages to avoid the fact that he flew on a military aircraft for his travels by jumping OVER the Republican Speakers of the House in between Gingrich and 9/11, all of which flew on military aircraft as does Pelosi.
And Pelosi never “demanded” use of a luxory aircraft, for either official or personal use. The House Sergeant at Arms noted that Pelosi’s district in California is outside of the range of the existing aircraft dedicated to the task, so he requested that an aircraft capable of making the trip non-stop be assigned “if available”.
In the event of a national emergency, the military wanted Pelosi traveling in an aircraft with secure communications which could make the trip non-stop, without having to stop for refueling (which might be difficult in times of a nuclear attack, for example). Even the Bush White House stood behind Pelosi on this issue.
Using the larger aircraft actually depends upon the headwinds – the smaller aircraft can make the trip from D.C. to San Francisco if the jet stream conditions are favorable. As of the last time they checked, she had used the larger aircraft only once, due to headwinds.
In fact, she travels to her home district much less frequently than the previous Speaker, Dennis Hastert, who traveled (using an Air Force Gulfstream) almost every weekend.
So again, Cynical, you are merely repeating right-wing B.S. without caring that it is false.
Further…
Just to point out your abject partisan stupidity, re: Gingrich and commercial flights..
What might have happened between Pelosi and Gingrich that would up the security level of flights to the third in line for the presisency?
“After September 11th, the Department of Defense – with the consent of the White House – agreed that the Speaker of the House should have military transport. And so what is going on is that the Department of Defense is going through its rules and regulations and having conversations with the Speaker about it. So Speaker Hastert had access to military aircraft and Speaker Pelosi will, too.”
Tony Snow while press spokesperson for G.W. Bush.
Goldy;
As I’ve mentioned before, the newspaper model arose because printing presses and the skilled labor to operate them were very expensive. The owners of the presses would take in dedicated printing jobs, but they hated to see them idle, so they created a model which allowed for smaller ads to be combined printed on a single page (and later multiple pages). The “Little Nickle” is a remnant of that tradition.
To make this service more marketable, they started making it more readable by adding “news”, originally the printer’s own take on local events, entertaining writings, and correspondence from other newspapers in other communities (hence the term “correspondent” for journalists). With the advent and growth of wire services, the news portion expanded greatly, and the AP/UPI neutral style of writing replaced the more emotionally-driven writing styles of the 1800’s and early 1900’s.
By the late 19th and through the middle of the 20th century, newspapers were in their heyday, being the primary arbiters of what is, or what is not, “news”. Similarly, they could decide who is, and who is not, a credible electoral candidate simply by deciding who to cover and who not to cover. Their endorsements meant tens of thousands of votes.
But take away the printing press from the equation, and everything else falls apart. With the internet, there is virtually no cost to tens of thousands of “competitors” entering the market, disensing news, opinion, and advertising services.
It’s an obsolete business model.
From an actual conservative:
Here: http://www.professorbainbridge.....ative.html
@15
big deal – anybody can come up with a similar list of nuttines demonstrated by the progressives over the last 10 years…
great, each side claiming that the other one is “TEH CRAZEE”….yawn, its the same old same old….
@6 That joke was circulated in the rightwing Laugh-O-Sphere in early 2009, Mr. C., and it’s been debunked countless times. Were you too busy fucking your goats this weekend to look for new material?
Snopes.com (“the urban legends web page”) rates it as “Mostly False.”
http://www.snopes.com/politics/pelosi/jet.asp
@16 Riddle
Ya think??
Lets make this a challenge.
I will focus on crazy ideas supported by the right:
creationism
global warming denial
US as world cop
decontrol investment houses
lower taxes on the wealthy
ban stem cell research
charge students for education
US a Christian country
witch doctors in Kenya
death panels in Obama care
While we are at it … who were the greatest FUs as President? Nixon, Harding, or Bush?
Charge students for education?????
are you talking about college? wtf?
@16: Not my words, I’m quoting an embarrassed conservative — an actual conservative vice the Teahadists who call themselves that.
People who call themselves conservative these days are religious nuts and/or glibertarians who serve the purposes of the oligarchy.
Basically, we’re talking Shitheads and Greedheads.
Which are you? And before you answer — and I know this’ll be struggle for your tiny reptile brain — it’s quite possible to be both.
@20
I think you have been watching way too much MSNBC and hanging out at Huffpo…
I could just as easily say that progressives are either limp writed faggots or died in the wool communists. Which are you?
See, it makes about as much sense, doesnt it?
@21: one brain cell or two?
@5 It would appear that FirstData and all the other companies in the transaction-by-plastic clearing business bet heavily–really heavily–on ever-increasing fee collections from ever-increasing use of plastic instead of checks and greenbacks. That might have been realistic, given the convenience factor in general and the growth of on-line commerce for which there’s just no other practical means of payment.
Well, it would have made sense, except the economy went so far in the toilet that people are just plain spending a helluva lot less, however they do it, not to mention Uncle Sam growing a pair and putting the kybosh on the scams most of the banks had started running with their victims–er, customers.
By the way, with all the hand-wringing going on among pundits about the likelihood of a “double-dip” rescession….
I’m seeing actual earning reports from freight fowarders, airlines, and trucking companies, along with projections of future growth which are backed by actual money – pre-paid cargo capacity, initial discussions of orders for new airplanes, etc. All of this indicates that those involved in freight logistics are convinced that the recent upward movement of freight levels and pricing will continue.
Re 18 and 15
In the post at 15 I have to agree in part with your guest writer, Zotz. Thoughtful and coherent argument on the inherent flaws in liberal and progressive thought seem missing in conservative talk. Obama Reid and Pelosi are wrong on so very many real points it seems a waste of time to question Obamas citizenship for example.
SJ point by point-
Creationism is not an indicator of stupidity. I’ve rarely been called stupid, but can’t conceive of the majestical work of art that is the created universe being a cosmic accident. Nor can many poeple well educated people I know. In fact the scientific ‘evidence’ supporting large scale evolution (as opposed to the small scale alterations in species which enable them to adapt to changing environments) takes every bit as much faith as creationism.
Global warming- well, climate change as it’s called now since the earth hasn’t actually been warming- is in the same class as the above. Take a large 5 gallon bucket of hysteria, add pinch of conjecture supported by silly degrees with a cup or two of outright manipulation of data and you have the C
Sorry, accidentally hit submit. Continued-
Global warming- well, climate change as it’s called now since the earth hasn’t actually been warming- is in the same class as the above. Take a large 5 gallon bucket of hysteria, add pinch of conjecture from people with educations but no sense, a cup or two of outright manipulation of data and a gallon of political use of the hysteria for self serving ends. Et voila, you have the COMING GLOBAL CATASTROPHE IN WHICH WE WILL ALL BE EATING EACH OTHER BY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!! Bon appetite.
You’re right about whether we should bear the financial burden of policing the world. The ungrateful bastards should take care of themselves in my opinion.
Ah, finance. The old liberal canard that by stealing lawfully earned money from one person to give to his profligate fellow citizen we better society is absurd on its face. Even if it weren’t, it simply doesn’t work. Most wealth is generated by business or investments in business. Tax the owners of Safeway on the childish liberal belief that they owe more as citizens (despite not gaining more as citizens) on the basis of wealth. Fine. Pretty quick you’ll see that gallon of milk or dozen eggs go up in price as they pass that on to you.
I have no idea what you mean by charging for education.
You’ve made a convert. We should use live children as scientific data points. We should use the bodies of babies as farms for medications. Sorry I ever doubted this elementary and extremely moral practice of stem cell research. In fact, why stop there? 2 year old kids don’t contribute much to society. Let’s use them too! And those worthless elderly taking up valuable resources in nursing homes. Let’s euthanize the selfish old fools and use their bodies as test beds for new scientific advances.
Death panels is a foolish way conservatives failed to adress a basic flaw in government run health care. With limited resources to spend someone WILL get cut out of line based on whatever standard will apply. It happens now with organ transplants. What in the world makes you folks think it won’t in your utopian dream of single payer?Fo
And I already addressed the silliness of not atttacking leftist thought on the simplicity and incoherence of the basic principles, rather than on the proponents personal failings, real or imagined.
@24
I doubt there will be a double dip. I also doubt that there will be much growth. People will buy what needs bought, but the level of “recreational spending” will much lower than it has been for the last 20 years and much of our economy has been based on that recreational spending.
@7
It used to be that you were a bit short of cash on a Friday and getting paid on Monday, you could float a check over the weekend. Not anymore, now you have to get a pay day loan, There were all sorts of ways that working class folks used to stretch a buck that no longer exist. The disappearance of the “casual economy” has cost the working class a good chunk of change.
@7
I know a few folks that went back to rabbit ears once cable went digital, their signals are just as good as cable and one of them even gets a bunch of cable stations that bleed off of his neighbors systems.
@23 ArtFart
KKR and FirstData
I really think we need some mechanism to control the vapors that First Data and their ilk use in place of productivity.
Even if KKR had made a good bet, how in hell doe investment in FD add to America’s productivity?
Look at it this way, exactly what does FD do that can not be done over the intertube to Hungary or India?
This sort of investment by the US will beggar us all.
@30 “Look at it this way, exactly what does FD do that can not be done over the intertube to Hungary or India?”
Hey, why not route all the network traffic through Moscow, so the Russian Mafia’s paid hackers won’t have to work so hard to skim our account information?
@22…its your brain, you tell me.
Sad news–
Mitch Miller, of Sing Along with Mitch fame died. He was only 99! I remembe watching his show as a kid.
http://music.msn.com/music/art.....;gt1=28102
chech & rhp–
Too Damn Funny.
I knew pulling up that oldy, moldy would get a rise out of a couple of you.
PS–I think I posted it last year TOO!
Perhaps I will post it monthly??
Gets your blood pumpin’
Laying TV cable is not building infrastructure.
@7 & 29 re:DTV
My reception sucked in Seattle before DTV; ghost city. Now with the same rabbit ears w/adjustable UHF antenna (shrink the rabbit ears & angle them to mimic a bow-tie antenna) I’m able to get great digital reception including KBTC in Tacoma. You also get all the back channels. In fact, FOX is also available on the back channel of KMYQ to extend their coverage. I no longer have to get up and adjust the TV to watch ch13.
@35
but laying cable in the toilet is a good test of infrastructure.
# 34: If you insist on repeatedly embarrasing yourself by posting such easily disproven falsehoods multiple times, feel free. We will also feel free to point out each time that you are either a liar or an idiot, or both.
@38
We will also feel free to point out each time that you are either a liar or an idiot, or both.
It’s both.
re 37: … and the best part of that is that the provider is a private entity — even if the receptacle is not.
rhp–
Are you oh so serious these days that you can’t take a joke?
Sheeeeeeeeesh, this ObaMao collapse is really taking it’s toll.
Relax.
The Dems will retain control of the Senate another 2 years…and probably the House.
It’s 2012 where the big change will take place if the National Debt isn’t addressed.
@41
That’s if they have credible challengers. From what I’ve seen of the right, I’d say those challengers are just as likely to come (if they come) from the left.
Helmet-Hair-Hamlet hasn’t been struck appropriately to be convinced on Kagan. What an enema bucket!
By Helmet-Hair-Hamlet’s logic, the US Senate is the wrong starting point for someone who has served a real estate flim-flammer.
Rossi: I’d vote ‘no’ on Kagan for Supreme Court
@43:
What a fucking crock!
I want this motherfucker on the record about Citizens United, e.g., I’m not aware that he’s been queried on the weak tea of the Disclose Act.
The founders would be appalled that we now equate money with speech and corporations with actual persons.
Here’s Goldy taking him to task:
http://horsesass.org/?p=28676
@44 Zotz on 08/02/2010 at 4:53 pm,
I’m absolutely convinced Kagan won’t “limit herself to interpreting the Constitution” cuz I know what a judge (SCOTUS or Federal Appellate) actually does. Apparently neither Rossi or anybody on his staff has a clue or cares to find out.
Any 1st semester UW law school students want to help Hamlet-Hair-Hamlet out?
@ spuddy
Uh, you are one of the people in here that has always consistently and vehemently supported the party that has always stood for money=speech. That corporations are people in the eyes of the law. That ruling was essentially made in 1886, under a Republican administration, by a Republican dominated supreme court with an openly bribed Supreme Court chief justice writing the decision.
The GOP and the conservatives have always been the party of big business since Grant was President. They’ve repeatedly collapsed the economy because of their underlying goal of national-corporatism and banking economics. They lost Congress in 1930 and were kept from a majority therin for over 50 years for a reason. the people who were adults with families and property during that period continued to vote Democratic until the late 1960’s, (when they started to die off) and their children continued that tradition untill 1986, when the GOP finally gained a majority in the US Senate.
They did it again just a couple years ago, and you lick their boots and fap away at their warmongering and hegemony and phoney moralism, then complain endlessly about how fucked things are in this country, when it is your “conservative government that has consistently caused most of the socioeconomic problems we are now dealing with.
Supply-side economics just means stripmining the middle class to benefit the bankers. Conservative economic philosophy is all about furthering the enrichment the already obscenely wealthy, at the expense of the people who actually do the work that makes them rich. That has always been the conservative method of economics.
Make up your mind, moron.
Jesus H Christ, people are stupid.
Frog: I’m sorry you didn’t get the joke. Zotz sez:… is me, Zotz, fucking with Pudpuller.
Arschloch is German for asshole. So, Puddybud is just another word for asshole. Get it?
I’m on your side, man.
BTW, Frog: That was truly a righteous rant at 47.
Zotz and Deathfrogg – two of my favorites. And both have great screen names.
@41: We don’t take things too seriously – in fact, we laugh at the ignorant fool you are and how stoopid you are.
Thanks for making right wingnut demogogues like you so obviously wrong and so obviously lacking in brain cells.