No politics, just some great writing:
– When my dad and I were hustlers.
– Joe Posnanski on the death, and life, of Clarence Clemons.
– Lindy West’s Guide to Life for the Recent Graduates
– Even if you’ve read Eli Sanders’ Slog pieces about the trial of the South Park rapes and murder, it’s worth reading this whole article (although, damn, it’s a difficult read).
SJ spews:
Looking over at the ads on the right side of Carl’s post, I see an ad for Western Governors.
I recommend HA fans take a look at this ad.
Of Siemens and Washington’s newest state university
If you have not done so already, I recommend going to the new website for Western Governors University Washington. Just think, “we” can now offer Bachelors and masters degrees at no cost to the State of Washington (unless you include state paid tuition and unemployment) !
At the same time, you may want to read on The-AVE.US about a frightening report from Siemens that, even with 9.1% US unemployment, the company can not even find US workers qualified at the level of apprentice! Take a look at the WGUW website and then tell me if you think the WGUW degrees address that problem!
TT spews:
Thanks for the great articles Carl.
Roger Rabbit spews:
Another Reason Why Nuclear Power Can’t Be Trusted
“Federal regulators have been working closely with the nuclear power industry to keep the nation’s aging reactors operating within safety standards by repeatedly weakening those standards, or simply failing to enforce them, an investigation by The Associated Press has found.”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43.....vironment/
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Nuclear power is one of the most unethical industries on the planet, perhaps even more unethical than the financial services industry. It abounds with liars, paperwork falsifiers, an industry-captive government regulatory establishment, cost cutters and corner cutters, crooked contractors, and shoddy engineering and maintenance. Whistleblowers are hounded, harassed, and silenced. The bottom line: Nuclear power plants are unsafe.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43.....vironment/
Roger Rabbit spews:
Why should nuclear operators go to any effort or expense to build and operate their plants safely? They’ve succeeded in shifting the costs of a major accident to innocent homeowners and small business owners in surrounding neighborhoods through the Price-Anderson Act, which limits their liability. Would you carry auto insurance — or drive carefully — if you could get a law passed that immunizes you from liability and makes the victim pay for his injuries?
Roger Rabbit spews:
Nuclear power just shouldn’t be built in the U.S. until the laws are changed to make the industry financially responsible and there’s a major housecleaning of personnel within the industry itself. The existing U.S. nuclear power industry just can’t be trusted.
MikeBoyScout spews:
John McCain told me that the illegal brown immigrants murdered Clarence Clemons because they hate us for our freedom.
Michael spews:
@6
Something happened with John McCain. He used to be a fairly sensible guy, not someone that I agreed with very often, but someone that I could disagree with in good faith. Now he’s, as you pointed out, kinda nuts. I wonder if he had a stroke or something?
TT spews:
@7 – I think it is easy to be a maverick when your seat isn’t in any jeopardy. The Tea Party has changed that in AZ. McCain now has to cater to a constituency (not that that’s unusual for a politician) if he wants to stay in the Senate. It turns out that he is a normal politician – keeping his seat is more important to him than being true to his beliefs.
Puddybud, identifying northwest liberals who elected an underexperienced man to the presidency weighed down by an oversized ego spews:
Carl,
Thanks for the Nina story. It’s really sad!
Deathfrogg spews:
@7
John McCain is an example of what you get with a long term alcohol abuse problem. Everyone points fingers at the Kennedys, but they have nothing On Boehner or McCain. Both are long term chronic alcoholics who have a lot of experience in manipulation and deceit. Alcohol cause real, physical damage to the central nervous system and that damage is permanent and cumulative. Their thinking abilities have long since been destroyed.
uptown spews:
Feds: $600M-plus of NY payroll project was tainted
Privatization of government in action again.
YLB spews:
3-5 – The whole situation with energy has pushed me further to the left. We have one very successful model for nuclear energy in this country – the nuclear navy. In the world we have another model – the French nuclear program.
Another commenter here, Zotz, has served in the nuclear navy and is concerned with the private sector capture of nuclear energy in this country. You both are right – it is not to be trusted and that’s why I think it’s too important to be left to private sector graft.
Abundant cheap safe and environmentally friendly energy is crucial to human progress and should be one of the top five or so priorities of all governments – along with health, education, housing, food safety and security.
Private sector graft has led to environmental degradation and high cost “solutions” which pad the pockets of the well connected. Energy should be a public good and taken out of the hands of greedheads.
That being said – here’s one private sector outfit in startup mode that’s on the right track:
http://flibe-energy.com/
Let’s make sure they stay on the straight and narrow.
Roger Rabbit spews:
@12 Msybe we should just park our subs at the dock and plug ’em into the grid?
[*raucous bunny laughter*]
Roger Rabbit spews:
Bachmann Backs Off Veterans Disability Cuts
Michelle Bachmann has been forced to take a proposal to cut veterans’ health and disability benefits off her campaign website after veterans’ groups complained.
http://www.mademark.net/2011/0.....t-off.html
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/201.....rans-cuts/
http://www.amvets.org/pressroo.....s_off.html
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Well that’s “supporting the troops” GOP-style. We’ve seen this tape played before — when Bush tried to eliminate combat pay for soldiers engaged in hot wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
To a Republican, “supporting the troops” means giving our troops an opportunity to practice their combat skills in “real time” by starting a war somewhere. It doesn’t mean paying them! If Republicans could fight their wars with unpaid slave labor (known as conscription) they would. Because they can’t the next best thing is cutting veterans’ benefits.
Bachmann apparently thought she could slip this past voters. But the organizations that protect veterans’ interests saw right through her bullshit.
Roger Rabbit spews:
@12 The most important thing to know about energy right now is that new technology has unlocked vast reserves of cheap domestic natural gas. These technologies aren’t without environmental impacts but those impacts are more manageable than, say, strip-mining Canada’s tar sands or reactor meltdowns a la Chernobyl and Fukushima.
rhp6033 spews:
I’m not sure where Boeing is going with this, but I’ve got an unsettling feeling it’s not going to work out well. From today’s Boeing press release:
“LE BOURGET, France, June 20, 2011 /PRNewswire/ —
I know airplane manufacturing companies have to outsource some of their work internationally if they want orders from foreign countries. China has been one of Boeing’s major buyers during the past couple of decades, and when U.S. carriers quit buying airplanes altogether for the better part of the last decade (except Southwest’s purchase of lots of 737 narrow-bodies), Chinese airlines filed the flight lines at Boeing Field in Seattle and Paine Field in Everett. It makes sense for Boeing to give China a piece of the work in what everyone understands is an exchange for future orders.
But this seems to go far beyond that. Perhaps it’s the “innovation” in the title, but it seems to me that Boeing is taking the final step towards grooming China to be it’s competitor.
You see, in China the company names may vary, but the interchange of people and technology isn’t restricted to divisions between the companies. And China aerospace manufacturers are currently developing both a narrow-body and wide-body airplane, both of which should be in service within a few years – perhaps by 2015.
At that point, you will probably see orders dry up for future aircraft from Boeing and Airbus, as the Chinese government – which ultimately holds the keys to financing and governmental approvement of all aircraft purchases – leans on Chinese airlines to order from a Chinese domestic manufacturer.
You have to ask – how much China’s entry into the commercial airplane market going to be hastened along by Boeing’s tutoring?
Americafirst spews:
@16. rhp6033 spews:
I’m not sure where Boeing is going with this, but I’ve got an unsettling feeling it’s not going to work out well.
————————————————-
They are going to China with it, as the article points out. Be sure to thank Obama and his nitwit NLRB for this. When you wreck industry here it goes overseas.
YLB spews:
Actually that’s not too much of a far-fetched idea. Some nuke advocates have proposed the same thing. When I first read that at certain pro-nuke blogs, I thought it was kind of absurd but sub nukes have been operated safely for decades.
rhp6033 spews:
# 17: It’s been going overseas for quite some time, mostly during George W. Bush’s presidency. It was during the LAST decade that China built it’s aerospace industry, starting with repair stations, then overhaul and maintenance facilities, then major conversion programs, and finally (now) full commercial aircraft.
Obviously, you don’t know anything about the aviation industry. And even less about the NLRA and the NLRB.
But if you were a supporter of our previous President, I guess it makes since for you to believe in ignoring clear U.S. law, and interfering with federal legal prosecutions for partison political purposes.
rhp6033 spews:
“since” should be “sense” in # 19, above.
YLB spews:
I disagree – the fracking is causing problems all over the place. It’s just being done in primarily rural places so the noise level right now is relatively low. In Pennsylvania, the potential exists to pollute large watersheds that people downstream depend on for drinking water. Just recently a spill of fracking fluids polluted some river.
The reactor meltdowns are due to the industry running old plants longer than their designers intended. They should have been replaced with better/safer designs by now.
YLB spews:
On the fracking front here’s a interesting bit of news:
http://www.scientificamerican......wastewater
RADIOACTIVE WASTEWATER! If the wastewater gets hot what about the gas?
Reaction of elements like Uranium and Thorium keep the the core of the earth hot. That’s something to keep in mind as the fracking craze and the heat mining craze ramps up.
In my opinion – if we’re to deal with radioactive stuff – it should be in safe controlled conditions like the reactors run by the U.S. nuclear navy and the civilian reactors operated by the French.
YLB spews:
And the tar sands – that’s ugly stuff, that should be shut down.
YLB spews:
Coal-burning – that releases more radioactive stuff into the environment this side of Fukushima.
Here’s something on coal ash:
http://www.scientificamerican......lear-waste
Deathfrogg spews:
I know this thread is probably dead but I had to share this.
YLB spews:
25 – I didn’t look at that too closely but was that local? Mt Vernon? When I thought I heard that I started looking for Pudge and his silly musical act.
What a turnout!
Roger Rabbit spews:
@26 I’m pretty sure that guy came from the other Mount Vernon. You know, this one:
http://www.google.com/imgres?i.....CCcQ9QEwBA
Roger Rabbit spews:
Shit, that link must be from a pirated website! Maybe I shoulda run it thru Tiny URL.
Roger Rabbit spews:
Speaking of Mount Vernon, Washington, whatever happened to the idiot mayor who took it upon himself to give the “keys to the city” to Glenn Beck? The local boy, um, made good?
It appears he’s still mayor of that illustrious Pacific Northwest metropolis — through the end of this year. His current term ends Deember 31, 2011.
http://www.ci.mount-vernon.wa......onid_E_460
LD spews:
Why the Jobs Situation Is Worse Than It Looks
We now have more idle men and women than at any time since the Great Depression
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/.....n-it-looks
Could not be a better statistic to be running for re-election on
YLB spews:
This is pretty big:
The world’s chief bond vigilante calls bullshit on the deficit/debt-limit madness:
Gross recommends a swift, deficit-financed investment in infrastructure. “[G]overnment must take a leading role in job creation,” Gross said. “Conservative or even liberal agendas that cede responsibility for job creation to the private sector over the next few years are simply dazed or perhaps crazed…. In the near term, then, we should not rely solely on job or corporate-directed payroll tax credits because corporations may not take enough of that bait, and they’re sitting pretty as it is. Government must step up to the plate, as it should have in early 2009. An infrastructure bank to fund badly needed reconstruction projects is a commonly accepted idea, despite the limitations of the original “shovel-ready” stimulus program in 2009.”
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.....?ref=fpblg
Let’s call this one a cure for the common ld(iot) out there.
YLB spews:
This one is funny. More Bill Gross:
Same tpm link above.
Rujax! spews:
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.....?ref=fpblg
Here’s that DAMN LIB-RUL that the puddybitch loves so much…
YLB spews:
Damn it. Newt Gingrich has to be the biggest dumbass in the Republican Party:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/.....614D71.DTL
Or is it TPAW/Gov Bridgefail? Hard to call that one.
Zotz sez: Teahadists are Koch suckers! spews:
@DF: That was awesome! Did you check out the right hand side? Lots more stuff.
Rujax! spews:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/.....via=blog_1
Best Justice money can buy.
Rujax! spews:
@30…
Damn you YLB…ya beat me to it!
LOLOL
rhp6033 spews:
YLB @ 32: A little over 15 years ago I worked in a major oil company, the department was involved in environmental remediation of oil-contaminated properties. During that time, I got to talk quite a bit with a lot of geologists.
One of the things they kept mentioning was the need to be extremely careful when drilling test wells to measure the extent of hydrocarbon contamination in the soil and groundwater. If you drill too deep, in the wrong place, you can punch a whole through a layer of rock and in essence, make a drain through which the contaminated groundwater can enter an acquafer, spreading the contamination considerably, with a much wider impact.
Now, the whole purpose of “fracking” is to break up the rock which is trapping the natural gas below ground. But all this fracking is also going to open up all sorts of cracks in the sub-strata, resulting in unkown consequences to the water supply burried deeply underneath. I’m not sure how much of that issue has been studied very well.
Puddybud, identifying northwest liberals who elected an underexperienced man to the presidency weighed down by an oversized ego spews:
Keep that thought yelling loser beta boi since the US government said otherwise about the I-35 bridge and it’s on leftist WikiPedia. No wonder only rujax listens to you. Two funny peas in the same pod.
Rujax! spews:
Gov. Bridgefail!
Niiiiiiiice…not the ONLY reason tpaw won’t cut it, but nice.
So does the puddybitch think Mormons are REALLY REALLY REAL christians?
Most of his fellow cultists don’t think so.
I’ll bet the puddybitch doesn’t either.
Too bad the only two candidates that AREN’T bat-shit crazy are LDS.
Rujax! spews:
Nahhhh the puddybitch didn’t see where Gov. Bridgefail TWICE vetoed highway funds that would have fixed the bridge. Nope, the dope just missed it.
Fucking teabagger just won’t spend the money to protect his citizens. Let’s have a pool on which hero will spring it first.
I say Bachmann in Iowa but I’ll add Cain for the daily double.
Rujax! spews:
http://thinkprogress.org/econo.....aid-taxes/
Everybody get this????
This is dead fucking wrong.
Puddybud, identifying northwest liberals who elected an underexperienced man to the presidency weighed down by an oversized ego spews:
Of course misogynist rujax dipshithead missed the final NTSB report
Now why did rujax miss this… because like yelling loser beta they are both idiots. Butt back to WikiPedia…
You see when you are born an idiot and you never aspire to anything higher than moronic monotonic, you accept leftist pinhead web sites as gospel truth.
So misogynist conservative lady hating rujax, please stay stupid.
Puddybud, identifying northwest liberals who elected an underexperienced man to the presidency weighed down by an oversized ego spews:
Gotta love that GE story from rujax. Laid off almost 30,000 in the US while creating more than 30,000 jobs in India alone.
GE lover of the Obummer and the misogynist conservative lady hating rujax pulled a Rip Van Winkle during this time. Otherwise why would he post an article that featured Obummer loving Immelt front and center. May stinky progressives ASSumed none of it’s DUMMOCRAPTIC stupid readers would check into GE’s politics.
ABC news reported GE has more peeps working overseas that it does in America now. GE stock has fallen 60% under Immelt.
Thanks for the laugh misogynist conservative lady hating rujax!
Puddybud, identifying northwest liberals who elected an underexperienced man to the presidency weighed down by an oversized ego spews:
Gotta love that GE story from rujax. Laid off almost 30,000 in the US while creating more than 30,000 jobs in India alone.
GE lover of the Obummer and the misogynist conservative lady hating rujax pulled a Rip Van Winkle during this time. Otherwise why would he post an article that featured Obummer loving Immelt front and center. Maybe stinky progressives ASSumed none of it’s DUMMOCRAPTIC stupid readers would check into GE’s politics.
ABC news reported GE has more peeps working overseas that it does in America now. GE stock has fallen 60% under Immelt.
Thanks for the laugh misogynist conservative lady hating rujax!
Puddybud, identifying northwest liberals who elected an underexperienced man to the presidency weighed down by an oversized ego spews:
Hmmm a double post from overseas.
Last point about GE.
From the official postings… from 2005 until now GE has made $24 BILLION in US profits alone and also received over $4 Billion in US Tax credits. In 2010 it received 14 grants wirth $24 Million + while laying off 18,000 peeps. Way to go libtardo GE!