Friday, July 1, 2011
What would Barry Goldwater say?
If everybody in this town connected with politics had to leave town because of chasing women and drinking, you would have no government.
How Much Would It Cost To Buy Congress Back?
Charles Hugh Smith has an answer. For my part, I say you're only entering a bidding war.
The African ruckus - we like it
The ruckus over oligarchs, universities, and agribiz buying up great swaths of African land is a good noise, a welcome noise. Take a moment to meet the creeps involved.
A congresswoman with ethics "issues"
Laura Richardson represents a definite type, as you can see from the linked story.
A company once sent me to work temporarily in a firm they were planning on acquiring. I had to report back that the owner was using staff as her personal servants, that she could not distinguish between personal and company property, and that she had no concept of herself as being apart from our outside the business. My prediction was that we would find her company records a deal-killing mess. And so it was.
Democrats like Richardson cannot be fired or expelled, nor will they be chastised by peers. Let's hope they can at least be jailed.
A company once sent me to work temporarily in a firm they were planning on acquiring. I had to report back that the owner was using staff as her personal servants, that she could not distinguish between personal and company property, and that she had no concept of herself as being apart from our outside the business. My prediction was that we would find her company records a deal-killing mess. And so it was.
Democrats like Richardson cannot be fired or expelled, nor will they be chastised by peers. Let's hope they can at least be jailed.
Gruntware
The modern tennis pro provides his own vuvuzela in the form of obnoxious, loud grunting. You have to wonder how Stan Smith, Rod Laver, Arthur Ashe and the rest got along without bellowing as they hit every shot.Technology has come to the fan's rescue with an application that allows you to tune out the grunts. If world tennis won't police itself, we will need these little gadgets. The next one will have to be a set adjustment that converts the player's clothes to whites.
The promise of Bitcoin
Detlev Schlichter:
...the Bitcoin promise – if, in fact, it can be kept – that an international financial system is feasible that allows parties to interact freely and voluntarily without state oversight, intervention and the threat of confiscation through taxation and inflation, is indeed significant.
Photo of the day
Good one. You might also say, Biofules, enriching corporate agro-business one fill-up at a time. We could mention tax subsidized enrishment but it wouldn't fit on a bumper sticker. Neither would the picture of Bob Dole.
The thing diminished and the thing exponential
Slavoj Žižek: "Increasingly in all areas we have the thing without having its nature. We have beer without alcohol, meat without fat, coffee without caffeine."*
But this is half the story. We also have the exponential version of the thing. We have fortified (high alcohol) beer, meat with "extra marbling," and "shock coffee."
We will always have with us the epicureans and stoics, Puritans and Roundheads.
--
* „In allen Bereichen haben wir zunehmend das Ding ohne sein Wesen. Wir haben Bier ohne Alkohol, Fleisch ohne Fett, Kaffee ohne Koffein.“
But this is half the story. We also have the exponential version of the thing. We have fortified (high alcohol) beer, meat with "extra marbling," and "shock coffee."
We will always have with us the epicureans and stoics, Puritans and Roundheads.
--
* „In allen Bereichen haben wir zunehmend das Ding ohne sein Wesen. Wir haben Bier ohne Alkohol, Fleisch ohne Fett, Kaffee ohne Koffein.“
Thursday, June 30, 2011
The Galliano affair: dog bites man
The people commenting on Dior designer John Galliano's Hitler love universally fail to notice that the WWII SS uniforms were designed by Hugo Boss. You can't take the Nazi out of the designer, it seems.
Russian monarchists on the radio
A compelling "elevator story" - "The monarchy can combine different institutions for the best fulfilment of the state's obligations."
Mike Dukakis and Bill Weld
Howie Carr remembers the political corruption of Mike Dukakis and Bill Weld.
You cannot function as governor of the Bay State without deeply compromising yourself, assuming there is anything there to compromise.
BTW, anyone could tell Dukakis was dishonest based on how he handled Bill Rusher on The Advocates.
You cannot function as governor of the Bay State without deeply compromising yourself, assuming there is anything there to compromise.
BTW, anyone could tell Dukakis was dishonest based on how he handled Bill Rusher on The Advocates.
Cheyenne is the new Vaduz
"The secretive business havens of Cyprus and the Cayman Islands face a potent rival: Cheyenne, Wyoming."
Here are some liberals worried sick about LLCs.
Here are some liberals worried sick about LLCs.
"Conservatives" celebrate gay marriage
Unbelievable.
This was a case where the radio conservatives would have been fired en masse for speaking out and thus it put great weight on the shoulders of the print brigade. The print brigade, however, has been out to lunch for 30 years.
Let us resort to Pope Benedict XVI: this is "insidious and dangerous."
Meanwhile, the armed forces' rank and file are in agony over gay integration while their officers prepare more "diversity" classes. Heterosexual soldiers have no one to defend them. Soon, they'll serve with "married couples."
Do Roman Catholics work for Bill Buckley's paper anymore?
This was a case where the radio conservatives would have been fired en masse for speaking out and thus it put great weight on the shoulders of the print brigade. The print brigade, however, has been out to lunch for 30 years.
Let us resort to Pope Benedict XVI: this is "insidious and dangerous."
Meanwhile, the armed forces' rank and file are in agony over gay integration while their officers prepare more "diversity" classes. Heterosexual soldiers have no one to defend them. Soon, they'll serve with "married couples."
Do Roman Catholics work for Bill Buckley's paper anymore?
The demise of the symphony orchestra
More orchestras are slated for Chapter 11. The slippery slope, I think, has been the decades-long recalibrating for a mid-market patronage. These people do not have the financial strength to make up the loss of major patrons and they also lower the quality of the music and repertoire (tune into any classical music station these days; this is, in the apt criticism of Frank Zappa, mere "Top 40" music).
In other words, symphonic orchestras entered a death spiral with the end of civic capitalism, the geographic scattering of the wealthy, and the rise of the middlebrow. That's not in the linked story, but that's what I've been observing.
Producers must understand that the New York Times reader, the PBS watcher, the NPR listener, these are cultural straphangers, not major patrons, and they cannot carry the weight of a city's culture in their personal tastes or finances.
The disbanding of opera companies is not mentioned here, but the loss of the Baltimore Opera crimped me rather hard. The other nearby opera companies are either middlebrow or painfully intermittent.
Racial neutrality violates the 1964 Civil Rights Act
But of course it would. Somewhere out there Hubert Humphrey is eating his hat (as promised) and Barry Goldwater is looking on.
"Chug for growth"
Your not just helping yourself to a drink, you're helping society:
...mounting evidence suggests that beer in particular, and the beer industry that surrounds it, may be as good for growth as excess sobriety. In some of the world's toughest investment climates, beer companies today are building factories, creating jobs, and providing vital public services, all in the pursuit of new customers for a pint.Hoist one "for the children."
Make him a general!
If ever you should find a recruiter who not only meets his quota but has recruits pay him to join the Army, know you have someone very special - someone with a great future. Don't send him to jail:
Yupeng Deng, 51, of El Monte recruited about 200 other Chinese immigrants from southern California, the San Francisco Bay area and Atlanta to join his bogus Army reserve unit, telling them it could improve their chances of obtaining U.S. citizenship, prosecutors said.This is genius.
The recruits were charged $300 to $450 to enlist and up to $120 a year to renew memberships in what Deng called the U.S. Army/Military Special Forces Reserve unit.
Recruits could increase their rank in the “MSFR” by making cash donations to the defendant, prosecutors said.
New Army sumptuary laws (cont.)
There shall be no wearing of ... shoes that feature “five separate, individual compartments for the toes” ... Such shoes “detract from a professional military image” ...Feel free, however, to visit Congress, VIPs, and five star restaurants in your baggy, dusty fatigues.
The curse of the Afghanistan War Timetable
From Spiked:
... everything was running according to the Afghanistan War Timetable, that strangely unreal schedule for this hitherto intractable conflict dreamt up in the White House just under two years ago.Meanwhile, we learn that the "option" Obama "picked" was never "on the table." In other words, he made a decision outside of the options.
[...]
...when the war being fought has so little to do with any strategic or material interest in the country in which it is being conducted, it is hardly a great surprise that domestic concerns rule the day. And so it is with the war in Afghanistan, a war so arbitrary in its objectives that its length and intensity can be governed by a timetable drawn up in a backroom in the White House.
Church of England opts for Heliolatry
Maybe this is overstated, but I like it:
If you thought heliolatry (worship of the Sun) had burnt out, except maybe at Stonehenge once a year and at various other gatherings of backward, madcap Druids, think again. The Christian Church itself is now converting en masse to heliolatry, ditching its faith in Christ and the Cross in favour of bowing and scraping before the almighty Sun and its precious rays.
"What we can learn from Estonia"
We can learn to implement flat taxes, low/no tariffs, e-government, rule of law, relatively modest borrowing. The main thing we can learn is that political shock treatment is needed when saddled with a corrupt oligarchy.
"...government is the primary cause of systemic risk"
Actually, not all government, more the out-of-control bank-run oligarchies.
People get happy listening to the radio
This is a bizarre finding:
...in the study called ‘Media and the Mood of the Nation’, ... respondents record[ed] a 100 per cent lift in happiness and 300 per cent boost to their energy levels when listening to a radio show versus not consuming any type of media at all.Are they listening to oldies? Sports? (BTW, this was commissioned by the broadcast industry.)
Is property defined by potential advantage?
In other words, is property a function of potential commercial value?
Someone has internalized Kelo, I think.
Someone has internalized Kelo, I think.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Bovard opposes extrajudicial killings
Good. But he makes the mistake of responding to Internet trolls: "... boundless groveling to the Commander-in-Chief is the new trademark of a good American."
p.s. To see Bovard on Counterpunch and Cockburn on Chronicles is the purest rush of Left-Right convergence you might ask for.
p.s. To see Bovard on Counterpunch and Cockburn on Chronicles is the purest rush of Left-Right convergence you might ask for.
IMF studies US financial lobbying
Interesting: "The more intense the lobbying, the more likely legislators were to vote for deregulation." Hard work pays off. "If a lobbyist had worked for a legislator in the past, the legislator was very likely to vote in favor of lax regulation." Friends help friends. "Spending an extra dollar on lobbying was less effective if the lobbyist was already connected to the lawmaker." See above.
If journalists fail at their job, does the IMF have to step in here too?
If journalists fail at their job, does the IMF have to step in here too?
"Greece is a kleptocracy"
Kleptocracy, yes. But Greece is also starring in a caper movie wherein, as if this were Topkapi, they are snatching the goodies from Eurocrats and Eurobanksters. Mr. Smith has the plotline.
The glacial pace of a wartime Pentagon
Yonathan Melaku was formally separated from the USMC today with his own cooperation. Without his cooperation, it could never have happened so "quickly." Ten days ago, he was arrested for inflicting a major scare on the Pentagon. Let's see: bombing materials, sniping at the Pentagon building, "acting suspiciously before dawn in the national cemetery," four counts of grand larceny, firearm violations, and more. The Marines say Melaku's attack on the Pentagon and any bombing of Arlington or the Iwo Jima memorial "had no bearing on the Marine Corps' initial determination to pursue the administrative separation process."
War is hell, isn't it? Especially when waged by a peacetime military.
One day in the early 1970s our company clerk arrived at work in a new car pulling a new trailer which contained within a new color TV. We gave him two hours to return the credit purchases or face court martial.
The same year, a soldier in our unit came back from a beach vacation with sunburn so painful that his duty had to be limited after a doctor's visit. We gave him the choice of non-judicial punishment or a court martial.
Another soldier returned from leave with a tattoo. He was simply thrown out of the Army. It might have taken two weeks at most.
It was a less forgiving time, I guess.
Now what will you bet that Melaku was given an honorable discharge?
War is hell, isn't it? Especially when waged by a peacetime military.
One day in the early 1970s our company clerk arrived at work in a new car pulling a new trailer which contained within a new color TV. We gave him two hours to return the credit purchases or face court martial.
The same year, a soldier in our unit came back from a beach vacation with sunburn so painful that his duty had to be limited after a doctor's visit. We gave him the choice of non-judicial punishment or a court martial.
Another soldier returned from leave with a tattoo. He was simply thrown out of the Army. It might have taken two weeks at most.
It was a less forgiving time, I guess.
Now what will you bet that Melaku was given an honorable discharge?
The new IMF managing director
"The post of managing director is not to be taken lightly in an institution that operates like a well-disciplined army, with staff looking up to the unquestioned general for decisive leadership." And here we thought it was another out-of-control bureaucracy.
"A celebration of the discredited seatbelt law"
John Adams is not amused. "I have been challenging the PACTS view of seat belt history since before it was history."
Wall Street dissimulates
The coolness Wall Street shows for Obama is a matter of "optics." To support him publicly "would be bad for business," this article says. So, banksters support him privately.
And accoutrements.
Local government debt in China: $1.65 trillion
Greece is small potatoes:
Local governments had an overall debt of 10.7 trillion yuan ($1.65 trillion) by the end of 2010, said China's top auditor on Monday in a report to the National People's Congress. He warned that some were at risk of defaulting on payments.Hat tip to Mish.
Taleb: "Had Reagan not bailed out Citibank in 1983..."
"... we would not be here" Exactly.
Does no one remember the odious John Reed and his insufferable mentor, Walter Wriston? In the 1970s, Wriston (and Reed) did a huge sell job in the USA to create a market for their Argentine and other Latin American sovereign debt. At the height of this Citibank push, the ever willing Fortune magazine ran an admiring cover showing bankers lined up at a South American customs stations displaying (for inspection) open suitcases of cash. The story inside gushed over Wriston's genius and quoted him to the effect "Nations don't go broke."
In this interview, Taleb tries to explain to his leftist interviewer that big government is not the answer to big corporations. Personal liability is the answer. In other words, a reunion of ownership and management.
Until the Right understands that public corporations are gaming lawmakers to rig the markets and until the Left understands that representative government is for sale everywhere and at all times, the voter in this country faces the alternatives of a tyranny of property or a tyranny of statism.
College athletics - you have it backwards
Look at you. Your whole life, you've been walking around justifying college athletics as an income stream for the alma mater.
From Critical Mass:
Last year Rutgers used nearly $27 million in university and student-fee money to balance its athletics budget. It was not unusual: since 2006, Rutgers has spent more than $115 million to cover athletics spending...Consider also that Rutgers is a state university.
From Critical Mass:
This is the school that just paid Toni Morrison $30,000 to give a graduation speech. It’s also the school that paid Jersey Shore’s Snooki $32,000 to speak. Fittingly, Snooki’s advice, delivered to two standing-room-only crowds, exemplifies Rutgers’ budgetary priorities: “Study hard, but party harder.”Notice that "Snooki" out-earns "Toni" in the state-funded speaker sweepstakes here.
SC takes Republican Party off welfare rolls
Governor Nikki Haley has "deleted funds from the state budget that were intended to help pay for administration of the Republican Party primary." The Party will have to pay for its own primaries, as onerous as that may be.
What is this world coming to?
It's a damn shame when a young oligarch has to roll up his pants and wade into the sty; can't he hire some puppets to take care of political business for him? Chris Dodd is available; so is Tom Daschle, Bill Clinton, and Tony Blair (highly available, in fact). Their Russian is not so good but they are flexible men of pragmatic outlook who could find a way forward.
Russia's never going to become a real republic without stooges and front men, is it? Somebody tell Prokhorov.
Russia's never going to become a real republic without stooges and front men, is it? Somebody tell Prokhorov.
Deinstitutionalization continues
The deinstitutionalization of mental patients in the 1970s was predicated on community care for patients. Almost immediately, such care was defunded, seeding the national homeless crisis.
Occasionally, states fund new community care programs and eventually, these too are cut. Likewise, funding for reinstitutionalization is also cut. This story from California compresses the whole cycle into a cameo.
Note the newish element of consultant funding. In certain corrupt states (that might be all 50), consultant funding is a political plum dispensed under patronage. The procurement formalities are observed but the outcomes are hilarious. At one point (and perhaps even today) all nursing homes in New Jersey were or are owned by companies run by prominent Democratic politicians.
Mental health remains another source of political patronage.
Occasionally, states fund new community care programs and eventually, these too are cut. Likewise, funding for reinstitutionalization is also cut. This story from California compresses the whole cycle into a cameo.
Note the newish element of consultant funding. In certain corrupt states (that might be all 50), consultant funding is a political plum dispensed under patronage. The procurement formalities are observed but the outcomes are hilarious. At one point (and perhaps even today) all nursing homes in New Jersey were or are owned by companies run by prominent Democratic politicians.
Mental health remains another source of political patronage.
New York City has gone too far
Just found out that in 2006 NYC banned foie gras and the circus. Any competing private sector circus, that is.
Shovel ready job: making new cribs
USG orders $32 million worth of cribs off the market.
Why not just order us to destroy all property and start over?
Why not just order us to destroy all property and start over?
Jesse says the silver cartel breaks first
Myself, I am suspicious of technical analysis, no matter how good the charts.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Obama's "nuclear weapons renaissance"
The anti-nuke group, Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety, has been pushing the meme that Obama is leading a "nuclear weapons renaissance" against Republican opposition. They explained their position on the Democracy Now! broadcast this morning, only a taste of which made it into this write-up.
In their view, which I am simplifying, Obama is refreshing nuclear stockpiles, developing new types of nuclear weapons at a lively tempo, and expanding bomb-making and research facilities while Republicans are calling for delays, studies, and postponements.
A meme worth watching indeed.
In their view, which I am simplifying, Obama is refreshing nuclear stockpiles, developing new types of nuclear weapons at a lively tempo, and expanding bomb-making and research facilities while Republicans are calling for delays, studies, and postponements.
A meme worth watching indeed.
Lawson on "green jobs"
This certainly applies to Obama:
[Dominic] Lawson dismisses as economic illiteracy claims of a green jobs boom powered by renewables that will mop up unemployment from the structural adjustment to a low-carbon economy, recruiting one of the great classical liberals to back his case.He makes an additional point that no green jobs promoter seems to understand:
"The French 19th-century economist Frederic Bastiat said you might as well go round breaking windows saying you're creating jobs for glaziers. The fact is you can't look at just one sector. The government can create jobs by employing large numbers of people to build statues of prominent politicians. You can always create jobs in a particular area.
"What you've got to be concerned about are jobs in the economy as a whole and you don't create jobs in the economy as a whole by promoting something [that] is wholly uneconomic and has to be subsidised."
A lot of these green jobs will be in China. The Chinese can see there is a market in the West for solar panels and other things so they are producing them very much more cheaply. In so far as there are jobs they will be there, not in the consuming countries.
Moody: Japan could face third lost decade
The country famous for losing its decades appears to be on a roll.
Remembering John V. Lindsay as an unhealthy indulgence
Mayor John Lindsay combined striking ineffectiveness with narcissistic flamboyance. When he ran for president, the farther away from his own NYC he got, the more votes he collected. Now, Florence Henderson recites an ugly kiss-and-tell. Florence: FYI, it wasn't just you: this philanderer loused up the entire body politic. (Photo via NYT: JVL is talking to an aide named Leon Panetta).
Art prize awarded on coin toss
The authority seekers are scandalized, but this art judge (himself an artists) awarded a prize based on a coin toss. "Most artists know what these prizes are about ... They’ve got very little to do with art and much more to do with the institution."
The lucky "winner" said, "“Every person who judges an art show brings their own agenda to it, same as a cattle show.”
The lucky "winner" said, "“Every person who judges an art show brings their own agenda to it, same as a cattle show.”
More Bush than Bush
Will Inboden explains Obama/Bush or Bush/Obama:
The president of the United States makes almost unprecedented assertions of executive authority and launches a controversial war of choice in the Middle East, targeting for regime change a dictator accused of committing atrocities against his own citizens, producing weapons of mass destruction, and sponsoring international terrorism. Amid the White House's promises of a quick victory, a compliant Congress initially goes along with the war, but months later disgruntlement sets in and Capitol Hill begins to raise concerns.(I thought MQ gave up on WMDs, BTW.)
Tony Blair is available
Tony Blair is available. Highly available. Very available indeed. Might you have a childern's party or something coming up?
Crony capitalism - a how to
Rocky Vega shows that the Chicoms know how oligarchy works. It's a short read and droll.
Goldman is offshoring itself
When news parodies itself:
Goldman Sachs Is Firing Employees In The US So It Can Hire 1,000 In SingaporeRemember when we were going to offshore all the low value added work so that we could do the high value work (like finance!) here in the US?
Bay State or Land of Lincoln - which is more corrupt?
Three out of three of the last speakers of the Massachusetts house have gone to prison. Does that trump four out of eight of the last Illinois governors? You don't want to overstate Illinois claims to corruption fame with contenders as strong as the Bay State in play.
If the jailed were not targets of federal investigations, they would still be lording it over their minions, I think.
If the jailed were not targets of federal investigations, they would still be lording it over their minions, I think.
The law school bubble
Bloggers have been taking it to the law schools ("swindlers," "toilets") for a couple of years now. If you've missed out on this genre, check out the blog roll on the right of this posting.
The disgruntled feel that law school is a trade school that profits from (federalized, borrowed) tuition dollars while turning out tradesman to an overfull market.
The disgruntled feel that law school is a trade school that profits from (federalized, borrowed) tuition dollars while turning out tradesman to an overfull market.
Obama raffle - guess the prize?
Micro donors to the Obama campaign will be entered into a raffle to have dinner with their idol.
I've worked for President Obama for almost five years -- but I've never actually sat down for dinner with him. That's why I'm excited about (and maybe a little jealous of) the opportunity you have to join the President for dinner. He's going to sit down and swap stories over a meal with four supporters, and you could be one of them.As he eats, they will get to wipe his feet with their tears and hair, if I understand this prize correctly.
Stay out of hospitals
Jim Goad: Our Scary, Filthy, Killer Hospitals. Quite the roundup and if you haven't met the deadly MRSA bacteria, here's your chance.
Canadian monarchists make their move
They cry out Give us a king of our own. This seems a defensive move against Canada's growing republicanism.
The The Monarchist League of Canada has quite the press office.
The The Monarchist League of Canada has quite the press office.
Two Americas: the shunned and the unshunned
"Edwards sits all by himself at the games." The isolation of a former political darling.
Soccer: PhD magnet?
NY Sun: "...almost every aspect of the game is ripe for cerebral theorizing and noodling."
The 1099 rules were not repealed for foreigners
Cato says: The bad news is that an international version of Obamacare’s 1099 scheme also was enacted early last year. But since the burden is largely falling on foreigners, there’s no groundswell among voters to repeal the law — even though it will impose far more damage on the American economy.
Van Creveld on air power
Here's a rather shallow new interview with military thinker Martin van Creveld on air power. The interrogator is not up-to-date on air power theory and does not ask van Creveld to react to any of the new theoretical propositions.
Nevertheless, there's enough generalized air power skepticism here to be worth the investment of a short read.
Nevertheless, there's enough generalized air power skepticism here to be worth the investment of a short read.
Delinking education from prosperity and mobility
In the UK, "Students actually seems to think this putative by-product of higher education, increased social mobility, is in fact its purpose..." Over here, they think its about increasing earning power. Both ideas are dubious.
"We think about universities purely in economic ways and I think that is a great pity." There was a time when colleges were for people who didn't need careers.
Check this out as well.
This one, too.
"We think about universities purely in economic ways and I think that is a great pity." There was a time when colleges were for people who didn't need careers.
Check this out as well.
This one, too.
Monday, June 27, 2011
Catholics that are anti-Catholic
Gagdad Bob ponders the riddle of Catholic organizations that are not even a little bit Catholic.
Secular fundamentalists are a huge nuisance and they get into everything.
Secular fundamentalists are a huge nuisance and they get into everything.
Owners and managers
The long-standing American tragedy of the separation of ownership from management has struck Chile rather spectacularly.
War dead go out the back gate
... sorry, the "side gate". And then down obscure country roads and bypasses to their resting places. Peter Hitchens noticed.
No sense wasting political capital on war dead honors.
No sense wasting political capital on war dead honors.
Leonardo's Salvator Mundi
A newly certified-as-authentic da Vinci painting goes on sale for $200 million.
That's quite an incentive for art fraud, isn't it?
That's quite an incentive for art fraud, isn't it?
The scientist as socialist saint
Does deference to scientists unfit a people for self-government? A British article has me thinking:
"...a recent survey of public attitudes towards science in the UK suggests support remains healthy. More than eight out of 10 people agree that scientists want to make life better for the average person and nearly nine in 10 people think scientists make valuable contributions to society."What in your life experience would lead you to such a conclusion? Would you trust people this gullible with a voice in government?
The New York Review of Books: down on Obama
A reconsideration worth considering:
Obama has always preferred the symbolic authority of the grand utterance to the actual authority of a directed policy.This too is interesting: "Obama’s first twenty-three months in office saw seventy days on foreign trips and fifty-eight days on vacation trips."
[...]
For Obama, protracted moods of extreme abstraction seem to alternate with spasmodic engagement.
[...]
Obama tends to speak as if he were the United States addressing the world; and he treats the United States as the most grown-up country in the world.
[...]
Barack Obama from the start of his presidency has exhibited an almost exclusive taste for the dignified part of government.
[...]
The new state of social science
From Body & Society (Sage Journals) by Lucy Pickering, School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Glasgow: "Toilets, Bodies, Selves: Enacting Composting as Counterculture in Hawai’i" -
Defecation has received limited attention within the social sciences and humanities. Toilets not a great deal. Urination even less.
[...]
Through looking at the everyday defecatory practices of hippies and drop-outs in Hawai’i, this article seeks to examine the interplay of the acts of defecation and urination with the materiality of toilets themselves. Each depends on the other, and both exist in relation to various others: other toilet designs, other communities, other people.
A mousetrap for hipsters
The aging hipster renews his credentials through purchases. Flying off the shelves is the delightful children's story, "Go the F*** to Sleep." It has sold more than Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Details here.
If you are suffering the tax of profanity, you may as well look at this, too.
Hipsters - a major sales demographic.
If you are suffering the tax of profanity, you may as well look at this, too.
Hipsters - a major sales demographic.
Soros: "We are on the verge of an economic collapse"
What Soros means to say is "We are on the verge of an economic collapse due to policies and politicians I have supported in the past." At least he's halfway there.
What would Winston Churchill say?
Although personally I am quite content with existing explosives, I feel we must not stand in the path of improvement.
Ex-dean of Yale Law School : busted
Nice collar of Harold Hongju Koh, mortal enemy of all that was Bushian, dear defender of all of Obama's Bushisms.
If I recall correctly, some wanted to bring up on charges those who rendered legal opinions to Bush re: Bush war policies. Can Koh be brought up on Obama-related war crimes charges?
The Obama administration has failed to close the military courts at Guantánamo, where it has tried and convicted a child soldier of newly invented ‘war crimes’; it has perpetuated indefinite detention and launched a legal assault on WikiLeaks. Perhaps most significantly, it has radically intensified drone attacks in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. (Throughout the campaign trail John McCain condemned the expansion of the Afghan War into Pakistan as reckless and foolhardy.) Koh has dutifully produced legal rationales for the drone strikes, supplying the necessary law component to a national security ‘strategy’ of open-ended global counter-insurgency. None of this has provoked much criticism beyond the marginal antiwar left and libertarian right, and Koh’s justifications have been largely ignored by pundits once outraged by similar Bush-Cheney edicts.Once his man was elected, Koh missed an opportunity (in the words of Jacques Chirac) to keep quiet.
Assembled in America
We are proud to assemble Chinese bridges and other infrastructure components here in the land of the shovel-ready.
You see, we allow the export of low-skill work like designing and building bridges, and keep the high-skill work of assembling ready-made components.
We are all about value added.
You see, we allow the export of low-skill work like designing and building bridges, and keep the high-skill work of assembling ready-made components.
We are all about value added.
Socialist morality
Hanson: Do socialists lack personal conviction? Meanwhile, Private Eye already weighed in with the captioned photo of Labor Pary boss Miliband.
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