Nobody Asked Me, But...

1) As conservative asswipes start beating the drum to retaliate against Russia for the downing of flight 17 over Ukraine – as seems to be the case – arming rebels and whatnot, I want to merely point out that no one ever declared war on the US for our own part in any number of insurgencies. Except some of the insurgents. The only nation who has much right to declare vendetta here seems to be the Netherlands, and today, we are all Dutch. (p.s. note how the Moscow Times covers a military action committed by their own factions.)

2) The whole world is a ball of confusion.

3) Madiba would have been 95 today.

4) Yea, there’s no global warming: Tropical diseases are hitting the US. Blowholes are popping up in Russia.

5) It’s been so easy to make fun of Florida, so we owe them a kudo for this.

6) Dude, you probably could have bought one at the gift shop

7) I could have answered this question in one sentence: It’s illegal, so who wouldn’t get paranoid, man?

8) Given the recent and tragic lionfish invasion of the Caribbean, this is a pretty important article.

9) Alzheimer’s? I see.

10) Finally, introducing “Cake in a Can”

I Don't Often Link to Pierce

I like to keep that as my private stash, but this, this was too good not to share:

It's not just that TBOTP [ed. note: Tiger Beat On The Potomac also known as Politico.com] invited the Manson Family of American geopolitics to come together for an exercise in ensemble prevarication. It's not just that the account of said exercise is written in the kind of cacophonous cutesy-poo necessary to drown out the screams of the innocent dead, and to distract the assembled crowd from the blood that has dripped from the wallet of the celebrity war-criminal leading the public display. And it's not as though this was a mere interview—a "get" that could help you "win the morning (!)." In that, it might have been marginally excusable. No, this was one of Mike Allen's little grift-o-rama special events—a "Playbook lunch," sponsored by that noted mortgage fraud concern Bank Of America. There's an upcoming TBOTP "event" in L.A. that is sponsored by J.P. Morgan. I know what Mike Allen is, but I am so goddamn tired of haggling about the price. Here's how TBOTP's own account of the event begins.

If I could write like that, I could put away my shitty little blog and become world-famous, and have women dripping off me like rainwater in a monsoon.

If You Had Told Me This Appeared on The Federalist Website....

…I would have laughed in your face. But it did:

Why abandon K-Street, and acknowledge, then reject, the Big Business perception of the GOP? They’ve had the Republican Party’s back for some time, right? In the past, the largest companies favored one party over the other because they understood a pro-capitalist, low-regulation government benefits them.

However, in recent years, especially since the 2007-2008 recession, many have turned to viewing government as a revenue source, a competition crusher, an error-eraser, and a partner in padding their bottom line. Their interest in cheap labor, bailouts, and selectively-favorable legislation has led to a flood of dollars into the Democrat Party, or into political action committees (PACs) that attempt to move Republican congressional votes away from their bases’ expectations, like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s push for amnesty. Meanwhile, a mix of bad deals and worse legislation left taxpayers and shareholders on the hook for trillions, millions lost their homes and jobs, and the senators and corporate heads responsible are laughing all the way to the bailed-out bank.

Christ, you’d almost have thought that I, a dyed-in-the-wool leftist, a Marxist of the Adam Smith school, wrote that and not Brandon Finnigan.

And it’s true. This corporatocracy that the United States has become, where corporate bribes have made it nearly impossible for the average citizen to exercise his freedom without being drowned out in a chorus of “Me too” from the corporations, a place distinctly unfriendly to human beings.

Take the last big bipartisan initiative: the TARP program and it’s immediate antecedents. Everybody jumped on board because “too big to fail.” And now, they’ve gotten even bigger and we’ve become even more diminished and the next big bubble is here, Right now. In front of our eyes. You want to know the glaring warning sign?

Corporate mergers.

Mergermania has forecast nearly every single economic downturn since, well, downturns began in America and certainly every one since the 1800s.You can trace the curves almost perfectly. After all, these are the business leaders who have their fingers on the pulse – and thumb on the scale – of the American economy.

In this instance, mergers aren’t happening because there’s a lot of spare money on the table (there is, but it’s not the primary reason). They are happening because Big Business knows that the tax haven that they’ve banked on for decades, even centuries – America – is about to go all pitchforks and tumbrels, and start soaking the rich.

And the rich aren’t Americans. They are Dollaricans. They will flee this nation in a heartbeat if we raise taxes even a fraction of a percent and this is evident from the wave of mergers overtaking the nation.

Of course, liberals and their progressive progeny have been all over Corporate America since long before Occupy Wall Street, long before the G8 Summit protests, long before the NAFTA. So welcome to the party, Finnigan! Pity you waited until it was too late.

Nobody Asked Me, But...

1) She singlehandedly stopped more killings in this spree by picking up the phone and calling the cops, not by firing a weapon. Tell me again how guns in the home make you safer?

2) Israel fires 1100 rockets into Gaza. The Palestinians and Lebanese fire 550 back. So how does the media cover this?

3) The IRS scandal rears its ugly head yet again. No, this is not a story from last winter. Congress ordered the IRS to investigate this new attempt at dodging taxes. Congress got the investigation it ordered. Congress was unhappy it was targeting their supporters because, guess what? The guy who they put in charge of the investigation knew where the crimes were being committed and so did his job!

4) The Polar Vortex is coming. No, this is not a story from last winter, either. Still don’t believe in global warming, Teabaggers?

5) Say, how do you think conservatives will feel about this story?

6) Not that Obama is going to care, mind you. He’s finally starting to chop wood.

7) Justice 1 Teabaggers 0

8) “Greetings, Professor Falken. Shall we play a game?”

9) OK, so we’ve had PEDs in baseball, football, weightlifting, even cycling…but walking?

10) Finally, another side effect of global warming? Kidney stones.

Meet the Next Florida

New York City

A new report released by research and news organization Climate Central predicts that by the year 2100 our usual 82 degree average summer weather will reach an average of around 91 degrees—the equivalent to an average July day spent in Lehigh Acres, Florida.

Of course, New York isn't the only city with a rising thermometer; Los Angeles and Miami temperatures could both see a jump of seven degrees, while northeastern Pennsylvania could see an increase as large as 11 degrees.

The report examines projected daytime summer temperatures for 1,001 cities across the United States, and matches them to other cities who already experience those projected temperatures today. Frighteningly, some city projections are too hot to match, and had to be linked to other parts of the world.

"In some cases, summers will warm so dramatically that their best comparison is to cities in the Middle East. Take Las Vegas, for example. Summer highs there are projected to average a scorching 111°F, which is what summer temperatures are like today in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. And at an average 114°F°, living in Phoenix will feel like summering in sweltering Kuwait City," the study states.

I suppose if there’s a bit of good news in there, it’s that Arizonans and Floridians and other redneck numbnuts will finally be forced to reckon with global warming. Only it will boil down to them wearing dishdashas and kaffiyahs, rather than doing something to stop it.

To be sure, NYC is an industrious city and we’re well on the road to preparation. Many office buildings already have air conditioning, many companies already have infrastructure in place to deal with telecommuting and keeping people and cars off the streets and of course, there’s the comprehensive public transit system.

The folks I feel for are the suburban commuters who will have to deal with Floridian temperatures while sitting in their cars in traffic. Anyone who’s sat on the LIE for an hour waiting for an accident to clear can only begin to imagine what that’s going to feel like.

Also, there’s no guarantee that anyone on Long Island or Miami will be able to drive anywhere, unless they own a submersible car. There’s that thought too…

Pretty Embarassing

If you hadn’t heard, World Cup host nation Brazil had its dreams shattered last evening.

Perhaps “shattered” is too nice a term. Germany paved the pitch and turned it into a one-way autobahn.

No country is more closely associated with soccer than Brazil. None have won more World Cup titles than Brazil’s five. None have so feverishly demanded style with victory. None could be more stricken by such total and bewildering defeat.

“We ask for forgiveness,” Scolari said.

Forgiveness will be hard to come by. The last time Brazil lost a game in the knockout round of the World Cup on home turf was in 1950 when Uruguay beat them 2-1. Those players still hear about it, some 55 years later.

This time around, the host nation endured huge protests as people felt rightly that wasting billions of dollars on stadia that would be used for only a handful of games and then basically abandoned to teams that might play for a few thousand people. Literally (Yes the Olympics are coming, but…) I can't imagine there won't be backlash on a enormous scale.

It’s hard to equate this experience to the average American, without either understating its importance or swerving into full blown hyperbole, but imagine if the original United States Dream Team in basketball – Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan et al. – lost to the Argentinian team that Olympics by a score of 80-12.

And then double that humiliation.

Hey, Remember How VW Wanted to Open More Factories in the United States?

And remember how they supported unions, the (informed) workers supported unions, and hell, most of America wanted to see those plants opening up here because, jobs? And it was only a small handful of conservative morons who were all Socialism!!!!!, which of course neglects the fact that the same “socialism” was expanding production into America?

Yea. About that…

That’s not to say that these two Chinese factories wouldn’t have been built anyway – China is still a huge nation and can easily support more factories – but it is to say that many manufacturers have found it cheaper to build in America for export to China, and so maybe that plan was scrapped?

Nobody Asked Me, But...

1) Our chickens are coming home to roost. It’s too late to prevent what is inevitable and too silly to start wringing hands over it. But, as inevitable as another terror attack against American interests is, more inevitable is the “No one could have forseen” antics of the far right.

2) Well, I suppose it’s a step up from “I am not  crook.”

3) Shorter Mayor Alan Long: “We don’t hate those people. Some of our best friends are those people. We just don’t want to see them.”

4) Not only is global warming real, and manmade, but NASA will now bother to prove it to the right wing, once and for all. Expect funding to be pulled in 3…2…1….

5) We had a strangely beautiful but really violent storm in the city last night.

6) Speaking of rain, and the city, tomorrow is the annual Twilight Zone marathon. Some episodes to make sure you catch.

7) It’s really cool to see an old professor quoted in the NY Times, and that he’s still doing what he loves to do: urban geology.

8) Incidents like this do not give me much comfort for a future.

9) You need to take it further, Mr President.

10) Finally, what does it mean to be a real American? This, not.

Assume Fire Truck Dead

Blogging will be light today and probably tomorrow because of an accident I had yesterday with a fire truck.

I was on my bike. The truck – more of a pick up truck than an actual fire truck – hit me. The truck is broken. I’m fine, apart from a bruise on my ass.

I’m left contemplating the wonders of the universe that allowed me to walk away unscathed while two machines (my bike is broken too) need repairs.

Nobody Asked Me, But...

1) The US had a chance yesterday to sell soccer to a crowd that was not only paying attention but had a vested interest in the game being played. That weak-ass shit was the best they could muster? Admittedly, Germany dominated so well that I expected them to declare they had annexed the Sudetenland, but come on! A game like that could have focused attention away from the really ugly and really ridiculous stories coming out of Brazil.

2) This weekend marks the 100^th anniversary of the Shot Heard Round the World. No, not that one. No, not that one either. No…*sigh*…OK, yea, there have been too many of them to keep track of…

3) How do we know that homosexuality is mainstream? Corporations are unafraid to sponsor gay pride parades. Not sure this is a good thing.

4) This was a ham-handed decision by the Supreme Court, but not as ham-handed as this one.

5) Arizona will become the first state to feel the real economic wrath of global warming.

6) NYC is about to bring undocumented workers out of the shadows. It’s about time. PS there’s a reason the Irish Times has such strong interest in this.

7) I guess they were hungry an hour later, too?

8) Your heartstrings moment of the week.

9) Oh, poo!

10) Finally, this story features Nikita Kruschev, Vladimir Putin and Arnold Schwarzenegger. And no, it’s not a buddy comedy. Well, maybe not.

Man, I Am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Screwed...

Premature death linked to TV watching.

Update

A few days ago, I mentioned the story of Aereo.

 

SCOTUS has chimed in. Capitalism loses one.

How Republicans Operate

The IRS “scandal” gives us an object lesson in the modus operandi of conservatives.

1)  Grossly underfund an agency.

2) Task that agency to investigate an entirely new kind of possible fraud.

3) Whine when that agency performs its task to perfection – even tho an appointee from a President from your own party was in charge! She would know that the first people to abuse the status would be the very people who appointed her. Why else would she have been appointed?

4) Stamp your feet and yell that the agency can’t provide all the information you requested. Mostly because, you know, underfunded!

Like a Circle In a Spiral

So Barry Diller’s latest venture, Aereo, has hit a major legal snag:

A two-year-long legal battle between the country's biggest broadcasters and a startup called Aereo is about to culminate at the U.S. Supreme Court.

The court's decision, expected sometime this summer, could have far-reaching implications for television and technology companies -- and ultimately on how people watch TV programs.

That's because Aereo brings up crucial questions about copyright law and threatens to disrupt lucrative business models.

The case basically pits former Paramount Pictures (now part of CBS) and USA Television (now part of NBC Universal) head Diller versus…well, his entire stock portfolio, I’m sure: CBS, ABC, NBC, and FOX (where Diller also worked), which means CBS Corporate, Universal/Comcast and Disney. And FOX, too.

Ironic that these cable providers would also be involved in this suit, as the concept of cable’s beginnings is essentially the model behind Aereo’s service: capture broadcast signals and re-transmit them to viewers (in Aereo’s case, using small over-the-air antennae on the roofs of subscribers, then streaming those signals to the Internet for viewing on phones and tablets, and also allowing a DVR-like option to view at a later time).

It seems duplicative, except that Aereo charges $8 a month for 38 channels. To contrast, Time Warner’s basic 20 channel plan in NYC starts at $20 a month. And that’s before rental fees and other “charges”, and won’t allow you to stream your selection over the Internet through their website or app.

Diller has been a strong voice for breaking up media conglomeration and warning about how the consolidation of media outlets can only be a bad thing for the nation.

So he’s putting his money where his mouth is. I only hope his lawyers got enough of the leftovers.

 

Nobody Asked Me, But...

1) Presidential politics seems to be heating up early this cycle. We’re starting to see opposition research come to the fore two years out.

2) Of course, sometimes it doesn’t even require an opponent to trip yourself up.

3) And one more Presidential campaign item: Start hotting up the popcorn.

4) Another fact that provides evidence that we are careening to worldwide war: There are more refugees now than at any time since the last world war. Think this doesn’t affect us? Think again. Texas calls them criminals, potential drug mules and every insult a politician can legally muster into speechifying, but the tragic fact is, things at home not only in Mexico, but Honduras and Guatemala and even Colombia, are so bad, parents will risk their childrens’ lives to see them safely into El Norte.

5) A real ugly chapter in New York City history closes. Not everyone feels the closure. Not one cop, not one malicious ADA, was ever punished for this crime.

6) You know, my arthritis has really been bothering me lately.

7) We’re sending “troops” to Iraq.

8) Looks like the Teabaggers have shot themselves in the foot. Again.  

9) This week in star farts

10) Listen, about that arthritis….

Well, At Least Someone's War Will Be Paid for With Iraq Oil...

Just not ours:

Sunni militants hung their black banners on watchtowers at Iraq’s largest oil refinery, a witness said Thursday, suggesting an ever-increasing stranglehold on the vital facility by insurgents who have seized vast territories across the country’s north. A top Iraqi security official and a militant fighting for control of the plant said the government still held it.

The fighting at Beiji, some 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of Baghdad, comes as Iraq has asked the U.S. for airstrikes targeting the militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. While U.S. President Barack Obama has not fully ruled out the possibility of launching airstrikes, such action is not imminent in part because intelligence agencies have been unable to identify clear targets on the ground, officials said.

The Iraqi witness, who drove past the sprawling Beiji refinery, said militants also manned checkpoints around it. He said he saw a huge fire in one of its tankers. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he feared reprisals.

Iraq still holds the facility, but it’s just a matter of time.

ISIS/ISIL seems to have a game plan in place: they’ve been very methodically gathering economic power in addition to strategic positions and military hardware. This does not bode well for the Iraqi people or for that matter Iran and Syria.

But there’s also an element of Dispensational Christian-like thinking involved:

The three-year Syrian war has attracted even more foreign fighters than the Afghan war. One possible reason is a prophecy, popular among global jihadists, about the final battle before Judgment Day. “There are hadith, or sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, that predict an apocalyptic war of good vs. evil, and according to one hadith, it would start in Syria,” says Solahudin, a Jakarta-based terrorism expert.

Yea. That’s going to work out well.

By the way, it’s not just America that is reaping what it sows.

But Of Course, Republicans Want to Go Back to This

US Healthcare: DOA

The 2014 Commonwealth Fund survey found that the United States ranks lowest when it comes to quality and efficiency of healthcare systems among 11 industrialized countries.

The healthcare system of the United States has been a topic of heated debate in the last decade but its performance has always remained consistent, ranking worst among industrialized countries for the fifth time. It was also the case in 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2010. The United Kingdom was ranked as the best while Switzerland followed closely behind. The researchers also studied Australia, France, Canada, the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, New Zealand and Sweden.

The report said the United States spent $8,508 on healthcare per person in 2011 but the United Kingdom only spent $3,406 per person even as it ranked higher in providing quality and safe healthcare than the U.S. All other 10 nations spend a lot less than the U.S. healthcare per person and as a gross domestic product but still achieved better quality.

So let’s sum up: most expensive, lousy results, and as the article goes on to state, the results would be even worse but for the fact a significant and substantial percentage of Americans simply opt out of any healthcare whatsoever.

Because expensive.

Where does all that money go, then, if not into patient care?

Believe it or not, right into the ground, if we are to believe a study by US News and World Reports:

Over the past year, “the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent,” Newman points out, quoting data provided by Morningstar, a company that rates mutual funds. Morningstar would have no reason to low-ball the insurance industry’s profits; its readers are looking for highly profitable sectors of the economy where they can invest.  But the health plan industry is not one of those sectors: insurers ranks 87th out of 215 industries.

“The most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin,” Newman reports, “Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows).  The average for the oil and gas industry overall was 10.2 percent, three times the margin in the health insurance industry.

But those insurance company profits are slightly masked by the fact they are net profits, after things like, ohhhhhhhhh, executive salaries and bonuses, and who knows what other hidden little benefits.

Now, drug companies are not a whole lot better but at least they serve a purpose. For instance, Amgen earned about a 30% profit, but this is after credits for R&D and amortization of drug development costs against the revenue they generate. No one is suggesting they should stop doing vital research or get some premium profit for saving lives.

Which is something insurance companies create obstacles to: saving lives. They are our death panels. They are our “just say no” brigade.

This is the scenario Republicans want to take us back to: sticking our healthcare dollars into the ground under hospitals and clinics, rather than use them to save lives.

 

When You Get Dissed By Bigoted Rednecks...

You’ve really shot your load:

The Duck Dynasty clan — the family behind the popular A&E reality show — is backing one of its own for the congressional seat that may or may not be vacated by Rep. Vance McAllister, the married congressman who was caught on a security tape making out with a married staff member.

McAllister, a Louisiana Republican, first said he would not run again after the kissing video went viral, then said he was keeping his options open, and is now leading a recent poll even though he has not declared his intentions.

But now a new entry in the race: Pharmaceutical representative Zach Dasher, a member of the Duck Dynasty family, says he is joining the race.

McAllister won a special election to Congress in 2013 in large part because of the support of the racist, homophobic, pedophilic clan members.

McAllister then felt his oats, felt her oats, and the rest is history. McAllister, as the excerpt above points out, has hedged on whether he’ll seek re-election or not.

Apparently, marriage vows are not the only vows he has ambiguous feelings about. In truth, what is the shmuck going to do after Congress, anyway? He has some experience in the oil business, but then this is Louisiana and you can’t spit without hitting an oilman. He does own some fast food franchises and a paper hat probably suits him.

Running Dasher raises some interesting issues: for one thing, it somewhat inoculates his cousins from being viewed as outliers in society. For another, it means big grift potential in a state where grifting is a high art form. And despite the drop in ratings, Duck Dynasty and its family remain popular figures on the far right political spectrum.

Louisiana’s Fifth has a twenty year string of Republican victories (the sole Democrat to win, Rodney Alexander, switched parties shortly after taking office in 2004), and there’s no reason to expect this district can be flipped.  

Nobody Asked Me, But...

1) Of course, you know my top story is going to be the commencement of the World Cup in feetsball, as it’s called. Somehow Brazilians managed to put aside their anger over the preparations and the damage caused to the nation to cheer on their team.

2) And of course, it wouldn’t be a World Cup without a heaping dash of controversy. For my part, I thought it was at best a really weak call, and at worst, called the wrong way (Fred should have been called for embellishment.) In the end, it didn’t make much difference. The Croatian keeper was terribly weak on the first goal.

3) It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when Baghdad will fall. The Bush failure is complete. He bankrupted our nation in the wan hopes of securing oil for the foreseeable future, and now we have neither oil nor a future.

4) Conservative libertarian Ayn Randian Bowe Bergdahl is back in the US. Funny how once it all came out he was one of theirs, fellow conservatives shut up.

5) Despite its reputation – or perhaps because of it – Jamaica is one of the harshest nations when it comes to the use of marijuana (ganja, as its called). That may be changing.

6) And just in time for the summer driving season…

7) Sunday is Father’s Day. If you have one, or even if you know one, send him this link. Unless of course you think he was great already.

8) As much as I really want the Rangers to perform a miracle this Stanley Cup season, they’ve already done one in getting this far.

9) There’s something both fascinating and Robocop-creepy about this.

10) Introducing: Egg on a stick

The China Syndrome

Well, the Chinese seem to be taking the name “China Sea” seriously. First came the dispute with Vietnam, the Philippines, and probably any nation with a couple of dinghies and a drunk captain over the South China Sea.

And now comes Japan:

HONG KONG — China’s Ministry of National Defense accused Japan on Thursday of airborne brinkmanship over the East China Sea, rejecting Tokyo’s account of the latest near encounters between military aircraft from the two increasingly estranged countries.

The official Chinese rejection of the Japanese version of events was predictable, but the vehement wording from Beijing showed the bitterness that has built up between the two neighbors. The Chinese defense ministry spokesman, Senior Col. Geng Yansheng, said that in two incidents on Wednesday that Japanese military aircraft flew “abnormally close” to Chinese air force planes — the opposite of the account by Japan’s Defense Ministry

“For some time, Japan has engaged in close-up tailing, monitoring and interfering with Chinese vessels and aircraft, risking the safety of the vessels and aircraft,” Colonel Geng said in a statement released on the ministry’s website. Japan’s behavior, he said, had “malign intentions and totally exposed its hypocrisy and two-facedness in relations with China.”

Ooooh, they’re “monitoring” a possibly hostile force of “vessels” and “aircraft”. Needless to say, Japan accuses China of aggression, that the surveillance planes were prop-driven…really?...and that Japan has photographic evidence that China’s planes were armed and aggressive.

This might all be as petty as the brouhaha over the South China Sea if it wasn’t for the history between the Japanese and the Chinese. Japan, you may recall, has punched above its weight several times in invading China, most recently during World War II.

And both nations are old enough that there are grudges a-plenty to go around.

Really, it would just take the wrong button punched on some console…