Politics & Money
From Ian Millhiser at Think Progress, Pa Gov. Tom Corbett had some advice for some law school grads:
[…] “remember to be at least as kind as we are smart.”via Corbett Needs To Practice What He Preaches | ThinkProgress.
Millhiser says Corbett should practice what preaches.
Maybe Corbett is already practicing what he preaches.
Weiner made a stupid (and pretty creepy) mistake over and over again. Weiner shouldn’t resign, he hasn’t broken a law. Just his wedding vows or whatever and his national image. Let the voters in his district decide if he can be effective for them.
Palin made a stupid (and completely consistent) mistake. Palin is re-affirming that she is what we thought she was. Neither “story” really affects me or the world at large directly. It’s gossip being tossed around in place of news.
There is a lot of news to cover, and even in a 24 hour cycle, limited time to do it. Every time a ratings driving empty story like this hits, it’s 10 to 15 minutes per story wasted out of every hour long interview format news show that dominates the US cable news world.
The GOP senators won’t let the President address the vacancies in the federal judiciary….
The GOP’s obstructionism grew so bad that conservative Chief Justice John Roberts scolded the Senate for its dismal confirmation record. A new report by the Alliance for Justice shows that the GOP’s obstructionism was truly historic — the worst obstructionism any new president faced at any point in American history
There are currently 50 nominations pending for 90 vacancies.
The news keeps pressing two stories that mean nothing to me or most Americans. A voluntarily unemployed person who runs nothing and is running for nothing decided to take a summer road trip with some of her family members and it’s being covered at the top of every news show. Apparently it is really important. The other story is that a representative may or may not have sent a lewd picture of himself or someone to one of his twitter followers. There are other stories…
What about nuclear energy on the “ring of fire”? Fukushima is still screwed. A review of American nuclear reactors on the ring of fire will be completed in July.
What about a story of a historic trip? An elected official who refuses to give up is married to an astronaut. That astronaut was part of the second to last NASA space shuttle mission.
What about the arrest of a man who was an international fugitive for 16 years? A man who is accused of murdering 8,000 plus Muslim boys and men in Serbia will be tried in the Hague.
What about economic Deja Vu? the US housing values and employment rates? Both are falling. So much so that the US could be heading into the second drop of a double-dip recession.
What about news regarding immigration reform? New York state has withdrawn from Secure Communities Immigration Enforcement Program, Arizona’s law that outlines strict punishments for companies that hire undocumented immigrants is upheld in the US Supreme Court and Maryland passed it’s own Dream Act.
What about climate volatility? Tornadoes have been wreaking some considerable havoc in areas where they are common and uncommon. Tornado alley Oklahoma, Arkansas, Alabama and the focus of the worst damage so far is Joplin, Missouri destroyed and 134 dead. 4 dead in Massachusetts while there were tornado watches in Minneapolis, New York and New Jersey. Whereas federal funding for disaster relief for Americans is usually a given, Eric Cantor, House Majority Leader says that relief efforts won’t be funded unless we cut some other government spending. [Note: This is the same cynical legislative brinkmanship the GOP has used with unemployment benefit extensions in past years and now raising the debt ceiling.] Meanwhile, as it seems to go with energy and dealing with climate realities, we are behind.
With regards to climate responsive civil engineering and energy, who is doing things we should be emulating? As far as building communities near flood prone river basins and deltas, the Dutch seem to be on the leading edge:
Complementing Room for the River are two corollary policies: “Retain, Store, Drain” and “Living With Water.” They encourage neighborhoods to retain water where it falls, using cisterns, green roofs and flood-able parks. Living With Water demands that urban planners and water managers create communities wherein water is a cherished asset and not something to fear and keep out of sight.
These efforts have not come without controversy. The Netherlands is the world’s third-most-densely populated country. Intensive land use is common. Forgoing hard-won reclaimed land is politically difficult. But the disastrous floods of the ’90s provided fertile political ground to start a process involving all stakeholders: citizens, businesses and local governments.
In Germany, huge projects are underway to replace nuclear energy with wind and solar (distributed panels and solar farms).
And oh yea, we are fighting 3 wars in 4 countries! Memorial Day comes and goes and so does our willingness to focus on the wars they fight on our behalf. We are due to reduce troop levels in Afghanistan in July 2011. What happens when troops come home? In addition to an atrophied job market, due to increased protective equipment for soldiers, more of our veterans are returning with serious brain injuries. In Libya, NATO (aka the US, UK and friends) has extended the campaign beyond the days and weeks Obama promised. We still haven’t placed any troops in the country, and Gaddafi is hemorrhaging ministers and top commanders, but has maintained a stalemate throughout. The NATO position:
NATO officials say their decision to keep the rebels at arm’s length was deliberate.
“For us, it’s all about not wanting to contravene or jeopardize the U.N. mandate that we’re following,” said a NATO official in the alliance’s headquarters in Brussels, speaking under NATO ground rules that he not be named. The U.N. resolution authorizing military action in Libya speaks only of protecting civilians from attacks by Gaddafi’s forces, he said.
“We cannot be [the rebels’] air power,” the official said. “This was a popular public uprising, and it has to unfold that way, in a natural way. It’s not for us to do any more in terms of support.”
via Libyan rebels in a fight they don’t control – The Washington Post.
Meanwhile Pakistan’s ISI and military continue to be infiltrated by elements of the Taliban and Al Qaeda even as the government continues to cooperate with our campaign in that region and continues their own diplomatic efforts.
The UN humanitarian aid will use the +888 interface. From a Q&A by Alec Saunders with Voxbone CEO Rodrigue Ullens:
In cases of humanitarian need, where telephone systems may be inoperable because of natural disaster, the first teams on the ground would deploy a local GSM antenna, connected via satellite to the rest of the world. Then Voxbone would simply forward calls to the +888 country code via satellite to the local GSM station on the ground.
via Joho the Blog » UN gets a telephone country code for disaster relief.
Take a moment to remember this Memorial Day.
Remember, for Ron and Rand Paul, this is ok. Shouldn’t have the Civil Rights Act to deal with this:
Plaintiffs Brian Johnston, 34, and Nile Charles, 25, have accused Apple of discrimination after an incident they claim occurred on Dec. 9, 2010. Both Johnston and Charles went to the store at 1981 Broadway when the incident allegedly began with an Apple employee, said to be white and in his 50s.
The lawsuit notes that Charles and Johnston, who are black, went to the Broadway Apple store wearing “baggy jeans and large sweaters with hoods” to purchase headphones. It was around 3:20 p.m., they claim, that the Apple employee, about 6-foot-2 and 225 pounds, confronted them.
The lawsuit alleges that the Apple employee approached the customers in an “intimidating fashion,” invading their “personal space,” and said to them, “You know the deal. You know the deal.”
The employee allegedly told the plaintiffs that they must leave the store unless they planned to purchase something or see a Mac Specialist. Johnston and Charles claim that before they could respond, the Apple employee told them they were not welcome there because of their race.
“And before you say I’m racially discriminating against you, let me stop you. I am discriminating against you,” the lawsuit claims the employee said. “I don’t want ‘your kind’ hanging out in the store.”
Johnston and Charles say they were “shocked and humiliated” by the alleged incident. They reportedly used their cell phones to record the confrontation when they say another Apple Store employee approached them.
“Now you have to go,” one of the employees is claimed in the lawsuit to have said. “If you want to know why, it’s because I said so. CONSIDER ME GOD. You have to go.”
via AppleInsider | Lawsuit accuses Broadway Apple Store employees of racial discrimination.
Ed Schultz has apologized for his sexist and derogatory words towards Laura Ingraham. It was necessary that he apologized for using an insult that was vile and unprofessional. MSNBC also made the right decision to suspend Schultz. The scope of his apology was excellent only to Right Wing Radio host Laura Ingraham, but also to his family, his company and staff and his viewers.
It’s not easy to say you are sorry and saying sorry is a very important. A sincere apology is not only a token of empathy for those you have offended and a request for forgiveness it’s also a sincere admission of guilt and personal moral failure. As far as I can tell, it was a contrite and wholly appropriate apology. Ingraham accepted. Unfortunately, a headline like “Schultz apologizes to Ingraham for ‘vile insult'” is not informative enough for Media-ite.
Schultz has had some bombastic episodes lately. Instead of just being loud and argumentative, he has lost his temper quite a few time and that can be the stuff that wrecks careers. He may be frustrated with his ratings at MSNBC or the direction his career is going, but he can’t fix those things if he becomes a guy who devolves into insults and expletives when he catches a right wing talk show host being a hypocrite.
Schultz’s shows aren’t my favorite, but he is a guy who focuses on two important political issue niches: he prioritizes labor issues and (by way of having a viable liberal talk radio show) issues for older Americans. The effectiveness with which the GOP chipped away at collective bargaining rights, passed anti-immigration laws, voter ID laws, and convinced older Americans that the ACA meant no Medicare/Medicaid during the 2010 midterms shows that liberals are still lagging in their ability to sell Democratic candidates to older Americans and effectively advocate for labor interests. Ed tries to do that and let’s hope he returns and focuses on these issues with a lower propensity for bombast and antagonism. It hasn’t worn well on him.
Ezra Klein is correct in pointing out that Bill Clinton’s plan is not Paul Ryan’s plan and that Bill Clinton at no time endorsed Ryan’s plan. After all that, Bill Clinton’s whisperings of support and offering of aid to Paul Ryan will be all the rage today and pundits will ignore the facts and go back to calling Ryan’s no defense spending cut, no tax increase budget plan bold and courageous because they believe addressing the deficit and nation building are more important than addressing unemployment and infrastructure.
MSNBC’s Ed Schultz Calls Radio Host Laura Ingraham A ‘Right Wing Slut’. Specifically a “right wing talk slut”
Could have called her a hypocrite, Ed.
Haven’t been blogging much lately because I went away on vacation and still haven’t really caught up to work and life. A lot of things to write about, some things I am glad I can skip. But one thing I want to comment on is the press release that is a symptom of Newt Gingrich’s self sabotage. You don’t get to be president when your campaign’s definition of crisis management is to paint a fairly accommodating David Gregory as a malicious foot soldier for a secret society of well read authors and commentators who exist to derail Gingrich 2012.
Presenting Donald Trump a man, who by his own estimation is genius who is without failure.
By the way, what Trump is advocating is running a protection racket against OPEC nations. “Pardon me Sheik, lower gas prices or else…we may just uh.. forget to honor our treaties and diplomatic agreements or something worse.”
Sullivan is a Trig Birther so this tidbit regarding President Obama’s birther opposition shouldn’t be that surprising:
Nonetheless, I think this should have been done long ago. Because a president has to put his public responsibilities before his pride and his privacy. That’s the price of the job – to defuse or debunk conspiracy theorists or just skeptics with all the relevant information you have.
It’s also the job of the media always to press for more information, not less. But so many spent their energy arguing that Obama need do no more and piling on the Birthers. They still seem to think they are gatekeepers, possessors of the power to decide what is or is not legitimate for citizens to ask of their public officials.
via Why Did Obama Wait So Long? – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast.
It’s not the media’s job to always press for more information. It’s their job to press for more information relevant to an issue, topic or subject that can aid them in the tasks of investigating, editorializing or documenting. Any skeptics were persuaded by the short form birth certificate, numerous investigations, newspaper clippings and his books and his childhood pictures.
Birthers should be ignored. As should 9/11 truthers. After thresholds of proof were defined met and reviewed repeatedly, they still say their theories hold. Conspiracy theorists cannot be convinced or debunked. They are fanatics and with regards to this birth certificate they cannot be convinced.
Obama provided a short form birth certificate which is accepted by state and federal law for identification purposes. The MSM should ignore people who demand we:
What Birthers demand that we prove Barack Hussein Obama II is not a Manchurian, Kenyan Born, Indonesian Madrassa trained plant under control of the Illuminati, USA Branch that they know he is. Yes. Let’s dig deeper into that. That should be the next question posed to Press Secretary Jay Carney. And who the hell said citizens questions are illegitimate when they ask to see proof of Obama’s citizenship. Citizens questions are illegitimate when they ignore that proof that answers that question.
Multiple media outlets sent a reporter to Hawaii so they could talked to people, newspaper officials and the Dept. of State of Hawaii to get the information (See FactCheck.org, Politifact, CNN and others). A variety of pictures from his childhood exist. I have never seen all of that type of information from Clinton, either Bush or Reagan or Carter. The MSM pressed for more information and they got it.
Sullivan is out of line here.
International Association of Fire Fighters to congressional Democrats: no more money.
“We’re feeling taken for granted,” the union’s president, Harold Schaitberger, told The New York Times, which seems reasonable—after all, they don’t just donate money and support Democratic candidates; they also fight fires, in peoples’ homes. IAFF’s dough will now go to state and local-level candidates, especially in states where unions are being threatened by Tea Party jerkoffs.
More specifically:
The firefighters’ union was disappointed that the Democratic-led Senate and House failed to pass legislation last year that would have given firefighters and police officers nationwide the right to bargain collectively. The union also voiced frustration that Congressional Democrats did not fight harder to prevent cuts in funding for emergency response equipment and training, a move that would have helped prevent the layoffs of firefighters.
via Irked at Democrats, Firefighters Suspend Federal Contributions – NYTimes.com.
Meanwhile, 9/11 First responders must explicitly prove that they are not terrorists before receiving First Responder benefits thanks to a McCarthyite amendment…
The provision was tacked on by Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) during the contentious fight over the bill in December, which was blocked by Republicans at the time. Stearns’ amendment adds a paragraph stipulating the “disqualification of individuals on the terrorist watch list,” and requiring each potential beneficiary to be run through the list.
McAuliff reports participants “will soon be told that their names, places of birth, addresses, government ID numbers and other personal data will be provided to the FBI to ensure they are not terrorists.”
Nine years and an FBI background check to receive health care for responding to the largest terrorist attack on our soil. Look at Henry Waxman’s response to the amendment in the Daily Show clip embedded below.
Have to be a prick about this:
I stand by my previous defense of the right of lawyers to represent clients without being targeted or pressured because of those clients. Without that, how would any mass murderer get a fair trial?
via Pressuring Lawyers, Ctd – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast.
How would anyone accused of mass murder get a fair trial? is the proper question.
PM Carpenter comments on the Times report on Britian after a year under Cameron’s Austerity measures that Sullivan loves:
We need not welcome ourselves to the Paul Ryan vision of a Path to Poverty. David Cameron is doing it for us, which J. M. Keynes could have told him 80 years ago would result in further misery and decline.
It’s time for the Democratic legislators to draw some hard lines so we can avoid a double dip recession and strengthen this recovery while in its infancy.