See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1a4k8
Monday, August 1, 2011
If you read nothing else this week...
Here's the real cost of our education system. We so wanted a FDR that we believed that Obama might be one, or that he was a democrat, or a liberal, or not owned by Goldman, or something except the truth. And now we want to punish the poor. The bank bailouts, somehow, in a uniquely American vocabulary, were not entitlements. Nor the no-bid thefts in Iraq. That's not welfare? Only in America.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Americans in heaven...
If the streets of heaven are paved with gold, is heaven a capitalistic society? Or will everyone have the same amount of gold? Isn't that socialism? Does that mean Americans won't go to heaven? Will there be unions for harp players? I'm looking for reasons that the Rapture failed to lift anyone away.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a14ynx
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
All those luxury jets...
Sadly, most Americans, I would guess, don't want the things Jilani lists in this article.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a14qmz
Monday, June 6, 2011
Jobs
Clipped from www.huffingtonpost.com
The 10 Cities With The Most Job Postings: Indeed.com
The Huffington Post
| Harry Bradford
First Posted: 06- 6-11 09:11 AM | Updated: 06- 6-11 09:11 AM
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a14noy
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Selling the farm
I just returned from Finland, a country that actually works. Maybe we could hire 100 Fins to run the US for a few years. I suppose they're too shy to propose managing the whole world.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a14kas
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Trivial Pursuit
Last night CNN interviewed Paris Hilton and her mother. Paris said she was "self-made." So are the new American tent cities that CNN doesn't report on.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a148y1
Monday, May 16, 2011
Trumped
Damn. I was looking forward to a new brand of American idiot. (with only an inch of forehead as they say in Ecuador.) Do you suppose his hands indicate the size of a fish he just caught?
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1341q
Monday, May 9, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Thoughts on Empire, from Chris Hedges
Too late, I suppose, for cautionary tales. No votes to gain in that.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a117xv
Monday, May 2, 2011
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Monday, April 25, 2011
Monday, April 11, 2011
Did Obama disappear?
Can anyone show evidence that he was every there? Wasn't it just our desire believe?
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bytsu
Friday, April 8, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
If the government shuts down...
Will the bombing stop? Will Guantanamo close? Will Private Manning be released? Will we stop selling arms to countries like Libya? Will the bankers have to return what they stole? Will Bush and Chaney go to jail? Just wondering.
One way to save money would be to stop "preemptive attacks" on Arab nations, the wars that never end. If I were in charge of a nation where one out of four children are hungry.... Oh well, never mind.
One way to save money would be to stop "preemptive attacks" on Arab nations, the wars that never end. If I were in charge of a nation where one out of four children are hungry.... Oh well, never mind.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/by9cv
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Private Manning's 10th month
President Obama is assured. Why is he not disgusted? Or even brave? Or even lawyerly? Better watch what you say in the land of the free.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bwot0
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Totalitarian Democracy--Richard Lichtman
Here, I think, it what we ought to be thinking about. However incomplete, the essay explores the most urgent questions of our time.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bvef2
Monday, March 14, 2011
Nuclear safety and other oxymorons
Clipped from www.truth-out.org
Tokyo Electric to Build US Nuclear Plants: The No BS Info on Japan's Disastrous Nuclear Operators
I need to speak to you, not as a reporter, but in my former capacity as lead investigator in several government nuclear plant fraud and racketeering investigations.
I don't know the law in Japan, so I can't tell you if Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) can plead insanity to the homicides about to happen.
But what will Obama plead? The administration, just months ago, asked Congress to provide a $4 billion loan guarantee for two new nuclear reactors to be built and operated on the Gulf Coast of Texas - by TEPCO and local partners. As if the Gulf hasn't suffered enough. Here are the facts about TEPCO and the industry you haven't heard on CNN:
The failure of emergency systems at Japan's nuclear plants comes as no surprise to those of us who have worked in the field.
Nuclear plants the world over must be certified for what is called "SQ" or "Seismic Qualification." That is, the owners swear that all components are designed for the maximum conceivable shaking event, be it from an earthquake or an exploding Christmas card from al-Qaeda.
The most inexpensive way to meet your SQ is to lie. The industry does it all the time. The government team I worked with caught them once, in 1988, at the Shoreham plant in New York. Correcting the SQ problem at Shoreham would have cost a cool billion, so engineers were told to change the tests from "failed" to "passed."
The company that put in the false safety report? Stone & Webster, now the nuclear unit of Shaw Construction, which will work with TEPCO to build the Texas plant. Lord help us.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/buc8l
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Monkeys and doubt
I love this notion. Self doubting monkeys are sort of like modern liberals. Conservatives know no doubt. So they are more advanced than monkeys or liberals? Such fun here. Rush really is superior in this context?
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/brk74
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
How US was duped by Iraqi fantasist looking to topple Saddam
In case there is someone in the world who didn't know this...
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bqe3y
Chilean Miners Smoked Pot...
Thanks, Mark, for this. I'm feeling better about humanity already.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/aqbfy
Sunday, February 13, 2011
It's legal because he said it was?
Clipped from www.democracynow.org
MATT LAUER: Why is waterboarding legal, in your opinion?
GEORGE W. BUSH: Because the lawyers said it was legal, said it did not fall within the Anti-Torture Act. I’m not a lawyer. And—but you got to trust the judgment of people around you. And I do.
MATT LAUER: You say it’s legal, and the lawyers told me.
GEORGE W. BUSH: Yeah.
MATT LAUER: Critics say that you got the Justice Department to give you the legal guidance and the legal memos that you wanted.
GEORGE W. BUSH: Well—
MATT LAUER: Tom Kean, who was the former Republican co-chair of the 9/11 Commission, said they got legal opinions they wanted from their own people.
GEORGE W. BUSH: Well, he obviously doesn’t know. I hope Mr. Kean reads the book. That’s why I’ve written the book. He can—they can draw whatever conclusion they want.
MATT LAUER: If it’s legal, President Bush, then if an American is taken into custody in a foreign country, not necessarily a uniformed American—
GEORGE W. BUSH: Look, I’m not going to debate the issue, Matt. I really—
MATT LAUER: I’m just asking. Would it be OK for a foreign country to waterboard an American citizen?
GEORGE W. BUSH: It’s—all I ask is that people read the book. And they can reach the same conclusion if they would have made the same decision I made or not.
MATT LAUER: You’d make the same decision again today?
GEORGE W. BUSH: Yeah, I would.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/aq3uz
Friday, January 28, 2011
Polemophilia
Help me remember the difference between Democrats and Republicans... Is there anyone not in love with war?
I guess the US has to build something other than chicken nuggets.
I guess the US has to build something other than chicken nuggets.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/anune
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Root causes of financial crisis?
Could it be that the people at fault are the same people we bailed out and whose million-dollar bonuses we admired? The same Goldman Sachs folks who moved seamlessly from the moron Republican Bush to the brilliant Democrat Obama? That can't be right, can it? Moron Republicans can't be the same as brilliant Democrats, can they? Is that why people like Sarah? Are they sure that she, too, won't hire Goldman Sachs to run her economy? Do we really expect a congress of millionaires to defend our meager bank accounts and home mortgages? It seems that Nader has been telling this story for about 50 years.
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/anq5m
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Sunday, January 23, 2011
If you know why Guantanamo is still open, thank Wikileaks
Otherwise we'd still be guessing...
BTW the new Chair of Armed Services (a Republican named "Buck") wants to grow Gitmo to 800...
What's the joke about the bucking ears?
BTW the new Chair of Armed Services (a Republican named "Buck") wants to grow Gitmo to 800...
What's the joke about the bucking ears?
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bngf3
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Micronutrients
Clipped from www.slate.com
The Best Dollar You Will Ever Spend
Nobel laureates have figured out the eight investments that will help the planet most. No. 1: micronutrients.
On the eastern edge of Kolkata, India, Dulu Bibi, a 25-year-old mother of four, worries about the cost of treating her two sick boys. Her husband earns 80-90 rupees ($1.90) a day. The family's basic diet is low in the essential micronutrients that children need to thrive. Dulu's two sons, age 3 and 1, are weak and feverish, lack appetite, and cry a lot. "If I have to spend 150-200 rupees on medicine," she asks, "what will I eat and feed my children with?"
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bmzlk
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Saturday, January 15, 2011
The role of whistleblowers
Clipped from www.truth-out.org
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bm2je
Monday, January 10, 2011
Free speech just might require a reasonable populace...
What do we stand for, Rush? The Gospel According to Matthew maybe?
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/blaub
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Ain't We Got Fun...
Clipped from www.democracynow.org
Professor, Author Jacob Hacker on "Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class"
On Capitol Hill, Senate Republicans are threatening to filibuster every bill until the Democrats agree to extend the Bush-era tax cuts to all income groups. The Obama administration and many Democrats want to retain the lower rates only for individuals with an annual income of $200,000 or less and married couples earning no more than $250,000 a year. We speak with Jacob Hacker, Yale University professor and co-author of the new book, Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class. [includes rush transcript]
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bkntz
Sunday, January 2, 2011
The culture of war
Clipped from www.truth-out.org
US at War Since 1950: A New Year's Meditation
Saturday 01 January 2011
by: Michael True, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
US Army Soldiers gather around a fire to stay warm during an operation in Helmand province, Afghanistan in February of 2010. (Photo: The U.S. Army / flickr)
"The same war continues," Denise Levertov wrote in her poem, "Life at War." Her lament is even more appropriate for 2011 than it was when she wrote the poem forty-five years ago.
Columnists and academics, including international relations professor Andrew Bacevich of Boston University, are finally acknowledging facts familiar to anyone "awake" regarding failed US policies, wasted lives and wasted resources during this period. Willfully ignoring such facts, as Bacevich wrote, "is to become complicit in the destruction of what most Americans profess to hold dear."
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/k8w7
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