The Daily Taylor

2012-02-10T21:56:00.001-05:00

Fun Friday

2012-02-03T23:50:00.000-05:00

It's been a loooong week of workin' and schoolin', so this well-written article by Joe Robinson was a much-needed reminder about the importance of balancing work time and play time.

Sure, newspaper companies are struggling, but case studies like that of the Journal Register Company give some reason to think that their extinction is not inevitable.

Fun Friday

2012-01-27T20:54:00.001-05:00

Things that don't suck:

Let's face it: The classic superheroes of our childhoods have been over-commodified and repackaged so many times that they just don't provide the same fuzzy nostalgic feelings they used to. Somehow, they no longer seem to even fit in with the popular zeitgeist. I mean, Batman is a billionaire playboy for god's sake - could there be any "occupation" less in keeping with the generation who brought you the past year of Occupations?

What we citizens need now is a new superhero for a new, politically fraught age. If bloodsuckers and parasites are the only people who can make things happen in Washington D.C., we plebes need the most powerful bloodsucker of them all working tirelessly in the public interest. We need...
BEDBUG MAN!

How to Do Your Part to Ensure that Citizens Retain Control over the Internet: Dave Winer, Internet philosopher king, provides some of the simplest, most radical advice I've seen yet for anyone concerned with government or corporate control over the Internet: run your own server. See his posts here and here to learn why this is easier than you think it is.

Atheist Gets Positive Coverage in NYT

Friendly Atheist has been following the story of Jessica Ahlquist, a high-schooler who sued to have a prayer banner removed from her public school hallway. Sure, it's a pretty trivial thing to sue about, but she's absolutely on the right side of that case, as the judges agreed, and the banner should not have been there. From my point of view, this story is a double-bonus - atheist checks creeping, illegal religious influence in public setting AND atheist gets positive press for once.

Awesome 90s Mega Mix Taking Us Into the Weekend

FBI Keeps Baby-Stepping Toward Big Brother

2012-01-26T19:27:00.001-05:00

What if you got a Facebook message alerting you that "The Federal Bureau of Investigation is now following your news feed?" Would that make you rethink your penchant for publicizing personal ponderings? Even worse - what if the FBI started following you and you never got that alert?

That invasive situation may well be the status quo in a couple of years, as the FBI has recently submitted a public Request for Information (RFI) concerning the possible development of a social media monitoring application. This potential piece of software would collect information from a wide variety of sources - mapping/geolocational sources, surveillance cameras, weather reports, diplomats, intel reports, and, controversially, social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.

As other sources reporting on this have noted, in its RFI, the FBI seeks to collect "publicly available" (their quotes, not mine) information on such sites, but the suspicious quotation marks (who are they quoting there?) suggest that, of course, the FBI's definition of "publicly available" will be problematic. For instance, is information that I share only with my family members public? How about information I share with both my family and my friends? How about the things I say only to my best friend? Isn't that sort of the same as a phone call, which the FBI can't tap without a warrant? What about information I share with a particular Facebook group? What about information I share with journalists, doctors or lawyers on Facebook - do our confidentiality and source-protection privileges go down the toilet if my Facebook privacy settings aren't set high enough? What if my privacy settings are high but the person I'm sending a message to doesn't have the same settings? How much of that message can the FBI read?

And those are simply the problems I can think of off the top of my head just for ONE WEBSITE. There would have to be separate, or at least tweaked, standards of "publicness" created for Twitter, Flickr, and every other site the FBI saw. Furthermore, you can bet that if the Supreme Court rules that all/most data posted on social networking sites is "public," there's going to be an immediate mass exodus out of those sites and/or an immediate mass decision to opt out of public posting. Not only would that basically kill the whole phenomenon/nascent industry of social media, but it would also leaves the FBI without all the data it was going after in the first place. (Hint to Facebook and social media advertisers: start lobbying against this initiative immediately because it might be an existential threat to your business.)

Now, aside from the huge problem that the FBI has in appropriately and legally defining "publicly available" data on such websites, I'm actually not opposed to this idea in the abstract. As long as I have a clear, easy option NOT TO BE CONTINUOUSLY SURVEILLED BY MY OWN GOVERNMENT online, I think the FBI should be able to collect whatever info it wants from public online sources.

Of course, this also assumes that its software actually does a pretty good job of coding and analyzing that data so it doesn't routinely send SWAT teams scrambling toward false alerts. I mean, you can see how it would be hard for a computer program to tell the difference between "I hate Obama - I want to make him dead" tweeted by a drunk Republican frat boy at Liberty University and "I hate Obama - I want to make him dead," tweeted by a radical terrorist ringleader plotting a presidential assassination attempt in his apartment down the street from Liberty University. It seems like there would need to be TONS of human oversight and double-checking of these alerts. For instance, I'm sure this blog post has already been caught in some domestic security agency's automated cyber-dragnet simply because of the words used in the example above. So is it really efficient to now make a security analyst read this blog post so he can make an educated guess as to what my true sentiments are/were?

So assuming the FBI can appropriately define what is "publicly available" content on social media sites, and assuming that the software it ends up with is actually able to parse tones of voice, connotations, and implicit meanings from disembodied text messages, I say go for it. In other words, this isn't a horrible concept from the FBI, but it will probably be impossible to implement in reality.

Barack Obama is Andrew Sullivan's Ideal President

2012-01-17T20:32:00.000-05:00

Many people forwarded me Andrew Sullivan's article on The Daily Beast yesterday arguing that Obama's critics on both the right and the left have grossly mischaracterized and misunderstood the president himself, his political strategy, and the results he achieved in his first term. After describing and justifiably dismissing the insane critique of Obama that emanates from the right, Sullivan proceeds to argue that liberals have also given the man short shrift considering the impressive list of accomplishments he compiled in such a time of national stress and strife. That's the part where Sullivan loses me, and I think betrays his personal political perspective as a gay, conservative, wealthy white man.

I give Sullivan credit for making best case I've seen yet for why liberals shouldn't be pissed off at the man they elected four years ago, but it's a case that's chock full of dubious phrases and specious claims that tend to, in my view, miss the point about why so many liberals are indeed so disillusioned with Obama. Below, I point out where and why I think Sullivan gets the lefty critique very, very wrong.

Starting on page 3 of the article, his first claim is that "liberals projected onto him absurd notions of what a president can actually do in a polarized country, where anything requires 60 Senate votes to even stand a chance of making it into law." Sullivan then lists a bunch of bad names that liberals have supposedly called Obama, but fails to provide any evidence that anybody expected him to perform grand miracles of any kind. He also neglects to mention who might have placed such lofty goals (if they existed) in the heads of Obama supporters - perhaps Candidate Obama's soaring rhetoric about "change" and "reform" played a part in pumping up those expectations? I mean, there's no denying he sort of got us all "hoping" pretty hard in the beginning there. Can you blame us for being let down when those hopes have yet to be fulfilled?

And no, Andrew, we weren't hoping for him to change the world on day one in office; we were just hoping he would do the things he explicitly promised he would do, like close Gitmo on day one in office. Plus, Obama could have used executive agencies to do anything within the law that he wanted done or change any policies within the law that he wanted changed, all without Congress. And 60 votes is not, nor should it be, the threshold for Congressional legislation. Call yourself a pragmatist or a realist for claiming that it is, Andrew, but to me, you're factually wrong, journalistically lazy and basically unpatriotic for doing so.

Next, Sullivan claims that the left hasn't recognized the sheer scale and number of Obama's achievements. His first three examples are a depression that was averted, an auto bailout that was successful and a bank bailout that was also successful. This is where it really hit me that Andrew Sullivan's idea of "the left" and my idea of "the left" are two different things. For one, it's WAY too early to be calling any of these a certain success. Paul Krugman argued we're in the midst of a global depression last month, for example. The auto bailout certainly forestalled the death of American automakers, but if that's Sullivan's standard for "success," then it's a pretty meaningless one. For all we know, they could be bankruptcy-bound again in a few years.

But more importantly, the fact that Sullivan termed the bank bailout a success highlighted his ignorance about the essential critique of those bailouts from liberals, as well as about the fundamentals of capitalism. You see, Andrew, we liberals don't judge the success of such bailouts (or any government activity, really) by whether or not we get our money back. That's the kind of private-sector-oriented profitability analysis you guys on the right love to misapply. Rather, liberals put a primacy on the deleterious political and governmental precedents set by these bailouts that specific corporations and even entire industries can rely upon the citizens of the United States to pay for their monumental, inexcusable fuck-ups, just as long as those fuck-ups are big and scary enough.

Liberals care about how these bailouts break the basic rules of capitalism - they undermine the legal and ideological standards undergirding the economic system of our country - so that major companies receive unfair advantages over individual citizens. The fact that you would cite these bailouts and the depression they supposedly avoided as issues Obama's supporters should give him credit for rather than issues they should be pissed at him over really drives home how little you understand our grievances. You argue that "any responsible president’s priority would have been stabilization of the financial system, not the exacting of revenge," but this feeble straw man can't stand up to a moment's consideration: Why were exacting revenge or stabilizing the financial system Obama's only two choices? They weren't. You just made them up out of thin air, struggling to make that choice seem rational and agreeable when even you likely realize that something very basic went wrong there.

Moving on, Sullivan claims Obama ended the war in Iraq "on time" and "without troops left behind." Again, he's using these phrases loosely in Obama's favor. The timetable for ending hostilities in Iraq was extended and revised several times in Obama's first two years, even if it stayed relatively consistent over the last two. Second, unless Obama was going to allow our soldiers to be tried in Iraqi civil courts, he had to get all troops out by 12/31/2011 under the SOFA agreement. Even if he had wanted them to remain, his military advisers would have urged strongly against it, and they would have been right.

Also, Sullivan neglects to mention how Obama essentially doubled-down, rather than folding, in Afghanistan. Also, there's that whole secret war in Libya, the ongoing, extralegal murder of foreigners with our drone spy planes, and the expanded and entrenched ability for the chief executive to indefinitely detain any American he points his finger at and calls a terrorist. Forces fighting for transparency and accountability in all this - WikiLeaks, Anonymous, Occupy Wall Street - are hunted down and harassed while those who may have committed war crimes are granted immediate, unconditional forgiveness with no questions asked.

So no, Andrew, when it comes to foreign policy and national security, we on the left are not pleased by Obama's ability to end Iraq on time and without leaving men behind. Oh yeah, and the defense budget is being cut only because the SECDEF came out and begged Congress to cut his budget for the good of the country.

Next, Sullivan notes that support for marriage equality and marijuana legalization are at all-time highs. How or why these levels of support are due to Obama in any way, shape or form, he doesn't say. Surely, they're not affected by the decades-long debacle that is the drug war or the dying off of a generation of bigoted, easily frightened elders. Moreover, when it comes to weed, Obama hasn't just failed to act as he said he would when he was a candidate; he's consciously avoided the discussion altogether, trying to laugh off the fact that every time he asks the country what it wants directly, the number-one response is legalization. I'll come back to the issue of gay rights at the end, because I think that's sort of what motivates Sullivan's perspective in this piece.

Moving on, he cites renewable energy investment and "drastically" raised fuel efficiency standards. Fair enough, and kudos to Obama for kick-starting the economy of the future, but his admirable record on energy could all go down the toilet should he approve the Keystone XL pipeline in the next few weeks, which, IMO, he probably will. Also, those drastic fuel efficiency gains aren't mandated until 2016 at the earliest (and that's just to 36 mpg, not the 55 mpg he wants to reach by 2025), so there's still a lot of time for them to be reversed, reformed or otherwise thwarted by the next Republican in office.

Next, Sullivan blithely claims, "Torture was ended." This is basically a punch line in the context of the blanket amnesty Obama granted to the torturers, his continued policy of extraordinary rendition, which allows prisoners to be shipped to countries where torture is totally fine, and his signing of the NDAA, with its clauses concerning indefinite detention and the like. But Sullivan hammers it home in his conclusion: "But [Obama] has done the most important thing of all: excising the cancer of torture from military detention and military justice. If he is not reelected, that cancer may well return. Indeed, many on the right appear eager for it to return." Heads up, Andrew: That cancer may well return even if he IS re-elected because he will, at most, be in office for four more years, not the rest of the lifespan of the United States. Moreover, the naivete oozing from this statement is almost provocative. You remind me a child stamping his feet and affirming that, gosh darn it, "Santa Claus IS real because Daddy says he is." Torture hasn't ended for sure just because Obama daddy said it did.

Two women replaced two men on the Supreme Court, Sullivan continues - an occurrence I don't think anyone is citing as a reason to vote for Obama. Finally, the "liberal holy grail" of "nearly universal healthcare" was signed into law. Like women on the Supreme Court, this is an issue I don't care very much about, and it certainly wasn't an issue that motivated me to elect Obama. I'd rather he'd spent all that political capital closing down Gitmo or making the public case for marijuana legalization.

Look, Sullivan clearly overstates the lefty case for re-electing Obama with a lot of wishful thinking, loose language and lazy, straw-man arguments. So why is he so optimistic? Because he's a gay, conservative white man - a segment of the population that may have benefited more than any other under Obama. See, in terms of gay rights, Obama made a TON of progress (or at least Sullivan attributes it to him), for instance gays in the military, DOMA dying in the courts and New York legalizing gay marriage. In terms of personal finance, Obama did his utmost to protect the interests of Sullivan's socioeconomic cohort over and above the interests of any other.

In fact, Obama might be Andrew Sullivan's ideal president - strongly committed to legal equality for gays but without any silly ideas about shaking up the economic system overall or the financial sector in particular. With this in mind, it's no wonder Sullivan sees this president with rose-tinted specs, and it makes sense that he wants the rest of the American left to appreciate Obama just as much to ensure another four years. Enjoy Obama while he lasts, Andrew, but don't claim the rest of us on the left are unrealistic or unfair just because he hasn't done as much for us as he's done for you.

News and Views Roundup

2012-01-15T15:43:00.000-05:00

A small sampling of media-related food for thought...

Newspapers Lose a Third of Stock Value in 2012 - Time to Buy Low?

Alan Mutter reports that major U.S. newspapers continued their steady financial decline last year, averaging a 27% decline in stock values. Some of his commenters, however, note that Warren Buffett just bought a newspaper and that the final few months of 2011 saw a significant surge in stock prices. Though the financial trend for papers certainly still seems negative, it's getting harder to say whether the decline will persist or whether this old news medium has finally found rock bottom in the opinion of Wall Street. Of course, Wall Street's opinion concerning paper profitability doesn't change the fact that newspapers provide an increasingly essential, if increasingly under-financed, venue for thorough, credible, well-researched journalism.

Media Critics Muse about Connections between Journalism and Information Science

Walter Frick at Harvard's Nieman Journalism Lab ponders ways in which journalists might better source their articles, as well as ways in which news consumers might be assisted by computers in their efforts to understand and evaluate claims and arguments. As my lengthy comment below Frick's post illustrates, I'm wholeheartedly supportive of the first project but just as strongly opposed to the second. Rather than assisting individuals in evaluating abstract arguments and making personal decisions about normative, controversial issues, I envision information science providing insightful concepts and language with which to evaluate journalism's social contribution and utility - for example, in the way that Nick Diakopolous lucidly describes in his recent blog post.

Discussion and Debate Rages on Concerning Anonymous, Wikipedia, and Twitter

Wired's Threat Level blog releases the second part of Quinn Norton's excellent expose of Anonymous; Andy Carvin and Clay Shirky banter about the many important impacts of Twitter; Nancy Scola discusses the uncertain future of an under-appreciated Internet mainstay - Wikipedia.

New Year's Roundup - The Country is Still Sucking

2012-01-04T13:15:00.003-05:00

(photo: Nathan Cheeley)

It's a new year, but America's death spiral continues unabated...

PRESIDENT OBAMA CREATES LOOPHOLE IN DUE PROCESS, THEN CLAIMS HE WON'T USE IT: In an uncharacteristically sketchy move, President Barack Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 on New Year's Eve in Hawaii. He attached a (non-binding, entirely interpretive) signing statement claiming he wouldn't exercise many of the extreme executive powers he just signed into law - for instance, the power to detain American citizens indefinitely without trial. Of course, as usual, Obama had no control over the movement of his own right hand, which was forced by congressional Republicans objecting to disentangling these fundamental due process concerns from the yearly paychecks of the U.S. soldiers whose asses they routinely revel in kissing.

Put simply, Republicans held this year's paychecks to the U.S. Armed Forces hostage to their national security ideal that anyone suspected of terrorism has no legal rights and should be tortured and jailed forever. Fuck you, Obama - you just lost my vote this year. If you can't take the time to explain to the American public that military paychecks DID NOT NEED TO BE TIED TO REAUTHORIZING GITMO, I can't take the time to support you. Plus, HELLO, you just opened the door to massive legal and human rights abuses when the next Republican gets elected president. Are your next four years in the White House more important to you than American due process? Did you or did you not go to Harvard Law School and learn about precedent? IMHO, you're a failure as a president; go back to Congress where you can compromise to your heart's content and you don't have to exhaust and contradict yourself trying to be an actual fucking leader.

MAJOR, SECRETIVE LOBBYIST GROUP IS WRITING MANY STATE LAWS: Check out this fantastic piece of journalism by Olivia Ward, who attended the luxurious, quasi-secret circlejerk of lawmakers and lobbyists put on each year by ALEC, or the American Legislative Exchange Council. Ward lays bare the Republican-led crony capitalism that takes place at ALEC's policy summit, wherein corporations make it very easy for lawmakers to obey them by simply providing pre-written state laws for them to pass in their cute little legislatures.

Numerous other exposes (including two entire websites devoted to keeping an eye on the group's shady hijinks) corroborate the reprehensible buying of votes and influence that takes place at ALEC's idyllic retreats: John Nichols did a two-part piece for The Nation, with one part focusing on ALEC's ties to the Koch brothers; NPR then interviewed Nichols about his findings, as well as ALEC's national chairman, Louisiana State Rep. Noble Ellington for a response.

People for the American Way also joined the expose fray. But there's actually no need to read any of those to get an idea of what ALEC is really about - just visit the cabal's own website, which proclaims "Limited Government, Free Markets, and Federalism" as its ideals and includes such dubious descriptors as "the nation's largest, non-partisan, individual, public-private membership association of state legislators."

HEALTHY FOOD IS GETTING MORE EXPENSIVE AND HARDER TO FIND: Last summer Gallup found that, overall, Americans were eating less healthy foods compared to recent years, despite the constant refrain in media and the marketplace about prioritizing healthy, local, and fresh foods over fatty, fast ones. From Gallup's report: "In particular, Hispanics and young people were by far the least likely to eat produce frequently in 2011, with less than half of each group getting the recommended amount of fruits and vegetables at least four days per week."

At Salon, David Sirota ascribed this trend to the overwhelming political influence of the "pizza and french fry lobby," whose success at securing government subsidies for unsalutary staples such as corn and cheese has kept prices of fruits, veggies, and other healthier foods artificially higher than prices of, say, Big Mac meals. At Grist, Stacy Mitchell added another piece to this bad-food puzzle, charting the rise of Walmart as a major supermarket chain, the effects that rise had on industry consolidation among both competitor chains and food suppliers, and the company's obvious ambitions to expand further, especially in low-income "food deserts," where the nutrition problem is already disproportionately severe.

To sum up, our national food system is pretty fucked up in terms of the health outcomes it generates now, so you'd best be shopping at farmer's markets or healthier grocery stores (Trader Joe's and the obvious Whole Foods come to mind) if you want to live well. Or even better, try growing some plants in your own backyard and then eating them - it will save you money and maybe a heart attack. At the very least, take a glance at the nutrition label on the foods you do buy from your local UBERGROCERYMART, and try to avoid high-fructose corn syrup.

For those too ignorant or apathetic to make these basic consumer choices, your increasingly poor health will translate into added strain on the nation's medical resources, and since many of you will be too poor to pay your hospital bills, the rest of us healthy people will pick up the tab for your fat, lazy ass as your butter-clogged arteries start to act up. This means that all those skinny hippies you see clomping around farmer's markets in their Crocs are not only more physically attractive than you, but they are MORE PATRIOTIC than you because they will ultimately be less of a drain on the country's emergency rooms. All I'm asking for is a bit of food consciousness - doing your part to keep your own body healthy. Since the government and corporations are making it harder to eat well, we consumers now need to think harder in order to do so.

Presidential Election 2012 - Obama Wins, Now Let's Talk About Serious Stuff

2011-12-13T00:20:00.001-05:00

So it's almost 2012, and I'm already sick of the MSM's pointless yammering about the "candidates" in this upcoming politimediagasm next fall. The Republicans are all clowns, and mean-spirited ones at that. They're in a race for second place, along with a bonus prize for whichever candidate can amass the most outrageous anecdotes for his or her "I just ran for president" memoir in 2013. Sorry to spill the beans early, people, but I don't think the country can afford to flush another year of social discourse down the tubes: Barack Obama, president of the United States for another four years. Bing, bang, boom - done.

Next topic...

It's a War Out There

2011-11-22T19:53:00.002-05:00

But only one side is violent...

MoJo: Newly popular Newt takes up a classic Republican cause celebre - numbers are the liberal devil!

NYT/Indy: Something tells me that Buy Nothing Day will be more successful this year than in years past. Perhaps it is that Americans are finally getting fed up with ceaseless commercialism and increasingly invasive advertising.

CJR: The IRS is stalling on granting non-profit status to several independent journalism outlets, even though similar decisions have been made on a routine basis in recent years. Keep digging, CJR - something smells fishy here if you ask me.

Wired: The Army is FINALLY getting around to trying Bradley Manning next month, 18 months after his initial arrest. I'm glad to see Manning's attorney, David Coombs, plans on mounting a vigorous defense, as he's listed 50 witnesses he would like to call during the five-day hearing. Anonymous and other hacker groups that support Manning's alleged leaking of documents are keeping up a steady drumbeat of digital abuse directed at their antagonists.

Wired/ThinkProgress: In other subversive news, Occupy Boston's legal status is in limbo pending a December 1st hearing, but at least OWS protesters were finally able to force a reaction from the Prez at a speech in New Hampshire.

Wonkette: Good news: big banks are cut and bleeding as a result of OWS's Bank Transfer Day effort. It seems credit unions are looking like a better and better investment compared to financial behemoths who have no idea what they're investing your money in. Guess what, Bank of America? You better enjoy my last checking account fee this month because come 2012, we're fucking through with each other. Bank on it, bitches.

And of course, everyone on teh intarwebs is now casually pepper-spraying everything.

OWS Grievance Roundup

2011-11-09T15:40:00.000-05:00

A survey of the sort of headlines that motivate many at Occupy Wall Street and motivate me to support it:

MoJo/WaPo: Kevin Drum nauseously passes along a good article in WaPo by Zach Goldfarb describing the grand success of Wall Street on the backs of the taxpayers.

GG: Greenwald's description of the "drone mentality" is, as usual, exceptionally lucid and extraordinarily vexing to anyone who believes in human rights and/or the rule of law. This nation's policy of prejudicial, "pre-emptory" murder of foreign citizens is not only sickening, but strategically stupid.

NYT: Paul Krugman voices support for Occupy Wall Street, confirming that wealth inequality is not just unfair or unhelpful, but fundamentally unsustainable in a democracy such as ours.

FP: Dan Drezner is none too confident in the "eurofarce" he sees playing out across the pond, claiming that the global economic system is teetering on the brink of collapse.

Monday Roundup

2011-11-07T09:20:00.000-05:00

A few interesting headlines:

NYT: I'm glad to see somebody is still focused on defense cuts. In particular, these seem like sensible steps to me:

Among other steps, Mr. Panetta said, Pentagon strategists were looking at additional cuts in the nuclear arsenal, with an eye toward determining how many warheads the military needed to deter attacks.

Mr. Panetta also held out the possibility of cutting the number of American troops based in Europe, with the United States compensating for any withdrawal by helping NATO allies improve their militaries.

NYT: Yet another worrying example of misguided drug-war mission creep begun by Bush and sustained by Barack:

The D.E.A. now has five commando-style squads it has been quietly deploying for the past several years to Western Hemisphere nations — including Haiti, Honduras, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala and Belize — that are battling drug cartels, according to documents and interviews with law enforcement officials.

The program — called FAST, for Foreign-deployed Advisory Support Team — was created during the George W. Bush administration to investigate Taliban-linked drug traffickers in Afghanistan. Beginning in 2008 and continuing under President Obama, it has expanded far beyond the war zone.

ThinkProgress: I guess that Keystone XL tar sands pipeline isn't too popular with a lot of folks. Whatever happened to your clean, green economy-growing machine, Obama?

FDL: "Top Secret America" looks like a must-read, in part because I transcribed some of the background interviews!

Roemer Endorses Occupy. Will They Endorse Him Back?

2011-10-21T13:27:00.001-04:00

Buddy Roemer: Don't count me out just yet!
Occupy Wall Street might like what I have to offer.

For a little while now, I've been thinking about what kind of candidates Occupy Wall Street should/will endorse, if they eventually do. Obviously, their main issue seems to be the corrupting influence of money in politics and government, so it would stand to reason that their candidate would prioritize that as a main issue, himself. Well, it just so happens there is one candidate whose main issue (perhaps only major issue) is getting the money out of politics and returning the power to the people: Republican fringe candidate Buddy Roemer.

Buddy has enjoyed bumps from Colbert and the Daily Show, but otherwise remains stuck below the media radar, excluded from major events like the Republican debates yet steadfastly marching on despite a $100 limit on all donations to his campaign. Recently, Roemer endorsed Occupy Wall Street, even joining the protesters on the streets. In response to Herman Cain's description of the protests as "un-American," Roemer replied: "You're wrong, Herman - this is as American as a civil rights march. This is as American as a revolution. The young people are speaking. We ought to listen."

So Roemer has endorsed OWS and clearly prioritizes their main issue as his main issue, as well. This all begs the obvious question: Will Occupy Wall Street endorse Buddy right back? I sure hope so. If OWS announced even majority support for Roemer, let alone unanimous support, his name recognition and his campaign would immediately enjoy a major boost. Moreover, Obama might finally realize how disillusioned many of his supporters are (enough even to vote for a Republican, given the right kind of Republican) and the mainstream Republican candidates would no doubt face an interesting new challenger at their next debate. So how about it, OWS? What say you all to endorsing Buddy Roemer for president?

Covering Occupy Wall Street - Questions and Answers

2011-10-11T17:49:00.000-04:00

Occupy Wall Street (OWS) is a grassroots protest movement. It's grassroots, which means a bunch of non-aligned strangers with similar sentiments are getting together spontaneously or via their own organization efforts. It's a protest, which means these strangers are all anti-status quo in some way, or they all want some sort of change. And it's a movement, which means it's occurring with significant numbers of people in a significant number of places around the country.

The mass media, which has been trained over the last 20 years to distill things like grassroots protests movements into 30-second sound bytes, is having trouble doing their usual thing when it comes to OWS. They need a spokesperson, a manifesto, a mission statement so that they can fit everyone involved in OWS into some sort of neat, stereotypical box. And until they get something they can latch onto, the mass media won't really know how to portray or "cover" OWS, besides in terms of the incidental violence between protesters and police or how much the protests are estimated to be costing X city each week or day or minute (which is a pretty transparent conservative media ploy to undercut the legitimacy of OWS, by the way).

Oh, mass media, you ignorant slut. Allow me to assist you in making sense of OWS because you are clearly struggling. This post is specifically a response to Rick Hampson's front-page article today in USA Today, wherein Rick asks five fundamental questions that are currently frustrating journalists when it comes to OWS.

1) Led or leaderless?

Hampson conveys the debate about whether or not OWS should elect or install some sort of spokesperson/leader figure to make decisions and represent the group overall. This debate entirely misses the point. Anybody can be a leader when it comes to the various causes that OWS champions - they just have to be doing something about them.

The protesters simply need to start pointing out good examples. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are two excellent ones to start with. When they speak passionately (and more importantly, ACT passionately) in defense of consumer rights and individual taxpayers rather than corporations, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are leading OWS. They are championing the causes that the people standing around shouting would like to be championed. When/if Obama actually closes Gitmo, Obama will be "leading" OWS because that is one of the main causes OWS is all about.

If you're looking for leaders of OWS, look for people that are already championing OWS-style causes. Of course, leaders may spontaneously emerge from the protests themselves, similar to what happened recently when the Pirate Party got elected in Germany. But my guess is professional politicians will see the political demand that OWS represents and present themselves as the suppliers ready to meet it (in exchange for OWS-supported votes come Election Day, of course).

2) Organization: horizontal or vertical?

This isn't even a question, really. Hampson correctly notes that OWS is currently horizontal, but in the future it will necessarily get more vertical, for instance by endorsing certain candidates or deciding on a governing committee or a manifesto or an official representative of some sort.

3) What's the agenda? Is there one?

Again, if not a misguided question, certainly a premature one. When OWS becomes a formal political party and starts enrolling members, then it becomes appropriate to ask for some sort of cogent, coherent political ideology or issue platform for the group.

Until then, the agenda of OWS is simply to voice dissent and discontent - to illustrate to society that I am so angry, so anxious, so aggrieved by the status quo that I am willing to get out in the street and literally chant my discontent to random passersby. That alone is the first, most fundamental message of OWS: these people are so unhappy with some aspect of the current situation that they're willing to physically, actively, publicly protest it.

Rather than asking what, on a specific and individual level, each of these persons is protesting about, mass media should be taking the protests as the general cue that they are to our elected officials: You are not representing the wishes of your constituents. People protest as a last resort, when they feel that all their systemic, institutional options have been exhausted and there is simply no more effective way to fix things than get out in the street and scream about them. Take a quick glance at polls and you'll get a good idea of how little faith Americans now have in their elected officials, the media or anybody, really, to accomplish any positive change.

So the fact that there are so many people protesting and they have such a variety of things to protest about is a really worrying signal for the health of American democracy. This country is saying to itself, hey, America, in a lot of specific, different ways, you are not taking care of yourself. Your head (government) is not correctly managing or responding to your body (the people). The significance, the meaning of OWS is that it is a symptom of increasing democratic disease, dysfunction and decay. Put more bluntly, there is taxation without adequate or legitimate representation - sound familiar, Tea Party?

4) What about Election Day?

See #1 above. When politicians start credibly promising and/or actually acting to meet the various demands and champion the various causes within OWS, members will start mobilizing for and supporting those politicians on Election Day. These politicians might emerge from the movement or they might choose to join it. Regardless of how it happens, in a democratic free market, where there is political demand, political supply will inevitably rise to meet it. Keep in mind, however, politicians need not necessarily be the "supply" here - it could take the form of popular referenda on various issues, skipping the political middlemen altogether.

5) Managing conflict

That's just a life skill, not unique to protest movements at all. Sure, it's interesting to observe, but doesn't directly relate to putting OWS into a wider sociopolitical context or making lay-sense out of it.

So for all you mass media professionals out there that are, I'm sure, reading this blog religiously, I hope this provides some insight on covering OWS as it evolves in the near future. It's significance is that it is yet another wake-up call America is giving itself.

"Fighting the Last War" Against Terrorism

2011-09-13T17:17:00.000-04:00

A constant refrain among American military officials is that they are concerned with "not fighting the last war." For those not steeped in military history, to "fight the last war" is to employ the strategy and tactics that were successful in the previous major conflict, regardless of whether or not they will work in a new conflict.

For instance, after the defense-oriented trench warfare of World War I, the French general Andre Maginot constructed a massive, impenetrable line of defenses on France's borders with Germany and Italy. If such defenses had existed in the First World War, France indeed would have been mightily strengthened.

But Maginot did not anticipate the highly-mobile, offense-oriented blitzkrieg of the Germans in World War II, who simply circumvented his stationary defenses by blazing through Belgium into France from the north. Simply put, the lesson here is as the technology and aims of war change, so too does its nature; thus a new strategy is needed for each new conflict. Old strategies are not likely to be successful.

Candidate Obama had clearly heard this phrase by July of 2008, when he stated on the campaign trail, "The danger ... is that we are constantly fighting the last war, responding to the threats that have come to fruition, instead of staying one step ahead of the threats of the 21st century."

Candidate Obama went on to demonstrate an impressive grasp of defense strategy, listing the kinds of policy changes that would enable the U.S. to stop "fighting the last war" against terrorism and instead start to meet the threat on its own terms: closing Guantanamo Bay, ending our "conflicts" in Iraq and Afghanistan, building up our cyber capabilities, increasing cooperation between police and intelligence agencies, and many others.

Unspoken, but certainly implicit, in Candidate Obama's message was that out-and-out war is not the right tool to use when attempting to solve the problem of terrorism; rather, employing other tools, like intelligence, police work, public relations, et cetera would be much more effective. Fighting terrorism by means of war is as cliche and muddleheaded as fighting fire with fire.

So what gives? Why hasn't President Obama carried out the strategic vision so eloquently enunciated by Candidate Obama? What persuaded him that tanks, guns, mortars and bullets would now be effective, whereas up until 2008, they had not? Why is President Obama trying to fight Bush's "war on terror" when he knew COMING INTO THE JOB that you can't fight terrorism with war? Someone should ask him that.

Ground Zero Mosque Could Be Our Best Defense

2011-09-05T11:58:00.000-04:00

I didn't give this "issue" a second thought when it was all the media could talk about, but now that I've actually considered it, why the hell are we not FORCING at least one mosque to be put near the WTC, if not inside it?

From a Republican perspective, wouldn't such an act perfectly symbolize the Christian principle of turning the other cheek, of continuing to reach out to one's "enemies," seeking to make peace with them and include them in a just society? Or maybe Christ would instead advise us to embark on decades-long wars with horrendous human and financial costs (Crusades, anyone?). Symbolically, then, a Ground Zero mosque is important.

Plus, more pragmatically, if your main priority is to ensure that a repeat attack does not occur, having a mosque on the grounds offers an obvious, inherent defense: what fervently religious Muslim zealot is going to be willing to kill innocent Muslims at prayer just to off a few more Americans?

It would be a hard sell, to say the least, for the mullahs and ayatollahs to convince their suicide-bombers-in-training that Allah would look kindly upon them murdering their innocent religious brethren in his name. Any group that dared to still attack the site would ostensibly suffer immediate and widespread condemnation in the Muslim world - something that might hamper their recruitment a bit. So strategically, this is also a good idea.

Finally, I don't see how this is an issue that the government legally CAN deal with, let alone SHOULD. What gives the government ANY power to regulate when/where American Muslims get together to worship? If they buy the space and pay the rent on it, how, legally, can the government do anything about that without circumventing the Constitution? Wouldn't that be, like, prohibiting the free exercise of religion? So legally, a Ground Zero mosque is probably unavoidable.

I've yet to hear any convincing reason why the mosque should not exist, and I can think of a few good ones why it should. It seems to me the most strident opposition is coming from red-necked, rural 'Mericans who have rarely stepped foot in ANY city, let alone New York City. Feel free to ban mosques out in Tuscaloosa or Greensboro, you ignorant, bigoted yokels; if for no other reason than simple deterrence, Ground Zero needs one.

Florida Roundup

2011-08-29T21:47:00.000-04:00

Some Sunshine State snippets...

Florida Capital News: Bill Cotterell reports that Governor Rick Scott will likely switch Florida's public pension system over from defined-benefit to defined-contribution, which is all the rage in his pro-business fantasy world. Good luck in the stock market, Florida state employees!

Wonkette: I'm sure Gov. Scott is also very smug and satisfied with himself for having ordered all Florida welfare recipients to take drug tests. So far, the positive test rate is about 2%, which I'd guess is probably lower than what you'd find in the governor's own offices.

Raw Story: If Michele Bachmann gets elected, Floridians can look forward to "responsible" oil and gas drilling right in the Everglades! Apparently one of the nation's greatest natural treasures is worth less to Bachmann than the vote-swaying fiscal resources of Florida developers, who obviously begin to salivate at any mention of drilling in the 'Glades.

Statistics Versus Sensationalism

2011-08-28T17:29:00.002-04:00

Media outlets have long known that one of the best ways to generate some sacred "buzz" is too report sensational statistical findings along with speculation about their insidious, hidden causes. Via Underwire, I came across this terribly misleading WebMD article that illustrates this unfortunate tendency to sensationalize and speculate when it comes to statistics.

Here's the lead-in to the article:

"Teens who spend time on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and other social networking sites may be more likely to smoke, drink alcohol, and use drugs. That's according to Columbia University's National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA). CASA recently polled more than 2,000 teens online or by phone, as well as 528 parents of teens."

Obviously, it would be very newsworthy and sensational if it were found that social media actually CAUSES use of drugs by teenagers, so that's sort of the implication the article conveys in the first few paragraphs, which quote harrowing statistics:

"The results show that compared to teens who don't visit social networking sites daily, those who do are:

Five times more likely to use tobacco
Three times more likely to drink alcohol
Twice as likely to use marijuana"

But WebMD, perhaps wanting to reserve some semblance of scientific authority, does not go so far as to actually claim the causal relationship that would make such great headlines. In fact, a few paragraphs later, they explicitly state that this survey's correlation does not at all prove that social media causes drug use. So the reader is sort of left thinking, well, what does this correlation mean if it's maybe causation but maybe not?

Now, I might be able to explain that correlation to you right now very simply. Basically, the sorts of teens who have many friends staying in constant contact are the sorts of teens who are going to be out doing things with those friends - things like trying cigarettes and drugs and alcohol and other teenage mischief.

It makes sense that the more friends one has and the more often one sees them, the more opportunities one has to be confronted with such substances at events like parties, sleepovers, road trips, what have you. Those who don't use social media as much usually spend more time alone and have fewer opportunities to try drugs, even if they wanted to. So I'd stipulate that the correlation cited in the survey above simply reveals that the more social and outgoing you are as a teenager, the more likely you are to have tried various drugs.

But the author or the surveyors apparently rejected that idea because they go on to offer a litany of possible explanations that all seem, to me, tangential and superficial - images of wasted peers on social media, glorified use of drugs in reality TV and teen media, even cyber-bullying.

My problem here is that the article takes a somewhat obvious statistical finding and emphasizes the most sensational possible explanation for it, then explicitly contradicts that explanation and instead attempts to offer the reader some closure by basically making un-scientific guesses about what the finding MIGHT mean.

Statistics are very specific and very limited in what they signify. The tendency to try to sensationalize them only detracts from their scientific credibility and encourages their misinterpretation.

Excuses, Excuses

2011-08-23T15:10:00.001-04:00

The Treasury reported today that the national debt has increased $4 trillion under Obama, the most under any president, EVER. His response:

Mr. Obama blames policies inherited from his predecessor's administration for the soaring debt. He singles out:

"two wars we didn't pay for"
"a prescription drug program for seniors...we didn't pay for."
"tax cuts in 2001 and 2003 that were not paid for."

My response to his response:

- two wars YOU extended and doubled down on
- a prescription drug program YOU could have addressed in your year-long health-care debacle
- tax cuts in 2001 and 2003 that YOU agreed to extend despite the majority disapproval of your constituents

Enough with the excuses, Barack. YOU are failing.

Taxes Good, Not Bad...Unless You're Some Sort of Anti-American Anarchist

2011-08-22T18:24:00.001-04:00

Look, I totally sympathize with those who want efficient government, who don't want our military buying $500 hammers and $3200 toilet seats. That sort of tax-dollar wastage is unconscionable and, if you want my opinion, purely corrupt. If you're serious about fixing that, you need to start by taking a hard look at what is called the defense acquisitions process, as the commandant of the Marine Corps himself is even saying these days.

But efficient government is a very different issue than taxation. Paying taxes is the one essential duty that every American citizen (and corporation, too - pay up motherfuckers) shares. If you're proud to be an American, you should be proud to send that check to Uncle Sam every year, knowing you've done your duty to keep this ship of state afloat and sailing steadily.

Plus, you get paid back little by little (or in some emergency situations, big-time) throughout the year as the government provides you with services, fixes the roads you drive on, filters the water you drink and bathe in, regulates the foods and drugs you consume, defends the homeland, films advertisements telling your kids not to try drugs, et cetera, et cetera.

So what's with all this rabid anti-tax idiocy I hear from populists of all stripes these days (many of the Tea Party/Ron Paul variety)? I mean, for the kinds of people who actually wear the stars and stripes on 70% of their clothing, that's the exact opposite of being a patriotic American; they're essentially opting out of citizenship in the United States.

The simple fact is that tax dollars are the blood that keeps the behemoth of government alive and kicking. If no one pays taxes, there is no government, the result being anarchy. You can argue about what rate you think is ideal for whatever "economic conditions" you're trying to achieve, but in the end, somebody's gotta pay the bill.

So whenever you see protesters like these waving "NO MORE TAXES" signs and hollering about government ruling by fiat and the Constitution not actually applying to all of us, just remember what they really are: anti-American anarchists.

Street Art in Central Square: Graffiti Wall Gets New Addition

2011-08-19T16:12:00.002-04:00

This afternoon I was on hand to document the evolution of the public graffiti/art wall in Central Square. A local street artist, who shall remain nameless, invited me to take some photos as he spent a few hours recreating one section of the vibrantly colored brick wall, located in an alley beside Harvest Co-op Market.

Entrance to graffiti alley from Harvest
Co-op parking lot. Note the art
wrapping around above the store.

Here's the wall's new piece in final form.

The photos below show the development of the artist's piece as he layers on colors and details to produce a pretty spectacular final product. The color palette is classic for graffiti and the lettering and embedded arrows evoke an old school, 80s/90s aesthetic.


I showed up about midway through, so about 60% of the piece was already painted - pink lettering over shades of brown and red.

As with most good art,
it all starts with a sketch.

The next step after I arrived was
to add white highlights to make the
edges and letters pop out at you.

Step three - green it up! More highlights for the letters and
some creepy green drips in between them. It took me about
10 solid minutes to notice that this was partly painted over a
pole in the wall, by the way - bonus points for difficulty!

Looking sweet!

After a few rounds of detailing, adding some scribbles and
outlining the word in pink, rocky shapes, the piece is complete!

Beyond the wall's newest addition, there are several impressive works including an elfin blue Buddha, a shifty-eyed Asian child, a surprised-looking hamster and various other interesting images.

As the photos below illustrate, besides being brilliant by itself, the art also benefits from vivid lighting effects due to the multicolored shades above the wall. I'd suggest checking it out sometime in the early morning to catch the full kaleidoscopic effect on the paint.

As a final sidenote, sitting opposite the graffiti wall, there's a photo-mural from 1997 of Central Square and its people, which provides a fairly stark, barren contrast to the warm colors emanating from the graffiti.

Hands Up, It's a Mobbery!

2011-08-17T14:22:00.000-04:00

So it seems the enterprising youth of America have taken a cue from the Brits (pop trends always start in Britain, duh) and are now committing some semi-riotous acts of theft and violence (mostly theft) here in the States.

Basically, this is becoming a trend of flash mob robberies, which the media is calling "flash robs," but I'd rather dub mobberies. Even those polite young folk up in Canada have taken to, well, taking things.

I don't have much to offer on this phenomenon beyond predicting that the demand for security guards might soon skyrocket. A mob of people in any situation is a dangerous, stupid thing and one specifically gathering for the purpose of theft seems like the kind of threat to public order that our local policemen should start prioritizing over, say, marijuana possession.

Obama Disappoints - Debt Ceiling Punt Shows Centrist Sympathies, Weakness from the Left

2011-08-01T14:42:00.002-04:00

Three quick observations about this debt ceiling deal that now appears likely to go through before tomorrow's previously scheduled government apocalypse:

1) It's A PUNT! After all the hard-ass negotiating and rhetoric about responsibly acting to solve America's deficit issues NOW, this plan turns out to be a punt, which means the powers that be have decided to kick the issue down the road a couple years rather than addressing it comprehensively today.

What spending cuts there will be won't even be noticeable for at least two years, and everything after that is on a 10-year timeline (totally unrealistic when you have two, three and four-year terms in elected office) or relies on committees to "find savings" in order to avoid "automatic triggers" that will cut spending. Beyond the mechanics, the scope of the bill just doesn't make a dent in the enormous debt problem the nation is facing. In Senator Lindsey Graham's words, “It’s a $3 trillion package that will allow $7 trillion to be added to the deficit over the next decade,” he said, instead of $10 trillion. “We’re no longer running toward oblivion, we’re walking toward it.”

So why is everyone agreeing to it? Matt Miller at WaPo has the correct answer. When it comes to a last-minute, disaster-averting deal, political concerns, as usual, trump policy ones:

"Politically, however, it’s a sufficient escape hatch. The Tea Party can claim it changed the debate. Other Republicans can say “this is the best we can do without the presidency.” President Obama can tell independents he got “a major down payment on deficit reduction” while still casting the GOP as unreasonably opposed to fair tax hikes on hedge fund managers, oil companies and corporate jet owners. And the president got the only thing that was ever nonnegotiable from his perspective: a big enough increase in the debt limit to ensure he doesn’t have a repeat of this fiasco during the 2012 campaign, which would make him look fatally weak."

2) Obama IS A CENTRIST! Obama once again shows his true ideological colors: strict centrism. Finally, definitively (I hope) he has demonstrated that he is not willing to negotiate for, nor does he even truly desire, progressive policy solutions. Everyone should now realize that while Candidate Obama was a progressive, President Obama is a centrist, and never the twain shall meet.

Tangentially, this understanding puts to rest the idea/argument that Obama is simply ineffective or feckless as a president, unable and unwilling to take the strong (often quasi-legal) leadership stands that, say, George W. Bush was known for. As Glenn Greenwald convincingly argues, it's not that Obama couldn't get a more progressive deal done (maybe one that mentioned taxes somewhere?); it's that he DID NOT REALLY WANT TO.

3) Obama SHOULD BE CHALLENGED FROM THE LEFT! Finally, this compromise once again displays Obama's biggest electoral weakness in 2012 - his weakness from the left. At this point, the rancid disillusionment amongst Obama's progressive base, let alone amongst the actual officials who have to vote for his crappy deficit plan, should be congealing into resolve - resolve to elect somebody who will actually attempt to do the progressive things he touts when he is campaigning.

The best Obama can hope for at this point is tepid support for his re-election campaign from his blue-blooded base, and it seems to me the conservatives haven't gotten much friendlier to Barry during his days in office, despite all he's done for them, so I doubt he'll be picking up too many red-state turncoats, either. That leaves him appealing to, maybe, the oldsters of the country and the rarest of American political creatures, the centrist conservative voter. Not a winning political strategy for Obama, who clearly made this deal largely for political reasons.

Hey Corporations, Where's Uncle Sam's Bailout? (Updated)

2011-07-29T11:46:00.003-04:00

So you might have heard that the U.S. government is going to run out of money on Tuesday. In fact, today the BBC reported that Apple now has more cash on hand than the U.S. government does. This raises a very simple question: Where's the bailout? Why isn't the private sector stepping in to return the favor that the American taxpayers did them just two short years ago? I mean, if we're basically abandoning capitalism as the economic system of the United States (by allowing government to prop up failed financial institutions) then what's to stop the government from demanding a little tit-for-tat from private industry?

I'm sure the good businessmen at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce would have a collective aneurysm at the thought of shaving off a portion of their sacred, swelling profits for the sake of, you know, the entire country when it needs them most.

But think about it, fatcats - this is your chance NOT TO BE THE BAD GUY. Imagine how nice it would be to be able to reply to the whining of every ungrateful, anti-corporate liberal like me by simply pointing out that these vilified corporations just bailed out the country. I mean, even a one-time tax in 2011 or an out-of-the-goodness-of-our-gold-plated-hearts charity donation to the United States would be much appreciated here, even if it didn't make more than a dent in the long-term fiscal situation.

This is your chance to show that you still give a shit about the nation that you love to celebrate so much in your marketing campaigns. Almost every truck commercial or retirement scheme ad proclaims "America this, America that, this is how we do it in America" - well, put your fucking money where your mouth is and be America's heroes for once!

Update: "Today, half of the world’s hundred largest economies are private companies. The other half are economies of nations. What this means is that when we measure corporate annual revenue and compare it to gross domestic product of countries, half the corporations are as large as nations. If Wal-Mart were a nation, its annual revenues this year would rank it roughly 30^th in the world ahead of Malaysia, Nigeria, Sweden and Belgium." - Melike Yetken, U.S. Department of State

Quick Theory of Human Survival: Leave Earth ASAP

2011-07-22T16:36:00.001-04:00

There is no denying that the apocalyptic buzz reverberating through American culture has been slowly, steadily growing. It seems more and more sane, rational people are at least open to the idea that humanity, the earth, or perhaps the universe will be ending relatively sooner than later. Or else the ones who do perceive such end times are growing louder and more insistent in their prognostications, if not more persuasive.

This is not without justification. Consider the following frightening factors:

1) 7 billion people on earth and growing quickly with most of the population growth in less-developed countries; water and food problems expected soon
2) gradual, steady proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and advancements in WMD programs of somewhat crazy countries (Iran, North Korea, even Pakistan these days)
3) climate change occurring at an exponential rate, meaning more massive disasters occurring more frequently across bigger regions and more extreme variation in general
4) loss of U.S. hegemony and geopolitical stability; rise of BRIC countries
5) rapid, loosely constrained advances/experimentation in certain scientific fields: genetics, cloning, epidemiology, virology, quantum mechanics, nuclear energy, molecular engineering, etc.
6) rapid, loosely constrained advances/experimentation with certain technologies: nuclear stuff, biological agents, chemical agents, mineral extraction technologies, lasers, robots, artificial intelligence, surveillance and global positioning technology, satellites, weather technology, Large Hadron Collider, communications and information technology, ballistics, nanotech, etc.
7) "softer" indicators like the end of the Mayan calendar in 2012 and a confluence of various other cosmic coincidences, the rise of atheism and agnosticism, loss of social cohesion, increase in political corruption and ineptitude everywhere, etc.

Sounds like a nasty little cocktail that humanity has mixed itself, doesn't it? No wonder a lot of people think the hangover might kill us. But I don't. I still believe that humanity will continue to eke out steady progress in the one crucial area of technology that can offer our species salvation, no matter what happens to planet Earth - space travel.

Despite the ubiquitous headlines heralding the conclusion of NASA's shuttle program as the end of an era, I believe humanity's endeavors to travel the universe are actually just beginning. As the incentives grow steadily stronger (meaning life on earth starts sucking more and more) everyone, from the littlest children to the most powerful multinational CEOs and government officials, will have reason to start dreaming more fervently of a life off of earth, either on another planet or in some kind of self-sustaining spaceship. Moreover, as technology advances us all toward probable man-made doom, it also offers us more and more tools and techniques to employ toward our potential salvation in space.

Plus, there's the simple fact that for all of human history, we've been explorers and colonizers, constantly spreading out until, at this point, we live on every single continent. Philosophically, I would contend that pioneering or exploring is part of human nature, as deeply embedded as the sex drive. Why else would people constantly seek new experiences, take cross-country road trips or be tourists at all? But pioneering has lost its flavor, has lost its sense of danger (and therefore the sense of satisfaction we can derive from it) ever since humans conquered the lands of the earth. The sea remains a big, blue mysteryland full of alien creatures and treasures, but is ultimately uninhabitable unless we have some serious breakthroughs in gill-growing technology. That leaves us only the sky, and the space beyond it (containing infinite worlds) to be explored.

The only uncertainty I have is how long it will take a significant part of us to realize that humanity's true collective goal, if we are to ensure our survival as a species and continue to expand and prosper, is to simply get off this rock. Such a realization will drive us all to focus more on strategic, useful fields, like biodomes and sleep research, rather than expending so much time and effort toward the short-term stupidity of killing or manipulating one another.

Random Roundup

2011-07-20T12:02:00.000-04:00

Food for thought...

Salon: Glenn Greenwald lays some serious smack down on Barbara Starr and Luis Martinez for their feckless journalistic subservience to the CIA. Meanwhile, he picks up Jeremy Scahill's scoop about the U.S. STILL USING SECRET PRISONS in Somalia for the purpose of detaining and interrogating whoever they want.

Attytood: Funny little post by Will Short that nicely sums up the bitter cynicism threatening to swallow my soul.

Uncertain Principles: The Baby Boomers started grade inflation, as they did most of the other harmful trends that we now suffer.

Wonkette: Dallas, harkening back to its cowboy roots, starts a new tradition: the annual poor people stampede.

Think Progress: Remember that federal budget surplus Clinton left us with that would be really nice to have right now? Don't forget where that went: tax cuts for the rich and "overseas conflicts."

Bloomberg: Good thing China bought up all our worthless dollars. You'd think they would be better at math...

Wired: Feds charge "hacker" for the grand crime of downloading lots of JSTOR articles with his MIT student account. WTF?

Americans Don't Want These Jobs

2011-07-06T15:00:00.000-04:00

Why not?

Because they pay less than minimum wage and come with no benefits and security.

Why?

Because they are performed by black market labor - illegal immigrants who are easy to exploit and have no leverage to negotiate better pay/benefits due to their illegality.

Aren't illegal immigrants, like, illegal? Why are companies allowed to employ them so broadly and with legal impunity throughout Florida's major industries?

Because well-funded business lobbies block any attempt to actually enforce immigration laws by "influencing" candidates to vote against them. If illegal immigrants are prohibited from working through programs like E-Verify, businesses will have no black market labor supply that they can exploit/underpay and will actually need to offer fair compensation for standing in the scorching Florida sun all day doing hard motherfucking work.

Now, if businesses weren't allowed to hire illegal immigrants that they could exploit so freely, Americans would want all those fruit-picking, hotel-room-cleaning jobs because they would pay so much better, and our Florida jobs crisis would be solved overnight. But that might work in Massachusetts or Colorado or some more sensible state...here, we're talking about Florida!

Big Brother is Watching

2011-07-06T12:48:00.002-04:00

And his eyes and ears grow sharper every day...

NBCDFW: Arlington police department introduces "first part" of unmanned drone program, emphasizing their use in rescue/search/disaster situations. I wonder what part two will be?

TIME: The Supreme Court will soon decide whether the cops need a warrant to slap a GPS on your car. Signs don't look promising for the civil lib side of this one.

Colbert Mocks Campaign Finance Laws Simply by Complying with Them

2011-06-30T16:08:00.000-04:00

Satire has become our nation's last and best defense against the predations of the uber-class.

Blog Showcase: Big Think

2011-06-20T15:23:00.003-04:00

Today's showcase is the self-described "knowledge forum" appropriately named Big Think. Big Think's mission is to aggregate and distill potent, relevant ideas from various industries and specialties so that one can gain broader perspective and make insightful linkages between concepts and events in a relatively short amount of time.

Personally, I enjoy stopping by Big Think because it is usually laden with articles and interviews that relate to the deep, enduring questions regarding metaphysical and existential reality. In other words, there's often a lot of philosophical content. Plus, the articles and interviews are bite-sized, which helps to ease cognitive digestion of even the most complex or obscure notions.

In my opinion, any website the provokes people to take a minute and really THINK about things is a worthy endeavor. To get a feel for why I like Big Think, take a look at some of the features on the site today:

An article contending that "We Should Stop Chasing Economic Progress" by Austin Allen.

An interview on "Philosophy in the Modern World" with Michael Walzer.

An interview on "The Value of Philosophy in our Daily Lives" with Rutgers prof Tim Maudlin.

An interview on "The Downfall of Western Thought" with Columbia prof Robert Thurman

A video by Michio Kaku purporting to explain "Why Quantum Physics has Ended the Free Will Debate."

Guess I Might as Well Keep Blogging Roundup

2011-06-14T10:43:00.003-04:00

It's either this or I play another game of NBA 2K11...

CFR: Guess what's due for another national debate: AFGHANISTAN! It is once again time to figure out what the hell we're doing in that country and why we should keep hemorrhaging American blood and treasure there. And make no mistake, it is a full-blown hemorrhage, at least in terms of the treasure: "Mounting concern over the U.S. debt crisis has also focused new attention on spending in the Afghan war theater, estimated at about $2 billion per day."

Yep, Uncle Sam is spending $2 billion EVERY DAY to help scrofulous, illiterate Afghans take charge of their own friggin land while he seriously considers major cuts to health care, Social Security and even the sacred national defense budget! Are any Americans actually frightened by the Af/Pak terrorists we've spent so much effort to "deny safe havens to?" I'm not. Let's bring the boys home then.

Oh, and by the way, this would all have been 100 times cheaper and less stressful on our forces if we had chosen CT and not COIN, and we'll probably end up with a CT mission now anyway, so suck it, COIN fans. Your strategy is bankrupting us.

CJR: Javier Garza Ramos examines the U.S. press's problems in writing about the drug war, primarily focusing on the lack of domestic coverage of the drug trade. Come to think of it, Javier makes a good point - you rarely see stories describing the mechanics of the drug trade inside the U.S.; most media stories are focused on the sensational violence along the Mexican border and/or official reactions to it.

The trend Ramos identifies may be related to the quietly but widely held view among the general public that, in fact, the U.S. drug war has been an abysmal, unmitigated failure and, actually, drugs aren't all that bad if society has in place the right institutions and mores to regulate their obvious harms, rather than restricting them to an ENTIRELY UNREGULATED BLACK MARKET.

You make it legal, you make it susceptible to official and social regulation; you keep it illegal, criminals will keep running the show and garnering ALL THE PROFITS. What fucking simpleton is still standing in the way of this? (Oh that's right, it's that same smiley simpleton who admitted to smoking weed during college - Barack Obama).

This should have been done 10 years ago and the problem continues to worsen. Good god, did we not learn this lesson about 100 years ago with the prohibition of alcohol? If people want it, they will buy it, whether it's available in stores or from their not-so-friendly neighborhood drug dealer. Now legalize it, you morons!

TB.com: A bittersweet farewell to the Tampa Bay Trib's Howard Troxler, who tenaciously criticized the corruption pervading Florida's politics and advocated for a healthier, cleaner, greener, happier Florida for all. On behalf of the next generation of concerned Floridians, thank you, Mr. Troxler.

In Troxler's final column, he describes the state's current predicament with a historical perspective earned over decades of hard-nosed, commonsense reporting in the Sunshine State:

"A generation of Americans was exposed to this paradise [Florida] during military training; many of them decided to come back as visitors, or to seek a new life in a newly mobile postwar nation.

Florida sold itself eagerly, of course. Florida has always sold itself eagerly. And plenty of people made a lot of money doing it, and plenty of people made a living by throwing up the new cities and subdivisions and shopping centers and strip malls that it required.

Only in the last generation did Floridians begin to question the wisdom of this. We saw our lakes and bays choked to death. We saw the highways jammed, the quality of life degrading.

And enough Floridians said, maybe this is not the state we want. So we passed laws that said, yes, we will always grow, but maybe we can grow better. Smarter. Wisely.

We should make sure Florida has the water it needs, and the roads it needs, and the schools it needs. The business of our state should be something besides unrestricted, anything-goes growth. Those people making money off Florida should help pay for the costs of their growth.

That was long-term thinking.

But, you know, we live in the short term. We live in the moment. And in this moment, for various reasons, we have chosen a generation of leaders of Florida who do not believe in these values."

His farewell speech at the St. Pete Yacht Club also raised some eyebrows.

Meme Roundup

2011-06-01T11:26:00.000-04:00

It's hard to write seriously in the summer!

Honey Badger:

Epic Meal Time:

Food Party:

Book Ideas 1-3

2011-05-07T00:51:00.000-04:00

Sowing acorns...

1) "Brilliant but Lazy" - modern man is 1000 times more knowledgeable and has 100 times the resources at his disposal as his forebears even a century or two ago, yet true Renaissance men seem fewer and farther between; manners are degrading, clothing is degrading; he devotes all of his advantages to creating leisure time; rise of mass media and mass entertainment; marginalization of humans by machines/information

2) "Marry Me?" - a couple makes a hobby of staging elaborate marriage proposals, which they act out with intense precision and dedication, yet they never actually wed each other; psychological gratification (applause and cheers from the room when the inevitable acceptance happens; center of attention) or material gain may somehow be involved; fetishization of marriage

3) "Dropping the Torch" - historical account of second half of 20th century, when America both peaked and then began a precipitous decline in terms of hard power, international prestige, social cohesiveness, politics and governance, law, education, energy, infrastructure, etc.; generational focus like Tom Brokaw - "Greatest Generation"

State of Disunion

2011-05-06T16:03:00.000-04:00

Taxes are low, executive pay is high, the Republicans are fighting transparency, the Supreme Court likes corporations more than citizens, and part-time jobs are the new normal.

Morning in America, indeed.

Bin Laden's Murder Harms U.S. more than al-Qaida

2011-05-05T17:13:00.001-04:00

h/t to Mr. Fish at Harper's

I watched the news of Osama bin Laden's death with mixed feelings. It was a momentous, memorable event, to be sure, and it was a relief to have finally finished him off. But the more I pondered the circumstances of his death, the way the military operation was carried out and the larger historical context of the Global War on Terror (GWOT), the more I felt depressed that this event, like so many others our country has participated in over the last decade, has only served to further weaken the United States and separate it from its founding principles.

Most importantly and most fundamentally, it is another reminder that the United States has abandoned its traditional convictions and principles regarding the sanctity of human life, the rule of law and JUSTICE FOR ALL. This thought struck me exactly as I watched President Obama utter the words, "Justice has been done," a quote that I think will be long remembered by historians as a pithy indicator about the new direction our country has taken in its foreign policy conduct. At this point, both a Republican and a Democratic president have felt justified in rewriting the rule of law, or simply ignoring it altogether, and then proclaiming their actions to the country and the world with the conviction that they've done the right things.

But they so obviously haven't. Even though I'm only 25, I'm old enough to know that Nazi war criminals were at least given A trial before they were executed or otherwise punished. The Allies didn't simply round them up and summarily gas them because that would be...wait for it...WHAT THE NAZIS THEMSELVES DID TO OTHER INNOCENT PEOPLE. In committing extrajudicial murders like the one Obama just authorized, the United States has, itself, become a terrorist state.

This claim would be weak if bin Laden's extrajudicial murder was just a one-off, extra-special violation of our principles, but my point is that it wasn't. It's entirely consistent with the rest of our conduct throughout the whole GWOT. Abu Ghraib, waterboarding, indefinite detention, Gitmo, even wiretapping U.S. citizens - these have become par for the course in America's dimwitted crusade to avenge September 11th by capturing or killing every foreigner who doesn't like us while progressively limiting the liberties of every American citizen domestically.

To sum up, think of the scene in Star Wars where Emperor Palpatine is encouraging the young Luke Skywalker to finish off his incapacitated father, Lord Vader. He knows that even with the loss of his powerful, feared lieutenant, turning the young Jedi to the dark side would be a greater victory, still. By striking down bin Laden in the way that we have, without even the semblance of a trial or other judicial procedure, we have taken another step toward abandoning what America used to represent, the very foundations of our democracy, and joining the forces of terrorism and tyranny.

Music Break: The Beastie Boys are Back!

2011-05-04T15:59:00.000-04:00

New BB video starring Elijah Wood, Will Ferrell, Will Arnett, Danny McBride, Seth Rogen, Jason Schwartzman, Steve Buscemi, Amy Poehler, Ted Danson, and many more.

Radiation Roundup

2011-05-04T12:49:00.000-04:00

Lots going on, so let's get right to it...

Guardian: Fukushima continues to leak radiation. Response of Japanese officials: start raising the legal rates of radiation exposure for schoolchildren. Don't worry, it's totally legit because the U.S. is doing it, too.

NYT: Fatah and Hamas finally bury the hatchet, meaning maybe the Israelis will see somebody come to the table who can actually get a deal done. For some reason, though, Tony Blair, Ben Netanyahu and the rest of the Western stakeholders view this reconciliation as a "mortal blow to peace and a big prize for terrorism."

IMO, this kind of blind, blanket criticism is hardly warranted before a government has even been formed. We're the ones who encouraged democracy in Palestine and Hamas won the vote. They're WAY, WAY more likely to give up their terrorist tactics if they are encouraged to focus on the political process and the necessities of governance, so why, again, is everyone so disappointed that this is happening? Sometimes it seems like we're actively obstructing peace.

Threat Level: Oops, somebody in legal screwed up: Warner Bros is facing a lawsuit over their lameass "Hangover 2" sequel from the man who tattooed Mike Tyson's face.

Bloomberg: A key player in Wall Street's wretched hive of scum and villainy, Goldman Sachs, is facing congressional allegations of fraud and renewed scrutiny from the DOJ, which (in the world of gumdrops and rainbows) might result in actual prosecutions of some of the white-collar criminals that make up the backbone of Goldman's workforce.

Don't hold your breath, as Atty Gen. Eric Holder clearly has more pressing issues on his plate, like reversing his own declaration that DEA raids on legal medical marijuana operations would cease:

"The Department of Justice said two years ago that it would be an inefficient use of funds to target people who are in clear compliance with state law. But U.S. attorneys have said in their recent memos that they would consider civil or criminal penalties for those who run large-scale operations — even if they are acceptable under state law."

Well, if you're going to keep raiding legal dispensaries, then they are eventually going to start reacting: Raid training courses are quickly gaining popularity as a way to give dispensary owners some peace of mind and preparedness for when the narcs come knocking.

Daily Journal: So climate change is still happening, as evidenced by the 300+ tornadoes that just ripped through the midsection of America. In an effort to force government intervention on climate change, Our Children's Trust is taking legal action in all 50 states to force the government to declare the atmosphere, much like the rest of the environment, a public trust. The gimmick: file the lawsuits with young adults and children as the plaintiffs to demonstrate the importance of governmental recognition of climate change to the welfare of future generations. Good luck, OCT!

I Wish You'd Step Back from that Ledge, My Friend (Updated)

2011-05-02T14:54:00.001-04:00

Shameless family plug: My uncle, a sociology professor at Temple U. in Philly, chats with "Freakonomics" author Stephen Dubner about why Las Vegas is America's suicide capital.

My thoughts about the interview:

1) Twice as many suicides as homicides every year? That is a simple, surprising fact that I bet 90% of Americans don’t know.

2) Mr. Wray’s simple advice to “get out of town” if you’re feeling suicidal strikes me as some of the most straightforward and pragmatic advice you’ll ever hear from anyone about suicide.

I mean, it seems truly simple-minded to suggest that leaving a high-suicide area is a solution to any particular individual’s suicidal thoughts/tendencies but in fact, changing one’s location and lifestyle, even temporarily, is probably the best and easiest way to shake off depression/melancholy/apathy or whatever else is driving one to think about killing oneself. Personally, I would opt for that sort of solution LONG before turning to prescription antidepressants and the like.

3) I am exposed to a lot of discourse by top military officials, and many have repeatedly remarked that the above-average rate of suicides in the ground forces especially is a very intractable and serious problem. Anomie would seem to have less of an explanatory effect there, since military personnel ostensibly have a high level of group cohesion, so what might account for the suicides being so much more common in the armed forces than in the general population? Is it just the horrors of war, or is there something beyond that?

Moreover, does Mr. Wray’s advice about leaving town still hold true here? Do you think a suicidal private would tend to be better off if he simply transferred units/postings?

Update: Another article from the Freakonomics site highlighting the interview.

David Roberts Describes Democratic Dysfunction

2011-04-29T16:21:00.003-04:00

David Roberts -
the dude who figured it out!

My congratulations to Mr. Roberts for such an elegant and powerful description of the basic reason why Democrats keep on losing, even though they should clearly be winning. His two articles on Grist's website, "Policy in an Age of Post-Truth Politics" and "Democrats Should Stop Trying to Change Politics with Policy Concessions," are sure to be required reading in all future American government courses.

Go read them now and please forward them to as many "important" policy/political people as possible. I will do the same. And hopefully, the Democrats will finally start to gain ground again in terms of both policy and politics once they realize that the two have now separated entirely.

Corporate Oppression Persists Unabated

2011-04-27T15:29:00.000-04:00

The beatings will continue until morale improves...

AP: The Supreme Court sides with corporations yet again over consumers, this time making it harder for consumers to band together in class action lawsuits. I wish I was a corporation so the Supreme Court could protect my rights, too!

WaPo: On an issue much too complex for most Americans to wrap their corn-addled brains around, the corporate puppeticians known as Republicans are sounding the alarm because Obama would like government contractors to disclose their political contributions. Obviously, it would be more transparent and democratic to know how much federal money contractors are bribing back to the specific politicians who provided it to them, but with Republicans in charge of one of our houses of Congress, transparency and democracy are out of the question.

TB.com: In my home state of Florida, the state senators seem to have misplaced their rubber stamp with which to mark Governor Rick Scott's abolition of corporate income tax. Don't worry, rich people, I'm sure they'll find it soon and corporations can enjoy not paying income tax in Florida, as they pretty much already do.

Also, as a recent "60 Minutes" documented and as Carl Hiassen details in the Herald, the Gulf's favorite corporation, BP, has yet to make good on its much-publicized promises to make up for the hundreds of millions of gallons of oil it dumped on the area. Oh, well, it can take solace in Rick Scott's number one priority right now - making sure BP pays no taxes in Florida ever again!

Cabinet Reshuffle is Meaningless

2011-04-27T14:15:00.001-04:00

As long as Obama insists on keeping the same people around him, do their titles really matter?

Spring Cleaning Roundup

2011-04-25T21:33:00.002-04:00

A new week, a new season - same old bullshit...

GG: To begin, WikiLeaks reminded the world that, A) they ARE JOURNALISM NOW and, B) the U.S. doesn't give two shits about rule of law anymore now that we've got terrorists to deal with, by dumping a whole load of classified Gitmo files over the weekend.

I bet Barack Obama is wishing he was actually a man of his word who had closed down Gitmo on day one like he said he would do, because if he did that, he wouldn't have to deal with the monstrous international shitstorm that's brewing due to this. Maybe there's a lesson to learn here, Barry? Something about whitewashing history and ignoring one's core principles, perhaps? YA DUMBASS!

Guernica: Steve Wishnia interviews Trish Regan, who is apparently the mastermind of all the "Marijuana Inc" and "Marijuana USA" specials you've been seeing on your cable channel menu. She seems to be genuine and pretty impartial about the whole issue, but also somewhat naive and hesitant to come to her own conclusions. The most striking part of the interview, by far, is Regan's shock at the sheer number and quality of the people who are getting involved in the nascent cannabis industry in the United States.

These are upstanding, respectable, entrepreneurial citizens who are risking imprisonment and worse because they see the MASSIVE opportunity that exists here. Very striking to see evidence of the government turning a blind eye to an industry that is actually creating jobs despite federal efforts to quash it.

WSJ: Unlike the cannabis industry, these 10 industries and occupations are going down for the count. There goes my rent-a-tux business.

2011 Tax Rant

2011-04-21T03:00:00.001-04:00

Ah, yes, the time-honored tradition of the yearly tax rant, wherein I lambast the U.S. tax code, the IRS and pretty much everyone who makes more money or pays less taxes than I do.

This year, to get my rage fires burning inside me, I perused this tour-de-force tax takedown by David Cay Johnston. The title is lame - "9 Things the Rich Don't Want You to Know About Taxes" - but pretty much accurate. And those nine things are honestly straight-up infuriating. For instance, check out number seven:

7. Some corporate tax breaks destroy jobs.

Despite all the noise that America has the world’s second-highest corporate tax rate, the actual taxes paid by corporations are falling because of the growing number of loopholes and companies shifting profits to tax havens like the Cayman Islands.

And right now America’s corporations are sitting on close to $2 trillion in cash that is not being used to build factories, create jobs or anything else, but acts as an insurance policy for managers unwilling to take the risk of actually building the businesses they are paid so well to run. That cash hoard, by the way, works out to nearly $13,000 per taxpaying household.

A corporate tax rate that is too low actually destroys jobs. That’s because a higher tax rate encourages businesses (who don’t want to pay taxes) to keep the profits in the business and reinvest, rather than pull them out as profits and have to pay high taxes.

The 2004 American Jobs Creation Act, which passed with bipartisan support, allowed more than 800 companies to bring profits that were untaxed but overseas back to the United States. Instead of paying the usual 35 percent tax, the companies paid just 5.25 percent.

The companies said bringing the money home—“repatriating” it, they called it—would mean lots of jobs. Sen. John Ensign, the Nevada Republican, put the figure at 660,000 new jobs. Pfizer, the drug company, was the biggest beneficiary. It brought home $37 billion, saving $11 billion in taxes. Almost immediately it started firing people. Since the law took effect, Pfizer has let 40,000 workers go. In all, it appears that at least 100,000 jobs were destroyed.

Now Congressional Republicans and some Democrats are gearing up again to pass another tax holiday, promoting a new Jobs Creation Act. It would affect 10 times as much money as the 2004 law.

Pretty galling, right? One of the other things in Johnston's article was the contrast between top-income tax rates in the 1950s and 60s and those tax rates today. Joseph Thorndike echoed this analysis in a Marketplace interview with Bob Moon. Back then, tax rates on the super-rich were steady at over 90 percent! Remember all those nice, clean, new buildings and dams and bridges and highways we built back then? That's from GOVERNMENT REVENUE, people, a.k.a. TAXES.

If you want to live in a country where growth and prosperity is felt, at least in some measure, by all Americans, then funding government sufficiently is what you want to do, and that means you actually want to pay taxes. Now, who doesn't want to live in that kind of country? The super-rich, obviously, because they're happy with the status quo, a not-so-gradual slide toward an economic/political oligarchy, much like a banana republic.

So what do we need to do to get government funded again? TAX THE RICH! Yep, it's high time for the rich to suck it up and shell out for the ridiculous bonanza they've enjoyed for the last 30 years on the backs of the less fortunate in America. Sorry, Uncle Pennybags, you've had your fat years, now sell off the sixth and seventh houses and the third yacht and GET UNCLE SAM HIS MONEY, BITCHES!!!

P.S. That means electing people who have, like, principles about this sort of thing and aren't corporate puppets, okay, America? (So definitely not Republicans, then. For Pete's sake, please stop voting for Republicans.)

New Drug Czar on the Horizon?

2011-04-20T13:52:00.002-04:00

The honorable struggle for commonsense drug policy in America continues, especially regarding the widely beloved Mary Jane. Is it so much to ask that the drug simply be federally reclassified to reflect its obvious medical uses and low potential for harm?

And it should be clear, I'm not petitioning the U.S. government for an official endorsement of smoking pot. On the contrary, the legalization movement, in my mind, is as much about reducing the harms of the drug war as about promoting any potential salutary effects of the substances themselves.

The judicial penalties for abuse should simply be much more sensible (maybe drug courts are a good step) and the government should gain the benefit of licensing and taxing what production it allows to reroute the flow of "drug money" that currently goes to fuel violent criminal cartels.

Perhaps commonsense will arrive in the form of a new ONDCP drug czar, as the current one, Gil Kerlikowske, seems to be looking for an exit door. There's an interesting potential choice to be made among his deputy directors: David Mineta, Benjamin Tucker and Patrick Ward.

Mineta hails from San Francisco, where he got a degree in PoliSci at Berkeley and worked his way up through local and state government. Tucker is a former NYC cop who got a JD at Fordham and has a professorship in criminal justice at Pace University. Ward is a former U.S. Air Force officer who, I'm guessing, handles more of the "kinetic" side of ONDCP, which is "supply prevention" (a.k.a. drug warring in Mexico and whatnot).

Just from the bios, I'd hope for David Mineta because, having gone to school at Berkeley, there's absolutely no way he wasn't exposed to some cannabis culture and should have a more reasonable view of it than, say, a career military man like Mr. Ward. But who knows? Maybe we'll all get really lucky and Biden will get glaucoma and simply demand that weed be reclassified. Keep fighting the good fight, and happy 4/20!

P.S. Michael Froomkin discovers that you may actually have to be sort of dumb to be a cop - like, it's a legal requirement for the job.

Tuesday Twofer

2011-04-19T12:39:00.002-04:00

Today's titillating tandem...

Byliners: Jon Krakauer rips into Greg Mortensen, the oft-feted author of "Three Cups of Tea," for the astounding level of apparent corruption and mismanagement within Mortensen's Central Asia Institute. His article also provides some fascinating insight into the petty, competitive culture of NGOs in developing countries, despite overlapping, morally-motivated missions.

Krakauer's courageous, powerful expose is sure to remove a lot of the shine from Mortensen/CAI's rose, and well it should. From what Jon writes, Mr. Mortensen has already been declared persona non grata in the Pakistani lands he claims to love so much because the inhabitants there have borne witness to the lack of follow-through and penchant for mendacious hyperbole which are apparently characteristic of the American philanthropist. I'd say Mr. Mortensen better hurry up and finish that last cup of tea; he's quickly wearing out his welcome.

Gainsville.com: In a much less surprising story but one that is equally frustrating and depressing, Floridians continue to be terrorized by the brash, bald-headed business-backer they elected as their governor. Apparently, even though 98% of Florida businesses PAY NO INCOME TAX WHATSOEVER, Rick Scott has determined that these nonexistent taxes are simply still too high and "in order to jump-start the state's economy" tax reform is needed. Le sigh.

Wha-SLAM!!!

2011-04-15T19:56:00.000-04:00

Takedown.

Bloggers versus Journalists

2011-04-15T19:37:00.002-04:00

What he said.

Monterey Institute Loses Fraudulent "Expert"

2011-04-12T18:22:00.000-04:00

The influential IR think tank, which is apparently a graduate school of Middlebury College (did not know that!), suffered a black eye today as one of its part-time faculty, Bill Hillar, pled guilty to fraud related to his supposed credentials as a counterterrorism expert with extensive military experience.

This is a good reminder not only for the think tank community to (duh) check people's credentials when they hire them but also to people in general not to automatically trust the words of "experts," especially on things as complex and conceptually squishy as counterterrorism. The real counterterrorism experts, obviously, are the ones out there COUNTERING TERRORISTS - ya know, with guns and stuff - not the ones sitting in ivory towers musing about how to "win hearts and minds."

I Will Never Be 24 Years Old Again

2011-04-12T17:17:00.000-04:00

Because tomorrow is my birthday.

Slate: I write a lot about legalizing cannabis on this site, and part of that effort involves industrial hemp. Unfortunately, industrial hemp has marijuana's bad legal rap, even though it contains LESS THAN 1% THC (meaning you'd have to smoke literally about a ton of it to get high). Fortunately, however, hemp is REALLY USEFUL and can be processed into an incredible number of products, from soaps to foods to clothes to plastics. Such a cheap, malleable commodity cannot be kept off the market for long, and consumers (and producers) in the U.S. are finally waking up to the vast potential of this simple little weed. Maybe one day the politicians will, too.

FDL: Bradley Manning - still locked up and being inhumanely treated for ALLEGEDLY telling the truth.

The Guardian: Aldous Huxley was, is and always will be a literary badass. Plus, "Brave New World" is pretty much coming true: some cannabis/ecstasy hybrid will comprise soma for keeping the masses happy, the U.N. will give way to a global government run largely by multinational corporations and monogamy will slowly die out. I just hope I live to see it.

Raw Story: So the U.S. Navy has weaponized lasers. Step two: find sharks and attach lasers to heads. Step three: profit.

ED-EN: Whistle-blowers like Bradley Manning need better protection (and a better nickname - watchdogs?) because they are actually really valuable to our economy and our government. Unsettling quote:

FSEEE, PEER, and GAP (three organizations I know that attempt to protect whistleblowers) all advise prospective whistleblowers not to blow the whistle, at least not publicly. Even though all three organizations know well the value of whistleblowers, they advise against the practice because the personal price to be paid is too high. Only crazy people blow the whistle, but FSEEE, PEER, and GAP (among others) stand ready to help by getting the message out (either anonymously or with what meager protection that can be offered by "going public in a big way").]

There is No Spoon

2011-04-07T17:03:00.000-04:00

Francis Bator knows what I'm talking about.

Gate Rape Kills

2011-04-07T11:35:00.000-04:00

Maybe.

Hiaasen Excoriates Florida Legislature

2011-04-04T16:52:00.000-04:00

My thoughts exactly, Carl.

National Decline

2011-03-28T11:33:00.000-04:00

More people acknowledge the simple fact that, in America, tomorrow looks worse than today:

Brilliant at Breakfast: "The Best of Times, The Worst of Times"

Bob Herbert: "Losing our Way"

NYT Getting Ripped Off with Porous Paywall

2011-03-24T09:35:00.001-04:00

The New York Times, who have smugly set up a $50 million paywall to block access to their content after a certain number of views each month, is apparently being ripped off, big time. With just four simple lines of code, anyone can bring that paywall crashing down and maintain access to NYT content for free.

Nelson says what everyone else in journalism is thinking to themselves -------------->

I Love You, Sarasota Herald-Tribune

2011-03-23T18:58:00.001-04:00

Hey newspaper industry! Do you want to step back from the brink of extinction and experience an inconceivable comeback in this country? Then your job ads need to look something like this:

We want to add some talent to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune investigative team. Every serious candidate should have a proven track record of conceiving, reporting and writing stellar investigative pieces that provoke change. However, our ideal candidate has also cursed out an editor, had spokespeople hang up on them in anger and threatened to resign at least once because some fool wanted to screw around with their perfect lede.

We do a mix of quick hit investigative work when events call for it and mini-projects that might run for a few days. But every year we like to put together a project way too ambitious for a paper our size because we dream that one day Walt Bogdanich will have to say: "I can't believe the Sarasota Whatever-Tribune cost me my 20th Pulitzer." As many of you already know, those kinds of projects can be hellish, soul-sucking, doubt-inducing affairs. But if you're the type of sicko who likes holing up in a tiny, closed office with reporters of questionable hygiene to build databases from scratch by hand-entering thousands of pages of documents to take on powerful people and institutions that wish you were dead, all for the glorious reward of having readers pick up the paper and glance at your potential prize-winning epic as they flip their way to the Jumble ... well, if that sounds like journalism Heaven, then you're our kind of sicko.

For those unaware of Florida's reputation, it's arguably the best news state in the country and not just because of the great public records laws. We have all kinds of corruption, violence and scumbaggery. The 9/11 terrorists trained here. Bush read My Pet Goat here. Our elections are colossal clusterfucks. Our new governor once ran a health care company that got hit with a record fine because of rampant Medicare fraud. We have hurricanes, wildfires, tar balls, bedbugs, diseased citrus trees and an entire town overrun by giant roaches (only one of those things is made up). And we have Disney World and beaches, so bring the whole family.

[h/t Steve Benen]

FOX News Claims Wars Cost Money

2011-03-23T14:52:00.000-04:00

Weird how FOX never mentioned monetary costs during our last 10 years at war in two different countries, but the instant a Democratic president launches a missile strike, the costs of war become SOOOO IMPORTANT.

People Power Roundup

2011-03-22T11:58:00.000-04:00

Wake up, citizens!

truthdig: Chris Hedges echoes the resounding words of Frederick Douglass: Power concedes nothing without a demand.

Existentialist Cowboy: Len Hart joins me and many others in calling for a progressive revolution within the Democratic Party.

TAP: Dean Baker details some of the tax tricks that the wealthy use to avoid paying their fair share. Meanwhile, at least a few congressional Dems are showing some good political sense, proposing a tax hike on millionaires.

Newsweek: Unfortunately, almost 40 percent of our countrymen aren't worthy of claiming the title "American citizen," since they can't pass the citizenship test. If left unchecked, apathy and ignorance of this magnitude will surely spell the downfall of our democracy.

CalculatedRisk: Oh, by the way, gas prices keep on rising. As I've been claiming for months now, we look set to see $5-a-gallon gas by next year, maybe sooner depending on conditions in the Middle East.

Hoyas Go Down Hard

2011-03-20T23:35:00.000-04:00

Happily, my vacation caused me to miss the ugliness that was their final downfall, but I'm still bitter about the way my Georgetown Hoyas totally tanked at the end of this year, in both the Big East tourney and their short stint in the dance.

Coach JT III has some work cut out for him in rebuilding a team about to lose four key seniors. At least Hollis Thompson has showed some potential. If I was the coach, I'd start looking for my next marquis seven-footer ASAP. Here's hoping the Hoyas better come back hungrier next year...

Taking a Much Needed Spring Break

2011-03-13T05:35:00.000-04:00

You better Belize it!

Rise and Shine Roundup

2011-03-09T09:35:00.001-05:00

Early morning randomness...

TRAINS: What a great story to start off with: Amtrak police chief John O'Connor bars TSA VIPR teams from performing security at Amtrak stations - just another reason that trains are looking better and better than planes these days. Also, TRAINS magazine is now an underground sensation.

NewScientist: Cave paintings in Spain appear to depict hallucinogenic mushrooms, indicating that humans may have been shrooming for over 9,000 years at this point. See Gawker for an example of a caveman on shrooms. (h/t Brett Robinson)

MiamiHerald: Carl Hiaasen is still kicking corrupt political ass these days with his column in the Herald. In this screed, he takes aim at Rep. Tom Rooney, who is opposing stricter EPA regulations in Florida despite his constituency's past experiences with toxic slime in their canals.

LGM: Robert Farley seems ambivalent about ignorant Americans, but I'm not. If you're not really passionate about politics, that's fine. But if you don't have some basic level of civic knowledge about our government and the people in it, you need to wake up and educate yourself because you're probably fucking things up for the rest of us.

WashMonthly: Speaking of citizen ignorance, Steve Benen echoes a point that not enough Americans understand these days: The government is not a private business, so why are politicians increasingly branding themselves as "CEOs" or boasting about their private-sector know-how? I mean, it only makes sense that if the government is being run like a private business (see Benen's Florida example, for instance) then it isn't being run like, I don't know, A GOVERNMENT.

Business Insider: BI relates reports from WikiLeaks that young Saudi elite are partying every bit as hard as your local freshman frat boy. Apparently, all those strict Wahhabist codes forbidding dancing and music and drugs and alcohol and sex don't apply when you know the royal family.

Reuters: Bill Gates is a heckuva guy. Thanks for the good example, Bill. Maybe someone on Wall Street will notice one day...

Chicago Breaking News: Subway usurps McDonalds' title as world's largest restaurant chain. Jared and Ronald will battle in a cage match this summer to determine the ultimate victor.

Global Times: What do you get when you're a journalist trying to opine on hot cultural trends from a totalitarian censor state? You get "Charlie Sheen is not Filial," by Hao Leifeng.

NYPost: Man-boys are a new buzzword. With women raising the kids AND winning the bread, man-boys like myself have discovered the wonderful world of underachievement.

Hey ladies, you've only got yourselves to blame on this one. You broke the natural social order of male dominance - now you've got to pay for it by taking charge and fulfilling all our responsibilities, in addition to being sexy and feminine and whatnot. Don't whine about man-boys when you were the ones who castrated all the MEN. Great move, feminists...

Miller-McCune: For those intrepid auto pilots who have yet to rediscover the old-timey awesomeness of riding on a train, "slugging" seems like a commuter coping mechanism that offers some unique advantages.

Corporate Personhood

2011-03-08T19:53:00.000-05:00

Thom Hartmann's new book, "Unequal Protection," focuses on the rise of corporations as people in the United States. Via Truthout, here's one enlightening excerpt:

"The modern corporation is neither male nor female, doesn’t breathe or eat, can’t be enslaved, can’t give birth, can live forever, doesn’t fear prison, and can’t be executed if found guilty of misdoings. It can cut off parts of itself and turn them into new “persons,” can change its identity in a day, and can have simultaneous residences in many different nations. It is not a human but a creation of humans. Nonetheless, today a corporation gets many of the constitutional protections America’s Founders gave humans in the Bill of Rights to protect them against governments or other potential oppressors:

● Free speech, including freedom to influence legislation

● Protection from searches, as if their belongings were intensely personal

● Fifth Amendment protections against double jeopardy and self-incrimination, even when a clear crime has been committed

● The shield of the nation’s due process and anti-discrimination laws

● The benefit of the constitutional amendments that freed the slaves and gave them equal protection under the law

Even more, although they now have many of the same “rights” as you and I—and a few more—they don’t have the same fragilities or responsibilities, under both the law and the realities of biology."

The Supreme Court did a Good Thing!

2011-03-08T18:08:00.001-05:00

Hooray! The Court of Conservative Opinion, formerly known as the "Supreme Court of the United States of America," actually ruled in favor of the many rather than the few today when it firmly struck down an oft-cited federal legal interpretation that agencies and officials routinely used to deny or delay Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. The ruling should provide a big boost to federal transparency advocates.

Of course, such a ruling is perfectly in accordance with the Official Conservative Ideology now espoused by the court, which seeks a minimization in the powers of the federal government and individual citizens and a maximization of states' rights and the rights of corporations.

Uber Roundup (Updated)

2011-03-08T13:22:00.002-05:00

Fast and furious...

Economist: Two interesting pieces from the Economist's travel section. First, they point out that rising oil prices (due in the short term to Middle Eastern uprisings and in the long term to peak oil) threaten the viability of the airline industry, which already chalks up 30 percent of its expenses to fuel alone. My prediction: The first airline to start flying solar-powered or other alternative-fueled planes will gain an immediate and exponentially increasing advantage in this market.

Second, the Economist weighs in on the partisan aspects of the "planes vs. trains" debate in the U.S. While I've pointed out the partisan divide on this "issue" before, to me, it really shouldn't be an issue, especially in view of the future threat to airlines' business model noted above. Trains and planes are not mutually exclusive: I'd love to see a greatly expanded, modernized rail network in my country AS WELL AS airline companies operating fleets of highly efficient, alternative-fuel-burning planes.

FOK News: KO pens a witty article highlighting conservative groups' tendencies to generate their own positive feedback on radio, TV and blogs. Man, it sucks when your ideology is so obviously bankrupt and reactionary that you have to pay people to publicly agree with you.

Pharyngula: Speaking of bankrupt ideologies, the head of the Catholic Church, who goes by the criminal alias "the Pope," has been charged with "worldwide crimes" at the ICC. I'm with PZ - I would LOVE to see a papal perp walk.

Salon: Shifting from Pope failure to "hope" failure, it seems Candidate Barack Obama lost another ideological battle with President Barack Obama, as the prez further entrenched the national disgrace of Guantanamo Bay in America's justice system with an executive order yesterday. Glenn Greenwald responds appropriately, voicing the disappointment we all feel in the man we elected to end this atrocity.

Slate: Simon Johnson rightly worries about Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's enthusiasm for foreign financial markets. Overall, our policymakers still seem to believe that the financial services "industry" is the economic heart of this nation; in my view, it's more like the economic nose of our country - useful, but not at all vital or important. Perhaps one day, we will elect leaders who put their duty to the public ahead of their duty to the private.

Sociological Images: What's up with all the restrictions on teenagers these days? Maybe instead of forbidding them from having fun, we should show them how to have fun responsibly. This quote stunned me:

"'Teens are subject to,' Epstein explains, '…more than 10 times as many restrictions as are mainstream adults, twice as many restrictions as active-duty U.S. Marines, and even twice as many restrictions as incarcerated felons.'"

Update: Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge reports that gasoline in Europe has reached an all-time high of $8.63 per gallon. Yep, you read that right - gas is $8 a gallon in Europe already. Perhaps now is a good time to kick the national oil habit?

Rick Scott Keeps Stirring the Pot...

2011-03-03T14:38:00.001-05:00

...and if you ask me, he's brewing up big trouble for himself and the rest of Florida.

Honestly, you've got to admire the guy's willingness to take almost unanimous, statewide criticism on multiple issues in stride and just keep on dragging Florida down his warpath of half-baked free-market fundamentalism. I use "half-baked" on purpose here because while Governor Scott is obviously supremely confident in the righteousness of the private sector and all of the good it can do for the world, he apparently doesn't understand it enough to respond to its actual priorities.

Mary Shanklin reports in the Orlando Sentinel:

"But in a recent survey of business executives for Area Development magazine, corporate taxes ranked sixth among the most important factors when companies relocate or expand — trailing transportation, labor costs, tax exemptions, occupancy and construction, and tax incentives." [Survey here, I believe.]

Scott has effectively opted for number six on that list over number one (transportation) with his adamant opposition (now being challenged in court) to Central Florida's rail project, which he says is necessary in order to get rid the rest of Florida's low corporate tax rate. Basically, he's making Florida less attractive to businesses, not more. As much as it's now obvious that Scott is a corporate tool, it's also becoming clear that he may be a mindless corporate tool, to boot...even worse.

Hump Day Roundup

2011-03-02T16:40:00.002-05:00

Random tidbits...

New Geography: For those who consider themselves citizens of the world, Aaron Maniam's well-reasoned article on how we all become "reasonable persons of goodwill" may interest you.

NYT: It's official. Liberals now love trains. And George Will hates them for it.

DrugWarRant: Pete Guither covers a marijuana legalization story in the Seattle Times that is getting quite a contradictory reaction: overwhelming support from the American people and heavy-handed disapproval from the Obama administration.

How Can Progressives Resist Plutocracy without a Party?

2011-03-01T15:43:00.001-05:00

Kevin Drum, in his recently published article "Plutocracy Now," lucidly describes the meteoric rise of the American aristocracy over the last half-century, as well as the concurrent decline of the American middle class. As I see it, he outlines two mutually reinforcing dynamics: elite consolidation of political power and elite consolidation of national wealth.

Of course, Republicans have long stood with the rich over the masses, but middle class interests used to be voiced and protected by the Democrats, in more or less equal opposition. With the gradual decline of labor union power and membership throughout the country, however, the Dem party apparatus began responding to moneyed interests more and more, and the rich became the true puppeteers of American politics, demanding fealty from both parties in return for their investments.

So what Mr. Drum ends up calling for is a replacement for the political force that the union-fueled Democratic Party used to be in defense of the economic interests of the American middle class, and the rest of us. Clearly, some sort of economically motivated, politically muscular force has to emerge in defense of the masses if the trend Drum identifies is to be halted or reversed, and he isn't sure what that will look like.

Presciently, Johann Hari published an article in The Nation just last month that might provide Mr. Drum, and the disenfranchised masses of laboring America, a glimpse of our collective salvation. He related the story of UK Uncut, a grassroots group that popped up in opposition to severe government budget cuts proposed by UK's ruling conservative party.

Rather accepting the official justifications given for slashing public-sector jobs and hiking university tuition, UK Uncut did some investigating and found that if just one major company, Vodafone, paid it's outstanding fines to the British government, the budget gap could be closed entirely without all of the middle class angst and anguish. Hari goes on to describe the growth and broad popularity of the movement across social and age demographics, noting in particular the support UK Uncut received from many prominent conservatives, as well.

Then Hari asks, and answers, the big question: Could this sort of populist protest movement emerge here in the United States? The reasons to believe so are many, and Hari details them thoroughly. He even describes potential tax-avoiding targets named by the GAO:

"Most of the companies that engage in the worst tax avoidance in the United States are Big Pharma and financial companies, which don’t have stores. But the GAO also named a number of major brands that are exploiting tax havens. They include Apple, Bank of America, Best Buy, ExxonMobil, FedEx (whose president, Frederick Smith, was named by Obama as the businessman he most admires), Kraft Foods, McDonald’s, Safeway and Target. That’s a wealth of potential targets."

Clearly, Hari is onto something with his focus on tax avoidance, and the recent labor protests in Wisconsin, as Drum would no doubt agree, signify a definite willingness of Americans to get out on the streets and fight for their rights when properly educated and motivated. That last part about education and motivation is key. I worry that much of America is too apathetic, cynical, egocentric or just plain lazy to wake up to our collective plight and do something - anything - significant about it.

People, Wall Street and corporate America fought hard, in terms of lobbying money and muscle, to get through the economic crisis without substantially paying for it, and in many cases, they're now well back into the black. Before officials in both states and the federal government get too crazy about hacking away at the public sector, their constituents need to remind them where to look first for that budget gap money - right back into the loving gaze of their corporate masters, who obviously have so much of it.

New Month Roundup

2011-03-01T12:29:00.001-05:00

Fresh miscellany for the month of March...

Consumerist: Maybe we should all vote in gum elections from now on. I guess that would suck for the ballot counters...

Prospect: Richard Dawkins muses that humans are becoming too much like robots - programmed to follow rulebooks and guidelines without question or critical thought. I agree, and I'd further extend his criticism to include our common credulity in the meaning and importance of mathematical projections and statistics.

The Hill: I've found the Onion News Network to be hit or miss in its first few episodes, but this interview with ONN anchor Jane Carmichael was definitely a hit - funny lady.

Careful, Governor Scott - This Shit is Getting Rail!

2011-02-22T17:34:00.006-05:00

With just three days left before Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood's deadline, Governor Rick Scott (pictured at right) doesn't seem likely to change his mind about refusing federal funds for the Tampa-to-Orlando high-speed rail project. Scott's decision has been heavily criticized in the state, as even those intrepid observers who dare to defend him would no doubt admit. But the project's merits are indeed debatable, as this somewhat objective observation from the Economist argues.

For the rail project's proponents, however, hope springs eternal, as various politically interested congresspeople continue to endeavor to assuage Scott's worries that Floridians might be held accountable for his hypothetical (but, to be honest, probable) cost overruns. Rep. John Mica craftily proposed a plan to at least get Orlando's share of the money saved, but got shot down by Secretary LaHood over the weekend.

I've got two observations to make about this little state of affairs in the Sunshine State:

1) As a recovering Orlando native, I sympathize with people in the area who support the rail project, though I'm no Pollyanna when it comes to the drawbacks. There probably will be cost overruns, as there seem to be on most government contracts, and maybe a light rail is more appropriate than a high-speed rail between two cities only 85 miles apart. That said, there's no question I'm against Scott's decision and think the project is still worth saving in its current form for its short-term jobs and long-term infrastructure benefits.

2) From a political perspective, this rail issue could be exactly the sort of time-sensitive catalyst that leads to a Wisconsin-style state government showdown/lockdown at the very start of Governor Scott's term in office. His determination to stage state-government sacrificial suicides in service to free market fundamentalism has evidently proven unpopular with a lot of constituents. Various sources are already reporting a lot of buzz on the intarwebs about large-scale, real-life protests in the offing around Florida.

Earlier on this site, I posted about the domino theory in international relations and its latest incarnation: the Tunisia Effect. What if, despite Jon Stewart's very appropriate mockery of the mainstream media's linkage of the issues, the "threat of a good example" turned out to apply not only to international relations, but inter-state relations as well?

Take heed, Rick Scott and Scott Walker and all other state governors and/or people named Scott: If you remain stubbornly deaf to the true will of your subjects, you may soon be shacking up on Despot-in-Exile Island along with the likes of HIM! ----------------------------------------------------->

Tunisia Effect/Domino Theory/Revolution Wave Theory - isn't this all just the power of example?

2011-02-22T13:32:00.003-05:00

In spite of my quasi-hiatus from blogging recently, world events did not suddenly cease to occur; on the contrary, there have been major developments in terms of international relations and U.S. foreign policy that certainly bear comment from an engaged IR enthusiast such as myself. One momentous occurrence has been the overthrow of the Ben-Ali government in Tunisia and the spread of its subsequent "Tunisia Effect" to many, if not most, other nations in the Middle East.

From my perspective, with a B.A. in political science, I cannot help but view the Tunisia Effect as simply the latest iteration of a fundamental international relations dynamic: the domino theory.

Briefly, the original "domino theory" was developed and popularized from the 1940s-1980s in the U.S. as we waged our global struggle (perhaps 'capitalist jihad' is also an appropriate term?) against the forces of international communism. During the late 1940s, as George Kennan developed our foreign policy of "containment," and the Korean War revved up, many Americans began to argue that the fall of a non-communist state to a communist revolution could/would precipitate similar events in neighboring countries in a given region - basically, one falling domino could set off the whole chain.

As it turns out, the American domino theory owes its intellectual heritage, at least in part, to the very ideology it was conceived to combat: Marxism. The concept of "revolutionary waves" is an essential part of classic communism, which predicts such events as an inevitable development in reaction to global capitalist exploitation.

And I'm sure that before there were communist theories of revolutionary waves, there were cruder observations among those charged with governance about the dangers that a successful insurrection in one nation might pose to neighboring countries. Perhaps a review of Machiavelli's "The Prince" would turn up some similar concepts, for example.

My purpose here, in briefly recounting the common intellectual history behind the Tunisia Effect/Domino Theory/Revolutionary Wave theory, is to wonder whether IR theorists (especially realists, who tend to dominate the intellectual landscape of poli-sci in the U.S., at least) might be able to escape this pattern of redundantly renaming the same concept by simply acknowledging the basic power of example.

In effect, I'm echoing Noam Chomsky, whose critique of "domino theory" itself ran along the same lines. Chomsky presciently observed that American theorists voiced much concern and negativity over the domino effect when it related to communism, but seemed enthusiastic and positive about the domino effect if it could be extended instead to democratic revolutions, which were obviously much more in line with U.S. interests around the world. Chomsky termed this positive domino theory the "threat of a good example," and indeed, his formulation of this dynamic seems most apt to what we're all witnessing in the Middle East today: The "good example" of a successful, minimally violent popular revolution in Tunisia has spurred similar events across the region.

In conclusion, what I would suggest is that IR theorists and observers simply dispense with the subjective normativity inherent in "good example," and begin to recognize that there is an actual, tangible geopolitical effect attributable to, simply, the power of example.

The realist school of theorists probably won't like this at all, apt as they are to dismiss the power of ideas in international relations, but I think this latest iteration of revolutionary waves in the Middle East really undermines the notion that a realist perspective can still be comprehensive. I mean, did the hard-power status-quo suddenly shift in Tunisia and all of these other Middle East states all at the same time, somehow? If not, then how do realists account for the revolutionary wave/domino effect we're all seeing?

I might go further and theorize that this effect has been greatly enhanced by the various dynamics of globalization (information freedom and speed, et cetera). It seems to me that if IR theorists of all stripes want to correctly perceive the dynamics at play in their field today, they need to begin to acknowledge the power of example and start to learn much more about it.

If Tunisia was the example that led to these other events, was it alone sufficient, or were other conditions necessarily in place to spur the wave we're seeing now? What other aspects of a nation or region (regime type, economic model, culture, etc.) have a cross-cutting effect on this dynamic, or work to undermine the power of example across borders? Are there regions, like the Middle East, that are especially apt to be affected by example, or are there regions that, conversely, are not likely to experience them?

I think these kinds of questions will prove vital for illuminating a dynamic that, until now, the world of IR has apparently been content to simply keep renaming as it crops up again and again across time and geography.

Random Roundup

2011-02-17T14:34:00.000-05:00

Brevity is the soul of wit...

DownwithTyranny: Predictably, just as Central Florida FINALLY gets ready to start constructing a rail system, governor-tard Rick Scott gives it a big thumbs down, and in the process basically loses any shot at winning another term. Have fun savoring all that I-4 traffic, Orlando, and enjoy all that horrible press, Gov. Scott!

RollingStone: Journo-monster Matt Taibbi reports on what is essentially an exception to the justice system built specifically for Wall Street. Yves Smith seconds Matt's incredible observations at Naked Capitalism.

Newshoggers: Bahrain is blowing up just like Egypt, and Nick Kristoff is watching it all go down.

NPR: Mark Memmott reports on the Pentagon's new aerial spy - a faux hummingbird.

CreditWritedowns: Ed Harrison observes that Google is feeling some "Bing sting." By the way, check out Blekko if you haven't had a chance, yet - a Google-killer in the making?

AlJazeera: Anonymous is now apparently producing content - and on AJ, no less! Be afraid, MSM - be very afraid.

I'm Back Roundup

2011-02-13T23:02:00.000-05:00

After a short hiatus to recover my spirits...

Geeokosystem: Bill O'Reilly stupid conundrums meme - love it!

Boston.com: MIT grad installs beer-waste energy machine at Magic Hat Brewery.

SI: Vintage and therefore possibly offensive Injun-themed Valentines.

Crazy Time Roundup

2011-02-03T13:44:00.001-05:00

And then things got weird...

TPM: Guns for everyone and driver's licenses for no one, hurray!!! Yay, Republican fantasyland!

CEPR: Maybe if the capitalist fatcats had a better grasp on, you know, capitalism, unemployment wouldn't be so high.

TPM: Pentagon admits billions in payments to fraudulent contractors, concludes "existing remedies sufficient" to deal with the problem. Nothing to see here folks, just more war-dollars being wasted.

Raw Story: Not all the 9/11 plotters died on the planes, apparently, as crack investigators in our homeland security establishment uncover new suspects a decade later...

BBC/HuffPo: Wall Street breaks pay records and Shell reports a doubling of profits over last year as the rest of the country resigns itself to long-term unemployment near double digits and a probable crisis in the near-future without meaningful financial reform. Two words: BANANA REPUBLIC.

Raw Story: But America isn't totally fucked economically, because we now have a near-monopoly on the world's oyster supply. Get them while they're not yet extinct, mother-shuckers!

Raw Story: And finally, WikiLeaks is nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize even as our government attempts to capture and prosecute those involved in the organization. We might live to see one Nobel Peace Prize winner sign a presidential assassination order for the murder of another - killer irony.

The Dream of the '90s is Alive...in Portland

2011-02-02T13:30:00.003-05:00

I'm A Blue-Collar Worker with a White-Collar Education Laboring in the "New Normal" of Low Wages, Temporary Gigs and Downward Mobility

2011-01-31T16:11:00.004-05:00

Economists are confused right now, which is to say there is a debate going on between them, about the state of the U.S. economy. On the one hand, corporate profits are again setting records, skyrocketing to historical highs just two years after many such firms essentially declared bankruptcy and asked the American people to bail them out. The meeting of international financiers and fatcats at Davos last week had an optimistic, even festive atmosphere, as corporate elites the world over congratulated each other on preventing global economic catastrophe (conveniently forgetting the fact that they CAUSED the potential meltdown in the first place).

Yet, on "Main Street," as the cliche goes, the economic situation looks starkly different. Unemployment remains stubbornly high, and the CBO says it will keep on this way for another five years at least. Those lucky ducks that do land jobs, like myself, must increasingly satisfy themselves with part-time and temporary positions, invariably offering lower pay, fewer benefits and much less job security than full-time, permanent jobs. Union membership is down throughout the private sector, further increasing corporate ability to push workers around and offer lower compensation.

In other words, it's quickly becoming clear that corporate profits are sky-high while worker wages are on the ground floor, sliding toward the basement. This economic dissonance is, in turn, helping to draw economists' attention to the HUGE wealth gap that now exists in America. In the past, rising corporate profits meant, cyclically, rising wages and job growth as companies employed workers to produce more and then paid them enough to actually consume the goods and services they were producing.

But as more and more astute economists are pointing out, the American corporations NO LONGER NEED AMERICAN CONSUMERS OR WORKERS. They can get cheaper labor outside the U.S., and increasingly, there is enough of an international market for consumption that they can sell their expensive products outside American borders, as well. All of this adds up to a situation in America that economists are now struggling to describe: Corporate elites getting even richer and fewer in number, while the ranks of the under- and unemployed swell with people whose incomes, even when they get a job, remain stagnant or decline.

All of this is a long way of explaining that there is not a cyclical or structural problem with our economy, but a deep-rooted institutional problem. A handful of white-skinned, white-collared executives in the financial industry have not only captured the economic soul of the nation (remember, this was the sector responsible for the vast majority of "growth" pre-meltdown), but the body politic, as well. Legislators are now captive to the whims of corporate America (Citizens United), as is the president and, increasingly, the courts.

Where there are important voices sounding the alarm for further, actual reform in American finance and politics, they are pooh-poohed and overlooked, or then threatened for their public service.

As a young, educated American worker who just finished a temp gig and is heading back into unemployment with over $40,000 in college debt, I've got to say I'm not too optimistic about my chances at upward mobility in America's future. I essentially envision a string of temporary, low-wage, low-benefit, even part-time jobs that I have to cobble together into a "career" with some sort of employment security and health and retirement benefits worked in there somehow on my own.

Union membership? Yeah, right. Loyal, 40-year career at one company with a gold wristwatch and a pension waiting for me at the end? I wish. The career outlook for any young college grad such as myself is simply different than in the past. My generation is staring at greater competition for what few salaried positions there are in this economy, and a decreasing quality of life in terms of what our wages will pay for.

This isn't to say I have no faith in the ability of myself and my peers to adapt to a new labor environment and play the hand we're dealt, so to speak, but it is to say that the picture is looking bleaker every year, especially since the fundamental problems with American finance and governance have yet to be addressed...

Old Media Deathwatch: Demand-Driven Journalism, or "Content Farming"

2011-01-27T16:20:00.001-05:00

I've noticed an uptick in media interest regarding a new pseudo-journalistic trend in the industry: demand-driven journalism, a.k.a. "content farming." The basic model is for a media company to offer low compensation to hordes of freelance, remote writers in exchange for highly searchable, niche articles about very specific or obscure topics, often from a "how-to" perspective, containing content that is not necessarily up to the standards of traditional journalism, but "good enough" for the small audience of interested viewers it is targeting. The media company receives a small, but almost certain, level of ad revenue from each of these, so that with enough of this content, a considerable profit is easily attainable, even if the content is low-quality and the workers are not well-compensated.

One example of such a company is Demand Media, which had an astoundingly successful IPO earlier this week that raised many eyebrows. Demand's flagship property, among many, is ehow.com, which is a source of thousands of popular how-to articles that rank highly in search engines, and thus produce considerable ad revenue even though they each target a very specific audience.

As the NY Post reported, Demand is somewhat amazingly now valued around the same level as the New York Times, the very embodiment of traditional journalistic excellence in America.

In terms of both the success of the business model and threat it poses to the quality of journalism in America, I'd say this content farming trend is a bit overhyped. First, the quality of Demand's content and what impact it makes on journalism and society are certainly open for debate, as this post from an Demand insider illustrates. When it comes to how-to articles, content farming might provide good-enough quality, but when content farms try to fill actual journalistic niches, like the hyperlocal reporting targeted by AOL's Patch network, the business model seems to be very tenuous indeed.

Moreover, even if Demand and other niche content farms see grand success in the short term, it's very questionable as to how long that will last for two reasons. First, search engines like Google are already responding to their consumers by attempting to filter out low-quality content in their results. Second, the number of how-to articles is sort of inherently limited, whereas the ability to comment and report on breaking news is inherently ongoing; in other words, you can only write so many how-to articles before you've pretty much described how to do everything, so Demand's growth potential seems to include a built-in ceiling.

Though the markets might seem exuberant over the moneymaking potential of content farms, serious consumers and purveyors of good journalism are much more skeptical of their utility, and there is reason to doubt the long-term viability of their business model, anyway. So don't buy all the hype - content farming may be just a passing, quasi-journalistic fad instead of a true threat to the old fourth estate.

Wealth Gap Roundup

2011-01-27T15:02:00.001-05:00

I'm starting to feel ironic whenever I walk into a Banana Republic...

Bad Subjects: Joe Natoli questions what leverage the masses have over the moneyed elites now that globalization has obviated the need to keep the American laboring class wealthy enough to sustain continuous consumption.

My short answer to your search for new leverage, Joe: WikiLeaks. As long as the fatcats rely on low-level paper monkeys (often young, hard-working idealists) to do the grunt work in their multinational corporations, law offices and lobbying/consulting firms, they'll be left open to leakage of their dirty deeds or exposure of their growing lack of concern for the plight of their less-fortunate countrymen.

The semi-public debate about WikiLeaks' implications for business transparency at this year's Davos meeting of capitalist bigwigs indicates that they themselves are realizing this. (More on this at Buzz Machine.) Plus, if leaks don't work effectively to check elite behavior, there's always the chance that good old-fashioned labor unions make a comeback and return some of the power to the people...

Wikipedia: In the above article, Natoli references the Gini coefficient, which is a simplified economic indicator of relative wealth inequality between countries (a value of 0 indicates total equality, while a value of 100 indicates total disparity with one person owning all the wealth in a country). The Wikipedia article on income inequality in the U.S. is well worth a read, including the section on our Gini coefficient. Here's some of the good stuff:

"According to the United Nations (UN), Gini index ratings for countries range from 24.7 in Denmark to 74.3 in Namibia. Most post-industrial nations had a Gini coefficient in the high twenties to mid thirties. The CIA estimates the US Gini index at 45,[44] and the UN placed the US Gini index rating at 40, in 2006[45].

Since the Census Bureau started measuring the Gini coefficient in 1967, it has risen by 20% for full-time workers and 18% for households. Among households, the index has risen from 39.7 to 46.9,[46] from 31.4 to 42.4 among men and from 29.8 to 35.7 among women.[47] According to Gini coefficient data, income inequality in the U.S., already among the highest in the post-industrial world,[17] has risen considerably between 1967 and 2005 among households[46] and individuals.[47]"

Emptywheel: A recent issue of Economist contained a special report devoted to the new global elite meme, in large part attempting to argue the for the legitimacy and list the benefits this new class of capitalists provides the rest of the world. Emptywheel correctly identifies that what's interesting about the Economist's special report is not so much the content of the apologies or justifications they offer for this elite class, but the fact that the Economist, which itself caters to the elites and those who aspire to join them, feels the need to supply its audience with arguments to sort of justify their own existence and lifestyle. EW's post is obviously worth reading in full, but it concludes:

"Now, I mapped this out not because it’s news (the report is over a week old) or because we haven’t heard these myths before. But I find it interesting that an outlet like the Economist–with its audience of the aspiring elite–feels the need to respond to rising concerns about inequality by trying to wrap up the looters in a myth that they’re the smart, self-made people who not only positively affect the world just by nature of who they are, but also bring business and philanthropy benefits.

This is they myth they’re going to use to justify their pillaging of the world."

Palin-Free February Misses the Point, But I'm Onboard Anyway

2011-01-27T12:09:00.002-05:00

Dana Milbank has declared a "Palin-free February" (PFF) for himself, and challenged several other mainstream pundits and bloggers to do the same. He frankly admits the addiction of the MSM to Palin caused by her ability to generate clicks and views.

Let me start out by saying I'm all for PFF and will be jumping on the bandwagon today with The Daily Taylor. I strongly encourage other bloggers to join myself, AverageBro, Democratic Daily and others in boycotting this bear-loving bimbo.

Yet, I have to argue that PFF does miss the fundamental point when it comes to media coverage of Mama Grizzly, at least in my mind. My problem with media coverage of Palin is not necessarily its frequency, but its perspective, or lack thereof.

Influential journalists and pundits routinely treat her as though she is a legitimate and plausible contender for the highest office in this land, when in fact she is much closer to an Ann Coulterish, celebrity-seeking demagogue with very little in the way of serious political training or experience. Half a term as governor of Alaska does not a presidential candidate make, and its the failure of those in the media to acknowledge this simple fact in the way they report on her that really irks me and a lot of my fellow citizens who expect a bit more intellectual clout AND political experience out of a leader of the free world, like Steven Colbert.

So I'd say Milbank's portrayal of Palin as a politically irrelevant guilty pleasure is an accurate and telling one, but I'd also second the harsher criticism meted out to both the sycophantic media and Palin herself in Ross Douthat's article on the same topic:

"To the media: Cover Sarah Palin if you want, but stop acting as if she’s the most important conservative politician in America. Stop pretending that she has a plausible path to the presidency in 2012. (She doesn’t.) Stop suggesting that she’s the front-runner for the Republican nomination. (She isn’t.) And every time you’re tempted to parse her tweets for some secret code or crucial dog whistle, stop and think, this woman has fewer Twitter followers than Ben Stiller, and then go write about something else instead.

To Palin: You were an actual politician once (remember that?), but you’re becoming the kind of caricature that your enemies have always tried to make of you. So maybe it’s time to turn off your iPad for a while, and take a break from Facebook and Fox News. The world won’t end if you don’t respond to every criticism, and you might even win a few more admirers if you cultivated a lighter touch and a more above-the-fray persona. Oh, and when that reality-TV producer sends you a pitch for “Sarah Plus Five Plus Kate Plus Eight,” just say no."

This topic is hot right now, as you'd imagine, so for more reactions, check out Andrew Sullivan's remarks and the counter-reaction from "U.S. for Palin" (written by the Examiner's "National Sarah Palin Examiner," Lori Calabrese, no less - hahahahaha).

DHS Fears Outcry Over Domestic Drones; Ignores 4th Amendment Conflict

2011-01-26T15:32:00.000-05:00

Sackerman reports that DHS officials are less enthusiastic about domestic drone surveillance than they seemed in the past, apparently due to worries about public outcry and condemnation of an organization that is already none to popular with the masses for instituting gate rape and the like.

This is good news at first, but bad news when you think about it a little more. Okay, so the good news is that, in the short term, American citizens won't be under surveillance (at least from the feds; local and state police are a different story entirely) when we're at an open-air concert or a political rally or some other public gathering in open space.

The bad news is that no mention is made of the more basic conflict that these technologies present with the U.S. Constitution. Even a very generous reading of the 4th Amendment would no doubt find random flyovers of public space by surveillance drones to be "unwarranted search" actions. This suggests that the utility of drone systems in a domestic context is inherently limited, not so much by public willingness to accept them, but a basic legal right not to be spied upon constantly and without justification by one's government.

There have already been test cases (most involving marijuana grow operations, coincidentally) establishing some baseline standards for drone use in a more specific context, like when the police want to raid a private residence to make specific arrests or seizures.

Here's part of the conclusion from Spencer's post:

"[DHS has] set up Community Perceptions of Technology panels, Doherty said, inviting civil-rights, civil-liberties and privacy groups to figure out whether new detection technology will earn public acceptance."

This is what really troubles me. If DHS thinks it is limited in its domestic spying only by the attitudes or perceptions of the public, then logically, it will simply wait until another attack or event occurs that sufficiently scares the populace into accepting these new drone "protectors" hovering above them in public.

DHS needs to recognize that it is fundamentally and permanently limited from deploying these sorts of technologies on their own citizens by the U.S. Constitution, not the whim of public opinion. If not, as I said before, this good news (and DHS's reluctance to spy on us) will surely only be temporary...

Republicans Today: Spoiled Brats and Sore Losers

2011-01-26T12:59:00.000-05:00

It occurs to me that the past two years of Republican obstructionism, unprecedented in its obstinacy and breadth, reveals a simple fact about the Republican Party: they're just spoiled brats and sore losers!

Republicans were on top of the world when G.W. was president, and he gave them pretty much anything and everything they asked for (spoiled brats). Then, over the course of eight years of blatant mismanagement and incompetence, the country turned away from them in a landslide, electing a young, principled reformer to the presidency, which they apparently thought they had finally locked up for good (sore losers).

Now, unwilling to concede the reality that most of America judged their party unfit to rule, Republicans are also unwilling to cooperate in any manner or measure with the man they view as some kind of repudiatory nemesis. They're essentially saying, "Oh yeah, America? You want to hurt our feelings and not keep us entrenched in power? Well, then we're going to make sure whoever IS in power is such a failure that you'll come crawling back to us begging for us to take over again."

This explains the knee-jerk obstructionism that is the default position of any Republican congressperson today. If a piece of legislation could lead to some sort of benefit or progress on an issue that Obama might be able to take credit for, Republicans now have a duty to stall, delay, deny or otherwise frustrate it as much as possible. They're thinking: "Fuck the American people. This is about who it's always been about: US, the REPUBLICANS. We're the best and the richest and the whitest. We're the true, historic soul of this country and we're not going to relinquish our death grip on power in the face of a changing nation and a changing world."

But guess what, Republicans. Despite the best efforts of Socialist/Marxist/Nazi Obama and his evil progressive base, you are still in power and your nation still needs you to not act insane in order for it to keep functioning. Your blind denial and rejection of anything that comes out of the mouth of Barack Obama continues to usher the very country you claim to love so much towards the political and economic abyss. And the violence-inciting invective you spew forth via your Tea Party rabble and your paid-for pundit-shills threatens to undo the fabric of American community much faster than sex, drugs or rock and roll ever will.

So stop being spoiled brats and sore losers, if you are actually able, and please, please try to think of some actual ideas of your own about how to move this country forward. Because regardless of what you do, it is moving forward.

Miscellaneous Roundup III

2011-01-25T15:12:00.000-05:00

Various and sundry items...

The Aussie: Australia is laughing at us for taking religion so seriously. I like Australia. (Sidenote, the article goes into stark detail about the need to cater to Middle American demographics for national TV events, which is kind of interesting and sad.)

MSNBC: "The Body" sues to protect yours.

NPR: A few weeks back, I linked to a story detailing a major shift in Atlantic currents, with concomitant weather effects, et cetera. Now biologists are seeing changes in fish populations along our Eastern Seaboard, as well, due to this apparently periodic shift known as the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, or AMO.

This illustrates how little we still understand about the interconnections and relationships between various elements of our environment - ocean currents, weather, marine life patterns. We have a lot to learn. My secret theory is that the plant is much more resistant to climate change, or any man-made effects, than we currently give it credit for.

First Draft: Athenae at her bastard-crushing best. Republicans will literally watch poor American children go without breakfast at schools in order to "reduce the size of government." They are, by and large, despicable.

WaPo: Up in the sky - it's a bird! It's a plane! It's DHS unreasonably searching you via drone helicopter?!?!

NYT: SECSTATE Clinton schleps back over to Mexico to reconfirm American support for the war on drugs. In related news, former Mexican President Vicente Fox now believes all drugs should be legalized.

It's weird how these leaders figure out the solution after they've left office. It's like they're pressured to maintain the status quo while they're in office, somehow...as though a more powerful neighbor to their north is goading and cajoling them to continue the failed campaign of violence that continues to drag their nation into criminal chaos.

SOTU: Please Don't Talk about Jobs (Updated 1/27)

2011-01-25T14:38:00.001-05:00

BBC reports that President Obama will focus his SOTU speech tonight on jobs. I just want to say, Mr. President, please don't.

I'm still totally confused by the unquestioned political consensus that the government, all of a sudden, is supposed to be the job-creation engine of this country. Is there another New Deal coming around the bend that I haven't heard about? That was the last time the government actually created jobs on a massive scale, and something tells me Republicans, even though they say their "number one priority is jobs," are not going to allow Obama to even boost infrastructure investment by a moderate amount, let alone propose a massive government hiring spree.

So what the hell are you going to talk about, then, Barry? How much we all need jobs and love jobs and wish we had jobs? I mean, beyond standing in front of America and spewing more hot air about how the government is focused on job creation, there really isn't anything you can do because, guess what, THE GOVERNMENT IS NOT THIS COUNTRY'S JOB-CREATOR. THAT IS THE PRIVATE SECTOR. That's why your main job-creating initiative so far was to hire the current G.E. CEO to (for real this time) figure out how the government can create jobs.

You're literally bringing the private sector into the public sector to teach the public sector how to do what the private sector is supposed to do. Does anyone else not see how frustratingly contradictory all of this is? Am I taking crazy pills? When did the U.S. government become the private sector?

Update: HOORAY!!! The Prez actually didn't talk about jobs very much! Nate Silver observed:

"One of the bigger chances that he took in the speech was in projecting an optimistic tone, and in going three-quarters of the way toward declaring victory over the recession while about 14 million Americans remain out of work, according to the Department of Labor’s conservative definition of unemployment."

Rick Scott Already Creating Jobs...for His Campaign Minions

2011-01-25T12:03:00.001-05:00

And...there it is. Like clockwork, Rick Scott upholds the time-honored American political tradition of doling out important positions in state government to inveterate campaign staffers as rewards for their electoral efforts. I congratulate Christine Jordan Sexton and Gary Fineout for some fine, hard-nosed journalism that won't win them any favors at the offices of the guvnah. This is what you voted for, Floridians. Enjoy the nepotistic ride.

In related news, here's a hilarious update to yesterday's post about Florida's immigration dilemma. It seems as though Florida's law against hiring illegals, despite being on the books for over a decade, has not been enforced A SINGLE TIME.

Not once have Florida's businessmen faced sanctions for employing undocumented workers, which makes sense because, as I said yesterday, when one of the biggest businesses in Florida is growing citrus fruit, cheap agricultural labor is a very desirable benefit, not something to be restricted or cracked down on, even if it IS against the law.

I especially liked this response from Michael Ramage (general counsel to Florida Department of Law Enforcement) "speculating" about why the law hasn't been enforced:

"Why hasn't the statute been used?

'There's probably little time and little resources for law enforcement to proactively go and scope out employers and see if they're in violation of this law,' Ramage speculated."

Yeah, Mike, that's it. There's just been no time for anyone in any of Florida's various police forces to have ever, even once, investigated a single business for this infraction, ever. Right. It's not the monstrous profit motive from powerful businessmen who use undocumented immigrants for their cheap labor and their lack of employee protections. That's not what's prevented enforcement of this law. It's just the issue of time.

And if you buy that one, I have very nice bridge to sell you...

Bad News Roundup

2011-01-24T11:52:00.000-05:00

Reasons not to be complacent...

USAToday: The Supreme Court is losing impartiality, or at least the appearance of it. I watch, dismayed, as moneyed elites continue to stretch their golden tentacles into every branch of my government.

NYT: Public universities are now relying more on tuition than state funds, which undermines that whole "provision of a public good" mission that they were on. I guess they'll have to switch purposes to "make as much money as possible," which is now the default reason for all American institutions to exist.

HuffPo: For-profit colleges are suing the government to avoid regulation. Looks like they've hoodwinked enough of you idiots out there that they've earned enough money for some good old-fashioned American litigatin'!

When you think about it, America has schools for the rich and smart (Ivy League), the poor and smart (state schools), and the poor and dumb (CCs and vocational schools) - so why no schools for the rich and dumb? I mean, the Ivy League has been suffering with these wealthy idiots for too long. I think for-profit schools fill their niche perfectly. I say keep them around and, as the rich tend to prefer, totally unregulated! That way the rich and dumb can "earn" their degrees just as they normally do (via cash payments) without dragging down the academic quality of good schools in the process.

WonkRoom: Republicans, who LOVE putting holds on nominees for federal agency positions in order to prevent the Obama administration from achieving anything, ever, have continued that trend with Joseph Smith, nominee for the Federal Housing Finance Agency. In particular, Repubs don't want Mr. Smith coming to Washington because they assert he will allow Fannie and Freddie to write down mortgages for those homeowners who are underwater (translation: allow readjustment of amounts owed by people who currently owe more than their houses are worth).

Basically, it's standard Republican policy of protect the lenders, bankers, or whatever institution has the money and power to help Republicans in politics, while ensuring there's no forgiveness or leniency for the individual citizens caught up in institutional meltdowns. You get what you voted for, America. Nice job choosing leaders in that last election! (I'm mocking you, America. You obviously made horrible choices almost across the board in 2010, which makes me also think you might not pick up on my sarcasm and necessitates this comment.)

Attytood: Will Bunch is right that the scary-sophisticated backpack bomb left at an MLK march in Spokane got short shrift from the mainstream media. In fact, gazing at C&L's list of anti-liberal or anti-government terrorist acts since 2008, I don't remember many of these showing up as large news stories at all.

Plus, I don't remember a single instance of any sort of attack on a conservative movement, group, event, et cetera. Maybe instead of snooping around Muslim communities looking for terrorists, the FBI/DHS/CIA/law enforcement should focus on groups like this?

Florida's Undocumented Workers Benefit from Inherent Contradiction in Scott's Immigration Assault

2011-01-24T11:09:00.004-05:00

In the Palm Beach Post yesterday, Dara Kam published a short article describing the dilemma that Florida's agriculture commissioner, Adam Putnam, is caught in.

On one hand, Putnam's serving a new governor, Rick Scott, who campaigned on copying Arizona's "show-me-your-papers" immigration law for Florida, and who apparently aims to keep that promise. On the other hand, Mr. Putnam believes that, "driving away undocumented farm laborers would create an employment hole that no one else would fill," a position supported by citrus growers, who claim Americans won't fill empty agricultural jobs.

Of course, this last position is utter bullshit, as anyone who understands the free market immediately realizes, because labor, like supply, rises to meet demand. What Putnam and the growers are really worried isn't that the jobs won't be filled; it's that the wage they have to pay to "real American" fruit-pickers might end up higher than what they're paying illegals to do the same work right now.

To me, this issue is a clear illustration of conservative principles conflicting with conservative profits. Conservative principles dictate that illegal immigration be strictly enforced, with all undocumented or illegal residents in the U.S. facing deportation and real Americans getting all their jobs back. But conservative profit motive (in this case, that of the citrus-growing industry in my home state) dictates that the cheap, easy-to-replace labor of illegal immigrants be sustained to keep payrolls low-cost and low-maintenance, despite the fact that it's not legal.

Poor Adam Putnam now has to be the decider, and chances are he'll be taking heat no matter which way he breaks. The harsher he is on the Hispanics, the more dissatisfied his constituents in the citrus-growing industry are going to be, since their artificially cheap labor force will be threatened. The more he pushes back against his boss, Rick Scott, the more tenuous his own job becomes.

As I see it, Mr. Putnam has to somehow convince Mr. Scott now, behind closed doors of course, that a good part of Florida's moneymaking activity takes place thanks to undocumented workers, so a harsh Arizona copycat law would be a serious monkey wrench in the Sunshine State's economic engine.

It will be interesting to see whose position softens on this one, but I'm betting Scott and Putnam aren't going to stare down the citrus growers and demand immigration law. Especially since he ran a starkly pro-business campaign, Scott is now hostage to the dominant Florida industries like citrus, and thus hostage to the very undocumented workers he's trying to eradicate. See how hard it is to govern when you're a conservative? at some point, profit tends to contradict principle.

Random Roundup: Politics, Economics, Miscellaneous

2011-01-20T15:49:00.001-05:00

I've got no way to tie these together, but they're all pretty interesting...

Politics

DWR: For sanity's sake, can we stop it with the knee-jerk political reaction against anything remotely resembling a "drug?" How in the world do Andean farmers chewing coca leaves in South America threaten the United States? Apparently, our officials believe it might "weaken the integrity" of the U.N. drug convention in question if chewed coca leaves were redefined.

But the "integrity" they are intent on preserving, and the entire paradigm behind making largely harmless drugs illicit and "waging war" upon their users, are both entirely based in denial. U.S. officials literally cannot bring themselves to acknowledge the incontestable REALITY that drugs are commonly used every day in a responsible manner by citizens of pretty much every country around the world, and that public health or legalization policies are obviously better ways to mitigate their harms than violent, unprincipled crusades against individuals involved in a social and economic activity that existed long before our country's laws did. It's not worth preserving the integrity of a perspective based on denial, and that's exactly why officials are taking so much criticism for their mindless anti-drug paranoia.

Economist: I see better news when it comes to Cuba policy, however, as Obama encourages the gradual hatchet-burying going on between the U.S. and the communist island nation. As in much of government policy, tragic ironies abound in this issue. For instance, probably the most effective way to turn Cuba from a communist to a market economy would have been, and still will be, to trade with them, rather than force them to sustain themselves economically via embargo. Over time Cuba would probably have become dependent on the U.S. for at least some key goods, and that would have given us political leverage to combat communist policies or rights violations.

Another irony is that the main group still opposed to the inevitable thaw in U.S.-Cuban relations are predominantly those Cubans who escaped the most repressive days of Cuba's government and now reside as expatriates in the U.S. Because of their venomous hatred of the Castros, they apparently cannot abide any U.S. relations with their former homeland until the government over there gets changed.

Again, if they truly desired a free and democratic Cuba, they would be pushing FOR the removal of the embargo because economic ties lead to closer cultural and political ties, which means the more widespread and effective introduction of American democratic values in Cubans at all levels. But at least Obama is pragmatic enough to see the potential benefits of a thaw, and I'm excited to see what a new era in Cuban-American relations could portend.

IPS: Obama faces a litmus test of his adminstration's willingness to arbitrate fairly in the Middle East peace process in the U.N., where a resolution condemning Israel's illegal settlements in occupied territories could soon see a vote. Many former officials and FP experts are urging Obama not to veto the resolution, as a staunchly pro-Israel America would customarily do, in order to preserve "American credibility" in the region.

I completely agree, and I think it will be intriguing to see what happens if the resolution does come up. After essentially giving the finger to American and international calls to halt the settlement building last year, Israel has given Obama plenty of reason to be less than supportive on this matter. With the political cover for such a move hot off the presses will Obama finally show us all some strategic spine?

Economics

Naked Capitalism: Ed Harrison confuses me with his excellent post today summarizing the state of American corporatocracy. We seem to both agree that there are huge, fundamental problems in both the government and private sector, if not the basic field of economics, that were exposed during the recent crises. Harrison quotes a number of pessimists with similar views about the many problems the country is faced with, but then wraps things up by noting that pretty much all of them, as well as himself, look forward to the next year with "cautious optimism."

What a non sequitor! You've all agreed that the country is facing serious, persistent economic decline without fundamental reforms and economic rethinking, yet you're all CAUTIOUSLY OPTIMISTIC???!!! Bill Gross, for example, essentially admits that political, judicial and economic power has largely been captured by the people in corporations:

"Corporations are probably at the peak of their domination. They dominate versus labor in terms of their ability to export jobs and production overseas. They dominate now in terms of Washington, given the Republican electoral victory and the Obama administration’s moving toward the center.

They even dominate with regard to the Supreme Court, as evidenced by the recent ruling removing limits on corporate donations to election campaigns. This is all good for the market, but not for Main Street in the long run." [Italics mine]

How do you not realize that Main Street IS THE MARKET (or at least the market that we, the schmucks living on Main Street, should be primarily concerned with). Economists keep looking at corporate profits or private sector "growth" statistics and saying the outlook isn't that bad - in fact, they're cautiously optimistic - but AT THE SAME TIME, they are astute enough to observe that we haven't fixed the basic flaws that led to the last crisis, and so we are inevitably headed for another one at some point.

They still fail to see how private profits DO NOT NECESSARILY mean higher living standards for everyone when those profiting are avoiding tax payments on a massive scale, refusing to spend money on their existing employees or to hire new ones, lowering, rather than raising wages, and continuing to outsource their labor out of America. Economists, stop taking your cues on the economy from the balance sheets of massive companies and take a look at how well the economy is doing on any other metric than private-sector profit. Your analysis might then start to make a lot more sense.

Ed Cone: Hat tip to Ed for snipping this amazing segment from Colbert about striking positive outcomes from the socioeconomic integration of public schools. Isn't it weird how failing schools suddenly start to turn around when rich kids are sent there?

Miscellaneous

Politico: NFL players stage a publicity stunt on the Hill to pressure the owners and get out ahead of what will no doubt be a red-hot sports topic throughout the spring and summer. My prediction: No real danger of a lockout when the NFL means so much economic activity every Sunday across the country. Congress is hesitant to jump in now, but wait until they start getting calls from lobbyists for every local restaurant/bar/delivery place in a city with a team. If no deal is struck when fall rolls around, we'll see how that tune changes...

Economist: Delivering renewable energy to solar panels on vehicles via a remote laser, allowing theoretically unlimited traveling time with no refueling? That is SO FREAKING COOL.

WaPo: Russia develops a gateway drug theory when it comes to beer and alcohol because they're too corrupt and in denial to simply enforce the restrictions they already have on the books. This seems like a case study in how systemic corruption prevents social progress. When those who profit from a socially harmful activity are powerful enough to ensure it continues unrestricted, society continues to suffer the harms and a few liquor magnates continue to capture all of the economic benefit.

Miller-McCune: Finally, a very interesting study emerges from UCLA claiming to illustrate a much more powerful altruism tendency in the average person than is typically assumed by government, economists, and the rest of the Hobbesians. Moreover, the study demonstrates that this tendency can easily be encouraged and cultivated, given the right social cues and incentives.

Obviously, this sort of theorizing could lead to support for social engineering on some level, which is initially a scary thought. But Lynn Stout is doing some excellent sociological investigating, and her results have potential turn a lot of really basic assumptions in a lot of major academic fields on their heads. In a lot of ways today, the U.S. government already socializes us to be individualistic and self-sufficient, entrepreneurial and even selfish.

If some of those incentives and policy mechanisms were simply reversed to encourage more socially beneficial behavior, I don't see any reason that would fundamentally degrade or undermine American democracy or society. In fact, I think it would certainly strengthen equality across the land at a time when divisiveness, social atomization, and the virtue of selfishness largely rules supreme.

Breaking News: Corporations May Not Have YOUR Best Interests at Heart (P2)

2011-01-20T12:00:00.002-05:00

Clyde Prestowitz apparently hit a corporate nerve with yesterday's article on GE's newly announced joint venture to supply Chinese airplane makers with high-tech avionics (airplane electronics systems). Prestowitz cocked a metaphorical eyebrow at GE's apparent about-face regarding partnering with state-owned Chinese firms.

Clyde notes that GE CEO Jeff Immelt recently complained about Chinese partners simply wanting to steal GE technology and vowed to bring more GE investment back to the States. Obviously, the recent announcement of this new joint venture contract belies those statements, and Prestowitz thinks he knows why:

"So what's going on? GE's Vice Chairman John G. Rice put it bluntly in commenting on the fact that China is expected to buy $400 billion of airplanes over the next twenty years: 'We can participate in that or sit on the sidelines. We're not about sitting on the sidelines.'"

Apparently, the potential Chinese market share and profit to be made look sweet enough to G.E. to offset the implicit technology transfer that will take place under the contract. Prestowitz concludes his article by correctly reasoning that the attractiveness of the Chinese manufacturing market, therefore, allows China to make access to it contingent on conditions American companies wouldn't normally accept, like tacitly allowing their technology to be copied.

In the comments section of Prestowitz's post, however, GE's manager for media relations, Rick Kennedy, strenuously objects. He claims Prestowitz's article is "playing with the facts" and "grounded in numerous inaccuracies," but doesn't specify any of them. Rather, he tries to distract from the point by launching into a PR spiel about all the wonderful jobs GE is "creating globally, including hundreds of jobs in the U.S., U.K. and China." (Wow, HUNDREDS of jobs across?! That will really put a dent in the MILLIONS of unemployed people.)

After he gets through his list of the economic virtues of the GE avionics business, Kennedy does briefly address the substance of Prestowitz's critique. He claims that:

"GE and AVIC have agreed to significant compliance safeguards as part of the deal, to protect the GE and JV technology. GE will control compliance within the JV, with a permanent GE CEO, Compliance Officer and Compliance Committee, which will exercise the power of the Board of Directors."

Of course, in order to believe this rebuttal, one must put some faith in the rigor and incorruptibility of the GE compliance department. For me, the jury's still out on that one - if GE has had tech "expropriated" by state-owned partners in the past, I see no reason to believe it absolutely could not happen now. Kennedy gives me none beyond a basic assertion that "we know what we're doing, trust us."

In any case, Kennedy probably could have done without this snarky and rather unprofessional conclusion:

"GE Aviation has long operated in a complex global economy that you apparently don't understand. You act as if GE has created the first significant joint venture between AVIC and a U.S. aerospace company.

Where on Earth have you been?"

Yes, Clyde Prestowitz, how DARE you question the business savvy or allegiance to U.S. interests of a mighty multinational corporation (MNC)? Let GE take care of its own business and stop sticking your journalistic nose into it! The American people don't need to consider whether the economic activities of giant, global corporations might not be in their national interest - such things are best left to those actually employed by the corporations, as well as the paid shills they routinely rotate through various government agencies.

Ultimately, Prestowitz's article is not as noteworthy for the story he's looking into as the haughty response it has received from GE. Kudos to Clyde for questioning the policy implications of MNC actions; companies like GE might have to hire a lot more (and better) PR people if the American media wake up to the fact that they're not really American companies anymore.

P.S. I wonder if Rick Kennedy has a team of young, underpaid intern monkeys waking up at dawn to scour Foreign Policy for bad publicity to "get out in front of." I'd guess yes.

Rapid Roundup II

2011-01-18T16:15:00.001-05:00

Today's second helping of mind munchies...

ConnLawTribune: Another day, another serious group concludes that marijuana legalization is the way to go.

BBC: More ex-Taliban switch sides and join the coalition, this time in the north of Afghanistan. That's two stories I've found on possible Afghan awakenings in the last couple weeks - I bet the next time you see this reported in the MSM, it will be characterized as an "emerging trend."

Philosopher's Beard: PB argues that the whole field of economics is suffering a crisis in the West due to the fact that it couldn't predict or avoid the global financial meltdown. I very much agree that economists would do well to revisit their basic methods and assumptions, as I think many are realizing that reality is a lot less "ideal" than they thought it was, and are turning to denial and opportunism in distress.

Global Elite versus Global Underground - This Round Goes to Rudolf

2011-01-18T14:25:00.002-05:00

If you give the people a chance, at least some of them will fight back.

That's the message reinforced yesterday by former Swiss banker Rudolf Elmer when he bravely handed over two data disks full of information on secret Swiss bank accounts to Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. Elmer claims he has implicated over 2,000 prominent people and companies in major tax evasion with this data, saying, "The man on the street needs to know how this system works."

It is no coincidence that this development occurs as certain media in the U.S. and other Western countries finally start reporting on the rise of a "global elite" class living a largely multinational existence above and beyond the borders or laws of any one nation.

If Elmer's former clients are the global elite - multinational executives, celebrities, kleptocrats, military industrialists - then WikiLeaks and its Anonymous supporters in the ether are the "global underground" - hackers, artists, academics, radicals - who are flexing their muscles in response to the elite's outsized influence over those in the military, the government and the mainstream media.

The elite continue to develop and expand a wide variety of methods, or tools, to control you, the mindless, interchangeable meat cogs they share the planet with - the PATRIOT act and massive expansion of domestic spying and surveillance, the proliferation of unmanned drones, the whitewashing of the fundamental cause of the global financial meltdown (financiers have no idea what they are doing, but they're using computers to do it really, really fast), the capture of the legislative branch through aggressive lobbying and unlimited campaign donations (Citizens United), legalistic limbo in the form of Guantanamo Bay, the encouragement of paranoia and hysteria through propaganda "news" outlets (Fox), the mining of our personal data via social media, telecommunications, medical and business records, and the list goes on and on.

WikiLeaks, miraculously, can serve as a counterweight to every single one of these, as well as almost every other conceivable method diabolically devised by global elites to consolidate their power and confuse the masses. How? Because it allows us, the very insignificant meat cogs needed by elites to power their huge, profit-generating multinational machines, to check those same machines that we're embedded in. Because elites depend on ordinary citizens, in some cases members of the underground, to work for them, at a basic level they are always susceptible to being checked by whistle-blowers in their own organizations. The bigger they get, the more potential whistle-blowers they are employing. WikiLeaks alone makes this natural check on elite power possible.

The significance of Rudolf Elmer's actions may be to remind the world that, given a fair opportunity free of the threat of retribution, normal people will act against evil where they see it. But the significance of WikiLeaks, Anonymous, and the rest of the global underground is their provision of that essential opportunity itself. By allowing citizens, at a grassroots level, the chance to publicize the evil that even their own organizations might be committing, the global underground has already begun to respond to the global elite and rebalance wealth and power between the classes in Western society.

THIS is why I'm such a vocal proponent of the mission and methods of WikiLeaks. THIS is why I believe it's such a vital organization for the maintenance of modern democracy in the face of elite consolidation of control. THIS is why we all must consciously defend WikiLeaks, for it is, in the end, our ultimate weapon against the insidious, creeping plutocracy we see engulfing this land.

Slow Day but not a Snow Day

2011-01-18T09:27:00.000-05:00

A few random tidbits to munch on with your mind, all courtesy of Fark.com...

Caligula's Lost Tomb Found

Some Lady Tracks Down a Thief with Social Media

A College Student Pays his Tuition with a Duffel Bag Full of Cash

MLK was Evidently Very Impressed By Connecticut

Rapid Roundup

2011-01-17T16:23:00.000-05:00

Three quick picks...

Atlantic: Chrystia Freeland continues the trend of media finally picking up on America's wealth chasm. She, like many, notes the rise of a global uber-class with even weaker loyalties to their proletarian countrymen than previous fatcats have had.

Boston.com: Another favorable review, after about a decade, of Portugal's decision to legalize all illicit drugs. Here's a striking quote:

"Coauthors [of a research study on Portugal's drug problem] Caitlin Elizabeth Hughes and Alex Stevens report a 63 percent increase in the number of Portuguese drug users in treatment and, shortly after the reforms took hold, a 499 percent increase in the amount of drugs seized — indications, the authors argue, that police officers, freed up from focusing on small-time possession, have been able to target big-time traffickers while drug addicts, no longer in danger of going to prison, have been able to get the help they need."

Popsci: I'm getting psyched for IBM's "Watson" supercomputer to take on a couple of Jeopardy champions next month. Word has it the cunning computer bested the champs in a short warm-up round last week. Go humans!

Uber-Roundup: Banks, China, Florida

2011-01-14T15:31:00.003-05:00

All other roundups shall bow before the might of this roundup...

BAD BANKS SECTION

BBC: JP Morgan reports a 47% profit increase in the fourth quarter of 2010 over last year. Great, so when is the private sector supposed to start hiring again? Have 50% profit increases given the markets enough "certainty" to employ people yet?

HuffPo: I bet the cretins at Bank of America are glad to see media criticism switching over to their cretin brethren at Citibank. SIGTARP (the Special Investigator General for the TARP program) has released a report detailing that Citi was only a week away from going out of business due to its terrible investments and lack of capital. Rather than engaging in thoughtful deliberation about whether or not to save this troubled titan, government officials essentially freaked out and immediately pulled the bailout lever. A quote from SIGTARP's report:

"Even so, the consensus to give Citigroup more taxpayer cash "appeared to be based as much on gut instinct and fear of the unknown as on objective criteria," according to the report. One FDIC official told SIGTARP that policy makers "made a judgment call" on the degree of Citigroup's importance to the entire fabric of the financial system.

More than three years later, such judgment calls persist. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who effectively oversaw Citigroup as the then-president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, told SIGTARP during an interview last month that it's not possible to create effective, objective criteria for evaluating the risk a financial firm poses to the system."

On top of the "judgment call" bailout it received, Citi may also have gotten preferential treatment from the SEC's enforcement director, Rob Khuzami, in a settlement deal it paid to atone for misleading investors and the public about its risk exposure to subprime markets. Shady, ill-conceived actions all around in this story - Fed officials, Citi executives, SEC regulators. This is your finance industry, America.

NYT: Simon Johnson points out that Goldman's vaunted report on changing its business standards misses the main point: it's too big to fail. In fact, he notes a section that seems to imply the opposite, claiming that size is a virtue Goldman consciously cultivates. For those who somehow still have faith in self-regulating markets, this should help clear away the remaining rubble of your beliefs that is left after the meltdown. Banks will come right out and say it: We know we're too big to fail AND WE LIKE IT.

CHINA SECTION

FP: At least one influential economist believes the Chinese economy overtook ours this year, after zipping by Japan's to become second-largest in the world last year. You can debate his methods of ascertaining this, but I think it's clear that America will soon fall from its "first-place" position on yet another major metric.

NYT Mag: In a masterpiece of equivocation and ambivalence, David Leonhardt argued last November that China needs to start converting its brand-new industrial economy into a consumer economy...or else. I only link to this piece to show how uncertain even the "experts" are about China. Here's one quote that is clearly belied by the preceding post:

"The United States, for all of our current problems, is still easily the world’s largest economy, which is partly because we made the transition from an industrial economy to a consumer economy." [Italics mine.]

The moral of the story: Don't put too much stock in U.S. China analysts. The country is still very opaque in terms of political decision-making, military policy (although the recent thaw with Sec. Gates is encouraging), and even basic statistical and demographic information.

Beijing Review: One fascinating economic and cultural connection between China and America is the construction of a new Disneyland park in Shanghai (there is already one in Hong Kong, off the mainland). This report predicts that Disneyland could be a major economic driver in Shanghai after the World Expo closes up shop, employing tens of thousands and improving transportation, tourism, property values, et cetera.

I have two thoughts. A) Concerning the need to boost domestic consumption in China, which is such a worry to Dave Leonhardt above and many other Western capitalists, I would think frivolous pursuits like Disneyland are a very welcome development. Disney represents, in many ways, an icon of American consumer culture, and the article linked above underlines the point that Disney is only the first major American entertainment company to gain access to mainland China.

Once the mainland is truly opened to American entertainment and advertising, if that happens, something tells me consumption won't be such a problem anymore. As soon as Madison Avenue gets its scheming mind around the Chinese consumer's psyche, I predict it will be peddling useless crap there just as well as it does here.

B) Since I grew up in Orlando, Florida, I have had a long, fruitful relationship with The Mouse, as he is known in those parts. I'll be very interested to see how Disney is adapted to China and how the Chinese adapt to Disney. Note the quote in the article from the 27-year-old who said his generation grew up on Disney." So maybe The Mouse won't bring much culture shock after all...

FLORIDA SECTION

Miami Herald: Rick Scott's first order of business as Florida's new governor was to "streamline" the state government, which apparently meant asserting his executive control over all state agencies and public contracts. Thirty minutes after taking the oath, he ordered all cabinet departments under his purview to submit any changes in their rules or regulations to his office for approval, and he also emailed departments not under his control and asked them to seek his approval on any such changes, as well.

Fortunately, since some department heads are directly elected in the Sunshine State rather than appointed by the governor, the response from at least some of those agencies not under Scott's legal purview to his executive power grab was, "No, thanks. We'll take care of our own rules and regulations." This is good news for state-level democracy in Florida, and very good news for liberal Floridians who should be rightly wary of Scott's aggressive drive to make Florida a corporate utopia.

St. Pete Times: Another dramatic Rick Scott power grab involves his mandate that all state contracts over $1 million receive his office's explicit approval, which immediately created a bottleneck of contracts awaiting his action. The Times published an editorial today criticizing the governor for holding up "hundreds of routine regulations" and "hundreds of millions in road projects." Together with the refusal of independent state agencies to voluntarily submit to his oversight, this bottleneck in governor's office highlights his political inexperience and makes for a shaky start in the new Scottland.

Orlando Sentinel: Scott is also intent on cutting state taxes and completely phasing out corporate income tax in Florida, despite the fact that the state is facing a $3.5 billion budget shortfall. The state senate president and a candidate for Bill Nelson's U.S. Senate seat in 2012, Mike Haridopolos, has floated major education cuts as the probable method to square that circle.

Hopefully new education adviser Michelle Rhee and others will find a way to reform, but not degrade, the state's education system without major wholesale cuts, but it seems likely that the short-term boost to Florida's schools as a result of Recovery Act money will be very short-term, indeed.

Cannabis Capitalism: Hey Big Business, Look Over Here!

2011-01-13T15:45:00.001-05:00

It always amazes me that Big Pharma continually ignores the incredible number of medical possibilities offered by various compounds found in cannabis. The smoked plant itself is medicinal in several ways (anti-nausea, appetite stimulant, analgesic, anti-anxiety, et cetera). But even beyond smoking a joint for medicinal purposes, the cannabis plant contains within it quite a few compounds that have shown significant promise in a multitude of controlled, scientific studies.

NORML has helpfully compiled a HUGE review of the medical literature on cannabis from 2000-2011 (keep in mind, that's just the last decade; they're ignoring the previous 50 years of research that occurred sporadically before 2000). Here's a key quote from their overview:

"A 2010 review by researchers in Germany reports that since 2005 there have been 37 controlled studies assessing the safety and efficacy of marijuana and its naturally occurring compounds, involved a total of 2,563 subjects. By contrast, most FDA-approved drugs go through far fewer trials involving far fewer subjects."

And just take a look at the list of ailments and conditions that cannabis has already been shown to have some effect on:

"This report seeks to provide this guidance by summarizing the most recently published scientific research (2000-2010) on the therapeutic use of cannabis and cannabinoids for 19 clinical indications:

* Alzheimer's disease
* Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
* Chronic Pain
* Diabetes mellitus
* Dystonia
* Fibromyalgia
* Gastrointestinal disorders
* Gliomas
* Hepatitis C
* Human Immunodeficiency Virus
* Hypertension
* Incontinence
* Methicillin-resistant Staphyloccus aureus (MRSA)
* Multiple sclerosis
* Osteoporosis
* Pruritus
* Rheumatoid arthritis
* Sleep apnea
* Tourette's syndrome"

I don't know what Pharma is doing with its thumb up its ass on this. They have here a wonder drug that could offer treatments for a huge range of conditions WITH VIRTUALLY NO LONG-TERM SIDE-EFFECTS AT ALL. Doesn't the pharmaceutical industry want to lobby for that huge market opportunity even just a little bit?

For that matter, doesn't Big Tobacco want to switch to selling a drug that DOESN'T KILL OFF ITS USERS? Where the fuck is the corporate backing on this thing? Legalization has been a grassroots issue for far too long, and the time is ripe for America to do what it does best - make some serious money off of a fucking amazing product. If even one major tobacco or pharma firm put its lobbying muscle behind the federal rescheduling of cannabis, it would be done tomorrow and America would be a much happier, less-violent, less-incarcerated place.

So what's the holdup, businessmen? Not enough cash on hand, yet? Not enough cheap, willing labor to harvest the fields? Not enough "certainty" in the markets? What's your excuse for leaving this gigantic business opportunity untouched?

Palin's Parrots

2011-01-13T11:00:00.001-05:00

How do you solve a problem like Sarah? IGNORE HER!

Intelligent observers of American politics abhor the rise of Sarah Palin as a politico-celebrity in this country. She's an airhead from a parallel Alaskan universe who represents, in many ways, the modern low point of American politics.

Unfortunately, the mainstream media ABSOLUTELY LOVE SARAH PALIN. They literally cannot and will not stop covering her every move, every tweet, every e-mail or video clip, all the while conveying the implicit message to the masses that this woman is actually a legitimate candidate for the highest office in our land.

Look, people, she's a half-term governor who quit the only significant political job she's ever had to pursue a celebrity career of TV shows, book deals and speaking appearances. That's not an opinion; that's a fact.

She's a classic populist demagogue who belongs in the category of Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Tucker Carlson, et cetera, NOT the category of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, et cetera. Her latest vapid pronouncement IS NOT NEWS, so stop breathlessly repeating it and "analyzing" it all over my television and Internet.

This advice goes double for bloggers, who I would expect to be more critical than the MSM when it comes to Palin's publicity grabbing. Why are you wasting effort even addressing her? Lump her in with the other die-hard conservative politico-celebs and maybe put her antics in a roundup, but for America's sake, STOP BEING PALIN'S PARROTS. She's sub-standard as a politician, if not a person, so just let her do her demagogue shtick and concentrate your coverage on important people.

Blog Showcase: Driftglass

2011-01-11T18:40:00.001-05:00

Sometimes you stumble upon a blogger whose writing is perfect for the genre - The anonymous Chicagoan currently posting as "Driftglass" is a prime example.

When I want pure venomous snark wittily marinated in liberal zeitgeist, Driftglass is the site I visit. He pulls no punches and accepts no excuses, skewering Republicans and their shills with biting words and hilarious images, such as Newt Jong-il and "Going Vague."

And what's more, if you read beyond his (justifiable) vitriol and (understandable) cynicism, Driftglass often makes some pretty incisive points about the way media and politics function in America. Maybe that's why he's getting more and more publicity for himself these days. He is an award-winner, after all.

And one other thing: I'd argue, somewhat counter to the current MSM worry-mongering about angry political rhetoric, some nice, non-violence-inciting invective is not only tolerable; it's downright democratically cathartic. If you're feeling pissed off at politicians and media minions, or just in need of a good laugh in spite of them, visit Driftglass's site or listen to his Professional Left podcast. And if you like him, donate to his work. He's definitely earning every penny.

Random Roundup

2011-01-10T15:19:00.000-05:00

Here's a collection of in-depth reporting on everything from the drug war to Chinese-American motherhood:

TomDispatch: Nick Turse reports on the plethora of bases the U.S. military maintains overseas.

Atlantic: Andrew Bacevich reports on the military-intelligence-industrial-legislative complex.

ICH: Eric Schlosser thoroughly describes America's prison-industrial complex.

MSNBC: Peter Stone and Michael Isikoff describe key donations to 2010 House Republican candidates by hedge fund moguls on Wall Street.

MetaMute: John Barker has posted a very provocative article on cocaine's role as a liquidity-enhancing bio-tool in First World capitalism. Also, the Faces of the Drug War campaign could turn out to be a watershed in pop culture regarding the drug war. I've got my fingers crossed.

WSJ: Amy Chua penned a provocative article arguing that Chinese parenting is superior to Western parenting. Don't know about that, but she does a good job of describing the differences in perspective.

Job Growth Gets Complicated

2011-01-07T16:09:00.000-05:00

Obama has started touting job growth as a trend after one better-than-expected month of numbers. Astute observers, however, make the excellent point that the jobs being grown happen to suck, so maybe this "trend" isn't so great after all:

"Did you hear the happy news? Dollar General stores will hire 6,000 people this year. Yes America, hiring is back!

Actually, curb the enthusiasm. This isn't the stuff that robust middle class recoveries are made of. According to Payscale.com, the Dollar General chain pays its assistant managers $9.22 an hour and store managers $11.51 an hour. Cashiers and sales associates make barely over minimum wage. We're talking about thousands of new jobs between $20,000 and $30,000 a year.

It's a sign of the times. Low-wage jobs, including everything from retail sales associates to home health aides, are the bread and butter of our employment boom, while middle income jobs are on the decline.

Among the top ten occupations projected to have the largest numerical growth in the next decade, seven pay median wages under $30,000 a year, including food preparers and servers earning $16,000, and retail and home care workers who make $20,000. Home aides and retail workers are expected to add about 1.4 million positions this decade while middle-class manufacturing jobs are projected to lose more than a million jobs."

Jill, over at Brilliant at Breakfast, has more.

Silver Lining for Florida Schools

2011-01-07T15:58:00.000-05:00

The ominous, gathering storm of pro-business conservatism that will be the Rick Scott administration in Florida has come with a silver lining in the form of Michelle Rhee, a no-nonsense, tough-skinned reformer who gained major credit and credibility in helping to turn many D.C. public schools around.

Scott just named her his "informal education adviser." I don't know what the deal is with that title, but hopefully the informality of her position isn't an obstacle preventing Rhee from implementing the kinds of reforms she pioneered in D.C. Her so-called "radical" reform scheme was essentially based on paying teachers A LOT more money (we're talking six figures) in exchange for imposing much more rigorous standards of accountability on them.

Rhee posted a short article outlining her expectations and vision for partnering with Gov. Scott on the website of her nonprofit, StudentsFirst. It will be interesting to see what kind of specific proposals she comes out with. The students of Florida certainly need them.

Republi-FAIL Roundup

2011-01-07T14:22:00.000-05:00

As usual, your conservative congressmen have been cockily clowning around...

Wonkette: While sanctimoniously reading the Constitution at the start of the 112th Congress, the Republicans happened to violate the Constitution. I literally could not dream up a better microcosm of Republican governance - self-righteous claims of allegiance to America's founding principles while simultaneously and idiotically violating them.

Boston Globe: Michele Bachmann is "frightened" by the "abuse of power" she sees in the watered-down financial regulations known as the Dodd-Frank bill. Ms. Bachmann, as usual, is absolutely right and not at all a raving lunatic. How is Wall Street ever supposed to do us the favor of pushing our economy off a cliff again with all these RULES?

Rolling Stone: Matt Taibbi absolutely crushes John Boehner in a thorough article detailing the Tan Man's political career. The article seems (partly) aimed at Tea Partiers, whose rabid libertarianism and stubborn adherence to the actual principles behind conservatism seem likely to conflict with the corporate-friendly, horse-trading style of the new House speaker.

Raw Story: Charles Barkley, who himself sounds hilariously dumb on television at times, has slammed Tucker Carlson for his over-the-top criticism of Michael Vick.

Says Barkley: "Tucker Carlson, who's a nobody, he used to work for us over here, we fired him, because he sucked..." As Nelson from The Simpsons often exclaims so eloquently, HA-HA!

Tech Roundup

2011-01-07T11:26:00.000-05:00

Gizmos make the world go round...

WSJ: AT&T upgrades its 3G network to 4G by simply renaming it. I'm so glad I left that company for CREDO.

NYT: Simon Johnson doesn't think taxpayers should be subsidizing Facebook (via Goldman Sachs). I'm inclined to agree.

Wired: 2011 is shaping up to be an awesome year for video games. My top three anticipated releases: Elder Scrolls Skyrim, Dragon Age II and Infamous 2.

Frenemies...For a While Longer

2011-01-06T11:57:00.001-05:00

Steve Levine concludes the following in his article on Saudi Arabia and the U.S:

"But the idea that the United States can end its dependence on Saudi oil is an illusion, just as the notion that Washington should abandon one of its closest security partners is profoundly unwise. These two countries were frenemies long before anyone coined the term -- and for better or for worse, they will be ambivalent allies for a long time to come."

My first contention here is that Levine is making a normative argument in the guise of an empirical one. He's claiming to objectively predict the future based on historical or empirical trends, but he's actually arguing that such a future SHOULD be the case, or that it is in U.S. interests. If Levine wants to make the normative argument, he should have the cojones and intellectual honesty to come out and say, "Here's why the United States shouldn't abandon its relationship with Saudi Arabia."

Not to mention, I'm pretty sure Steve Levine can't predict the future, so why frame the argument that way? What if another attack happens in the U.S. tomorrow in which even more Saudis are involved? The recent, resurgent warmth Levine identifies in the security relationship would immediately be in peril, and he'd look like an idiot having published a tribute to Saudi-U.S. friendship the day before an attack.

Second, Levine's conclusion argues against straw men - nobody is proposing that the U.S. immediately cut all ties with Saudi Arabia, and nobody realistically expects U.S. dependence on Saudi oil to disappear in any short-term period. Still, I think "Frenemies Forever" is a bit of an optimistic stretch for a bilateral relationship that is certainly still in post-Cold War flux.

Let's take oil. I mean, there's no question that a concerted effort will be made by U.S. policymakers, at some point, to move the country onto alternative fuels in a major way. If nothing else, the steadily rising price of oil in the long term, which one Shell exec predicts will hit $5 a gallon in the U.S. as soon as next year, will create powerful economic incentives to dispense with fossil fuels in transportation.

Whether through public sector policy or private-sector profit-seeking, the United States will eventually kick its oil habit. In fact, as the domestic pressure builds and the time approaches when the technology and infrastructure are sufficient to move off of oil in a major way, U.S. policymakers could find that they have a powerful bargaining chip with the Saudi government - "cooperate with us on XYZ issues and we'll continue to buy at least some of your oil; refuse, and we'll cancel our contracts completely." How cozy will the relationship be at that point?

What about security and terrorism? Levine is correct that the Saudis have gradually become valuable allies in the GWOT, but he also notes that almost every 9/11 hijacker was from Saudi Arabia, that Osama bin Laden was born and raised there, and that Saudi money is still a huge source of sustenance for the spread of anti-U.S. fundamentalism in madrassas across the Arab world. The last item is particularly vexing to those in U.S. military and intelligence circles, and it's hard to say for sure that they won't eventually overrule their diplomatic brethren in U.S. policy circles and turn the tide of sentiment back against the Saudis on the anti-terror issue.

Where Levine is more persuasive is arguing that the U.S. and the Saudi security sectors will remain somewhat close simply for the sake of balancing against Iran in the Middle East. In fact, such a relationship could be indispensable for a progressive foreign policy based on offshore balancing rather than global dominance, as suggested by John Mearsheimer recently.

To conclude, my main problem with Levine's article is his implicit confusion of normative and empirical argumentation, but I think he has a clear perspective of the relationship as it has been and stands now. I disagree that the U.S. simply cannot hope to end its dependence on Saudi oil, but I agree that energy independence won't come anytime soon. Finally, the security ties between the nations are less permanent than Levine argues, but could indeed prove crucial for combating terrorism and containing regional rivals in the future.

Awakening in Afghanistan?

2011-01-05T16:25:00.003-05:00

It's much too soon for realistic speculation, but not too soon to hope against hope that we've finally seen the first light at the end of the Afghan tunnel. If A-stan follows Iraq's pattern of tribal "awakenings" (meaning tribes switching side to fight with us, rather than against us), Obama's 2014 deadline might actually be realistic. My fingers are crossed, but as I said, this is really just a glimmer in an otherwise dismal situation over there.