A fantastic book about drinks & drinking!

Everyday Drinking: The Distilled Kingsley Amis is an excellent read and highly entertaining. And it's about booze.

It's available in its entirety on Google Books (link above).

Enjoy your well lubricated week-end.

Boston. Drunks!

Surprise, surprise! Boston is the nation's drunkest city!

Lovely

http://www.isthatcherdeadyet.co.uk/

Reaganomics Fucked Us Over

This graph should make you very angry:

The poorest half of us has been getting poorer. Where did it trickle down to?

Fuckers.

Ahhh...So Obama is a Crackhead now?

From C&L Brent Bozell: Obama Looks like a Skinny Ghetto Crackhead.

BOZELL: How long do you think Sean Hannity's show would last if four times in one sentence, he made a comment about, say, the President of the United States, and said that he looked like a skinny, ghetto crackhead? Which, by the way, you might want to say that Barack Obama does. Everybody on the left would come forward and demand he be fired within five minutes for being so insulting towards a leader of the United States.

Class. Pure Class.

Goddamn Christwire is Hilarious!

This shit is funny as hell:

THE CHRISTIAN GUIDE TO NOT BEING MISTAKEN FOR A HOMOSEXUAL, PT. 1

It seems that some people think I have repressed homosexual tendencies. This is not true. I am attracted to Jesus and to Christianity and to Morality and nothing else. I suspect it is because I am slender, young and attractive, and that is a favored type of the obsessive compulsive athletic homosexual. However, desperate times call for desperate measures, so I will be discussing in this article and the next cautionary measures I am taking so that people stop mistaking me for a somdomite.

This guy then goes on to elaborate about expensive clothes and exercise and being near women is all actually part of some kind of secret, limp-wristed, satanic plot to turn him and other young jesus-freaks gay.

Highly fucking entertaining.

Fuck Ron Paul Some More.

To those who ask if Ron Paul can actually win in Iowa, Jonathan Chait has this:

No, he really can’t. It would be nearly impossible to imagine the Republican Party nominating a candidate who spent years and years publishing a racist newsletter and has deep associations with the fringe far right. (Here he is speaking to the John Birch Society on the occasion of its 50th anniversary.) It would be even more impossible to imagine the Party nominating a candidate who favors total withdrawal from world affairs and takes a Chomsky-ite line on American power. The notion that the Party might nominate a candidate who does both these things is totally preposterous.

...

Paul’s supporters seem to believe that the media ignoring him is the only thing keeping him from challenging for the Party nomination. More likely, it’s the only thing that’s allowed his candidacy to progress to this point. If more people actually understood the full scope of Paul’s fringe-right views, a huge portion of his support would peel off.

Ron Paul is a atavistic racist scumbag. Yeah, he's good on foreign policy (some), but other than that he's a crazy fundamentalist christian right wing nut job. Fuck him, and if you're too lazy too look into what his actual policy proposals are and where he's been fuck you too.

Fuck Ron Paul.

What Digby said: Paul Fever Entering Our Precious Bodily Fluids and Corrupting Our Purity of Essence.

At the John Birch Society 50th anniversary gala, Ron Paul spoke to another favorite theme of the Reconstructionists and others in the religious right: that of the "remnant" left behind after evil has swept the land. (Gary North's publication is called The Remnant Review.) In a dispatch on Paul's keynote address, The New American, the publication of the John Birch Society, explained, "He claimed that the important role the JBS has played was to nurture that remnant and added, 'The remnant holds the truth together, both the religious truth and the political truth.'"

Yes, Ron Paul is essentially part of the John Birch Society. He's also a Christian Reconstructionist. Also, Ron Paul is a bigot and an asshole and a misogynist (no-exception abortion ban!). His economic policies are fucking retarded (gold standard, really?).

Re-thinking American foreign policy and leaving other countries the fuck alone is a an admirable policy position, but it is very nearly the only one Paul holds that is not fucking insane.

People who died

Well, Christopher Hitchens is dead. Say what you will about his advocacy for the Iraq War, but he was a great writer and a brilliant debater. Some say that scotch and cigarettes did him in, but one does have to live, no?

Also: Kim Jong Il is dead. Apparently his son is taking over and N. Korea has already agreed to suspending its nuclear weapons program in exchange for expanded food aid. Progress?

Hacky Hackingtons

Alex Parene at Salon brings us perhaps the only valuable journalistic year end round-up: The Hack Thirty.

His thoughts on:

Richard Cohen: "There’s no subject on which Richard Cohen is not completely inessential. "

Mark Halperin: "At the very least, Halperin’s TV chyron should read, “ALWAYS WRONG ABOUT EVERYTHING.”"

Thomas Friedman: "He’s a silly, simple-minded man whose success leads a cynic to the conclusion that the world is run by similarly silly, simple-minded men."

David Broder: "He has a simplistic understanding of politics and no understanding of the electorate except as an abstract concept. His hatred of partisanship is actually a thinly veiled disdain for popular rule itself."

Not only does he point out why these people are the hackiest hacks in journalism, but he provides examples!

Thank you, Mr. Parene, and thank you Salon.

Class Conflict Comix

http://www.dailykos.com/blog/Comics

Screaming into the void

Blogs and Facebook are scarcely a substitute for face to face conversation. With a whiskey.

Newt Gingrich Wants to Return to 19th Century Child Labor

GOP Presidential Candidate Newt Gingrich wants to eliminate paid janitorial positions in schools and replace them with child labor. Really. He thinks this will promote a strong work ethic amongst the poorest Americans (right wing code for minorities).

From Crooks and Liars: Confessions of a Child Janitor.

Working (even scrubbing toilets) should mean making a living. If someone who works is still eligible for food stamps and government assistance – it’s really the employer who is federally subsidized. These “job creators” are taking advantage of government programs so they won’t have to cut into their profit margins to pay living wages.

I had never considered the angle that these amount to subsidies of the private sector, but it is in fact completely true. If people work full time for shitty wages and still need food and housing assistance, it's the employer, not the employee who is really being subsidized with tax dollars.

Example: If you pay someone minimum wage they will make roughly $15000 a year for 40 hour weeks. They will almost certainly need food stamps (around $250 per month) on top of that to merely not to starve to fucking death. The food stamps don't buy much, but they keep families alive.

When working people need SNAP benefits (food stamps) the employer (the asshole that pays only $7.25) is the one being subsidized, not the worker. The worker is working full time. The employer is not providing them with sufficient compensation to live and eat, but instead relying on GOVERNMENT HANDOUTS (oogie boogie!) to make up for the wages he is not paying his employee.

Now suppose you pay someone not the just the minimum required by law ($7.25 per hour), which translates to $15080 per year (full time), but pay them an additional $1.57 per hour ($8.82 total). They will now have the same purchasing power they would at minimum wage plus food stamps, and you, Mr. Job Creator McGalt, will have been the one to add that power to the economy, not the socialistic, Kenyan, Muslim federal government.

This boils down to "job-creators" being cheap shitheads who lack the compassion and empathy to pay someone $1.57 more per hour.

Q.E.D.

The Federal Budget Explained, in one Graphic.

Here is the embiggened version: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/125xx/doc12577/budgetinfographic.htm. It is from the Congressional Budget Office, and it does a fine job of explaining what costs what.

The only quibble I have is that it could clearly show that Social Security is not paid for with general funds, but rather its own trust fund that is solvent all by itself and has nothing to do with the deficit. Not a small quibble, either.

Democratic Party Backed Laws are Laws too Fuckers.

From Charles Pierce: The Truth About Consumer Protection and the Laws of the Land.

In merciful brief, Congress passed the law creating the CFPB. It did so narrowly, and that law is popular neither among the members of the Republican base nor among the plutocrats who gin them up. But the law did pass. You could look it up. So, now, the Republicans have decided simply to pretend that it didn't pass. They have decided to make sure that a law duly passed by Congress cannot function. They don't like it, so they are trying to will it out of existence. If they succeed, then, in the legislative process as it has in so many other areas of the government, the democratic process becomes nothing more than a dumbshow.

This is the type of shit that led to the fucking Civil War. Really. Nullification.

What the fuck.

Thank a Republican for shitty mail service

From The Atlantic: Who Killed the Postal Service?

Today, the Postal Service announced roughly $3 billion in service cuts that will slow down the delivery of first-class mail for the first time in 40 years. Starting in April, it plans to shutter more than half of its 461 mail processing centers, stretching out the time it will take to ship everything from Netflix DVDs to magazines. One-day delivery of stamped envelopes will all but certainly become a thing of the past....

And should you wonder why, (hint: it was a privatization scheme), from Think Progress:

At the very end of that year, Congress passed the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 (PAEA). Under PAEA, USPS was forced to “prefund its future health care benefit payments to retirees for the next 75 years in an astonishing ten-year time span” — meaning that it had to put aside billions of dollars to pay for the health benefits of employees it hasn’t even hired yet, something “that no other government or private corporation is required to do.”

The outgoing Republican controlled congress of 2006 did this for the express purpose of making the USPS go bankrupt so they can sell off its assets to private companies like UPS and FedEx. Fuckers.

And for the uninformed who says "gee that's no so bad, I like UPS!", look at the fucking costs. It costs $.44 to send a letter anywhere in the United States by mail. The absolute cheapest UPS option is over $26. Assholes.

Crazy laws? Subversion of democracy? Look to ALEC

This is fucked. And wrong. From BusinessWeek: Pssst...Wanna Buy a Law?

The American Legislative Exchange Council, a nonprofit based in Washington, brings together state legislators, companies, and advocacy groups to shape “model legislation.” The legislators then take these models back to their own states. About 1,000 times a year, according to ALEC, a state legislator introduces a bill from its library of more than 800 models. About 200 times a year, one of them becomes law. The council, in essence, makes national policy, state by state.

ALEC’s online library contains model bills that tighten voter identification requirements, making it harder for students, the elderly, and the poor to vote. Such bills have shown up in 34 states. According to NPR, the Arizona bill that permits police to detain suspected illegal immigrants started as ALEC model legislation. Similar bills have passed in Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, and Utah, and have been introduced in 17 other states. Legislators in Oregon, Washington, Montana, New Hampshire, and New Mexico have sponsored bills with identical ALEC language requiring states to withdraw from regional agreements on CO2 emissions. Sound a national trend among state legislators, and often you will find at the bottom of your plumb line a bill that looks like something that has passed through the American Legislative Exchange Council.

These are the assholes that brought you SB1070 in Arizona and the new anti-immigrant legislation in Alabama that resulted in millions of dollars of crops rotting in the fields because no one wanted to pick them. Classy fucks. Check out the whole BusinessWeek article for more depth.

Telemarketers are the spawn of Satan

Have you ever been robo-called for some product or service you want nothing to do with? Maybe five, six times in one day from the same number? Then you know.

Call this number: 302 394 9573. Or text it. Or spread it around. Make these terrible bastards pay! Perhaps I'll print up flyers listing this number as the source for free hookers or the best crank in town? Ideas?

Sometimes it's the smokes, not the booze.

I have, on occasion, noticed that the worst part of a hangover seems to be too-many-cigarettes-last-night feeling rather than the ill effects of overindulgence in amber-colored liquids. Someone should do a study.

That said, I'm sure I'll do it again, and I expect you will too.

Labor 65 Years Ago

On this day in 1946, the AFL and CIO workers of Oakland Caligfornia staged a general strike to protest insufficient wages during the post-war price boom.

From Libcom.org comes this fine account: This Day in Labor History: The Oakland General Strike.

And, fuck you if you don't like unions.

Rich dude speaks sense

This guy is not talking like a Galtian asshole: Raise Taxes on Rich to Reward True Job Creators.

I’m a very rich person. As an entrepreneur and venture capitalist, I’ve started or helped get off the ground dozens of companies in industries including manufacturing, retail, medical services, the Internet and software. I founded the Internet media company aQuantive Inc., which was acquired by Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) in 2007 for $6.4 billion. I was also the first non-family investor in Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN)

Even so, I’ve never been a “job creator.” I can start a business based on a great idea, and initially hire dozens or hundreds of people. But if no one can afford to buy what I have to sell, my business will soon fail and all those jobs will evaporate.

Great googly-moogly! It's as if the Randian poison is not the ultra-contagious virus we thought it might be!

This shit is pretty cool

Wolfram Alpha.

Tunes that are good

In other news:

Still awful:

Soda still tastes like shit. The corn-syrup hyper-sweetness is not as some may think, refreshingly delicious, but rather leaves a cloying aftertaste that makes one thirst most thirstily for a frosty cold brew or even some really cheap tannic box wine.

I probably only have 6 sodas a year or something on that level. It usually takes about two months for me to forget how shitty the last one was and then dupe myself into getting the Sprite or Mountain Dew for the extra $.25 cents or whatever the fuck it is in the special at the sandwich shop. This isn't really a health thing at all; I consume an ungodly amount of bear and cheap liquor, which must be a drain on proper organ function somewhere in the realm of high-fructose corn syrup. What I suppose I'm really getting at is that I don't like sweet things to hit my tongue unless they have booze in them. Whiskey, wine, ale, gin etc. are all tip-fucking-top fine by me.

On a last note, not at all fond of soda with booze in it. It ruins perfectly good booze. If you need to sweeten your drinks to enjoy them, just fucking put some simple syrup or grenadine or red vermouth in it. Fuck.

Last last not: Mexican Coca-Cola is delicious if you can find it. The above rant does not apply.

Iran Contra broke 25 years ago today. Reagan still sold weapons to Iran and started an illegal war in Central America.

Outsourcing to Charles Pierce: The Lost Opportunities of Iran-Contra, 25 Years Later

Rich assholes save more than you and I make

From ThinkProgress: The Average Bush Tax Cut For The 1 Percent This Year Will Be Greater Than The Average Income Of The Other 99 Percent.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), who co-chaired the super committee, explained that the major sticking point during negotiations with the GOP was what to do with the Bush tax cuts. With that in mind, the National Priorities Project points out that those tax cuts this year will give the richest 1 percent of Americans a bigger tax cut than the other 99 percent will receive in average income:

The average Bush tax cut in 2011 for a taxpayer in the richest one percent is greater than the average income of the other 99 percent ($66,384 compared to $58,506).

Looks like I'm in the bottom half of the 99%. NOt surprising, because I'm still quite young. Hopefully the 1% will keep taking a disproportionate share of US income, and you and I can get poorer together and then everything will be fine.

Thanksgiving

Tis the time to offer thanks for Squanto, manifest destiny and so on

Get some.

Fuck Steve Jobs, he was an asshole and a shitty aesthete

As usual, something excellent from the Awl: Less Human Than Human: The Design Philosophy of Apple.

The widespread admiration for Apple's design ethos is in two parts: one functional, the other aesthetic. The functional aspects of Apple's products can indeed be magical and thrilling. But the vibe of Apple's product design is uniformly cool and impersonal, and the monolithic sterility of their glassy retail palaces is really something shocking. So far as design goes, it's an imperial aesthetic, entirely lacking a human dimension—or a potted plant. And this remains so, no matter how much the marketers have tried to soften things up with the aid of Justin Long, John Hodgman and sassy dancing silhouettes. Bow down, Apple seems to say. And in the cold, Big Brotherly sway of uniformity that it holds over millions upon millions of people, Apple seems to deny or even thwart the natural world, and with it the individual, the mutable, the unscientific, the instinctive, the flesh and blood. It won't surprise me a bit when they provide snow-white Matrix plugs to poke tidily into the back of your head. Or maybe even the heart plugs from Dune.

Steve Jobs was also a shameless exploiter of Chinese laborers, had bad taste in literature, and was an unrepentant hoarder of his wealth for no purpose. John Galt anyone?

Stay classy cops

From Crooks and Liars: Pregnant #occupy protester miscarries after police abuse.

After being pepper sprayed and hit in the stomach, a Seattle woman miscarried.

Apparently, she questioned their authority.

There's a lot of wierd shit in Chinese deserts

That is a pool that is 10 miles long and 5 miles wide. Look at google maps for a sense of scale: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=40.452107,90.85693359375&ll=40.445379,90.814362&spn=0.357427,0.705185&t=h&z=11&vpsrc=6.

One hell of a cement pond. 5x10 miles.

Social control.

Michael Parenti:

There's really no economic interest involved in it.
They're not protecting the banks!
The police are just doing this because they're on a power trip,
or they're macho, or uh they're control freaks.
That's why they do it. No! Of course it's an economic,
of course they're defending the banks.
...
You see, there are people who believe that the function of the police is to fight crime.
And that's not true, the function of the police is social control,
and protection of property.

He's right, you know.

MIT Professor uses proper language about Romney

Mitt Romney has been desparately trying to distance himself from his signature achievement in Massachusetts: (near) Universal Healthcare for Bay State residents. In his ongoing commitment to his perpetual candidacy for higher office, he has tried to make distinctions between the Mass. Healthcare law and the one signed by President Obama. There is one issue though:

From TPM: Obamacare & Romneycare are the same fucking bill.

MIT Professor Jonathan Gruber:

“The problem is there is no way to say that,” Gruber said. “Because they’re the same fucking bill. He just can’t have his cake and eat it too. Basically, you know, it’s the same bill. He can try to draw distinctions and stuff, but he’s just lying.”

Way to tell it like it is prof. Rich assholes like Romney get what they want by lying through their teeth and saying anything their supporters want to hear. Unfortunately for Romney, the Affordable Care Act was modeled directly on his accomplishments in Mass.

Is it not insane that a major piece of the Republican platform is to deny healthcare to people?

In which old grannies are pepper sprayed

Looks like the cops in Seattle have it in for little old ladies. I have a hard time believing she was resisting arrest.

From Olbermann via Crooks and Liars: http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/scarce/occupy-seattle-octogenarian-activist-dorli-.

Grannies? Really?

Courts say Occupy Boston can stay.

From the Globe: Judge issues temporary restraining order barring city from evicting Occupy Boston protesters.

Just in case Mayor Menino was thinking of trying his Bloomberg pants on:

A Suffolk Superior Court judge issued a temporary restraining order this afternoon barring the city of Boston from evicting Occupy Boston protesters from their encampment in the downtown area.

The order applies unless there is a fire, medical emergency, or “outbreak of violence,” Judge Frances A. McIntyre ruled.

Menino made a statement saying he didn't know why the Occupiers would go to the courts about this, conveniently forgetting the 100+ people, including veterans arrested on the Greenway a few weeks ago.

Cop not beating the shit out of a protester

Nothing to see here folks:


Move along. The protester is about to start attacking the cop's fist with the back of his head.

From Yahoo News and the AP (caption to the above photo):

An Occupy Wall Street protestor draws contact from a police officer near Zuccotti Park after being ordered to leave the longtime encampment in New York, Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011, in New York, after police ordered demonstrators to leave their encampment in Zuccotti Park. At about 1 a.m. Tuesday, police handed out notices from the park's owner, Brookfield Office Properties, and the city saying that the park had to be cleared because it had become unsanitary and hazardous. Protesters were told they could return, but without sleeping bags, tarps or tents. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

As we all know, cops never, ever hit innocent civilians. And besides, this kid is obviously resisting arrest. Look at him try to flee!

Side note: cop looks a bit like Michael Keaton.

Presented without comment:

Give Wikipedia a couple bucks

Click the nice button and throw them some scratch. Just a bit is still a contribution.

Democrats keep moving to the right? No Shit.

From Ezra Klein at the WaPo: The Democrats' peculiar negotiating strategy.

So far, Republicans have not said yes to any of the deals the Democrats have offered. They continue to assume a better deal is just around the corner, and thus far, they have been right. Currently, they may be assuming that yet a better deal could be struck with, say, President Mitt Romney, and if he wins the election, they may well be right. If Obama wins, a reinvigorated Democratic majority might prove them wrong. But the fact remains: Their strategy of saying no has, thus far, paid great dividends, though not ones Republicans have decided to collect.

Holy Space Ghost! Why do congressional Democrats and the Administration keep offering the republicans republican-idea based plans? Every time, they are derided as being the product of Kenyan Muslim socialism, which in turn spurs the Democrats to make their next plan even more friendly to republican ideologues. The new plan is then derided as the product of Kenyan Muslim Socialism, and the cycle repeats.

Perhaps actual left-wing policies could be proposed? Maybe then when the compromise happens it will actually be a compromise and not the just a republican proposal from a few years back.

Fuck.

Newtmentum!

And... Newt Gingrich takes the lead.

Sweet Christ. Does no one remember what an asshole this guy was 15 years ago? Bueller?

Some are oblivious to reality

If you actually can't see the correlation between what Occupy Wall Street is doing and the easily identifiable inequalities inherent in our system pictured above, I officially abandon hope for you. Cripes, its not that hard to stay informed. Look at a graph

Chuckles?

I think this is a joke: http://www.theawl.com/2011/11/some-thoughts-on-jack-and-jill. Who can say?

Still down with The Awl, either way.

They will call it judicial activism...

And they'll be assholes. It's called justice fuckers.

From Matt Taibbi: Finally, A Judge Stands up to Wall Street.

The amazing thing about the wave of corruption that has overtaken the financial services industry is that most of it couldn’t happen without virtually every player at every level signing off on these deals. From the ratings agencies to the law firms to the accounting firms to the regulators to the bank executives themselves, everybody had to be on board in order for a lot of these fraud schemes to work.

Judges are a part of that picture, and too often, members of the bench sign off on dirty deals made between banks and regulators when the law says that such settlements must be “fair, reasonable, adequate and in the public interest.”

It’s great that Rakoff is behaving as any decent human being would and rejecting these disgusting settlements. But equally disturbing is the fact that more judges haven’t done the same thing. Are people with backbones really that rare?

To those who still ask "WHY IS OCCUPY WALL STREET PROTESTING?"

Well, in simple terms I would say they want justice. Economic justice perhaps? Judge Rakoff understands that banks and financial firms are not above the law merely because they control vast sums of wealth, and through it, wield disproportionate amounts of political and social power. The people at the various Occupy Everywhere protests understand this as well and are tired of it. Their demand is economic justice, not handouts. Props to them and props to those like Rakoff who do the right thing.

It rains.

Rain is liquid precipitation, as opposed to non-liquid kinds of precipitation such as snow, hail and sleet. Rain requires the presence of a thick layer of the atmosphere to have temperatures above the melting point of water near and above the Earth's surface. On Earth, it is the condensation of atmospheric water vapor into drops of water heavy enough to fall, often making it to the surface. Two processes, possibly acting together, can lead to air becoming saturated leading to rainfall: cooling the air or adding water vapor to the air. Virga is precipitation that begins falling to the earth but evaporates before reaching the surface; it is one of the ways air can become saturated. Precipitation forms via collision with other rain drops or ice crystals within a cloud. Rain drops range in size from oblate, pancake-like shapes for larger drops, to small spheres for smaller drops.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rain

And there you have it.

Douglas Rushkoff has interesting things to say

Check this interview with him out at hilobrow.

Intriguing?

Would you look at that...

Jerry Sandusky wrote a book called "Touched"

And he fucks little boys in the showers. Jesus tits, what a world. It like he knew he'd get caught and have a movie made about him and the boy touching and whatnot, right?

Hippie Punching on Whitehouse,.gov

From It's Just a Ride:

White House: FUCK YOU HIPPIES!

Indeed, when this website was first announced, it seemed like Obama and his team were making an honest attempt at testing the waters regarding American's feelings on a lot of contemporary issues. That is until some of the responses started being released.

Unsurprisingly, supporters for change regarding marijuana legislation teamed together and gathered a staggering number of signatures for their petition - topping the threshold that would demand an official response in its first day. For half a heart-beat, stoners and sobers sympathetic to the cause shared a brief unifying moment of hope, holding on tenaciously to the dream that maybe someone in power would finally lend an interested ear. That is until the site posted their official response from Gil Kerlikowske, Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. In his response Gil basically says "Fuck You, hippies. These are the rules." Which of course is the perfect response for anyone hoping to set the stage for constructive democratic discussion. You can read Gil's response here.

"Sure we'll listen to you. Just don't expect new or sensible answers." Hippie punching doesn't make republicans vote for you fuckers, it just alienates your own base. Jesus tits.

Take that stereotypes!

From McClatchy:
Black and Asian teens are less likely than whites to abuse drugs or alcohol.

Black and Asian adolescents are much less likely than their white peers to abuse or become dependent on drugs and alcohol, according to a Duke University-led study based on an unusually large sample from all 50 states.

"There is certainly still a myth out there that black kids are more likely to have problems with drugs than white kids, and this documents as clearly as any study we're aware of that the rate of . . . substance-related disorders among African American youths is significantly lower," said Dr. Dan Blazer of Duke's Department of Psychiatry, a senior author of the study.

Surprise, surprise! I wonder what the heartland, corn-fed, Tea Party (the GOP base) has to say about that?

Don't be absurd

I implore you to listen to Bill Moyers

He is a very good journalist.

Why New York’s Zuccotti Park is filled with people is no mystery. Reporters keep scratching their heads and asking: “Why are you here?” But it’s clear they are occupying Wall Street because Wall Street has occupied the country. And that’s why in public places across the country workaday Americans are standing up in solidarity. Did you see the sign a woman was carrying at a fraternal march in Iowa the other day? It read: “I can’t afford to buy a politician so I bought this sign.”

We know what all this money buys. Americans have learned the hard way that when rich organizations and wealthy individuals shower Washington with millions in campaign contributions, they get what they want. They know that if you don’t contribute to their campaigns or spend generously on lobbying,

WHY ARE THEY PROTESTING!!!!!???

They have....A plan?

Throw this shit at people who say the Administration has put forth no effort.

Facts!

Tucker Carlson & The Daily Caller are full of shit.

A fine friend of mine, who is also a gentleman & a scholar, pointed me to this story from Tucker Carlson's shitrag the Daily Caller: NYC Arrest Records - Many Wall Street Protesters Live in Luxury. He noted he "bet this shit is bunk but here you are." He was right. 2 minutes of googling sheds some light on just how disingenuous the Caller story is.

My response:

Tucker Carlson and his gang tend to be full of shit. The median home value figure he sights for the country is more or less correct, but most of the occupiers live in NYC, where the average (mean) home value is 457,800 according to the same website he sites: http://www.zillow.com/local-info/NY-New-York-home-value/r_6181/.

The rent figure he uses is also low compared to the NYC average of $2800 according to: http://articles.nydailynews.com/2010-10-21/news/29441696_1_rent-jon-pastor-miami-tops.

The shittiest thing in the article does is use the median figures for the protesters instead of the mean (average). This can heavily skew the numbers up if there are a few very wealthy people in the sample. The median is the one in the middle, not the actual average.

So, in short: fuck Tucker, fuck the Daily Caller, and fuck right wing figure mangling to prove their spurious points and discredit anyone they disagree with.

When it comes to your news sources, remember: caveat emptor.

Selah.

p.s.
Since when is $1800 rent for a city apartment high? I pay that in a less than ideal section of Boston (albeit with 3 roommates).

I can't get enough Charlie Pierce

Read this: The Case Against David Brooks, Man of the Privileged Few.

It is about this man, who is among the cleverest of right-wing hacks (but who remains a hack, nonetheless):


It was written by this man, who is not only not a hack, but a fine sportswriter as well:



And it stirs my brain-meat into remembering its fondness for this man, who was also not a hack, and was another fine sportswriter:

You can't make this shit up

From Mother Jones: The story of four old white guys who planned a Constitution saving killing spree at Waffle House.

Also, this smacks of FBI instigated terror sting operations.

Damn right!

Borrowed from :http://crooksandliars.com/bluegal-aka-fran/open-thread-165.

Well That's Reassuring...

From ProPublica: U.S. Government Glossed Over Cancer Concerns As It Rolled Out Airport X-Ray Scanners.

Research suggests that anywhere from six to 100 U.S. airline passengers each year could get cancer from the machines. Still, the TSA has repeatedly defined the scanners as “safe,” glossing over the accepted scientific view that even low doses of ionizing radiation — the kind beamed directly at the body by the X-ray scanners — increase the risk of cancer.

“Even though it’s a very small risk, when you expose that number of people, there’s a potential for some of them to get cancer,” said Kathleen Kaufman, the former radiation management director in Los Angeles County, who brought the prison X-rays to the FDA panel’s attention.

About 250 X-ray scanners are currently in U.S. airports, along with 264 body scanners that use a different technology, a form of low-energy radio waves known as millimeter waves.

Robin Kane, the TSA’s assistant administrator for security technology, said that no one would get cancer because the amount of radiation the X-ray scanners emit is minute. Having both technologies is important to create competition, he added.

“It’s a really, really small amount relative to the security benefit you’re going to get,” Kane said. “Keeping multiple technologies in play is very worthwhile for the U.S. in getting that cost-effective solution — and being able to increase the capabilities of technology because you keep everyone trying to get the better mousetrap.”

Thanks TSA! I guess by this point, "Only 100 of you will get cancer this year while we violate your 4th amendment rights, so fuck you and stop complaining" isn't really a surprising thing for the TSA to be saying to the citizens of the United States.

Good news everyone!

Rad. Weak speed doesn't fuck up your heart.

An analysis of data collected from more than 1.2 million children and young adults between the ages of 2 and 24 years of age found no evidence that the medications increase the risk for heart problems, as had been feared.

Just don't tell the Crue:

You may want to buy your processed chicken sandwich elsewhere

Apparantly, the owner of Chick-Fil-A is a bigot.

On a side note, I don't now about you, but I'd have to be pretty drunk to eat something that looked like the sandwich above.

In Which Ann Coulter Proclaims Black Republicans Superior to Other Blacks

My, my. Ann Coulter continues leaving the rails on her train of crazy:

From Balloon Juice: Ann Coulter on Cain: “Our Blacks Are Better Than Their Blacks”

Coulter once again praised the conservative black people she had known, arguing that “our blacks are so much better than their blacks” because “you have fought against probably your family, probably your neighbors… that’s why we have very impressive blacks.” She went on to compare conservative black Americans to the family of the President, arguing that “Obama… is not a descendant of the blacks that suffered these Jim Crow laws,” that he was “not the son of American blacks that went through the American experience,” but the “son of a Kenyan”

Keep wagging that finger, Coulter.

NYPD: Sneaky Fucks

Clever. Clever, but a little bit dickish, too. NYPD tells drunks to camp out with OccupyWallstreet.

Justin Elliot at Salon:

The NYPD is reportedly telling drunks to hang out in Zuccotti Park, apparently as a way to undermine the credibility of Occupy Wall Street.

Harry Siegel reports:

But while officers may be in a no-win situation, at the mercy of orders carried on shifting political winds and locked into conflict with a so-far almost entirely non-violent protest movement eager to frame the force as a symbol of the oppressive system they’re fighting, the NYPD seems to have crossed a line in recent days, as the park has taken on a darker tone with unsteady and unstable types suddenly seeming to emerge from the woodwork. Two different drunks I spoke with last week told me they’d been encouraged to “take it to Zuccotti” by officers who’d found them drinking in other parks, and members of the community affairs working group related several similar stories they’d heard while talking with intoxicated or aggressive new arrivals.

…

“He’s got a right to express himself, you’ve got a right to express yourself,” I heard three cops repeat in recent days, using nearly identical language, when asked to intervene with troublemakers inside the park, including a clearly disturbed man screaming and singing wildly at 3 a.m. for the second straight night.

Dude. I knew Bloomberg & crew were assholes, but this boils down to a very sneaky attempt to paint the Occupiers as substance abusing indigents looking for handouts, which is NOT what OccupyWallstreet is about. The Occupiers are protesting economic injustice and the total ass-raping perpetuated by the 1% on the other 99% of us. Actually it does occur to me that there would be considerably fewer homeless folks in NY and elsewhere had our Galtian Overlords on Wallstreet not blown up the fucking economy in 2008.

In Which Little Tommy Friedman Makes Sense

Gasp! The horror, the horror! Thomas Friedman is not insane:

But, then, what happened to us? Our financial industry has grown so large and rich it has corrupted our real institutions through political donations. As Senator Richard Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, bluntly said in a 2009 radio interview, despite having caused this crisis, these same financial firms “are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they, frankly, own the place.”

Our Congress today is a forum for legalized bribery. One consumer group using information from Opensecrets.org calculates that the financial services industry, including real estate, spent $2.3 billion on federal campaign contributions from 1990 to 2010, which was more than the health care, energy, defense, agriculture and transportation industries combined. Why are there 61 members on the House Committee on Financial Services? So many congressmen want to be in a position to sell votes to Wall Street.

We can’t afford this any longer. We need to focus on four reforms that don’t require new bureaucracies to implement. 1) If a bank is too big to fail, it is too big and needs to be broken up. We can’t risk another trillion-dollar bailout. 2) If your bank’s deposits are federally insured by U.S. taxpayers, you can’t do any proprietary trading with those deposits — period. 3) Derivatives have to be traded on transparent exchanges where we can see if another A.I.G. is building up enormous risk. 4) Finally, an idea from the blogosphere: U.S. congressmen should have to dress like Nascar drivers and wear the logos of all the banks, investment banks, insurance companies and real estate firms that they’re taking money from. The public needs to know.

And he's cleaned up his egregious mixing of metaphors! Zwounds! What comes next?

Blog ad algorithms are not clever.

Look at the title of the video and the ad to the right.

Republicans are bad at math

-370,000 < 0 < ANY POSITIVE FUCKING NUMBER

The GOP apparently does not understand simple arithmetic. From ThinkProgress: REPORT: House GOP’s ‘Job Creating’ Spending Cuts Destroyed 370,000 Jobs.

The FBI may be retarded, or at least not wise in the use of taxpayer funds...

Apparently the FBI thinks Juggalos are analogous to the Crips, Bloods and Aryan Brotherhood. Spencer Ackerman brings us the grasping our heads in disbelief gory details here.

The FBI considers the fans of shticky rap group Insane Clown Posse to represent a threat on par with the Crips, Bloods, and Aryan Brotherhood, according to its annual report on gang activity.

You might think Insane Clown Posse’s people — known as the Juggalos — are just a group of face-painting teenagers who wonder how magnets work. Not so, says the FBI’s 2011 National Gang Threat Assessment. To the feds, Juggalos are a “loosely-organized hybrid gang” that are “forming more organized subsets and engaging in more gang-like criminal activity.”

Consult page 22 of the FBI’s brand-new annual report on gang activity nationwide. (.PDF) Listed in the same breath as street gangs with ties to murderous Mexican drug cartels is the Juggalo threat.

Seriously. What the fuck?

They may not go down in history, but they'll go down on your sister...

Art, dude.

So, I think this is art:



and I am going to order a framed poster of it. 1940s Public domain health posters as 21st century wall hangings? I think so.

Pat Buchanan is a Racist Piece of Shit

From Cranky McWhiterson's new book:

"If Mac Donald’s statistics are accurate, 49 of every 50 muggings and murders in New York are the work of minorities. That might explain why black folks have trouble getting a cab. Every New York cabby must know the odds, should he pick up a man of color at night."

And he's still on TV every week. Fucker.

The Dude Occupies Wall Street.

The Dude above is Jeff Dowd, actual radical dude from way back. And he points out that some new economic shit is coming to light.

From Slate (please do not consider this a retraction of my sentiments about Slate's awfulness posted below): Occupy Wall Street: What Would Lebowski Do?

Noam Chomsky in Dewey Square for #OccupyBoston Saturday 10/22

Professor Noam Chomsky of MIT, a generally well-informed and spoken man, will be speaking in Dewey Square in Boston at the #OccupyBoston protests on Saturday 10/22 at 6PM. I believe I'll go and hear what he has to say.

Now We Laugh!

Michelle Bachmman's entire NH campaign staff quits.

Perhaps they took some smart pills?

Sweet Jesus God is that a Shitload of Money or What?

$74,000,000,000,000.

Crooks and Liars tells us the Bank of America is trying to stick taxpayers with $74 Trillion in possible debt. Story here.

This move paves the way for another TARP-style shakedown of taxpayers, this time to save depositors. No Congressman would dare vote against that. This move is Machiavellian, and just plain evil.

Seventy five trillion dollars looks like this as a number: $75,000, 000, 000, 000. It's a big number. According to this article: total 2007 wealth for the entire country (everyone) was a bit under $66 Trillion (also a shitload of fucking money). Now, it's something like 48 or 49 trillion. So, if the derivatives BoA is trying to move into FDIC insured accounts ever go south, we'll be on the hook for %150 of the total wealth in this country and for 500% of U.S. GDP.

What the fuck?