Slog
News & ArtsMonday, October 15, 2012
News The Morning News: Baby-Saving Dogs, Very Expensive Cocktails, and Sound Barrier-Breaking Skydivers
Posted by Megan Seling on Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 8:23 AM
Tomorrow's Presidential Debate: Will be town hall-style, moderated by Candy Crowley.
In Other Debate News: Pizza Hut was offering a free pizza a week for 30 years to anyone who asked Obama or Romney "Sausage or pepperoni?" but after a bunch of backlash, they're changing the contest.
The Bravest Girl in Pakistan: The 14-year-old Pakistani girl who was shot in the head and neck will go to the UK for medical treatment. The Taliban shot her outside her school for "speaking out against the militants and promoting education for girls."
In Happier News: A dog saved a baby's life.
A Man Jumped FROM (almost) SPACE: Felix Baumgartner broke records by skydiving from 23 miles and breaking the sound barrier.
In Other Record-Breaking News: The world's most expensive cocktail costs $8,824. It's made with a bunch of old stuff like a 1770 Kummel liqueur.
I Have a Better Suggestion For That Money: A Capitol Hill-based day center for homeless teens might permanently close on Wednesday if it doesn't get more donations. Find out more (and donate) here.
In Rock News: Curiosity Rover found a new type of rock on Mars.
In Moon News: Solar winds are responsible for moon water.
Save the Primates!: "25 primate species in Africa, Asia reported on brink of extinction from deforestation, hunting."
Giant Eyeball!: Mystery solved. It came from a swordfish.
The Seahawks Won: Neat. Now WHERE THE FUCK IS HOCKEY?
Drivers Take Warning: Snoqualmie Pass is down to two lanes all week.
Splitsville: Russell Crowe and his wife are separating after nine yearzzzzzzz......
And the MOST IMPORTANT NEWS OF THE DAY: Bartell's is selling a replica of the hairbrush used on the set on Twilight. For only $9.09! Get yours today.
3
Very telling quote from Elaine Simons, director of the homeless center for teens:
Four more years, seriously, four more years?
""The economy is not getting better; it's getting worse," she said. "We've got more demand and less supply."
Four more years, seriously, four more years?
5
@3 - What? This is the first I'm hearing of it! Thank God I haven't gotten my ballot yet; you saved me from a terrible mistake. Bless you, sir! Bless you!
6
@3: And yet, you rally for four more years of the Bush economic policies that dug the enormous hole we are slowly climbing out of.
Why exactly do you think the same policies that caused the crash will do any better than Obama's policies, which are causing the economy to improve on basically every front?
Elaine Simons is wrong. The economy is getting better. Her anecdotal statmements carry less water than the raw numbers, the analysis of independent economists and consumer faith in the market.
Why exactly do you think the same policies that caused the crash will do any better than Obama's policies, which are causing the economy to improve on basically every front?
Elaine Simons is wrong. The economy is getting better. Her anecdotal statmements carry less water than the raw numbers, the analysis of independent economists and consumer faith in the market.
7
You think a republican president would improve Elaine Simons or the homeless teens' condition? Are you ignorant or simply lying?
9
@6: How often we forget that there were headlines in the mainstream media about "unexpected revenue" to the government during W's term due to his tax cuts. But as we all know the selling and reselling of sub-prime loans and the free-for-all party it caused was a big part of it. You can't blame the Republican's entirely for the housing collapse, those issues were brewing during Clinton's term. In fact, Bush tried to reign in Fanny & Freddy, but didn't pursue it.
10
@9, Bush had 8 years to rein in Fanny and Freddy. An unfunded $5 trillion tax cut for millionaires and billionaies is not an economic plan.
11
@10: Blaming the past is not very productive. But let's at least have a president who will work constructively with the opposition party instead of just dismissing them, Obama: "They can ride with us if they want, but they got to get in the back seat."
12
@11, you brought up the past to avoid the obvious conclusion that Romney/Ryan have no plan other than a fleecing of the middle class.
Second, everyone is aware that the RNC/Tea Party do not act like an opposition party. They have voted against anything that would make the country better on the premise that it would help Obama. They boast that compromise = defeat. They forced the country to the brink of default to try and eliminate Social Security and are threatening to push the country over the fiscal cliff in a lame duck session if they are not re-elected.
Second, everyone is aware that the RNC/Tea Party do not act like an opposition party. They have voted against anything that would make the country better on the premise that it would help Obama. They boast that compromise = defeat. They forced the country to the brink of default to try and eliminate Social Security and are threatening to push the country over the fiscal cliff in a lame duck session if they are not re-elected.
13
@12: Nobody is talking about eliminating Social Security. Bush proposed optional private accounts to supplement taxpayer withholdings and provide a greater return. Let's hope Romney picks up on that next year.
15
@13, weakening government programs or voting to water them down so that they can later say that government doesn't work is the RNC/Tea Party MO. Providing choice is code for eliminating with your base. Also, there was this stock market crash that happened on GWB's watch that would have wiped out those private accounts the way it wiped out the 401k's of the middle class.
16
The Corporate Fascist State and Your Genitals --- or why foreign corporations can seize your private property!
TransCanada has now officially seized American private property through eminent domain; that is, a foreign corporation “legally” exercises the right of the non-sovereign American local government to seize private American property.
This isn’t the first case of this happening, simply the most recent and publicized instance.
How can this be, you may well ask? Let’s examine the carefully designed steps, from the Clinton-Bush-Obama administrations which brought us to this point.
During Clinton’s administration, the US government signed the WTO Financial Services Agreement, according economic obeisance to those who wield transnational capital control.
During the Bush administration, the Supreme Court’s decision privatized eminent domain (the case in 2005 (the case in Connecticut involving the developer, working for Pfizer, who razed a neighborhood for a Pfizer corporate site, only to abandon it for a cheaper site in another state after destroying an entire neighborhood). By privatizing, or corporatizing, eminent domain, they allowed for a corporate entity anywhere on the planet to seize private property, in accordance with the WTO Financial Services Agreement.
Also during the Bush administration, the bankruptcy bill was passed in 2007, exempting the rich and super-rich, while dictating that students must pay off their usurious loans, without recourse to full bankruptcy protections, which also applied to individual households who defaulted on their mortgages.
A most important amendment was attached to that bankruptcy legislation, giving first right and preference to any and all assets of those who declared bankruptcy or were in default to bond holders, i.e., banks, private equity firms, hedge funds and derivatives dealers. (Therefore, if the bondholder should be a foreign entity, lots of luck, fella, and that applies to seizure of property for unpaid credit card charges as well.)
Those three major steps (certainly there were smaller ones along the way) allow for the existing situation today.
And what of President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton?
From Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now show on 10/15/12:
DARYL HANNAH: Right, the southern leg of the Keystone XL was fast-tracked, but it was sort of done under cover, because from then on the Keystone XL got very little press, and most people just assumed that the decision had been postponed until after some environmental review and, of course, after the elections. But you have to remember that both the president and the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, have had TransCanada’s chief lobbyist running a high part of their campaign efforts. You know, the director of President Obama’s campaign used to be TransCanada’s chief lobbyist, and Hillary Clinton’s deputy campaign director (Paul Elliott, added by sgt_doom) is now their chief lobbyist. So there’s a very—a very comfortable relationship. So, very few people have any doubt that the whole pipeline was going to be approved. And I think it’s important that we all stand up for our natural living systems, our life support systems, and get this back in the conversation so people know that it’s happening, so our rights aren’t trampled.
A vote for Romney is suicidally psychotic, and a vote for Obama is a wasted vote.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/12/o…
Recommended reading:
The Fine Print: How Big Companies Use "Plain English" to Rob You Blind, by David Cay Johnson
Retirement Heist, by Ellen E. Schultz
Treasure Islands, by Nicholas Shaxson
Wall Street Capitalism: The Theory of the Bondholder Class, by E. Ray Canterbery
Battling Wall Street: the Kennedy presidency, by Donald Gibson
Sources:
http://www.democracynow.org/seo/2012/10/…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelo_v._Cit…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bankruptcy_…
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-FCIC/pd…
[Sidebar: These steps aren’t discrete events --- they don’t just happen! Dick Cheney’s Godson, DJ Gribbin IV, didn’t just happen to work for Koch Industries --- George W. Bush’s sister wasn’t just coincidentally Mrs. Koch!
Cheney’s Godson isn’t just coincidentally involved in the national promotion of toll roads --- not only do toll roads further privatization and austerity, but they all have surveillance cams, which furthers the national surveillance agenda.
It’s not just a coincidence that Henry Kissinger and Richard Perle have long been affiliated with David Rockefeller, nor that Peter G. Peterson is Rockefeller’s protégé.
It wasn’t a coincidence that Chris Mellon (a Mellon family member) “leaked” Iran’s nuclear program when he was at DoD --- just as it wasn’t a coincidence when Halliburton, when Cheney was their CEO, urged the Iranian government to exploit their second most abundant resource, radium, and develop a nuclear industry.
Few Americans have any idea that Mitt Romney, through Bain Capital’s ownership of the G.R.I.D. (the Regulatory Data Corp’s Global Regulatory Information Database), has enormous access to private and confidential data, which endows him with incredible, behind-the-scenes, power.]
More...
TransCanada has now officially seized American private property through eminent domain; that is, a foreign corporation “legally” exercises the right of the non-sovereign American local government to seize private American property.
This isn’t the first case of this happening, simply the most recent and publicized instance.
How can this be, you may well ask? Let’s examine the carefully designed steps, from the Clinton-Bush-Obama administrations which brought us to this point.
During Clinton’s administration, the US government signed the WTO Financial Services Agreement, according economic obeisance to those who wield transnational capital control.
During the Bush administration, the Supreme Court’s decision privatized eminent domain (the case in 2005 (the case in Connecticut involving the developer, working for Pfizer, who razed a neighborhood for a Pfizer corporate site, only to abandon it for a cheaper site in another state after destroying an entire neighborhood). By privatizing, or corporatizing, eminent domain, they allowed for a corporate entity anywhere on the planet to seize private property, in accordance with the WTO Financial Services Agreement.
Also during the Bush administration, the bankruptcy bill was passed in 2007, exempting the rich and super-rich, while dictating that students must pay off their usurious loans, without recourse to full bankruptcy protections, which also applied to individual households who defaulted on their mortgages.
A most important amendment was attached to that bankruptcy legislation, giving first right and preference to any and all assets of those who declared bankruptcy or were in default to bond holders, i.e., banks, private equity firms, hedge funds and derivatives dealers. (Therefore, if the bondholder should be a foreign entity, lots of luck, fella, and that applies to seizure of property for unpaid credit card charges as well.)
Those three major steps (certainly there were smaller ones along the way) allow for the existing situation today.
And what of President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton?
From Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now show on 10/15/12:
DARYL HANNAH: Right, the southern leg of the Keystone XL was fast-tracked, but it was sort of done under cover, because from then on the Keystone XL got very little press, and most people just assumed that the decision had been postponed until after some environmental review and, of course, after the elections. But you have to remember that both the president and the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, have had TransCanada’s chief lobbyist running a high part of their campaign efforts. You know, the director of President Obama’s campaign used to be TransCanada’s chief lobbyist, and Hillary Clinton’s deputy campaign director (Paul Elliott, added by sgt_doom) is now their chief lobbyist. So there’s a very—a very comfortable relationship. So, very few people have any doubt that the whole pipeline was going to be approved. And I think it’s important that we all stand up for our natural living systems, our life support systems, and get this back in the conversation so people know that it’s happening, so our rights aren’t trampled.
A vote for Romney is suicidally psychotic, and a vote for Obama is a wasted vote.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/12/o…
Recommended reading:
The Fine Print: How Big Companies Use "Plain English" to Rob You Blind, by David Cay Johnson
Retirement Heist, by Ellen E. Schultz
Treasure Islands, by Nicholas Shaxson
Wall Street Capitalism: The Theory of the Bondholder Class, by E. Ray Canterbery
Battling Wall Street: the Kennedy presidency, by Donald Gibson
Sources:
http://www.democracynow.org/seo/2012/10/…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelo_v._Cit…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bankruptcy_…
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-FCIC/pd…
[Sidebar: These steps aren’t discrete events --- they don’t just happen! Dick Cheney’s Godson, DJ Gribbin IV, didn’t just happen to work for Koch Industries --- George W. Bush’s sister wasn’t just coincidentally Mrs. Koch!
Cheney’s Godson isn’t just coincidentally involved in the national promotion of toll roads --- not only do toll roads further privatization and austerity, but they all have surveillance cams, which furthers the national surveillance agenda.
It’s not just a coincidence that Henry Kissinger and Richard Perle have long been affiliated with David Rockefeller, nor that Peter G. Peterson is Rockefeller’s protégé.
It wasn’t a coincidence that Chris Mellon (a Mellon family member) “leaked” Iran’s nuclear program when he was at DoD --- just as it wasn’t a coincidence when Halliburton, when Cheney was their CEO, urged the Iranian government to exploit their second most abundant resource, radium, and develop a nuclear industry.
Few Americans have any idea that Mitt Romney, through Bain Capital’s ownership of the G.R.I.D. (the Regulatory Data Corp’s Global Regulatory Information Database), has enormous access to private and confidential data, which endows him with incredible, behind-the-scenes, power.]
17
@9
"How often we forget that there were headlines in the mainstream media about 'unexpected revenue' to the government during W's term due to his tax cuts."
You're going to have to post a link for that because I do not remember it.
http://home.adelphi.edu/sbloch/deficits.…
Look for "Table 1: Deficit by year, corrected for inflation"
But then you spend your time defending racists and bigots.
So why expect any factual information from you?
"How often we forget that there were headlines in the mainstream media about 'unexpected revenue' to the government during W's term due to his tax cuts."
You're going to have to post a link for that because I do not remember it.
http://home.adelphi.edu/sbloch/deficits.…
Look for "Table 1: Deficit by year, corrected for inflation"
But then you spend your time defending racists and bigots.
So why expect any factual information from you?
18
@9: To bad all that "unexpected revenue" did not help when Bush was turning a surplus into an enormous deficit with the exact same policies Romney and Ryan are endorsing. Are you seriously going to bring up revenue during Bush's term?
Surplus became deficit. The past does matter when policies that caused economic collapse are being rolled out again by the GOP. You want everyone to forget the past because you want them to forget how much the GOP fucked America's wealth and global standing. Not to mention if the past does not matter, why are you bringing up Clinton?
You say that Bush tried to reign in Fanny and Freddie, but did not pursue it? So he DID NOT try to reign in Fanny and Freddie. What are you talking about? Your arguments do not even hold up against your other arguments.
Surplus became deficit. The past does matter when policies that caused economic collapse are being rolled out again by the GOP. You want everyone to forget the past because you want them to forget how much the GOP fucked America's wealth and global standing. Not to mention if the past does not matter, why are you bringing up Clinton?
You say that Bush tried to reign in Fanny and Freddie, but did not pursue it? So he DID NOT try to reign in Fanny and Freddie. What are you talking about? Your arguments do not even hold up against your other arguments.
19
@4 I actually think it makes the story even cooler when you consider that we have those rocks on Earth.
21
@20: Right, he blustered about it, but suggested no actual legislaton, and the Republican held congress also did nothing. You are forgetting that the GOP held the majority in Congress until 2007, when it would not have been possible to stop the crash.
The Dems only held congress for two of the eight years you claim Bush was frantically trying to stop the economic crash. The GOP had six years of essentially unfettered ability to enact law. They did nothing.
Thanks for the article proving my point, genius.
The Dems only held congress for two of the eight years you claim Bush was frantically trying to stop the economic crash. The GOP had six years of essentially unfettered ability to enact law. They did nothing.
Thanks for the article proving my point, genius.
22
@20, failing to act while your party controls Congress, must have been a priority for GWB. And you complain that Obama can't work with the RNC/Tea Party who disdains compromise and refuses to act to avoid a US default that would cost middle class Americans thousands per year? If things require complicated stories, then they are usually horseshit (i.e., Bush's lack of oversight over the finance industry, the ignored 9/11 warnings, the Romney/Ryan economic plan, tax plan, Soical Security plan, Medicare/Medicaid plan, Affordable Health Care Act repeal plan).
23
@20
I'm going to have to go with everyone else on this.
If you need some clarification on which party controlled what, here's a link for you.
http://home.adelphi.edu/sbloch/deficits.…
I know that you're just here so that strangers on the internet can tell you how stupid you are.
But it is your choice on exactly how stupid you want to be.
The facts are easily referenced.
I'm going to have to go with everyone else on this.
If you need some clarification on which party controlled what, here's a link for you.
http://home.adelphi.edu/sbloch/deficits.…
I know that you're just here so that strangers on the internet can tell you how stupid you are.
But it is your choice on exactly how stupid you want to be.
The facts are easily referenced.
25
@20, how about you explain this c/o Paul Krugman:
Last week, speaking to The Columbus Dispatch, Mr. Romney declared that nobody in America dies because he or she is uninsured: “We don’t have people that become ill, who die in their apartment because they don’t have insurance.” This followed on an earlier remark by Mr. Romney — echoing an infamous statement by none other than George W. Bush — in which he insisted that emergency rooms provide essential health care to the uninsured.
The Romney-Ryan position on health care is that many millions of Americans must be denied health insurance, and millions more deprived of the security Medicare now provides, in order to save money. At the same time, of course, Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan are proposing trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy. So a literal description of their plan is that they want to expose many Americans to financial insecurity, and let some of them die, so that a handful of already wealthy people can have a higher after-tax income.
Last week, speaking to The Columbus Dispatch, Mr. Romney declared that nobody in America dies because he or she is uninsured: “We don’t have people that become ill, who die in their apartment because they don’t have insurance.” This followed on an earlier remark by Mr. Romney — echoing an infamous statement by none other than George W. Bush — in which he insisted that emergency rooms provide essential health care to the uninsured.
The Romney-Ryan position on health care is that many millions of Americans must be denied health insurance, and millions more deprived of the security Medicare now provides, in order to save money. At the same time, of course, Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan are proposing trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy. So a literal description of their plan is that they want to expose many Americans to financial insecurity, and let some of them die, so that a handful of already wealthy people can have a higher after-tax income.
26
Here's a news flash. The financial markets are freaking out about massive problems in China and India.
The problem? Expected growth in GDP is only 6-8 percent, instead of 10-12 percent.
The horror!
In reality, that's a good thing. Superheated economies suck up and waste resources like fish.
Stuff is fixing itself, except in countries (e.g. UK, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece) which were stupid enough to do Austerity which never has worked. Ever.
We now return you to your Republicant sponsored Fear program. Suckers. Oh, by the way, markets have a 26 percent growth this year as the Capital/Labor split that normally is 50/50 is now 95/5. Keep listening to the Rich people taking you to the cleaners, sheep. Baaah.
The problem? Expected growth in GDP is only 6-8 percent, instead of 10-12 percent.
The horror!
In reality, that's a good thing. Superheated economies suck up and waste resources like fish.
Stuff is fixing itself, except in countries (e.g. UK, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece) which were stupid enough to do Austerity which never has worked. Ever.
We now return you to your Republicant sponsored Fear program. Suckers. Oh, by the way, markets have a 26 percent growth this year as the Capital/Labor split that normally is 50/50 is now 95/5. Keep listening to the Rich people taking you to the cleaners, sheep. Baaah.
27
You are a LIAR.
Bush proposed optional private accounts to supplement taxpayer withholdings and provide a greater return
You are a LIAR.
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